Who are Marketers and Why Do Businesses Need Them? 

Imagine the world of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: trade was developing, competition was growing, merchants were looking for ways to increase profits, so they learned from customers what goods interested them. These very merchants were the first marketers, though they didn’t realize it. This profession began to be taught officially in the early 20th century when marketing departments appeared in businesses. Since then, the tasks of marketers have not changed globally.

Their main goal is to study the consumer and apply this knowledge so that the business could earn more, attract new clients and occupy a profitable position in the market. For quite a long time, classical channels were used for this: television, radio and the press. But in 2018, the market has changed. According to the consulting corporation Gartner, companies’ investments in digital marketing have exceeded investments in all other promotion channels. So now the profession has moved almost entirely online.

Writemyessay.nyc believes that marketing is now inseparable from online and technology, so any modern marketer is a digital marketer. The market, the audience, its needs change, and the business adapts to them.

Marketers are engaged in market research, developing promotional strategies and tactics, and analyzing their effectiveness. There are five modern directions of their activity:

1. Attracting clients through media platforms. This is a purchase and adjustment of advertising and the generation of new traffic.
2. CRM – consumer relations marketing. Encompasses working with a brand’s existing customer base through communication channels and loyalty programs.
3. Online products. Specialists in this area work with the brand’s digital platforms: making them comfortable and useful for users.
4. Online-promotion through media personalities, bloggers and Influencers.
5. E-commerce – distribution in online marketplaces. Employees in such departments build the right positioning of products on online store platforms.

Skills a marketer needs

To successfully cope with the tasks of a marketer, you need to have a certain set of profile knowledge:

• Have a basic understanding of the global and local markets where you are going to promote products. You need to understand the major players and know how many people use popular online venues and what their preferences are.
• Know the key tools. You need to learn the basic metrics for evaluating the effectiveness of campaigns and the technical aspects of the work. Depending on the chosen position, you need to know how to use advertising offices, social networks, email services, web analytics tools and so on.
• Know the brand and its products. You need to know the company’s history, mission, values, positioning to consumers. Also, a marketer should know how the products they work with came to be and how customers want to benefit from them.

Developed soft skills are also useful:

• The ability to build communication and work as part of a team. It is important to learn how to properly communicate and compromise with colleagues from other departments to prove hypotheses and implement ideas. The marketer must also be able to manage projects to coordinate processes.
• Willingness to learn on their own and to share expertise with others. The profession, the market, and the industry are rapidly evolving, and it is necessary to constantly follow new trends and learn from the experience of others, and then transfer the knowledge to the team.

A good marketer understands how the result of his work affects the money he brings to the company. He also knows how to calculate all the digital relationships between different indicators in order to correctly influence the economy of the product.

Advantages and disadvantages of working in marketing

Many people are attracted to the profession by the connection between analytics and creativity. Dry calculations and research are not enough here – you need to constantly come up with something new and interesting.

The benefits of working in marketing:

• Demand. There is a high demand for good digital marketers in the market, and their salaries are increasing. If you are qualified enough, you will easily find a high-paying job in a prestigious company.
• Mobility. You are not tied to a specific point on the map. The tasks that marketers perform do not require a personal presence in the office. Many corporations and agencies offer remote work.
• The opportunity to try new things. Marketers often change the direction of their work and perform tasks from related fields. Here is just a small part of what the profession of a marketer is associated with: email newsletters, chatbots, SEO optimization, content, creativity, supply chain, targeting, contextual advertising, web analytics, SMM, PR.

Cons of the profession:

• Competition. The number of new professionals and their expertise is growing. Be prepared to fight for a good position.
• Irregular schedule. In order to keep up with deadlines, you will likely have to stay late at work during project preparation and launch.
• Great responsibility. Even small miscalculations in analytics or strategy can lead to major financial losses. Worse, they can easily make customers turn away from your brand forever.

Career prospects

Starting as an intern, in 7-8 years you can easily reach the Brand Business Leader in the classic marketing department of a large company. 5-6 years it will take the same path to the Digital Manager position in the digital direction, where there are now far fewer quality professionals. Be prepared for the fact that the managerial position will require knowledge of management, sales and supply chain, as well as experience in related areas.

To accelerate your career progression, you need to add as many successful cases as possible to your portfolio. This can only be done through trial and error. The earlier and cheaper a marketer makes them, the faster they grow. Those hypotheses and creatives that have worked for competitors may be irrelevant to other target audiences, brands or products. Simply copying someone else’s approaches in order to repeat their success won’t work – you’ll have to keep trying different methods.

Marketing is when you walk in the dark by touch. It will not come out not to hit anything, but you can learn to fight very lightly, draw conclusions from this and move on.