Marketing Skills: The 11 Skills Essential to a Successful Marketing Career Over the last few years, we’ve spent tens of thousands of hours working with hundreds of different marketers. When you spend this much time with people in a certain role, one of the more interesting things you can do is try to determine the skills that make someone successful in that role. This is particularly interesting for the field of marketing simply because marketing has changed so much in the last decade. While successful marketers can exhibit a wide variety of traits, we’ve identified 11 marketing skills that really stand out today. In general, today’s highly successful marketers: 1. Are revenue-driven marketers 2. Know their customers and markets 3. Create remarkable customer experiences 4. Are great storytellers 5. Test everything and assume nothing 6. Never stop acquiring new marketing tricks 7. Use data to make decisions 8. Enjoy working with technology 9. Manage their work according to a schedule 10. Write very, very well 11. Deliver specific, identifiable results Revenue-driven marketing Marketers who are capable of driving revenue tend to thrive in their careers. That’s because most CEOs believe that marketers are detached from corporate business objectives. A recent survey by the Fournaise Marketing Group highlights this problem – 78% of CEOs think marketing isn’t focused on generating topline revenue growth. And 80% of CEOs believe marketers are disconnected from short and long-term financial objectives. Marketers who can tie their efforts to improving revenue thrive in an environment like this. Know your market The success of a marketing organization depends on its ability to understand its target market. The marketer who can understand and effectively articulate what customers and competitors are doing has a foundational marketing skill. Becoming the voice of the customer is particularly valuable to a business. Marketers who can collect both quantitative and qualitative data about customers and present that data to executives in a strategic manner are very valuable. One other point – this isn’t just about gathering data via surveys. Direct conversations with customers are critical to this effort and usually more valuable than survey data. Create remarkable customer experiences Today’s most successful marketers create remarkable experiences for customers. Thanks to the internet, there are now many more points of interaction between a customer and brand today. These interactions are growing richer and richer and it’s marketing’s job to create and manage these experiences. Marketers who can create experiences that truly resonate with customers are rare, but those that can deliver business results that far exceed the norm. Become a storyteller A big part of creating a remarkable customer experience is telling a good story. It’s harder than ever to get a customer’s attention. That’s why marketers such as Seth Godin believe that storytelling is critical to successful marketing. Marketers must be good storytellers for the simple reason that customers identify with compelling stories more than anything else. Most successful marketing campaigns tell a story that customers identify with on an emotional level. Marketers who can tell great stories to customers via a variety of marketing campaigns are indispensable in a world where attracting a customer’s attention can be challenging. Test everything; assume nothing Many marketers make decisions based on their gut instincts, but with the wealth of data available to them, this doesn’t need to be the case. Good marketers are continuously testing things like new marketing campaigns, ad copy, and pricing to turn data into business results. Fortunately, a number of tools, such as online advertising platforms and SaaS tools, are now available, making testing easier than ever. For example, simple A/B tests will help you test the effectiveness of relative offers, copy, and designs. Never stop learning Marketing is changing at a rapid pace thanks to dynamics like the internet and the changing customer behavior. That means that marketers have to learn faster than ever. Something as simple as learning has become an essential marketing skill. Fortunately, there’s a wealth of information available online that can help marketers learn about new marketing trends. Many of the world’s best marketers are actively blogging and tweeting the latest data and information. LinkedIn is another powerful tool for acquiring marketing knowledge. Examples of topics to learn about now include social media, content marketing, big data, and mobile marketing. My co-founder, Craig Rosenberg, puts the importance of continuous learning this way, “Self-educate as much as you can. The marketing you learn in school or in books is much different than how marketing actually works. You should read blogs, white papers, attend webinars, go to online and offline training… Even CMO’s spend a lot of time self-educating on marketing. You can never know enough.”
Posted on: Fri, 20 Sep 2013 13:33:45 +0000
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