Careers in Content Marketing

What is Content Marketing?

Content and Context are the buzzwords these days. Content Marketing is a judicious mix of traditional and modern marketing to engage customers. In simple words it is the application of social media tools, effective use of online medium for creating and promoting “Thought and Action Leadership content”, not to influence customers regarding buying decisions but to keep them informed about industry trends, provide clarifications and address their needs. Content Marketing aims to provide customers with what they want in terms of information products rather than trying to sell a company’s product or services/dump the prospect with the company’s sales literature.

Content Marketing is a million-dollar industry. It is a by-product of the Information Technology revolution in the Marketing arena. Content Marketing is the precursor to revamping messaging themes, conveying the essence of large text in few lines, irrespective of which part of the globe readers are. Content Marketing essentially addresses increased consumer awareness, constant demand for in-depth and research information, the opportunity to enhance a company’s brand etc and serving global audience.

How does it work?

If one were to buy a car or plan a holiday what would one do? One would browse travel-related websites, or websites of different companies manufacturing and selling cars, evaluate prices, features, go through user reviews, customer testimonials and then arrive at a purchasing decision. The whole process happens through a click of a mouse and irrespective of whether the person is at home or travelling. Content Marketing provides users with what they want and in the place and through the device preferred by them. For instance all the above steps can be executed either through a laptop or a mobile phone with an internet connection.

In comparison, in the past, buyers had to contact different dealers or travel agents over phone as the case may be, get competitive quotes, meet them at their place, and negotiate and so on. Content marketing provides the convenience of doing all that immediately as compared to the earlier time span of weeks or months for the same process.

Job Opportunities in Content Marketing

Web/Content Writer

A content/web writer’s role involves writing crisp and concise copy such that it immediately grabs the attention of online readers. Surveys claim that most of the readers decide to skim through an article only if the headline is impressive, since they do not have the luxury of time anymore. These writers are employed by companies across all sectors. With the digitalisation of newspapers, magazines, websites of television channels offering live-updates and the increasing online advertisements, even advertisement agencies employ them. A knack for writing, attention to details, ability to work under tight pressures and deadlines, multitask and coordinate are some of the prerequisites for the job. Graduation/Post Graduation in English and working experience in the same sector are preferred. Journalists and Writers with some relevant experience are the ideal candidates for this job. The salary could range from `12,000 to 15,000 for freshers whereas experienced candidates could fetch a greater sum ranging from `30,000 to 45,000 (experience of 4-5 years). In India, we do not have any specific institute offering courses in web/content writing, and even the veterans in the industry are either from journalism/advertising background. The ideal career growth could be Senior Content Writer, Content Manager, Content Lead and Content Head. Content Heads with experience of 13-15 years draw a salary of `18, 000,000 to 20,000,000. Content writing also involves the effective use of instructional design techniques to create storyboards, presentations that can be uploaded online and provided to readers. There are several institutes offering courses in instructional design or web content writing through the online medium, but the fees are highly expensive and it may be worth to pursue a program, only after several years of relevant work experience.

Online Marketing Executive

An online marketing executive is expected to almost everything if not more than that of a traditional marketing executive right from generating leads to conducting specific campaigns to providing sales support to gather marketing/business intelligence. The only difference is that he or she has to do it in an online medium. Important job skills include the ability to research information on the internet, awareness of cyber regulations like spamming, effectively using online alerts like Google Alerts in the interest and towards fulfillment of business objectives. An MBA from a reputed institution is the most sought after qualification for this job. Salaries could range anywhere from `20,000 to 30,000 and as one moves up the career ladder, they can earn much more handsome rewards. Online Marketing executives can also consider moving into areas like adwords, demand generation through online content.

Webmaster

This is one of the newest job profiles and is a very niche skill required in the industry. A webmaster’s job involves managing the website, ensuring that the organisation’s goals and objectives are kept in letter and spirit in the online medium, comfortably manage different online tools like Google Ad words, Content Management Tools developed in-house, and coordinate with writers, designers and Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to ensure timely delivery of content on the web. A graduate in any stream is eligible to apply for this job. Since it involves a high degree of coordination and creativity, aspirants are required to have a deep orientation towards planning and execution. A successful webmaster is one who uses the web as an effective marketing tool. The salary range for freshers could be anywhere from `8,000 to 12,000 but with 3 to 4 years of experience candidates can earn a huge sum as much as and even more than `50,000. Since this is a widely growing phenomenon it would not be possible to define a certain career path but is undoubtedly a very promising opportunity.

SEO and Social Media Specialist

Large organisations employ a SEO/and Social media specialist in addition to a webmaster, but in small organisations the task is often taken care by the webmaster. SEO expands Search Engine Marketing and it involves effective use of keywords to ensure that the company’s website is ranked high among search engines. They procure keywords that are searched frequently by web crawlers. Web crawlers are tools used by search engines to spot the keywords relevant to a particular industry/area of interest. On the other hand a social media specialist works towards ensuring timely delivery and consistency of the company’s messages across social networking tools like Facebook, Twitter, Orkut, internal and external blogs etc. Since both jobs are a sub function of the previous, the aspirants could lose interest and feel that it is monotonous unless they are able to think out of the box and exhibit zeal in the creative ideas that they could come up with. Salaries and career growth possibilities are similar to the former jobs listed above.

Prabu is working as a content management executive for a software testing company in Bangalore. His email id isprabumds@gmail.com and his LinkedIn profile is http://in.linkedin.com/pub/prabu-subramanian/21/143/a85.

About the illustration:

Used with permission from Mallika Yelandur.