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It’s the age of the hybrid marketer, but a jack of all trades won’t cut it

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It’s the age of the hybrid marketer, but a jack of all trades won’t cut it

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Marketers today must be in a constant state of learning and up-skilling, but how can we decide which skills are the right ones to invest our time in developing?

This article was sponsored by RMIT to let readers know about its online Master of Marketing program.

Rapid advances in technology have given rise to an age of always-on connectivity between consumer and brand, and has also equipped brands with an evolving collection of tools for maximising their impact in the market. These developments present amazing opportunity, but mean today’s professional marketers must be equipped with the skills to understand and keep up with an ever-changing landscape.

The amount of competencies required to make up a complete marketer is increasing in real time. We are now in an era where marketers must bring multi-dimensional skills to a role and be in a constant state of learning.

But how can we choose the avenue in which to develop our professional skills when we can’t know what relevance they’ll have to new jobs as we move forward in our careers?

Every brand and campaign is different, and every marketing role will require a professional with a unique combination of competencies across creative, brand management, customer experience, data analytics and campaign strategy development, just to name a few.

An ever-developing skill-set of practical workplace experience combined with the necessary tertiary skills to perform in upper-level management positions is the key to future-proofing yourself for tomorrow’s career unknowns. To solidify your relevance in any organisation, you need expertise in planning, directing, implementing and monitoring an organisation’s marketing efforts. Furthermore, improving your own personal management skills and developing an understanding of the relationship between marketing and other functional areas of management will give you the competitive edge in the workplace. This helps in boardroom discussions where business cases for new marketing endeavours must be made, and an all-of-business understanding of marketing also helps entrepreneurs who need to be across every aspect of business marketing when considering new ventures.

It’s also common for marketers to reach a point in their career where they can’t progress any further – because formal qualifications are a requirement at many organisations, particularly for management-type roles.

“To have a formal qualification in business or marketing is the basic requirement to even get an interview,” says Zofia Deschepper, an RMIT Masters of Marketing Student on her own career progression.

 

An online course is desirable for many because it enables professionals to work on these formal skills in flexible ways, while still focusing on career – or other personal – goals. For some, it means actually finishing a Master of Marketing qualification faster than traditional learning structures, while others may continue working full time, applying learnings to their current role, advancing their career sooner.

As for a hybrid skill set, a masters course in marketing covers a wide range of skills, including consumer behaviour, market research, communication strategy, product innovation, interactive marketing, business and network marketing, services marketing, social marketing, brand strategy and business research design. Aside from the benefits of speed and flexibility, online courses can be more cost effective, as students often won’t need to pay the amenity and travel costs associated with on-campus learning.

RMIT University’s online Master of Marketing program is designed for current and aspiring managers looking to increase their knowledge. Industry-renowned experts will help see the role of marketing in new and unimagined ways, and the flexible online structure means no on-campus commitments and the ability to start whenever you like. It’s accredited by the Australian Marketing Institute (AMI) and students and graduates are eligible to apply for membership of the Institute and Social Research Society.

 

 

 

Image copyright: paulgrecaud © 123RF

 

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