Millions of companies rely on digital marketing experts to reach their customers and sell their products or services online. Due to the increasing need for experts in this space, digital marketing is one of today’s fastest-growing, in-demand digital careers.

If you are curious about a career in digital marketing, you may be interested in learning more about a day in the life of a digital marketing manager. This article will take a closer look at what digital marketing managers do and examine how they use their digital skills to build awareness and drive business growth.

What does a digital marketing manager do?

Digital marketing managers are responsible for building awareness about a company’s products or services. Using their knowledge of marketing strategy and technical skillsets, digital marketers create campaigns that engage their target audience, drive traffic to its website, and convert potential customers to paying customers.

Digital marketing managers do things like:

• Develop marketing strategies
• Create engaging and relevant content
• Manage online ad campaigns
• Improve search engine optimization
• Monitor and analyze campaign data
• Track and report on campaign performance

Digital marketing managers can perform many duties or specialize in search engine optimization, ad management, or content creation. Regardless of specialty, digital marketing managers are responsible for understanding the ins and outs of their target audience and finding effective ways to connect with them online.

Digital marketers use digital platforms like social media, email, ads, or podcasts, to reach their target audience. These platforms have built-in analytics tools that give marketers real-time data about campaign performance. This data provides digital marketing managers with the information they need to:

• Monitor engagement – what content is being viewed, clicked, “liked,” or shared
• Track conversions – how is the site or campaign content converting to sales
• Improve strategies – based on engagement or conversion data, what improvements can be made to the method or strategy

In addition to the responsibilities outlined above, digital marketing managers frequently collaborate with other departments to implement marketing strategies and ensure everyone aligns with the company’s message and goals.

Daily tasks of a Digital Marketing Manager

A digital marketing manager is responsible for planning and overseeing all aspects of a digital marketing campaign on a day-to-day basis. A typical day in the life of a digital marketing manager generally includes some combination of administrative duties (e.g., emails or team meetings), content creation, strategic planning, and real-time data analysis.

The daily tasks of a digital marketing manager can vary based on the company, type of product or service, or the specialty of the digital marketing manager. However, some of the common daily tasks of a digital marketing manager include:

• Checking and responding to emails
• Developing marketing campaign strategy
• Creating campaign content
• Implementing campaign strategy
• Analyzing campaign performance
• Improving search engine optimization
• Collaborating with others

A digital marketing manager typically works during traditional business hours, Monday – Friday, 9 am – 5 pm. However, due to the nature of the work, digital marketing careers can have flexible work schedules depending on the company or role. The information below outlines and explains some of the daily tasks of a digital marketing manager.

Checking and responding to emails

Email communication is a basic yet essential responsibility in nearly every job. For digital marketing managers, checking and responding to emails is a daily task often repeated throughout the day.

Emails help marketers communicate with team members, prioritize tasks, respond to requests, and troubleshoot campaign issues.

Developing campaign strategy

Digital marketing managers are responsible for developing marketing campaign strategies that directly align with the company’s goals and the needs of their target audience. To do this, marketers must first complete extensive market research to understand their audience, competition, and the ever-changing digital landscape. Once that research is complete, they can create a campaign strategy consistent with the needs, behaviors, and online location of their target audience.

Creating campaign content

Engaging and relevant content is the foundation of any successful marketing campaign. Digital marketing managers are often responsible for creating campaign content daily. This process involves writing, editing, and producing original content that clearly conveys a message to the target audience. Digital marketers write content for social media, email, podcast episodes, and ads. Often, marketers will also create graphics to accompany the content.

Implementing campaign content

In addition to creating content for the campaign, digital marketing managers are also responsible for creating a plan to implement the content on the desired digital platforms. This task might include things like building Facebook ads, scheduling social media posts, uploading a new podcast episode, or designing email campaigns. For example, a digital marketing manager might use an email marketing platform like MailChimp to build and schedule an email campaign to promote a new product or advertise a sale.

Analyzing campaign performance

Once a campaign is up and running, a digital marketing manager and their team analyze how the campaign content is performing. Campaign analysis is an essential daily task of a digital marketing manager. Analytics tools like Google Analytics help digital marketing managers monitor, track, and interpret data points like engagement rates, website traffic, and sales. This type of information helps marketers understand what is working and identify opportunities for improvement. It also provides insight into the business’s key performance metrics over time and informs future campaign strategies.

Improving search engine optimization

In addition to campaign strategy, content, and performance analysis, a digital marketing manager might also spend part of their day improving the company’s search engine optimization (SEO). SEO is a fundamental aspect of digital marketing. In short, it is the process of improving a website’s organic search ranking or visibility on search engines like Google or Bing. To do this, digital marketing managers might work with an SEO expert or website designer to ensure that the pages on the site are fully functionally and optimized with SEO strategies like keywords, visuals, and compelling content.

Collaborating with others

Collaboration with team members and other departments is an integral part of a digital marketing manager’s day. Digital marketing managers will often spend a portion of their day meeting with colleagues, company executives, or clients. They use this time to discuss goals, develop marketing strategies, delegate tasks, review campaign performance, and outline opportunities for improvement.

Day-to-Day challenges

The digital marketing industry is constantly evolving and adapting to new trends, technology updates, and changes in customer behavior or habits. One of digital marketing managers’ biggest challenges is staying current within this ever-changing landscape. With millions of users interacting with companies online every day, it can be challenging to capture the attention of a target audience and connect with them clearly and authentically. Digital marketing managers must utilize their analytical skills to produce content and campaigns that resonate with potential customers and successfully reach them on the correct platforms.

Keys to success in digital marketing

A digital marketing manager manages complex customer relationships and communicates a company’s message across several digital platforms. To be successful in digital marketing, you must know how to connect with people creatively and strategically. A skilled digital marketer can create beautiful and engaging content, communicate information, analyze data, troubleshoot technology issues, and collaborate with others.

A successful Digital Marketing Manager is a:

• Creative problem-solver
• Effective storyteller
• Strategic and analytical thinker
• Skilled communicator
• Flexible and adaptable leader

In addition to these skills, digital marketing managers also have various technical, industry-specific skills like ad management, data analytics, design, or content creation. Suppose you are interested in becoming a digital marketer. In that case, you may want to learn technical skills – like ad management – that will set you apart and make you a more competitive applicant for digital marketing positions.

Launching your Digital Marketing career with Pathstream

Does a day in the life of a digital marketing manager excite and intrigue you? Are you ready to launch your digital marketing career and become a competitive applicant in one of the fastest-growing job markets today? Taking the next steps in your digital marketing career has never been easier with Pathstream’s online digital skills programs.

In the Facebook Digital Marketing Certificate program, you’ll learn the skills to launch and manage your clients’ marketing campaigns successfully. Throughout this 18-week program, you’ll learn how to develop Facebook ad campaigns, create search and display ads, and evaluate campaign performance using analytics tools like Facebook Business Suite and Google Analytics. You’ll also practice designing and implementing effective email marketing campaigns on popular email marketing programs like MailChimp.

This certificate program is 100% online and flexibly paced, meaning you can move as quickly or slowly as you’d like through the program. The course curriculum also features hands-on projects that mirror the ones you’ll have to do on the job so you can feel job-ready immediately after completing the program. Once you’ve received your certificate, you will be ready to apply for thousands of digital marketing jobs with companies like Ralph Lauren, Food52, Yelp and more. Learn more about starting your digital marketing career with Pathstream today.