Social Rocket
AI is changing the demands placed on entry-level marketing staff. At a recent Digiday industry meeting, executives reported that automated tools now handle tasks that used to be a common part of junior roles. At the same time, participants warned against removing junior staff from people development as a result.
For German agencies, this has become a concrete staffing question: which tasks should junior staff learn when AI already produces the first drafts, reports and media plans? New examples from large agencies and data from the industry association GWA show how training and teams are changing.
AI skills are being requested far more often in marketing
Stepstone has analysed more than 5,6 million job advertisements. According to this, demand for AI skills has more than tripled since 2019. In marketing, the share of corresponding job advertisements rose from 2,2 percent in the year 2023 to 7,2 percent 2025, and to 10,2 percent in the first half of 2026.
LinkedIn also reports that the number of newly hired entry-level workers in Germany 2025 fell overall by 17 percent compared with the previous year. Media and communications, however, do not present a uniform picture: LinkedIn names marketing specialists, content producers, graphic designers and PR consultants, among others, as growing entry-level profiles.
Junior roles are becoming more demanding
For social, content and performance teams, the role of entry-level staff is therefore shifting. Simple research, variant production, reporting or initial analyses can partly be automated. Tasks that require checking results, classifying data and steering workflows cleanly become more valuable.
This matches a problem already visible in many AI workflows: more output is not automatically better output. Social Rocket has already analysed why AI content without human review quickly ends up at "good enough" quality.
Human control also remains important in creative processes. An AI creative director workflow only works reliably once brand rules, sources and approvals are clearly defined. The same applies to agentic media buying, where AI systems take over more and more operational steps.
What international industry data shows about entry-level careers
Concern about a lack of new talent is not merely an agency opinion. The industry association IAB Australia reported on 2 June 2026 in its Digital Advertising and Ad Tech Industry Talent Review: only 1 percent of the open positions at the time of the survey were entry-level roles; 49 percent of vacancies required more than six years of experience. Meanwhile, 42 percent of the surveyed organisations reported staff growth, and 37 percent reported declines. The figures describe the Australian adtech and digital advertising segment that was examined, not the entire German labour market.
The British IPA Agency Census 2025, published on 11 February 2026, also points to a narrower talent pipeline: the number of employees up to and including 25 years of age fell by 2024 percent compared with 19,2. Only 43,4 percent of responding agencies employed entry-level staff in the form of graduate trainees or apprentices; the previous year it was 56 percent. 8 percent of agencies cited AI as a direct reason for job cuts last year, and 24 percent expected such cuts in the following year. The labour market is therefore under economic and technological pressure at the same time.
What can be derived for German social and media agencies
The German BVDW Trend Monitor from 23 September 2026 shows the operational shift, but does not provide a comparable entry-level job rate: 63 percent of the media agencies surveyed already use AI permanently in daily work to automate recurring tasks; for 90 percent, AI skills are considered a given. For German companies, it therefore makes sense not to evaluate training and entry-level tasks solely by production speed.
A possible junior learning path can be organized around real campaigns: formulate the brief and success hypothesis, check AI variants for brand and legal risks, question tracking and attribution, and derive a well-founded budget decision from a test. What matters is that junior staff receive feedback and responsibility – not just access to more automation.
Monks and M&C Saatchi anchor AI training in agency day-to-day work
The change becomes more concrete at two international agencies. M&C Saatchi North America reserves one working hour per week for further training, said group CEO Nadja Bellan-White at the Digiday Media Buying Summit. At Monks, both juniors and experienced staff are trained in AI workflows. Data and media chief Gila Wilensky said the agency wants to tailor its entry-level roles more closely to new tasks: manually compiling spreadsheets is becoming less important, while strategic work and quality control of automated processes are gaining weight. Digiday reported on this on 30 October 2026.
Staffing plans in Germany show why further training is currently an operational issue for agency heads. In the GWA spring monitor 2026, 45 percent of the agencies surveyed planned a stable headcount, 28 percent wanted to increase staff, and 27 percent planned job cuts. At the same time, 84 percent named strong or very strong transformation pressure. In the survey of 92 agencies, the weak economy was the most frequently cited growth obstacle, while 49 percent saw the replacement of agency services by AI as a challenge.
The GWA AI white paper 2026 examines this change in more depth, based on interviews and two surveys of 170 CEOs and CMOs as well as 78 agency managing directors. It covers, among other things, new remuneration models, AI agents and training of new talent. For team leaders, a simple priority follows: using AI requires dedicated learning time, new entry-level tasks and clear accountability for results – not just an additional software license.
Human skills remain decisive
For its State of Marketing Careers report 2026, the American Marketing Association surveyed a total of 1.412 marketing professionals. AI was named as the most important skill for the next five years. At the same time, the study emphasizes that adaptability, critical thinking, creativity, communication and leadership are skills that continue to require strong human involvement.
For career starters, it is therefore not only important which AI tools they know. What will decide is whether they can evaluate automated results, spot errors, interpret data meaningfully and integrate the technology into a sound marketing process.
For companies, this creates a practical task: entry-level roles should not just be reduced, but redesigned. Mentoring, structured AI training and real responsibility remain important so that today's juniors can also become experienced strategists, creatives and performance marketers in future.
Sources: IAB Australia, Talent Review 2026, IPA Agency Census 2025, BVDW Trend Monitor 2026, Digiday partner article from 27.10.2026 (sponsored opinion, not an empirical study), Digiday, Stepstone, LinkedIn Jobstart guide 2026 Germany, AMA State of Marketing Careers 2026, Digiday, agency training and AI teams 30.10.2026, GWA Spring Monitor 2026, GWA AI White Paper 2026