Marketing

Marketing roles involve working out who might buy a product or service, what would persuade them, and then planning and running the activity that reaches them - adverts, emails, social media, events, websites, content and sponsorships. Graduates usually start as a marketing executive, assistant or coordinator, either in-house at a company (promoting that company's own products) or at an agency (doing the work on behalf of client companies). Much of the job is practical execution and measurement rather than coming up with big creative ideas.

Starting salary: £22k–£28k
Live graduate jobs: 186 open now
Main way in: Direct entry as a marketing assistant, marketing executive or…
They usually ask for: A degree in almost any subject is accepted

Approximate graduate salary

Typically around £22,000–£28,000 to start outside London and roughly £26,000–£33,000 in London, though this varies widely. Structured graduate schemes at large consumer goods, tech or financial firms can start meaningfully higher, while small agencies and charities often start lower.

What you'd actually do

Writing and scheduling content - social posts, email newsletters, website copy, blog articles, product descriptions - usually against a content calendar someone else set
Pulling numbers out of analytics tools (website traffic, email open and click rates, ad spend and conversions) and putting them into a weekly or monthly report for a manager or client
Setting up and monitoring paid campaigns on search and social platforms, adjusting budgets, keywords, audiences and creative based on what's performing
Briefing and chasing other people: designers for artwork, developers for landing pages, external printers or agencies, and internal stakeholders who need to approve copy

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Updating the CRM or marketing automation system - tidying contact lists, building email journeys, segmenting audiences, checking data is compliant with UK GDPR and PECR rules on marketing consent
Helping organise events, trade shows, webinars or product launches: logistics, delegate lists, stands, giveaways, follow-up emails
Sitting in planning meetings with sales, product or account teams, and doing the small research tasks that come out of them - competitor checks, customer surveys, pricing comparisons

How graduates get in

Direct entry as a marketing assistant, marketing executive or marketing coordinator - by far the most common route, and these roles are advertised constantly by companies of all sizes
Graduate schemes at larger consumer goods, retail, financial services, telecoms and media companies - often called brand management or commercial graduate schemes, usually rotational, and very competitive with early autumn deadlines
Agency entry at a marketing, digital, PR or media agency, often starting as an account executive, junior paid media or SEO executive - agencies hire regularly and are a common first job
Internships and placement years, including a sandwich year as part of a degree, which often convert into graduate offers; summer internships in marketing are common and worth targeting

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Building a demonstrable portfolio instead of formal experience - running social accounts for a student society, charity or small business, writing a blog, completing free platform certifications in search and social advertising - this genuinely helps for direct-entry roles
Sideways moves from sales, customer service, retail or admin roles into a marketing team, which happens often in smaller companies and is a legitimate route if you don't land a marketing job immediately

What employers ask for

A degree in almost any subject is accepted; marketing, business, communications, English, psychology and economics are common, but the subject matters much less than evidence you can write clearly and handle data
Many employers ask for a 2:1, particularly on structured graduate schemes; a great many direct-entry marketing executive roles accept a 2:2 or don't specify a classification at all
Some practical evidence of doing marketing - a placement, internship, society committee role, freelance work or your own content - is often what separates candidates, since the field attracts a lot of applicants
Familiarity with common tools is frequently listed: web analytics, email platforms, CRM systems, content management systems, social scheduling tools and spreadsheets. Employers rarely expect mastery at entry level but do expect you to have touched them

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Professional qualifications from the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) or the Institute of Data & Marketing (IDM) are respected but almost never required to get in - people usually take them a year or two into the job, often employer-funded
Marketing apprenticeships (Level 3 and the Level 6 degree apprenticeship) are an alternative entry route and are growing, though this guide assumes the graduate route

Skills that matter

Clear, concise copywriting

A large share of the job is writing short pieces of text - subject lines, ad headlines, social captions, web copy - where tone and brevity change whether anyone responds.

Comfort with data and spreadsheets

You'll be expected to explain whether a campaign worked, which means pulling figures from several platforms, spotting what changed and summarising it without overclaiming.

Project coordination and chasing

Campaigns involve designers, developers, approvers, agencies and printers, and the junior person is usually the one keeping the deadlines and version control straight.

Understanding of how the platforms actually work

Knowing the basics of search engine optimisation, paid search auctions, email deliverability and social algorithms stops you proposing things that can't work.

Customer empathy and audience thinking

Good marketing starts from what the buyer cares about rather than what the company wants to say, and junior staff who can articulate that get trusted with more.

Handling feedback and competing opinions

Everyone in a business has a view on marketing, so you'll regularly have your work rewritten by people with no marketing training and need to push back constructively or let it go.

Putting these on a CV? We counted which skills 12,914 live graduate adverts ask for, and what to do with the answer — part of our application advice.

Where it leads

Marketing assistant or executive: executing campaigns others plan. Most people spend roughly one to three years here, though it varies a lot by employer size.
Senior executive, or a specialist title such as digital marketing executive, SEO specialist, paid media executive, CRM executive, content marketer, product marketer or events manager. Many people specialise at this point, and the specialism you pick shapes the rest of your career.
Marketing manager or brand manager: owning a product, channel, region or client, with a budget and often one or two junior staff. Timelines vary widely - fast in small companies, slower and more structured in large ones.
Head of marketing, marketing director or, in agencies, account director and then client services or strategy director. In smaller businesses people reach head-of level considerably earlier than in large corporates, usually with a smaller team and budget.
Longer term, routes include chief marketing officer or commercial director, moving into general management or product management, going freelance or consulting, or starting an agency. Sideways moves into sales, product, e-commerce or customer insight are common and respected.

What people get wrong

“Marketing is a creative job where you think up advert ideas.”

Most marketing jobs, especially at graduate level, are closer to analysis, planning and project admin. The people who make the adverts are usually copywriters, designers and creative agencies; the marketer briefs them, manages the budget and measures the result.

“It's the easy, non-technical option for people who don't like numbers.”

Modern marketing is heavily measured. You will be asked what a campaign cost per enquiry, which channel drove sales and whether a change was real or noise - and spreadsheet and analytics fluency is often the thing that gets someone promoted.

“Agency and in-house marketing are basically the same job.”

They're quite different. Agency work means multiple clients, timesheets, pitching and fast variety, often with long hours and lower starting pay in exchange for steep learning. In-house means one brand, deeper product knowledge, more internal politics and generally more predictable hours.

“You need a marketing degree.”

Employers hire from across all subjects. Demonstrable work - a campaign you actually ran, a blog with readers, a society's social accounts you grew - usually counts for more than the title of your degree.

Where this varies

"Marketing" covers very different jobs depending on where you land. In a small business you may be the entire marketing function - writing copy, running ads, fixing the website and booking the exhibition stand in the same week. In a large corporate you'll own one narrow slice, such as email or a single product line, with specialists and agencies around you. Business-to-business marketing (selling to other companies) leans towards lead generation, long sales cycles and close work with the sales team; business-to-consumer marketing leans towards brand, media buying, retail and social. Agencies differ from in-house employers as described above. Geographically, London has the deepest concentration of agency and brand roles, but Manchester, Leeds, Bristol, Birmingham, Edinburgh and Glasgow all have substantial agency and in-house markets, usually with lower salaries and lower living costs. Charity, public sector and higher education marketing tends to pay less but is often more flexible and mission-driven.

See all 186 live Marketing jobsFrom employers' own careers sites, updated daily Tailor your CV for this roleFree with an account, 3 a month

General guidance about the role across the UK market, not about any specific employer. Entry routes and requirements vary — always check the individual job advert.