8 Skills All Digital Marketing Employees Should Have if They Want to Get Hired

Digital advertising and media, as an industry, is rapidly changing globally and India is no exception. While the consumer is consuming information digitally, brands are following them across multiple touch points in the digital ecosystem. This has accelerated the spends on digital media.

With the increased usage of digital medium and the growing spends in this area, the pie of digital media budgets is growing and so is the demand for digital media professionals. The changing technology space as well as the changing behaviour of the new-age consumer on digital medium has also morphed the ‘Digital Media’ Profession and this transformation can be seen across organisations.

Nowadays, there is a huge demand for right digital marketing professionals and this has also opened up opportunities for all those aspiring to enjoy the benefits of the sunrise industry like Digital Marketing.

A good digital marketing professional has a combination of soft skills as well as technical skills. Both of the skill sets are absolutely important for getting someone hired in this fast growing industry. 

I remember an instance from the past few months when I was interviewing a candidate. The candidate mentioned to me that he is looking for gaining experience of working in the digital marketing industry. I would want to tell you all one thing here. In an industry where the industry and ecosystem (technology, consumer behaviour, client expectation) are changing at a really fast speed, the definition of experience will not be limited to the specific technical skills or any other skills, what you learn today can get outdated in no time. It becomes crucial to keep up with the pace at which the industry is transforming and continue learning to be successful in this industry.

I would say this is what drives the first and important skill required for getting hired in this industry:

1. Learning attitude and a knack to learn new things and unlearn old stuff

In a famous book by Steven Covey, he mentions about a habit that reflects the same ideology with the name of the habit being ‘Sharpen the Saw’. Those people who continuously upgrade their skills (technical as well as soft skills) will be more likely to align and re-align with the rapidly transforming and evolving industry. In order to keep up with the pace of this industry and really succeed, it is very important to have a learning attitude and an ability to quickly learn about new things, developments, innovations, techniques, etc to be able to flourish in the digital marketing industry.

2. Ability to use the combination of Right Brain and Left Brain

Digital Marketing is very much measurable. One cannot escape by being just ‘Creative’ and ignore the signals about hard fact customer data. I personally believe that when the right brain adds to the creativity of a person, the left brain can assist with enhancing the power of that creativity. The combination of using the left brain as well as the right brain can go a long way and help you survive in this industry. 

3. Understanding Customer Business and Industry

One can easily get lost amongst all sorts of terms like CPC, CPL, CMP and many more that are used by digital marketing professionals. However, understanding the core proposition of the client and their products/ services is crucial in Digital Marketing. Understanding the dynamics of the client’s industry can also provide insights about how Digital Marketing strategies can be devised, executed and measured in an efficient way.

4. Empathy - understanding customer’s customers

During the customer journey, the end customer needs to be excited with the right message, at the right time and in the right format. To do this, one needs the understanding of the customer’s customers - the ultimate person who takes the decision about buying/ not buying the goods and services provided by your client. I personally have a habit of purchasing the products/ services offered by the clients I work with just to get a feel of the entire customer journey. This helps profoundly while designing a customised digital strategy for our clients.

5. Follow up and Coordination

A successful digital campaign requires a huge amount of coordination across various stakeholders not just in agency side and client side but also with publishers and some third-party players. The deadlines for these campaigns are sacrosanct. Those who are able to thrive on uncertainty and manage to coordinate well to make things happen and successfully execute the activities planned are sure to be rare assets in the Digital Marketing industry.

6. Good understanding of Analytics tools and how to decipher the consumer behaviour using digital assets

Analytics systems like Google Analytics provide data about demographics, interest, behaviour, as well as some other custom parameters and dimensions of customers. A good understanding about how to set and analyse data can be a great skill as this data can be a treasure trove to understand the performance of different channels and consumer behaviour using various goals and funnels.

7. Understanding Tech Platforms

There are various platforms that are essential for better execution of digital marketing campaigns like Adwords, facebook, Third Party Mailers, Native, Programmatic, DMP, Marketing cloud, etc. On a Lumascape, you will see that there are over 6000 platforms that constitute a larger Digital Marketing tech infrastructure. One doesn’t need to know all of the platforms, knowing few of them is ok. However, one needs to know at least one platform really well and be an expert in the same.

The digital marketing industry is changing rapidly and hence one needs to be tech-savvy and continue to excel at the usage of the platform that he/she is an expert in. Also, it is essential to keep reading and learning about any new updates in the industry to keep up your status of being an expert at what you do best.

8. Social Media Understanding

Human beings are social animals and, we have special skills to be a part of the society and work for bigger goals. Social Media in the current format is a new phenomenon. However, the urge to adhere to social norms and be socially active is an innate need for everyone of us. Those individuals who understand this and can utilise this behaviour to efficiently promote the brand, can be great employees.

Here’s one bonus skill that I would like to add. Something that can really help you in the long run.

9. Data Engineering / Sciences and Love for reading insights from data

Digital marketing industry is expected to see a rise in machine learning related technologies. Personalised messaging with creative at scale is already being used by a lot of marketers. Data consolidation at one place to create right digital strategies is not just an impressive tool but will be critical in a few years time. This will attract some skills related to data engineering and data sciences. Digital marketing industry will see a huge influx of people with these skill sets. Obviously, people who work on this skill set and keep their game strong are sure to succeed in this industry for a long time.