Job Interview Q&A for the position of Digital Marketing Manager

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Interview questions for the role of a Digital Marketing Manager

“Congratulations, you have got the job” 6 words that give wings to all your dreams. After listening to these words your mind automatically starts calculating the EMI of that car you were planning to buy for a long time now. But wait, before you start calculating the EMI for that mansion, lets just have a look at what it takes to hear those magical 6 words.

Interview questions for the role of a Digital Marketing Manager

All it takes to get your dream job are the right answers to the questions that the interviewer asks. So what are the interview questions for digital marketing manager and what are the right answers to them? We asked many Digital Marketing Experts about the most important digital marketing job interview questions and their expected answers and their replies are as follows:

Question 1 by Courtney Cox, Director of Digital Strategy at Atomic Design and Consulting

What resources do you follow to learn about new trends and stay abreast of industry news?

Answer

This is one digital marketing job interview question that you’ll be asked often. Be honest with your answer. Tell them about the books or blogs you read, podcasts or webinars that you listen to etc. Don’t just say something that you have not done because a follow up question that Courtney Cox plans to ask can get you in trouble.

Courtney says, “Most applicants can rattle off the blogs and podcasts they know are leaders in their industry. I then follow that question up with, What have you learned recently from one of those resources, and how will it change the way you do your job? This follow-up separates the contenders from the pretenders. You can’t fake it. Applicants either have a quick, confident response, or they flounder. Job seekers should prepare for questions like this by paying attention to the leading industry blogs, podcasts, and newsletters. Then, they should think about how recent changes impact their current or past companies.”

Question 2 by Linda Pophal, owner of Strategic Communications

We’d like to do a better job of engaging our target audience through Facebook (or any other platform). How would you do that? 

Answer

This is a kind of trick question. Basically the interviewer wants to see whether you reply some mugged up answer or you actually try to know about the target audience.

Linda says, “I use this type of question as a way of exploring whether they take a strategic or tactical approach to marketing decisions. Far too often, the responses I received were tactical. They’d describe what they would do on Facebook (or whatever channel or tool I presented them with), rather than taking the time to step back and consider the situation before jumping to a solution.

The answer I would want to get to that question would go something like: 

Well, before I can answer that, I’d have a few questions for you — who, specifically, are you trying to reach and what, specifically, are you trying to achieve? “

Question 3 by Dylan Kissane, Content Manager at DOZ

What are we doing wrong right now and what would you do to change it?

Answer

This question means that you have to know everything about the company for which you are going for interview. So do your research, go through the company’s website, go through its social media profiles, learn about their clients and then you will easily know what is the company doing wrong. Don’t hesitate to point out the mistake. But after pointing out the mistake also provide them with a proper solution.

According to Dylan this will prove 4 things:

• prove that you have assessed the company’s current strategy and tactics
• prove you can be honest about the fail points you have identified
• show that you can do more than just criticize by offering constructive strategies for addressing fail points
• prove you have the confidence to tell their future employer when they are making a mistake

Question 4 by Christina Nicholson, Website Specialist at Media Maven & More

What is more important – the number of likes/followers or engagement numbers? Why? 

Answer

It is a misconception social media is all about the number of likes and follows. But if those likes and follows don’t translate into sales or an increase in business for your client, what is the point? Therefore Engagement > likes/follows.

Christina adds that, “This question lets the employer know that the potential employee understands the importance of interacting with people online and not just scheduling daily posts.”

Question 5 by Kevin Lennon, Digital Marketer at Digital8

Should your Content Marketing strategy be more clearly geared toward Social Media/Engagement, SEO (Organic Rankings), or Onsite Informational purposes?

Answer

This again is a trick question. A good content marketing strategy encompasses all three. It is keyword focused, genuinely informative & encourages engagement.  Good content encourages engagement, builds brand & authority & contributes to organic rankings via the content itself onsite as well as the potential nurturing of organic link growth an active social presence can provide.

Kevin says, “This will also start to give an idea of whether or not the applicant possesses cross-platform skills or if they are more heavily skilled in some areas over others. SEO, Social Media & Content Marketing are all one in 2015.”

Question 6 by Peter Spinda, Founder & CEO at Digital Duet

How much money have you wasted on unsuccessful marketing campaigns?

Answer

Here again don’t try to lie because every marketer has wasted some money on unsuccessful campaigns so if you lie, the interviewer will come to know. So give an honest answer, share your experiences, tell them what have you learnt from your mistakes and assure them that you are not going to repeat them.

Peter says, “If candidate’s answer on above question is $0, they are lying. If they are unsure and say not that much. They are lying. If they are truthful and say quite a bit, and then go on to explain how that taught them lessons on strategy development, budgeting etc, then I’d hire them.”

Question 7 by Collin J Slattery, founder of Taikun.Inc

How you would setup, track, and determine if a campaign was successful?

Answer

Collin says, “I would need to hear about the determining goal of the campaign (brand awareness, leads, social media followers, etc) and then planning the campaign around the desired result. Candidate will need to talk about TRACKING and using analytics (Google or otherwise) to get as much data as possible. Tell me how they’re going to track it. Adding URL parameters and the like. The key to digital marketing is having as much data as possible in order to be able to leverage that data to make actionable insights. The more they can tell me about how they’re going to gather the data and the ways they can look at the data to see what worked, what didn’t, and where things could be improved the more likely it’d be they would get the job.”

So that were the 7 important questions that you may be asked in your next interview so be prepared with the answer and talk confidently and we assure you that your dream car or mansion is not far away.

You can also go through the interview questions for:

SEO Specialist

PPC Marketer

Social Media Manager

If you have other important questions that you were asked then mention it in the comment box below so the other aspiring Digital Marketers can learn from them.