Demand for brand consultants is up 68%, while demand for senior regional marketing managers is falling, according to exclusive data from LinkedIn.
It’s tough out there for marketers looking to find work or move jobs, with widespread redundancies, a lack of hiring intention from brands and slow growth impacting resourcing.
However, some marketing jobs are growing in demand.
The fastest growing job in marketing, according to exclusive LinkedIn data gathered for Marketing Week, is search analyst. The role is up 152% in demand, according to an analysis of job roles on the platform between January 2022 and December 2024.
The second fastest growing job is brand consultant, which is up 68%. Growth in this area signposts the changing shape of marketing teams.
The figures tally with Marketing Week’s 2025 Career & Salary, which found a quarter (23.8%) of more than 3,500 marketers surveyed say their business has cut senior marketing leaders and not brought in a replacement.
Annual research from leadership advisory firm Spencer Stuart released yesterday (11 March), also found only 40% of marketing leaders from Fortune 500 companies hold the CMO title. Indeed, a third (33%) of marketing leaders hold marketing-related leadership titles without ‘chief’ – such as senior vice-president of marketing.
To plug this gap, some brands are bringing in consultants or fractional CMOs. It’s something noted by Beckie Stanion, former Frasers Group CMO and now co-founder of Problem Child, a new creative solutions collective.
“What we’re finding is we’re out talking to brands and where those CMO roles have been cut, there is a space,” she says.
“[It’s an emerging skills gap], because there’s no one doing visionary thinking in terms of marketing. It’s very transactional. It’s very functional.”
Returning to the LinkedIn data, other fast-growing roles include sponsorship sales manager (+67%), product marketer (+48%) and sales marketing manager (+30%).
While some roles are growing in demand, others are declining – highlighting areas businesses may be moving away from.
The fastest declining role is senior regional marketing manager, which is down 83%, signifying a potential move by brands towards more global-focused teams to help drive growth.
Also in decline is creative services manager (-82%), which LinkedIn suggests may be due to businesses preferring to hire freelancers or contracted creatives to fill this responsibility.
Worryingly for media planners, this role is down 70%. This could suggest media planners are being brought into other functions, such as data and programmatic, rather than sitting separately.
Similarly in decline are market intelligence analysts (-64%) and customer relationship management assistants (-63%).
