Why you must learn SQL if you are a marketer?

Data-driven marketing isn’t the future – it’s what the best marketers are using for their work right now. In this article, we give you the lowdown on an amazing marketing hack that more and more employers are demanding. Read on and find out if SQL can boost your campaigns by helping you pursue a more data-driven approach.

SQL for Marketers:

If you’re a marketer, you’re probably big on words. You know that words sell, and you’re talented at harnessing them to appeal to customers’ needs, desires, and emotions.

But who are your customers? What are their interactions with your product? Which ones are slipping by the wayside? Which need special attention?

To find these answers, you can politely clear your throat next to a long-suffering IT colleague, hoping they’ll be receptive to doing a bit of database trawling for you. Not until next Tuesday? Ah, well, then your work will just have to wait a bit.

Luckily, there’s a way to clear this blockage in the collaborative pipeline. An increasing number of marketers are hacking the IT department’s wait time and doing database research themselves. Furthermore, many companies are now insisting on hiring marketers who already have this skill.

So, if you’re a wordsmith and not a numbers ninja, what’s the way forward?

The answer, friends, is SQL.

What is SQL?

Structured Query Language (pronounced both as “S-Q-L” and “sequel”) is a basic programming language used to retrieve data from databases. It’s commonly used by software developers, database developers, and administrators, but it can be an asset to people in many different roles.

With data analysis skills now in high demand, you’re far more likely to land a great marketing gig if you have SQL skills in your toolbelt.

But what’s all the fuss about? What does SQL actually do?

To get an idea, let’s take a brief look at the most common and useful concept in SQL: the query.

An SQL query uses a set syntax to request information from the database. It’s like ordering a “decaf soy latte, to go, extra sugar please,” just … in IT-speak. That IT-speak can get complicated if you’re going to become an SQL guru, but if you want to use it in your daily marketing work, you’ll only need to know the basics.

Why People are Turning to Data-driven Marketing?

“Data-driven marketing” may sound like a buzzword, like “growth-hacker” or “influencer,” but it is far more than hot air. The term refers to marketing strategies founded on insights from “big data.” It can help you predict future customer behavior and work more effectively with your current customer base.

By using SQL to analyze your databases and follow a data-driven marketing strategy, you can be much more effective at organizing, analyzing, and applying data to your marketing campaigns.

Here are just some of the ways SQL will make you a better marketer:

• It will make you a generalist specialist.

For a long time, we were told that the best move for our careers was to establish ourselves as either a generalist or a specialist. But times have changed, and these days companies have different expectations of their new hires. Managers are looking for marketing generalists who have both a broad understanding of the marketing cycle and a specialized skill such as coding, designing, or analyzing data.

• Learning SQL will ramp up the speed of your team’s performance.

No more waiting around for a developer to help you analyze basic database information? Win. Your team will be more efficient, gather better insights, and run better campaigns.

• SQL will help you learn more about your audience.

You’re not just going to be more efficient. You’re going to be more awesome all around! The insights you can gain from using SQL to access your database are practically limitless. Get in there and give it a go – you’ll learn some pretty interesting stuff about your business and its customers!

• You’ll be able to perform your own quantitative analysis.

You have questions. We all do. Sometimes, you mull those questions over but consider the answers too tricky to unearth. However, if you become familiar with SQL, the world of quantitative analysis is your oyster. SQL helps you reach the answer quickly and your marketing objectives by the time your morning coffee mug is empty.

Basic SQL – Your Key to Success in Data-driven Marketing

Learning SQL may be the most useful skill you’ll learn on the road to becoming a data-driven marketing whizz. Being the SQL-savvy marketer in your team will:

• Help you understand the demographics following your different platforms (ie, why do your Facebook signups have a greater lifetime value than your Adwords signups?);
• Enable your company to provide better products and better services to its customers;
• Make campaign metrics and reporting a breeze;
• Help you work faster and smarter;
• Empower you to communicate more effectively with other departments in your organization; and
• Make your boss so happy that they’ll (hopefully) pay you more!

So, if you want to gain a little competitive advantage in your marketing work then a little knowledge of SQL can help you stand out.

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