The marketing field is full of diverse talent.
People with undeniable personalities. Masters of photography, design, and wordsmiths to name a few.
Many of these star marketers have no formal training and follow different paths to success.
The same goes for marketing itself.
People continue to apply science to marketing. And they continue to predict human behavior with a degree of accuracy allowing them to craft successful campaigns.
But as much as we’d like to believe marketing is a science, you can’t pin human behavior down to a set of immutable laws.
People are more complex and unpredictable than they are physics.
And marketers must be artful in discovering ways to continuously wow audiences.
So, if you’re a new marketing professional looking to get ahead, what can you do to supplement your art with a dose of reasoning?
How can you become “qualified” in a field where experience and imagination are the currency?
Become a Qualified Marketing Artist
Marketers must embrace the unpredictability of human behavior and learn to intuit successful strategies.
However, clear patterns and trends exist which they can study to bring a closer understanding of what works and what doesn’t.
As author Dan Ariely explains it:
We are “predictably irrational.” We are all bizarre, contradictory creatures, but we are predictably so.
Novice marketing professionals can use this predictable irrationality to develop skills for delivering the right message to the right audience at the right time.
Practice will get you there eventually, but earning marketing certifications can help push the needle.
It’s a form of growth-hacking. Artfulness mixed with a scientific mode of experimenting and evolving leads to better results.
Marketing Certifications for Novices
You’re looking to kick-start your career in marketing—as are thousands of others—so you must find a way to stand out.
Set yourself apart by earning marketing certificates to show real-world, concrete experience, and skill.
When a resume lists certain marketing certifications, you may be more likely to believe the applicant has the tenacity to keep learning and to better themselves.
Here are five marketing certifications that will grab a recruiter’s attention.
Facebook Blueprint
Facebook Blueprint must come first on this list. It’s the most innovative, widely applicable, and is the best performing platform for ads.
While Google invests in smart home technology and self-driving cars, Facebook is devoting developer energy into its advertising space.
And they are continually etching out fractional improvements in their machine learning algorithms.
But with this devotion comes a certain number of problems.
Facebook takes risks and often gets it wrong.
The platform can be buggy. And the sheer amount of data it collects causes it to be front and center with security concerns.
However, Facebook has stepped up to the challenge of the new General Data Protection Regulation and continues to be a vital tool for marketers.
The Facebook Blueprint Certification isn’t the most exciting learning experience you’ll ever complete, but because it’s connected to such a renowned platform, it’s necessary to achieve it.
Google AdWords
Google AdWords is a Google marketing tool which keeps up with Facebook.
And it’s still the highest performing digital channel by a mile for certain industries.
Using Google for ad purposes makes the most sense, especially because the platform owns over 70 percent of the search market share.
Additionally, the Google display campaigns reach 80 percent of internet users worldwide.
Understanding Google is a key competitive edge in today’s marketplace, and the company is likely to grow (and grow in the advertising space, too).
Another thing to consider, Facebook took inspiration from the Google model when creating their platform.
So learning Google puts you in a solid position to understand Facebook as well.
The AdWords Certification itself is well-developed.
The course is full of new content, is well-written, and quick to complete.
And you genuinely learn a lot—not just about AdWords, but also general marketing principles.
Google Analytics
Google Analytics is arguably the most valuable tool you can learn as a marketer.
It connects the art and science of customer behavior in a way that pinpoints next action steps.
Additionally, almost every client you’ll meet has Google Analytics installed and expects to benefit from it.
But here’s the catch, learning analytics is tough and technical, and that’s why it’s so valuable.
The Google Analytics Certification will help you go from basic optimization of ad accounts to CMO-level understanding of business strategy (and that’s no walk in the park).
And you’ll be training yourself to engineer the natural patterns of human behavior into successful ads.
HubSpot Inbound
The super-intelligent customer relationship management tool, HubSpot, has a free inbound marketing certification course.
It’s great if you’re looking to achieve tangible results in organic marketing.
There are only a few courses like this.
Organic marketing is a more subjective, less analytical discipline, and most people think they can teach themselves.
HubSpot Inbound provides tips and insights to help use unpaid channels to generate valuable traffic and conversions.
It guides you through the nuances of social media strategy, email marketing, building a landing page, and blogging.
And the best part?
All of these are accessible (even if you don’t have a marketing budget), so they’re incredibly powerful for beginners.
Excel for Marketers
Excel is a vital skill for marketers.
Almost every material you create or encounter as a marketer—your analysis, strategy, marketing plans–will filter through the prism of a database tool like Excel or Google Sheets.
Not learning how to leverage it will put you at a distinct disadvantage.
Instead of learning a particular platform, like Facebook, you can get many forms of Excel training that add organization and logic to your marketing.
Ladder delivers a course on Excel for marketers, but there are others such as Udemy or Lynda.
Whatever certification you choose, it’s important to get a grip on Excel so you can start making smart, data-driven decisions.
Marketing Certifications Help Propel Your Career
Whether you’re aiming to be a whiz at Facebook Ads, or you want working knowledge of the best marketing tools, earning a marketing certification takes you one step further in your marketing career.
Explore these marketing certifications and get started today.
