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Content creation and management skills involve storytelling and are often crucial for <anchor>marketing careers</anchor>. This skill set incorporates creativity, originality, social perceptiveness, and emotional intelligence. Taking these skills a step further can also mean adding data analysis to your toolbox, specifically honing in on marketing analytics so that you can assess how well an audience is connecting with your content.
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# Marketing Careers: 6 Areas to Explore

Written by Coursera Staff • Updated on Feb 15, 2024

A marketing career could lead you down several in-demand career paths.

[Featured image] Two men and two women sit around a conference table, scattered with papers and charts, and have a conversation. 

A marketing career typically involves generating interest in a company’s brand and products, but marketers go about that work in various ways. If you choose to pursue this in-demand work, there’s more than one career path to explore—and lots of growth opportunities.

Learn about the different types of marketing and how your interests may align with each one.

## Types of marketing careers

- Brand managers oversee a brand’s persona, driving interest and appreciation for it.

- Communications and public relations teams promote a brand through a variety of external communications efforts. They often work closely with other units (social media, content) to foster conversation about a company.

- Content marketers create informative and valuable content for customers, like blog posts, podcasts, and videos.

- Digital marketers reach out to customers to promote products through various digital channels, including social media and email.

- Event marketers plan events and experiences that support a brand’s persona.

- Product marketers use data-backed strategies to launch new products—or product lines—in the marketplace.

- Search engine marketers (SEM) use search engine optimization (SEO) strategies to increase a company’s visibility on search engine results pages (SERP) so customers can discover a brand more organically.

## Marketing careers: 6 areas of interest

Within these different types of marketing, there are a number of career options to explore depending on your interests. Here are six areas to start:

Blue text on a light blue background that reads: "Six marketing career paths: 1) Research: Find and parse information to drive data-driven marketing recommendations. 2) Strategy: Plan and execute strategic campaigns to generate awareness and sales. 3) Design: Tell stories through visual mediums and create assets that support the team’s visual needs. 4) Writing: Write content for print and digital channels that exemplifies brand voice. 5) Events: Put together experiences to drive brand visibility, media attention, and customer engagement. 6) Social: Generate and publish content that garners attention and propels conversation on social channels.

### 1. Research

Marketing teams rely on data-driven research to tailor and target everything from campaign messaging to product launches. If you conduct research,  you’ll use a variety of tools to help you figure out what customers need and want, and then translate your findings so your team can develop more impactful marketing strategies, campaigns, and more.

Key skills: Data analysis, critical thinking, communication

Could be a fit if you like: Finding and parsing information and using those conclusions to make strategic recommendations that improve a marketing team’s efforts

- Entry-level roles: Marketing assistant, market research associate, business analyst

- Mid-level roles: Market research analyst, global marketing analyst, social media analyst

### 2. Strategy

No matter which type of marketing you work in—product, brand, content, or otherwise—developing a well-researched and brand-specific strategy is instrumental to success. If you work in strategy, you’ll be responsible for identifying new ways to reach customers and developing plans that ensure each campaign is a success.

Key skills: Planning, communication, creative thinking, analytical thinking

Could be a fit if you like: Thinking strategically about a company’s marketing needs, and then developing and executing campaigns that generate greater awareness and sales

- Entry-level roles: Digital marketing strategist, product marketing strategist, SEO specialist

- Mid-level roles: Brand content manager, product marketing manager, senior SEO manager

If you’d like to learn more about strategy but aren’t sure where to start, check out UC Davis’s course The Strategy of Content Marketing.

### 3. Design

From distinctive logos to eye-catching packaging, designers create visual assets that set a company apart from its competitors and feed into larger campaign narratives. If you work in design, you’ll be responsible for a number of creative tasks that may include producing original art and infographics, editing and retouching photos, designing web pages for ultimate user satisfaction, or using research to inform your creative choices.

Skills: Creativity, attention to detail, project management, knowledge of design tools such as Adobe Creative Suite

Could be a fit if you like: Telling stories through visual mediums and creating assets that support a marketing team’s various visual needs

- Entry-level roles: Graphic design specialist, visual information specialist, web design specialist

- Mid-level roles: Creative project manager, design researcher, graphic designer

### 4. Writing

Much in the way that companies rely on visuals to help create a unified brand image and tell a story, they need writers to do that very thing with language. If you work in some aspect of writing, you may be responsible for producing writing that exemplifies a brand’s voice, developing content for different digital channels, or even managing internal or external communications.

Skills: Writing, communication, audience and engagement strategy, project management

Could be a fit if you like: Reaching audiences—be they internal employees or external customers—through the written word

- Entry-level roles: Junior copywriter, communications specialist, content writer

- Mid-level roles: Brand copywriter, marketing content writer, communications manager

### 5. Events

Companies hold events and experiences to increase visibility about their brand and products. If you work in events marketing, you’ll be responsible for ideating and executing in-person or virtual events that support larger campaigns and strategies.

Skills: Planning, organization,vendor management, budgets, multitasking, communication

Could be a fit if you like: Putting together experiences, either in-person or virtual, that results in greater brand visibility, media attention, and customer engagement

- Entry-level roles: Experiential marketing coordinator, events marketing specialist, field marketing coordinator

- Mid-level roles: Experiential marketing manager, events marketing manager, field marketing manager

### 6. Social

It’s imperative that companies communicate about their brand and products across a number of digital channels. Social fosters a different level of interaction thanks to its direct engagement with customers. If you work in social media marketing, you’ll be responsible for generating and publishing content—written posts, videos, graphics, and more—that garner attention and propel conversation.

Skills: Writing, communication, creativity, planning, social media strategy

Could be a fit if you like: Being both creative and strategic about how to reach and engage customers, and producing multimedia content that supports larger brand and product strategies

- Entry-level roles: Marketing associate, social media marketing assistant, social media marketer

- Mid-level roles: Social media editor, social media manager, community manager

As of 2021, skills related to social media were in high demand. Needs for people with paid social media skills increased by 116 percent while social media advertising increased by 46 percent [ 1].

## Marketing careers: flexibility

A career in marketing offers a good degree of flexibility. You can apply your skill set to different types of marketing, moving where opportunities best suit your interests and needs. For example, if you start off writing blog posts for a content marketing team, you may be able to apply that experience to email marketing or search engine marketing.

You can also get started in one type of marketing and eventually move to another. For example, if you begin as a social media marketing assistant, and learn you’re more interested in brand strategy, you may be able to move into that type of marketing. Having worked in social media, you have done brand management to some extent.

Beginning in one area doesn’t mean you can’t jump to another, though it may take some additional experience—or time—to make that move.

## How much can you make? Marketing salaries

Marketing jobs are in high demand. LinkedIn reported that 381,000 marketing jobs were posted on its site between 2020 and 2021, and digital marketing will continue to be a high-growth area in the future [ 2].

While starting salaries for an entry-level marketing career can be lower, there is the potential to earn more over time and with more advanced roles.

Job titleAverage salary (US)Social media marketing assistant$62,156Marketing assistant$72,321Communications specialist$93,011Market research analyst$88,257Communications manager$101,393Event marketing manager$83,904

*All salary data is taken from Glassdoor, as of July 2022, and reflects total pay (base salary + additional pay such as cash bonuses, commission, and profit sharing).

## Build your marketing skills on Coursera

Develop or strengthen your marketing skills with any of these top-rated products on Coursera:

For an introductory course, start with Wharton's Introduction to Marketing. In approximately 10 hours, you’ll learn about the fundamentals of marketing, including how to develop a marketing strategy and how to communicate that strategy.

To prepare for a career in marketing, try Google's Digital Marketing and E-Commerce Professional Certificate, where you'll learn about email marketing and marketing analytics, among other topics, and get job-ready for an entry-level marketing role in less than six months.

To enhance your marketing skills, explore Meta's Marketing Analytics Professional Certificate, where you'll learn how to sort, clean, and visualize data that can inform key marketing strategies.

## Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

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### Is marketing a good career?‎

Marketing can be a good career path for many reasons. In addition to the earning potential of someone in marketing, high demand for marketing professionals across industries, and growth projections for this field, marketing offers many rewards. If you enjoy being strategic, creative, and exploring new technologies, you may enjoy working in marketing. When conducting a marketing job search, be sure to review employee feedback on companies you’re considering to gauge employee satisfaction and compare salaries on job listings to average salary data for those roles.‎

Chevron Right

### What job in marketing makes the most money?‎

Salaries in marketing can depend on several factors, including companies’ marketing budgets, industry norms, regional trends, as well as your seniority or level of experience in marketing. The highest-paying marketing jobs are typically advanced or senior roles.

According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the average pay for marketing, advertising, and promotions managers in the US is $133,380, as of 2021 [ 3]. Based on July 2022 information from Glassdoor, here are three US roles with salaries that exceed the national average, for professionals with 15 or more years of experience: chief marketing officer ($196,110), vice president of marketing and communications ($169,454), and global vice president of marketing ($199,458).‎

Chevron Right

### How do I write a cover letter for a marketing position? ‎

There are several strategies you can use to write a stand-out cover letter for a marketing position. Format the marketing cover letter as you would a standard business letter. Look for keywords in the job description and use as many as you can when outlining your qualifications and experience. Because marketing tends to be strategy and results driven, it’s important to quantify your accomplishments in previous positions, emphasizing how you were able to help your team or employer meet marketing objectives. When appropriate, conduct market research on your prospective employer’s target market and marketing strategy and use what you find to include ideas in your cover letter about how you might contribute to the company’s efforts. Read more about cover letters here: Cover Letter Tips: How to Stand Out to a Hiring Manager.‎

## Article sources

3. US Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Advertising, Promotions, and Marketing Managers, https://www.bls.gov/ooh/management/advertising-promotions-and-marketing-managers.htm." Accessed July 28, 2022.

## Keep reading

Updated on Feb 15, 2024

Written by:

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### Coursera Staff

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Coursera’s editorial team is comprised of highly experienced professional editors, writers, and fact...

This content has been made available for informational purposes only. Learners are advised to conduct additional research to ensure that courses and other credentials pursued meet their personal, professional, and financial goals.

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