Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
A college education can be an important benefit, but is it enough for a successful marketing career in today's booming digital environment?
The digital world is rapidly expanding and evolving. Marketing trends and practices that were standard before may no longer be relevant in today's ever-changing mileu.
Here are five questions to help you decide if you need to update your marketing education to stay ahead of the competition.
1. Social Media Management
In-depth training in social media marketing means more than scrolling news feeds and making friends. Are you aware that social networks like Twitter and Facebook have applications dedicated to marketers and business owners? Are you familiar with running campaigns on social media, diving into the analytics and being held accountable to a client for the performance?
You need to understand how to analyze data and to know solid social marketing principles to save yourself time and money. According to Brandon Hassler, founder of Market Campus, a nine week digital marketing bootcamp here in Utah, "Social media marketers that make competitive salaries do much more than posting a few times per day on Facebook."
2. Content Marketing
How do you generate brilliant content and effectively promote it? Successful marketing requires in-depth training to create content that end-users love to read and share.
In a Forbes article, Sujan Pater predicts that companies' use of digital content marketing will be more important than ever. Maintaining a blog with the occasional interesting article just won't cut it in today's competitive digital market.
3. Analytics
In a data-driven world, are you making marketing decisions based on theories? To be a great marketer, you need to be adept at using programs like Google Analytics, Adobe SiteCatalyst and other platforms for analyzing data to make successful marketing decisions.
“[Consumers] are searching for emotional connections to companies, not just transactional relationships,” said Michael Lazerow of Salesforce ExactTarget Marketing Cloud in a PBS interview.
“The value of targeted marketing isn’t just from the marketing message itself, it’s from the intelligence and optimization with each interaction that builds a one-to-one relationship with each customer to increase brand loyalty and drives sales.”
4. Evaluate and Project
Are you marketing in today's world and projecting for tomorrow's? It's easy to replicate what others are doing and apply a "remarketing" strategy, but will that take you where you want to go? A good digital marketer looks at today's trends and projects where society is going to be tomorrow. Market Campus is a leader in training you to become a cutting-edge designer and trendsetter.
5. Mobile Design/Marketing
The average smartphone user checks their phone over 150 times a day, according to ABC News. As a digital marketer, do you understand the value of mobile marketing? Tom Goodwin of the Tomorrow Group says, "Digital must be applied at the core of business to be truly effective."
To stay ahead of ever-changing trends, you need the ability to analyze and evaluate data and to project and implement a sound digital marketing strategy.
While a traditional university education may be sufficient for some, an alternative, cutting-edge education that provides you with the tools to use up-to-the-minute digital technology may be just what you need to be relevant in today's world and to move ahead toward tomorrow's. Pamela has worked as an event planner and is an author os several books.
