Does your brand fit your personality?
There are lots of “glamorous” brands on the market that inevitably have a strong pull for marketers looking to take the next step in their career. However, it is easy to be seduced by the glamour and chemistry and not consider your own strengths and psychological make up.
The old classic is whether you are self-centred, a role model, average, a nurturer, an idealist or an artist, or any one of Myers and Briggs classification of 16 Personality Types,
But why not simplify things? There was a fantastic piece of work undertaken by CrowdCat and Marketing Week a while ago that established Marketers fall into three key spectra and gives real insight into where you might best belong.
When working out where your long terms prospects lie, it might be helpful to understand where you stand on these issues.
INDUSTRY PROFESSIONALS VS COMMUNICATORS?
The easiest way to work this out is to ask yourself the question, “Am I a Marketer who happens to be in an industry or am I an industry professional who happens to be in Marketing?” This is deep question to be asking and will pose a challenge. Do you see metric as enabling or constricting? Do you measure success by campaign performance or respect from your peers? Do you interpret challenge to resilience/respect or relating positive to creative thinking? We tend to find Industry Professionals leaning towards FMCG, whereas Communicators are more commonly found in entertainment, pharma, tech and finance.
ANALYSERS VS EMPATHISERS
This is a little easier to work out as Marketers tend to be more polarised on this spectrum. Ask yourself where you place your value; in talent or in data? Do you view professional success as driven by relationships (empathisers) or confidence (analysers)? When it comes to customers do you want to achieve customer loyalty (empathiser) or influence their behaviour (analyser)?
Where you come on this spectrum will also influence where you will best fit. If you are a strong empathiser and a marketing team is made up of analysers, you may find it difficult to adjust. Industries driven by metrics such as technology, software and FMCG are more likely to attract analysers and empathisers find it more difficult to fit. If you are an empathiser, then charity and travel may fit you better. Don’t make assumptions though; your Recruitment Partner can give you insight into the culture and fit of the team when briefing you on the role to help you work out whether it’s the right fit for you.
CREATIVES VS DRIVERS
Creatives are far more likely to lean towards intuition and believe that inspiration and individual understanding shape solutions as opposed to customer data. Drivers however, see success due to resilience and that creativity is something everyone has to some degree. So think, do you view analytics as closely related to conversion (drivers) or communication (creative)? Do you view customer relationships and loyalty as distinct (creativity) or that customer relationships drive conversions (drivers)?
Those marketing professionals who have a strong bent towards creativity may struggle in businesses where there is little scope for individuality and innovation as opposed to those businesses who embrace such approaches.
As with anything like this, nothing is set in stone. However, these insights might give you a steer in terms of working out where your long-term prospects sit. Discussing it with your Recruitment Partner will provide additional insight as on occasion it might be challenging to change industries midway through your career, but they can point out areas of synergy with your existing experience which may open up opportunities.
MORE HELPFUL ADVICE FOR YOUR MARKETING JOB SEARCH
