Learning and sharing... by Zoe Sands

idmb2b:

Just as email has become a ubiquitous business tool, so too will social media in the coming years. Therefore it is imperative that businesses take notice of social. When I first started my digital career at Hyundai back in 1997, I was the only person within the organisation that had an email account and access to the Internet. Gradually over time more people were provided with email and Internet access, and nowadays it’s expected you would have access or you cease to be efficient and effective in your work. Zoe Sands is Head of Digital, EMEA, at Juniper Networks and a member of the IDM Digital Council….

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(Source: theidm.com)

Last night I attended an event organised and hosted by the Institute of Direct and Digital Marketing themed ”Engineering your Business for Digital” (I was live tweeting at the event, to check out the tweets from last night go to Twitter and search on #idmdigital). The event consisted of a presentation from Richard Hartigan of Google; where he outlined the changes in digital looking back at the past 10 years to now. None of which was new to me having been working in digital since 1997, I’ve seen and been party to a lot of the significant changes in online marketing over the past 15 years. But what stuck accord with me was the panel discussion, which one of my friends Tim Bush, Microsoft was on. The general consensus of the panel was that organisations shouldn’t rely on agencies to deliver digital marketing excellence and that organisations should invest in up skilling their marketing teams with knowledge on how to execute the digital toolbox efficiently and effectively in integrated marketing campaigns. All too often organisations are lead by agencies because marketing teams capabilities lie in project management and are inexperienced in leading and driving digital strategies and plans themselves.

In these austere times increasingly marketers and in particular digital marketers are under greater pressure to create and implement effective digital marketing campaigns on little or no budget and without the assistance and support of agencies. Without strong digital skills and a good knowledge base, these marketers will find themselves pigeon holed into project management roles and missing out on future strategic communication, digital and marketing roles.

Education is key for a successful digital marketing career

As a digital veteran I have always been keen to maintain both my digital and project management skills, as I feel it opens up many more career opportunities. Education doesn’t have to mean expensive intensive courses; you can support your learning by attending industry conferences, exhibitions, open courses, online courses, reading books and blogs all of which should help you keep up to speed on the ever changing world of digital marketing.

Often as a digital marketer your marketing team or other departments will be looking at you to be an educator on digital best practice and have the experience to implement that knowledge into actual digital campaigns, programmes, processes and procedures. So, I would urge all digital marketers to develop a lifelong learning approach to online marketing. If you’re unsure where or who to study with when it comes to digital education, then check out the following reputable organisations;

The Chartered Institute of Marketing
The Institute of Direct and Digital Marketing
Econsultancy

All of whom have accredited professional short and long digital marketing courses and qualifications.

After 15 years of working in digital, I’ve recently started my IDM Diploma in Digital Marketing, which I should finish in December 2012. I decided to undertake this qualification because I wanted my experience professionally validated; you may have other reasons why you want to start your digital education journey, whatever it is good luck with your studies.

The IDM is currently running a content marketing experiment today, there’s quite a few articles written by thought leading B2B marketers on a range of subjects. Check out John Bottom’s article on B2B social media opportunbities and threats. Here’s my thoughts on the B2B social media research conducted:

“Great synopsis regarding the future of social media from some senior B2B marketers. For me the main opportunity is social media opens up a new two way communication channel with customers, prospects, brand enthusiasts and influencers that transcend all parts of the business from marketing to sales to customer service. Although, I do think the main threat to social media is where it should live within an organisation, what function should take charge of social media? PR, Marketing, Customer Service, Legal etc? Whilst this is still undecided organisations are often running many diverse social media strategies or should I say social media tactics, which aren’t in sync with the brand messaging and goals and are often fragmented diluting the effort put into social media to create engagement.”

What do you think the B2B social media opportubities and threats are? Post your comments on my blog or on the main IDM page.