AI has commoditised the shallow end — basic copywriting, simple graphics, generic research. What remains valuable is judgement: knowing which channel to use, reading data correctly, and being able to defend a spending decision.
Technical skills
- SEO — Keyword research, on-page, technical audits, local SEO.Taught in our course
- Paid advertising — Meta Ads and Google Ads, including tracking and attribution.Taught in our course
- Analytics — GA4, Search Console, Tag Manager, conversion tracking.Taught in our course
- Content & copywriting — Writing that converts, not just fills a page.Taught in our course
- Video editing — Short-form editing — now close to non-negotiable.Taught in our course
- AI tooling — Prompting, AI creative, automation workflows.Taught in our course
The skills AI has not touched
Anything that requires judgement under uncertainty remains valuable, and has arguably become more valuable as execution gets cheaper. Deciding where to spend, diagnosing why a campaign failed, and explaining a result to a client who is losing money are all still human work.
Skills by role
Employers rarely want all of these at once. Each entry role has a core set, and the job description usually tells you which one they are hiring for.
| Role | Core skills | Tools to know |
|---|---|---|
| SEO Executive | Keyword research, on-page fixes, technical audits, local SEO, reporting | Search Console, GA4, Semrush or Ahrefs, WordPress |
| Performance Marketing Executive | Campaign setup, audience targeting, creative testing, conversion tracking | Meta Ads Manager, Google Ads, GA4, Tag Manager |
| Social Media Executive | Content planning, short-form video, community replies, reporting | Meta Business Suite, Canva, CapCut |
| Content Writer | Research, structure, SEO writing, ad and email copy | Google Docs, Search Console, ChatGPT for drafts |
| Video Editor | Pacing, hooks, captions, sound, platform formats | CapCut, Premiere Pro or DaVinci Resolve |
Soft skills that decide hiring
- Clear writing — Reports, briefs and client messages are most of the job. Short, clear writing is noticed immediately.
- Explaining numbers — Being able to say what a metric means for the business in one sentence.
- A testing habit — Treating every campaign as an experiment — change one thing, measure, decide.
- Reliability — Posting on schedule and meeting reporting dates matters more to a small agency than brilliance.
- Honest reporting — Saying plainly when something did not work, and what you will change.
How to prove each skill
Listing a skill is not the same as proving it. For every skill on your resume, have one piece of evidence ready to show.
- SEO — A page you ranked, with a Search Console screenshot of impressions and clicks over time.
- Paid ads — A small campaign you ran, with spend, cost per result and what you changed mid-way.
- Analytics — A GA4 property you set up with a working conversion event.
- Content — Published articles or landing pages, with links.
- Video — Three to five Reels or Shorts you edited, ideally before-and-after versions.
- AI tooling — A short write-up of a workflow where AI saved real time and what you still checked by hand.
Which skills to learn first
- 1. Fundamentals — funnels, audiences, and how each channel connects to revenue.
- 2. One creation skill — writing or short-form video — because every channel needs content.
- 3. Analytics basics — GA4 and Search Console — so you can measure what you do.
- 4. One channel in depth — SEO or paid ads — to become hireable for a specific role.
- 5. AI tools layered on top, once you know what good output looks like.