The Importance of Learning in Digital Marketing
For many, learning something new every day is the ultimate goal. In a fast moving industry such as digital marketing, the importance of learning is even more crucial. With industry specifics changing almost daily, keeping up to date and learning about new trends, algorithms and practices is now part of the job!
Just how important is learning?
95% of people think that learning about new things boosts your confidence - National Adult Learning Survey (1998)
On a personal level, learning is great. The confidence it gives to a person can transfer well into the workplace. Learning empowers employees and in turn increases morale and productivity. That's reason enough to show that we should never stop learning!
The ever-changing digital environment
In the ever-changing digital marketing environment, learning is a constant cycle. Just as you've begun to master one skill, a Google update could mean you have to start all over again! It's all part of a rollercoaster digital marketers are continually riding. If you want to get into digital marketing, you'd better be prepared to learn.
At Realise, one of the main reasons we invest in learning is to include latest updates and events when planning customer strategies. Our philosophy is that clients pay for high-level expertise and therefore we invest time and money into this type of training. Those who don't can get left behind or may be delivering outdated or less efficient solutions. In addition, the actual delivery of work brings learnings in itself! We enjoy being able to pass all these benefits onto our client projects. We also invest in sharing some key learnings back with our community through our blog and social media.
Which areas are effected?
In digital marketing, most areas are ever changing. Unlike traditional marketing, where methods stay quite similar and adapt over a number of years, digital marketing can adapt overnight. Areas such as search engine optimisation, social media management and content marketing are just some of those effected.
For example, in terms of search engine optimisation, Google are constantly updating and tweaking their algorithms. Recently, they built on their 'mobile friendly' policy, further favouring websites built to be mobile friendly.
In social media marketing, Facebook are again constantly updating and tweaking their policies. They've recently updated the news feed to favour friends posts over business posts. This means social marketing will now have an even smaller organic reach than before, resulting in many strategies being adjusted accordingly.
How do you keep on top of the trends?
In order to keep on top of everything, you must be constantly aware. This means watching videos, reading news articles and other media, following blogs of the main industry players and so on. It's a time consuming task but fortunately working with a good digital marketing agency should ensure that they keep up to date with latest developments, so you don't have to! Some examples of tools we use include;
The Facebook for business page offers tips, advice and best practice examples for paid and organic Facebook. It contains a bank of Facebook advert case studies, advice, guidelines and FAQs on creating Facebook ads.
Google webmaster guidelines will give you exactly that - guidelines on how to rank well. Read up on the guides and learn for yourself how Google chooses where a website ranks and adjust yours accordingly. Check here to be the first to hear about major search engine updates too.
3. Blogs
We read and recommend a number of blogs daily. Hubspot, eConsultancy and MOZ to name a few.
The MOZ resources section provides updates on search engine optimisation and how to keep on top if it almost daily. Be sure to keep tabs on their content if you're serious about learning about SEO and keeping on top of the updates!
Above are just three of many resources you can use in educating yourself about the ever-changing technical requirements of being a digital marketer. Facebook have their own help centre relating to Facebook paid ads, Google have their own centre regarding SEO and other platforms such as Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest will have their own too. Going direct to the platform is always the best way to find reliable information in real time.
The importance of learning is now more apparent than ever before - so keep on top of it and find success in a fast-paced growing industry! Utilise resources such as blogs to keep on top of rumours and trends but ensure you go direct for the most up to date and reliable information. In this industry, only the best educated will survive..