In 2024, the marketing industry is continuously growing. Only in the US did job postings related to marketing and other creative jobs reach 3.5 million ! On average, B2B companies spend 2-5% of their revenues on marketing, while B2C ones invest 5-10% in their marketing activities. In an age where for a business to be seen you need to have a well-established marketing strategy, more and more people are expected to join the field.
I get that as a young person or as a professional looking for a career change marketing can be an area you would want to explore. And you should do it! It is everchanging, flexible and dynamic so it is appealing to work in!
If you don’t know where to start and what to do to get into a marketing position, let me reassure you that this article will answer the burning question of how to get into marketing.
Understand what you want to do
It is important to narrow down what you want to be active in. The marketing field is broad and opens up the opportunity to work in different areas.
Here is a list of domains of marketing to consider:
- Copywriting => writing text specifically for advertising and publicity purposes
- Social Media Manager => crafting social media materials (both visuals and text), managing the posting calendar and managing the community online
- PR => organizing events, writing press releases and making all the efforts for the organic appearance of business in the media
- Email Marketing => crafting the strategy and the emails themselves focusing on marketing goals and the performance
- Performance Marketing => everything related to Google Analytics and Ad Sense, SEO, SEA, adjusting your strategy depending on the budget and the performance of the competitors
- Affiliate Marketing => performing on behalf of the merchant and driving traffic to their website
- Marketing Consultant => advising a company to implement the best strategies for them to reach their business goals
- Influencer marketing => looking for the best partnerships with social media influencers that organically will present the product/service for the company
Once you know what you want to do you can start looking further into what possibilities your niche has.
Get a university or college degree
Once you understand the direction you want to take, you can start studying for it! Even if marketing doesn’t always require having a degree, it is always good to have the extra confidence that your career is backed up by a strong academic background.
Going for an appropriate degree in marketing will give you a deeper insight into the history of the craft, the theory of it and the perspectives of its evolution. It also allows you to work on practical projects that can be used in your portfolio.
It is important to mention that it is not necessary to have a degree in marketing to be active in the field. Contrary to what you might expect, a proven record of experience might be more valuable to employers than your academic background. So decide on your own if you need to get a degree in marketing.
Here are some universities that offer degrees in marketing-related fields.
Take online courses
When getting hired, your knowledge can have some serious weight in proving you are fit for the position! This is why it is important to get certifications that will best contribute to your professional growth. Not to mention that they will make your CV look great! They can replace a higher degree or complement it as a sign of your commitment to the field of study.
Consider Hubspot Academy for Email Marketing, Content Marketing, Social Media Marketing and Inbound Marketing.
You can take a look at Google. They offer a lot of insightful training in Google Ads, Google Analytics E-commerce and Digital Marketing.
Additionally, Coursera and Udemy offer useful courses to help you build a strong base in marketing, you have to choose one that best fits your professional needs!
These courses are always a good addition to the already existing skill set you have so don’t hesitate to get that extra certification!
Work on your CV
As far as job applications go, you always have to have a strong start and that means having an attention-grabbing CV is a must. Applying for a job in marketing might require a more dynamic yet structured CV that can show a bit of your creativity while displaying your professional and academic snapshots.
What to include in a marketing CV?
- Concentrate on a nice, simple and clean design that will best match your personality! A lot of good CV templates can be found on Canva where all you have to do is add your information! Additionally, you can change and adapt each template to your taste!
- Follow a well-defined structure. Usually, that will mean a short generic introduction where you can introduce yourself and your eagerness to join the project/company, your academic achievements where your certifications will be proudly displayed and finally your previous working experience all in chronological order.
- Make sure to add your contact information, your address, your website/portfolio and social media. This is an important step that HR will take to research you and your online presence. A marketeer’s online presence is important to understand their communication style and how active they are online.
Work on your portfolio
Lastly, if you gain confidence in your knowledge skills, it is time to put it all into practice. Working on your portfolio means displaying your finest work in the areas you want to be active in.
For instance, if you want to work as a social media manager you could display case studies of different social media pages, maybe your own previously managed page.
In most cases, when you don’t have previous working experience you can analyze extensive case studies, create a mockup for a hypothetical company of choice or design a website or a social media page that you can use as a canvas for your content marketing skills.
In any situation, you will need to prove a wide variety of abilities both analytical and practical, so make sure to include a wide variety of props in your portfolio to make the best impression!
Conclusion
Starting something new can always feel scary, however, if you plan it all and continue putting time into it, you can achieve great things!
Marketing is a diverse and ever-growing field that can be easily learned on your own or with the help of universities or online courses. In both cases, after accumulating knowledge you will have to build a portfolio and a CV that best describes your personal and professional profile. From here you can start conquering the marketing field!
Good luck with your adventure!
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Featured Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-using-a-laptop-5198239/
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