I’ve been doing digital marketing for a long time. I started my first blog in the late 90s, which, I’ll note, is before we had a term for them. It was fun. I’ve done a lot of goofing around with various forms of digital media over the years. I never took it very seriously. Then I got laid off from a job I didn’t really like anyway, and my friend who worked in digital marketing told me about a job opening at her office.

“You Can Make a Living Doing This, You Know.”

That’s what my friend said to me during the time that I helped out with a WordPress site at a nonprofit we were both volunteering for. I didn’t really take her seriously because I never took the work very seriously. Making, breaking, and fixing websites had been a hobby of mine for years, plus a whole other constellation of marketing-adjacent activities. I learned how to make videos using my little FlipCam and a copy of iMovie. I eagerly jumped on every social media platform as soon as it opened up to new users. I was putting my content on the web in every form I could, from podcasts to tweets, and I never made a single dime.

This blog isn’t about me, it’s about the top 5 skills you need for a career in digital marketing, but I’m telling you about my past because

1. I have a career in digital marketing
2. I work with a lot of digital marketers
3. I’m the one writing this post.

0. Curiosity

This also helps me give you context for my number one trait that you need for a career in digital marketing: curiosity. You should be excited by learning new things, because this stuff moves fast and changes often. No matter where you’re starting in the field of digital marketing, you have a lot to learn. Curiosity will serve you well.

But curiosity isn’t a skill, and I don’t think you can fake it. You either consider yourself a curious person or you don’t. Unlike the rest of the items on this list, nobody can teach you that.

I will also note that this list of skills is applicable to anybody and everybody in the field of digital marketing. I’m not going to focus on one specific subset. Luckily, the most important skills are applicable to everybody in digital marketing.

Ok, so before I get to the actual list of skills you need for a career in digital marketing, I feel it’s only right I ask you…

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1. Learn How SEO Works

Even if you never find yourself wrenching on a WordPress backend or crafting a FAQ schema, you should know the basics of how search engines index the world’s information. SEO is not just about increasing a website’s attractiveness to search engines. Learn a little bit about how the tactics we use to improve our organic rankings work and you will understand better how the whole internet works, and how people use the websites we make.

2. Learn How Digital Ads Work

Just because you’re an SEO or a social media manager doesn’t mean you don’t have to know how advertisers do their jobs. Sometimes SEO and PPC feel like two entirely separate disciplines. But they are intrinsically linked. One look at the search results for a high-competition keyword will tell you that much. Still, it’s up to you to know how one can affect the other.

3. Learn How to Tell a Story

All marketing is storytelling. I might seem biased in stressing the importance of telling a good story, but even social media, ads, graphic design, and PR are forms of storytelling. If you can tell a good story, you can take an audience from the beginning to the end and make them feel something or learn something. You’ve done more than just sell a product or make a conversion. They’ll remember that.

Sidebar: A Brief Defense of Learning a Little Bit of Everything

I just told you to learn three things that might not have a direct influence on what every single digital marketer does on a daily basis. More precisely, you might not really see the point in learning how to code an H2 heading if you’re working on the advertising side. Again, I can’t make you curious if you aren’t already. But here are two reasons to learn a little bit about things other people are doing in your agency or marketing team:

1. Knowing how other stuff works makes you do your stuff better. Since we’re all working toward the same goals, it helps you do your job better when you know what everybody else is doing. If you know that the PPC side is advertising against a certain set of keywords, that information can help you pick the keywords you use in SEO.
2. Knowing how everything works makes you a more attractive job candidate. Since this post is about careers, consider this: If you can strut your stuff in a job interview and show off a little bit of knowledge in areas that don’t apply directly to the job you’re hoping to get, it shows you’re curious, knowledgeable, and at least conversant in areas that don’t apply to you.

4. Learn How to Analyze Data

One of the most appealing features of digital marketing over the conventional kind is the ability to measure it. You can’t track who sees a billboard or who reads your newspaper ad. But every version of digital marketing has at least one observable and measurable dimension to it. Knowing how to track those metrics—and, most importantly, what those numbers mean—is vital to figuring out what works.

5. Learn How to Optimize for Conversions

I saved this for last, because it gets overlooked a lot when our heads are all a-tizzy with all the other stuff we do as digital marketers, and it applies to both SEO and PPC. Don’t forget why we’re doing all these things in the first place: to improve the bottom-line success of the business you’re marketing for. If you’re in an agency, that means you work for your clients. If you’re in the marketing department of a company, you might only have one client. Whatever your role, you are there to help those customers move down the sales funnel, to convert those leads, and to help your clients meet their goals.

I started doing this for fun. For many years I never took it all that seriously. That was fine when I was just a hobbyist playing around with my own little creative projects, but as a digital marketer for a digital marketing agency, I am no longer just having fun—I’m helping our clients meet their traffic and sales goals. The fun is still there, but now I have the additional satisfaction of watching my work make a real difference for the clients I work for.

If you can check the boxes on those skills, and you’re looking for a rewarding career with a great agency, come join me at Direct Online Marketing.

The post The Top 5 Skills You Need for a Career in Digital Marketing appeared first on Direct Online Marketing.

“the action or process of causing a group of people to work together effectively as a team, especially by means of activities and events designed to increase motivation and promote cooperation.”

DOM’s Break It Ups

Here at DOM we took this definition to heart and designed our own weekly, 15-minute team activities called “Break It Ups.” The point of these activities is to get us away from our computer screens and clear our minds.  We have a standing event in our office calendar for Wednesdays at 2:40PM that reminds the whole office to pause and interact with our coworkers through fun activities.

Doing these Break It Ups helps the DOM team foster cooperation, motivation, and some healthy competition. They also give the team some time to relax and reenergize toward our work. We often feel more productive and eager to tackle our most difficult projects afterwards.

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Team Building = Team Bonding

We recognize that the team spends a large portion of their days at the office; Break It Ups are a great way to get to know the coworkers we spend all our time with. Since starting DOM Break it Ups, we have developed stronger connections between the branches of the office as well as our teammates.

Haley Steed from our Organic Team told FitSmallBusiness.com that our Break It Ups are “.. a great way to break out of our weekly routine, and really laugh and bond with our colleagues. While it may seem silly (…), it really helps create an air of camaraderie in the office.”

Activities have included:  Scattergories, seeing which team could build the biggest tower out of spaghetti and marshmallows, and even Cards Against Humanity.

Team Activity Favorites

A DOM favorite has been Pictionary where we compete in teams to guess what each other are drawing. We set a timer and if nobody guesses by the time is up, that team loses out on the round. We may or may not fight over which team gets the graphic designer on their team.

The back to back drawing contest also brought out a competitive edge in us which was able to distract us for a few minutes. One of our PPC managers, Leland Reed, said this about his experience participating in the back to back drawing contest:

“One of my favorite things we’ve done for Break It Up is the back to back drawing exercise. It was a great way to explore the trust we have in each other and also get our minds off of work, while still dealing with some problem-solving situations. It also doesn’t hurt that my team dominated the competition and ended up with an almost perfect drawing.”

We love trying new activities every week and are always on the lookout for new ideas. Please share your ideas with us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Instagram!

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I can speak from experience about the gob-smacking knowledge gap between what I learned in my courses and what was happening right then in marketing. I graduated with my Master’s in Marketing and Communication in 2012 (why thank you, it is a big deal), armed to the teeth with marketing concepts and techniques, branding strategies, and moderate knowledge of Photoshop and Excel. I really thought I was ready.

I really was wrong.

I was not aware that the line dividing the two sides of marketing—digital and traditional—is beginning to blur. These approaches are changing (rapidly).

What did I know about digital? Nothing. Zilch. Nada.

The applications of digital marketing are staggering. The impact it’s had on the way professionals market is profound. The skills necessary to survive in the field have drastically changed.

Although I found myself almost utterly in the dark about digital marketing, I sure wasn’t alone.

How it started

Justin—our resident keynote speaker—brings the purpose, process, and rewards of digital marketing to life for audiences at seminars and conventions around the world. This enables attendees to better target their audience, to be heard and be found on the most competitive platform (the internet), so they can flourish as a company. DOM is essentially the modern-day Robin Hood: we steal from our digital experts’ wealth of knowledge and give it to those who are in need of this vital information. It’s beautiful, really.

Besides speaking at these events, DOM also partners with Google to host fantastic symposiums. Search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) information is shared. Local businesses learn how to get found on Google maps. And DOM digital geniuses show business owners and managers the fantastic Google tools available for small businesses (hello, Google diagnostics!). Educating these businesses, universities, and marketing professionals is pretty awesome and definitely rewarding. This inevitably led to an “Aha!” moment of Oprah proportions.

Eureka!

It dawned on us—while educating these businesses, universities, and marketing professionals—that it would be equally beneficial to speak to businesses and marketing professionals before they become businesses and marketing professionals. Cue the magnificent epiphany: go to colleges and universities, and share our knowledge of digital marketing, as well as its implications for the marketing profession, with the future faces of the marketing world.

We will inform those attending of how the marketing platform has evolved, the impact of digital marketing, what digital marketing is, how it is applied in business settings, viable career options and a slew of other incredible stuff.

How could it get more amazing? We did some research and found out that “bringing in speakers with proven expertise in a topic provides added credibility to [your] content.”

See? Not only is it interactive and relevant, it’s also super beneficial to academic institutions.

On that note…

Obtaining higher education is veritable proof that you take your future seriously. Your school teaches you about your passion and provides you with a career-centered backbone composed of knowledge; expert lecturers in the field complement that knowledge with practical experience. Karen Hughes Miller, PhD, says “hearing new voices provides students not only with different points-of-view, but also with potential resources they can apply in later courses.”

We would be delighted to be a new voice in your classroom, and a resource for students’ success. If your class is ready to take the dive into digital, just let us know.

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We’ve all had that dream.

You know, the one where you’re heading somewhere important—a big presentation, a date, school. You get there, look down, and realize you’re naked.

That’s what entering the marketing profession without a solid knowledge of search and digital marketing is: knowing what you’re heading into, only to realize (too late) that you’re completely exposed. Your training, tools, and knowledge of the field make up your body of work. Digital marketing is how you dress for success.

Since no one takes a naked professional seriously, allow me to introduce you to digital marketing pants.

Pants-Free Didn’t Work for Me

Disclaimer: Until quite recently, I functioned in the professional world completely pants-less. That all changed when I took an internship at Direct Online Marketing (DOM) and began working with DOM’s fearless leader, and founder, Justin Seibert.

It takes a certain courage to start up a digital marketing company in a market where nothing of the sort had ever existed. (DOM is the oldest and largest company of its kind in West Virginia.)

DOM’s first customers were based overseas or spread out across the nation. Then something spectacular happened: Local businesses started inquiring about this digital marketing firm, right in their own backyard.

Turns out, there is a demand for digital marketing in West Virginia. And why shouldn’t there be? There are businesses here, businesses that want to succeed. And digital marketing enhances that chance,  whether the business is down the street or across an ocean.

Seeing is Believing

In just a month here, I have seen DOM work with organizations spanning the entire business spectrum, from colleges and universities to law offices to the export industry. I’ve learned that technology is not only changing the world; it’s changing how we work in the world.

Sure, I had heard of PPC, Search Engine Optimization, and the like—but it seemed to me that the whole endeavor of digital marketing was just for tech companies and computer geeks.

Boy, was I wrong.

Last week, I had the privilege of sitting in on a social media training course that the DOM team presented at a local university. The goal was to help the university increase student retention and better target their ‘ideal’ prospective students (saving time and resources—now that’s what I call a ‘win’).

Digital not only wears the pants in the marketing industry, digital is the pants of the industry.

And the survey says…

Nothing quite lends credit to a bold statement like facts.

So, without further ado, the CMO council predicts that digital ads will lead the way for global media growth in the next four years, and that by 2018, internet advertising will be poised to overtake TV as the largest advertising medium.

Gartner Digital Marketing Spending Report (2013) performed a study that found that 50% of digital marketing activities are outsourced. That means there’s a whole lot of naked companies and organizations out there, paying someone to wear the pants for them.

That’s not all…

A year later, in 2014, the Online Marketing Institute interviewed 750 ad agency executives from Fortune 500 companies found that “[t]here’s a vast gap between the digital marketing expertise needed by organizations and the talent actually available to them at every level.”

Outsourcing marketing work? Currently not enough talent in the Fortune 500 pool to keep up with technological advances in marketing?

Do you hear that?

It’s opportunity knocking.

All you need to do is complement your marketing skills with digital powers, then *BOOM*, you are fully clothed, and exactly what these Fortune 500 companies are looking for.

Put Your Pants On!

We’ve established that digital marketing weaves the pants to cover your body of marketing work. Your schooling is what composes that marketing body.

As marketers, our career field evolves (almost) as quickly as technology. We need to supplement our body of academic knowledge with the reality of technological advances. Thanks to my education (MS in Marketing and Communication), my marketing body is pretty solid. What my body lacked was the power of pants, which would permit me to go where I needed to be.

To find your pants, research the vast field of digital marketing.

Go to events where you can learn about digital marketing, check out any speakers in your area, take an internship, and watch videos of experts in the field giving inside advice. You will be shocked to discover (or at least, I was) the diversity of the field. It’s not just for the tech savvy and analytical geniuses; it is also for social networkers, artists, passionate writers, and those who thrive on creativity. When I realized I was a naked professional, I did my research, took an internship, and finally found my pants (which are quite comfortable, thank you).

Your dream job is out there waiting for you…will you arrive appropriately dressed?

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