This guide helps you discover what types of marketing jobs best match your special skills and interests, shows you how to conduct the kind of job search that will get you the position you want in the company of your choice, describes marketing career paths open to you, and suggests other information resources.
Marketing Careers Today
The marketing field is booming with nearly a third of all people now employed in marketing-related positions. Marketing salaries may vary from company, position, and region, and salary figures change constantly. In general, entry-level marketing salaries usually are only slightly below those for engineering and chemistry but equal or exceed starting salaries in economics, finance, accounting, general business, and the liberal arts. Moreover, if you succeed in an entry-level marketing position, it is likely that you will be promoted quickly to higher levels of responsibility and salary. In addition, because of the consumer and product knowledge you will gain in these jobs, marketing positions provide excellent training for highest levels in an organization.
Overall Marketing Facts and Trends
In conducting your job search, consider the following facts and trends that are changing the world of marketing.
Focus on customers: more and more, companies are realizing that they win in the marketplace only by creating superior value for customers. To capture value from customers, they must first find new and better ways to solve customer problems and improve customer brand experiences. This increasing focus on the customer puts marketers at the forefront in many of today’s companies. As the primary customer-facing function, marketing’s’ mission is to get all company departments to “think customer,â€
Technology: is changing the way marketers work. For example, price coding allows instantaneous retail inventorying. Software for marketing training, forecasting, and other functions is changing the way we market. And the internet is creating new jobs and new recruiting rules. Consider the explosive growth in new media marketing. Whereas advertising firms have traditionally recruited “generalists†in account management, “generalist†has now taken on a whole new meaning – advertising account executives must now have both broad and specialized knowledge.
Diversity: The number of women and minorities in marketing continues to rise. They also are rising rapidly into marketing management. For example, women now out number men by nearly two to one as advertising account executives. As marketing becomes more global, the need for diversity in marketing positions will continue to increase, opening new opportunities.
Global: Companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, IBM, Wal-Mart, and Procter and Gamble have become multinational, with manufacturing and marketing operations in hundreds of counties. Indeed, such companies often make more profit from sales out side the United States than from within. And it’s not just the big companies that are involved in international marketing. Organizations of all sizes have moved into the global arena. Many new marketing opportunities and careers will be directly linked to the expanding global marketplace. The globalization of business also means that you will need more cultural, language, and people skills in the marketing world of the 21st century.
Not-for-profit organizations: Increasingly, colleges, arts organizations, libraries, hospitals, and other not-for-profit organizations are recognizing the need for effectively marketing their products and services to various publics. This awareness has led to new marketing positions, with these organizations hiring their own marketing directors and marketing vice presidents or using outside marketing specialists.
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