How To Become A Direct Marketing Specialist: What It Is and Career Path

What is a direct marketing specialist and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted expert

Kim Chatani

A direct marketing specialist manages, designs, and executes direct marketing campaigns across various channels, including telemarketing, emails, SMSs, direct mail, and social media. They are generally responsible for the acquisition and retention of clients through targeted promotional marketing campaigns and strategies. Their ultimate objective is to achieve customer satisfaction and, at the same time, increase sales revenue.

Direct marketing specialists work closely with other professionals, including creative designers, product managers, analysts, and sales personnel. A successful direct marketing specialist should have marketing skills and other technical skills, communication skills, email etiquette, negotiation skills, interpersonal skills, research skills, and attention to detail.

Direct marketing specialists work 40 hours a week Monday to Friday from 9 to 5. Their work is mostly in an office setting, although sometimes they may need to visit suppliers and hold meetings with other stakeholders. They may also need to attend events like exhibitions and product launches and may work beyond the 40 hours a week.

What general advice would you give to a direct marketing specialist?

Kim Chatani

Assistant Professor, Concordia University Irvine

The career path for graduating students is full of unpredictability, as we have seen during this COVID 19 pandemic. In addition to academic excellence, graduates will face challenges that will test their core principles and beliefs. My advice is to view each challenge you meet with a long-term perspective while addressing the immediate concerns in a balanced way. Your career will span decades, and what you may face during the first several years will only be a fraction of your professional career. View how your immediate decision may impact you in the long-term.

ScoreDirect Marketing SpecialistUS Average

Salary

4.7

Avg. Salary $59,907

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

4.9

Growth rate 19%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

3.1

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.13%

Asian 9.61%

Black or African American 5.20%

Hispanic or Latino 12.44%

Unknown 5.01%

White 67.60%

Gender

female 47.09%

male 52.91%

Age - 34

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 34

Stress level

4.9

Stress level is manageable

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.2

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

4.6

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a direct marketing specialist

Explore direct marketing specialist education requirements

Most common direct marketing specialist degrees

Bachelor's

65.6 %

Associate

11.3 %

High School Diploma

9.3 %

Start to develop specific direct marketing specialist skills

Skills	Percentages
Marketing Campaigns	12.64%
Customer Service	10.84%
Data Entry	9.58%
Email Marketing	7.43%
Print Production	6.53%

Complete relevant direct marketing specialist training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 1-3 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New direct marketing specialists learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a direct marketing specialist based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real direct marketing specialist resumes.

Research direct marketing specialist duties and responsibilities

Execute worldwide eMarketing strategies to drive leads and revenue for assign products.
Manage relationships with print, mail, e-mail, creative and copywriting vendors.
Manage B2C direct marketing tactics including e-mail and direct mail to drive revenue for the remarketing efforts.
Manage the creation and deployment of mobile-optimize e-blast HTML templates to use for company's online marketing efforts.

Prepare your direct marketing specialist resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your direct marketing specialist resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a direct marketing specialist resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable direct marketing specialist resume templates

Build a professional direct marketing specialist resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your direct marketing specialist resume.