Over the past few years, we’ve seen the boundaries blurring between marketing roles & design roles.
More & more we’re seeing designers, traditionally tasked with bringing creative visions to life, now being pressured to measure their work’s ROI. Meanwhile, marketers are turning to DIY design tools like Canva or Adobe Express, blurring the line between professional design & quick-fix solutions.
It’s crucial to remember the unique expertise each role brings.
Let’s not dilute the art of design with excessive analytics or rely solely on templated solutions.
Designers excel at bringing creative visions to life, while marketers possess a deep understanding of audience dynamics and strategy.
They’re two very different skill sets.
So here are three simple ways you can implement to navigate the blending of marketing roles & design roles.
#1 Understand the unique strengths of each role
By understanding the difference in skillsets between marketing & design roles, we can see where the focus should lie for these roles.
Depending on the type of marketing role (social media, strategy, CRM etc.), these roles tend to focus on understanding the market, crafting strategies & campaigns to reach & engage audiences as well as analysing the insights behind these strategies & campaigns to measure the effectiveness.
While designers concentrate on visual communication – crafting unique concepts & creating engaging designs that convey messages effectively & enhance brand identity.
#2 Encourage collaboration
Marketing really shines when you can see a clear connection between the visual elements & the strategy behind them.
So how do we make sure our marketers & designers are working collaboratively to build the very best campaigns?
- Implement regular syncs & workshops so marketing & design teams can share ideas, goals & feedback.
- Use collaborative tools & platforms, like Notion, Slack & OneDrive, to ensure seamless workflow & visibility into each other’s processes.
While we’re on the subject, using tools like Notion can really help to define roles & responsibilities too, such as establishing clear processes for projects, such as design briefs for designers & strategic briefs for marketers.
Another way to utilise different tools is to allow marketers to use tools like Canva or Adobe Express for quick, templated designs.
As we know, heavily templated or overly used templates just don’t feel professional or unique to your brand. And that’s where your designers come in. If they’re able to create on-brand templates for your marketers to use for things like social media graphics or email headers is a great way to give the marketers some autonomy over these elements & take some work off the designer’s plates.
#3 Provide cross-training opportunities
Letting marketing & design teams learn from one another is another great way to blend the two departments.
You could offer workshops for the marketers in the business to learn basic design principles & for designers to the basics of marketing.
This enhances mutual understanding & respect for each other’s expertise, without diluting the unique skills each role brings to the table.
In conclusion, by following these four ways of working, your business can effectively navigate the blending of marketing & design roles.
This approach ensures both teams can work together harmoniously, leveraging their unique strengths while respecting the specialised skills & expertise each role contributes to your business.
TL;DR
- Understand the difference between the roles of a marketer & a designer.
- Implement processes & use tools to track workload & allow collaborative working.
- Make sure the marketing & design teams are learning from one another.
