Are you interested in digital marketing, but also wondering about which field to choose to develop your career?
These are the 8 digital marketing careers you should keep an eye on.
Marketers are always looking for the right place and time to promote their brand. And now, that place is on the internet. The playing field for marketers has changed to a more digital area, and the job of digital marketers is to reach people online through websites, social media, emails, search engines, and more.
There is a bigger chance for your brand to be seen in places like TikTok and Instagram than on a billboard in your city. It is the job of digital marketers to translate those marketing efforts into the digital stage and create strategies that can attract people through the many different online channels.
As companies realize the benefits of having an online presence, digital marketing is an area that continues to gain more and more importance, creating as such many different areas of development and career opportunities.
In this article, I’m going to guide you through the best careers in digital marketing so that you can have a better idea of the career path that you are going to follow.
Why Choose Digital Marketing?
If you are a creative and passionate type of person, digital marketing could be a great fit for you. You can take all your creative knowledge and combine it with online marketing techniques to create marketing campaigns for your clients, employers, or even for yourself.
So, if are interested in starting a career as a digital marketer but are not still convinced, these are the top 8 benefits of starting a digital marketing career:
1. It Has A High Demand:
If you are a digital marketer, your chances of being unemployed greatly decrease. That’s because, alongside tech, digital marketing is one of the fastest-growing professional fields right now. Whatever organization it is, no matter its goal, will need to undergo digital transformation and build an online presence.
Companies achieve big benefits from being able to reach more people via digital means, and every year we see more and more companies invest in digital marketing. Investing in you, and your ideas.
If you are looking for the perfect place that helps you share your ideas, you’ve found it.
2. It’s A Diverse Role:
One great benefit of a career in digital marketing is the tremendous diversity of roles that you can choose from, whether you’re switching to a new role or just getting started in the industry.
Depending on your skills, you can choose to target roles such as:
PPC Specialist – An entry-level specialist role with a focus on creating, managing, and optimizing digital advertising campaigns
SEO Specialist – An entry-level specialist role with a focus on creating and executing organic search campaigns
Digital Marketing Specialist – A generalist role with a focus on executing digital marketing campaigns across multiple marketing channels.
Social Media Specialist – An entry-level role that focuses on building brand awareness, and engagements, and driving conversions through social channels.
A career in digital marketing gives you the freedom to specialize in marketing channels where you can make the most of your existing talents and abilities. I’ll explain more about these positions and some others after talking about the benefits, so be sure to keep reading!
3. It’s A Well-paid Job:
There are plenty of opportunities to earn great compensation for your work in the world of digital marketing.
Working as a digital marketer freelancer with us will bring you great benefits that you can read more about in this article. We have great opportunities and benefits for entry-level digital marketers and much more.
If you are interested in any of our positions and have questions regarding accommodations and salaries, be sure to contact us so we can clear all your doubts and help you achieve your new job!
4. You Can Be Independent
With the skills of a digital marketer and some entrepreneurial spirit, you can skip employment altogether, be independent, and choose to work for yourself instead.
You can launch your digital brand, products, or services online, market them yourself, and reap all of the profit. It’s plenty of work at first, but it’s worth it to see the fruits of your labor.
If you are a Spanish speaker, a great example of this is carlaconwifi. She started as a digital nomad and content creator and, little by little, created a strong and loyal audience to which she can speak and help out with tips, advice, and even courses.
5. You Can Improve Your Skills
One of the fantastic benefits you’ll find when transitioning to a career in digital marketing is the ability to leverage your existing skills.
If you love writing, you can start writing informative blog posts and persuasive ad copy. If you love graphic design, you can apply your skills to create captivating landing pages and attention-grabbing display ads.
If you love working with numbers, digital marketing offers plenty of opportunities to excel with effective data analytics.
Any ideas that you may have and that you want to work on can be translated into a marketing campaign, content for your blog, social media, website, etc.
6. You Can Make An Impact
The most satisfying part of a digital marketing career is using your creativity to make an impact. When you design an advertisement that people relate to or write a text ad that connects strongly with your audience, that relationship you’ve created can be an awesome source of gratification.
In addition to connecting with your audiences, you’ll also have the opportunity to make a real impact on your business, helping others achieve their personal, business, and financial goals, and support their families.
7. You Can Achieve A Work-life Balance
Digital marketing jobs typically don’t require a lot of overtime, leaving you plenty of time to enjoy the daily pleasures of living. That translates into lower stress and high job satisfaction – two essential ingredients for a happy and successful digital marketing career.
To learn more about the importance of having a work-life balance and how to achieve it, I recommend you to read Work/Life Balance-Start Setting Healthy Boundaries.
8. You’ll Be Able To Work Remotely
While it can be enjoyable to share an office space with like-minded individuals, working remotely is usually considered a massive benefit.
When you work remotely, you’ll spend less time commuting to work, get more sleep, save money, and be able to spend more time doing what you care about – pursuing hobbies and side projects, or spending time with friends and family.
You can read Building Connections in Hybrid Workplaces if you want to learn more about remote and hybrid workplaces
Career Paths You Can Take In Digital Marketing
Now that you know the benefits of choosing a career in digital marketing, you are surely more motivated than before to start your career. If you are still not sure about which path to take, make sure to keep reading because now we are going to review the top career paths that you can take in digital marketing with us.
Remember that this path is the one that you are going to specialize in. After reading and researching more about these careers, I highly advise you to try them out to see if you feel comfortable and motivated with your choice.
You can only excel if you enjoy what you’re doing, so don’t feel discouraged if at the beginning you believe that you made the wrong choice, you are still in the digital marketing area and it’s never too late to choose another career path.
Still, I want to help you make a choice in which you’re going to be comfortable and happy working. That’s why, without further ado, we are going to go through the top career paths in the digital marketing area:
1. Social Media Manager
One of the most popular areas to work in at the moment. The reason for this is the ability of digital marketing to capture and connect with your target audience with the help of popular social media platforms.
As a social media manager, your key roles will be to handle social media profiles, create social media campaigns, create content, develop strategies for increasing followers, and monitor analytics, changes, and updates in the platform’s algorithm.
Depending on your focus, you can specialize in one specific platform like TikTok, Instagram, or Twitter, or you can also strive to be an all-rounder and manage different platforms at the same time.
This is important because a brand should have the same branding in all of its platforms, even though the content may vary, so if you are not the one in charge of the other social media platforms your brand is working with, then you should at least communicate and create plans together with the other leaders. Remember that content and strategies are something that can be repurposed to other platforms.
If you choose to work in this role, you may be offered opportunities to work in all kinds of places like large corporations, startups, small businesses, and online stores, and you can even choose to assist influencers and celebrities by setting up and handling their social media profiles.
So, if you spend most of your time on social media channels, stay on top of the news and conversations, and have a solid understanding of various platforms, this role might be the best for you.
2. Content Strategist
Similar to the social media manager, a content strategist’s job also involves planning content. They should work alongside the social media manager when planning content for social media, but also they are in charge of overseeing the content that will be on your websites, emails, and any other digital channels used to boost engagement and achieve business goals.
This is a job that normally works alongside other specialists, but it differs in the fact that the content strategist should be the one to brainstorm ideas by researching the brand’s competitors’ profiles and trending posts in the related industry, developing creative guidelines, and creating a content plan accordingly.
Aside from collaborating with other specialists, you are also going to collaborate with creative teams, including graphic designers and writers, to implement strategy and ensure the content plan meets all the business objectives.
This is a more empirical role. So, If you’re a creative thinker with a keen eye for content and design, this role might be the best for you.
3. Content Writer/Copywriter
Whether it is social media, emails, or websites, the internet is dominated by content. You see content everywhere online, and you are here for it. Heck, you are even reading content right now.
Writing a good piece of content or copy will help you boost engagement and escalate your brand’s reach online. That’s why so many businesses are looking to hire a content writer or a copywriter.
While those two are different jobs, they are both similar and, at the of the day, essential to driving marketing efforts and are vital to digital marketing. Both require you to have effective writing skills that enable you to communicate your ideas or concepts online.
If you are looking to be a copywriter, I (a copywriter myself) also advise you to develop the skills of a content writer, because you never know what you need to write about in the future.
So, what does a copywriter or a content writer write about?
The difference is that a content writer writes focusing on a specific purpose, which could be educating the audience or raising awareness about your brand. On the other hand, being a copywriter will require you to write to persuade the audience to buy your product or service.
Both of these jobs you’ll see mainly in the forms of articles, headers, websites, ads, and even scripts. And, with the growing demand for content, the number of job opportunities is also abundant in this field.
So, if you enjoy writing, thinking about catchphrases, puns, and maybe a little of sales, this might be the job for you.
4. SEO Specialist
If you don’t know anything about SEO, it stands for Search Engine Optimization, and it’s basically about optimizing your website to rank higher on search engines’ result pages. This is a job for those who are not really on the creative side but on the analytical side because to become an SEO specialist you’ll need to know how search engines work, understand and work on strategies, keep up with industry trends, try and test various methods that work, and monitor analytics.
To become an SEO specialist you’ll also need to be patient. SEO is a long-term process, it often takes a long time to find the right strategy that brings good results, so you’ll not only need patience but also have a critical thinking, research, and analytical mindset.
Moreover, having technical and programming knowledge is often required for being an SEO specialist and is considered a plus.
This is a role for those who are interested in both marketing and tech. So, if you are interested in technology but don’t want to go full into programming then SEO specialist might be the role for you.
5. Ads Specialist
As an ad specialist, you are going to develop, implement, and manage advertising campaigns on different platforms. This is a role that may go outside the digital space, but in this article, we are going to focus only on the digital.
An advertising specialist specializes in creating marketing strategies for social media channels, and other digital platforms. This is also a job that collaborates with other specialists such as copywriters, photographers, graphic designers, and much more.
But, as an ad specialist, you are the one who is going to take the reigns of the whole ad campaign and create a strategy that will bring results and put your business or your employer on the map.
This is a job for people who are analytical, but also eager to make an impact on the world. As an ad specialist, you may oversee marketing programs, develop external communications guidelines, and help create product catalogs.
While your job duties may vary from one day to the next depending on the clients you work with, some of the key tasks you can expect to be responsible for in this role include:
- Customizing advertising campaigns for different social media platforms
- Assessing analytics from advertising campaigns
- Generating performance reports for clients and executive team members
- Providing suggestions to optimize future campaigns and improve performance
- Meeting with clients to discuss their marketing goals
- Allocating advertising budgets for each client based on their goals
- Coordinating with creative professionals to develop visuals for advertisements
- Educating clients on the best advertising practices for each platform
6. Email Marketing Specialist
Email marketing is used to communicate with your target audience and drive them toward your website to buy your products or services. They are strategies that offer important information about your or your employer’s business (offers, promos, updates, etc) directly through email so that you have another way to communicate directly with your audience.
As an email marketing specialist, you’ll be in charge of creating emails, building email lists of prospects, developing strategies, following up on emails, and monitoring email marketing campaigns.
If you like the idea of working in this area you should consider developing your writing and communication skills, have an understanding of marketing messaging, and know email automation software.
Companies are always looking for email marketing specialists to engage with their target audience at every stage of the sales funnel and boost conversion rates.
So, if you are the type of person who likes to keep a tidy and organized email, with a knack for communicating and selling, this might be the job for you.
7. Branding Expert
Your brand is the reflection of your product or service, it’s what you offer to the world.
As a branding expert, you can help people or businesses manifest abstract ideas and help them show their brand to the world while building a strong reputation online by differentiating themselves from the competition. You can see why so many companies are interested in hiring a branding expert.
When you start working as a branding expert, you are going to manage your client’s brand, create strategies for building awareness, improve the company’s visibility and reputation online over time, and review progress. Furthermore, you’ll oversee the creative team’s efforts to align product display, logos, visuals, and website design.
If you are creative, organized, with good communication skills, and who likes to keep up with online trends, then this might be the job for you.
8. Digital Marketing Manager
If you liked all of the roles mentioned above and don’t know which one to choose, you can choose to specialize in all of them in general and become and digital marketing manager.
As a digital marketing manager, you should have a solid understanding of all the roles mentioned before, since you are going to be responsible for leading and managing all the digital efforts, including social media campaigns, SEO, branding, ad campaigns, growth strategy, reviewing analytics, and more.
As in every job, the number of your tasks will depend on the size of the company. Within a startup, the role is likely to be responsible for handling the entire process.
However, large organizations usually have a digital marketing manager devoted to a specific area of digital marketing.
Either way, as a digital marketing manager you should be knowledgeable about all the tools and software needed in the before-mentioned positions since you are possibly going to be managing a whole project.
So, if you like to be in charge and are eager to be an all-rounder, this might be the best job for you!
How To Find A Job In Digital Marketing
Once you choose a career path and master it, you are more than welcome to apply to one of our remote positions in digital marketing.
You can also find more career paths to break into freelancing in the YouTube video we made about it!
We are always looking for skilled freelancers to join our team, so if you want to test your skills and grow in your area, we’ll be waiting for you! Freelance Latin America is a great place to grow professionally.
See more articles by Ender Cárdenas.