The new communications environment and the rise of Web 2.0 services seem to require a variety of new skills and a new way of thinking. Focus on what the online revolution has created in terms of jobs and trainings in the specific field of digital marketing.
Facebook, Twitter, Google and Apple head the list of the 50 most innovative companies for 2012. One in every nine people on Earth is on Facebook. People spend 700 billion minutes per month on it. More than 250 million people access the website through their mobile devices and 2.5 million websites are integrated with Facebook. Twitter handles 1.6 billion queries per day and adds nearly 500,000 users a day, and Google + has more than 25 million users.
Economic rules have shifted and well-established marketing and distribution dynamics have radically changed as a result of easier access to the world's information via the Internet. Five years ago no one could have possibly imagined that social networks and new technologies giving us mobile access to the Internet would have changed our lives so dramatically.
Now information and content have become a valuable and highly priced commodity. In response to consumers’ behaviour, companies’ marketing strategies have recently become more digital. Marketing expert David Meerman Scott asked a simple question at his conference lectures around the world: “How have you personally orprofessionally researched a newproduc t to buy in the lastyear ?”Mainstream traditional media counted for 15% of the answers; Google or other search engine 100% and social media 85!
Social Marketing MBAs
Pat Spirou, Ph.D. Chair of the Marketing Department at Southern New Hampshire University believes that “There's a tremendous need in the marketplacefor professionals who know howto implement social media marketing effectively ”. SNHU is one of the first schools to begin offering an MBA in Social Media Marketing in 2010. Their online degree promises to give you ‘real-world understanding of social media marketingfrom instructors with extensiveindustry experience’.
The trend is for an ever-growing number of business schools to offer courses on social media management , governance and strategy. In Europe, for example, IE Business School offers a Master’s in Digital Journalism or in Digital Business Management , Hult Business School offers an Msc in International Marketing or Newcastle University an Msc in E-business.
Jobs in social media
Businesses seem to be of a different opinion and are looking for people with social media competencies in all fields – from management to sales and IT. Here is just one example from the UK where BT is seeking a Social Media Community & Content Manager and a Social Media & Online Analyst for their offices in London. Ultimate Asset, specialised in Digital Media, is hiring a Sales Manager – Social Media Planning Tech. Most positions require only experience in the field: knowledge of blogs, Twitter, web, PR, LinkedIn, good copywriting skills and personal activity in social media, but it might just be a matter of time before candidates will need an MBA in Digital and Social Marketing in order to be considered.
Web 2.0
The Internet has changed yet again and though it is a gradual ‘quiet revolution’ it is yet to impact upon our personal lives and business in ways we cannot yet understand. Web 2.0 brings social networking sites, blogs, wikis, videos haring sites, hosted services, web applications, mash-ups. This is a move which creates an online culture of public participation, remixing data and information, providing services rather than products. Web 2.0 allows users to interact and collaborate with each other in a social media dialogue as creators of user-generated content in a virtual community, unlike before where people were limited to the passive viewing of online content.
Companies such as HP invent a recreating buzz on the web by launching video contests on social networks and Youtube quite successfully. For example: Cindy Gordon's brave endeavour in announcing and popularising the Wizzarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando, FL . "Ratherthen spend a huge amount ofmoney on doing traditional PRand marketing, she chose to tellthe seven most popular bloggerswho write about Harry Potter.24 hours later, 350 million peoplehad heard of the new park tobe opened".
The new professional leaders in communications of the future are most likely to have titles like Community manager, Digital content manager, Social Media Manager and Social Media Analyst. Titles which today sound quite ambiguous and most often do not yet have proper job descriptions. The education industry is stepping in and helping create new professionals with a wide range of managerial and leadership skills, but with the added understanding of social media and new technology.