Keep Your Finger on the Pulse of Marketing

So, you're a proven marketing professional with 20 years of experience and contacts, and maybe even a CMO with a longer than average (>2yrs) stint in your current position. Maybe even considered a fixture at your organization. Great, until you lose touch with how to connect with customers, sales drop, and investors or others in the executive management team force you out. Or...when an up-and-coming marketing hotshot crowds your space.

Alternatively, you may be a little green in the marketing space. Maybe you've learned in the classroom or in an entry-to-mid level position. And maybe you understand the latest technology and marketing buzz, but haven't had a wide range of experiences or had exposure to a wide range of real-world business/operational models.

The solution for each predicament is something you ain't gonna learn in school or won't learn in time by reading it after it has already happened. What you need is a weekly or monthly 10-minute dose of surfing job boards, regardless of whatever your position or title may be. I guarantee you will learn something, whether you are old hand or new one within the marketing club.

As marketers, it is our job to continually learn and to provide vision within our organizations. That being said, I implore you to check out Craigslist and other job websites. Read the business overviews and job descriptions in the postings, and visit the websites. There is no better way to survey the landscape from the ground zero "before it happens" perspective. This should complement the journals, newspapers, e-newsletters, blogs, books, seminars, webcasts, and conferences, that you are hopefully immersing yourself in already.