Is Marketing, Communications or Public Relations the right career path for you?

Careers paths in Marketing , Communications and Public Relations.

Marketing often appeals to not only creative thinkers, but also numbers-minded statisticians. While many jobs in marketing are appealing, keep in mind that you must be willing to work long hours and not mind working evenings and/or weekends. You must be able to work well under pressure and thrive off meeting deadlines and goals that are set. In some positions substantial travel is not uncommon.

Here are some of the career paths one may take.

Market Research

Market Research involves researching the intended target. That target can be companies or individuals. In order for a company to capture a market it must first be able to understand that market. Research involves the first process of understanding the consumer, what their needs are, what their purchasing habits are, and how they view themselves in relation to the rest of the world. The ideal candidate for a market research position is a person who possesses both qualitative and quantitative analytical ability, because the job depends on your ability to gather data from human subjects, crunch numbers, and interpret the results accurately.

Brand Management

Brand management is the career track you hear about most often. It is the key function in the consumer products industry. Brand managers are always focused on the big picture. It is their job to distill the brand's essence, map out their competitors in their brand's category, identify marketing opportunities, and be able to effectively communicate the unique benefits of that product or service. They are also responsible for guiding the market research team by setting the agenda and criteria and also selecting the stimuli, such as product-benefit statement, pictures, product samples, and video clips. Once the research is complete it is the brand manager's job to analyze the data that's been collected then develop a marketing strategy.

This marketing strategy may call for a new ad campaign, development of new products, or drawing out a new vision for the brand. It is also then the brand manager's job to ensure that other functions such as promotions, market research, research and development, and manufacturing are orchestrated to implement the strategy that they have developed. Careers in product and brand management tend to attract high potential, well motivated individuals who can accept broad responsibilities easily and with little supervision, communicate well with other people, are willing to do some traveling, and thrive on constant change. Starting salaries are good, with career and compensation advancement based on achievement.

Advertising

If you decide that Advertising is the career track you wish to pursue you will find that advertisers work with all aspects of marketing from strategy to concept to the execution of the strategy. You will find that most jobs on the business side of advertising include account management and media buyers. Account managers act as the liaison between the agency's various departments and the client. Their job is to manage the execution of ads by making sure that they are created within the allocated schedule and budget. Account executives focus more on the consumer. Their job is to conduct research on demographics of the targeted consumers. They use that research to get to know what motivates their behavior in the marketplace. The job of the media buyer is to find media to place ads in. They use the demographic study that is done by the account executive to decide the best possible place to purchase ad space. Careers in advertising involve variety, compensation based on performance, creativity, travel, satisfaction from seeing ones' personal accomplishments, and contact with others. Advertising jobs are found in advertising agencies, media organizations, advertising departments in business firms and marketing research firms. The major career paths in advertising are account directors, managers, executives & media planner, coordinator and buyers and researchers and creative designers.

Promotions

It is not uncommon to find a dedicated promotions team in marketing firms. This team works on creating programs that unite advertising to purchase incentives such as special discounts, coupons, samples, gifts with purchase, rebates, and sweepstakes. In order to promote these programs the promotion team will often use direct mail, telemarketing, in-store displays, advertisements, product endorsements, or special kick-off events. Creativity and judgment are highly valued.

Public Relations

It is the responsibility of the Public relations department to manage the communication with the media, consumers, employees, investors, and the general public. They are considered the spokespeople for the company. They will often write press releases to promote new products or to keep the investment community informed of business partnerships, financial results, or other company news. If they are based out of media relations they will spend their time responding to information requests from journalist or pitch stories to the media.  The job and oath that a public relations employee often takes is to portray the company in a flattering light, uphold its public image in a crisis, generate a positive buzz around its company and business practices, and of course to publicize its products and services successfully. In order to do well in public relations you must have strong communication skills, the ability to articulate both with the written and spoken word, be able to understand a variety of people, be confident, and be able to learn quickly what your clients do in order to communicate their messages effectively. Public Relations professionals should also be quick thinkers and persuasive as well as have an outgoing personality and be will to be assertive.