Entry-Level Positions for Aspiring Marketing Coordinators
Luke, an Associate Marketing Director at NAMM, highlights two primary entry-level paths in the music product industry for undergraduates: a marketing coordinator position requiring strong writing skills ("a great entry-level position"), or leveraging technical skills like coding in C++ to create plugins and start a business, a route that "gets paid" and provides immediate industry experience.
Entry-Level Positions, Marketing Skills, Pro Audio Engineering, Coding and Software Development, Entrepreneurship
Advizer Information
Name
Job Title
Company
Undergrad
Grad Programs
Majors
Industries
Job Functions
Traits
Luke Walton
Associate Marketing Director
NAMM
USC 2013, SDSU 2020
MBA, SDSU
Fine Arts, Music
Arts, Entertainment & Media
Communication and Marketing
Scholarship Recipient, Took Out Loans, Worked 20+ Hours in School
Video Highlights
1. Learn some electro-engineering skills such as soldering and reading diagrams to increase your chances of landing an entry-level position in pro audio or guitar pedal companies.
2. Consider pursuing an entry-level marketing coordinator position. Strong writing skills and the ability to provide writing samples are highly valued.
3. If you have coding skills (e.g., C++ and JUCE framework), you can create your own music plugins and potentially start your own business, which can help you get noticed in the industry and secure a job later on.
Transcript
What entry-level positions are there in the music product industry that an undergraduate college student might want to consider if they're looking into this field?
I think the biggest thing would be to identify what side of the industry you'd want to be in. One of the biggest growth areas is Pro Audio and guitar pedals. On that side, I would say learn some electrical engineering. You don't have to do it in school, but learn to solder, maybe make some stuff, and learn how to read some diagrams.
Then, try and go into one of these places and help out a little bit to get your foot in the door. I personally don't like unpaid internships; I think they're kind of messed up. But this is a kind of old-school industry, and that's a lot of the way people break in.
So if you have the opportunity when you're an undergrad to find a local Pro Audio or guitar pedal company, get in there and see if you can solder with them or help out a little bit. See if you can work your way in.
On the marketing side, a lot of people do come through products, which is interesting. So if you are on the engineering side, that does help. But you can also come from the side that I did, which was applying for a marketing coordinator position.
That's a great entry-level position if you can write. One of the biggest things you'll be asked in an interview for marketing coordinator is for writing samples, or here's a prompt: do XYZ. Here's the style guide. Knowing how to do that really well, being driven, and showing you care can get you a lot of entry-level marketing positions.
Marketing positions are always expanding. Every marketing coordinator gets asked to do all sorts of things not in their job description, like, "Hey, can you run these Google Ads?" Now you have Google Ads as part of your toolkit. So, copywriting and entry-level marketing coordinator is a great path that actually gets paid.
Unpaid internships and working on hobby projects are a great way to start. Or start your own business. Music products is really cool because if you learn how to code, you can make a plug-in company and start selling plug-in software immediately.
I know I did some of that. There's a thing called The Juice package; it's a C++ wrapper. If you learn C++, you'll learn how to deal with audio. Then all you need is a good creative idea, and you can start building a plug-in company and grow those things really quickly.
In music products, if you make something cool, people are always looking for the next cool toy. If you make that, that's probably the best path because then you're in charge, you own your own business, and you're part of the industry. From there, it's easy enough to get another job because people will know you as that upstart kid who invented that cool bit of code that made a guitar tone sound a certain way.
Now you can get a job with Roland or Aria, because you're that person they saw at a trade show, and they know you know your stuff because you did it from scratch. So if you're a freshman, just learn C++. Learn the Juice framework. Don't even worry about GUI or user interface stuff that much; just get it to press a button and make it sound cool. If you do that and learn it enough, you'll get a job and make money in music products.