Since most people became dependent on the internet for day-to-day activities, digital marketing has changed the way of marketing entirely. It has been highly respected as a proven system to attract new potential customers and increase profits among businesses across all industries.

In this highly competitive circumstance of the job market, while students and professionals are getting tired to hardly manage a survival job, digital marketing skill offers tremendous earning scopes and opportunities to build a successful career.

Regardless of industries, businesses need digital marketing experts to handle their internet marketing campaigns efficiently. However, it’s worth exploring the digital marketing field for new career aspirants.

In this article, we will discuss the pros and cons of an MBA in Digital Marketing and a Master Certification in Digital Marketing in a little bit of detail. So, let’s get started.

What is MBA in Digital Marketing?

MBA in Digital Marketing refers to Master of Business Administration specialized in digital marketing. In this course, students learn everything related to business administration or management such as HR, budgeting and finance, and record management along with a specialization of digital marketing. This means students learn the overall basic concepts and implementations of digital marketing facets that are only required for managing a business successfully.

But students of MBA do not learn digital marketing skills in an in-depth and practical manner, as they hire digital marketing experts to get their jobs done. An MBA in digital marketing majorly focuses on the management and development process of a business by getting help from digital marketing experts as per their requirements.

What is Master Certification in Digital Marketing?

Master Certification in Digital Marketing emphasizes practical professional skills of digital marketing with a variety of specific facets. In master certifications, students acquire professional skills in an in-depth and hands-on manner by exploring essential knowledge and skills.

Master certification in digital marketing can be a core digital marketing certification course with all the necessary facets or can be a specialized certification course that covers specific facets of digital marketing such as search engine optimization, search engine marketing, or email marketing among others.

MBA in Digital Marketing vs Master Certification in Digital Marketing: Which One is Better?

Since a variety of digital marketing courses are available at different levels, people often get confused to decide which course is perfect for them. Students often ask, which is better? – Is it MBA in Digital Marketing or Master Certification in Digital Marketing?

Making a decision on which course is better between an MBA in Digital Marketing and a Master Certification in Digital Marketing can be overwhelming. You will need a thorough research and comparison of the pros and cons of each program and it will take a certain amount of time and energy. But as this is an important decision for making a career, it’s worth taking time and making it one of the best decisions in your life you have ever made.

Though according to various studies and data recorded out over the past few years, scopes and opportunities of Master Certifications in Digital Marketing are much better than MBA in Digital Marketing, you will need to explore both courses and take into consideration your preferred job profiles to make your own decision.

Now, let’s have a look at a comparison between Master Certification in Digital Marketing and Digital Marketing MBA course so that you will have a clarity on which one is better.

Comparison between MBA in Digital Marketing and Master Certification in Digital Marketing

The nature of the course

An MBA in Digital Marketing majorly deals with business management and the overall concepts of how the business applies to digital marketing methods. They will give you a fundamental idea of what digital marketing involves but does not necessarily teach you the practical approaches of digital marketing techniques.

On the other hand, the practical approaches of digital marketing techniques are intensively covered in certification courses in digital marketing. Digital Marketing Certification Courses are mostly conducted by working professionals who are coping with the challenges of cut-throat competition with their enhanced actionable skills every day.

Prerequisites for admission

For pursuing an MBA in Digital Marketing, you will need to have a previous graduate degree and a considerable grade or percentage of marks for qualifying in the selection process of the programs.

Whereas, Digital Marketing Certification programs do not require any prerequisite education barrier. All you need is good communication with learning capacity and a burning desire to excel in the digital marketing industry.

Emphasis on hands-on skills

Since digital marketing skills are based on practical implementations, intensive learning with hands-on practice is essential for developing a successful career in the field of digital marketing.

An MBA in Digital Marketing course emphasizes the administration and management aspects of digital marketing techniques but never teaches you the skills on a hands-on practical basis.

Master Certifications in Digital Marketing focus on the practical hands-on skills to handle day-to-day activities of digital marketing campaigns instead of only theorical knowledge.

Course duration

An MBA in Digital Marketing typically needs a minimum of 2 years to complete the program and obtain the certificate from a university. Digital Marketing Certification Programs vary from 3 months to a maximum of 1 year to learn the necessary skills comprehensively.

Course fees

An MBA in Digital Marketing is a full-time master’s degree course in the field of business management conducted by a university; hence the cost is much higher compared to Digital Marketing Certification Courses.

Flexibility

An MBA in Digital Marketing is a full-time regular course and you will need to remain present physically on the campus during the classes. Whereas, Digital Marketing Certification Courses are typically online and you will get recorded versions of classes if you miss any class.

Job opportunities

Companies hire MBA professionals basically for management and administration purposes. An MBA in Digital Marketing professional will have to compete with other MBAs such as finance, HR, and more and the jobs are very limited compared to pass out professionals.

Whereas, Master Certification in Digital Marketing offers various job opportunities because they are required in every business among all industries and the supply is significantly low and the demand is very high.

Besides, companies give more importance to digital marketing certification courses for their practical and intensive knowledge and skills in the digital marketing field.

Finally, in summarizing, we can conclude that Certification Courses in Digital Marketing provide more scopes and opportunities in comparison to an MBA in Digital Marketing in terms of building a successful career in the digital marketing field. And the reasons are well-grounded and quite logical. But, for making a management career, an MBA in Digital Marketing is obviously a perfect choice.

Types of Specialized Digital Marketing Certification Courses

SEO or search engine optimization certification

SEO or search engine optimization certification program involves different techniques, tactics, strategies, and methods to higher ranking of website or web page content on the search engine results pages (SERPs) such as Google, Bing, or Yahoo.

Major modules of SEO certification courses include –

Search engine algorithm
On-page optimization
Off-page optimization
SEO content creation

Social media marketing (SMM) certification

Social media marketing is the method of gaining traffic or potential new customers or prospective customers’ attention using different types of social media channels such as Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, etc. This course teaches to create social media content and to use them for fulfilling a predicted business purpose using social media platforms.

Major modules of social media marketing certification courses include –

Social media channels
social media strategies
creating content for social media
promotion of content through social media platforms
social media ads
social media analytics

SEM or search engine marketing certification

SEM or search engine marketing is basically a paid form of internet marketing that is used by businesses to increase visibility on the internet through paid ads. PPC is the major part of search engine marketing where advertisers pay per click.

Major modules of search engine marketing certification include –

Strategic planning for ad campaigns
Market analysis
Campaign creation and management
Budgeting and bidding for ad campaigns
Performance tracking and optimizing ad campaigns

Web analytics certification

Analytics is an important facet of digital marketing that involves measuring, procuring, analyzing, and creating reports of data with the purpose of better understanding the campaigns and optimizing them with more effective approaches. Web analytics cover different types of analytics such as social media insights, website analytics, and many more.

Major modules of web analytics certification include –

Benefits and uses of analytics
Different types of data on analytics
Common analytics mistakes
Different analytics tools
Integration of analytics
Ecommerce analytics
Analytics and CRM
Analytics of ad campaigns
Social media analytics

Email marketing certification

Emails have been found one of the most powerful digital marketing channels over recent years. Businesses send purpose-oriented messages to their target audience via emails to create awareness, trust, and loyalty. Emails help brands, to guide their customers moving through a smooth buying journey, and to increase sales as well as profits.

Major modules of email marketing certification include –

Email marketing planning
Generating leads
Creating different types of email content
Ensuring deliverability
Tracking customers’ behaviors
Personalized emails
Email automation using email marketing tools

Inbound marketing certification

Inbound marketing emphasizes attracting prospective customers via different types of useful and relevant content such as blogs, eBooks, tutorials, etc. that are being searched by the customers. Unlike outbound marketing, inbound marketing doesn’t involve promoting any content directly to customers, instead, produces attractive content that can be found by customers and encourage them to communicate with the business.

Major modules of inbound marketing certification include –

Creating a marketing funnel
Creating different types of lead magnets
Attract prospective customers into the funnel
Converting prospects to leads through different techniques
Nurturing leads using relevant contents
Increasing sales and ROI

Content marketing certification

Content marketing is a powerful marketing method that involves creating and promoting different useful and relevant content consistently to a specific target audience. The aim of content marketing is to drive traffic and convert them as per business goals using relevant content.

Major modules of content marketing certification include –

Setting business goals for content marketing
Strategies of content marketing
Types of content used in content marketing
Creating several types of content as per business goals
Distributing content to a specific audience in proper time
Measuring results and audience behaviors
Optimizing content marketing campaigns

Career Opportunities on Digital Marketing Certifications

A variety of jobs and earning opportunities are available after completing Digital Marketing Certification Courses. You can join a job according to your choice of industry, or you can start a freelancing career and work from your home, or you can develop a business and start your entrepreneurship journey with a very minimum cost using your digital marketing skills.

Related reading: Digital Marketing Salary

Here’re a few lucrative job opportunities that most businesses offer to digital marketers after the successful completion of digital marketing certification programs.