The demand for digital marketing specialists, also known as digital marketers, is increasing year by year. This profession can bring you profound job satisfaction and decent income. It involves compiling digital marketing strategies, writing texts and arranging their publications, drawing graphic content, making the most of marketing funnels and reporting one's achievements to supervisors.
The Workflow of a Digital Marketer
The workflow of a digital marketing specialist typically includes six main types of activities.
Carrying out Campaigns
A digital marketing specialist builds and implements online strategies for the businesses they work for. To boost awareness about their goods, services, brands and organizations, they rely on social networks, email promotions, paid advertising, organic search and many other methods and instruments.
Writing Texts
These are just a few varieties of text that a digital marketing specialist needs to generate:
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Ads
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Guest posts
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Articles
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Electronic books
Normally, digital marketing specialists create content on their own. They should be able to write informative and convincing texts. If the companies that they work for are large and affluent enough, they might allocate some extra funds to hiring freelance or in-house copywriters — but that's not always the case.
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Developing Visual Assets
Just as it happens with texts, digital marketing specialists might either generate visual content by themselves — or they might collaborate with graphic designers. The majority of employers expect that a digital marketing specialist knows how to handle Adobe Illustrator.
Administering Sites
After a digital marketing specialist begins a campaign, they should support it with relevant content on their company's site. They should know how to publish, format and edit this content.
Tracking the Campaigns' Performance and Introducing Amendments
For a digital marketing specialist, it's not enough to launch a campaign — they should monitor it and adjust it to achieve the best results. To cope with this task, they should resort to Google Analytics or other similar instruments. Digital marketing specialists need to know which sources generate the most traffic to their website and use every opportunity to increase conversions.
Report to Their Supervisors about Their Achievements
Typically, digital marketing specialists report to the marketing managers or directors of marketing of the organizations that they work for. To showcase the results of their campaigns, they compile presentations, graphs and reports. Digital marketing specialists analyze the outcomes of their campaigns and show a positive return on investment from digital channels.
Ten Crucial Skills for Digital Marketers:
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Search Engine Optimization. To be able to launch and control organic search campaigns, digital marketing specialists should have a profound understanding of this sphere.
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Pay-Per-Click Advertising. Digital marketing specialists should know how to conduct campaigns in Microsoft Ads, Google Ads and other networks.
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Conversion Rate Optimization. Professionals need to streamline marketing funnels and maximize landing page conversion rates. It is vital for enhancing campaigns' efficiency and guaranteeing steadily high incomes.
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Data Analysis. Digital marketing specialists analyze information to assess the performance of their campaigns and report on it. Based on their findings, they need to develop insights and amend the company's selling strategy.
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Email Marketing. Digital marketing specialists design email marketing campaigns and write newsletters for them. They strive to keep potential clients engaged until they decide to purchase the marketed good or service.
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Content Marketing. This skill implies creating unique, helpful and memorable content. It should generate an emotional response among the target audience and they should be eager to share it.
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Social Media Marketing. Digital marketing specialists need to understand how to grow large loyal followings and build engagement throughout social media. They should pay primary attention to the following platforms: LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
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Digital PR. It means building and expanding the web presence of the business that the digital marketing specialist works for. They need to generate high-quality backlinks, organize guest posts, write and send out news pieces and conduct diverse activities to increase the brand's online exposure and raise its prestige.
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Website CMS. The majority of digital marketing specialists today know how to handle WordPress — this is the most popular content management system that approximately 30% of all sites in the world were built on. Professionals should be ready to quickly embrace other CMS when needed.
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HTML and CSS. A digital marketing specialist would use these mark-up languages to introduce changes to a site, customize its content, experiment with it and build landing pages without third-party assistance.
These were the paramount skills that enable digital marketing specialists to make impressive careers. But this is not an exhaustive list. The more versatile a professional is and the more duties they can take on, the better perspectives they will have.
Where Do Digital Marketers Study?
To start working as a digital marketing specialist, one doesn't need to attend an offline university. Instead, you might want to complete an online course that is focused on hands-on experience and not theoretical knowledge. When choosing a course, glance through its content plan and check whether it covers all the skills and responsibilities that were mentioned above in this article.
In some cases, it might be possible to land a position as a digital marketing specialist without a profile certificate. This might happen if a professional has graduated from a university and got some experience in a field that has something in common with digital marketing — such as product or project management, for instance. This professional might have helped his or her colleagues with digital marketing and has built a portfolio of relevant projects. This portfolio might impress their future employer and they might offer them the position of a digital marketing specialist — yet that would be a rare case. If you look for job offers online, you'll see that a certificate is an important prerequisite.
Apart from getting a certificate, a digital marketing specialist should tick the following five boxes.
Compile a Portfolio
On online courses, digital marketing specialists complete one or multiple projects that they can mention in their portfolios. In addition to that, a young professional might want to try their hand at promoting some other projects — such as their friend's business, for instance. By doing so, a digital marketing specialist would kill two birds with one stone: gain experience and show more real-life proof of their skills to their potential employers.
Make a Convincing Resume
For a digital marketing specialist with decent writing skills, that should be a no-brainer. On the Internet, you can find dozens of worthy examples and adapt them to your own professional experience.
Prepare for a Face-to-Face Interview
You should be ready to back up every fact from your resume with a real-life example from your work. If a hiring manager asks you to do it during an interview, they will be able to check the information online in a couple of clicks. So it's important to be honest and never overestimate one's abilities.
During the interview, it might be wise to prove that you're aware of what's going on in the industry. Feel free to talk about relevant facts, trends and other brands' campaigns.
Build a Network
Surround yourself with committed digital marketing specialists who are eager to discuss their workflow and exchange precious recommendations. To compile a base of useful contacts, you should attend offline industry events and join online communities.
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Look for High-Quality Online Sources of Information
A digital marketing specialist should consistently expand their knowledge. These are the types of online resources that they might want to use to stay aware of the latest industry trends.
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Webinars
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Educational videos
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Podcasts
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Articles
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Blog posts
Some of these resources might be distributed at no cost. But usually, digital marketing specialists should be ready to pay for valuable knowledge — and these investments should quickly pay off.
Final Thoughts
Hopefully, this article came in handy and its readers got a better notion of the skills and responsibilities of digital marketing specialists. This exciting profession should enable you to get a sense of fulfillment and make your major career ambitions come true. In the future, you might become a marketing director or found your own agency. Digital marketing specialists can interact with their clients 100% remotely, so your job opportunities will be nearly endless.
