At Inception, we have been hiring marketers since we opened doors. Along the way, we have actively helped and supported many clients with structuring their marketing roles and finding the right talent for those roles. Looking back on this recruiting experience, there is a clear evolution in what it takes to be a successful marketer.

While evaluating young marketer-recruits in recent times, we seem to use a combination of a broad general assessment of fit and thereafter a specific-skill match. Part science, part gut-feel, part assessment led – our methods are not foolproof but we definitely know what we are looking for – someone with the right mesh of marketer skills, aptitude and talent – and the willingness to apply effort across these to deliver performance.

Questions such as, ‘Are you a generalist or a specialist?’, are moot today, with the T-shaped marketer (I recommend this article if you want to know more about this) being the avatar that works. Even before one dives into finding those crucial 3-4 complementary skills that would fit the ‘T’ (pun intended), it is important to consider the breadth of marketing as a function in the current context. 

Here is my 4-dimensional approach to understanding this better. I hope this will equally help young talent seeking to build a marketer career as much as brands/businesses looking to build out their marketing teams.

A – Analytical Marketer: Data-driven decisions in marketing range from media spends & channel performance to digital metrics and performance marketing ROI. The analytical marketer is one who does not faint at the sight of a spreadsheet but can build pivot tables, chart and graph and interpret metrics (read numbers) into actionable/intelligible information. Budgets and % are not the only numbers marketers need to handle. There are more key skills needed as you move up the marketing lattice.

What it takes:

  • View data to understand trends and patterns 
  • Deriving insights & Info from data
  • Analytical ability to go to the cause or contributors for data points 

The Analytical Marketer is like your navigator, helping you identify key points along your map and aiding in course corrections so that your brand does not lose its way (or money!).

B – Brand Marketer: From positioning, articulations of value proposition, ability to translate those into a brand’s messaging and mapping the customer or buyer’s journey – the brand marketer’s work is foundational to marketing. From scanning the brand category, competitor research, thinking through brand architecture to brand archetyping, the brand marketer is like the compass in marketing. The strategic intent that is the output of the brand marketer’s work is what sets the direction and true north for the brand. 

What it takes:

  • A deep understanding of marketing fundamentals 
  • A keen business sense would be needed and additionally, 
  • An intellect to adapt emerging frameworks to shine a light on the brand’s challenges. 

Often, brand marketers are also solution-crafters to help architect the brand’s roadmap.

C – Creative Marketer: Whether one is crafting a brand’s visual identity, an impactful campaign or copy that sells and content that attracts followers, the creative marketer is much in demand today. In addition to creativity as understood in finer disciplines, a creative marketer needs to marry aesthetics in visuals or the written word with a sharp customer focus. The best of creative marketers are able to deliver content or design that is not only relevant but remarkable. In the attention economy, where share-of-mind is crucial, brands who win are the ones with the best creative marketers in their corner. 

What it takes: 

  • Ability to seek continuous inspiration
  • Remain clued into customer mindsets
  • Staying abreast of contemporary language & design trends. 

If marketing were a journey (hope my compass, map, navigation metaphors were not lost on you!), the creative marketers ensure you enjoy the ride and make it memorable.

D – Diligent/Disciplined Marketer: The devil is in the details. The power of an idea lies in its execution. I have more clichés from where those came from. And all clichés put together cannot underline enough – the importance of the diligent, disciplined marketer. From omnichannel advertising to marketing automation, running point on marketing, requires significant process adherence, discipline and diligence. Marketing operations can range from running campaigns to tracking them, leading nurture programs or handing comms on loyalty programs or handling community engagement or a thousand other avenues where marketing needs to perform on-the-ground. It is composed of grounded people who make no mistakes, miss no details and can be counted upon to ensure your brand’s marketing flywheel is spinning flawlessly. 

What it takes:

  • Ability to learn tools with DIY videos
  • Discover better ways to run a process
  • Stay abreast with changes in all platforms
  • Figure out marketing tech stack on the go 
  • Trouble-shoot when something (anything) goes wrong
  • Generate data on performance across channels, metrics
  • Rewire, re-do, rework as the case may warrant 

To be a successful diligent marketer, one needs not only a fine appreciation for all the different aspects of marketing but a genuine empathy for the customer and business outcomes that marketing has to deliver for.

Clearly, you cannot afford to be only ONE of the above marketers. At Inception, for instance, we find that the best marketers are exemplary at two of the above and competent in the other two areas.

  • For those seeking to begin their career in marketing, evaluate your skill sets and strengths against these areas and plan your path and invest in learning accordingly.
  • If you’re building a marketing team or hiring agencies: evaluate if between the in-house team and outsourced support – you cover all of these areas to ensure your marketing function is complete.

I’d love to hear more views on how the shifts in our marketing industry are shaping and re-shaping the talent needs and how best you’re navigating this. What else would you like to know about building a marketer team or career?

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