Sometimes, you need to dive into a topic, ingest all you can and master it quickly. Maybe you’ve just started a new job heading up marketing, or you’re leading business development for a startup or launching your own gig.
So what do you do? How can you learn marketing quickly?
First, let’s break down why it’s so hard, then we’ll share some best practices, templates and resources to go from zero to hero and learn marketing quickly.
Challenge #1: Finding the right resources
The internet is full of guides, courses, books and resources on marketing. You might have gone through dozens of web pages on marketing but found too many options to choose from and too much information for you to grasp. Who can you trust? Who do you listen to? Unfortunately, too much information can be pretty much overwhelming. It’s like having too many choices; it becomes harder to choose.
With so many resources online, you are left wondering, which should I opt for? What is the best way to learn marketing quickly? Naturally, you need to trust experts, but who?
Challenge #2: Time
Once you’ve found a good guide or course, like The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing or Udemy Digital Marketing Course, the next challenge becomes – how do you find the time? There are so many guides to read and topics to cover, but when you’ve just started a new job or are launching your own project, it’s simply hard to find the time.
So, how can you learn marketing quickly without having to spend months on a book or video course?
Because of these two challenges, time and curriculum, the best way to learn marketing quickly is through audio courses! “How could that be?” I hear you ask in surprise. Well, let’s break it down.
Why audio courses are the best way to learn marketing quickly
Typically, reading can be faster for most readers According to most experts, the average person reads an average of 250 words per minute (wpm), which is an advantage over the average talking speed for audio courses (around 150 wpm). This enables you to obtain more information from prints at a faster rate than an audiobook. But, and this is a big but, most people actually listen at faster than regular speeds, enabling audio listeners to catch up to the average reading wpm.
Reading has other advantages, for example reading at your own pace and reviewing difficult concepts. You can easily go back and re-read the previous line or page to better understand a point you missed. But you may not readily want to rewind audio, and it may not be easy to locate points where certain things are mentioned.
Notwithstanding, neuroscientists from the University of California at Berkeley confirmed through MRI scans that the human brain is stimulated by listening as equally as reading.
What about video courses? Video courses typically activate more senses, providing a fuller learning experience – such as the tutor’s body movement and facial expression, can help keep the audience engaged and aid retention of information. But learning quality aside (which is an issue we discuss in ‘Audio vs Visual learning’) the question is, can text or video courses help you learn marketing quickly to accomplish your goals? And this is where audio shines.
The line between audio and visual learning
Audio learning helps save time
The sad truth is that today everyone is busy. We’re working longer than ever, juggling family, friends, work and commutes. So finding the time is the first struggle. And it’s a big one we cover in our essay on ‘how to learn when you have no time’ – as most of my friends tell me:
“Between working 9–6, some family time, an evening with friends and you know, a life — I simply don’t have time to take that course”
Which is all true.
Audio learning helps deal with multitasking
Even when you do find the time, we’re constantly multitasking (even though that’s bad for productivity) and therefore find it hard to keep our attention focused on something for long periods.
This is especially true for online video courses, since all of your to-do list is just one tab away. For example, as a newbie marketer, you could be reading a book or watching a video course on Udemy but remember you need to reply to your business emails, run an important errand, or do the dishes. So you become distracted, and you can’t focus all your attention on learning from a video while carrying out such tasks. (Learning marketing is very unlike watching a movie in terms of interest level). And if you already have kids, it becomes thrice as difficult to find enough time to focus on your marketing book or video after work hours.
The loss of focus has led to video modules getting shrunk from 30-40 minutes to 3-7 minutes. And what happens? Video course creators now have to shorten their courses to keep learners engaged but avoid repetition and re-emphasis, which are vital to learning.
Notably, with audio learning, the reverse is the case. With an audio course, you can wear headphones and focus your attention on the tutor’s voice while commuting to your new workplace, having lunch at work, washing dishes, or doing some other task.
The point here is that you can mentally focus on the audio learning while being physically and visually occupied with the other task. But with video, both tasks will be competing for your visual, physical, and mental attention.
Since you’re less preoccupied mentally while multitasking during your marketing audio course, the tutor has enough time to break down complex concepts and repeat vital information. You are thus able to learn more effectively on the go. And most importantly, you will be able to learn marketing more quickly than with videos and text because finding the time and convenience is no longer a challenge. If you’re worried about your ‘learning style’ and being a visual learner, don’t be – that’s a myth we debunk in our post on audio vs. visual learning.
The power of audio learning
As an individual looking to learn marketing quickly, there is so much power in audio learning that will help you do so effectively. Below are some inherent attributes of audio learning that make it an effective tool.
1. Do not wait for a free time
Never wait for a spare time to listen to your marketing audio course; you may never get one. You’re your new job and many other things competing for your attention, you may find yourself with only 5 minutes of spare time before something else comes up. That’s why video courses and textbooks can take longer.
But with audio, you can listen and learn marketing as you drive to the supermarket, do dishes, or make coffee. Audio courses, therefore, enable you to learn much faster because you can learn almost anytime and anywhere.
2. Build sustainable habits for lifelong learning
To learn effectively, you shouldn’t have the mindset of learning for a test or exam. That way, all you’ve learned flies away once you’re done with the exam. Marketing is something you want to learn professionally, so you must be ready to build sustainable habits to become a lifelong learner; to always be in the continuous process of learning.
Learn more on how to build sustainable habits for lifelong learning.
3. Benefits of audio
- Reproducing: In all forms of learning, the most effective way to get a longer-lasting hold of what you learned is to reproduce it. After listening to your marketing audiobook, you can reinforce it to memory by saying it aloud to yourself or writing it down. Take it as a piece of homework. It is like bringing in more of your organs into the learning process. Hear the words, try to reproduce them later by speaking aloud with your own mouth, and write them down with your hands. By so doing, you are revising, but, this time, getting practically involved and teaching yourself what you’ve learned.
- Audio learning facilitates assimilation through vocal inflection: Vocal inflection, which is the variation in speech patterns, tone, and pitch, gives you a more life-like experience. It is like having someone talk to you, of which their words become more memorable than those from a complex book. Listening to the words makes you became a part of the story, and your imagination awakens. Furthermore, listening to expert marketers and their storytelling pattern also builds you since you’d be using word of mouth and storytelling a lot to capture customers’ interest as a marketer yourself.
- Fosters critical learning: Audio enables the learner to process information by how it’s said, rather than what’s being said.
- It creates a deeper connection: While written texts from academic books are most times boring, especially if you’re not a bookworm, spoken words can typically elicit more exciting emotions that facilitate retention and connection.
How to use audio courses to learn marketing quickly
At Alpe Audio, we have several audio courses on marketing, where marketing principles are broken down explicitly by marketing experts. Our audio lectures on marketing include:
With these courses, you can learn all you need to become a professional marketer within a week. Listen to Dr. Marcel Cohen break down how to market as a response to your customers rather than attempting to convince customers to respond to your product. In his course Mastering Marketing, Marcel also discusses the fundamental principles of making what you can sell rather than attempting to sell what you can make. You can listen to the trailer here.
How can you learn marketing quickly?
So how can you learn marketing quickly? By building the right curriculum of audio courses of critical topics that every marketer needs to know. That way you have the time and the structure to learn in depth when you have time. Audio is the best medium for learning in a time and place that suits your lifestyle. Whether you’re commuting, running errands or out for a run, audio courses help you master topics like marketing in the time you have.
Audio also adds life, warmth, drama, pace, and connection, all of which enhances memorability. So instead of getting books or videos on marketing which you’d barely find time to go through, you can harness all the benefits audio courses have to offer. Learn on the go, effectively, anytime, anywhere.
At Alpe Audio, we have marketing courses for you, including Mastering Marketing, Mastering Product Marketing, Pricing Strategy, and Applied Market Research. In the process of creating the courses, a humanities student even gained so much insight into marketing that she started applying it to her everyday life.
If you need to learn marketing quickly, enjoy a 7-day free trial when you download the app today.
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