Report indicates fastest growing online jobs 2015

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The report discovered that jobs related to Swift, Apple’s programming language, were quickly gaining traction - Swift jobs grew by 566% in 2015 on the website, as more developers took notice of the newly open-sourced programming language.

This growth is backed by The Next Web’s report: “Swift has seen a surge of energy from the developer community; so much so that it’s now the most popular language in active development on GitHub. Over 20,000 users have starred Swift, which has a huge lead on second-place Rust (14 434). Swift even has more people liking it than Go (12,828), Coffeescript (12,271) and Ruby (8617).”

Touted as safe, fast, and expressive, Swift appeals to developers who are aiming to build on Apple’s multiple platforms, such as iOS, OS X and WatchOS. Moreover, with Apple’s release of its iPhone SE and the 9.7-inch iPad Pro, Freelancer.com predicts that interest in Swift will continue to surge, as programmers rush to meet the demands of the Apple-crazed market.

This might eventually spell the doom of Blackberry, which has been struggling ever since Apple launched the first iPhone. Despite efforts to keep up (even launching an Android phone of its own), Blackberry jobs were at a dismal -27% (to 1,107 jobs) growth last year.

Delivery jobs on the rise

Delivery jobs also rose in 2015, with a 1874% increase (to 1046 jobs), from 2014.

The jobs fall under the Local Jobs & Services category, which was globally launched by Freelancer.com early last year— the feature allows employers to look for freelancers within 50-kilometre radius and hire them directly through the site.

Interest in On-Demand Delivery Services has been on the rise over the years: earlier in 2016, Foursquare partnered with Delivery.com to facilitate delivery of food and groceries through the app—an announcement which came at the heels of delivery management software Onfleet’s breakthrough one-millionth delivery. In 2014, Uber ventured into this arena with the launch of its own on-demand delivery network, Uber Rush, and its new food-ordering app, UberEATS.

With more on-demand delivery services coming in (even Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts are joining with their respective partnerships with Postmates and DoorDash), it seems that the services will continue to flourish this year.

Social media platforms

Except for Facebook, social media platforms are slaying traditional marketing.

Instagram-related work grew by 1328% (to 1870 jobs) in 2015. With the launch of paid ads on the popular visual social media platform, small businesses are able to market themselves quickly and easily to their audience —allowing them to compete with larger brands, which have bigger marketing budgets.

“For many businesses owners, Instagram has not only catapulted brand awareness but also acted as a powerful sales driver,” reports Suzanne Bearne in her 2015 Guardian article.

While its growth pales in comparison to that of Instagram, Pinterest still makes it onto the list, with 152% growth (to 8439 jobs) in 2015.

Instagram jobs have been rising phenomenally, especially with the trend leaning towards snackable visual content that makes it easier and at the same challenging small business owners to highlight their products and services.

Instagram has been making great strides to make itself the perfect platform for marketers: after rolling out paid ads last year, it has also just launched the ability to add up to five accounts in its app.

This feature will now allow marketers to promote various products at a push of a button (while monitoring their personal Instagram accounts).

Notably though, Facebook Marketing jobs are plummeting (down to -12%, or 28 421 jobs). With organic reach virtually dead, marketers are likely bidding goodbye to their once most-loved social media platform.

To cut through the clutter, show & tell it better

Coca-Cola’s recent branding efforts to deviate from its “Open Happiness” strategy and unify its approach under its new slogan “Taste the Feeling” underscores an attempt to solidify its core message closer to its product, making it easier to communicate the brand to its target audiences.

This affirms a cardinal rule: whether it is a global company or a small business, a strong, unique brand identity that is reinforced across every channel is paramount for a business to differentiate itself from its competitors and resonate with the audience.

Small businesses seem to recognise this key marketing truth. Package Design saw a huge rise (up to 526%, or 1177 jobs, in 2015)—a growth potentially linked with the growth of delivery jobs as more and more small businesses see the value of a stronger branding identity.

This heightened need to create a solid brand experience comes at a time when customers are having less brick-and-mortar engagements and are only physically interacting with the brand as the product reaches them.

Blog Install, Fiction, and Online Writing-related work were also among the top growing jobs in 2015 (to 1133%; 394%; and 296% growth—or 2749; 1,502; and 2935 jobs, respectively), which likely also supported these small businesses’ need to create a cohesive and consistent marketing strategy for their companies online. Along with these, Shopify jobs also grew by 127% (to 2593 jobs.)

Matt Barrie, chief executive of Freelancer.com, says, “The site has been empowering small businesses from its inception and the recent growth trends show how small businesses continue to benefit massively from our platform. The launch of our Local Jobs feature, which is a great addition to our platform that facilitates online work among entrepreneurs and freelancers, has made it possible for these small players to stay competitive and find ways to achieve growth cost- and time-efficiently.”