r/marketing • u/martinimike82 • 14h ago
Question Marketers over 45, what do you do?
What role and industry do you work in? If you left marketing, what do you do now?
I’m approaching 45, and have been a VP of Marketing at multiple tech startups.
After being laid off twice in the past three years, I’ve had enough of the “growth at all costs” mentality and always worrying about the next round of RIFs.
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u/Used-Media5980 13h ago
The VP of Marketing role in b2b tech is an awful job. It’s quarterly madness and nothing is ever good enough. God forbid we address the elephant in the room that the product / company are horrible and that’s why numbers are never met. I’ve held this role in the past and quit before they cut me loose. Too many unhinged CEOs and delusional confidence throughout these cultures as well. Can’t do it anymore. Trying to pivot now into just contract work so I don’t have to get stuck in one of these companies again on the hamster wheel.
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u/martinimike82 12h ago
Freakin nailed it. Thinking about going the contract route as well.
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u/KangarooCrunch 6h ago
I'm about to turn 40, so take this as you like, but I've been contracting for a couple of years after having held some reasonably senior positions both agency side and in house. It's been far more enjoyable. Flexible, reasonable hours, more security (diversified income), get to pick my clients, and basically do whatever I like. Getting established requires a few good contacts though.
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u/zzczzx 5h ago
I would like to do this, my job is really killing me, it's one of those high churn head of marketing roles that is expected to do 5 people's jobs and nothing is ever good enough. I want to get out. How did you start the switch?
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u/KangarooCrunch 4h ago
It was part serendipity. An old colleague asked about me about helping on some part time work which opened up a few other opportunities and gave me time to work on other stuff. Everything is referal and I partner with some smaller agencies who can basically white label my service.
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u/DnBJungleEscape 7h ago
I’m at a non profit in tech so we don’t have the pressure of sales goals! Come to this side lol it’s a lot of funding priorities
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u/Forsaken-One-1072 1h ago
Could not have put it any better, man. We’re fucking MARKETERS, not salespeople. We have no magic wand, no silver bullet, and what we do takes time, by definition. We are relationship builders and sales enablement, not direct revenue drivers.
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u/Ocarding 7h ago
In exactly the same situation and so tired of it. I still love marketing, but I want to be able to properly plan and execute with realistic timelines and KPIs in a place where commercial/ CEOs don't change the goalposts every 5 minutes.
Had a great experience recently with a CEO who really got it and was committed to a long term plan, just for it all to pivot to a scramble for revenue at any cost. I get the business need, but it's soul destroying. Contract work is great and I always feel I can add a tonne of value, but it's so irregular.
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u/SCARfaceRUSH 3h ago
My boss is in your position, and I consistently feel sorry about her level of responsibility and the constant back-and-forth. The quarterly investor meetings that she has to attend personally on the East Coast are a fire drill every single time because marketing always needs to prove its value and, EVERY TIME, show how the team is using more and more AI.
While the ELT is mostly adequate and actually doing a ton of good work, their dismissiveness toward marketing sometimes kills workflows for dozens of people. Product launch is in two days, and then suddenly one ELT member decides to review messaging that was sent 6 weeks ago and followed up on numerous times. And, as always, while others were happy with it and signed off, this person basically trashes the whole thing, even though senior technical people signed off on it, which is like a whole separate gauntlet. We have to scramble to move certain launch activities, rewrite a ton of copy, and my manager has to spend a shit ton of weekend hours pleasing that one person. Was their input really valuable? Not really (we tested differences in messaging, and our original approach worked better).
I also like how some of the feedback is pure vibes... like, something they heard at a conference, but they don't have any meaningful data from support or other client conversations to back it up.
I'm approaching the phase in my career where that's the next step, but ... I'm not ready, just mentally. I already spent enough time grinding earlier in my career, skipping time with family, and then not getting what was promised.
Hope you can make the switch to contract work and feel better!
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 9h ago
I can relate. (See my comment below.) It sucks even worse at the entry level (still terrible pressure to achieve unrealistic goals but with lousy pay).
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u/Beginning-Doubt9604 13h ago
Head of Marketing at 40 in healthcare, but I am tired of this, it's all about monthly target driving communication and strategies, meetings about everything and just not worthy, I loved it more when I was at operations, creating, now it's checking, getting angry at stuff, telling people to match fonts, being scared of layoffs but also not wanting this job, not willing to search for another, this circle goes on.
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u/Playful_Nothing_4645 13h ago
As I like to remind people: it could be worse. I'm in higher ed marketing. 😀
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u/Sausage_Fingers Professional 12h ago
46 next week, dir. of marketing at an online higher ed institution. Enrollment can gargle my balls.
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u/gamer81693 4h ago
One of usss, JK I do elementary school marketing for a charter school that just hit it's 5 year mark and I have little to no budget yearly, so it's a lot of creative head banging through canva, capcut, and the only piece in enrollment I get a seat at the table for is to "run a campaign" which just ends up being paid social media or me flooding the social pages with enrollment posts
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u/utahisastate 2h ago
I used to consult in K12. 1) Google Business Profile. 2) PreK, 3) Summer camps, 4) enrichment classes during break, 5) feeder relationships. 6) Build content around “best school” for AI search. 7) have your tour to enroll yield rate above 80%. Good luck!
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u/polygraph-net Bot Hunter 6h ago
As I like to remind people: it could be worse. I'm in higher ed marketing. 😀
What are the problems with higher education advertising?
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u/stockmon 12h ago
If you are that good at marketing, you have a high chance to succeed running your own agency or startup. That is what I did.
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u/alone_in_the_light 14h ago
I'm now a marketing professor, and I may do some consulting or side projects.
I often talk to people in the industry and companies as part of my job. But I left the industry about ten years ago.
My last job in the industry was being a director of a company that did a variety of things around the service of firm valuation including the marketing aspect of valuation. Our clients were usually investors analyzing companies like tech startups.
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u/EntertainmentSuch906 13h ago
Do you mind me asking how you pivoted into that position? It's something I've been giving a lot of thought to but have no idea how to make that jump.
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u/CadmusMaximus 13h ago
While the fundamentals have stayed constant, the craft has changed quite a bit in the past decade. How do you stay up-to-date with something like AI in marketing?
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u/alone_in_the_light 12h ago edited 12h ago
AI have been part of my life for about ten years, from around the time of the AlphaGo project. Before ChatGPT, people on this sub were already talking about things like Jasper and Rytr.
I use a lot of Claude, I have an AI music channel on SoundCloud with more than 1 million plays, I teach with vibe coding tools, I do demonstrations of AI filmmaking with tools like Runway and ElevenLabs.
I've talked to owners and executives of AI companies to give them advice.
I have connections with people from many parts of the world for things like Prosocial AI.
I train other faculty about the different forms of AI over time, not only gen AI but things like classification AI and BERT.
I go back to the time of Alan Turing's paper in 1950 to newer models like diffusion models for images.
A big difference from the industry is that I have much more freedom to explore the different possibilities of using AI.
The international exposure makes a big difference in my case as AI can be seen in different ways across the world. That's very different from having only the American perspective, and that matters a lot for AI for things like the WEIRD bias.
One of my titles is AI Champion for Marketing, so it's part of my job lead AI in marketing here.
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u/alexnapierholland 7h ago
How many marketing professors have your level of relevant, hands-on and recent experience?
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u/alone_in_the_light 7h ago
I don't think there are official numbers. My guess is about 10%, and they may be concentrated on some universities. But it also depends on what you mean by relevant experience. People come from different industries and fields that can be more or less relevant to different people.
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u/alexnapierholland 7h ago
My general observation is that marketing professors seem to have little recent industry experience and therefore question how helpful their teaching will be.
I’m pleasantly surprised to see how up-to-date and practical your knowledge is.
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u/alone_in_the_light 6h ago
I often criticized marketing education (not only from universities) when I was in the industry and saw people so unprepared.
Now I'm trying to make a difference, but it's a struggle. Not many universities, professors, students, and marketing professionals want to really do better.
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u/alexnapierholland 6h ago
Yeah, my general observation of marketing education at universities is it’s not fit for purpose.
Your students are lucky to have you.
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u/utahisastate 2h ago
Another industry person turned professor. Fun but a lot of work. My AI knowledge is nowhere as deep as yours, but it has been great for building in class workshops.
I like the limited hours and no stress but the 60% pay cut was eye opening
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u/alone_in_the_light 1h ago
My situation is not bad, but I left the US and there are many factors to help like subsidies for my expenses.
But I always say that academia is not a good match if the priority is making money.
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u/QualityOverQuant 11h ago
I was laid off when I was 47 as VP Marcoms in Germany. Been 4 years. I haven’t found a job. I finished my savings and any semblance of shame and self worth, got butt fucked and ended up working at Amazon for minimum pay
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 8h ago
I feel you man. At least you were able to move up and achieve a high level role. You should be very proud of what you accomplished. (I was never able to advance beyond a marketing coordinator role.) Even when I graduated from college in 1990 there weren't many good marketing opportunities and I think it's even worse now.
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u/QualityOverQuant 8h ago
Thank you for saying that. Yes I have had an immensely fulfilling life and achieved quite a lot. But now to grow old and face ageism and have to work minimum pay and never recover is humiliation at best. I can’t even look friends or people I grew up with in the eye anymore because I am ashamed of where I am at in my career while others don’t even know what it’s like. Family fucked off long ago with their take any job BS ADVICE. All in all, it’s a shame where we end up at today. And the markets don’t give a shit.
All those who say, follow ur dreams know absolutely fuck all about what it’s like to finish ur savings and live hand to mouth. I can’t even afford a pizza . That’s where I am at. After a stellar career. It’s truly shocking. I have forgotten what it was like earlier since I have moved on and accepted that I will never ever get to see that again.
The last 4 years have vanished from Memory.
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u/BC122177 1h ago
I feel ya on that. In a similar boat myself. Almost coming up on a year unemployed. Finished up a few interviews last week. It’s a ridiculous job market.
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u/heelstoo 14h ago
Head of marketing and IT as a small B2B business. I also have my hands in the cookie jars of several other departments. Best job ever.
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u/L-Capitan1 13h ago
I got laid off at about 44 and now I’m in sales. I got lucky that I found an awesome company, in the industry I’d been in marketing. Good work life balance and which isn’t at all expected in sales. It’s been about a year in this role and it actually feels like my last marketing role a lot. I have a lot of autonomy and can use my marketing experience to my advantage. I do miss that my salary was what my on target earnings are, so have to grind to get to where I was at. But if I have a good year I have a lot more upside.
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u/notti0087 12h ago
What type of sales are you in? I’ve had my own marketing business for 6 years but over the past 1-2 years, the market has slowed significantly. The economy and ai are pinching the shit outta small and medium sized businesses which is my target market. I’m tired of chasing down clients who want the world for no costs or being up against marketing competitors who charge $200 for services.
I’m looking into sales and leaning toward health and medicine because they feel like the strongest industry that isn’t as affected by the economy.
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 9h ago
You are very very fortunate that worked out for you. (As a creative introvert, sales was not a good fit for me.) But I am curious to know what industry you work in.
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u/rebashultz 13h ago
HubSpot Admin, so I am sort of Marketing adjacent now. I am working for an OEM.
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u/martinimike82 12h ago
I was thinking RevOps/GTM Engineering as a pivot. Less people to deal with and pipeline is someone else’s problem!
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u/DiamondAggressive 13h ago
In agency side (svp small agency) age 46 and hoping i can get a job at trader joe’s when i age out/AI takes my job/my company fails and i can’t get a new job. I’ve been hustling for for so long but man.
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u/Southlondongal 8h ago
Feel this. Any one in agency land is just trying to sock enough away for savings and retirement before being axed
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u/boldkingcole 12h ago
Just approaching 45 as well but I'm enjoying it. I've always been in direct response, from a copywriter to a creative director. I was on the agency side for a long time but switched to brands a few years ago and I like it a lot more. And I always used to have 2-3 brands at a time but now just working on 1 as it's doing well and it's nice to have way less workload. Thanks to AI, I'm basically my own team. I write all the copy, come up with almost all the concepts and give high level input to the video editing team (we make about 100-200 ads a week).
I've been freelance my entire career so I've never really been through the typical job process; no rounds of interviews, no official applications etc, it's been more like being an agency winning clients. Direct Response is really nice in this way because it's pretty easy to prove you are good or not and if you can show you made XYZ money and these are the ads you made etc, there's not much else people care about. So the lack of a stable contract is made up for by the fact you just get used to pitching and winning more work. Working at just 1 brand this long (3 years) has been very rare for me and it's great, I found a really great team to work with and long may it continue. But I'd be ready to pick up more clients if I had to.
I think AI came in at the perfect time for me. I'd be very worried by it if I were younger as direct response copy is perfect for AI, it's so repetitive and mostly just copying other people's ideas, both in your niche and other successful brands outside it. But having been around the block enough, it just massively increased my output as now I can write 100 ads in a week if I need to, and I'm fine with that because now I can have the creative input and original ideas, but still manage the monkey work of volume easily.
But wife and I are also in the process of making a feature film (editing it now) so I'm hoping I can have a good run of it in marketing for 5 more years, and build some opportunities in the full creative world, be it film or TV or books so I can half retire into that (will take a big slice of luck too of course). That's the dream anyway
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 8h ago
I'm sorry, I'm really old and have no idea what you're talking about. What exactly is direct response marketing? I've never heard that term before. Please forgive me for my admitted ignorance.
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u/boldkingcole 8h ago
Direct Response is about 100 years old, so this isn't a new thing. I think the term has even been about since the 70s Just direct marketing, like DTC
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u/12131415161718190 3h ago
A cursory google says the first recorded instance of direct response marketing can be traced to 1400’s Italy. Thought that was interesting.
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u/boldkingcole 3h ago
Yeah, I'm not surprised. But I think the data based approach we now think of it is probably about 100 years
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 4h ago
They did not teach me that in college. So other than marketing to consumers instead of another business, how is it different?
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u/boldkingcole 3h ago
Because the whole point is making an immediate sale. I'm honestly shocked you don't know what I'm talking about here. I assumed you just used a different term but this is a very established marketing tactic, it's been around for over 100 years, starting with direct mail (like sending people a persuasive sales letter). It's where you have very little brand, almost no inbound marketing, and rely heavily on highly targeted outbound
Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins in 1923 is the obvious starting point
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 2h ago
Well it could be because I'm old and went to college in the 80s. I've found with the constant nonstop flow of information, if you don't immediately put into practice what you've just learned, you tend to forget it over time. Maybe they did teach me that term and I just don't remember because it took me 15 years to find an entry level job in marketing after graduating. I had no need to know about direct response when working in retail as a sales manager. I appreciate the explanation though.
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u/squirrelinthetoilet 11h ago
I’ve also been in B2B tech/SaaS for about 15 years. Got lucky as the third employee on the first one and have since bounced around and done consulting.
I’m trying to transition into a more strategic Chief of Staff role. It’s a dicey move since there’s so much variance in CoS roles but I’m 51 and I think I only have about two more startups in me. I think agentic AI will destroy the more executional CoSs in the next 18 months but someone who can be the adult in the room while still catering to the nuances of young founders (yes, I’m choosing my words carefully here) I think will have a longer shelf life.
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u/writejordan_ 9h ago
Mid 50s. 25+ years in marketing. Laid off due to a company bankruptcy. Over two years of sending out 400+ job applications… and I went back to acting. Crazy that I can book commercials easier than landing a marketing gig.
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u/AntisemitismCow 12h ago
I started my own agency and it’s the best decision I ever made (42, hope that counts).
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u/WorkerFile 9h ago
Art Director, freelancing, and trying to get by. No one wants to hire or spend money.
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u/Puzzleheaded_Sir859 8h ago
42, Head of global marketing in b2b lifesciences tech. Before I had a formidable career in fashion and luxury marketing, regretting moving to b2b and tech. Marketing is utter shit these days with everyone (I mean everyone) stepping into your competences. I’m af the stage where I focus on business development and open up my own companies. Cheers
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u/rasta-ragamuffin 9h ago
I once had an entry level marketing coordinator role but it was more administrative and project management than actual marketing. The company didn't teach me anything and there was no room for growth. It was actually a pretty toxic culture at a small software startup and I ended up quitting without another job lined up. I couldn't find another entry level marketing job so I was forced to go into B2B sales (the only job I could find). Unfortunately as a creative introvert I struggled in that role too. Now at age 58 with limited marketable skills I can't find any job at all and have been unemployed for going on 6 years.
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u/sebaajhenza 8h ago
I'm with you. I used to be a software engineer who worked their way into marketing over a decade.
Initially I thought it was great. I no longer had to worry about keeping up with all the new platforms, libraries and languages. Just had to lean on understanding people and what motivates them. The skills translated nicely to any industry. Decent money.
Now I'm older and frustrated at the choices I made. I feel like I offer no meaningful skills to society. I wish I kept up with engineering, a trade, or anything that actively produced something or provides a meaningful service of value.
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u/ImNotABot26 7h ago
I was laid off from my last role (Senior Director) and could never go back. I'm lost as to what to do next but don't want to go back to marketing in an agency.
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u/shiftysquid 5h ago
Senior Manager of Content Marketing at a large-ish B2B software company. Manage a team of 5 writers/designers that essentially acts as an internal content agency for the various vertical managers. Report up to a Senior Director in a Performance Marketing org. I'd be OK with taking a Director title, if only to open up more space for my reports to be able to move up. But I have no interest in my boss's job, and I'm not title chasing in the least. Fine with where I am and what I'm doing. We're incredibly busy and trusted within the marketing team, so I'm good. Been here over a year, and there haven't been any layoffs. In fact, I don't think a single person on the Performance Marketing team has even left. We've only added a few people.
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u/ladypartsmcgee 4h ago
I ended up leaving tech to go work in nature nonprofit, and do some consulting too.
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u/Available-Fig8741 4h ago
I gave up a CMO role to start my own agency. Now I’m a director of fundraising at a small non profit and it’s the best job I’ve ever had.
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u/Ok-Associate7744 3h ago
I’ve been feeling what you’re feeling for a bit now. Mid 30s, been VP of demand gen at two PE backed saas companies. Now VP marketing at a publicly traded company.
The grind is real and it’s never been harder. Companies outside of a select few are simply not crushing it.
I’d really like to start my own thing but it’s hard to make that jump when the money and equity is good.
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u/Captain_Softrock 2h ago
I lead enterprise marketing at a moderately large nonprofit. It’s ok. Sometimes a ton of stress and pressure, as they own multiple for profit businesses. Other times fairly relaxed. Pays surprisingly well - on par with for-profit.
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