become a better marketing professional

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The marketer profession is in the midst of a renaissance. New technologies are changing the landscape faster than many people can keep up with, and it is genuinely hard to know what skills to prioritize. The rise of the digital marketer suggests how significant these changes truly are.

From social media to SEO, and from producing excellent content to being able to manage a team, today’s marketers have a lot on their plate. But, what are the skills and aspects of your profession that you should focus on to advance your career? Follow these tips to become a better marketing professional.

Hone Your Video Skills

Hone Video Marketing Skills: How to Become a Better Digital Marketing Professional
Video Marketing: How to Become a Better Marketing Professional

As a marketer in 2020, you definitely want to brush up (or acquire) video-related skills. Studies show that this is one of the most effective options in a marketer’s toolbox. Videos work because they allow you to speak directly to the consumer. According to MarTech, videos can hold customers’ attention on retail sites for two minutes longer than average.  

Prioritize SEO & SEM

Improve Your SEO & SEM Skills
Improve Your SEO & SEM Skills: How to Become a Better Marketing Professional

Whether you are involved in producing copy or managing a team, knowing how to optimize the content your company creates is vital in today’s marketing industry. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) boost your entire digital strategy on both data and content levels, so you must understand the fundamentals to succeed.

Don’t Forget About Content 

Improve Your Content Creation & Marketing Skills
Improve Your Content Creation & Marketing Skills

With so many metrics to keep an eye on and so many tools to master, it can be easy to forget the simple things. You should never lose sight of what’s important—the content you produce continues to be a key aspect of your work. As a marketer, always strive to produce quality work that will impress your client and wow your audience.

Deploy the Latest Tech

Stay Up-To-Date With Latest Tech in the Digital Marketing Industry
Stay Up-To-Date With Latest Tech in the Digital Marketing Industry (Image: Mahto)

Artificial Intelligence and related technologies are changing the game, pretty much every year. As a marketer, one of the most valuable skills you can acquire now is deploying machine learning to create targeted campaigns. This technique also allows marketing professionals to improve ad personalization and conduct complex brand sentiment analysis. It is also behind applications like audience clustering and predictive marketing.

According to a Boston Consulting Group report, retailers who use machine learning for personalization have seen sales increases of up to 10 percent compared to companies that do not employ these techniques.

Study Data Science

Study Data Science (Image: KPMG)
Study Data Science: Become a Better Marketing Professional (Image: KPMG)

If data is king in today’s world, then data science should be high in every marketer’s list of subjects to study. Being able to gather the right data and using it to make crucial decisions is a valuable skill for any digital marketer. Studying and mastering Google Analytics will always be time well spent. Learning these tools will make you an important asset in the eyes of your employer.

Apply Design-Based Thinking & Planning

Figure: Design Thinking stages Source: Prepared by the authors ...
Leverage Design-Based Thinking

Marketers can benefit from learning how other professionals approach problems. Case in point: design thinking. Design thinking is a way of approaching a problem from a user-centred perspective. It is an approach used by designers and developers, but applying it in marketing can have many benefits because so much revolves around the user experience. This process has five key phases: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test. 

Be Persuasive

Be Persuasive: Become a Better Marketing Professional( Source: Red)
Be Persuasive: Become a Better Marketing Professional

Being able to sell your product or service is, of course, imperative to be a successful digital marketer. But, being persuasive goes beyond a good sales pitch. Marketing professionals need to use their persuasion to rally up team members and get them behind a particular idea or project. In other words, today’s marketer must have great people and leadership skills.

Make Use of Unusual Skills 

The best way to sharpen your skills is to use them. ~@RE_Shockley ...
Use Your Skills

Whatever your unique blend of social skills is, you’d want to put them to good use in your projects. Although there is plenty of room for all kinds of personalities in this field, digital marketers can all benefit from generous doses of curiosity, versatility and a forward-thinking mentality. If you have these skills, make sure it shows. If you have others, find a way to weave them into what you are doing.

Get the Skills You Need

Learn New Skills & Become a Better Marketing Professional (Source: Pes Maximum)
Learn New Skills & Become a Better Marketing Professional

You may be a seasoned professional with decades of experiences behind you, but times move fast, and to keep up, you may need to go back to the classroom. Fortunately, this has never been easier. While you can always study marketing the traditional way (i.e., going to class), there are now many online degrees. Some universities with excellent online marketing programs are the University of Vermont, Duke University and the University of California, Irvine.

Gaining popularity over traditional programs like university degrees, coding bootcamps can be the perfect solution for those wishing to kickstart their career in tech. These programs are short, intensive and aim to make the process as convenient as possible for the students. There are also plenty of excellent online coding bootcamps. Bootcamps with great marketing and data science programs include Acadgild, Udacity, BrainStation and CareerFoundry.

Take Advantage of Free Resources

Leverage Free Resources
Leverage Free Resources to Become a Better Marketing Professional

Before committing your hard-earned dollars to one of the above programs, you may want to consider taking advantage of the many resources available for free on the web. Some of the best are Google’s Digital Marketing Course, WordStream’s Growth Academy and Coursera.

Working in an ever-evolving landscape, marketers need to work hard to remain relevant. Honing your video, SEO, content creation and data-related abilities, among others, will take you a long way. Also, make sure to visit the Career Karma website for great advice on how to become a digital marketer.