How to Hire a Digital Advertising Marketer: A Complete Hiring Kit for Recruiting, Selecting, & Training

Looking to hire a digital advertising marketer?

This hiring kit will give you the guidance needed to hire the right digital advertising marketer the first time.

The term “digital advertiser” can refer to a wide variety of roles and responsibilities. You might be running solo and looking to bring in someone to jumpstart your digital advertising initiative. Or, perhaps your business is growing and you’re looking to add talent to an existing marketing team.

(RELATED: Crafting a Digital Advertising Plan)

This hiring kit includes: 

• Job Titles and Descriptions
• Organizational Chart
• Job Posting Builder
• Interview Questions
• Where to Find Your Next Digital Advertising Marketer
• Training Your Digital Advertising Team Member

 NOTE: You’ll get a downloadable version of the Social Media Hiring Kit at the end of this post. 🙂

Let’s get right to it…

Job Titles & Descriptions

It’s important to know what role you’d like your new hire to fill.

A fully fleshed-out digital advertising team at a large corporation is often a part of a larger marketing team. It will include most, if not all, of these roles while a small operation might only include one.

(RELATED: How To Build A Marketing Dream Team For Your Brand (Even If You Aren’t A Marketer))

We’ll begin with a high-level overview of each position:

Digital Advertising Manager – The lead digital advertising marketer is responsible for directing and coordinating advertising strategies, campaigns, and budgets for assigned segments. This role is also responsible for planning, executing, and evaluating digital and online advertising strategies across all markets to meet company goals.

Digital Media Buyer – The digital media buyer is responsible for creating, managing, and executing highly targeted digital media campaigns, including PPC, display, and programmatic buying. This role conducts campaign analyses and tracks analytics to achieve a positive return on ad spend.

Data Analyst – The data analyst supports digital advertising initiatives by analyzing data, identifying trends, and using insights to help optimize campaigns and drive business growth.

Graphic Designer – The graphic designer builds graphics and ad creatives that support digital advertising initiatives while maintaining brand consistency.

Videographer – The videographer creates videos to strengthen marketing and advertising initiatives while maintaining brand consistency.

It’s important to note that the positions listed above are roles, not necessarily individual people with individual titles. If you are a smaller company, you might have one person who fills several of these roles.

In most cases, if you’re building a brand new digital advertising team, hire the Digital Media Buyer role first. The right Digital Media Buyer can be a “jack of all trades” who handles a myriad of roles and responsibilities.

When hiring a one-person team, look for an individual with superb media buying skills and strong analytical and problem-solving skills. Keep in mind, though, any additional skills (graphic design or video creation, for instance) will be enormously valuable to a budding digital advertising team.

The Digital Media Buyer is the foundation upon which your digital advertising team is built. Add new members to this team based on the gaps presented by your Media Buyer. For example, your Media Buyer may be great at creating Facebook advertising campaigns but not so hot at creating videos. Use your next hire to close the gaps.

Use the organizational chart below when you are ready to add specialists and expand your digital advertising team.

Organizational Chart

Your organizational chart will depend on the size of your organization and the temperament, talent, and experience of your team members (among other things), but the configuration below is a solid starting point for many organizations.

Remember, if you’re just getting started with digital media, begin by hiring the Digital Media Buyer role. Then, add other roles as the need arises.

Once your digital advertising team is fully fleshed out with multiple hires in the same roles, start looking to add a Digital Advertising Manager to direct and provide strategic guidance to the team.

Job Posting Builder

The following section is designed to build a custom job posting appropriate for your unique circumstances. The makeup of your job posting will depend on the skills needed by your company, salary available, and availability of talent.

A thorough job posting has six components:

1. Position Summary
2. Roles & Responsibilities
3. Skill Requirements
4. Education & Experience
5. Benefits & Salary
6. About the Company

How to Hire a Digital Advertising Marketer Step 1: Choose a Position Summary

Hiring a Digital Advertising Manager? Analyst? Designer?

If you’re not sure, make your best guess now and adjust as your thoughts clarify later in this process:

Digital Advertising Manager

The Digital Advertising Manager directs and coordinates advertising strategies, campaigns, and budgets for assigned segments.

This individual oversees the creation of digital advertising campaigns, ongoing creative and media optimizations, the digital analytics of all campaigns, and testing strategies.

This position ensures the advertising team produces high-quality, effective advertising campaigns that align with budget guidelines.

The right candidate has 2-3 years of experience managing a digital advertising team.

This position requires a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Advertising, or Communications (or an equivalent combination of education and experience).

Digital Media Buyer

The Digital Media Buyer, working under the direction of the Digital Advertising Manager, develops digital strategies and media buys to achieve advertising objectives.

This role drives innovation on both the strategic and campaign level, cultivates key partnerships to develop the best digital media opportunities, and executes a variety of online media campaigns across display, mobile, social, and video.

The ideal candidate has 2-5 years of experience in digital media buying with a focus on programmatic and/or social, A/B testing, and integrating different media channels to optimize campaign results.

This position requires a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing or Business Administration (or an equivalent combination of education and experience).

Data Analyst

The Data Analyst turns data into information, information into insight, and insight into advertising decisions.

This role monitors the data behind all advertising campaigns, reviewing the campaign’s performance, targeting, ad creative, and ad spend with the goal of optimizing performance and improving ROI.

This role requires strong quantitative, analytical, and problem-solving skills, and the ability to collect, organize, analyze, and report on data quickly and accurately.

This position requires deep experience with Google AdWords, Facebook Advertising, and Microsoft Excel. A degree in Statistics, Marketing Analytics, or another quantitative field is preferred.

Graphic Designer

The Graphic Designer is responsible for the coordination and production of all advertising creative needed for the organization’s digital marketing team.

The right candidate has experience in a variety of design software and a proven ability to produce entertaining, promotional, or inspirational visual content that is consistent with the brand’s “look and feel.”

Videographer

The Videographer is responsible for the coordination and production of all the video content.

The right candidate has experience in directing, shooting, editing, producing, and optimizing a variety of corporate videos.

The Videographer is a creative, out-of-the-box thinker, capable of translating advertising messages into compelling visual stories that are consistent with the brand.

How to Hire a Digital Advertising Marketer Step 2: Choose Roles & Responsibilities

In this step, you will add detail to the role this new hire will play in your organization.

Keep in mind, it’s unlikely you’ll find a candidate who fits each and every role or responsibility below. For example, you’re unlikely to find a candidate with proficiency in both advertising creative and statistics.

Consider creating a job posting that lists the roles and responsibilities you feel are absolutely necessary and list others as “nice to have.”

Now, choose the roles and responsibilities for which you want to hire. Common job titles associated with the roles are noted in parentheses.

Key:

• (DAM) Digital Advertising Manager
• (DMB) Digital Media Buyer
• (DA) Digital Analyst
• (GD) Graphic Designer
• (V) Videographer

Oversees the digital advertising team and supports team growth, development, and implementation of new initiatives. (DAM, DMB) 

Interprets business objectives and develops effective advertising programs to achieve those objectives. (DAM, DMB)

Develops advertising strategy across all digital channels to ensure the effectiveness and consistency of brand messaging. Includes digital advertising, such as PPC, programmatic ads, and social media ads. (DAM, DMB)

Oversees campaign creatives and guides digital media planning and execution. (DAM, DMB)

Manages advertising calendars and produces media plans and forecasts. (DAM, DMB)

Paces delivery of campaigns, ensuring ad spending remains within budget and on track. (DAM, DMB)

Establishes digital campaign measurement and analytics strategy and reports on campaign diagnostic measures and other key performance indicators of effectiveness. (DAM, DMB)

Implements digital advertising plan and maintains budget control throughout entire process. (DAM, DMB)

Manages input from stakeholders throughout the company to develop advertising campaigns that meet business requirements. (DAM, DMB)

Develops and executes digital media planning and advertising activities in all markets. (DAM, DMB)

Understands, customizes, and optimizes the entire campaign management process, including production, execution, and quality control. (DAM, DMB)

Develops rigorous A/B test plans to draw insights critical for growth and optimization, including ad copy, audience segmentation, and landing page tests. (DAM, DMB)

Creates monthly or end-of-campaign reports, including affidavits of performance for digital campaigns and reports to market-specific teams. (DAM, DMB)

Has a comprehensive understanding of targeting and campaign structure best practices within each search engine/paid channel (Google, Yahoo, Bing, Facebook, and others). (DAM, DMB)

Forecasts and monitors quarterly performance goals for responsible channels. (DAM, DMB, DA)

Manages paid media strategy by approving appropriate digital channels, authoring and approving digital media briefs, and actively monitoring and optimizing in-market programs to improve effectiveness. (DMB)

Manages daily campaign tasks through digital workflow tools and communication with market-specific teams. (DMB)

Recommends the size and scope of media buying options, including but not limited to banner, search, email, social, and mobile marketing. (DMB)

Conceptualizes new and innovative ads and partners with the creative team for development. (DMB)

Maintains status reports of advertising budget, plans media schedules, and proposes new test vehicles and formats. (DMB)

Evaluates, negotiates, and purchases online media opportunities, including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other media. (DMB)

Works with third-party vendors to ensure the accuracy of digital media order entry and processing. Tracks media budgets and expenses by channel. (DMB)

Establishes, develops, and maintains media, vendor, and partner contacts. (DMB)

Determines which paid channels yield the best returns and allocates advertising budget accordingly. Monitors/adjusts campaign controls to achieve optimal results. (DMB)

Authors and presents plans and campaign reports to managers and stakeholders. Clearly communicates campaign successes, failures, and optimizations for future campaigns. (DAM, DMB, DA)

Responsible for new big data initiatives and analytics. (DMB, DA)

Troubleshoots common campaign issues. (DMB)

Monitors social, cultural, and industry trends and their impact on the industry and consumer behavior. (DMB)

Analyzes advertising data to identify outliers in performance, delivery, tracking, and pacing. (DA)

Develops strategies for effective data analysis and reporting. (DA)

Compiles advertising data analytics and reports on the effectiveness of campaigns to maximize results. (DA)

Performs competitive analysis, researches new opportunities, and uses data to provide strategic recommendations that support revenue growth. (DA)

Works collaboratively with team members to create, implement, and measure sophisticated digital advertising campaigns. (DA)

Analyzes monthly reports to uncover insights and help provide recommendations for ongoing digital marketing success. (DA)

Designs engaging and compelling creatives for use in advertising campaigns. (GD)

Collaborates closely with other members of the digital advertising team to brainstorm and plan upcoming campaigns by determining the scope and realistic deadlines for various design content. (GD)

Creates accurate graphics, charts, graphs, etc., that visually supports ads. (GD)

Creates a video marketing project plan that aligns with organizational social media marketing goals. (V)

Produces and/or directs video content for advertising initiatives. (V)

Manages the production of video content (shooting, editing, uploading, optimizing, and adding effects). (V)

Leverages interviews, testimonials, demos, and other storytelling styles to meet the needs of the target audience. (V)

Strategically examines available platforms and apps to ensure video content is easy to use in advertising initiatives. (V)

How to Hire a Digital Advertising Marketer Step 3: Choose Skill Requirements

Here, you’ll choose the specific skills required for this position. As with the roles and responsibilities section, it won’t be possible (or necessary) to find a candidate that possesses all of the skills listed below.

Again, consider listing some skills as necessary and others as an added bonus. Also, list specific hardware, software, or applications your organization is using such as Adobe Creative Suite, Google Analytics, or Google AdWords in this section.

Choose which role you want to hire. Common job titles associated with these skills are noted in parentheses.

Leadership – Experience leading a team in a fast-paced, project-driven environment. (DAM)

Media Buying – Proven experience evaluating, developing, and executing a variety of online media campaigns. (DAM, DMB)

Project Management – Experience coordinating with multiple stakeholders and teams to create digital advertising initiatives that support specific business initiatives. (DAM, DMB)

A/B Testing – Proven experience developing and running rigorous A/B tests, including ad copy, audience segmentation, and landing page tests. (DMB, DA)

Analytics – Experience collecting and analyzing the appropriate advertising metrics for the purpose of optimizing digital advertising strategy and tactics. (DMB, DA)

Analysis – Experience researching and analyzing the effectiveness of paid search activities in meeting campaign and business objectives. (DMB, DA)

Design Platforms – Expertise in Adobe Creative Suite, including Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, and Acrobat Pro. (GD)

Design Principles – Comprehensive understanding of design principles for desktop and mobile layouts. (GD)

Creative – Excellent creative and design skills with proficiency in typography, color, layout, composition, imagery, and video, as evidenced by a professional portfolio. (GD)

Organization – Proven capability to manage multiple projects or initiatives effectively and efficiently while maintaining priorities, deadlines, and deliverables in a fast-paced environment. (DAM, DMB, DA, GD, V)

Critical Thinking – Capacity to identify trends and adjust strategy using analytical and quantitative problem-solving. (DAM, DMB, DA)

Video Production – Proven skill to create compelling visual stories for advertising and marketing objectives while maintaining creative, technical, and brand standards. (V)

How to Hire a Digital Advertising Marketer Step 4: Choose Education & Experience

The level of education and experience you require for the role will depend on the salary you are willing to offer and the availability of talent in the area you are recruiting. 

Keep in mind, digital marketing is still a young vocation. While a veteran in more traditional professions (think accounting or human resources) might have 20+ years of experience, the equivalent in digital marketing might be half that.

Choose the level(s) of education and experience you’ll require for this position.

• Technical Training
• Bachelor’s Degree
• Master’s Degree
• 1+ years professional experience
• 3+ years professional experience
• 5+ years professional experience
• 10+ years professional experience

How to Hire a Digital Advertising Marketer Step 5: Add Salary, Benefits, & Company Info

The last step in building a solid job posting is the addition of salary and benefits.

Are you offering health and vision insurance? What about 401k matching?

Lastly, add a paragraph or two about your company.

Here’s an example from our job postings:

DigitalMarketer is a research, training, and certification company based in Austin, TX, that focuses on sharing what’s new and what’s actually working in digital marketing with small businesses, agencies, and marketing professionals.

Our mission is simple: We want to help double the size of 10,000 small businesses by 2020, and we believe the best way to do that is to train a new breed of digital marketing professions so they’re able to leverage modern distribution channels to generate additional leads and sales for their companies.

We’re passionate about this mission, and we absolutely love what we do. If you would like to share in this mission, and you believe you possess an uncommon blend of marketing genius and entrepreneurial irreverence, then we invite you to apply.

Interview Questions for a Digital Advertising Marketer Job

A successful digital advertising marketer will be required to think creatively, strategically, and tactically.

They may also be required to manage people and/or projects, meet deadlines, and provide proven experience in their given field of expertise.

The following sample interview questions are intentionally behavioral in that they ask the candidate to describe actual scenarios that reveal their level of experience. These are general questions that we ask our digital advertising marketer candidates and should be adjusted to fit the role for which you are hiring.

Tell me about the best-performing ad campaign you’ve helped create for an organization.

• FOLLOW-UP: What was your role in the creation of that campaign?
• FOLLOW-UP: How and where did you use the campaign?
• FOLLOW-UP: What organizational goal did the campaign meet?
• FOLLOW-UP: How did you measure the effectiveness of that piece of content?

Tell me about the most memorable digital advertising campaign you have worked on.

• FOLLOW-UP: What organizational goal did that campaign meet?
• FOLLOW-UP: How many team members did you work with or manage during this campaign, and what were their roles?
• FOLLOW-UP: Describe an obstacle you encountered in this campaign and how you overcame it.
• FOLLOW-UP: Did the campaign meet your objectives? If so, how did you ensure it did?

Tell me about a video (or ad creative) you produced for a digital advertising campaign that boosted results.

• FOLLOW-UP: What tactics did you use to optimize the video (creative) for conversion?
• FOLLOW-UP: Did you plan and execute it yourself, or did you work with a team to complete the project?
• FOLLOW-UP: What challenges arose during the production of the video (creative), and how were they resolved?

Tell me about a time when you used data and analytics to optimize an ad campaign (the strategy and/or assets).

• FOLLOW-UP: What were the metrics you found most useful?
• FOLLOW-UP: Can you describe your process for interpreting the data?

Tell me about a time when you ran an advertising campaign that failed.

• FOLLOW-UP: How did you discover the campaign wasn’t working?
• FOLLOW-UP: How did you respond?
• FOLLOW-UP: Were you able to salvage the campaign? If so, how?

Tell me about a failing digital advertising campaign you optimized and how your efforts strengthened it.

• FOLLOW-UP: Was it your own campaign or someone else’s that you strengthened?
• FOLLOW-UP: What was your process?

How long have you been doing media buying?

• FOLLOW-UP: What drew you to media buying?
• FOLLOW-UP: What has been the most effective media channel for you? Why?

Is there a brand whose digital advertising strategy stands out to you, either for good or bad?

• FOLLOW-UP: What makes it stand out to you?
• FOLLOW-UP: What would you do to improve on what they’re doing?

Name a brand whose approach to digital advertising is worth imitating?

• FOLLOW-UP: Why?
• FOLLOW-UP: How would you implement something similar in a different industry?

Do you have a Google, Yahoo, or DigitalMarketer certificate?

• FOLLOW-UP: When did you get it?
• FOLLOW-UP: How has it affected your work as a digital advertiser?

What kinds of resources do you use to stay up-to-date?

• FOLLOW-UP: Is there an expert or thought leader you tend to imitate? Why?

How do you think the digital advertising world will change in the next three years?

• FOLLOW-UP: How will it stay the same?
• FOLLOW-UP: If ads were removed from YouTube, how would you monetize it?
• FOLLOW-UP: If a brand-new advertising channel were to open up today, how would you go about vetting it?

Have you ever had to create a campaign on a tight budget?

• FOLLOW-UP: What challenges did you face?
• FOLLOW-UP: How did the campaign perform?

What are the limitations of Online Marketing?

• FOLLOW-UP: How do you see it integrating with other marketing tactics, such as content marketing or social media?

Where to Find Your Next Digital Advertising Marketer

To find qualified applicants, you can list your job postings on both free and premium job board websites, including:

Free Job Posting Sites

Glassdoor

Glassdoor is a free resource for job seekers to get access to over eight million company reviews, job listings, salary reports, interview reviews, office photos, and more. This allows candidates to get a good feel for what companies are like as they consider applying. Glassdoor gets over 19 million monthly visitors, the vast majority of which are in the US.

Portfolium

Portfolium is great if you’re looking for entry-level positions or internships. This site is a place for college students and recent graduates to showcase their work to potential employers. They have a free job board that you can use to recruit from their pool of one million students based on coursework, projects, and experience.

Upwork

If you’re looking to go the freelance route, Upwork is an online aggregator of a variety of marketers and other self-employed professionals. They have over 10 million registered freelancers and four million registered clients. While they do offer enterprise-level solutions, you can search and browse their network for free.

Paid Job Posting Sites

Indeed

Indeed has over 180 million unique visitors every month from over 50 different countries and is one of the leaders in job posting sites. They do offer a free option to post job listings, but they also give you the ability to get paid traffic to your listings to attract more leads.

Workable

Workable is a paid tool that posts your job listing on all major job boards and social networking sites, so you can knock out your recruiting efforts in one fell swoop. It also organizes candidate resumes and has a space for notes and feedback, so you can keep all your important hiring documents in one place.

LinkedIn

As the largest professional networking site, LinkedIn’s job posting feature puts your ad in front of qualified candidates, whether or not they are actively seeking a job. There is a free demo available if you want to check it out.

CareerBuilder

CareerBuilder boasts 24 million unique visitors per month and works with a wide variety of employers, including 92% of the Fortune 1000. It operates in the US, Canada, Europe, Asia, and South America and has partnerships with over 1,000 sites, including 140 newspapers.

SimplyHired

SimplyHired is a targeted pay-per-click job board that includes job postings from 24 countries in 12 different languages. They get 30 million unique visits per month and over one billion job searchers every year.

Training Your Digital Adverting Marketing Team Member

Congratulations on committing the time and energy to hiring the right digital advertising marketer the first time!

Whether you’re hiring your first digital advertising marketer or expanding an existing team, consider onboarding your new hire the right way by certifying them as a Customer Acquisition Specialist.

In this class, your new digital advertising specialist will learn the how to drive quality traffic from platforms like Facebook, Google, YouTube, and LinkedIn using the most up-to-date digital advertising marketing strategies and methodologies that are actually working TODAY, including:

• Watch step-by-step instructional videos on how to build successful ad campaigns on platforms like Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, and YouTube.
• Use the “3-Step Automated Traffic System” that builds an automated traffic system that generates leads and sales for your business 24 hours a day.
• Discover how to successfully scale your campaign once you have a winner so you can build massive subscriber lists while avoiding ad fatigue that can lead to increased click costs.
• Learn about “traffic temperature” and how media buying is actually like building an in-person relationship.
• Understand the five elements of a high-converting paid traffic campaign.
• Quit wasting time analyzing numbers that are useless to the bottom line. Learn to analyze the metrics that actually matter so you can “trim the fat” from your campaigns and scale.

…And much, much more!

Why Should You Get Certified?

If you’re a business owner, this certification is a great way to learn digital advertising marketing yourself. It’s also a smart way to train and certify members of your own team to ensure they’re up to speed on the latest trends and best practices.

If you’re an agency, this certification is a tangible way to show that you are a Customer Acquisition Specialist, which could help you attract and retain better, higher-paying clients.

If you’re a student, this certificate can set you apart from other graduates who merely have a business or marketing degree by teaching you specialized skills employers today are desperately seeking.

If you’re an employee or marketing professional, this certificate can make you more valuable to your company, which is the surest way to get that raise or promotion you likely already deserve (but don’t have a tangible reason to request).

How It Will Work

The Paid Traffic Mastery course is an advanced, 6-Module, 35-Lesson online course.

At the end of each module, you will be asked to take a short quiz prior to moving on to the next module.

Once you have completed the entire course, you can then sit for the final certification exam, and after passing this exam you will earn the “Customer Acquisition Specialist” designation, complete with displayable badge and printable certificate (suitable for framing).

Ready to learn more and take the next step? Get all the details now.

Want a PDF version of this hiring kit? Get it here!