The prospect of jumping into a new career can be both exciting and daunting—especially in a field like digital marketing. A growing number of new social channels, innovative technologies, and techniques have transformed the field. What was once limited to basic websites, search engines, and email campaigns is now a multi-textured, media-rich landscape full of endless possibilities.
While the diversity of digital marketing makes it a brilliant choice for those seeking to carve out niche new careers, there are a few hoops to jump through first. The biggest one, unsurprisingly, is finding that first role. In this post, we’ll demystify digital marketer job descriptions, helping you determine which marketing area might interest you most. We’ll cover:
- In summary: What is digital marketing?
- Where’s the best place to look for digital marketer job descriptions?
- What skills and experience will I see in digital marketer job descriptions?
- Examples of digital marketer job descriptions
- Key takeaways
Ready to dissect some genuine digital marketer job descriptions to find out what they mean? Then let’s dive in.
1. In summary: What is digital marketing?
Before we dive deep into some real digital marketer job descriptions, it will help to clarify what digital marketing involves. Let’s take a look.
The basics: What is digital marketing?
Digital marketing describes any type of marketing that takes place online. It involves various techniques, from email and social media marketing to paid ads and SEO. In today’s world, digital marketing is an essential asset for building brand awareness, connecting with customers, promoting products and services, and, ultimately, driving sales.
What are the different digital marketing channels and techniques?
The various digital marketing channels (or ways we can connect and communicate with consumers) are diverse and continually evolving. However, some core channels include social media marketing, influencer marketing, content marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, email campaigns, and creating immersive websites that promote products and services.
What is multichannel marketing?
One term you might hear in your travels is ‘multichannel marketing’. This describes the common practice of using not a single channel, but several at once. In the case of multichannel marketing, each channel is strategically aligned to drive customers toward a particular action—such as purchasing a product or sharing a brand’s content. While the term is not limited to digital marketing, it is most commonly applied in this sphere because of the sheer number of online channels available.
What are the benefits of digital marketing?
The main benefit of digital marketing over traditional, offline techniques is that it has the potential to reach a much wider audience. In addition, the introduction of digital data analytics makes it much easier to track, measure, and evaluate the success of a digital marketing campaign in real-time. This helps improve campaigns to create maximum impact—something that is much more challenging with offline marketing.
While there’s much more to digital marketing, that covers the basics for you! Now, let’s get to the digital marketer job descriptions.
2. Where’s the best place to look for digital market job descriptions?
While many industries employ digital marketers (widening the options) this also makes it tricky to know where to start. First up, ask yourself what job level you’re looking for. Your past career experience (if any) will help determine if you should be looking for an entry-, mid-, or senior-level digital marketing role. If you’re reading this, chances are you’re new to the field, which means you should be seeking an entry-level role.
Finding entry-level digital marketer job descriptions
For entry-level digital marketing roles, especially for graduates or those entering employment for the first time, we recommend checking out the following popular job sites:
There are many entry-level digital marketing job descriptions available on these sites. While this means you’ll face stiffer competition, it can be helpful to explore the job boards simply to see what skills and attributes employers commonly look for.
Finding more specialized digital marketer job descriptions
Already got some experience under your belt? If so, you may be looking for more specialized, mid-, or higher-level digital marketing roles. For these, it’s worth checking out some more niche job boards. A few recommendations:
- American Marketing Association (AMA) Jobs Board: Specialist and senior marketing roles from the United States’ association for marketing professionals (Outside the US? Check out the industry associations in your own country)
- MarketingHire: A leading marketing-focused job site, part of the Marketing Career Network (MCN).
- OnlyMarketingJobs: Jobs aimed at marketing, digital and creative professionals.
- DigitalMarketingJobs: Matches employers and candidates in the online marketing industry.
While you’ll find competition for the roles on these sites, too, the fact that they center around digital marketing means the job descriptions are usually written by marketing professionals and are, therefore, likely more accurate. Keep in mind that the digital marketer job descriptions on sites like Indeed are often written by recruiters or HR professionals who lack specific knowledge of the role.
Finally, it’s also worth considering which industry you want to work in. List some companies you might want to work for and check out the vacant positions directly on their website.
3. What skills and requirements will I see in digital marketer job descriptions?
Although not all ads are written the same way, broadly speaking, every digital marketing job description will contain three types of skills and requirements. These include:
- Technical skills
- Soft skills (or ‘essential’ skills)
- Domain expertise
Let us look briefly at each of these now.
Technical skills and knowledge
It helps to think of technical skills as those you need some type of qualification for.
Within digital marketing, common technical skills include proficiency in SEO, SEM, paid search, social media marketing, website and graphic design (and associated software, e.g. the Adobe Suite), customer relationship management (CRM) expertise, knowledge of data analytics, and tools for social media management, keyword research, and more.
You’ll also need a solid understanding of the theories underpinning digital marketing practice, such as what sales funnels are and how they work, the concept of lead generation, consumer decision-making, customer segmentation, etc.
For more senior roles, you might acquire these skills through a formal qualification such as an undergraduate degree or even a master’s or Ph.D. But a suitable digital marketing certification is also an option.
Soft skills (or ‘essential’ skills)
Soft skills are the character traits and interpersonal skills that shape how you interact with others in the workplace. These aren’t specific to digital marketing and cannot be ‘learned’ in the way that technical skills can be. Instead, these skills must be cultivated through time and practice in a workplace environment.
Essential skills include problem-solving, creative and critical thinking, communication, empathy, time management, team leadership, curiosity, an active learning mindset, and listening skills. This is not exhaustive but it gives you an idea of what digital marketer job descriptions will include.
Domain expertise
Finally, some jobs require expertise in the industry that you’ll be working in. For instance, finance or healthcare. Even within specific industries, there are particular domain areas. You might need to be an expert in product marketing, for example, or you may need expertise in brand and reputation management.
For most roles—especially entry-level ones—domain expertise is a nice-to-have rather than a must-have. This is because you’ll generally develop your domain expertise on the job. Bear in mind, though, that for more senior managerial or directorial positions, prior domain expertise is usually a prerequisite.
Since all job descriptions are written differently, it’s important to note that you’ll rarely find these three different skill types listed in neat categories. Instead, they’re likely to be mixed under headings such as ‘roles and responsibilities’ or ‘essential skills’ and ‘experience’. Once you’ve read a few digital marketer job descriptions, you’ll start spotting the different skill types easily. To illustrate, let’s now look at some real-world job ads.
4. Example digital marketing job descriptions
In this section, we’ll look at the skills and experience you might find in some typical digital marketer job descriptions—both at entry-level and mid- senior-level.
Entry-level digital marketer job description
The ad shown here is a genuine digital marketer job description for a role at L’Oreal in New York City. It’s taken from the popular job site indeed.com. Let’s take a look.
Source: Junior digital marketer job description from indeed.com
At first glance, this job role could be intimidating to a digital marketer entering the field for the first time. But on closer inspection, we can see that despite the numerous headings and some industry jargon, the skills outlined largely fall under the three categories described in section 3. Pulling out the skills that fit in each category can help you determine which ones the employer is looking for. You can then tailor your job application or resume to match.
For instance, in the L’Oreal job description, requirements like ‘purchase order set up and invoice tracking,’ ‘knowledge of Google Analytics, Coremetrics and Salesforce,’ and ‘SEO and PPC skills, and proficiency in MS Excel’ are littered throughout the job ad. In reality, however, they all fall under ‘technical skills’. What qualifications do you have that can tick off some of these requirements?
Meanwhile, characteristics like ‘highly analytical’, ‘excellent written and communication skills’, and ‘multi-tasking in a deadline-oriented environment’ all fall under ‘soft skills’. What experience do you have, in an office, sports club, or another team-working environment, that proves your ability in these areas?
Finally, things like ‘exposure to beauty/ lifestyle/ fashion retail’ and ‘staying abreast of web analytics trends’ describe the knowledge that falls neatly under domain expertise. Remember: or an entry-level job, employers won’t expect you to have years of experience. So demonstrating this knowledge could simply be a case of mentioning that you read industry magazines or blogs on the topic. The main thing is to show that you take an active interest in the sector.
Mid- to senior-level digital marketer job descriptions
The next job description is representative of mid and senior-level digital marketing roles. If you have several years of work experience and have recently trained as a digital marketer, this may be the type of job you’ll want to look for. The following job description, taken from marketinghire.com, is for a digital marketing specialist at the world-renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Source: Mid-senior level digital marketer job description from marketinghire.com
In many ways, this digital marketer job description is not dissimilar to the entry-level job we just explored. The main difference is the specificity of the role. In this case, it involves working specifically with MIT’s School of Engineering to promote education programs and products to engineering professionals. Quite a niche! The main difference, then, is that you’ll require appropriate domain expertise for this type of position. Whether that means digital marketing for engineering, health, or finance, you’ll need to prove your working knowledge in the relevant area.
Beyond this, many of the skills listed are almost identical to an entry-level position. For instance, ‘building collaborative working relationships,’ ‘excellent organizational, interpersonal, customer service skills,’ and ‘editing, oral, written communication, and presentation skills’ are all vital soft skills, no matter what job you’re applying for. Try to find ways of cultivating these essential skills, regardless of the domain area.
Finally, the technical skills. Once again, these are not dissimilar to entry-level roles. They include things like Salesforce, Excel, SEO, and paid campaigns. However, it also includes more nuanced tools such as (in the MIT job ad) knowledge of the Adobe creative suite and video editing expertise. Even if you’re applying for entry-level roles right now, it’s worth looking at more senior positions, simply to see what sorts of niche skills you might want to develop in the longer term.
5. Key takeaways
In this post, we’ve explored the kinds of digital marketer job descriptions you might come across as you embark on your new career. We’ve asked what digital marketing is, what skills you should look out for, how best to interpret tricky job ads, and which skills you might want to cultivate as you progress. Essential skills for all digital marketers include:
- Social media marketing
- Influencer marketing
- Affiliate marketing
- Content marketing
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Search engine marketing (SEM)
- Pay-per-click advertising
- Email marketing
- Web design
- Customer relationship management
Remember, even if you can’t tick off every single item in a job description, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t apply. Keep an eye open for ‘required’ and ‘desirable’ skills. The former means that, yes, you must have the experience to apply. However, the latter means you can probably get away with applying. You’ll be surprised—enthusiasm and a willingness to learn will take you much further than you might imagine.
To learn more about a potential career in digital marketing, check out this free, 5-day Intro to Digital Marketing short course. Or read the following introductory guides: