5 Email Marketing Roles & How to Get Started

Email marketing is a strategy used by marketing professionals to connect with customers through targeted email campaigns and encourage them to visit a company's website or purchase a product or service. Email marketing roles typically involve creating and deploying email marketing campaigns and crafting a specific strategy to promote sales and reach a target audience.

Learn more about email marketing, including roles you may pursue, their salaries, and how to qualify for them.

5 email marketing roles

When you work in email marketing, your role may include writing copy for emails or strategizing on a new marketing campaign. 

Explore five potential email marketing roles and learn how they differ from one another to determine which role is best for you and your career.

1. Email marketing specialist

Average annual US salary: $66,176 [1]

Requirements: Bachelor’s degree

As an email marketing specialist, your role typically involves compiling an email list for an email campaign to reach, assisting in creating emails, and operating email software. Your other responsibilities may include sending follow-up emails to customers, discarding email addresses that no longer fit your target audience or don’t engage with your brand, and proofing emails before they’re sent out.

2. Content strategist

Average annual US salary: $91,540 [2]

Requirements: Experience in marketing and communications

Content strategists are marketing experts who rely on research and strategy to create strong campaigns. After a campaign deploys, you then analyze its performance and note how you could improve in the future, whether that includes targeting a more specific audience or tweaking language within the content.

3. Email campaign coordinator

Average annual US salary: $60,046 [3]

Requirements: Bachelor’s degree in marketing or a related field; experience

As an email campaign coordinator, you typically schedule and plan email marketing campaigns and manage the team producing the campaign. With the help of your team, you develop campaign ideas. You then rely on copywriters to write the content for an email and artists to meet your design vision. Once the email is complete, part of your role is to pick a time for the email, or multiple emails, to deploy and to track how the emails perform.

4. Email copywriter

Average annual US salary (Glassdoor): $60,046 [4]

Requirements: Bachelor’s degree in English, marketing, or a related field of study

Email copywriters write the copy that appears in an email, and the subject line and headline that captivate the intended audience. As an email copywriter, your objective is to create compelling copy that is free of errors and drives traffic to a brand’s website. In this role, your work may go through many revisions before you and the brand or client determine the perfect way to craft a marketing email.

5. Email marketing manager

Average annual US salary (Glassdoor): $84,364 [5]

Requirements: Bachelor’s degree in marketing or a related field

As an email marketing manager, your primary responsibility typically involves overseeing an email marketing campaign. You help develop the campaign and oversee other members of your team to ensure they fulfill their own responsibilities in developing and implementing it.

Additionally, you analyze performance metrics and data to determine if a campaign performed well or not, and strategize with your colleagues on future email campaigns.

How to get started in email marketing

To begin a career in email marketing, consider majoring in marketing, business, or communications. Many email marketing roles require some experience and/or a bachelor’s degree. Additionally, you may stand out to employers by earning certifications that demonstrate your email marketing skills.

Education and training

Similar to other marketing roles, email marketers typically need a bachelor’s degree in a subject related to marketing or communications. Some jobs may hire you without a formal degree, but it may help boost your chances if you’ve completed some education.

Employers may also look for specific skills in an email marketer. These can include performing A/B testing, understanding HTML, paying close attention to detail, and having excellent communication skills.

Certifications

Many certifications are available for aspiring email and digital marketing professionals. Consider the following for your resume:

• Email Marketing Certification Course: This certification, offered by HubSpot Academy, focuses on crafting copy that engages readers and prompts them to click through to any links within your email. It also teaches you to understand better how performance analytics work to set you up for success with future campaigns.

• Certified Marketing Management Professional (CMMP): The International Institute of Marketing Professionals (IIMP) offers four Certified Marketing Management Professional designations, including Associate CMMP, Manager CMMP, Executive CMMP, and Chartered CMMP. You may gain a deeper, more advanced understanding of marketing at each level.

• Professional Certified Marketer (PCM): This certification, offered by the American Marketing Association, aims to help you build your marketing skills to grow professionally.

Experience

You may consider entry-level marketing positions to gain experience in an email marketing role. Entry-level marketing roles may have some overlap with email marketing jobs you want to advance to, and can be a good place to start your career. Explore entry-level roles that involve email marketing, digital marketing, and social marketing for you to gain experience:

• Marketing assistant: $48,615

• Marketing coordinator: $53,817

• Junior marketing associate: $56,364

• Social media assistant: $44,489

• Digital marketing specialist: $62,084

• Junior copywriter: $58,343

• Media planner: $76,971

• Account coordinator: $58,037

*All annual base salary data is sourced from Glassdoor as of January 2025 and does not include additional pay, such as commission and benefits.

Explore email marketing on Coursera.

Email marketing roles may vary from writing the content of a marketing email to developing email campaigns.

If you’re ready to begin a career in email marketing, consider building your skills with Professional Certificates and courses on Coursera. Explore the Google Digital Marketing and E-commerce Professional Certificate, designed to teach you how to improve your digital marketing skills and build e-commerce stores. You may also discover the Meta Marketing Analyst Professional Certificate, which consists of courses focused on analyzing and collecting data to improve marketing campaigns.