Latest Employment Report a Reason to Smile
- Digital and direct marketers are revising upward their projections for 2011 as margins improve and demand picks up, creating the need for more headcount.
- The number of online digital and direct marketing-related job listings has been up sharply in the past couple months.
- Bernhart Associates has seen a “dramatic” decline in the number of resumes from recently laid-off digital and direct marketers.
Bernhart further noted that he's fielding more calls from companies asking about executive searches, adding, "you don't see that happening unless job recovery is taking hold."
Among those companies planning to add staff, Bernhart said digital and direct marketing openings will be across the board and at all levels. “Usually we see a couple of job categories stand out, but this time it’s very broad-based with marketing, analytics and sales topping the list, along with a strong showing among IT-related positions.”
Bernhart Associates’ Q1 hiring survey was emailed on Jan. 5 and again on Jan. 12 to more than 11,000 senior executives, hiring managers, human resource officials and other key participants in online and offline direct marketing. A total of 399 organizations responded to the widely followed employment trends survey.
According to the Direct Marketing Association (DMA), commercial and nonprofit marketers spent $149.3 billion on direct marketing last year, which accounted for 54.3 percent of all ad expenditures in the U.S. Measured against total U.S. sales, these advertising expenditures generated approximately $1.783 trillion in incremental sales. The DMA further reported that in 2009 there were 1.4 million direct marketing employees in the U.S. Their collective sales efforts directly supported 8.4 million other jobs, accounting for a total of 9.9 million American jobs.
Jim Gilbert has had a storied career in direct and digital marketing resulting in a burning desire to tell stories that educate, inform, and inspire marketers to new heights of success.
After years of marketing consulting, Jim decided it was time to “put his money where his mouth was" and build his own e-commerce company, Premo Natural Products, with its flagship product, Premo Guard Bed Bug & Mite Sprays. Premo in its second year is poised to eclipse 100 percent growth.
Jim has been writing for Target Marketing Group since 2006, first on the pages of Catalog Success Magazine, then as the first blogger for its online division. Jim continues to write for Total Retail.
Along the way, Jim has led the Florida Direct Marketing Association as their Marketing Chair and then three-term President, been an Adjunct Professor of Direct and Digital marketing for Miami International University, and created a lecture series, “The 9 Immutable Laws of Social Media Marketing,” which he has presented across the country at conferences and universities.
