6 SEM Certifications for 2023!

There are a ton of certifications out there for marketers to get, to the point where it can be a daunting task to find out which ones are worth your time. One challenge you can run into when taking certifications that a software company has put together is that they mainly teach about the software instead of teaching you marketing. 

Another issue is that the digital marketing space changes daily, especially nowadays, with the increase of AI in our day-to-day lives and jobs. 

You have to pay for different certifications to participate, but that is only sometimes the case. You can quickly learn and get certified with purely free certifications; if you want to take it further, the paid ones are also available.

1. Google Analytics

With the sun setting on UA coming up soon, getting as much knowledge and experience as possible surrounding GA4 is crucial.

Even before the archival of UA Google Analytics, knowledge of how to use the tool has always been needed. In particular, since it can be used for both paid and organic to help create and optimize your website and ads.

What will you learn?

Through the certification process, you will learn:

• How to set up a Google Analytics 4 account for both web and app properties through an account.
• Collect the data you need for your business and use the reporting tools and features to understand your data better.
• Recognize key measurements and show the effectiveness of your digital marketing efforts.

2. Google Ads

Even as someone who loved learning by doing this course and certification will serve you well if you want to get into the paid side of SEM; going through the course to know the best practices and then applying them to your campaigns can help you go far. 

What will you learn? 📚

Unlike the Google Analytics course, Google Ads has multiple courses covering Search, Display, Video, Shopping Ads, Apps, and Measurement.

This way, you can choose which ones will benefit you most or get them all.

At the very least, I recommend getting the Search and Display certifications, as those are often the most used and a good foundation for the rest of your ads. 

3. Facebook/Meta

There are a couple of primary areas of Meta certifications that you can get, one surrounding the Facebook page/community building itself, Messenger, and ads and how their ad platform works. Particularly if you are in the eCommerce space, Facebook has a massive reach that can help show your ads to the right audience and give you a great return on your investment. 

For the most part, the page portion of things isn't necessary regarding SEM.

What will you learn? 📚

With the ads platform certifications, you'll learn:

• How to target the right audience
• Increase online or in-store visibility and sales,
• Manage ads, and more.

There are also courses around ad creative and how to manage ad performance. 

4. HubSpot Inbound

One of the biggest CRMs out there is HubSpot, and although only some people you work for will use it, their courses will help you learn more about inbound foundations, all areas of marketing, and how you can make an impact. Through the lessons, you find out how to approach marketing from a holistic point of view.

What will you learn? 📚

You will learn the following:

• How to attract, engage, and delight your customers
• Create buyer personas
• Use the flywheel model, and more throughout the course.

You can find out how to get the most out of your current content and create new engaging content to convert your users. 

5. HubSpot Content 

Like the HubSpot Inbound certification, the Content Marketing course digs into the content side of things.

What will you learn? 📚

• You will learn to create appealing, share-worthy, high-quality, and converting content.
• How to develop your goals and a plan to achieve them,
• Measure ROI through goal setting and tracking your performance, plus some SEO tactics to get your content ranking.

There technically aren't any prerequisites for this certification, but if you take the HubSpot Inbound course before, there is a chance that you will get more out of it.

6. Semrush SEO Toolkit

Semrush is similar to HubSpot, where they have a ton of different courses that you can take, all for free, to expand your knowledge on PPC, SEO, content marketing, and more.

What will you learn? 📚

The SEO Fundamentals Course with Greg Gifford is great for covering the basics of SEO that stay the same, so you don't have to worry about the course being outdated.

After that, you can take the PPC Fundamentals Course with Joel Bondorowsky. Once the foundations are covered, you can explore all the other available courses. 

So which ones are you going to take? 🤓

There are a ton of certifications out there that you can give your time and money towards, these are the top handful that are a must-have for all marketers.

As a marketer time and knowledge are your two most valuable resources and should be treated as highly valuable. When picking which certifications you get it's important to find ones that won't waste your time or your money!