How to Get Hired in a Digital Marketing Agency in India

I was browsing through Quora the other day and I came across an interesting question asked by an aspiring professional;

"How do I get hired in a Digital Media Marketing Agency?"

Now, you see, this is not an unusual question asked by one person; a lot of people these wonder the mantra of getting into a Digital Marketing Agency. Well, frankly, I believe, to get hired in any of the industries these days, you have got to make sure that you have got all the expertise and most importantly charismatic enthusiasm, to dissolve in the company and become its new catalytic unit.

Now, to answer more specifically, keeping Digital Marketing Agencies in consideration, I would like you to first and foremost understand what a Digital Marketing Agency exactly does. A digital marketing agency usually has a dedicated team of digital advertising experts, graphic designers, web developers, creatives, analysts and account executives. To provide unbeatable digital services to each client, agencies prefer hiring candidates who don't just have an eye for details, but who also are creatively knowledgeable about digital trends; ad campaigns, events, and trending social media buzz. After building a team full of bold innovators, the agency strives strategically to deliver a digital experience beyond client's expectation.
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To become a Digital Marketing Agency fit, I would like to suggest you the following things:**

A recent article on The Wall Street Journal dated, Aug. 30, 2016 by KATE DAVIDSON quoted

A recent LinkedIn survey of 291 hiring managers found 58% say the lack of soft skills among job candidates is limiting their company’s productivity. In a Wall Street Journal survey of nearly 900 executives last year, 92% said soft skills were equally important or more important than technical skills. But 89% said they have a very or somewhat difficult time finding people with the requisite attributes. Many say it’s a problem spanning age groups and experience levels. [read the entire article here](http://www.wsj.com/articles/employers-find-soft-skills-like-critical-thinking-in-short-supply-1472549400?mod=e2fb)

Get Your Foundation Right:

Before you embark on your Digital journey, pause and get your foundation right. For instance:

1. Invest a quality portion of your daily time- Invest time in improving upon your Inter-personal skills. Having good interpersonal skills will always help you achieve success in any organisation you join. To sharpen your soft skills you can browse through these interesting article. Why Soft Skills Matter Coaching your directs on Inter-personal skills: ( An Audio file to which you can tune-in while doing your routine work)

2. Define your career objectives and goals- While improving upon your skills also spare some time to envision where exactly do you see yourself in an agency in the 1st month, quarter, year and 5 years. To understand the significance of knowing your goals and objectives, you can read. Resource:

3.Basic digital marketing skills- To attain the basic digital marketing skills, it is extremely important that you keep a tap on latest developments happening in the ever-evolving Digital space. To know more you can browse through- Why you need a formal education in digital marketing More Resources : - Invest in getting certified. Google Adwords, Google Analytics, Inbound marketing certification, Hoot Suite University

4. Fine tune your digital marketing skills - Learning and getting certified for Digital & Social media marketing skills is not enough; to stand out among the rest you have to keep exploring and learning. For instance: Knowing the best practices of yesterday's is not enough, you have got to keep a tap on as many latest developments as you can. The digital space we all share is dynamically surprising with several technology breakthroughs happening every single day. example: Instagram Stories, Facebook Live Videos

5. Spend time reading latest Digital marketing centric books- To become a good Digital Copy/Content Writer, you would first have to become an avid reader. So, I suggest, you get your hands onto every creative piece circulated online by people from across the globe. This will help you gain an in-depth understanding of the global perspective about things that matter. Once you get hired in an agency, you can use these insights and digitally market your product or service accordingly. To know more browse through- Social Media/Digital Marketing Books to read in 2016 Digital Marketing Blogs every Marketer should read
To have a better understanding, watch- To have a better understanding, watch How to get Hired & Stand Out in Digital Marketing in 2016 (VIDEO)

Prepare Yourself:

After attaining the theoretical knowledge and understanding of Digital Marketing, it is essential to take certain preparatory measures to make yourself agency ready.

1. Your Identity Online - Start with rebranding your online identity, embellishing it with newly attained skills and academic mastery. It would be foolish to ignore the fact that your potential employers would always try to 'Google' you prior to contacting you. Therefore, it becomes extremely important that you maintain the sanity and the aesthetics of your online portals, including Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, websites, and blogs.
   To get a better idea, I suggest you do a simple Google search for your name and location, and later scan through the results to locate areas you need to work upon. To build your online identity, start sharing, commenting, and reaching out with your individual take on the trending buz

   1. Your Resume - Before you drop another employment inquiry mail with your resume attached, make sure you have satisfactory answers to the following questions- -How interesting is your resume? How long is it? An ideal resume should comprehensively present your career objective, skill set, academic background, work experience, portfolio links, interests & hobbies, and most importantly your contact details. And, the length should not be more than 1-2 pages. To know more navigate to tip# 28 from this link- more resources

1. Read extensively- Make sure that you set aside 30 minutes time, read this, bookmark and share it with others : Job Interviews in Digital Marketing - 52 Things you SHOULD be prepared with

** 9. Research**- Before you start targeting agencies, make sure you conduct an in-depth research whereafter you have an extensive list of top digital marketing agencies, their company portfolio, their USP (unique selling point), their social outreach. Observe how the market their product and service, how they manage their brands on social media and what all mediums they use to reach out to the audiences.
Accordingly, document your observations and send across an expressive mail to share the same with the agencies. This can help you create a strong and favourable impression which could eventually help you in getting hired.

10. The Power of LinkedIn- Every social portal offers a unique set of networking possibilities. For any aspiring professional, LinkedIn is usually one of the most recommended sites. After all, it is one of the most powerful platforms for professional networking. To introduce you to the positive networking capacity that LinkedIn offers to each of its users,

I would like to share an interesting story. So, early this August, my teammate, Vignesh, came across a personalised connection invite on LinkedIn. The invite was sent byAditi Gulati, a Communications professional based out of Delhi. Vignesh was so impressed by Aditi Gulati's out of the box effort that he shared with me the invite where she creatively mentioned her admiration for digital india podcast a podcast scripted, anchored and broadcasted by staff and students of Web Marketing Acadamy, Bangalore.
I wasn't just impressed, I rather felt elated by having come across an avid listener to our WMA podcast, who found our marketing centric content to be of extreme relevance. The next minute, I navigated to her LinkedIn profile and found inspiring work-related details, whereafter we spoke about her effort on one of our podcast episodes which eventually led to an exchange of a series of feedbacks and she's connected with us till date.

After having recognized Aditi Gulati's enthusiastic potential and her enriched experience, we offered her a work opportunity and to your happy surprise, she will soon be working with us as our Content Marketing Strategist. Just like her, there are thousands of other LinkedIn users who everyday extract great benefit from networking smartly. Your LinkedIn profile is one of powerful tool, be pro active, participate, network and build an audience.

Reach out

Once you update and improve your online existence, start reaching out.

11. Connect- Reach out to Digital Marketing personnel who have enriched agency experience. Scan through their details both: academic and professional to understand what all you need to equip yourself with. Check out if their agency is sponsoring some event, if yes, then further check out the participation criteria and try attending event/s. This practice will help you go to do the offline networking which is undoubtedly rewarding.

12. Speakers in Conferences/Events- Attending events can be very fruitful; you can directly connect with the some of the most influential Marketers, as most agencies count on industry experts for delivering insightful speeches at their event. Some of the industry conferences you should keep a tap on include, Social Media Week and Ad Tech.

13. LinkedIn Pulse Post - Now, I have got to mention LinkedIn again. Have you heard of LinkedIn Pulse, yet? Have you ever posted quality content on Pulse? How many posts have you published so far? These are few questions which your potential employer most probably will ask you. So, start utilizing the free publishing space; Pulse powered by LinkedIn and voice your observations and opinions about trending developments in the digital space. This helps create a positive impression in the minds of you profile viewers.

14. Sample Digital Marketing strategy- Come up with a sample digital marketing strategy and share it with successful agency experts to know their feedback. This will help the experts understand and recognize your enthusiasm for becoming a part of the agency.

15. Attain problem-solving and crisis management ability- No doubt, Digital Marketing Agencies are one of the most exciting places to work in, but the fact that there is ever-pouring deadline pressure, is undeniable. So, if you till now do not have problem-solving and crisis management ability, try attaining it. And, once you gain it, do not forget to enlist it in your skill set.
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1. Communication skills**- If you have to make yourself Agency ready then you got to possess sharp communications skills. Because one day or the other, you might be asked to deliver successful pitches to your potential clients or present your agency's business strategy and that is why you have got to communicate like a pro.

17. Try attain additional skills- Apart from attaining essential digital marketing skills, try gaining an expertise on additional skills including the ability to organize/coordinate an event, to make simple on the spot fixes like website tag implementation, basic image/video/audio, etc. So, basically try learning how to become the hands-on go to person in any situation.

And, above all, be humble, most companies these days prefer hiring candidates with extraordinary attitude rather than aptitude. So, good luck to your digital job hunt! In case of any inquiry feel free to reach out to us at suresh@webmarketingacademy.in or just give me a call: +91 9731388721

(Side note: If you are really want a job in any agency, you will get it. You have to hustle and prove them you badly need that job!)

I have posted this in my #Linkedin Post here

Hope this helps and I have some blog post which might help:

• A Step by Step Guide to Modern Digital Marketing (PDF)
• Scope of Digital Marketing in India & How to get Started
• Digital Marketing Career Guide (Audio)
• Useful Posts on Digital and Social (LinkedIn Post)
• Podcast on latest digital marketing updates (Audio) Best regards

Suresh Babu,

Founder & CEO,

Web Marketing Academy Bangalore