Create your very own Auto Publish News/Blog Site and Earn Passive Income in Just 4 Easy Steps
Is there even a career in marketing anymore?
As we approach Content Marketing World 2024, I'm impressed by how much has changed in just 12 months.
In my opening speech last year I announced: “Content marketing is marketing.” At the time it felt slightly provocative.
As it turns out, the entire marketing practice has evolved to encompass something familiar to those who do content marketing: creating value through trusted, content-driven experiences.
Regardless of the paid, owned and earned media approach, most marketing organizations focus more on building trust than attracting attention.
To be clear, I'm not suggesting that traditional direct marketing and advertising techniques are dead. Nothing is dead.
What I'm saying is that modern marketing techniques require teams that are structured more like a media organization than a trading desk, driving attention, clicks and search results.
The old career ladder in marketing does not fit the new model
It's been a strange year in marketing. I've been saying this for 18 months, but it's still true. There is a silent recession in B2B marketing. There are challenges in the job market. And AI continues to suck the oxygen out of any discussion about possible innovations.
But as much as marketing seems to have changed, a lot remains the same.
For example, many people mistakenly believe that people stay in their jobs for much shorter periods of time than before.
In fact, the average length of employment since the early 1980s has been around five years. Although there are greater differences in employment relationships based on age and gender, it is a myth that young people have become significantly less loyal to working in the same company.
But how can you describe young people as the “job hopping” generation when their average length of employment is similar?
It would be easy to attribute this to the impatience of young people. Gallup research found that only half of workers ages 25 to 40 strongly believed they would be working at their company in a year, while 60% of older workers said the same.
However, these numbers are too similar to distinguish. Because if 40% of one part of your workforce and 50% of another part aren't sure they'll be there in a year, something else is at work.
We saw a similar tension in CMI's 2025 Career Outlook for Content and Marketing Professionals.
Overall, marketers are optimistic about their jobs and careers. More than three quarters (76%) are somewhat or very satisfied with their marketing role. However, more than a third (35%) say they are actively looking for another job or are very interested in it. That is 4 points more than last year and 7 points more than two years ago.
What is there?
The answer comes from the redefinition of “career management” in marketing and the associated lack of response from many companies.
Simply put, companies have evolved their marketing efforts, but the associated career paths are mazes that end in dead ends.
How it began…
In the 1990s and 2000s (yes, I was still back then), companies hired bright young people fresh out of college and placed them in entry-level marketing positions.
The company laid out a path – a ladder – for advancement to greater responsibility and higher pay. The person would advance from coordinator to manager, to senior manager, to director, to vice president, to senior vice president, and perhaps even to the C-suite.
The ladder reflected an employee's ability to advance from a “skilled player” to a manager of employees, teams, departments, regions and companies.
The employee's marketing specialty determined how he or she could move up the various career ladders. Product marketing, branding, sales and communications had different, functional career paths.
Then digitalization came into play. Companies began to differentiate between “digital marketing” and “other marketing.” (Some companies still do this today. Yes, it's weird.)
Worse, companies have divided their digital marketing into channel-based silos such as web, email and social. Confusing and isolated versions of career paths emerged.
Is it any wonder that content marketing has become yet another marketing silo with no clear career path?
The flattening of organizational structures has also created career silos. With the rise of technology-driven marketing, many companies have eliminated middle management in favor of more agile, faster, and multifunctional digital teams. Practitioners focused on channels, and executives spent time isolating (or duplicating) channel teams.
This chaotic organization obscures what it means to manage your marketing career within an organization. And it changes the nature of what it even means to lead a marketing career.
If marketing leaders care about retaining great talent, companies need to redefine, clarify and communicate pathways within their organizations.
How it's going…
In almost every company I've consulted with over the past few years, content and marketing managers have three options after reaching a certain level. You can:
- Move into a more siled, technology-driven marketing role, leaving behind integrated marketing and content to optimize one aspect of the marketing portfolio. (Senior Director of Social Media, anyone?)
- Switch to another company for a lateral entry position.
- Let’s build a solo practice.
The 2025 career outlook for content and marketing experts also confirms this experience.
We asked marketers why they think it's harder to find a marketing job than it was five years ago. Most (75%) attributed this to financial/economic pressures on businesses, but the next four responses were:
- More competition for jobs (69%)
- Marketers are not valued (55%)
- Poorly defined career path/ladder (34%)
- Poorly defined job responsibilities (34%)
Content and marketing professionals have lost their identity within companies. There is usually no obvious next career step. Therefore, they need to prioritize ways that lead to a better (albeit still isolated) marketing task.
Because of this, most respondents (76%) agreed that they “need to master specialized/niche skills to stay relevant.”
That's not surprising.
Most companies are still trying (almost five years later) to evolve in or out of the remote work and other digital disruptions of the pandemic. Many, if not most, younger marketers have probably never seen a clear career path in marketing.
Why we need new career paths in marketing
When I was CMO of a fast-growing startup, a mentor told me that hiring someone was the only really expensive thing a company does. So he said, “Do it carefully.”
If hiring is expensive, losing a great employee is also expensive. Some reports put the cost at an average of 21% of the position's annual salary.
The solution to retaining great talent cannot be to lock the content and marketing professional into a traditional, siled digital marketing career ladder. This misses the point of modern marketing – and jeopardizes your company's ability to retain the talented communicators of tomorrow.
Your HR department almost certainly has an established career ladder for some traditional marketing positions. It contains job descriptions for entry-level marketers, marketing managers, senior email managers, social media directors, etc.
But do these roles and descriptions match what's really going on within marketing teams in 2024?
In my experience, this is not the case for many. I am often asked to help organizations create new roles.
For now, I'm not suggesting the roles, titles, or even the type of team you should build. (If you're interested in my recommendations for content marketing career paths, check out The 7 Core Roles of a Content Marketing Team.)
I'm working to create new career path resources that reflect the reality of modern marketing organizations. So look for it later this year. In the meantime, consider this column the beginning, not the end, of the discussion about the new career path in marketing.
Creating valuable content-driven experiences has become a staple of modern marketing. Companies that differentiate to attract and retain their talent will develop the career paths that support them.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on the marketing career ladder. Find me on LinkedIn to continue the discussion.
When hiring, send the details of your vacancy to [email protected]and we will add it to our content marketing jobs page.
HANDPICKED RELATED CONTENT:
Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute
Create your very own Auto Publish News/Blog Site and Earn Passive Income in Just 4 Easy Steps
