The Most Important Sales & Marketing Skills for the Future

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The skills required to succeed in the fields of sales and marketing have seen a dramatic shift over the past seven years. The top 10 in-demand skills for marketing changed by 50%, while sales saw a 60% change.

This demand for new skills was met with a move toward better skill-building opportunities during the Great Reshuffle. In 2021, LinkedIn saw a 31% growth in year-over-year career change among members in marketing. More than half of those leaving their jobs changed careers entirely.

The key to creating and retaining strong sales and marketing teams is to ensure you are investing in their skill development.

When skill development is done strategically and in alignment with corporate and personal goals, it can produce incredible outcomes.

The 2022 LinkedIn Workplace Learning report found that skill building, internal mobility, and worker retention are directly linked to one another.

In fact, companies that invest in skill building as a way to support internal mobility retain employees for an average of 5.4 years. That’s nearly twice as long as the average retention span for organizations that don’t have successful internal mobility programs.

In terms of what motivates employees to engage in skill building, workers cited three top priorities. The skill-building opportunity should:

Help them stay up to date in their area of expertise.
Be personalized for their interests and career goals.
Help them achieve a new role internally through lateral or upward mobility.

In sales and marketing, some of the most in-demand hard skills include:

Digital marketing
Sales management
Social media marketing
Business development
Search engine optimization (SEO)

Soft skills typically transcend job categories, though in sales and marketing, some key skills to have include:

Communication
Problem solving
Listening
Emotional intelligence

While there is some urgency around the upskilling and reskilling of hard skills to meet the demands of an ever-evolving technology landscape, ignoring the development of soft skills can leave your team with a serious deficit.

Soft skills are the kinds of skills that follow you throughout your career. Data platforms come and go, but the ability to communicate clearly will serve you no matter what role you’re in. It’s important to invest in the development of both sets of skills as your sales and marketing team grows.

From the instructor:

“We're going to walk through each part of the sales cycle. I'll show you how to recognize and qualify a good prospect, help you to fill and manage a robust pipeline, and give you an inside view of how you'll be evaluated. I'll even share some tips on how.”

B2B Sales Foundations
with Robbie Kellman Baxter
From the instructor:

“Throughout this course, we're going to take a look at what the funnel is, how it's used, and how we can leverage it to improve our marketing at each stage of the buyer's journey.”

Marketing Foundations: The Marketing Funnel
with Brad Batesole
From the instructor:

“I'm going to cut through the noise, dispel the myths, and give you a proven step-by-step approach to developing your digital marketing in a way that will not only grow your business but will also adapt with the times.”

Digital Marketing Foundations
with Brad Batesole
From the instructor:

“This course teaches you a step-by-step systematic process for creating and managing an effective sales team. You'll learn the tools and frameworks on how to recruit, motivate, deploy, and measure sales representatives.”

Sales Management Foundations
with Drew Boyd
From the instructor:

“To excel with social media at your organization, I'm going to teach you how to create a social media strategy, communicate more effectively on these channels, and of course, measure your results.”

Social Media Marketing Foundations
with Brian Honigman

From the instructor:

“Presence is a foundational part about being able to understand someone in conversation and unpack some of those needs and motivations that they might be bringing to a given conversation.”

The Three Pillars of Effective Communication
with Ximena Vengoechea
From the instructor:

“Problem-solving is vital in all aspects of business, from people problems to technical problems and from short-term to long-term problems. And problem-solving involves two completely different, possibly conflicting thought processes: creativity and decision making.”

Problem-Solving Techniques
with Chris Croft
From the instructor:

“In this course, we'll cover the three principles of productivity: space, mind, and time. Meaning you'll have a more organized workspace, increased mental clarity and focus, and a schedule built for productivity and balance.”

Time Management Fundamentals
with Dave Crenshaw
From the instructor:

“I'm excited to join you on this journey about developing your strategic thinking as a habit. It'll become an automatic process in your life, something that you do every day, not something that you have to exert a vast amount of willpower for but instead a part of your standard operating procedure.”

How to Make Strategic Thinking a Habit
with Dorie Clark
From the instructor:

“When you aren't careful in your approach to leadership, you risk making poor decisions, jeopardizing relationships, and failing to meet your goals. Being a strategic leader gives you a shot at avoiding these common pitfalls and instead sets you and your team on a course for success.”

Leading Strategically
with Eric Zackrison and Madecraft

The Most Important Sales & Marketing Skills for the Future

Don’t sleep on these upskilling opportunities for business development professionals.

The role of skill-building in sales and marketing

Why skill development is good for business

What are hard and soft skills?

Hard skills

Soft skills

Why it’s important to continually develop both hard and soft skills

Top sales and marketing skills for the future

Hard skills that thread the needle of innovation

Soft skills that make your team more effective

Make skill development a priority