Starting a career in marketing (digital marketing to be exact) was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. As you probably already know, digital marketing has quickly become one of the fastest growing and most in demand careers available today.
With the ability to work on fun and exciting marketing projects, with amazing businesses and companies, and live the “laptop lifestyle” working as a digital marketer from anywhere in the world, it’s easy to see what makes the digital marketing industry so appealing.
So I’m going to break down exactly what you need to know so you can start, and succeed, with a career in digital marketing in 2021. So, let’s get to it.
The number one question I get about digital marketing.
Do I need a marketing degree?
Short answer? No. I feel qualified to say this, because I do have a marketing degree. The most useful courses I took in my college career were the general business classes I took my freshman year, but most of my marketing knowledge came from self study. I remember one day in class we wrote down what we would like to learn from this course, and I wrote down ‘Digital Marketing.’ The professor read it out loud and said “me too,” and that’s when I knew I was in the wrong place.
The best way, by far, to learn digital marketing is by practicing digital marketing!
Whether you’re looking to work for an agency or start your own digital marketing firm, you’re going to need to know what you’re doing! Too many people read one book or take one class and call themselves a professional digital marketer. If you really want to be that top level marketer, you’re going to need to study, take what you’ve learned and apply it to actually get results. The best thing you can do, period, is to just start digital marketing!
Easiest ways to start digital marketing?
Sign up for an Instagram account, make some content, see what people like and don’t like. Create YouTube videos and learn about recording and editing and optimizing them for SEO. Build a website and learn how to design and development skills, and also how to rank that website with SEO and keywords! Learn anything and everything that is interesting to you in the field of digital marketing!
To succeed today you need to become a T shaped marketer!
A T shaped marketer is someone who has a broad understanding of a bunch of different topics, but then a very specific focused knowledge on a few things.
Digital marketing is made up of a ton of different sub categories. Things like content, SEO, public relations, email, design, development, advertising, social media, the list goes on and on. I’ve studied these things for years, and I’d still only consider myself an expert on a handful of them. For example, I’m not very good at coding, but that’s okay! I’m much better at things like marketing strategy and content, and I find them much more profitable.
The best place for you to start!
The best place for you to start learning and honing your skills as a digital marketer is by learning the key foundational marketing basics! The core marketing principles are just as relevant today as they were 10-20 years ago, and more importantly they’ll be just as useful in 10-20 years as they are today! If you want to find out more about the key marketing basics, check out my video Introduction to Marketing | Marketing 101!
DigitalMarketer Author
Adam Erhart
Rich is the Original Full Stack Marketer. Rich has been a freelancer for 15 years and has run an agency for 3 years. Rich is known for bridging the art and science of digital marketing. He shares his knowledge and experience as a freelance marketer via YouTube. Rich continues to expand both into DFY Services and DIY Courses for his clients. Check out RichandNiche.com to learn more about full-stack digital marketing and digital marketing consulting.
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