How to become a Digital Marketing Consultant in India

What is digital marketing?

Promoting your product or service by using the online mediums as a tool is digital marketing; which is a branch of marketing. With the upheaval of COVID-19, various brands have adapted the digital marketing strategy and established a position on social media apps.

This branch of marketing is not limited to just social media apps; which is the leading platform. Using Email marketing, blogs, SMS are a part of the tactic

Target Audience and Social Media

The myth that digital marketing is only targeted to the youth is overtly concealed in past couple of years. Although, the audience is primarily segregated as Generation Z ( Age 7 to 22) for Instagram, Millennials ( Age 23 to 38 ) for Twitter and Generation X ( Age 39 to 54) for Facebook. Developing content strategies by understanding the activity pattern of the audience plays a key role in not only successfully creating your strategy but also safeguarding the success of your execution. As email newsletters and blogs have lengthy content which is only read by a small percentage of people due to the decreasing attention span, social media posts act as helpers that say much by using less.

The career in Digital Marketing requires you to be exceptionally good in communicating with your clients as well as being well versed in the language of algorithms and SEO ( Search Engine Optimisation.) All brands have realised that whatever is on internet, will only get the chance to be in the race of final selection. The algorithms are designed in such a way that they implant your product/service in the audiences’ minds if you have consistent traffic on your profile.

Difference between Marketing and Advertising

People still use advertising and marketing interchangeably. However, Advertising is a branch of Marketing.

Advertising focuses mainly on the medium, is targeted towards consumers and lasts for a short time. Whereas Marketing focuses on the content, targets the potential customer with a good research about the product/service and lasts for longer time.

Many students mistake advertising for marketing and hence it is necessary to clear the doubts in the initial stage of their career planning.

Types of Roles

1. Digital Marketing Manager/ Consultant/ Executive
2. Content Strategist
3. Conversion Rate Optimizer
4. Pay-Per-Click Specialist
5. Search Engine Optimizer
6. Email Marketing Specialist
7. User Experience Designer
8. Analytics Expert
9. Social Media Expert

You should have a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing, Business Management or Multimedia and Mass Communications to apply for the position. Marketing is also considered a talented trait and hence, many companies sometimes hire those who are naturally good in that, despite their unrelated education background.

Why you should choose Digital Marketing?

With the development in education and rise in career driven lifestyle ideologies, every individual is taught to own a business/get a job in order to lead an independent life. This implies that each such company will require a digital marketing agent for their progress.

While concurrently many human jobs are being replaced by bots and AI, marketing requires critical thinking which is only possible by the working of a human brain. Opting for a career in this field would be a good decision as the opportunities are rapidly thriving.

Supposedly, you have established a boutique. If you hire interns initially for the promotion, you may get a few orders, recognition and a small community. Gradually, with the help of success in your business, you may hire an agency to handle your digital marketing. This agency already has researched about your potential community, practiced various tactics and is fully aware of how the website functions. There is only scope of further success, if the strategies remain consistent and adaptable to the changing trends.

When observed through the eyes of a client, the job may seem easy and smooth. However, it requires a lot of planning, dedication and consistency. Have I mentioned how important consistency is? Even if the job gets tiring, the rewards are fulfilling and worth struggling for.

Becoming a successful Digital Marketing Consultant

• Educate yourself thoroughly, join some extra courses.
• Build a community.
• The technology is updating every minute. Keep yourself updated.
• Understanding SEO and Algorithms; who are the modern agents of your content.
• Building your website client friendly and not in analytical language.
• Consistently posting 1oo% original content on social media.
• Not compromising with clarity for brevity.
• Having direct one-to-one conversations with your clients
• Be Open to changing your own ideologies with time
•  Have transparent talks and healthy relationship with your team
• Do not underestimate the power of trends on social media. Grab every opportunity.
• READ DAILY

Interpersonal Skills:

Creativity, Communication skills, Leadership, Emotional Intelligence, Reliability, Stress Management and Negotiation are the significant skills required.

Top Universities

1.Expert training institute (ETI), 2. IIDE – Indian Institute of Digital Education, 3. Delhi School of Internet Marketing (DSIM, 4. Digital technology institute (DTI )and 5. Tackstack are some of the top universities for digital marketing.

Scope in India

Marshall McLuhan had said that “The Medium is the Message”. Indians have always responded better to broadcasting medium than print medium. Today, online mediums have become the only platforms where they spend more than half of their daytime. Becoming a Digital Marketing guide for people’s businesses is a flourishing job in almost every country today, including India. The rise in the field of digital careers is unstoppable and inevitable. Indians are also well-known for being chatty and friendly, which also works immediately if you play your word game well.

The only threat is that the youth is extremely skilled with the functioning of internet. This means that every person whether it is an influencer, art page owner or small business profile; they all know how the internet functions. The sole difference between a professional marketing agent and a teenager posting regularly online is simply that of knowledge, not even experience. In order to develop a successful career with the threat of extensive level of competition, it is very important for aspiring Digital Marketing Consultants to get their hands filled with the bags of immense knowledge.