When it comes to job availability and security, the future looks bright for inbound marketers.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) projects that employment for marketing managers will grow by 13% between 2012 and 2022. Job security for marketing managers also looks positive according to the BLS, which cites that marketing employees are less likely to be laid off since marketing drives revenue for most businesses.
While the BLS provides growth estimates for managerial-level marketing roles, these projections don’t give much insight into the growth of digital marketing, specifically the disciplines within digital marketing. As we know, “marketing” can refer to a variety of different specializations and methodologies. Since digital marketing is still relatively new compared to other fields, there is not much comprehensive research on job growth and trends in our industry.
To gain a better understanding of the current state of digital marketing careers, Fractl teamed up with Moz to identify which skills and roles are the most in demand and which states have the greatest concentration of jobs.
Methodology
We analyzed 75,315 job listings posted on Indeed.com during June 2015 based on data gathered from job ads containing the following terms:
- “content marketing” or “content strategy”
- “SEO” or “search engine marketing”
- “social media marketing” or “social media management”
- “inbound marketing” or “digital marketing”
- “PPC” (pay-per-click)
- “Google Analytics”
We chose the above keywords based on their likelihood to return results that were marketing-focused roles (for example, just searching for “social media” may return a lot of jobs that are not primarily marketing focused, such as customer service). The occurrence of each of these terms in job listings was quantified and segmented by state. We then combined the job listing data with U.S. Census Bureau population estimates to calculate the jobs per capita for each keyword, giving us the states with the greatest concentration of jobs for a given search query.
Using the same data, we identified which job titles appeared most frequently. We used existing data from Indeed to determine job trends and average salaries. LinkedIn search results were also used to identify keyword growth in user profiles.
Marketing skills are in high demand, but talent is hard to find
As the marketing industry continues to evolve due to emerging technology and marketing platforms, marketers are expected to pick up new skills and broaden their knowledge more quickly than ever before. Many believe this rapid rate of change has caused a marketing skills gap, making it difficult to find candidates with the technical, creative, and business proficiencies needed to succeed in digital marketing.
The ability to combine analytical thinking with creative execution is highly desirable and necessary in today’s marketing landscape. According to an article in The Guardian, “Companies will increasingly look for rounded individuals who can combine analytical rigor with the ability to apply this knowledge in a practical and creative context.” Being both detail-oriented and a big picture thinker is also a sought-after combination of attributes. A report by The Economist and Marketo found that “CMOs want people with the ability to grasp and manage the details (in data, technology, and marketing operations) combined with a view of the strategic big picture.”
But well-rounded marketers are hard to come by. In a study conducted by Bullhorn, 64% of recruiters reported a shortage of skilled candidates for available marketing roles. Wanted Analytics recently found that one of the biggest national talent shortages is for marketing manager roles, with only two available candidates per job opening.
Increase in marketers listing skills in content marketing, inbound marketing, and social media on LinkedIn profiles
While recruiter frustrations may indicate a shallow talent pool, LinkedIn tells a different story—the number of U.S.-based marketers who identify themselves as having digital marketing skills is on the rise. Using data tracked by Rand and LinkedIn, we found the following increases of marketing keywords within user profiles.
The number of profiles containing “content marketing” has seen the largest growth, with a 168% increase since 2013. “Social media” has also seen significant growth with a 137% increase. “Social media” appears on a significantly higher volume of profiles than the other keywords, with more than 2.2 million profiles containing some mention of social media. Although “SEO” has not seen as much growth as the other keywords, it still has the second-highest volume with it appearing in 630,717 profiles.
Why is there a growing number of people self-identifying as having the marketing skills recruiters want, yet recruiters think there is a lack of talent?
While there may be a lot of specialists out there, perhaps recruiters are struggling to fill marketing roles due to a lack of generalists or even a lack of specialists with surface-level knowledge of other areas of digital marketing (also known as a T-shaped marketer).
Popular job listings show a need for marketers to diversify their skill set
The data we gathered from LinkedIn confirm this, as the 20 most common digital marketing-related job titles being advertised call for a broad mix of skills.
It’s no wonder that marketing manager roles are hard to fill, considering the job ads are looking for proficiency in a wide range of marketing disciplines including social media marketing, SEO, PPC, content marketing, Google Analytics, and digital marketing. Even job descriptions for specialist roles tend to call for skills in other disciplines. A particular role such as SEO Specialist may call for several skills other than SEO, such as PPC, content marketing, and Google Analytics.
Taking a more granular look at job titles, the chart below shows the five most common titles for each search query. One might expect mostly specialist roles to appear here, but there is a high occurrence of generalist positions, such as Digital Marketing Manager and Marketing Manager.
Only one job title containing “SEO” cracked the top five. This indicates that SEO knowledge is a desirable skill within other roles, such as general digital marketing and development.
Recruiter was the third most common job title among job listings containing social media keywords, which suggests a need for social media skills in non-marketing roles.
Similar to what we saw with SEO job titles, only one job title specific to PPC (Paid Search Specialist) made it into the top job titles. PPC skills are becoming necessary for more general marketing roles, such as Marketing Manager and Digital Marketing Specialist.
Across all search queries, the most common jobs advertised call for a broad mix of skills. This tells us hiring managers are on the hunt for well-rounded candidates with a diverse range of marketing skills, as opposed to candidates with expertise in one area.
Marketers who cultivate diverse skill sets are better poised to gain an advantage over other job seekers, excel in their job role, and accelerate career growth. Jason Miller says it best in his piece about the new breed hybrid marketer:
Inbound job demand and growth: Most-wanted skills and fastest-growing jobs
Using data from Indeed, we identified which inbound skills have the highest demand and which jobs are seeing the most growth. Social media keywords claim the largest volume of results out of the terms we searched for during June 2015.
“Social media marketing” or “social media management” appeared the most frequently in the job postings we analyzed, with 46.7% containing these keywords. “PPC” returned the smallest number of results, with only 3.8% of listings containing this term.
Perhaps this is due to social media becoming a more necessary skill across many industries and not only a necessity for marketers (for example, social media’s role in customer service and recruitment). On the other hand, job roles calling for PPC or SEO skills are most likely marketing-focused. The prevalence of social media jobs also may indicate that social media has gained wide acceptance as a necessary part of a marketing strategy. Additionally, social media skills are less valuable compared to other marketing skills, making it cheaper to hire for these positions (we will explore this further in the average salaries section below).
Our search results also included a high volume of jobs containing “digital marketing” and “SEO” keywords, which made up 19.5% and 15.5% respectively. At 5.8%, “content marketing” had the lowest search volume after “PPC.”
Digital marketing, social media, and content marketing experienced the most job growth
While the number of job listings tells us which skills are most in demand today, looking at which jobs are seeing the most growth can give insight into shifting demands.
Digital marketing job listings have seen substantial growth since 2009, when it accounted for less than 0.1% of Indeed.com search results. In January 2015, this number had climbed to nearly 0.3%.
While social media marketing jobs have seen some uneven growth, as of January 2015 more than 0.1% of all job listings on Indeed.com contained the term “social media marketing” or “social media management.” This shows a significant upward trend considering this number was around 0.05% for most of 2014. It’s also worth noting that “social media” is currently ranked No. 10 on Indeed’s list of top job trends.
Despite its growth from 0.02% to nearly 0.09% of search volume in the last four years, “content marketing” does not make up a large volume of job postings compared to “digital marketing” or “social media.” In fact, “SEO” has seen a decrease in growth but still constitutes a higher percentage of job listings than content marketing.
SEO, PPC, and Google Analytics job growth has slowed down
On the other hand, search volume on Indeed has either decreased or plateaued for “SEO,” “PPC,” and “Google Analytics.”
As we see in the graph, the volume of “SEO job” listings peaked between 2011 and 2012. This is also around the time content marketing began gaining popularity, thanks to the Panda and Penguin updates. The decrease may be explained by companies moving their marketing budgets away from SEO and toward content or social media positions. However, “SEO” still has a significant amount of job listings, with it appearing in more than 0.2% of job listings on Indeed as of 2015.
“PPC” has seen the most staggered growth among all the search terms we analyzed, with its peak of nearly 0.1% happening between 2012 and 2013. As of January of this year, search volume was below 0.05% for “PPC.”
Despite a lack of growth, the need for this skill remains steady. Between 2008 and 2009, “Google Analytics” job ads saw a huge spike on Indeed. Since then, the search volume has tapered off and plateaued through January 2015.
Most valuable skills are SEO, digital marketing, and Google Analytics
So we know the number of social media, digital marketing, and content marketing jobs are on the rise. But which skills are worth the most? We looked at the average salaries based on keywords and estimates from Indeed and salaries listed in job ads.
Job titles containing “SEO” had an average salary of $102,000. Meanwhile, job titles containing “social media marketing” had an average salary of $51,000. Considering such a large percentage of the job listings we analyzed contained “social media” keywords, there is a much larger pool of jobs; therefore, a lot of entry level social media jobs or internships are probably bringing down the average salary.
Job titles containing “Google Analytics” had the second-highest average salary at $82,000, but this should be taken with a grain of salt considering “Google Analytics” will rarely appear as part of a job title. The chart below, which shows average salaries for jobs containing keywords anywhere in the listing as opposed to only in the title, gives a more accurate idea of how much “Google Analytics” job roles earn on average.
Looking at the average salaries based on keywords that appeared anywhere within the job listing (job title, job description, etc.) shows a slightly different picture. Based on this, jobs containing “digital marketing” or “inbound marketing” had the highest average salary of $84,000. “SEO” and “Google Analytics” are tied for second with $76,000 as the average salary.
“Social media marketing” takes the bottom spot with an average salary of $57,000. However, notice that there is a higher average salary for jobs that contain “social media” within the job listing as opposed to jobs that contain “social media” within the title. This suggests that social media skills may be more valuable when combined with other responsibilities and skills, whereas a strictly social media job, such as Social Media Manager or Social Media Specialist, does not earn as much.
Massachusetts, New York, and California have the most career opportunities for inbound marketers
Looking for a new job? Maybe it’s time to pack your bags for Boston.
Massachusetts led the U.S. with the most jobs per capita for digital marketing, content marketing, SEO, and Google Analytics. New York took the top spot for social media jobs per capita, while Utah had the highest concentration of PPC jobs. California ranked in the top three for digital marketing, content marketing, social media, and Google Analytics. Illinois appeared in the top 10 for every term and usually ranked within the top five. Most of the states with the highest job concentrations are in the Northeast, West, and East Coast, with a few exceptions such as Illinois and Minnesota.
But you don’t necessarily have to move to a new state to increase the odds of landing an inbound marketing job. Some unexpected states also made the cut, with Connecticut and Vermont ranking within the top 10 for several keywords.
Job listings containing “digital marketing” or “inbound marketing” were most prevalent in Massachusetts, New York, Illinois, and California, which is most likely due to these states being home to major cities where marketing agencies and large brands are headquartered or have a presence. You will notice these four states make an appearance in the top 10 for every other search query and usually rank close to the top of the list.
More surprising to find in the top 10 were smaller states such as Connecticut and Vermont. Many major organizations are headquartered in Connecticut, which may be driving the state’s need for digital marketing talent. Vermont’s high-tech industry growth may explain its high concentration of digital marketing jobs.
Although content marketing jobs are growing, there are still a low volume overall of available jobs, as shown by the low jobs per capita compared to most of the other search queries. With more than three jobs per capita, Massachusetts and New York topped the list for the highest concentration of job listings containing “content marketing” or “content strategy.” California and Illinois rank in third and fourth with 2.8 and 2.1 jobs per capita respectively.
Again, Massachusetts and New York took the top spots, each with more than eight SEO jobs per capita. Utah took third place for the highest concentration of SEO jobs. Surprised to see Utah rank in the top 10? Its inclusion on this list and others may be due to its booming tech startup scene, which has earned the metropolitan areas of Salt Lake City, Provo, and Park City the nickname Silicon Slopes.
Compared to the other keywords, “social media” sees a much higher concentration of jobs. New York dominates the rankings with nearly 24 social media jobs per capita. The other top contenders of California, Massachusetts, and Illinois all have more than 15 social media jobs per capita.
The numbers at the bottom of this list can give you an idea of how prevalent social media jobs were compared to any other keyword we analyzed. Minnesota’s 12.1 jobs per capita, the lowest ranking state in the top 10 for social media, trumps even the highest ranking state for any other keyword (11.5 digital marketing jobs per capita in Massachusetts).
Due to its low overall number of available jobs, “PPC” sees the lowest jobs per capita out of all the search queries. Utah has the highest concentration of jobs with just two PPC jobs per 100,000 residents. It is also the only state in the top 10 to crack two jobs per capita.
Regionally, the Northeast and West dominate the rankings, with the exception of Illinois. Massachusetts and New York are tied for the most Google Analytics job postings, each with nearly five jobs per capita. At more than three jobs per 100,000 residents, California, Illinois, and Colorado round out the top five.
Overall, our findings indicate that none of the marketing disciplines we analyzed are dying career choices, but there is a need to become more than a one-trick pony—or else you’ll risk getting passed up for job opportunities. As the marketing industry evolves, there is a greater need for marketers who “wear many hats” and have competencies across different marketing disciplines. Marketers who develop diverse skill sets can gain a competitive advantage in the job market and achieve greater career growth.
