Know-How Exchange : Career/Training

What expertise do you have? What field do you want to go into? Marketing is a pretty vast field.

Marketing and sales in the high-tech and telecom industries tend to be pretty lucrative. If you get into B2C marketing that can open some good opportunities for you. It's kind of a different bag than B2B. However, I'll give you the advice I wish someone gave me when I started out:

Marketing is an extremely competitive field. It can be lucrative, but it usually takes a long time to get to that point (as compared to fields like engineering). Because there's no real barrier to entry for marketing, like there would be for a technical field, there are a lot of people in it. If you love it, by all means go for it, just be prepared that you will be constantly learning, competing, and marketing yourself. Hope that helps, and good luck!

Don't look to others for the answer. Look inside yourself. What do you really want to do for the rest of your life? What impact do you want to have? What do you love? What excites you?

As already notes, marketing is vast. When you have some answers to the above, get specific and specialize. There's power in being an expert. And, a lot of fun, too.

You need to talk with some people who are doing what you think you want to do. Ask them what they like about what they do and what they don't like about it. Find out what they think are the critical skills for success, what kinds of people make it in their area, and what kind don't make it.

If you do that with a dozen people in different marketing positions, you'll have a much better idea of what you want to do and what's right for you.

I'd also suggest that a sales position is a great training ground for marketing positions -- even if it's just for a few months. Ask if you can start out in sales and then, after 6-9 months, transfer into marketing. It will give you an excellent understanding of the direct customers and it will demonstrate to your employer that you're really interested in getting your hands dirty (so to speak). Besides, you might love sales so much that you won't want to leave it!