During 30 years as a marketing consultant, trainer and speaker I have found that much has changed. The world wide web, search technology, the ubiquitous smartphone, Apps, and software as a service come to mind.
To a large extent, the underlying psychology of marketing has not changed as this is based on the human psyche. As marketing is all about customers – a good place to start is psychology which teaches you about the way that people think. NLP is an interesting topic if you want to learn more about people / customers.
With regards to marketing, what should you learn? It is all too easy to get lost in the details, so you should study strategy. For example, is your enterprise going for market share or rapid profitability? Are you preparing new services / products? Is brand awareness increasing? What is the optimal promotional mix? Are you receiving your fair share of sales enquiries and sales? Your marketing strategy should be encapsulated within a written marketing plan (see Marketing plan training).
If you are writing your own content, you can increase the speed at which you write and the quality of your content via copywriting training.
Learning to use software properly can save a considerable amount of time. In addition, you will discover how to get the best out of the features that are available. See WordPress training and MailChimp training for example.
I read marketing books; magazines (the monthly magazine from the Chartered Institute of Marketing is very good); websites; e-newsletters; and blogs. I also attend marketing workshops and listen to webinars. also listen to marketing podcasts.,
