If you’re looking to earn more money in your marketing or design position, this guide can help you accomplish that in just four easy steps. Check it out now:
Are you feeling stuck in your marketing or design position?
Maybe you’ve been there for years without a sizable raise or title change, or maybe you’re just a mere six months in and already bored by the lack of challenging work.
Instead of sitting there waiting for something awesome to happen, why not take control by leveling up your skills?
Do this and you’ll set yourself up to not only further your career and earn more money, but create rewarding challenges that motivate you to get out of bed each day too.
There are just four steps you’ll need to take to reach this goal — and I’ll be going over each of them today.
Let’s start with the first one, which actually requires a bit of soul searching on your end to get right:
Step 1: Identify Your Strengths and Weaknesses
Before you can level up your skills, you need to first figure out where you stand.
To do that, take inventory of both your strengths and weaknesses.
Jot this down in a Google doc or on paper along with a list of:
- All the tasks you enjoy doing
- Activities you wish you could do more of
- Everything you don’t enjoy doing
Next, take a look at your most recent performance reviews and compare these to your very first ones (if you have them).
Notice any common trends or themes here?
Are there any areas you improved?
Or ones you did worse with?
Do these answers match the strengths and weaknesses you identified earlier?
Uncover where you stand, both objectively and subjectively, so it’s easier to identify what needs work.
You’ll turn these flaws into selling points when you hone your skills, which also happens to be your next step.
Step 2: Sharpen the Saw
From here, your goal is to make yourself even more valuable in the eyes of employers.
And to do that, you’ll need to sharpen your saw, a concept from well-known author Stephen Covey.
Essentially, if you want to earn more money, you need to hone your craft and expand your skill set.
As Darian Kovacs mentions and reiterates in this interview, it’s crucial you’re always learning, especially through experience.
This means you’ll want to:
- Study trends and test them out for yourself
- Learn new concepts
- Understanding older ones on a deeper level
You can and should also consider specializing in one particular area and learning everything you can about it. This will set you apart from the competition.
It’s also essential to look for industry experts in your field and start learning from them. Ask yourself:
What concepts are they mentioning?
Why are they important?
What can I take away from this?
How can I apply it to my work?
By seeing what they’re focusing their attention on, you’ll have a better idea of how to enter the competition.
Another way to figure out where to start is to think about how your existing strengths and weaknesses play into what you actually enjoy doing.
So if one of your strengths is something you can spend hours doing without blinking, such as designing websites from the ground up, consider taking this to a more advanced level through online courses or in-person ones.
If one of your favorite activities happens to be a weakness of yours, such as spending too much time deciding which colors you’ll use for said website designs, you can apply the same advice.
To improve your overall skills in this case, you could spend time each week learning how to make decisions faster or create a cheat sheet of your favorite color combinations as a quick go-to.
In a few short weeks, you’ll turn an activity you like but may have been slowing you down into one you can use to your advantage.
This is also the time to consider stepping outside your comfort zone to learn more about what inspires you.
The more you sharpen your saw, so to speak, the fiercer your weapon of mass creation will become. And all that leveling up will lead to one killer portfolio.
Step 3: Build Your Portfolio and Track Your Performance
If you’re able to, track your performance over a few weeks or months to check out the results of all the hard work you’ve been able to achieve leveling up your skills.
Keep adding to and expanding your portfolio so you can show your employer or potential ones just how valuable your new skills are.
All of this will help you build an even larger arsenal of marketable skills, which will help you tremendously in this next and final step.
Step 4: Figure Out How to Earn More Money
By levelling up your skills, you’ll become more valuable to employers.
Do this and you’ll have a better chance of getting that coveted raise you’ve been working towards.
But other than an annual or merit-based bump in pay and working overtime, are there any other ways you can earn more money?
Would you ever consider moonlighting or freelancing?
If that doesn’t appeal to you, would you consider taking on a new position? One where you could use your newly acquired skills along with your existing experience to level up and earn more?
Most people get trapped by a ceiling or wage cap preventing them from moving up the payroll ladder. And when this happens, going outside your existing position may be the only way to earn more money.
If that’s the case, you’re doing yourself and your future career a disservice by staying at a job that’s not challenging your skill set or paying you enough for it.
Instead, you may want to take a peek at current job openings in the marketing and design fields in Canada to see where you can earn more money for your sought-after skills.
After all, if you beef up your service offerings and don’t actually use them, you’ll just be wasting your time.
Start Levelling Up Your Design & Marketing Skills Today
Now that you know how to start earning more money, your first step is to figure out where you stand.
Identify your strengths, weaknesses, and current skills so you can map out a plan of where to go from there.
While you work hard levelling up, spend time creating a portfolio and resume that attracts the right employers.
Once you have all of those pieces in line, you’ll be ready to find a position that rewards your hard work and challenges you at the same time.
The best part is you can continue to use this formula to consistently level up your skills and advance your career whenever you need a new goal to reach.
This means you’ll never have to settle for a job that doesn’t pay well or challenge you.
So are you ready to find a position that excites you to do more with your skills?