In October, the USC Career Center put on the Marketing & Advertising Panel as part of the student-led Industry Insights series that invites panelists to share their career experiences. Three professionals from the field joined students to share their knowledge from working in the field with roles in media agencies, sales, content creation, social media management, and more. Student intern, Alex Higa, moderated the panel.

Panelists

Chelsea Wyatt is an Early Careers Recruiter at OMG23, an agency that works with Disney for their marketing. Prior to joining the HR department, she worked at various other companies in print media and digital.

Nikolas Brown is a Talent Acquisition specialist at Gallo Wines, one of the world’s largest wine and spirits companies. Before he became a recruiter, Brown served in the sales department that works with grocers and other clients to sell wine.

Michael Hunter is a Master’s in Digital Media Management candidate at USC Annenberg with extensive career management and content creation experience in sports and music. Currently, he is a Live Social Contributor with the NHL for the three teams in the New York City area: the Islanders, Ranger, and Devils. Additionally, he serves as a social media manager with Atlantic Records and EMPIRE where he runs the accounts of artists such as A Boogie Wit da Hoodie, OhGeesy, and 310babii. His past employers include the NFL, MLB, New York Giants.

Key Takeaways

Life on the Job

As marketing has gone increasingly digital, the demands of employees in the industry have grown alongside it. Now, with social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok providing around-the-clock interactions with users, marketing has to be as agile as ever to maintain their constant attention. Moreover, Chelsea Wyatt touched upon the similarities and differences between working in-house for a company and at an agency for clients. Generally, the requirements and responsibilities in both environments are comparable, but the hours in an agency are more. This is driven by the need to always be available for whatever may come up for the clients and a constant learning process as you take on new projects.

Skills Needed in Marketing

Fortunately, for marketing recruiters, regarding early career roles, the expectations for your skill set are not incredibly high. They understand that you’re still in college and probably don’t have very much or any experience on the job. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t prepare with skills that might help you stand out on your resume.

Excel is the most relevant tool in marketing and sales, with its importance only growing as digital expands. Being able to explain your level of knowledge on the application – whether it’s basic functions or intermediate knowledge such as XLookup – can help you stand out. Marketing-specific experience such as work on programmatic applications are not expected from early career hires. Free certifications offered through LinkedIn, Google, or Coursera are bonuses but certainly not required.

Soft skills are equally, if not more important than technical skills. Attention to detail, excellent communication, and critical thinking are all attributes that most employers list in their job postings. Your resume and LinkedIn pages can be updated to highlight these traits. Extracurricular involvement such as Greek life can show that you have the ability to work in a team. Service jobs in food or retail can demonstrate your ability to interact and be persuasive with clients. Ultimately, recruiters are looking for potential in candidates, not necessarily expertise.

Showing Interest

Demonstrating your excitement and motivation for an early career role can really help you stand out. The panelists mentioned a few ways to do it. First, reach out for a coffee chat or informational interview with the recruiter on LinkedIn or through email (a tip for emails: if you can find one person at the company’s email address, the others follow a certain formula with the names). This not only shows interest, it also prevents your resume from getting buried among the wave of applicants. Second, ask thoughtful questions during the interview. It shows that you care and that you’re someone who will be able to learn on the job.

Building a Career 

Making a career in marketing can be a daunting task. But Micheal and Nikolas emphasized the need to go out and get what you want. For Micheal that meant returning to school to pursue a Master’s degree to bring together his experience and build a business. Young people, as frequent users of digital platforms, are in demand and being given more opportunities than ever before. Ultimately, the panelists agreed that, as long as you try hard enough, a great opportunity will present itself.

Watch the recording of the session here