The advertising and marketing industries’ influence is ever present. Open a webpage, turn on a radio or television, walk outside and see a billboard or bus bench, and that impact is clear. The best jobs in advertising and marketing bring products and services into the public consciousness.
If a tree falls in the forest but no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?, asks an old proverb. Apply the same principle to marketing.
Without consumer awareness, does a product exist?Advertising is essential to commerce, and thus to the American economy. Consider that Samsung spent a reported $11 billion in marketing and advertising in 2012. And that’s just one company.
Google’s advertising revenue topped $20 billion in the United States last year, surpassing print outlets for the first time.
The staggering sums of money being spent in marketing and advertising are an investment in even higher returns. Thus, professionals in these industries are faced with high-stakes decisions on a daily basis.
Successful marketing is a multifaceted endeavor.
“It takes a team,” says John McDougall, president of McDougall Interactive Marketing in Danvers, Mass. “There’s a huge misconception on the client side that you can hire a ‘webmaster’ and they can do everything. [The agency] takes over for people like that all the time.”