Many women struggle with the fear of choosing the wrong degree or career. In business, it is particularly easy to become overwhelmed with the ever-changing job climate, and the endless opportunities to specify your degree. As a marketing major with a concentration in social media, I’ve asked myself many times if I made the right decision.
Will “typical” marketers frown upon the more creative route I’ve chosen?
Would a different concentration come with a higher salary?
Or even, will it be more difficult to find a job?
It’s easy to get lost in forums and articles, one discussing a particular opinion while the other states the opposite. Instead of continuously analyzing my fate, I decided to do some actual research. This led to one conclusion: if you are a marketing student, you need concrete social media skills.
It is well known that social media has dominated modern-day marketing, becoming a pivotal resource in many companies’ successes. How often did you think about Wendy’s or MoonPie before they began posting on Twitter? Or how many companies have you sent a direct message to on Instagram because it was faster than calling and being put on hold? On the outside, we can easily see more companies using social media to connect with their consumers, but what’s happening on the inside?
Surprisingly, as of January 2021, most companies expect their general marketing staff to be skilled in social media marketing. According to research published by the Statista Research Department, 91.9% of marketers are expected to utilize social media as a marketing tool in their jobs, which means about nine out of ten general marketers need to be educated about social media marketing. If you are studying social media marketing, this means you’ll have concrete proof that you possess skills companies are actively looking for.
However, if you’re studying marketing but have no intention of specifically studying social media marketing, that doesn’t mean you’re out of luck. You can find a free social media marketing course on Hubspot which takes less than five hours to complete. This will give you the opportunity to show employers that you have experience without dedicating your college experience to it. If you decide not to do this, throughout the rest of your college experience, your job search, or wherever you may be in life, make a conscious effort to educate yourself about the marketing side of social media. This goes for any marketer, but watch out for current trends, understand the algorithms, and know-how the basic target markets behave. (Ex. Younger generations frequent Twitter and engage with posts uploaded later in the day. Older generations prefer Facebook and tend to engage most during the earlier hours).
A good resource to check out for any aspiring marketer would be the news portion on the American Marketing Association’s website. Being a member of AMA requires you to purchase access, but AMA’s Marketing News is free for anyone to access and is a great resource.
Lastly, don’t be scared to start your own page promoting a particular hobby of yours or showcase a few items you’re selling. If you can successfully understand your own target market, a company would be more inclined to trust that you can understand theirs too.