Digital marketing goes far beyond just ads and emails. Marketing teams can employ a wealth of different platforms and tactics, including blogs, multi-layered email campaigns, websites, and social media platforms, just to name a few. Ultimately, the goal of a digital marketer is to generate leads, as well as engage, capture the attention of, and forge a strong bond with the people who might be interested in what you have to offer.

1. Digital Marketing
A Guide to Careers in

2. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Overview2
Are you interested in a digital marketing career but don’t know exactly which career
path is right for you?
If you are the type of person who would enjoy using creative solutions to connect with
people, writing compelling content, telling engaging stories, and understanding how
human behavior patterns emerge—a digital marketing career might be right for you. If
you are considering a career in digital marketing, then keep reading as we guide you
through the various career paths you can take.
An Overview

3. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing: An Introduction3
B2C
B2B
In a nutshell, the term “digital marketing” refers to the online marketing and
advertising efforts of any business or organization. Digital marketers know how to
craft a persuasive message and disseminate it to a particular audience.
Digital marketing goes far beyond just ads and emails. Marketing teams can employ
a wealth of different platforms and tactics, including blogs, multi-layered email
campaigns, websites, and social media platforms, just to name a few. Ultimately,
the goal of a digital marketer is to generate leads, as well as engage, capture the
attention of, and forge a strong bond with the people who might be interested in what
you have to offer.
Digital marketing careers are identified by one of two acronyms: B2B and B2C.
B2B stands for business-to-business, while B2C stands for business-to-customer.
In the B2B marketing category, your focus would be to promote a product or service from
one business to another business. For example, think of a company that makes dog toys
advertising to large retail pet stores to carry and sell their product at a wholesale price.
In the B2C marketing category, a business directly targets its marketing to the consumer.
If you think of the same dog toy company that has their product already on the shelves
of a retail store, they will additionally use B2C marketing to directly sell the same
product to a consumer at a retail price.
What Exactly Is
Digital Marketing?

4. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Outbound vs. Inbound Marketing4
Digital marketing has 2 simple approaches outbound and inbound. One reaches out to
people and the other invites people in.
Outbound marketing is when a digital marketer reaches their hand out to grab a
potential customer’s attention and close the deal or make a sale rather than waiting
for a customer to walk through the doors.
Inbound marketing creates interest by offering a product, service, or deal that lures
a customer to otherwise engage, whether that means visiting a physical location or a
virtual one (website).
Two Types of
Marketing

5. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing Tactics5
In a digital marketer’s toolbox, there are many strategies that can be used to build the
perfect campaign. Let’s explore some of them and what they each can do:
Content marketing refers to materials that are
creatively written or designed to be visually
engaging and attract attention while connecting
with a target audience. These could be blog posts
on a company website, infographics, content that
educates and informs readers, photos, videos, or
other types of content.
Social media marketing takes place on social
media channels such as Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram, TikTok, or any other social media
platform being used by a company to
promote or build their brand.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) this one is pretty straight
forward, just like the name says, a company
pays for ad space for ads to appear on
websites and search engine results pages
(think Facebook, Twitter, or Google’s search
results). Companies will usually pay the
publisher “per” every click their ad gets,
hence the name Pay-Per-Click.
Email marketing is when a company utilizes emails
to promote their brand offerings. They may send
out promotional emails to newsletter subscribers,
prospective customers, loyal customers, or
they might send follow-up emails to one-time
customers, or create a holiday promotion.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the
strategy used to ensure that a website’s
content ranks higher on search results pages
when certain keywords are searched online.
SEO can be used in a number of ways.
On-page SEO refers to optimizing the content
on every single page to improve search engine
rankings. Depending on the content it may
involve optimizing keywords, images, and
providing answers to questions that potential
customers may have.
Off-page SEO is a strategy that concentrates on
activity that happens on external websites. By
creating backlinks, or links on other webpages,
a company will try to lead engagement back
to their own website. This is usually done by
contacting other websites and asking them to
write articles that include backlinks to their own
website.
Technical SEO is a focused approach to the
coding of the website and how that code
interacts with search engines. Optimization in
this area will include image compression, CSS
optimization, and other tools that help a website
communicate better with search engines.
The Tactics of a
Digital Marketer

6. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing Tactics6
Each metric compares the strategic successes of each campaign and can determine
what steps need to be taken to increase website traffic, develop more subscribers
for email contact lists, or generate sales leads.

7. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Job Descriptions7
Below are just some of the more prominent jobs in digital marketing.
Job Descriptions
Content Marketer
A content marketer develops an overall content strategy that aligns with a business’s
overall goals. They ensure that all content is constantly kept up to date, including blog
posts, downloadable assets such as e-books, and any distributed video content. They
may also utilize management tools to schedule and track posts and may need to have
several skill sets to be able to handle all responsibilities of the job.
Content marketers work together with other departments to make sure marketing
campaigns and materials are being supported and that messaging remains consistent
across the entire organization. Content marketing teams also function to generate web
traffic, increase brand awareness, attract new leads, new business, and maintain their
target audience’s attention.

8. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Job Descriptions8
Social Media Marketer
SEO Manager
A social media marketer’s primary duties involve crafting custom content for platforms
like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. They will also serve as
community managers for those online environments, engaging audiences through
actions such as comments, shares, and likes.
Social Media Marketers might use management and automation tools to create content
schedules or pre-schedule their posts. Gathering data with tools like Google Analytics
allows social media marketers to make adjustments to their strategies and content.
SEO managers ensure that their organization’s digital content generates organic traffic.
They work alongside content creators to make sure their business, product, or service
ranks high in Google search results while maintaining the integrity of the brand’s
message.
Successful SEO managers increase both a business’s search rankings and the number
of people who visit their site. Since SEO is such a critical aspect of digital marketing,
companies that do not have an expert in-house may hire a freelance or third-party SEO
expert.
Successful SEO managers understand the importance of on-page, off-page, and
technical SEO (as defined above). SEO managers must also understand how search
algorithms work and stay up-to-date on any changes to these algorithms so they can
adjust their campaigns accordingly. To illustrate how often changes happen, Google
makes more than 250 changes to its algorithm every year.

9. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Job Descriptions9
Email Marketer
E-Commerce Specialist
As the job title suggests, an email marketer plans and creates email campaigns to
promote a business and its digital content. The importance of this position cannot be
understated since emails are six times more likely to generate a click through to a
business's website than a Twitter. Emails have the highest return on investment (ROI)
of any channel.
Succeeding as an email marketer means having a keen sense of the goals you are
trying to achieve. Are you trying to increase sales, or get people to sign up for a free
account? Is it about increasing traffic, or awareness of an event? Whatever your goals
are, you need to have solid writing skills, as well as some marketing experience.
E-Commerce specialists focus on online businesses that sell products and collect payment
online. They analyze every product their company sells online so they can collect data
that will help them increase sales.
They utilize Conversion Rate Optimization marketing (CRO) and find new ways to increase
the percentage of website visitors who take specific actions, such as buying a product or
subscribing to a mailing list.
It may be as simple as small adjustments to the site's copy, or changing a button’s location
or appearance. They will then test to see what happens when changes are made. It is
equally important for e-commerce specialists to understand how conversions work in
order to correctly identify the behavior patterns of their website visitors. The ability to
work with a team is as important as having the ability to enjoy the fast-paced nature of
the work.

10. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Job Descriptions10
Marketing Assistant
Digital Marketing Manager
A marketing assistant is a support role that aids the more experienced content
marketers in completing a variety of tasks. They might create reports summarizing a
campaign’s success, organize events, brainstorm campaign ideas, and research trends.
A marketing assistant typically has a bachelor’s degree in marketing or advertising,
or some hands-on experience in the field. They can further set themselves apart
from the pack by enhancing skills in areas like analytics or copywriting. A marketing
assistant position is an excellent springboard to get started in digital marketing, it can
provide the opportunity to learn from working alongside seasoned digital marketing
experts.
A digital marketing manager serves as a leader for the team who sees how each
marketing component works together to achieve the best results. They develop
comprehensive online marketing plans and delegate tasks accordingly. They also
develop campaigns while taking into consideration how they will be executed across
different channels and applications like SEO, social media, email marketing, and more.
A digital marketing manager will have past experience and a clear understanding of
lower-level marketing roles in order to manage their team appropriately. Their skillset
will include applied strategic thinking, excellent time management, a clear ability to
communicate, and technical skills, including budgeting, analyzing ROI on campaigns,
and data processing.

11. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Job Descriptions11
Marketing Automation Coordinator
Marketing Analyst
Marketing Automation Coordinators use technical approaches to maximize campaign
effectiveness. That means they select and manage the tools their team uses to
understand their customer’s behavior, develop campaign strategies, and analyze
campaign metrics.
As an automation coordinator, being well-versed in automation platforms in their
target industry is key. It is also critical to understand the tools that integrate with
that platform, like data enrichment services and analytics tools. Having the ability to
think logically and understand what makes some design elements look great, and
which calls to action are compelling and engaging, will make for a very successful
Automation Coordinator.
A marketing analyst’s goal is to constantly keep a pulse on what their audience
and customers think and feel. A marketing analyst’s primary job for a company
is to determine what product or service offering is doing well and to project what
consumers will want next.
This is done by studying market conditions, consumer behaviors, and competitor
data. The data is analyzed using statistics programs, predictive analysis, and other
tools that help an analyst stay up-to-date—and try to predict—industry trends. The
results of this data can be very valuable for an organization’s bottom line.
Since this position needs to be highly skilled in statistical analysis, data mining, and
other analytical methods, a four-year degree in statistics, math, computer science,
economics, or another related field may be required. However, with the growing
importance and complexity of data about consumers, companies are more now
commonly requiring marketing analysts to have an even more advanced degree,
such as an M.B.A. with a concentration in marketing research.

12. A Guide to Careers in Digital Marketing
Job Descriptions12
Paid Search Analyst
A paid search analyst's main role is to gather data, manage, and develop PPC
strategies (as described above). As part of their daily tasks, they review and analyze
the performance of their campaigns on platforms like Google Adwords, Yahoo, Bing,
and more. They also monitor keyword bids, manage budgets, create large lists of
keywords, and use web analytics to determine what is trending.
Paid search analysts will benefit from having excellent analytical and project
management skills, as well as a strong sense of motivation since much of the work is
entirely self-directed. Since they need to have the ability to translate dense technical
jargon into information for other team members, they should also be very articulate
and grasp the importance of clear communication. A certification in PPC services like
AdWords and Bing are also helpful to land this position.
UX Designer
UX stands for "user experience" and describes the entire experience a person has
from the moment they interact with a piece of marketing content, all the way until they
purchase and use the product.
A UX designer takes into account how consumers will engage with a website, app, or any
other piece of digital marketing content. The aim is to keep the user engaged and happy
after they visit a website or use an app. Designers do this by setting up wireframes,
running tests, and making adjustments based on customer feedback. This role can be a
one-person operation or a team of talented UX designers working together.
The UX designer position can be both challenging, lucrative, and engaging. The
position has the privilege of sitting on the crossroads of the creative, technical, and
social skill sets. A great UX designer also needs to be comfortable with programs like
Adobe and Sketch. It typically is not a requirement for a UX designer to be familiar
with coding, but they do need to be skilled at graphic design. Interestingly, many UX
designers are self-taught, as the role benefits significantly from talent and experience
rather than a specific training course.

13. To learn more about how you can launch a career in digital
marketing,contact us and speak to a San Diego State University
Digital Marketing Bootcamp advisor.
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