A November 2013 eMarketer survey of companies with 100+ employees estimates, that 88% of U.S. marketers will use social media for marketing purposes in 2014. This number has been steadily increasing from the 85% eMarketer first reported in 2012. The companies surveyed were asked about social media marketing tools including: blogs, microblogs, photo- and video-sharing, podcasting, ratings and reviews, social games, social networks, virtual worlds, widgets and applications, wikis, etc.
No surprise here. We have all seen this coming for some time now.
What did surprise me, however, was a recent LinkedIn blog post (December 18, 2013, by Sohan Murthy). The title immediately caught my attention, “The 25 Hottest Skills That Got People Hired in 2013.”
The post reported on the findings of a LinkedIn exercise conducted to answer the question, “Who’s getting hired and what are they doing?” The folks at LinkedIn analyzed the skills and employment history of more than 259 million LinkedIn members’ profiles.
What they found surprised me.
Topping the list of the 25 hottest skills at #1 was “social media marketing,” followed by others that are closely related, including “mobile development” (#2), “statistical analysis and data mining” (#5), “user interface design” (#6), and “digital and online marketing” (#7). LinkedIn’s conclusion: “If the skills you have on your LinkedIn profile fit one of the categories below, there’s a good chance that you started a new job or were approached by a recruiter about an open position in the past year.”
Here’s the takeaway…
If you are looking to stay relevant in today’s competitive job market, it’s time to start marketing your personal brand through social media. And that means LinkedIn is a must.
