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How To Start A Business: Brand And Marketing
July 25, 2021
January 21, 2021
According to Investopedia, Marketing “refers to activities a company undertakes to promote the buying or selling of a product or service. Marketing includes advertising, selling, and delivering products to consumers or other businesses.” Marketing is arguably the most essential aspect of every business, as the success of the business relies on how well a company's products and services can be matched to customers who are willing and able to pay for such products and services.
Marketing often rests on the principle of the 4 Ps, also known as the “marketing mix”. The 4 Ps are used by companies to identify some key factors for their business, including what consumers want from them, how their product or service meets or fails to meet those needs, how their product or service is perceived in the world, how they stand out from their competitors, and how they interact with their customers. The 4 Ps refer to the product, price, place, and promotion of a good or service.
Global Marketing Sector
Global marketing as defined by Wikipedia is “a field of study in general business management that markets products, solutions and services to customers locally, nationally, and internationally.” This is of optimum importance in this day and age, as the internet as made cross-country trade easier than it has ever been. With the advent of eCommerce and dropshipping, it is important for companies to strategically market their goods or services to potential customers all around the world. As of 2017, approximately 62% of consumers buy items online each month. Experts expect online sales in the U.S. to increase from $587 billion in 2019 to over $735 billion by 2023. 2019 estimates from independent equity research and execution firm Redburn and PwC, put the global marketing sector at over $1.7 trillion. The average salary of Digital marketers in the US as high as $90,000, more than over 70% of the population.
Careers in Marketing
The business landscape is constantly evolving due to changing customer demographics and technological advancements, therefore companies need to optimise their growth. Marketing roles are required in virtually every industry and are indispensable to the survival of any business. These are some of the top categories of marketing careers.
Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing can be defined as the use of the internet to reach new and existing customers. Since the internet boom of the 90s, the internet has become the fastest and most widely used method of reaching out to customers. With more than half the world’s population being on the internet (4.66 billion, as of October 2020).
The latest data from GlobalWebIndex shows that about 75% of the world’s internet users buy something online every month. According to datareportal, the amount of money spent on online consumer good purchases in 2019 was in excess of $1.9 trillion, with Statista reporting that the average eCommerce shopper spends about $500 per year on online purchases of consumer goods. In addition to consumer goods, the world’s internet users spent $1.2 trillion on online travel-related purchases in 2019.
This shows the enormous potential digital marketing has in providing revenue for companies.
These are some of the career paths under digital marketing:
Advertising and promotions are typically the most expensive element of a comprehensive marketing strategy, requiring the combined creative skills of graphic designers, writers, art directors, and media specialists.
Brand Marketing
Brand marketing is an essential part of creating a forceful, immediately recognizable market identity for companies and the products or services they sell
Content Marketing
Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action
Market Research
Market research is essential to the development of all marketing strategies; these jobs require strong analytical, needs assessment, and problem-solving skills.
Sales
Despite the growth of content and eCommerce marketing, there is still a large demand for talented sales representatives who can engage clients in person, either face-to-face or through telephone and internet customer service technologies.
Important skills every Marketer needs to master
To be an effective marketer, one must cultivate specific skills to be of relevance to your company and create more revenue for the company. These are some of the essential skills every marketer needs to master
Getting started in Marketing
There are several ways of getting started in marketing. However, rather than spending 4-5 years of your life going back to school or stumbling through sub-par YouTube video after the other, you can take tailored, specialized and accredited online digital marketing courses such as a 5 day Special Masters Programme for executives, an International Postgraduate Diploma, a Masters in Strategic Marketing or an Advanced Professional Certificate in Strategic Marketing Management.
Marketing is arguably the most important contributing factor to a business’s success. Therefore, investing in yourself to become proficient at it pay dividends several times over. There is an increase in demand for all kinds of digital marketing related jobs and this is expected to continue for years to come. As the Covid-19 pandemic forced more business online in order to survive, digital marketing professionals become more indispensable.
Source: Futurelearn
Image Source: Getty Images
