I have experience, just not in the right industry.

I've completed a degree in IT & Business Management and want to break into the Marketing industry, looking for a Marketing Assistant role.

The issue i'm having now is I don't have the "Marketing experience". I've completed an internship in Investment Banking and others in the IT sector in other blue chip companies. I've tried explaining the transferable skills i've gained in cover letters and interviews, but still no luck at the moment.

Even if i were to apply for Marketing internships, i'd be up against people who have done a full "Marketing" degree. Does anyone have any advice?

don't worry companies are looking for diverse people with different backgrounds if you're an IT specialist, engineer, philosopher... you got better chances in marketing than all those marketing grads (me included)... make your degree to your USP in order to stand out from other applicants cheers

Did you do any marketing modules in your degree?

I've completed a degree in IT & Business Management and want to break into the Marketing industry, looking for a Marketing Assistant role.

The issue i'm having now is I don't have the "Marketing experience". I've completed an internship in Investment Banking and others in the IT sector in other blue chip companies. I've tried explaining the transferable skills i've gained in cover letters and interviews, but still no luck at the moment.

Even if i were to apply for Marketing internships, i'd be up against people who have done a full "Marketing" degree. Does anyone have any advice?

Are you breaking the transferable skills down in the right way? Don't just go for generic skills like teamwork, leadership, organisation etc. Make sure you have a well researched, detailed understanding of the specific skills required for marketing entry level jobs, and try and demonstrate you have those specific skills.

Also, when you are trying to transfer evidence, there can be a tendency to stick to one of two extremes, when what you really need to do is find a middle path. The language you use is key. If you say something like (simplified example!)



Then the fact you organised a global conference is masked by all the IB references and it doesn't look nearly as transferable. Remember you have to do the work for the reader, don't ever hope they will interpret things the way you want.

On the other hand, if you strip out all the IB references, you get something too bland to be useful like



So you need to be very clear about what you are trying to demonstrate as a transferable skill (organisation, event, large scale, senior people) and write something like



Other than that, strip out anything that isn't marketing focussed and make your CV purely about things that are relevant to marketing. Don't ever say anything negative about your previous experience, make sure the move is presented as a positive more TO marketing, not FROM anything you did before.

I hope so! I'm guessing you've just graduate with a marketing degree? Posted from TSR Mobile