Marketing Career Paths In The Real World

You can study marketing for years and still feel unprepared the first time a real client and a real deadline land on your plate. Mattie and Alexis step in for Shelby and tell the honest version of what it looks like to break into a marketing career when your path is not perfectly linear, from a creative background to an esthetics business owner who fell in love with the marketing side before learning the fundamentals through an online digital marketing program.

We get into how both of us actually got hired at a marketing agency, including the awkward part nobody talks about: reaching out when you think you are “not qualified enough.” One of us moved to Arkansas with no local network and job hunted through Facebook, emails, and a single Zoom call. The other leaned into persistence, followed up multiple times, and discovered that initiative and coachability can matter as much as a four year degree. If you’re searching for an entry level marketing job, a marketing internship, or a way into digital marketing without a perfect resume, you’ll hear practical, real world context.

Then we share what we’ve learned working with a marketer who stays authentic with her team and her clients, and why hands on client work changes how you think about SEO, social media strategy, content creation, and results. We close with two simple marketing tips that drive outsized impact: stay consistent with your posting schedule, and get crystal clear on your target audience so your content converts.

If this helped you, subscribe to the Marketing Happy Hour Podcast, share the episode with a friend who’s trying to get into marketing, and leave a review so more people can find it.

Transcript

Welcome And Why We’re Hosting

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey guys, welcome back to the Marketing Happy Hour Podcast. I'm Maddie with the Marketing Broker, and this is Alexis with the Marketing Broker. We are taking over the podcast for Shelby today. She's out of office and she put us in charge. So here we are. Here we go. We kind of just wanted to talk about our experience, like getting into marketing, how we started the job with the marketing broker, and then just what we've learned up until then.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

So do you want to start? Yeah, I'll start. So I actually am an esthetician as well. And so I've been doing the marketing for my business for almost four years now. And I've really loved the marketing side, but I actually didn't know all what I was really doing with it. Like I didn't know the like the right way to do it. And so I decided last year to go through LSU online for digital marketing specialists course.

Alexis’s Shift From Esthetics

SPEAKER_00 0:54

And I did that in about six months. And that's how I got started with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Very good. Yeah. I actually went to school for four years. I went in undeclared, so I kind of didn't know what I wanted to do. I knew that I was super like into the creative artsy side of things. Um so I originally went in undeclared. I declared my major in art education. I was gonna be an art teacher.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:19

Yeah, but then I was like, what if I hate it? What if I get there and I only study to be a teacher and that's it? Um so then I switched it to business and marketing and kept a minor in art, so I still kind of

Maddie’s Creative Path Into Marketing

SPEAKER_01 1:28

had that. That's awesome. Um so I went through business administration and marketing classes for four years and I loved it. I did a marketing internship during that time as well. Um I mean, it fit really well. I knew that with the business business I could kind of go whichever direction I wanted, but the marketing was like really where I wanted to be.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

So and there's so much you can do with marketing. Obviously, we found what we're doing, but you know, there's so many ways you can go with it too.

SPEAKER_01 1:54

So for sure is a good outlets of marketing as well. Like, I mean, even though I was like working for the marketing broker, we both do different jobs. Yeah, so exactly yeah. I mean, so how did you find Shelby? How did you kind of get into it after going through the digital marketing school?

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Well, um, I started looking up marketing firms, and I've always heard of Shelby because she is kind of a big deal. So just a little bit. Just a little bit. So she was always the main one that stood out, and I was just like, she's not gonna hire someone who is just like out of school, like a short school, too,

How We Landed Jobs With Shelby

SPEAKER_00 2:32

like not a four-year college. And so I did message her um and email her about three times. That's for that. We love a good skill. I was very persistent, and finally she's like, Okay, we've got to do Zoom. And so, yeah, our first call, she hired me. So, yeah, that's how I got started with her, and that's how I found her.

SPEAKER_01 2:53

I love that, I love that. I was actually in the job market for a while. I graduated last year. Um, and so I was looking for jobs back in Virginia, and then my fiance was like, Oh, actually, we're moving. He's military, so so then I had to switch my whole job search to uh Arkansas, and so then when I came here, it was kind of even harder because I didn't have a network, I didn't know people. Um, so I started out like nannying, and I find all of my nannying jobs from Facebook, so I was like, I'll just see if I can find a marketing job on Facebook. So I did, I typed in like marketing agencies in Arkansas, and her page came up, and I sent her an email, sent her my resume, and she well, we went on a Zoom call and she hired me on the Zoom call. See, that was meant to be everything really does happen for a reason. I feel like I agree, definitely. I think it's been good so far. We've been both been with her for what four or five months now. So do you want to maybe tell us about like your experience with Shelby, what you've learned, what like marketing tips you have?

SPEAKER_00 3:51

I feel like just in this four or five months, I've learned so much way more than the actual marketing short school I went to. Like I felt dumb at first coming into this because I was like, wait, I don't know if I actually learned anything. And I feel like that is

What Real Client Work Teaches

SPEAKER_00 4:08

how it is with a lot of marketing jobs. Like you learn the basics with the school, and then finding someone who actually knows what they're doing, which she does. Yes. And so I feel like you know, we're both learning from the best. And I I've had the best time, like I love networking with people, and this is that's part of marketing, and so getting to do that and meet so many people and just seeing the ins and outs of marketing that she has taught, like, you know, and she's gone through this herself, and so I feel like that's been the biggest thing is just learning from her.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

Yeah, I agree. I feel like she's taught so much, like, even like you said, going through school, it's like so different seeing it on a PowerPoint or your professor being like, Oh, this is how it is, versus like, oh, these are real clients, these are real issues, this is real money. So I think that definitely affects it a lot. I think I've learned a lot through that too. I mean, I remember being in classes and being like, Okay, well, this is SEL, well, this is like me making posts, but it's so different too. I I get such a serotonin boost from creating posts and then seeing it posted. I'm like, I did that.

SPEAKER_00 5:15

It's awesome, and I feel like with her, like she's so patient too, especially with me. I do ask some dumb questions probably. She's so patient, yeah, and I think that makes such a difference, like, especially me being my own boss for four years. It was scary, like having a boss, but she's made it so easy, and I think that makes a huge difference for sure.

SPEAKER_01 5:37

And I think that reflects in how she works with her clients as well. Like, I mean, she's so genuine and authentic with her clients, and I think that's what brings people in like on both sides for us working for her and then for her clients as well.

SPEAKER_00 5:50

Yeah, because she stays the same, like with us and with them, like it's no like it's not. Yeah, there's no different two different Shelby's, right? Right. It's just one, and you get what you see, like it's very authentic, and I think that makes the world of a difference.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

I agree, I agree. Well, maybe we should just give one marketing tip to the listeners. So if you want to give a tip and then I'll give a tip and we can close out.

SPEAKER_00 6:12

I will say be consistent. Like, that's my main thing that I'm still working on is being consistent on all your social media. Like, if someone's trying to look for something and they're not gonna scroll back, you know, two weeks of post to find it. Right. So that is why it's so like important to be consistent and just keep posting,

Two Simple Marketing Tips That Work

SPEAKER_00 6:32

even if you're just I mean, you gotta post the right things too, but like just be consistent.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

And going off of that, I was gonna say like that with being consistent, also know your target audience. Because if you're posting to like whoever and you don't know who your target audience is for your business, it's not gonna go anywhere. You could be making the best graphics, the best captions, the best stories. But if you don't know who you're marketing that to, you're not gonna get it's not gonna convert, you're not gonna get credits. So yep.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

All right, I guess that's all. Do you want to close us out? Thank you for tuning in to the marketing happy hour podcast. We'll see you next Friday. Bye. Bye.