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Marketing manager: what the job actually is

Deciding how an organisation talks to its customers, and managing the people and the budget that do it.

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Marketing manager: quick facts

Marketing manager salary in Ontario: the median pay is $57.44 an hour, according to Job Bank (reference period 2023-2024). Its three-year outlook in Ontario is very limited.

Median pay in Ontario
$57.44 an hour
Pay range (low to high)
$36.86 to $88.94 an hour
Job outlook, 2025-2027
Very limited
People working in it in Ontario
28,050
Usually needs
Management

Source: Job Bank wages (updated 19 November 2025) and job prospects (updated 10 December 2025), NOC 10022. Pay varies by region and experience.

The work

What this job actually is

  • Setting the plan for how a company or organisation is seen: its advertising, its website and social media, its public relations and its events, and then managing the people and the budget that carry it out.
  • Job Bank's group is advertising, marketing and public relations managers. It covers three kinds of manager: advertising and public relations, marketing, and e-business. It reports one wage and one outlook for all of them.
  • Job Bank says the usual education is a university degree or college diploma in a related field, such as communications, public relations, marketing, journalism or business administration, plus several years of experience in advertising, marketing, sales or public relations.
  • Job Bank says this occupation is not regulated in Canada, so no certification is compulsory.
  • Job Bank's Ontario outlook is Very limited, with employment expected to stay relatively stable and the factors it lists including general downsizing by major employers and AI-driven technologies changing the skills required in marketing, communications and digital media roles.
  • Unlike the marketing specialist who does the work, the manager decides what work is worth doing, buys it from agencies or staff, and answers for whether it worked.

A Tuesday

What a normal day looks like

Not a good day or a bad one. The ordinary version, which is what you would actually be living.

  1. 8:30 — Check the numbers from the weekend campaign. Someone clicked, nobody bought.
  2. 9:00 — Team check-in. The designer is waiting on copy and the copywriter is waiting on approval.
  3. 10:00 — Agency call about next quarter's plan and what it will cost.
  4. 11:30 — Argue gently with the sales department, who want a flyer by Friday.
  5. 12:30 — Lunch is a sandwich and a competitor's website.
  6. 13:30 — Review a draft of a press release and cut the best sentence because it makes a promise you cannot keep.
  7. 15:00 — Budget meeting. Someone asks which half of the advertising is working. You say you are working on that.
  8. 16:30 — Approve photos for the new campaign, and sign off an invoice.
  9. 18:00 — Read the plan for the week and rearrange it around the thing that went wrong this afternoon.

Honestly

Who loves this, and who should not do it

The second list is the useful one. Nearly every careers page leaves it out, which is why nearly every careers page reads like an advert.

You may like this if
  • You like ideas and people equally and want to be the one who chooses which ideas go ahead.
  • You can work with designers, writers, data and sales without being any of them.
  • You are comfortable being judged on results that you only partly control.
  • You can work in marketing for several years before you manage anyone.
  • You are curious about why people choose one thing over another.
You may hate this if
  • You need steady openings. Job Bank rates the outlook for this group Very limited, and says general downsizing at major employers is one reason.
  • You dislike being judged on numbers. Marketing is measured in clicks, leads and sales, and a good idea can still fail.
  • You want to stay creative. A manager spends more time on budgets, schedules, approvals and meetings than on making things.
  • You dislike change. Job Bank says AI-driven technologies are changing the skills required, so the job is a moving target.
  • You do not want to be answerable for others. When an agency or a team member misses a deadline, you explain it.

The route in

How you actually get there in Ontario

  1. Study communications, marketing, journalism or business

    Job Bank lists a university degree or college diploma in communications, public relations, marketing, journalism, business administration or a related field. Search Ontario college programmes at ontariocolleges.ca and look at which ones include a co-op placement.

  2. Work in marketing, sales, communications or public relations

    Job Bank says several years of experience are required, in advertising, marketing, sales or public relations roles, depending on which kind of manager. Most people start as a coordinator or specialist.

  3. Build a record you can show

    Keep copies of what you made and the results it got, as far as your employer allows. A manager is hired for judgement, and results are the evidence of it.

  4. Take on a team

    Ask to lead a project, supervise a junior or manage an agency relationship. Those are the steps between specialist and manager.

Where this comes from: Job Bank — Advertising, marketing and public relations managers (NOC 10022), requirements · Job Bank — Advertising, marketing and public relations managers (NOC 10022), outlook · ontariocolleges.ca — program search

The money

Marketing manager salary in Ontario

Job Bank's own figures, quoted rather than summarised, with the period they describe — so you can tell how old they are and go and check them.

$36.86
Low (hourly)
$57.44
Median (hourly)
$88.94
High (hourly)

Ontario, NOC 10022. Reference period 2023-2024, last updated by Job Bank on 19 November 2025. Wages vary a lot by region inside Ontario and by how long you have been doing it — the low figure is roughly where you start, not what the job is worth.

Source: Job Bank — Marketing manager wages in Ontario

Where it is heading

The outlook for the next three years

Job Bank publishes a three-year outlook for every job in every province. It is the closest thing to an honest forecast, and it moves, so read it as a weather report rather than a verdict.

Ontario, 2025-2027

Very limited1 out of 5 stars

  • Employment is expected to remain relatively stable.
  • A moderate number of positions will become available due to retirements.
  • There are several unemployed workers with recent experience in this occupation.

What that rating means: how many openings Job Bank expects in Ontario for this kind of work against how many people are likely to be looking — not whether it is a good job. A “limited” rating means more competition for each opening; it does not close the door, and it can change before you are ready to walk through it.

What is changing in this work

  • General downsizing by major employers
  • AI-driven technologies are changing the skill sets required in marketing, communications, and digital media roles

Who hires for it

  • Across most industries, particularly advertising, marketing and public relations firms
28,050
people work in this job in Ontario
60%
are women (48% across all jobs)
12%
are self-employed (15% across all jobs)

Source: Job Bank — Advertising, marketing and public relations managers job prospects in Ontario (NOC 10022). Outlook updated by Job Bank on 10 December 2025; read by us on 5 October 2026.

Before you leave school

Things you can do now

  • Take business, media or communications courses, and join the yearbook, school paper or student council publicity team.
  • Run the publicity for a school event and write down how many people came and how you told them.
  • Start a small page for something you care about and watch what people respond to, in numbers, for a month.
  • Notice ads around you and ask yourself who they are for and what they want you to do.

Test it

Do this before you decide anything

Reading about a job tells you almost nothing. This is designed to be done alone, this week, for free.

Plan and measure a tiny campaign for a real event

About 120 minutes
  1. Pick a real small event or cause you can promote, such as a school club meeting or a family fundraiser, with the organiser's agreement.
  2. Decide who you want to reach, the one message you want them to get and two ways to tell them, such as a poster and a message to a group.
  3. Run both ways, and write down how many people said they heard about it from each one.
  4. Write a short note of what you would change, spending only the same budget of nothing.

What it tells you. If choosing the audience, the message and the way, and then checking the result, held your interest, you have the thinking part of this job. If you only liked making the poster, a creative role such as a designer may suit you better than managing. If counting the response was boring, a job judged on results will wear on you.

Better than any article

Questions for somebody who does this job

Most people say yes to a teenager who asks good questions. These are the ones that get real answers rather than encouragement.

  1. “How did you get from doing the work to managing it?”
  2. “How do you know whether a campaign worked?”
  3. “What has changed most in your job in the last few years?”
  4. “How much of your week is creative, and how much is meetings and budgets?”
  5. “What would you tell someone choosing between a marketing degree and a college diploma?”
  6. “What is the hardest part of managing agencies and staff?”

Could you own one of these?

The part other career sites never mention

Job Bank reports a share of self-employment in this group, a little below the all-occupations average. Many people with these skills work for themselves as consultants or run a small agency, usually after years inside an organisation building clients and a record. It is a business that depends on a handful of clients, so look at the business owner page as well.

Business 101 is free and teaches that part

Quick answers

Questions people ask about this job

How much does a marketing manager make in Ontario?

The median pay for a marketing manager in Ontario is $57.44 an hour, according to Job Bank (reference period 2023-2024, updated 19 November 2025). The range Job Bank publishes runs from $36.86 to $88.94 an hour. Pay varies by region, employer and experience.

What is the job outlook for a marketing manager in Ontario?

Job Bank rates the employment outlook for this work in Ontario as very limited for 2025-2027 (updated 10 December 2025). Employment is expected to remain relatively stable. A moderate number of positions will become available due to retirements. There are several unemployed workers with recent experience in this occupation. A lower rating means more competition for each opening, not that no one is hiring.

What do you need to become a marketing manager in Ontario?

Job Bank says this work is classed as a management occupation. The usual route in Ontario, in order: Study communications, marketing, journalism or business; Work in marketing, sales, communications or public relations; Build a record you can show.

Where does a marketing manager work in Ontario?

Across most industries, particularly advertising, marketing and public relations firms. (Job Bank.)

How many people work as a marketing manager in Ontario, and how many are women?

Job Bank counts about 28,050 people working in this job in Ontario. 60% of them are women, compared with 48% across all jobs. That describes who does the work today, not who can.

Where people come from

Which programs lead here?

In the 2021 Census, this job is one of the 12 most common for graduates of these programs. Each page shows what else they do, and which of those jobs have openings.

What can you do with your degree?

Not sure this is the right list to be reading

Start from yourself, not from the job.

Future Finder is free, takes about ten minutes, needs no account and stores nothing. It will tell you which kinds of work you lean toward, and which of these pages are worth your time.

Try Future Finder — freeAll jobs

Parent of a teenager weighing this up? Career coaching for teens gets them talking to people who do the work, anywhere in Ontario.

If this appeals, look at these too

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Wages and training requirements change. Every figure on this page is linked to the body that publishes it, and the review date above says when we last checked. If you find something out of date, tell us and we will fix it.