What Do Digital Marketers Actually Do?

It’s become apparent that digital marketing is no longer a niche industry. It has become a crucial part of any company’s marketing activities to boost brand awareness, engage potential customers, drive traffic and generate high-quality leads. 

Brands that actually want to succeed in today’s fast-paced digital world need marketers with great skills and knowledge that go beyond basic marketing strategies to ensure their products or services are seen online. 

The good news for marketers is that there’s a huge demand, as digital marketing roles are set to grow by 6% by 2032 according to the U.S. Bureau of Labour. This growth is fueled by the emergence of new technologies such as AI to automate and streamline the process of marketing tasks. 

That may bring you to your next question

What is a Digital Marketer

A digital marketer is responsible for using a variety of online channels to build brand awareness, engage customers and generate leads. 

There are several channels a digital marketer can use: 

• Websites (link to service page)
• Social Media networks and apps (link to service page)
• Search Engines 
• Email Marketing (Link to blog)
• Search Engine Optimisation SEO (What is SEO)
• Paid Advertising (PPC Ads) (Link to blog)
• Content marketing 
• Influencer marketing. 

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Beyond this, a digital marketer must also be able to track performance across channels using data. This will help identify any opportunities and gaps to optimise campaigns. 

Another skill that is a must-have is the ability to develop and implement a digital marketing strategy. This is important for small to medium-sized businesses with limited budgets for their marketing. 

What are Key Skills Digital Marketers Should Have?

Being a digital marketer comes with a variety of tasks that can change so much from day to day. One day you could be creating social media content to post and the next you’re creating an email marketing campaign. 

This level of variety requires marketers to have a wide range of knowledge and skills. According to new research by the DMI of marketing, HR, L&D, and sales leaders, the top skill that businesses lack in their teams is AI, at 54%, followed by SEO, at 44%, and data analytics, at 42%. 

So what skills should your digital marketing agency have? Let’s take a look at the top 5. 

Video Marketing 

It’s hard to catch people’s attention online, and with the rapidly decreasing attention spans, being able to grab people’s attention is invaluable to a business. 

While YouTube for the longest time has been recognised as a search engine, TikTok too is becoming a hub for people’s questions to be answered. 

There’s also Google search which can display videos on the main search tab if you go into the videos section, this can also increase a business's brand awareness. 

Important skills for video marketing are understanding how to write a video script, how to use creative platforms to create great short-form videos and why types of videos perform the best. 

SEO & SEM

Online searches drive traffic to a website, ad or landing page. SEO is the organic effort of getting your website a better ranking and increasing your brand awareness. 

If you’re curious to know how SEO works, without the back-end techy stuff, read our blog on what is SEO for beginners.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) has the same goal as SEO, to drive people to your site or landing page, but you just have to pay money to get there. It uses the same process as SEO with getting relevant keywords for what you’re trying to advertise but you get more results A LOT quicker. 

One way marketers utilise these paid and organic tools is to use them complimentary with each other, as SEO is a long-term game. 

Content Marketing 

Using AI tools for copywriting has also made it easier to research, brainstorm, and draft content. However, you’ll still need to review, edit, and sense-check any content that has been written by AI, as you want something with a human touch. 

Content marketing is a crucial part of digital marketing. It helps to attract, engage, influence and convert customers. Content marketing differs from other forms of marketing as it allows you as a brand to tell a story, and make a personality online that websites and other forms of marketing can’t replicate. 

Not every content type will suit a business. If you don’t know where to start, start off by looking at your competitors, see what they’re doing, see what’s driving results and go off of that. 

Data & Analytics 

Analytics are central to every facet of digital marketing. With so many channels providing data, it’s important to understand what the data is telling you. With data, you can use analytics to drive better business insights. 

Monitoring campaigns and applying findings based on consumer behaviour will allow you to come up with data-driven solutions. Not off what you think will work, but what is actually working. 

One of the best platforms to use and get experience in, in Google analytics as this can provide insights on any website. Social media platforms also have analytics built-in so you can get insights on consumer behaviour from the app. 

Gathering and using data is essential for any digital marketing role. The information you collect is a gold mine to be used in innovative ways to attract and retain customers. 

AI

Can you really call yourself a marketer if you haven’t used AI to help you with your daily tasks? It would be silly not to utilise such a powerful tool that will save you time. 

There are many benefits to using AI, as it can take over menial or repetitive tasks and drive automation.

It’s important to have skills that can leverage AI. Learning how to write better prompts is a massive game changer too. AI can only work with the information you give it, so if you inputs get better, so will your outputs. 

Marketers with AI experience are becoming more desirable. A survey we conducted with 277 marketers found that 64% are more likely to hire a new employee who had an AI certification vs someone who doesn’t.

It may be worth doing an AI course, as AI is not going anywhere and it would be a shame not to learn how to use it fully. 

Hopefully from this blog, you learnt something useful or perhaps learnt more about what your digital marketing agency actually does for your business. 

If you feel you need a digital marketing agency based in West Sussex to take over your marketing and supercharge you to the top of your field get in contact with us . Book a call with our founder Matt and see what we can do for you!

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