Marketing CV: example and tips for digital marketing

Keywords that come up in marketing job ads

Marketing is a broad field, and there are many job titles: marketer, marketing coordinator, digital marketer, performance marketer, social media manager and head of marketing. Digital marketing ads are often full of channels and tools, and applicant tracking systems look for them by name. So write “Google Ads” and “Meta Ads”, not just “advertising”. Our guide to an ATS-friendly CV explains how these systems read your CV.

These words come up often in Norwegian ads. Many ads are in Norwegian, where SoMe is short for social media:

• Digital marketing, paid advertising and performance.
• Google Ads, Meta Ads, LinkedIn Ads and TikTok.
• SEO, content marketing and websites in a content management system such as WordPress.
• Google Analytics 4, Google Tag Manager, Looker Studio and conversion tracking.
• Email marketing and marketing automation, for example in HubSpot or Klaviyo.
• Social media, content plans, brand and campaigns.
• Metrics such as ROAS, CPA, conversion rate and customer acquisition.
• Creative, analytical, results driven and a good writer.

Formal requirements: education, certifications and regulations

utdanning.no lists no formal requirements for working as a marketer. Marketers have often studied a combination of marketing communications, marketing and business, and the subject can be studied at a vocational college, university college or university. Write your degree with the full title and year, and include courses that fit the job if you are early in your career.

Certifications are not required, but they show that you know the tools. Google's foundational Google Ads certifications on Skillshop are free and valid for one year, so give the year, and renew them if you want to keep them on your CV. Include courses and certifications from Meta or HubSpot, for example, with years.

Knowing the rules is a strength. Under the Norwegian Marketing Control Act, you must as a rule have the recipient's prior consent before sending marketing by email or text message to private individuals, and marketing must be designed and presented so that it is clearly recognisable as marketing. If you have worked with consent, labelling of advertising on social media or data protection under GDPR, it is worth mentioning.

Example of a summary for a marketing CV

The summary should say which channels you are strongest in, what kind of businesses you have worked for and what results you have created. Here is a made up example you can use as a pattern:

Example: “Digital marketer with five years of experience in e-commerce and travel, strongest in Google Ads, Meta Ads and Google Analytics 4. Has managed an annual advertising budget of 4 million kroner and raised return on ad spend (ROAS) from 4.2 to 6.1 in two years. Enjoys testing, measuring and writing copy that makes people click. Looking for a role with responsibility for the whole digital customer journey.”

Replace the numbers and channels with your own, and only write results you can explain. You will find more examples in our guide to writing a CV summary.

Bullet points with results: weak versus strong

A marketing CV becomes weak when it only lists channels and tasks. The employer wants to see what happened because you were there: more customers, more sales, lower cost per customer or more people reading the content. Start with a strong verb in the past tense and finish with a number. Give the period as well, so the figure is credible.

• Weak: “Responsible for Google Ads.” Strong: “Rebuilt the Google Ads account structure for an online shop with an annual budget of 3 million kroner, cutting cost per purchase by 28 percent in six months.”
• Weak: “Worked on SEO.” Strong: “Wrote and updated 40 articles based on keyword research, doubling organic traffic to the blog in one year.”
• Weak: “Sent newsletters.” Strong: “Set up automated email flows in HubSpot for new customers, which accounted for 18 percent of online sales in the second half of the year.”
• Weak: “Responsible for social media.” Strong: “Created a content plan and short videos for Instagram and TikTok, growing followers from 8,000 to 31,000 in 14 months.”
• Weak: “Built reports.” Strong: “Set up conversion tracking in Google Tag Manager and a shared dashboard in Looker Studio, so management could follow sales by channel every week.”
• Weak: “Campaigns.” Strong: “Led the summer campaign across five channels, with 2.4 million impressions and sales 11 percent higher than the year before.”

Skills, tools and portfolio

Name your tools and group them. Marketers are often judged on what they have made, so a link to a simple portfolio with campaigns, copy or results can make a real difference. Only use figures and material you are allowed to show. These are worth including:

• Advertising: Google Ads, Meta Ads, LinkedIn Ads, TikTok Ads and programmatic buying.
• Analytics: Google Analytics 4, Google Tag Manager, Looker Studio and Excel.
• Content and websites: WordPress, Shopify, Canva, Photoshop and Premiere Pro.
• Email and automation: HubSpot, Klaviyo, Mailchimp or Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
• SEO: keyword research, technical SEO and tools such as Ahrefs or Semrush.
• Certifications with name and year, for example Google Ads or Google Analytics.
• Languages and writing: Norwegian and English, and copy adapted to channel and audience.

Recent graduate, or many years in marketing

If you have little experience, you can show what you can do in other ways. If you have run social media for a club, built a website, started a small online shop or run a campaign during your studies, it is relevant. Say what you did and what it achieved, for example “ran the student society's Instagram account and grew attendance at events from 40 to 120”. Free certifications show that you have learned the tools. Our guide to a CV for recent graduates and the guide to finding relevant work experience as a student have more advice.

With long experience, your CV should show more about strategy, budgets and leadership: how large the budgets you have managed were, which agencies and teams you have overseen, and what results the brand or sales achieved. Cut down older roles and channels that are no longer relevant. If you are aiming for head of marketing, figures for revenue, customer growth and profitability are stronger than follower counts.

Common mistakes in a marketing CV

Look out for these mistakes before you send your CV:

• Channels without results. What happened because you were there?
• Numbers without a period or comparison, such as “increased traffic” without saying from what to what.
• A creative CV with graphics and two columns that the applicant tracking system cannot read.
• Qualities such as “creative” and “analytical” without examples.
• Internal figures or customer data you are not allowed to share.
• Spelling mistakes. For a marketer they count double.

Create your marketing CV in under a minute with Selja

An ad for a performance marketer asks for Google Ads, ROAS and tracking, while an ad for a content marketer asks for SEO, copywriting and social media. With Selja you paste in the job ad and upload the CV you already have. In under a minute you get a professional, ATS-friendly CV and cover letter tailored to the job, with the channels, tools and words from the ad where they match what you have done. If the ad is in English, you get your CV and cover letter in English.

Selja never adds channels, tools or results you do not have. If the ad asks for Klaviyo, for example, and your CV does not show it, Selja asks you first and only uses what you confirm. It is free to start: take a free ATS check to see which words from the ad are missing, or check your CV for free. Get started when you want to create your first application.

The application, the case task and pay

For a marketer, the cover letter is also a work sample. Keep it short and concrete, and show that you have looked at how the business markets itself today. Feel free to mention one thing you would test, without criticising what they do. See our example of a job application and our guide on how to write a cover letter.

Many employers set a case task, for example a campaign plan or an analysis of an ad account. Practise with the interview questions, and go through your LinkedIn profile, since it is often checked. Before you negotiate, check the figures in the pay check.