As more and more businesses are moving into a digital transformation, digital marketing skills are in demand. Here are some courses you could do to improve your skills.
Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, many businesses around the world were forced to embrace digital transformation, and with that comes a need for digital marketers.
This also means that as a marketer upskilling yourself in the digital sphere opens up lots of opportunities and the right training programme and courses are a must. With all the online learning opportunities available, choosing the right programme can be difficult. To help you decide, we've compiled a list of the top six digital marketing courses.
1. HubSpot Academy
HubSpot co-founder Brian Halligan first developed the concept of Inbound Marketing in 2005. You can read more about the concept in our blog: What is inbound marketing, and why do you need it?
Over the years this concept has not only evolved but has helped millions of businesses worldwide grow their business with the help of the HubSpot CRM platform. And the HubSpot Academy has plenty of certifications and courses you can take to not only upskill your digital marketing skills but your customer service and sales skills too. You’ll need a free HubSpot account to utilise the Academy, so sign up here and get started.
All courses are led by experts such as Sujan Patel and Justin Champion, who are recognised professionals in digital and inbound marketing with years of industry experience. To start, we recommend the Digital Marketing Course.
2. Google Online Marketing Challenge
Over the past 8 years, over 100 000 people from over 100 countries have participated in Google's online marketing. The Marketing Challenge is an online course with modules in digital introductory marketing, search engine marketing, search ads, screen advertising, mobile, social media, analytics, and video. This makes it one of the more advanced courses for beginners.
But it's also unique in that Google gives students an AdWords budget of $250, which they can use to run a commercial or non-profit online advertising campaign for three weeks. The most successful students can even receive prizes from Google. If you are looking for a free digital marketing course in terms of competition and real experience, this is a great option.
3. Complete Digital Marketing Course (Udemy)
More than 450 000 people have signed up for this Udemy Digital Marketing course. It’s the best-selling and top choice internet marketing course. Created by Daragh Walsh and Rob Percival, this is the most comprehensive digital marketing course that includes SEO, YouTube Marketing, Facebook Marketing, Google AdWords, Google Analytics, and more.
It consists of 12 modules covering different aspects of digital marketing and case studies to help you combine all these aspects into one marketing strategy and includes approximately 24 hours of video on demand, as well as tests, assignments, checklists, and exercise steps. This is a very interactive course, each part of which contains a project based on the latter in a logical order.
The course is suitable for beginners and does not require any marketing experience. It is suitable for professionals who want to apply as a digital seller, or for business owners who want to expand their market knowledge and grow their online business, or for existing website owners who want to increase traffic and profits, or for those who work as a Freelancers want to work as online marketers or affiliate marketers.
4. Coursera’s Digital Marketing Specialisation
Coursera’s Digital Marketing Specialisation is an introductory course that explores various aspects of the new digital marketing environment, including digital marketing analysis, SEO, social media marketing, and 3D printing.
The content is designed to understand the fundamentals of the new digital marketing landscape and to acquire new stories, concepts, and tools to help you digitally create, distribute, promote, and evaluate products and services. The learning path is quite broad, but a lot of time is spent on concepts and theories, analysis, and market channels.
Coursera's specialisation is part of the University of Illinois's Master of Business Administration degree. The MBA methodology is evident in many of the theoretical modules in the course. As digital marketing is a practical field, it would be better to have a practical application in each element than in the end.
The course is open to the public so almost anyone with experience can sign up for the program. He also offers a certificate to highlight your new LinkedIn skills. Unfortunately, Coursera doesn't provide on-demand support for great customers. Each course lasts four weeks, works 8-10 hours a week, during the first module of 6-8 weeks.
5. Udacity Digital Marketing Nanodegree
The Nanodegree programme allows you to learn platform-specific skills while creating a broad understanding of the entire digital marketing ecosystem.
As part of the programme, Udacity also offers real-world projects where you can run direct campaigns on major marketing platforms. Display ads are a unique addition to the tutorial that shows you how to set up display ads in Google Ads.
You take a holistic approach to learning digital marketing, but most training courses offer a holistic approach to the digital marketing ecosystem. An interactive Q&A session and forums to interact with experts and mentors in the department. You will receive a mentor who will provide personalised project feedback and expert advice from career services.
6. Spitfire Inbound’s Academy
As HubSpot Diamond partners, we work with the tool every day, and more than that, we help businesses grow through inbound marketing, sales, and service. But in the world of the internet, nothing is ever stagnant and your marketing and CRM tools should be either. That’s why HubSpot continues to update and grow their products.
That’s why we started the Spitfire Inbound Academy, the only classroom-based HubSpot training in South Africa. We host a mixture of free and paid courses to up your HubSpot game, and to learn the ins and outs of this constantly evolving tool.
As a digital marketer, we know that the world is changing rapidly around you. We hope this list of courses helps you get the edge, and remember - the best way to stay ahead, is to keep learning!
Want to find out more about inbound marketing? Take a look at our guide: What is inbound marketing or subscribe to our blog for monthly insights.
