My experience of the Digital Marketing Academy

Lukas Blazek via Unsplash

by Zoe Waite, liberal arts student

The Digital Marketing Academy (DMA) is a programme that provides students from all faculties with the opportunity to gain knowledge and experience in digital marketing, whether they are set on a career within the field or not. Students can expect to develop a range of industry-specific skills and liaise with like-minded peers and professionals all whilst obtaining an industry-recognised qualification.

I took part in the DMA during the final year of my undergraduate degree from November 2023 to January 2024. The content and activities were easily managed alongside both my studies and additional commitments. I found the programme to be extremely informative regarding industry knowledge and skill development.

Meet the experts (networking)

In December, UoN held a ‘Meet the Experts’ networking event. This was the most intimidating part of the DMA for me as I did not know anyone else on the programme, so I went to the event alone which was extremely daunting.

Despite being out of my comfort zone, I was able to speak with peers who had also attended the event by themselves. We shared why we joined the DMA, our career aspirations and our experience of the programme thus far. I was also able to listen and speak with a range of marketing experts, based in Nottingham and surrounding areas, about their careers, roles and digital marketing in general. The networking event brought out a confidence in me that I will take forward in my career and develop further.

Online accreditations

As part of the DMA, participants must complete two online certifications; the first being the Google Intellum Fundamentals of Digital Marketing, and the second is a qualification of their choice selected from a range of proposed courses (Google Analytics, Google Ads Search, Codecademy Learn HTML, Codecademy How to Make a Website with NameCheap).

The Fundamentals of Digital Marketing is a 40-hour, 26-module course that covers the basics of digital marketing. The course uses videos, case studies, short end-of-topic quizzes and bite-sized information to make the content memorable and accessible. All this prepares users for the end-of-course quiz that utilises a multiple-choice format, which when passed presents the user with their completion certificate. I found the course easy to comprehend, yet massively informative as it supported the knowledge and understanding that I had gained in other areas of the DMA.

For my optional choice qualification, I opted for Codecademy Learn HTML (9 Hours). I have always had an interest in starting to code but had no idea where to start or how time-consuming it would be. The Codecademy course provides step-by-step instructions on how to code a website with HTML and uses projects for users to work on to practice their new coding skills. The course made coding less intimidating and instilled a base level of knowledge surrounding HTML which I can build upon in my own time.

Interactive workshops

Finally, the DMA held a range of interactive workshops run by local digital marketing professionals. To complete the programme you must attend two of the online lectures. During the 2023/24 cohort, some examples of the available workshops were as follows:

• Paid Social Advertising: The Fundamentals with Hallam
• Organic Social Media
• Consumer Behaviour with Diversity and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) with Adtrak.

Being able to choose which area of digital marketing I wanted to learn more about made the lectures more engaging and relevant to my interests.

The workshops I attended introduced the topics with comprehensive understanding and utilised question-and-answer segments, clear slides and engaging commentary to ensure audience understanding.

I would recommend the DMA to any student considering enrolling in November regardless of whether you’re set on a career in digital marketing or not. The programme gives individuals a foundation of skills, knowledge and connections needed to go forward into a successful career.

Find out more about exclusive work experience opportunities at UoN and a career in marketing and digital marketing 

 First published January 2024