Right now, the working world is going through a radical evolution. Since the 2008 financial crash, many of the traditional white-collar jobs that always seemed dependable have seen rates of pay stagnate, and an influx of students with the relevant degrees, but not enough available positions. Throw on top of this a tech revolution which not only creates wholly new industries for people to work in, but also creates a new risk of automation for many traditional industries, and those old trades — the law, accountancy, banking (among others) begin to look less dependable.
Automation and the worker deficit
Here you can see the likelihood that your job will become automated in the next decade or so. It can be pretty harrowing stuff for people who spent a long time studying just to get a foot in the door of some of these industries. In the marketing industry at the moment, people with very meager experience are being hovered into growing tech companies due to a sheer deficit of available workers. Have a marketing qualification? Things are looking good. Have no marketing qualification but know a bit about SEO or PPC Advertising — you can make a living and move up quickly. In terms of the prospects as an entry-level job hunter, the marketing world is pretty forgiving at the moment — in part because the digital marketing world is so new that even people running DM teams in major companies hardly know what’s going on half of the time.
Other benefits
But what are the other benefits of being a marketer, particularly a digital marketer, in the modern age? Well, this appears to be a growing list. Including everything from being more likely to be able to turn up to work in a hoodie and slippers to have flexible hours, the generic digital marketer tends to exist somewhere in a small to mid-sized company and there is a good likelihood that their boss has a modern take on the world of office politics (because old people don’t know how to use the internet) and there is probably a beanbag or two lying around. If that sounds like the kind of working environment you’re after, then line up right here… Get tired of a certain industry after a while? Your skills are transferable! You can shift somewhere else and try something completely different. How many intellectual property lawyers can do that?
Even more benefits — Digital Nomads
With the boom in free communication technology still underway, there has never been a better time to work remotely. While many traditional trades would balk at the idea of employees spending time working from home, or other parts of the planet, for the marketer involved in the online space, location can be less of an issue. While there are still dis-benefits to working remotely — communication is getting easier. When VR becomes more readily available and more proficient, you can expect VR meeting rooms and the ability to have even better working relationships from where ever you might choose to be. Like the idea of living on a desert island with nothing but a MacBook and your intellect? That golden goose could already be possible…
Marketing’s changed — it’s more important
These days, you will often find CEOs choosing to sit with the marketing departments. Why? Because marketing isn’t what it was 20 years ago. The deal used to be that the product developers would build a product, be stoked about it, then palm it off to the marketing department, saying “go sell!” Now that shiz has been flipped on its head. Due to being positioned close to the consumer, the marketers began to realize that they had a far better insight into what customers wanted than the product developers often had. Marketers slowly began to sink their sticky fingers into different departments, until there almost wasn’t a department they couldn’t claim some influence over. As long as a topic affects a company’s bottom line, marketing seems to have a say. So now marketing has become the ultimate seat for learning how businesses work overall, so if you are the entrepreneurial type, or simply like the idea of becoming a more valued member of a business, you could do far worse than to start out with the marketing boys.
A New and Exiting Industry
It can’t be understated how curious the world is getting about the intricacies of the online world — and those people who are building the technology we are all using. Every digital marketer, to some extent, has felt that they are caught up in that world, and it’s exciting. If the human race is really changing itself with the use of technology, you will find a lot of digital marketing types feeling happy with the fact that they are clued into that world, and may be able to benefit from the foresight they are gathering. It’s an exciting time to be in tech.
So, looking for a new line of work, or wondering why it is you ended up in the marketing world? It seems the wide world of marketing may well be a great way to earn a living, especially one which can be better tailored to your own lifestyle.
Think we missed anything? Or do you think marketing is a terrible way to go because Bill Hicks told you so? Let us know in the comments. Also, check out the data displaying tool that our little tech company built here!
