The industry is quite wide spread and keeps blooming, never stopping. Whether there's a pandemic or recession or climate change, marketing industry does not stop. With the evolving marketing campaigns and marketing strategies, the roles of marketing specialist demands something more than what an average marketing specialist may offer.
This simply means, you need to stand out to land your dream job. And that happens when you have a really good marketing specialist resume.
There are many people out there, with their resumes, getting rejected or landing jobs where they are overworked and never getting fairly compensation. While the industry does play a role in this situation, there is some efforts that you can put in to protect yourself. With a set of skills, extra knowledge and outstanding resume, you can make a huge difference, if you present it all well.
Let's learn how to do that. You should also check out our resume examples and figure out which format is best for you.
How to write a Marketing Specialist resume?
You are a marketing specialist so you know how a marketing strategy can impact the sales directly. Your resume is where you market yourself so that the hiring manager would want to hire you.
Your marketing specialist resume is your digital marketing, print marketing, advertising and sales pitch! Your resume, your cover letter, your details in a job application, your portfolio are all your marketing materials. Why should you be hired and if hired how will you make the employer's organization better?
Marketing specialists have ton of skills and experience but often forget that when they are job seekers, they are supposed to market themselves too. You are reading this article meaning you are not about to make that mistake so let's learn how to market you in your marketing specialist resume!
Choose a format
When you are sitting down to write your resume, first you will read this article, then refer to some resume examples and resume templates. And then you will decide which format you are going to use for your marketing specialist resume.
There are various resume formats: minimalist, modern, traditional, contemporary, visual, creative and so on. You need to choose the format that-
- is in accordance with the expected professionalism level, creativity level in the industry of your employer
- is suitable to ensure your profile is laid out in the best manner possible for visual appeal as well as readability
The format is very important because it will determine how your resume presentation looks and as important as the details are, the presentation is going to make all the difference for you.
As a marketing specialist, you should reflect your capabilities and skills in your resume and that will leave a good impression on the hiring managers.
We all know how on social media posts, the good presentation gets better reach. Whether it is social media marketing or digital marketing or print marketing, marketing is essentially all about how you present the goods to create demand.
And you don't always need a whole marketing team, just a good knowledge on how to present.
Contact info
Once you have chosen a format, start putting in information. First up, you have contact information section. Begin with your name, followed by your contact number.
After the contact number, mention your professional email ID and make sure that your contact number and email ID are both reachable.
After that you may want to mention your home address in short if you are applying to another state or country, otherwise you can also leave it out as it is not mandatory.
Make sure your email ID is professional and doesn't have informal parts. And mention your contact number properly with + sign, () parenthesis and spaces. any mistake could mean that even if you get shortlisted, the recruiter will not be able to reach you.
Marketing Specialist Resume Summary
The summary of any resume is important but summary of marketing specialist resume? Even more important! You need to make an impact that is effective enough for the recruiters to think- this person really knows marketing, I should go through the resume carefully.
Your summary begins with the title of your position. After that there are 3-5 bullet points. First bullet point will cover the number of years of your professional experience. After that comes your key accomplishments and skills. And at last your dedication for performing well at your next opportunity and the kind of opportunity you are looking for.
Make sure you use numbers and quantify your accomplishments, skills and knowledge as much as possible. Numbers help with the credibility and make you seem legitimate.
For example, if the handwash soap bottles had written on them- kills most bacteria and very effective, very few people would be tempted to buy them. But with the- kills 99.9% bacteria- written on the handwash soap bottles, we all know how easily they sell out.
Hence, use numbers to tell the recruiter, what all you have to offer.
Experience
Your professional experience is important for your marketing specialist resume. The experience section of resume is the evidence that backs all your claims of 'skills, knowledge and accomplishments'.
When writing the experience section, note the company name, the period of time that you worked there for and then the details of how you contributed. Do not get stuck on your responsibilities, rather highlight the challenges you overcame, accomplishments and helped make difference for the company.
You should note the marketing campaigns you successfully carried out the new marketing strategies you developed and implemented along with the results you achieved from these actions.
Try to talk about what all you did, in addition to your given responsibilities, how you performed better than your counterparts and the dedication and passion you bring to your work.
Half the battle of getting hired is about creating an impression of confident, capable, skilled potential candidate and convincing the recruiter that all your claims in resume are true and there's more unlike an average resume that is half fluff and jargon and barely half facts.
Education
Your education background is your foundation on which you build your career. If your foundation is weak, your building will not stand tall or strong. When you mention your education, begin with the education institution's name and location. After that mention your degree.
To relate how you started your career in the marketing field, you can also briefly mention the relevant coursework, awards, accomplishments. If you participated in any special programs or online courses in addition, you should also mention that.
Your resume should have a flow like you are telling a story which means you can explain how your education or a part of it, inspired you into becoming a marketing specialist.
Marketing Specialist Skills
As a marketing field professional, you must already know all the skills you have and need for the role of marketing specialist. What you might not know is that you should try to reflect proofs of your skills in your resume.
When you are noting down the skills, make sure you use the terms that are used in the marketing department by marketing professionals. Throughout your resume try to provide proofs of your skills through your experience and accomplishments.
When you are mentioning skills, be sure to include all the hard skills, soft skills, technical skills and anything that may qualify as a marketing skills. You should also include skills of related and overlapping fields such as advertising, management, social media, digital media, public relations, communications, business development and so on.
Certifications
Certifications are not always mandatory however they make a great addition and prove you to be a candidate who has something more than the average applicants. There are many certifications for marketing field.
You should mention the certifications with brief details of what you learned. You can also acquire the certifications by pursuing short term marketing courses online in case you don't have any certifications yet. These courses are short term and easy to complete and add good value to your marketing specialist resume.
Extra
If you have any awards, hobbies, interests, recognitions or such, you can also add an extra section in your resume and mention those details. Many hiring managers are not interested in the obvious requirements that a candidate should fulfil, some of them often look for 'character' of the candidate and what is something extra or unique about the candidate.
You can also mention any marketing events you attended or market research you conducted or project management that you handled well. You can mention everything that will reflect your knowledge and skills of the field, the tasks you've successfully completed and anything extra that you have attended that is relevant.
Whether it is something like email marketing or online marketing or marketing campaigns of big scale. The more keywords included, the better your resume.
You can add the extra details to show that you have a little extra, something different and something better to offer than your fellow job applicants and that's why you should be hired.
You can also reflect your USP as a marketing specialist and a professional person to convince the hiring managers.
What will get you your dream job?
We talked about the outline of the marketing specialist resume. But now, let's get you some extra tips so you can land your dream job!
Because marketing industry has a huge market and chances are you can land a dream job with exceptional compensation if only you have the right resume.
In 2022, global digital marketing industry reached the value of US$ 321 billion! And by 2028, it is estimated to reach US$ 671.86 billion!
Skills
When you are noting down your skills, ensure that you include some of the skills that set you apart. Skills that help you have a different perception and approach for better efficiency and impact.
How you utilize your skills in ways that are not that popular in the industry, how your skills help you out-perform your fellow marketing specialists and the expectations from your role.
Fulfilling what is expected is not enough if you want your dream job, you should offer more than what is expected.
Keywords
Lately there's a new challenge for job seekers in the market. The Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS). Sounds like some intelligence agency's tool, doesn't it? Well, it's not anything like that however you need to beat it.
ATS tracks all the resumes that are received by the hiring managers and then it filters the resumes to shortlist the best candidates. The filtering is done with the parameters of relevant keywords.
Meaning your resume must have all the relevant key words for your role/ job title, job description, employer, industry and everything in between. The keywords should be included throughout the resume and should not be overused or underused. Ensure the readability of your resume is maintained.
Quantifying
As mentioned before briefly, the number are important. Your skills, your experience, your accomplishments and everything else should be quantified. The results you provided to your employers should be laid out in numbers wherever possible.
Make sure that your summary and experience in particular, has the quantified details.
Portfolio
As marketing specialist, you might have a portfolio, social media links of the clients and entities that you have worked for and achieved results for. You can mention the details from your portfolio in your resume.
You should mention the links if possible to show how well you have performed in the past. Your portfolio is your literal proof of skills and experience. It will help you a great deal with the hiring manager.
Cover Letter
Last but not least, write a cover letter to the recruiter. In the cover letter, address the hiring manager and lay out how you want to contribute to the company with all your skills and knowledge and experience.
What all will you bring to the table when hired and how passionate you are about this job.
Conclusion
We have covered the format, the outline of the marketing specialist resume and the extra tips to ensure you land your dream job. Once you have written your resume, check it for any spelling errors, grammatical mistakes and details' inaccuracy. Proof read your resume twice before saving it.
Save your resume in .doc or .pdf formats and label it with your name_resume to keep it simple, clear and professional.
That's it! Now you know everything there is to know about marketing specialist resume! You can also check out our resume examples and templates.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Do I need a marketing degree for the role of marketing specialist?
Well, there are many successful professionals who didn't exactly graduate with a marketing degree and still thrived. So not really.
Having a relevant degree, courses and certifications certainly helps however you should check the job description for the exact requirements laid out by the hiring manager for the particular role.
Do I need cover letter and resume both?
You certainly need a resume. Cover letters are however, often optional. That said, including cover letter only increases the chances of landing the job.
It may not be mandatory but it will certainly intrigue the recruiter.
I'm applying for a marketing manager role, can I still use this guide article as a reference?
Don't worry, we have got you covered. We have a marketing manager resume titled article for you with all you need to know. Head to our resume examples page and take a look.
