Perhaps you never imagined working in marketing, but suddenly, the field is calling your name. Thanks to online courses, picking up a new skill is easier than it has ever been, and in most cases, they cost a fraction of tuition fees. Recently, the online job aggregator Adzuna did a little web crawling and found a handful of brilliant digital marketing courses covering a range of topics, including SEO and email marketing. Here’s where and how you can get started with your upskilling efforts!
Specialised Social Media Marketing Online Courses
#1 – Introduction to Social Media Strategy
Skillshare’s Introduction to Social Media Strategy is taught by the Strategic Partnership Manager at Shopify and covers fundamental topics you need to understand to work in social media marketing. In addition to forming a social media strategy, it also touches on using tools like Buffer for organising and tracking your efforts. On the whole, this 9-lesson course is an excellent foundation for any SMM newbie.
#2 – Getting Started with Canva
Canva for Beginners is a $20 Udemy course that spans 15 lectures. If you’re not a graphic designer but want to learn how to create unique social media assets, this course is the perfect fit. Canva is a great design tool that can help you create beautiful images for web content, but there’s a learning curve involved before using the platform effectively.
#3 – Instagram Best Practices
Instagram Best Practices is available on Skillshare and teaches you how to make your brand’s Instagram page stand up to the likes of an influencer’s profile. The course is led by a professional photographer that worked with big names like Toyota and CNN and offers excellent advice on choosing the right images for posts and using suitable editing apps.
#4 – Writing for Social Media
edX’s Writing for Social Media covers assessing your target audience to develop the most compelling and engaging content on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Although you can do the 4-week course for free, it’ll cost you $99 to obtain certification.
Popular Public Relations Courses
#1 – The Ultimate Public Relations Masterclass
If you’re just diving into the world of PR, this masterclass from Udemy is the perfect starter pack. It covers how to develop the proper messaging, get in touch with members of the media, manage crises, and craft a PR strategy. Spanning across 51 lectures, this isn’t one of the shortest online courses, but it is very comprehensive.
#2 – PR Storyfinding 101
Another great Udemy course in the public relations niche is PR Storyfinding 101. It’ll help you understand how to find newsworthy angles for your brand. A former broadcast journalist turned PR consultant leads the course. It teaches you to identify exciting stories that the media will want to cover.
#3 – Use Your Networks to Build Buzz
Skillshare’s Public Relations course highlights the importance of networking for successful PR. This 9-lesson course will help you better understand your connections both within and outside the media industry and how to use them to your advantage.
Superb SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and SEM (Search Engine Marketing) Courses
#1 – Introduction to Search Engine Optimization
Coursera’s Intro to SEO course does a great job covering SEO basics and also dives deep into modern trends to follow. The course is just four weeks long and will leave you with a better understanding of SEO and the confidence to implement SEO best practices.
#2 – Digital Marketing with Google Ads
This AdWords course from Skillshare will help you pick up the skills you’ll need to run and monitor ad campaigns. We all know that paid search is an essential component of search engine marketing. With Google Ads leading the way, this introductory course is ideal for beginners.
#3 – YouTube Audience Growth 101
Udemy offers an online course that teaches you how to Build What Attracts Audiences. It covers YouTube SEO that includes attracting and growing subscribers and viewers based on content YouTube loves. This is by no means a short course. But the rewards are well worth the time you’ll spend on the topic. Over 69 lectures, you’ll learn how to master the art of Video SEO.
Enriching General Marketing Online Courses
#1 – Introduction to Marketing
Coursera’s Intro to Marketing course is an ideal fit for anyone that didn’t major in marketing but now wants to make a career shift. Taught by a top professor from Wharton, the course covers the three elements of customer loyalty. It focuses on branding, customer centricity, and practical marketing strategies.
#2 – Bridging Business and Technical Experts
FutureLearn’s Introduction to Data Science with Google Analytics offers great insight for understanding the role data plays in the marketing sphere. Keen to learn how to analyse consumer behaviour with Google Analytics? This beginner course in data science is the ideal foundation.
#3 – The Strategy of Content Marketing
Coursera offers a lecture series that covers the basics of Content Marketing. It’ll help you understand the importance of writing good copy and how to build brand awareness. It also covers the topic of authority and leveraging the content marketing ecosystem.
#4 – Market Research and Consumer Behavior
Another great general marketing course offered by Coursera is Market Research and Consumer Behavior. This course is ideal for anyone that wants to decipher customer behaviour better and solve marketing problems. It teaches you the techniques and tools to acquire data, parse through it, and use it to formulate solutions.
Final Thoughts
By expanding your knowledge of marketing, you’ll make yourself a more attractive candidate for prospective employers. With a new set of skills on your resume, you’ll be able to search for a broader range of positions. Start browsing Adzuna’s listings right now to see if you have the kind of skills employers are willing to pay more for!
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