Digital Marketing seems to be the need of the hour today and with that, the demand for a digital marketing coach or trainer is at an all time high.
- So is there someone who can be really called the world’s greatest digital marketing coach?
- Can you ensure that the trainer you have hired is really the best digital marketer to learn from?
Well, the following article is an extensive and very detailed report to answer many important queries about:
- Things that you need to ensure as individuals prior to getting into the field of digital marketing today
- As a corporate or an academic institution, things to keep in mind before professionally hiring digital marketing corporate trainers, digital marketing coach and or social media digital marketing visiting faculty.
With the ever increasing need for digital transformation, digital strategies, digital marketing social media ROI for business campaigns etc, the need to be a great digital marketer is on the rise.
Organizations and even professionals on their own are investing in tools, resources and in learning digital marketing social media from some of the best digital marketing coaching institutes or from the best digital marketing professionals.
Every organization today wants their employees to learn from the world’s greatest digital marketing coach so as to be able to implement their learning into their respective field of work at the earliest.
Every individual planning to build a career in digital marketing today wants to learn and get coaching from the best digital marketer in the industry so that they are not only upto date with the latest technology and tools but also are aware of the best digital strategies for their industry, business and demographics.
But then when you look at the big percentage of the so called digital marketers out there, the quality of skill sets for a vast majority of them, at best seems to be passable!
So what went wrong?
Like many other popular educational fields and programs, due to a sudden demand, too many institutions, course programs, coaching programs, digital marketing training institutes cropped out of nowhere and there seems to be very little scrutiny of both, about who’s really qualified to train and who are qualified to get trained.
To make matters worse, a huge number of individuals are ‘lured’ promising a lucrative career and asked to invest their time, money and resources with many of these institutes conducting digital marketing social media training who in reality lack a complete understanding of what is really needed in the industry today.
Resultant impact is hundreds and thousands of digital marketers with certifications, claiming to have done courses in digital marketing and social media. Now this is supposed to be great news right?
Well, it was supposed to be, till organisations started realising the bigger problem.
Even though majority of them have certifications from institutes claiming they are skilled and have done digital marketing coaching and training from the best institutes available today, a vast majority of these digital marketers seem to be unemployable as they lack practical skill, exposure, hands-on training and so much more.
Some of them seemed to have only learnt a few tools from the trainers and coaches on digital marketing whereas most of them seem to be lacking in practical digital marketing strategy and conceptual understanding.
Who is to be blamed?
a) Can you blame the institutes?
Can you blame the institutes that claim things such as they are the best digital marketing training institute or that they offer options to choose from the top digital marketing training institutes and courses with tie-ups aboard or that they have online and onsite best digital marketing programs or the fact they are offering PG and diploma courses in digital marketing with a huge salary hike etc?
Well, to be honest, most of them are really trying to sincerely do a good job but failing to realize that for being able to deliver the best corporate training or digital marketing coaching training programs, you need the best digital marketers, best coaches, trainers and most important of all, ensure that the enrolment process for such programs has some clear cut credentials that you expect out of the students too.
You cannot simply hire everyone who expresses interest in pursuing a course without evaluating if that is the right career path for that individual.
Failure to evaluate such important aspects results in poor quality of students and a poor learning experience for them as well as they are clearly not cut out for this field.
On similar lines, you can’t hire trainers just because they have either offered to train at your institute for free or for a low fee.
Failure in clearly understanding if the trainers hired by you really fit the bill will result in eager and worthwhile students getting poor quality of training, which also is unfair.
b) Can you blame the organizations or academic institutions?
Can you blame the organisations or academic institutions that hire trainers and coaches at times purely based on a budget.
Now these are budgets that they seemed to have allotted for their learning and development programs or employee development programs or for their student skill development and in reality, they don’t really either seem to care or even understand what their team members or their students really need to learn today when it comes to digital marketing training courses, workshops, training programs, coaching programs on digital marketing etc.
Rather than focusing on the actual skill sets that these individuals could impart to their employees or students and how would that impact their learning and experience in the long run, the focus at times mostly seems to revolve around “available budget” which at times is fairly misjudged.
c) Can you blame the trainers?
Hundreds of trainers are cropping up day in and day out.
When you look closely, you realise that a big ratio of those trainers seem to lack what you might call even a basic level understanding of digital marketing skill sets but are employed as trainers by institutes hiring them for peanuts either as full-time trainers or as part time employees or freelancers etc.
Some of them are hired as freelancers, digital marketers etc and all they are asked to do is post on facebook, twitter, LinkedIn with no focus or control on strategy or goal whatsoever.
This often results in desperation wherein these brands or organisations then start asking their peers in the industry to re-share their content for the right target audience exposure. Remember, if you had hired the right professional in the first place, none of this moments of desperation or third party dependency and support would be needed.
With respect to trainers, a big percentage of these trainers are people who have been out of jobs for a long time and ended up doing some online course or onsite course that promised them a lucrative career in the field of digital marketing only to have realised at the end of the course that they have wasted a huge amount of money, time and opportunity in this process.
Finally, they come to terms and start looking for ‘gigs’ and freelance training opportunities who are ready to hire them unfortunately mostly based on the “budget” allotted for each trainer.
d) Can you blame the participants?
Thousands of students and professionals are making assumptions that a few days, weeks, months of course can help them gain a tremendous advantage and skill sets in the field of digital marketing?
Some of them sadly join courses purely based on the cheap course fees too. Not that by paying huge amounts of fees is anyone guaranteed a great learning experience.
But, in any case, these prospective students see so much of confusion all around them and end up opting for courses and programs that are cheap so that they don’t end up losing much in case of the program not panning out the way they have thought it would. But, in majority of their cases, they lose the most since they find themselves stranded without a portfolio or actual practical know-how or skill sets to choose from at the end of their digital marketing training program. And this happens because majority of these so called institutes hire trainers for peanuts salary.
Unfortunately, many times, people who finally opt to join as trainers in such institutes are those who have been trying for jobs as professional digital marketers after pursuing small courses but haven’t been able to get such a role. They end up taking jobs as trainers in such low paying institutes.
Imagine, learning from those who themselves aren’t industry focused, ready, what can you learn?
How much of their skill would they be able to pass on to you?
Which results in theses students claiming to have digital marketing and or related certificate but with no practical learning in a lot of Course cases.
In a field like digital marketing which is purely focused on practical know-how, strategies and hands-on application, merely having certificates means nothing!
So who can you blame?
To be honest, I think none of them can be blamed in isolation or at least completely.
But the field is here to stay.
So to ensure that you get the best coaching and learning training experience in the field of digital marketing and social media, here are few things that you need to ensure before embarking on a journey or trying to learn from the worlds best coach in digital marketing or from the best digital marketing training institutes or before hiring a digital marketing trainer:
If you are a corporate or an academic institution and are planning to:
- Hire a digital marketing corporate trainer for your learning and development or employee development corporate training programs or
- For training your students with these power packed skill sets that are the need of the hour today in the industry and corporate world then,
These are the things you need to focus on:
- Credentials of the trainer:
Does the trainer have a background in marketing, branding, advertising, digital technology integrated tools or at least a combination of these?
WHY?
Because let’s face it, if their credentials fairly seem to revolve around technical skill sets, they are most probably going to focus and make the training experience completely technical too.
On the other hand, if they seem to be low on practical application of these digital strategies, they will end up talking about “what could happen” as in, just discuss concepts which again, in practicality on it’s own, would not serve the purpose for your students and or employees best training experience.
You need to look out for trainers who have a balance of all three worlds, marketing, management and technology. - Visibility:
Do these so called trainers themselves have great visibility on digital media platforms sharing content across various platforms (unless you are hiring them only for one skill set). It is a red flag if they don’t seem to have quality content across their own blogs, twitter platforms, Facebook pages, LinkedIn posts etc. Also, it is core to focus on the engagement of these types of content too.
There have been cases reported by students across many institutes that you can read online that their so called faculties or trainers have never created a blog or a website or practically designed, implemented a social media digital marketing campaign of their own!
But, please note that at the same time, merely having a verified or an authenticated page or thousands of likes or followers or many awards & accolades etc is not a qualification of a good trainer either.
Their actual practical work should speak louder than their media coverage.
Look at the brands they have worked with, countries that they have exposure with, industries that they have worked across. All of this goes a long way in ensuring that you as an organization or as an academic institution have been able to get the best for your employees and or students training and coaching.
So when we say visibility, we are talking about their actual practical work and not just notes, social media reach and articles.
A really good digital marketing trainer has a good combination of actual corporate experience with a balance of entrepreneurial skill set.
If you find people who claim to be trainers who have no real or valuable corporate world exposure, then be a little careful.
Remember, a good corporate trainer is visible for the right reasons, has the right connections, generates valuable content regularly, has testimonials, credentials, accolades, awards, experience, academic background, corporate experience and entrepreneurial experience to back up their talk.
Good things always come at a price. If you are looking for something cheap, believe it or not, you will easily and quickly find it, but rather, if you focus on “value” and “quality”, it might take a bit more time, but it will be worth it to work with such trainers. - Focus on case studies across countries:
Do they have case studies across countries and industries that they can offer as learning experiences?
Remember, a good digital marketer, a great trainer and the best digital marketing coach today will have plethora of practical digital marketing case studies with hands-on training experiences to offer your employees and students with a local and a global perspective. And these will not be only case studies that they have read or downloaded or accessed online. These will be case studies that they have been a part of! - Focusing on concepts of marketing, advertising and its integration into the digital technology world of today:
This should be visible across their content shared from time to time across platforms. Another red flag here is if you start noticing that too much of their content seems to be comic or gif’s or cartoons or graphic or focused to be more creative than actual valuable content, then these are mostly individuals pretending to be knowledgeable in the field. Remember, great content speaks for itself as it engages, adds value and educates you at every single stage. - Academic background:
Their academic background is very crucial. It tells you a lot about if they ended up here by force or by choice. Look for a blend of marketing, technology, management, PR and advertising combination that would deliver wonders for your employees. Why? Because a great digital marketer is first a marketer. Marketing never changed, only the medium and channels used have. So having a strong background and know-how of the traditional media, actual concepts of advertising, marketing etc are crucial. - Their actual professional work experience:
What companies have they worked for? Another crucial aspect before hiring a digital marketing trainer or digital marketing coach is this one.
If they seem to be individuals who have just started their career in this field, it mostly won’t add value to your organisation or employees since they lack corporate world experience, expertise and know-how. How much can you really expect them to offer as a learning to your employees at this level of their own limited experience. Let’s be honest, not every college dropout is a Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates or a Steve Jobs.
- Experience is not equivalent to number of years alone:
In the field of digital marketing, practical experience is not necessarily equivalent for the number of years of work alone. It is possible that someone is in the field of digital for over a decade but lacks practical know-how and has not updated themselves to the world or industry needs of today. On similar lines, focus on the projects, campaigns and the brands that these so called trainers have done. Look at their practical digital marketing social media campaigns prior to hiring them. If they haven’t themselves been a practical and major part of digital marketing campaign design, planning and implementation, there is not much you could expect them to offer in return either. - Are they a good coach and can they really train?
Sometimes, few digital marketers are exceptionally skilled, but are terrible trainers or coaches and lack skills needed to be a great mentor.
Looking at their videos, articles, blog posts, speaking to them, looking at their work over the years across their sites etc should give you a great deal of information about the same. Remember, knowing something and then being able to transfer that skill to others is a skill on it’s own! - Is their greatest selling point the fact that they are available for a cheap cost or does conversation with them clearly showcase that they can bring value:
Hiring a digital marketing trainer, coach because they are cheap will do more damage to your brand and organization than not having them trained at all. Remember, if you don’t invest in your brand and people, no one else will. You pay peanuts, you get monkeys. - Are they influencers in the real sense of the term:
And no, I don’t mean those social media influencers that we hear about online.
What is important to note here is to ask, listen and understand if their journey of building a business, entrepreneurship, training moments inspire you and tell you that these are leaders who can take your team on an amazing journey with them. Price is what you pay and value is what you get. - How many training programs have they conducted so far and for what type of organizations? Can this be authenticated?
Do they have links, pictures of these events or does it just seem to be random numbers and training claims?
Be very careful out there. Unless you see pictures from some of these events across organizations and events that they claim from, it is most probably falsified information. - Practical, hands-on, tools, strategy, case studies across industries and countries:
This is what you need in the best digital marketing coach trainer of today for your employee development programs and employee training programs. Someone who has a combination of these skill sets. - How do these programs end?
What does the trainer offer in addition to delivering the training?
Do they have resources of articles and blogs that the participants can read and learn from?
Most importantly, make sure these resources are articles not just about what tools are best, what tips and guides are available for new social networking sites etc.
Remember, if the focus is too much on tools and websites, then it is a cause of concern. Because, digital marketing and social media is not about hits, likes, traffic, websites, apps or followers. It was, is and will always be about people. People buy from people they trust.
So your learning experience and strategies need to ensure you learn to humanize the brand and connect with the customer within to engage and deliver actual ROI using the best digital marketing campaign strategies.
A great digital marketing trainer, coach or an exceptional digital marketer does not necessarily have a background with an Ivy League education coupled with exceptional PR and media or amazing network connections all though, it certainly wouldn’t hurt if they do!
An exceptional digital marketing professional or corporate trainer today in this field is simply fantastic at what they do. Which is what will eventually make them the world’s best digital marketing coach too!
So it is fairly easy to evaluate to be honest.
All you need is to ensure that when you are hiring, you are focused on a digital marketing coachor a digital marketing corporate trainer not based on things like tools to teach or low budget or just hearsay, but from your own experience, research and by actually looking at what these professionals have accomplished over the years, their journey in the corporate world and as entrepreneurs in building a successful brand for tomorrow!
If you are a corporate or an academic institution, I hope you have a wonderful learning experience hiring the best digital marketing trainer for your corporate training experiences and events
and
If you are a digital marketer yourself, here’s wishing you an amazingly successful career ahead doing what you love!
Thank you for taking your time out to read the entire article.
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Be Well
Ananth
A quick brief about my journey:
Name: Ananthanarayanan V (Ananth)
Website: ( www.ananthv.com/ )
After working in the corporate world for about eight years, I started my own digital agency called Techdivine Creative Services in March 2010 with just Rs.500/- and a laptop. (TOTAL: 17 years of professional work experience as on June 2019)
Today, 9 years later, my digital agency is one of India’s beloved, sought after best digital marketing agency that has catered to 70+ clients across 7 countries (India, USA, UK, UAE, Austria, Australia, Spain) and has won global awards, recognitions and accolades.
I have been awarded and listed among the best in the industry with award titles from CMO ASIA and World Marketing Congress as the best digital marketing professional in India (2014), 100 smartest digital marketing leaders (2018), most influential digital marketing leaders (2016). I have also won the Global Peter Drucker challenge award across 35+ countries in the first place in the entrepreneurs category.
I can honestly say that I have dedicated majority of my career working with digital strategies implementing it for ROI focused results across industries and countries.
In addition to running my digital agency, I also conducted corporate training programs for some of the top corporate brands, Fortune 500 companies and elite academic institutions focusing towards employee engagement, employee skill development, employee development programs, learning and development programs etc for 9,500+ participants of which 52% of them have been C-suite and Sr.Management professionals from some of the best companies in the world today.
I am also a brand digital marketing social media influencer, blog influencer for some elite corporate brands and across their live events.
I also blog at some of the top brands on topics of digital marketing, social media ROI, technology integrated marketing, management, leadership and entrepreneurship.
You can connect with me here on LinkedIn – Twitter – Facebook – Blog Professional – Blog Personal – Social Media Book – Corporate Training
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