5 Essential Skills a Digital Marketing Consultant Should Have

Do you know how much marketers all over the world spent on digital advertising in 2015?

A whopping US $161.77. That’s how much.

Then 2016 came. And when it went, it went with a banging, resounding 12% increase in marketing budget expenses.

What do all these figures say? A lot, but the primary takeaway is that more and more organizations are seeing the utmost importance of online marketing. As it should, seeing that as of December 2017, more than 4.1 billion people use the Internet.

It also points out that now is the time for you to become a digital marketing consultant. That there is no other better time than now for you to get on this innovative marketing bandwagon.

It’s easier said than done though. Yet, succeeding in this field is totally doable.

First, you need to make sure you have these five essential skills.

1. Ability to Recognize What the Statistics Say

Being a digital marketing consultant isn’t all about colorful language, bring and vivid advertising tools, or amazing, attention-grabbing displays. It’s also about numbers.

And when it comes to digital marketing, there are more crucial numbers than you can ever imagine.

It’s for this reason that successful digital marketers know how to make sense of all the statistics associated with this field. How these digits, percentages, and fractions can impact their marketing campaigns. And how they can make these work for and not against them.

Here’s an example:

According to the Gartner CMO Spend Survey 2016-2017, 2016 marked the third year of an increased marketing budget. It showed how larger companies spent 13% of their revenues on marketing alone. It also revealed that smaller organizations spent about 10% of their yearly profits on their marketing campaigns.

So as a digital marketing consultant, how do you use this information? One way is to use it as a benchmark. As a way to ensure your own organization isn’t overspending or underspending.

Or in the case of offering consultancy services, ensure your clients’ budget is withina reasonable range. This way, they can keep up with the ever-changing world of digital marketing, while avoiding sudden budget cuts because of overfunded marketing campaigns.

You know how proper personal budgeting means setting goals and factoring all expenses and cash inflows? Budgeting for clients who need your digital marketing expertise is pretty similar. Spending greater than the revenues can result in major losses.

2. Exceptional Data Analysis

You want to know how to make money in online marketing and retire early, right? If you’ve got number one on this list covered, you’re on the right track to becoming a digital marketing consultant. But, there are more numbers waiting for you.

In addition to your skill of understanding and harvesting info from statistics, you also need to excel in data analysis. All successful marketers out there can handle the online analytic tools of today. Whether they’re pure digital, traditional, or a mix.

Think Google Analytics and Iconosquare for example. And let’s not forget the built-in analytics of your favorite social media platforms Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

To succeed as a digital marketing consultant, you need to base a lot of your decisions on data and metrics. After all, these influence your goals and how well your campaigns perform.

Keep in mind that today, marketing automation and analytic tools play as important a role as any other computing device you have. As such, you need to have the skill that lets you process all these information and harvest relevant details without panicking.

Remember, technology always comes with data. And because technology always changes and improves, that means even more data for you to deal with.

And there’s the thing about clients wanting to know the specifics of their marketing campaigns. If you can present these into an easy-to-understand layout, you’ll no doubt impress them.

3. You’re on the King’s Good Side

In the kingdom of online marketing, the first thing you should learn more about is the King.

Leading business magazine Entrepreneur talked about how content is king. Everything you’ll find online revolves around content.

Forbes magazine also released its own piece on the matter. In the article, it talked about how content will always be king.

Considering that these two websites are leading publications, you’d already trust their word for it. The thing is, there’s more to content than just publishing loads of it. There’s more to ensuring your own (or your clients’) online assets really follow the king than just routine creation of posts.

In essence, you need to be a great storyteller to be a great digital marketing consultant. You need to know how to create a story and put it into writing. And as important is ensuring that your stories capture the interest of your client’s market.

You may have a personal love for all things DIY, and you have such great stories about it. But you can’t use this as a marketing tool if your client is all about providing certain services. Your stories of giving things a go defeat the purpose of your client, which is to provide professional, expert services.

We hope you’re getting our gist, because if not, then that means we’ve failed as storytellers.

See where we’re getting at?

In a nutshell, a marketer’s success, be it on the digital or the traditional platform, also depends on how they curate content. Since we’re talking about you getting into the digital marketing bandwagon, then that means web publishing.

Always remember that content is one of the most powerful tools in today’s inbound marketing industry. When you can tell a story and people find it great and useful, you’ll no doubt drive traffic to your clients’ online platforms.

And from traffic, you can then convert them into leads, then into paying customers for your own customers.

4. Social Skills that Attract, Impress, and Engage

On a personal level, you most likely have thought of making investments. But because many of these involve making considerable expenditures, you want to make sure you’re putting your money in the right investment media.

As a digital marketing consultant, it’s basically the same when choosing which portals you’d want to market your clients in. In such a social, digitally-connected world, you want to make sure the organizations you work for are highly visible on social media networking platforms.

Here are a few stats to put social media into perspective:

• As of 2017, a shocking 2.46 billion people used social media.
• At the time of this writing, this number went up to 3.196 billion.
• Facebook remains the ruler of all social media sites, with 2.167 billion users.
• It’s followed closely by YouTube, at a 1.5 billion-user count.
• More than 50% of adult Facebook users access their account multiple times a day.

What do all these tell you as a digital marketing consultant?

That you have access to a multi-billion audience. That social media has such a large market that it would be a complete waste for you not to take to social marketing. That not taking advantage of this sector can mean huge losses on your clients’ part.

Seeing that these are sites where people socialize, it’s time you polish your social skills. Present your clients through these platforms with the intent to attract, impress, and most importantly, engage their target market.

And remember: The King plays a major role in how effective your social media marketing campaigns are. After all, your goal is to let people know about your clients, and the best way to do so is through relevant and interesting content shared via social media networking sites.

5. Powerful, Well-Rounded Communication Skills

In a world where the competition is in every corner, you can’t afford to not have a voice. Especially in the online world.

This is why as a would-be marketer, you should polish your communication skills. All marketers need to know how to communicate because that’s their job after all.

But only those who succeed possess such powerful soft skills that allow them to communicate not just with their clients, but their clients’ customers too.

Always keep in mind that successful marketing campaigns result only from a direct, clear message addressed to a specific target market. As a digital marketing consultant, you’ll need to use the appropriate tone for them, whether in terms of age or gender.

And you can’t just be proficient in one way of speaking or writing. You have to master the art and science of written and verbal communications.

You also need to accept that digital marketing grows every second. And with every second that passes, you only have a few milliseconds to capture the interest of consumers. You have a tiny amount of time to hold on to this interest and make consumers remember the brand you’re marketing.

Ready to Become a Successful Digital Marketing Consultant?

Digital marketing is here to stay. And as the numerous studies and research done on it show, it’s only going to grow in massive proportions.

So, if you want to become a digital marketing consultant, then now is the best time for you to start doing so. You want to get ahead of the competition, and taking that step now to developing or honing these skills can make all the difference.

Enjoyed this article? Want to get access to more business-related tips and tricks? Then head to our blog now!