The Supreme Guide to a Future-Proof Digital Marketing Career (AI, Recessions & Pandemics)

“Will AI replace Digital Marketers?”

“Anyone else feeling lost after getting laid off?” 

“The recession/pandemic is hitting hard and the job market is brutal” 

AI, recessions, pandemics – these are some of the most common worldwide threats when it comes to job security. 

They can hit you unexpectedly. 

One day you’re working in your office in peace. 

The next day, you’ve been summoned to HR to receive the bad news…

“We’re really sorry but we’ll have to let you go”. 

Those very words are enough to make anyone’s heart sink to their stomach. 

It’s why years ago, I decided that I needed to attain self-reliance. 

Because to me, when you are truly self-reliant, everything can be taken away from you…

Your money, your status, your shelter, etc…

But what can’t be taken away from you is your wisdom and skills. 

And your wisdom and skills can be used to get them all back. 

When you’re in that position, you are not at the mercy of anyone. 

No one holds your destiny in the palm of their hands except for YOU! 

This is why I obsess over my Digital Marketing education. 

I’ve invested $14,000+ into my own self education as a marketer…books, courses, mentors, communities, etc. 

I saw Digital Marketing as the ticket to endless opportunities. 

When you have the right skills in this field, you can: 

Because your career is not at the mercy of any economical, societal or industry-wide pressures. 

So, if that resonates with you, then all I have to say to you is WELCOME, Supreme Digital Marketer…

WELCOME to the ultimate guide to future-proofing your Digital Marketing career 

(in a world of rapid AI development, recessions and unexpected pandemics). 

By the end of this article, you’ll have a roadmap to build a career without the constant anxiety of what the future is going to be like. 

That way, all you need to focus on is pursuing your wildest dreams. 

Let’s get into it, shall we? 

First, I want to address some common questions that can hold you back if not answered…

Pop quiz: who do you think makes more? 

The doctor or the neurosurgeon? 

Well, you don’t need to be in the medical field to make this guess. 

Specialist doctors such as Neurosurgeons and Cardiothoracic Surgeons can have salaries ranging from AUD$500,000 all the way to AUD$800,000. 

General practitioners on the other hand have salaries ranging from AUD$70,000 to AUD$300,000. 

So the specialists tend to make more than the generalists. 

Now, as you read that, you’re probably thinking, “wow, I need to become a specialist too”. 

This is what I was taught early in my marketing career… 

That I needed to stick with one thing and one thing only…

“Ok, I need to position myself as ONLY an email marketer working with ONLY business coaches”. 

And sure, that strategy can work to get your first initial clients/jobs. 

But is it a good long term strategy for your career? 

See, I realised overtime that Digital Marketing is a field that changes almost as fast as the Road Runner…

Go subscribe to newsletters like Search Engine Land or Search Engine Journal. 

Almost everyday, you’ll see updates on new tools, new marketing strategies, new features or changes added to social media platforms.

It gets overwhelming very quickly the amount of changes and things you need to think about in this field. 

Now, here’s a scenario. 

Let’s say you ONLY focus on Facebook ads and you don’t have any other skill sets. 

And let’s say, for whatever reason, Facebook decides that they don’t like you so they ban your account. 

Or the government decides that Facebook has too big of a monopoly and decides to shut them down. 

What are you going to do? 

You spent so much time and energy just focusing on Facebook. 

But at this point, you’ve just been set back. 

In fact, years ago, Facebook implemented stricter guidelines on ad compliance. 

The result? Those who failed compliance got their ads shut down. 

Businesses even had their ad accounts shutdown.

And if you’ve tried to contact Facebook support before, you probably know that it’s next to impossible to get their help. 

Bottom line: if you put all your eggs in one basket especially when the basket keeps changing things around (sometimes for the good, sometimes for the really bad)...

How can you truly have a future-proof career? 

So regardless of AI developments, recessions, pandemics, social media platform changes or industry-wide changes…

What I’ve discovered to be a sustainable way to adapt and future-proof your Digital Marketing career…is to be an M-Shaped Marketer. 

The M-Shaped Marketer is the kind of marketer who understands at least the basics of every important marketing skill…

All while having deeper expertise on a few of those skills. 

So for me, I studied email marketing for over a year.

That became my first specialisation.

Then, I started branching out.

Now, my other specialisations are content marketing and paid media.

This mixture of generalisation and specialisation seems to be one of the best paths to take for an industry that changes so rapidly. 

Plus, when you develop the foundations of all these skills, you’re not stuck on any one job role or industry. 

You can choose to focus more on SEO for example if you find that paid media doesn’t suit your fancy. 

But even as you’re focused on SEO, your understanding of paid media will definitely help you make better decisions…And vice versa.

NO! You will NOT be replaced by AI. 

There, you can breathe now. It’s ok, you're OK…

HOWEVER…

You CAN be replaced by marketers who USE AI.

Dun, dun, dunnnnnnn.  

See, AI tools like ChatGPT, Jasper.ai & DALL-E are already being used as prime virtual assistants to marketers as you can use them for…

And it’s not just these kinds of AI language models that you can use. 

Ad platforms like Facebook and Google have their own machine learning. 

Facebook’s machine learning is so advanced that it has access to trillions of data points that it can use to show your ads to the right people. 

So if you know how to get FB’s machine to do the hard work for you, the machine can consistently increase click-through rate while lowering the cost per customer/lead. 

Now, here’s where AI is limited and where you as the human still have the upper hand…

All in all, creativity and human ingenuity is the heart and soul of marketing. 

Also, I believe that the more the robots take over the human experience, the more the human touch can become a premium that people appreciate more of. 

I see AI as your friend…as long as you put in the effort to understand how to use it to create better marketing campaigns faster. 

If you want a recession-proof & pandemic-proof marketing career, then here’s the key…

The people who spend money are replaceable. The people who decide where to spend the money are not.

Fields that involve strategy such as account management, project management and business development are usually the most future proof during a recession. 

These can also be directors, senior managers and CMO-type roles. 

These are the marketers who know how to allocate money, time and energy into marketing campaign vision and execution for the best results. 

They are the main marketing decision makers. 

Also, the closer you are to generating revenue, the better. 

Companies won’t be able to sell consistently if they don’t have consistent leads coming in. 

But with fields such as social media management and other content related jobs, it’s harder to attribute those activities to direct profits. 

Now, obviously you can’t get up to the main decision making level right away. 

But you can work your way up. 

So how do you get to that decision making level? 

One of the most important skills you must have as a Digital Marketer, especially if you want to get into a managerial/director kind of role, is the ability to audit and maximise all stages of the customer journey. 

Every marketing effort you ever create will fall into one of these 5 categories of the customer journey. 

Your customer journey is like an engine and there are many parts in that engine. 

If one part of the engine is not working properly, the whole engine won’t work as well as you want it to. 

Think of two Facebook advertisers for example. 

Advertiser A only focuses on turning on and off the ads. 

Advertiser B works on the ads but they can look at the whole funnel and determine which parts of the ‘Customer Journey Engine’ are not working properly. 

For instance, Advertiser B sees that subscription registrations are 1%. 

Then he sees opportunities to take them up to 2%. 

And if subscription registrations go from 1% to 2%, ad spend literally doubles overnight.  

So at that point, it’s not about making better Facebook ads. 

It’s about improving other parts of the ‘Customer Journey Engine’. 

You can have the best Facebook ads in the world but if: 

Then at that point, it’s not a Facebook ads problem. 

The problem lies with another part of the ‘Customer Journey Engine’. 

So if you can act as not just the advertiser…

But also the consultant/strategist/expert who can look at the whole ‘Customer Journey Engine’ and then fix the parts that are not working properly…

Then your career as an advertiser will be much more future-proof. 

Bottomline, if you want to future-proof your Digital Marketing career from AI, recessions, pandemics, social media platform changes & rapid industry changes, then… 

So, where do you start? 

Well, just as a building needs strong pillars to hold it up, even in the middle of an earthquake…

These 10 core pillars will ensure your Digital Marketing career stays future-proof.

Do you know what the most life-changing number of all time is? 

It’s not 3 and it’s not 7. 

Those are lucky numbers. 

But the most life-changing number of all time is, of course, the number ONE!

And it’s not just because first place always wins the race.   

It also has to do with how you can use the number ONE to succeed in any area of your life. 

See, there is ONE success principle that I have always followed and that I will continue to follow until the day I leave this Earth. 

That success principle is called the “1% Rule”.

It’s simple – to achieve success in any area of life, become 1% better today than you were yesterday. 

Whether that’s getting stronger in the gym – lift heavier weights, increase reps or do one more set in your workout. 

Or having healthier relationships – do at least ONE act today to show your family and/or spouse that you care about them OR look for the parts of your relationship that you’re not happy with and see what you can do about it. 

Or improving your marketing – look at your marketing funnel (your webpages, emails, social media, ads, sms, etc) and see where there is room for improvement today. 

Now, 1% might not seem like much. 

But there are 365 days in a year. 

Do this for a whole year and that’s 1% x 365 days = 365% better in a year. 

Do this for two years and that’s 365% x 2 years = 730% better in two years. 

Apply that to your Digital Marketing career (as well as your entire life) and you will go further than you ever thought you could. 

So how do you guarantee that you get 1% better everyday with your Digital Marketing? 

If I pull up your social media apps, what will I see on your feeds? 

Will I see Digital Marketing related posts? 

Or will I just see random memes and posts from your friends where you’re not learning anything useful at all?

For most people, social media is a waste of time.

But for you, social media can ACCELERATE your Digital Marketing skill tenfold. 

Plus, it allows you to connect with other ambitious Digital Marketers around the world. 

Everytime I open my Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, I immediately see content that gives new insights, updates on new trends/tech and changes in the Digital Marketing world. 

That’s what you gotta do for yourself if you want to accelerate your learning & get ahead. 

The best thing you can do is to unfollow people who don’t add anything to your life (and who you don’t even care about anyway)...

Then replace them with Digital Marketing-related accounts. 

OR 

If that’s too harsh for you, what you can do is create a 2nd account on your social media apps. 

Then, use that as your daily source of Digital Marketing inspiration. 

So, to get started, here are 32 of the top social media accounts to follow (sign up to their email list too)…

Keep in mind, this is just a general list. 

Once you figure out what skills you want to specialise on, then you may need to look for more accounts specific to those skills you want to build. 

(example: if you want to master content marketing, follow accounts that talk about content marketing) 

Otherwise, you really can’t go wrong with this comprehensive list of pure marketing wisdom. 

It’s like having your own council of Digital Marketing mentors that talk to you everyday. 

BONUS: look into ‘Digital Marketing Podcasts’ as well so you can listen to Digital Marketing wisdom in your car. 

Because who the heck listens to the useless radio nowadays? 

The average daily drive time is 46-51 minutes. 

That’s 51+ minutes you can use to learn more about Digital Marketing and get ahead. 

All in all, take a few minutes of your time to set this up so you can put yourself on an accelerating path towards your future-proof Digital Marketing career. 

Aside from expert Digital Marketing accounts to follow on social media…

You also want to join some Digital Marketing communities. 

When you join a community, start connecting with other fellow Digital Marketers. 

Here are some natural ways to meet new marketers online…

Once you have a few people you talk to regularly, you can set up a group chat. 

From there, you can set up a mastermind where you and other Digital Marketers get on a weekly call and discuss the following…

The other Digital Marketers in your mastermind will see blindspots that you don’t within your own marketing campaigns. 

As a result, you ACCELERATE your mastery of Digital Marketing & you guys are able to get ahead together. 

If you’ve read ‘Think and Grow Rich’ by Napoleon Hill, then you’re already aware of how powerful a mastermind is. 

We talked about becoming an M-Shaped Marketer earlier in this article. 

The M-Shaped Marketer is the type of marketer who knows the foundations of each of the key Digital Marketing skills and also has a few key specialisations. 

This is the best combination of a generalist and a specialist I have seen so far.

And it will allow you to adapt to the fast-paced & unpredictable global and industry changes. 

But how do you become the ‘M-Shaped Marketer’? 

Where do you even start when there are SO MANY tools, platforms, strategies, changes happening in this industry? 

Well, let’s take a look at simplifying the skill of paid media as an example. 

Google is the top dog when it comes to search-based advertising. 

Facebook (& Instagram) are the top dogs when it comes to social media advertising. 

Because they are the top dogs, every other search engine and social media platform will want to follow and model what they have. 

After all, why would you reinvent the wheel? 

You’d want to follow what is already successful in the marketplace, right? 

YouTube is also a search engine and their advertising models are similar to Google’s ad platforms.

TikTok, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter and most likely every other social media platform that will come out in the future will follow Facebook’s ad platform. 

Sure, different platforms will have their own innovations and different styles of ads you can run. 

But the foundations of their ad platforms are modeled off of the top dogs. 

Once you’ve gotten good at Facebook ads and Google ads…

You already have a solid foundation to do paid media on all other search engines and social media network ad platforms. 

And aside from learning paid media…

You also want to learn at least the basics of SEO, email marketing, content marketing, social media growth hacking, data analytics & human persuasion. 

Now, obviously that’s A LOT! 

So if you’re just getting started in Digital Marketing, I highly recommend choosing one job role that interests you most. 

Then create your own experience and land a marketing job asap. 

That way, you can accelerate your learning through experience and working in a team. 

And as you're learning these skills, you will eventually land on a few skills that interest you deeply. 

Those will be your specialisations. 

Bottomline: becoming an ‘M-Shaped Marketer’ will open you up to almost limitless opportunities. 

For instance, you can definitely get to those 6 figure jobs where you spearhead entire marketing departments (if that’s what you want to do). 

And if you want to grow your own business, you will have a range of POWERFUL skills to grow that business to the moon. 

Want to become the kind of marketer that can stand the test of time no matter what changes happen in the industry? Here’s how.

Before Digital Marketing, you had traditional advertising. 

The only way businesses could advertise was on TV, radio, billboards, newspapers, magazines, brochures, etc. 

All of that costs a lot of money.  

And unlike Digital Marketing, it’s more difficult to track & measure results. 

For example: with digital, we can track everything from Facebook ad engagement to Landing page engagement all the way to how many purchases we got. 

But if you advertise on TV, how do you know exactly how many people watched your commercial (and for how long did they pay attention to your ad?) 

And how do you know exactly how many of those people who watched your commercial ended up buying your product? 

And for those that bought your product, how long did it take for them to go from watching your ad all the way to buying your product? 

Now, obviously there are many ways to measure the correlation between a TV ad and a spike in digital traffic…

(Like seeing how much more traffic/revenue you get in the minutes/hours/days after the TV ads are broadcasted) 

But with traditional advertising, it’s much more difficult to get exact measurements. 

So when Digital Marketing came in, it revolutionised the industry. 

For the first time, you could actually track the entire customer journey from “I don’t know who you are” to “I’m gonna tell all my friends and family about your brand”. 

On top of that, we have super advanced machine learning on ad platforms like Facebook that have access to trillions of data points to help you reach the right people ASAP!

Now, while this is all great, we have to understand that when things become easy and convenient, people tend to lower the standards. 

A lot of Digital Marketing campaigns today are either average or, pardon my french, just plain shit. 

There are a lot of “marketing gurus” nowadays selling overpriced courses with basic marketing knowledge that you can easily find on YouTube. 

Now, of course, I’ve seen some genius level gurus that will definitely blow you away with their wisdom & experience – search these two names: Alen Sultanic & Flint McGlaughlin. You can thank me later.  

But the majority of gurus are just plain shit that it can be difficult to know who to trust. 

So how do you ensure you learn the RIGHT marketing knowledge – the kind of knowledge that will serve you for the rest of your life no matter what happens in this field? 

And how do you do that without having to break your bank? 

Well check this out. 

Traditional advertisers of the olden days actually had to make super smart decisions with their marketing campaigns. 

The risks they took were higher than the risks a lot of Digital Marketers take today. 

Plus, with Digital Marketing, you can easily make edits (like if you noticed a typo on your Facebook ad so you take a couple of seconds to fix it). 

But with traditional advertising, once the ads have been created, it’s out there in the public and you can’t take it back. 

And that’s why I implore you to study the old masters of advertising. 

Because when you understand what truly makes a marketing campaign great, no matter the time period, you can start to become timeless as a marketer. 

No matter what new platforms, tech or trends come out in the future, you can always rely on marketing principles that stand the test of time. 

So without further ado, I’d like to introduce to you some of the great masters of olden day advertising for your gluttonous and ever-curious mind to feast on…

There are many other great olden day advertisers but for now, start with this list. 

Google their names and go find their ads. 

Then save their ads on your Google Drive so you have them as inspiration for your next marketing campaigns. 

I’d also recommend these other resources for studying high-converting ads in the olden days or the modern times:

In a future article, I’m gonna delve into the entire history and evolution of marketing and advertising. 

Super excited for that one so stay tuned. 

For now though, you have all the resources you need to fill your marketing head with the wisdom of the marketing masters of the world on a daily basis. 

As I said earlier, you won’t be replaced by AI. 

But you can be replaced by Digital Marketers who know how to use AI. 

So if you haven’t started learning this stuff yet, now is the time to get into it. 

But where do you start? 

Here are my favorite resources to help you integrate AI into your marketing processes. 

For just $6, you can get 10,000+ ChatGPT Prompts that cover everything from content creation to creating products and running a business. 

Head over to this link. 

Here are some of the newsletters I have subscribed to for my weekly dose of AI news, advice and updates. 

Superhuman Newsletter

AIPRM

Ben’s Bites

Digital Agency Network

Charley is a Facebook Ads Expert who has managed hundreds of millions worth of Facebook ads budget. 

He’s the best source I’ve come across for understanding how to really leverage Facebook’s machine learning to get maximum results for your Facebook ads. 

One big thing I learned from him is that the harder you work on Facebook ads, the less results you get. 

You want the machine to do the hard work for you because it has access to and can process trillions of data points to make better decisions. 

Check out his Youtube channel over here if you want to learn how to become a next level Facebook beast. 

It’s easy to fall into shiny object syndrome and FOMO in this field. 

New marketing tactics/tools/trends come out all the time. 

You hear about other companies using it. 

Marketing experts on your newsfeeds tell you how far behind you are if you’re not doing xyz. 

Then, what happens? 

You drop whatever you’re doing and now you’re chasing the shiny new marketing tactic/tool/trend. 

Maybe you get some level of success. 

Maybe it was a complete waste of time and now you’re even more behind on your KPIs this week. 

Regardless, If you work in a company or you own your own company, do you want to be at the mercy of your FOMO? 

Probably not, right? 

Then it’s time to accept that success is much less about catching up with the latest marketing tactics/tools/trends.  

It’s much more about focusing on the decisions that actually move you closer to your goals. 

This is your magic 80/20…

The 20% of the decisions you make as a marketer that will lead to 80% of the engagement and revenue. 

The most successful people and companies focus on their magic 80/20. 

Because those who focus their energy on the right things will surpass everyone else. 

But how do you find your magic 80/20 in the first place? 

For example, if you’re selling products or services, then the most obvious thing to look at is: 

There’s a lot of metrics to look at with your marketing campaigns. 

Determine which ones are the most important when it comes to profitability. 

That way you know what you have to focus on first BEFORE you start looking at the shiny new tactics/tools/trends. 

I mentioned earlier in this article that every marketing effort you ever create will fall into one of the 5 categories of the customer journey…

Awareness, Interest, Decision, Action, Loyalty/Advocacy. 

Your customer journey is like an engine. 

You want to look at all the parts of your ‘Customer Journey Engine’ and see which parts are not working…

From the amount of people who engage with your ads…

To how many people visit, stay and become buyers/clients through your landing pages…

To how many people subscribe to your email list...

To even the show-up rates and no-show rates (if your sales process involves getting on calls with leads). 

Find the parts of your funnel that need fixing. 

Fix those parts and your marketing campaigns will increase profit and decrease costs. 

Here’s an example. 

Research shows that about 40% of users exit your page when it takes longer than 4 seconds to load. 

So by making your page load for 4 seconds or less, you potentially increase your landing page views by 40%. 

This will then increase all other conversions on those landing pages. 

Which will then reduce the money, time and energy cost of your advertising and marketing efforts. 

So, focus on the parts of your ‘Customer Journey Engine’ that need fixing. 

And you can do this using tools like Google Analytics, which are super important if you want to see how people interact with your marketing channels. 

Because there’s no point getting caught up with shiny new tactics/tools/trends if there are parts in your funnel that are not working as well as they should be.

90% of marketing and sales success comes down to understanding your market…

Not what shiny new tactic/tool/trend you’ve been using. 

And how can you understand your market if you’re not constantly doing market research? 

See, the ego can be a deadly trap for marketers. 

You think you’ve done enough research. 

You think you know your market like the back of your hand. 

But this is a mistake that marketers and even managers/executives in many companies make. 

Many companies out there are very product-centric – they focus on product first, understanding customers second. 

They spend hours, days, weeks, months building products that they think are going to be the ‘best thing since sliced bread’. 

Then when they put it out into the market, spoiler alert…NO ONE wants what they sell. 

You have to be customer-centric – understand customers first, THEN make the product second. 

In fact, your customers can even tell you exactly what products they want you to make. 

That way you can be confident that the product you make is something your customers actually want – they literally told you. 

Don’t listen to that ego of yours that’s telling you that you’ve done enough research. 

Humans are not simple little “avatars” or caricatures that you think you know everything about just from a few hours of market research. 

Humans are complexed amalgamations of personality traits, interests, values, hopes, dreams, frustrations, fears, traumatic moments, emotional experiences & relationships that have influenced who they are today. 

So here’s a rule of thumb for you…

There is ALWAYS more research you can do. 

Make it a habit to spend at least one hour a week doing market research. 

In the future, I’ll have an article where I go super deep into market research. 

There are endless amounts of things you can test in Digital Marketing. 

For example, when I do Facebook ads, I can change one word in the copy or one word in the creative and that could potentially make a difference. 

But those are tiny changes. 

Should I test every tiny change I can think of in the hopes of improving my marketing? 

If I had infinite money, energy and time, then sure, maybe I would.

But if you want to see big results asap, then you need to focus on testing the 80/20…

The 20% of marketing changes that can bring at least 80% of the results. 

So if you use Facebook as an example…

Some of the big changes you can make are:

Focus on the changes that will lead to the most impact in your marketing. 

“Check your blindspots”, that’s what my driving instructor taught me when I learned how to drive a car. 

And if your instructor didn’t teach you the same thing, then they’re not fit to be driving instructors, lol. 

But this is a key lesson for marketers too. 

Marketing is complexed. 

You don’t know what you don’t know.

So, if you want to become a future-proof digital marketer, not only must you get at least 1% better at your craft everyday…

You must also get as much feedback about your marketing as possible. 

One way to do this is by having weekly meetings with you and the team you work with. 

Sit in a room, look at all the marketing data and see whether you guys hit the KPIs this week or not. 

If not, explore what needs to be improved. 

If you guys hit the KPI this week, then see how you can improve it even more. 

Whether you hit your KPIs or not, you’re always thinking of how you can improve your results. 

Bounce ideas off of each other.  

Your colleagues will see things you don’t, thereby revealing your marketing blindspots. 

Now, what if you don’t have a team or anyone to turn to? 

No problem. 

Go join a Digital Marketing community and connect with people. 

Gather some people you’ve connected with. 

Then form a weekly marketing mastermind where you can give each other feedback (scroll up to pillar 3 for an overview of this). 

This is how you can have a feedback cycle to help accelerate you towards becoming an future-proof Digital Marketer.

And of course, the most important thing you can do is invest in a mentor, someone who has the results you want. 

Then, all you need to do is just sit down and listen to everything they say. 

Don’t question them. 

Just do what they say. 

Because they have the life you want…so why would you go against their words? 

If you lose your job, are you still making money? 

If your answer to that is no, then it’s time for you to follow the age-old wisdom…

“Don’t put all your eggs in one basket”. 

And this is especially true when it comes to your income. 

You can have a six-figure job. 

But if you get laid off, do you have a separate income stream you can rely on? 

No? Then until you get a new job, you won’t be making any money. 

And it takes an average of 6 months to land a new job. 

So that’s 6 months where money is not flowing into your bank account. 

Now, what if you had a side business that made you money? 

Even if it gave you just $500/month, that’s still $500 going into your pocket every month as you look for a new job. 

So if it takes you 6 months to find a new job, at least you had $3000 going into your savings. 

And this is what I love about Digital Marketing. 

It gives you OPTIONS! 

As a Digital Marketer, you can choose to work a job…

OR serve clients…

OR grow your own business using the skills you learn. 

So, as you’re working a job, start thinking of what side business you want to get into.  

This is what I’m doing now. 

I want to educate beginner Digital Marketers so they can succeed in this space. 

The skills I learn and develop in my job, I can apply them to growing this side business. 

And the skills I learn running my side business, I can apply them to get better results in my job, which can open the doors for promotions and better job opportunities. 

So if you haven’t thought of having a side business of your own, now is the time to start. 

And to help you get your juices flowing…

Here are some of the most common side businesses you can start with. 

If you’re a beginner, then you will need to develop your marketing skills. 

That way, when you decide to run your own business, you know how to make it profitable. 

So if you’re just starting out, I highly recommend you take on some clients first as a freelancer.  

And if you want to take it further, you can have your own agency. 

It’s simple. 

You sell your marketing services to clients. 

Once you get a client, you focus on getting results and overdelivering for them. 

That way, they will want to keep working with you and tell their other business owner friends about you. 

From there, you can get more clients. 

Eventually, your agency becomes big enough that you will need to start hiring people to help you serve your clients. 

That’s the agency model in a nutshell. 

This business model is one of the lowest risk business models you can start. 

What you’re doing is you’re selling someone else’s product/service in exchange for a commission. 

Example, let’s say you create a YouTube channel that talks about cars. 

And you sign up to be an affiliate for a company that sells car parts. 

When you make your next video…

You get your audience to visit the car company’s website through an affiliate link. 

That affiliate link tracks who exactly came from your YouTube channel and purchased car parts.

Then you make a certain commission off of that. 

It’s definitely not the most lucrative business model by any means because you’re only taking a small amount of the profits. 

But for those who are just getting into business for the first time, this is one of the lowest risk business models you can find. 

And who knows? 

You might end up making a lot of money from it if you stick with it long enough. 

Worst case scenario, you gain more experience. 

These are some of the riskier types of business models to get into because they involve a good amount of initial capital first. 

Though with ecom, you can look into dropshipping if you want a lower risk option of selling physical products. 

But these are some of the most popular options right now that you can explore as a marketer. 

This is definitely something I want to get into. 

Starting your own business from scratch can often be very difficult. 

So, instead of starting your own business, why not buy an established business instead? 

Now, you’re probably wondering, “well Sam, a business costs tens of thousands of dollars to acquire. I don’t have that money”. 

That’s a very common concern. 

But in the world of buying businesses, there are different financial schemes you can look into. 

One financial scheme in particular allows you to acquire a business for zero dollars down. 

Yep, you read that right. 

ZERO DOLLARS DOWN – meaning you don’t have to pay for the business right now. 

I’m definitely not the expert on this topic. 

So I’ll let the real expert – Codie Sanchez – a veteran in the world of acquiring businesses, show you how to acquire a business for zero dollars down.

How to buy a business with no money in 2023

Take a skill that you’re good at and teach it to others. 

It could be anything. 

You could teach people how to grow a tomato farm and then make 6 figures off of that – this is a true story I heard of years ago. 

You could teach people whatever skills you acquired like graphic design, marketing, etc. 

From there, you can have multiple digital products and services. 

Now, you might think, “I’m not smart enough to teach people” or “I don’t have enough experience to teach people”. 

Those are common limiting beliefs, ones that I had myself. 

But here’s the thing. 

You don’t need to be a complete master at what you do just yet. 

You can start by teaching complete beginners on a topic. 

Like what I’m doing now – teaching beginner Digital Marketers how to secure high-paid jobs and set themselves up for a future-proofed career. 

Understand that most people are rarely experts on anything. 

So if you show even just a little bit of expertise on something, they will see you as an expert. 

Take one of the most famous con artists in history, Frank Abagnale, for example. 

To evade capture by investigators, he posed as 8 different identities. 

One of them was posing as a teacher for a sociology class at Brigham Young University (and he never studied the subject he was teaching). 

But none of his students knew he was a fake. 

How? 

“It wasn't difficult, I read one chapter ahead of my students. They never knew the difference,” he said in an interview. 

That right there is the key. 

You just gotta read one chapter ahead of the average person and they immediately think you are the expert on the topic. 

And if you’re truly passionate about a specific topic, you’ll be reading much more than just one chapter. 

Heck, you’d probably have read at least 5-10 books on your chosen topic (or you’ve at least watched many videos or read many articles on the topic). 

So, if you have a passion for teaching people a specific skill or topic, don’t let the voice in your head that says you’re not “smart enough” stop you. 

You are way smarter than you think. 

And even if you’re just beginning to learn a certain topic…

You can easily build an audience by sharing your journey with others.

I highly recommend heading over to this YouTube channel to know more about how you can create an entire business just off of your skills alone. 

F.Y.I. Steven Spielberg made a movie about Frank Abagnale and his extraordinary life of con-artistry. 

It’s called “Catch Me If You Can” – such a fun movie to watch. 

Every business exists to solve a specific problem. 

And I think everyone will agree when I say that this world is littered with problems. 

Now, judging from all the mass fear that a recession – and even a potential world war – is coming, there are going to be even more problems in the future. 

WAYYY more problems. 

All those problems will create opportunities for those who have trained their mind to see it. 

These problems don’t even need to be anything significant. 

It can be something as simple as selling plastic cups to people who are sick of washing their glasses. 

Or a solution to rusty door locks (having to unlock a rusty door lock can be a pain in the ass). 

Or people just being bored and wanting entertainment (which there is an abundance of on social media). 

In a recession, money doesn’t just go away, despite all the jobs being shut down around the world.  

The money just goes towards those who can solve a specific pressing problem. 

So, as you’re building your Digital Marketing skills, develop your ability to look for opportunities. 

It could be a common complaint you see. 

It could be something that pisses you off. 

It could be a problem that you yourself have solved. 

Start brainstorming. 

Pretend you are the Billionaire owner of Walmart. 

You are basically the Michael Jordan of the supermarket industry – you’re number one. 

One day, a couple of Brazilian businessmen wanting to connect with high-level American business owners sends you an email.  

All the other business owners they sent emails to said no. 

But you, despite being the top dog, you decide to say ‘Yes’. 

You then invite them over to your home and have a nice dinner to see if you can learn anything from them. 

Sure enough, these guys are amateur supermarket owners so they seek your wisdom and guidance.  

You happily share with them what you know – and their faces light up in amazement. 

Later on, you decide to fly out to Brazil to visit their supermarkets. 

You walk in and you’re intrigued by the layout of their supermarket. 

So intrigued in fact, that you grab a measuring tape, get down on your knees and you start measuring the aisles of their supermarket. 

You want to know if they know something that you don’t. 

Then a police officer shows up. 

He walks up to you, then handcuffs you. 

Your heart pounds. 

You have no idea what’s going on. 

But you’ve been through worse situations before. 

So you breathe and calm down. 

You then get forced into a rotten jail cell. 

One day later…

You are released from the jail cell. 

The officer apologises to you, telling you that it was a misunderstanding. 

He thought you were planning a crime. 

You smile, accept his apology and then walk away. 

You then go back to the Brazilian supermarket owners and thank them for their time. 

And that was the end of it. 

Now, think about how crazy that is. 

You are the top dog of your industry. 

Yet, not only were you willing to help out some amateurs in your industry…

You flew all the way to Brazil just so you could get down on your knees to study the aisles of their local supermarket. 

Then what happens? 

You go to jail for it. 

But regardless, you don’t act angry, vengeful or “holier than thou”. 

No, you are grateful for the experience and you walk away. 

This, ladies and gentlemen, was a tiny piece of the life of Sam Walton. 

When I read that story, I was blown away. 

Imagine the level of humility you need to have in that situation. 

It didn’t matter if Sam was number one in his industry. 

He was ALWAYS learning, growing, getting better. 

And it’s no wonder why he was number one in the first place. 

I myself don’t have this level of humility – not even close. 

But I’m always looking to improve. 

No matter how good you are…

There will always be someone out there who is better than you…

Or they WILL be better than you if you stop growing. 

Because if you’re standing still, you’re actually moving backwards. 

And that could not be truer than in the field of Digital Marketing. 

Strive to have the humility of a Sam Walton and always be learning. 

Always be proving yourself no matter what you’ve achieved and no matter how good you think you are. 

This doesn’t just apply to Digital Marketing, this applies to all areas of life. 

There you have it folks, the 10 pillars to future-proofing your Digital Marketing career. 

Set these 10 pillars up and you will get to a point where you don’t ever have to worry about losing your position. 

And if there is a chance you would lose your position, you can easily have other opportunities coming to you. 

Plus, you might already have a side business of your own so you don’t have to worry about your bank account drying up (if you’re out of a job).

This level of confidence is priceless in a world where AI developments, recessions, pandemics or any industry changes can put you in a state of fear. 

Hope this article was helpful to you. 

Please send an email to [email protected] if you have any questions, feedback, concerns or anything you’d like to share. 

I love feedback and I read all of them as they help to create better articles for you. 

Talk soon. 

P.S. If you want a complete step by step, ‘hold-you-by-the-hand’ roadmap to landing your very first $40K+/year Digital Marketing job (even if you’re a beginner), then check this out. 

P.S.S. If you know anyone else who wants to get into Digital Marketing, please share this article with them. 

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