Full Stack Marketing 101: What You Need to Know About How to Be a Full Stack Marketer
What is a Full Stack Digital Marketer?
Full stack marketing: it’s one of the many buzzwords to hit the digital space in recent years, right? Wrong. While full-stack marketing might be a new term for some people, it’s a critical consideration for anyone who wants to succeed in the modern digital world. Today, we’re going to talk about the ins and outs of full stack marketing and why you’d want to become a full stack marketer today.
Let’s dive in.
What is Full Stack Marketing?
According to Michael Haupt, and a recent post he published on Medium, full stack marketing is a blanket term that refers to a broad approach and set of skills. Here’s his definition:
Full stack marketing is a term first coined by Marcelo Calbucci and Morgan Brown. It refers to the type of skills, mindset and approaches some marketers are capable of because they are knowledgeable about and can refer to all levels of the marketing “stack” (a phrase that came from “full stack developers” — those who can code both back- and front-end requirements for an app). These marketing professionals are better known as full stack marketers.
As digital marketing has evolved, the traits attributed to good marketers have, as well. And for a good reason: the marketing funnel has shifted massively in recent years.
Instead of creating wide-open funnels designed to capture any lead within range, today’s companies have moved to a more targeted approach, which utilizes tactics like SEO, Paid Search, and Google Ads, among others. Strategic content is the name of the game with any of these approaches, and businesses are more committed than ever to leverage content and targeting niche audiences. As you might imagine, this requires a comprehensive set of skills that are just as cohesive as it is powerful. That’s where full stack marketers step in.
Full stack marketers are some of the best-rounded, most comprehensive marketing experts out there, and they’re providing a critical service for companies of all sizes.
What Makes a Good Full Stack Marketer?
Full stack marketers aren’t your average marketing professionals.Full stack marketers are well-rounded experts who have experience in all facets of marketing, including social media, UI/UX, content, and more.
To put this another way, full stack marketers can provide services to support the entire “stack” of marketing services.
While these marketers might have a background in one specific type of marketing, they’re skilled enough to adapt to the needs of virtually any marketing situation, without having to learn new skills or hire someone else. A full stack marketer has the ability to develop creative, one-of-a-kind solutions for problems, thanks to their practical experience in development and extensive subject matter expertise in SEO, research, PPC, and more.
Full stack marketers have risen quickly to the top of the marketing industry. This is because they’re exceedingly flexible and don’t require much notice or time to transition between projects.
6 Traits of Excellent Full Stack Marketers
Curiosity
Marketing is a diverse practice. There’s a considerable amount to learn, excel at, and be excited by. In light of this, full stack marketers remain curious about what’s around the next corner. These professionals want to stay abreast of all the information in the industry. They also want to process it and find ways to incorporate it into their strategies.
Resourcefulness
Full stack marketers believe there’s a solution to every puzzle — as long as you’re willing to work hard enough to find it. People who want to solve challenges and work smarter (not harder) will excel as full stack marketers.
Resilience
Full stack marketers have to jump from project to project, which means they must be resilient and flexible. If a campaign doesn’t work, full stack marketers pivot quickly to find a solution. They must be open to new ideas, new adaptations, and new tactics at all times.
Motivation
Full stack marketers are motivated to make the best of everything. They want to learn everything they can, improve their companies, and improve the marketing campaigns they work on. They’re motivated to keep learning, growing, and improving.
Charisma
Full stack marketers have to get onboard with the vision of the company they’re working with. Charisma is a critical part of any good full stack marketer’s toolkit. It’s essential to possess a natural degree of charisma before you enter the industry.
Technical Marketing Expertise
Marketing expertise can be made, not born, in a full stack marketer, but it’s still an essential skill. As a general rule, full stack marketers should have a strong basis in marketing strategy, development, lead generation and more.
Busting the “Jack of All Trades” Myth
The modern full stack marketer is not a “jack of all trades, master of none.”
These marketers don’t just dabble in various marketing tactics, and they don’t only provide halfway-there services in a bunch of different fields. Instead, they specialize in providing the services necessary to support that big-picture view of a marketing campaign.
They’re experts at taking things apart and putting them back together again. They’re experts at diagnosing a problem and understanding which puzzle pieces fit and fill a gap. They’re also exceedingly good at strong interpretation of analytics and data from various channels because of their multi-dimensional foundation.
Full stack marketers are highly trained and highly educated — experienced in a wide selection of marketing approaches. They also keep their training current, continually learning new strategies, and improving their services.
Why Would You Want to be a Full Stack Marketer?
There are dozens of reasons you would want to be a full stack marketer or bring one onto your team. Full stack marketers are flexible and agile, which means they are a critical addition to projects that move quickly and require a wide assortment of skills.
1. Rapid Project Development
Marketers develop projects quickly because they have the skills to do so. Because full stack marketers don’t need to switch between teams routinely, project completion timelines are generally shorter. This is an attractive trait for people who get bored quickly and like to see projects wrapped up.
2. Lower Operational Costs
Because full stack marketers operate primarily as one-person agencies, they aren’t subject to the overhead costs of full marketing teams. Instead, full stack marketers are agile enough to thrive in today’s economy and flexible enough to take on a variety of jobs. They have the freedom and flexibility to work on the projects they’re attracted to, not just the ones they feel obligated to complete.
3. Diversity
When you’re focusing on a single approach, even the best marketing gets boring after a while. One of the benefits of being a full stack marketer is that it allows you to dabble in a whole bunch of things. A week in the life of a full stack marketer could include copywriting Monday through Wednesday, video production on Thursday, and social strategy on Friday. It’s an exciting and fast-paced field, and people love it.
4. Close Proximity to New Tech
The martech landscape is changing at breakneck speed, and full stack marketers have a front-row seat. If you love the idea of working closely with things like chatbots, Marketing Automation software, email marketing, AI, voice search, vertical video, and more, a position as a full stack marketer may be the place for you. Unlike other types of marketers, who may work only peripherally with this tech, full stack marketers take a full-contact approach, implementing and deploying new tech and watching it work its magic.
The Case for the Full Stack Marketer
The marketing landscape has changed immensely in recent years. Where marketing used to be a static, one-dimensional approach to making sales, today’s marketing is diverse, varied, and flexible. There is no one-size-fits-all strategy for marketing, and companies are getting more creative than they ever have before.
Full-stack marketers fit nicely into this overall picture. Agile enough to adapt to a company’s needs and skilled enough to participate effectively in all facets of marketing, full stack marketers provide companies with something they’ve never had before: a one-stop-shop for all of their marketing needs.
If the idea of becoming a full-stack marketer sounds stressful to you, you might not be the right fit for the job. If you love diversity, challenge, fast-paced environments, and creative thinking, though, full stack marketing could be your ideal niche.
Originally Published by Blacksmith Digital a Los Angles based Full Stack Marketing Agency.
