One specific CV challenge in digital marketing is ensuring your skills and experience are both accurately and strategically presented to stand out in a competitive field. Our guide offers detailed insights and practical advice to craft a CV that highlights your unique capabilities, ensuring you catch the eye of potential employers.
- Answer job requirements with your digital marketing CV and experience;
- Curate your academic background and certificates, following industry-leading CV examples;
- Select from +10 niche skills to match the ideal candidate profile
- Write a more succinct experience section that consists of all the right details.
Do you need more specific insights into writing your digital marketing CV? Our guides focus on unique insights for each individual role:
How to ensure your profile stands out with your digital marketing CV format
It's sort of a Catch 22. You want your digital marketing CV to stand out amongst a pile of candidate profiles, yet you don't want it to be too over the top that it's unreadable. Where is the perfect balance between your CV format simple, while using it to shift the focus to what matters most. That is - your expertise. When creating your digital marketing CV:- list your experience in the reverse chronological order - starting with your latest roles;
- include a header with your professional contact information and - optionally - your photograph;
- organise vital and relevant CV sections - e.g. your experience, skills, summary/ objective, education - closer to the top;
- use no more than two pages to illustrate your professional expertise;
- format your information using plenty of white space and standard (2.54 cm) margins, with colours to accent key information.
Once you've completed your information, export your digital marketing CV in PDF, as this format is more likely to stay intact when read by the Applicant Tracker System or the ATS. A few words of advice about the ATS - or the software used to assess your profile:
- Generic fonts, e.g. Arial and Times New Roman, are ATS-compliant, yet many candidates stick with these safe choices. Ensure your CV stands out by using a more modern, and simple, fonts like Lato, Exo 2, Volkhov;
- All serif and sans-serif fonts are ATS-friendly. Avoid the likes of fancy decorative or script typography, as this may render your information to be illegible;
- Both single- and double-column formatted CVs could be assessed by the ATS;
- Integrating simple infographics, icons, and charts across your CV won't hurt your chances during the ATS assessment.
PRO TIP
Use font size and style strategically to create a visual hierarchy, drawing the reader's eye to the most important information first (like your name and most recent job title).
The top sections on a digital marketing CV
- Professional Summary showcases your expertise and value.
- Core Competencies highlight your most relevant skills.
- Work Experience details your track record and achievements.
- Education and Certifications show your formal training.
- Digital Tools Proficiency demonstrates your technical know-how.
What recruiters value on your CV:
- Highlight your expertise in various digital marketing channels such as SEO, PPC, social media, email marketing, and content marketing, and provide metrics or results to showcase your accomplishments.
- Showcase your ability to develop and implement digital marketing strategies by explaining successful campaigns, the objectives you set, and how you measured their success.
- Demonstrate your proficiency with analytics and data interpretation tools, such as Google Analytics, with examples of how you've used data to inform marketing decisions and drive conversions.
- Detail your experience with marketing automation tools and CRM systems, explaining how you have used them to optimise campaigns, manage leads, and improve customer relationships.
- Exhibit your creative skills by mentioning campaigns you have conceptualised and executed, particularly focusing on content creation, visual design alignment, and the use of multimedia in digital marketing.
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Our checklist for the must-have information in your digital marketing CV header
Right at the very top of your digital marketing CV is where you'd find the header section or the space for your contact details, headline, and professional photo. Wondering how to present your the name of the city you live in and the country abbreviation as your address;
- are tailored to the role you're applying for by integrating key job skills and requirements;
- showcase what your unique value is, most often in the form of your most noteworthy accomplishment;
- select your relevant qualifications, skills, or current role to pass the Applicant Tracker System (ATS) assessment. Still not sure how to write your CV headline? Our examples below showcase best practices on creating effective headlines:
Examples of good CV headlines for digital marketing:
- Digital Marketing Specialist | SEO & Content Strategy | Google Analytics Certified | 5+ Years Experience
- Social Media Manager | Brand Engagement & Community Building | CIM Diploma | 8 Years in Industry
- PPC Campaign Expert | Google Ads & Conversion Optimisation | AdWords Certified | 3 Years’ Tactical Experience
- SEO Consultant | Organic Growth & Keyword Research | Moz SEO Expert | 10+ Years Strategic Insight
- Content Marketing Lead | Storytelling & ROI Focus | HubSpot Certified | 6 Years of Creative Solutions
- E-commerce Marketing Director | Omnichannel Strategies | Salesforce Accredited | 12+ Years Leadership Success
What's the difference between a digital marketing CV summary and objective
Why should it matter to you?
- Your digital marketing CV summary is a showcasing your career ambitions and your unique value. Use the objective to answer why your potential employers should hire you based on goals and ambitions. The objective is the ideal choice for candidates who happen to have less professional experience, but still meet some of the job requirements.
Before you select which one will be more relevant to your experience, have a look at some industry-leading CV summaries and objectives.
CV summaries for a digital marketing job:
- With over five years of dedicated digital marketing experience, including a pivotal role in growing an ecommerce brand by 300% in two years, I bring proven expertise in SEO, content marketing, and data analytics, seeking to leverage my skills in a dynamic and growth-oriented environment.
- Dynamic marketing strategist with a decade-long track record in leading successful digital campaigns across the tech sector, adept at PPC, email marketing, and social media engagement. My work has resulted in a 50% increase in lead conversion for a SaaS provider in just one year.
- Career educator making a strategic shift into digital marketing, armed with intricate knowledge of audience engagement and content creation developed over eight years teaching and a palpable passion for applying this expertise to drive digital strategy and community building in a new sphere.
- Accomplished financial analyst eagerly transitioning to digital marketing, equipped with strong analytical skills, an MBA in Marketing, and a track record in identifying market trends to capture new business opportunities, eager to apply quantitative aptitude to data-driven marketing methodologies.
- Eager to embark on a digital marketing career, I am a recent Digital Media graduate with certifications in Google Analytics and AdWords. My objective is to apply my theoretical knowledge and innovative creative skills to execute high-impact marketing campaigns focused on measurable results.
- Recent university graduate with a Bachelor's in Marketing, poised to enter the digital marketing domain. My objective is to harness my fresh perspective, strong grasp of marketing foundations, and proficiency with social media tools to contribute to impactful online branding and messaging initiatives.
The best formula for your digital marketing CV experience section
The CV experience section is the space where many candidates go wrong by merely listing their work history and duties. Don't do that. Instead, use the job description to better understand what matters most for the role and integrate these keywords across your CV. Thus, you should focus on:
- showcasing your accomplishments to hint that you're results-oriented;
- highlighting your skill set by integrating job keywords, technologies, and transferrable skills in your experience bullets;
- listing your roles in reverse chronological order, starting with the latest and most senior, to hint at how you have grown your career;
- featuring metrics, in the form of percentage, numbers, etc. to make your success more tangible.
When writing each experience bullet, start with a strong, actionable verb, then follow it up with a skill, accomplishment, or metric. Use these professional examples to perfect your CV experience section:
Best practices for your CV's work experience section
- Implemented multi-channel marketing campaigns, boosting the online presence of the brand and resulting in a 25% increase in web traffic over 6 months.
- Led a team of five to devise and execute SEO strategies which improved the website's organic search rankings, leading to a 40% growth in non-paid search traffic.
- Managed a monthly AdWords budget of £5,000, reducing cost per acquisition by 30% through continuous A/B testing and landing page optimisation.
- Conceptualised and launched an influencer marketing programme that increased brand engagement on Instagram and Twitter by over 50%.
- Analysed customer data with Google Analytics to refine and personalise digital marketing efforts, resulting in a 10% uplift in conversion rates.
- Developed and maintained an editorial calendar for email marketing campaigns that nurtured leads and contributed to a 15% rise in newsletter subscriber retention.
- Utilised CRM tools such as Salesforce to segment and target customers accurately, improving the effectiveness of retargeting campaigns by 20%.
- Regularly updated the company blog with SEO-friendly content that doubled the organic reach and positioned our brand as an industry thought leader.
- Collaborated with the web development team to enhance site UX/UI, which resulted in reducing the bounce rate by 18% and increased average session duration.
- Devised and executed an online content strategy for cross-channel marketing that increased website traffic by 40% within six months.
- Managed a monthly PPC campaign budget of £10,000, achieving a 20% reduction in cost per acquisition over the course of a year.
- Spearheaded the development of an influencer marketing programme that led to a 15% increase in online sales quarterly.
- Led a digital marketing team in implementing a cohesive SEO strategy that lifted the brand's website to top 3 search results for 10+ key terms.
- Innovated performance tracking by integrating analytics, which provided actionable insights for campaign optimisation, boosting conversions by 25%.
- Launched and managed a targeted email marketing campaign for a subscriber list of 50,000, with a sustained open rate improvement from 18% to 22%.
- Orchestrated a digital rebranding campaign, leading to a 35% increase in brand engagement across social media platforms within 9 months.
- Coordinated with the sales department to align marketing efforts with quarterly sales targets, surpassing goals by 10% each quarter.
- Initiated a partnership with a tech firm to co-create a mobile app, which boosted customer engagement by 50%.
- Restructured the company's Google Ads campaigns, which decreased bounce rates from 75% to 50% and doubled the click-through rate.
- Developed a content marketing strategy that incorporated user-generated content, thereby cutting content creation costs by 30%.
- Implemented a social media customer service process that improved response times to under 2 hours and customer satisfaction by 20%.
- Driven by data analytics, optimised digital ad spend across several channels, achieving a 60% increase in marketing ROI.
- Directed a successful B2B digital campaign that generated a 150% increase in leads for the company’s SaaS products.
- Implemented a customer segmentation project that tailored content to buyer personas, resulting in a 45% increase in campaign engagement rates.
- Pioneered the use of data visualisation tools for reporting to stakeholders, providing more transparent campaign performance insights.
- Overhauled the email marketing strategy, automating sequences based on behaviour triggers, which uplifted customer retention by 18%.
- Engaged in a multi-channel retargeting approach that reduced shopping cart abandonment rates by 30%, significantly lifting revenue.
- Expanded the digital brand presence to new social media platforms, netting an additional 100k followers within the first year.
- Initiated a video marketing strategy that contributed to a 70% increase in social media engagement metrics.
- Implemented a strategic content partnership with key industry influencers, producing a series of webinars that drove product awareness by 25%.
- Automated lead scoring and nurtured workflows in the CRM, boosting lead conversion rates to paying customers by 33%.
- Executed a localised digital marketing strategy, resulting in a 50% uptick in regional engagement and doubling the local market share.
- Enhanced UX and UI of the main company website, which led to a sustained increase in session durations by 40% and a decrease in bounce rates by 20%.
How to ensure your digital marketing CV stands out when you have no experience
This part of our step-by-step guide will help you substitute your experience section by helping you spotlight your skill set. First off, your ability to land your first job will depend on the time you take to assess precisely how you match the job requirements. Whether that's via your relevant education and courses, skill set, or any potential extracurricular activities. Next:
- Systematise your CV so that it spotlights your most relevant experience (whether that's your education or volunteer work) towards the top;
- Focus recruiters' attention to your transferrable skill set and in particular how your personality would be the perfect fit for the role;
- Consider how your current background has helped you build your technological understanding - whether you've created projects in your free time or as part of your uni degree;
- Ensure you've expanded on your teamwork capabilities with any relevant internships, part-time roles, or projects you've participated in the past.
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PRO TIP
If applicable, briefly mention a situation where things didn’t go as planned and what you learned from it, demonstrating your ability to learn and adapt.
Hard skills and soft skills to showcase your unique skill set on your digital marketing CV
Did you know that your CV will mostly likely be assessed by recruiters based on skill alignment? And that means that the way you feature your key skills across different CV sections will play a crucial role in landing you that first interview. We recommend you add your:
- technical capabilities or hard skills in your CV experience, certificates, projects, etc. Use your past accomplishments to prove your technical capabilities. List up to a dozen different software or hardware in your dedicated skills section to match the job keywords;
- personal and communication skills or soft skills in your CV strengths, achievements, summary/ objective, etc. Soft skills are a bit more difficult to prove. How do you define your aptitude in active listening? So, instead of just listing the skill name, include a tangible metric to show your success.
On a final note, when you're in a hurry to create your profile, you may misspell a particular technology or soft skill. That's why we suggest you copy and paste the particular skill name (or keyword), directly from the job advert. This would also help you to pass any initial Applicant Tracker System (ATS) tests.
Top skills for your digital marketing CV:
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising
Content Marketing Strategy
Social Media Marketing
Email Marketing
Web Analytics and Reporting
Graphic Design
Video Production
Mobile Marketing
Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO)
Creativity
Analytical Thinking
Communication Skills
Adaptability
Problem-Solving
Teamwork
Attention to Detail
Project Management
Time Management
Leadership
PRO TIP
If you have received professional endorsements or recommendations for certain skills, especially on platforms like LinkedIn, mention these to add credibility.
Listing your university education and certificates on your digital marketing CV
The best proof of your technical capabilities would be your education and certifications sections. Your education should list all of your relevant university degrees, followed up by their start and completion dates. Make sure to also include the name of the university/-ies you graduated from. If you happen to have less professional experience (or you deem it would be impressive and relevant to your application), spotlight in the education section:
- that you were awarded a "First" degree;
- industry-specific coursework and projects;
- extracurricular clubs, societies, and activities.
When selecting your certificates, first ask yourself how applicable they'd be to the role. Ater your initial assessment, write the certificate and institution name. Don't miss out on including the completion date. In the below panel, we've curated relevant examples of industry-leading certificates.
PRO TIP
If you have received professional endorsements or recommendations for certain skills, especially on platforms like LinkedIn, mention these to add credibility.
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Key takeaways
Impressing recruiters with your experience, skill set, and values starts with your professional digital marketing CV. Write concisely and always aim to answer job requirements with what you've achieved; furthermore:
- Select a simple design that complements your experience and ensures your profile is presentable;
- Include an opening statement that either spotlights your key achievements (summary) or showcases your career ambitions (objective);
- Curate your experience bullets, so that each one commences with a strong, action verb and is followed up by your skill and accomplishment;
- List your hard and soft skills all across different sections of your CV to ensure your application meets the requirements;
- Dedicate space to your relevant higher education diplomas and your certificates to show recruiters you have the necessary industry background.