From Funnels to Pipelines: Why I’m Trading Digital Marketing for DevOps
Source: Dev.to
The Shared DNA of Marketing and DevOps
In marketing I obsessed over automation—building email funnels and lead workflows so no user was dropped. In DevOps that same “workflow” mindset applies, only the object of the pipeline changes from leads to code.
I’m moving to DevOps because I want to build the systems that make the products, rather than just selling them. The “technical debt” we feel in marketing operations—broken APIs, slow landing pages, siloed data—is exactly what DevOps is designed to solve.
My 4–6 Month Transition Plan
I don’t believe in “overnight” success. Below is the rigorous plan I’ve laid out to become job‑ready while still balancing my current role.
Month 1 – The Foundation (Linux & Networking)
Key Skills: Bash scripting, SSH, DNS, OSI model.
If you can’t navigate a server, you can’t automate it.
# Example: Quick SSH test to a remote host
ssh user@your-server.comMonth 2 – Version Control Phase (Git & Python)
Key Skills: Mastering Git workflows, branching strategies, pull‑request etiquette.
I’m also picking up Python to automate repetitive tasks that used to take hours in marketing spreadsheets.
# Initialize a new Git repository
git init
git add .
git commit -m "Initial commit"Month 3 – Containerization (Docker)
Key Skills: Building Docker images, writing Dockerfiles, running containers locally, and pushing images to a registry.
# Sample Dockerfile for a simple Python app
FROM python:3.11-slim
WORKDIR /app
COPY requirements.txt .
RUN pip install -r requirements.txt
COPY . .
CMD ["python", "app.py"]Months 4‑5 – Cloud & Orchestration (AWS & Kubernetes)
Key Skills:
- AWS: EC2, S3, IAM, basic networking (VPC, security groups).
- Kubernetes: Cluster provisioning, pod lifecycle, deployments, services, and Helm charts.
This is the “big leagues” of DevOps—managing container clusters at scale.
Month 6 – Project Phase & Career Bridging
Outcome: Build a Full‑Stack Observability project that demonstrates how system performance directly impacts marketing conversion rates. The project will showcase end‑to‑end monitoring, alerting, and dashboarding, tying infrastructure metrics back to business outcomes.
Closing Thoughts
Transitioning isn’t about discarding my marketing experience; it’s about upgrading the toolkit. I remain focused on the “customer journey,” but now I’m ensuring that journey runs on fast, secure, and unbreakable infrastructure.