Our professional lives often revolve around learning new things, promotions, and appraisals. While promotions and appraisals are in the hands of your employer, garnering new changes and updates in your field of work can take you to the next level. If you are working in the field of technology, then you have to stay updated with anything and everything. While staying updated is one thing, another thing revolves around polishing your skills. A lucrative way to do this is with the help of certification courses. Google offers several free and paid certification courses through its own learning platforms and third-party providers. Their goal is to help people build job-ready skills to start a career in the tech industry. In yet another blog, Cybertech is here to tell you what Google courses are and will suggest five fantastic blogs that can give you an edge in your field. So let’s get started.

Google courses or Google certifications are 100% free or paid online certificates meaning that you can complete the courses online without having to attend a classroom in person. Google courses are designed and built by experts working at Google. Some certifications are delivered by Google online training platforms (Google Skillshop, Google Digital Garage, Grow with Google), and others by external e-learning providers. The Google courses or certifications are grouped into three main categories:

1. Google Career Certifications

These are professional certifications related to IT support, Data Analytics, Project Management, UX Design, and Android Development. Google career certifications are paid for and delivered by Coursera.

2. Google Digital Marketing Certifications 

These are free and paid certifications delivered by Google Digital Garage and Coursera. These courses cover various topics, including online marketing, social media marketing, cloud training, SEO, email marketing, machine learning courses, and more.

3. Google Product Certifications

These are free training courses (with certifications) related to Google products. The most popular are Google Ads certifications and Google Analytics. Courses and certifications are delivered by Google Skillshop.

Five Fabulous Career-altering Google Courses for 2023

Given the plethora of career-altering courses available online, it is very difficult to choose the ones that will actually benefit you. So, to ease your burden, we have made a comprehensive list of Google courses for 2023 that can get you an edge over others in your profession. Check out the list here:

1. For Digital Marketing.

One of the most popular Google courses is “Fundamentals of Digital Marketing”. This is considered by many experts as one of the best digital marketing courses. It’s a free course that includes 26 modules created by Google trainers. Upon completion of the lessons, you can take an exam and earn a digital marketing certificate. The certificate is accredited by the Open University and IABE Europe, and it’s the official Google Digital Marketing Certification. It’s a certification course aimed at beginners, and the total time investment is 40 hours. To get certified, you must complete all 26 modules and pass the Google garage exam (40 questions, multiple-choice). But why should you opt for this course? Well, one should consider studying for this certification if one wants to pursue a career in digital marketing. By taking this course, you’ll build the necessary skills to work with various digital marketing channels, including content marketing, display advertising, e-commerce marketing, e-mail marketing, mobile marketing, and online marketing strategy. Post-completion, one is preferred for the job profiles of digital marketing manager and digital marketing specialist if one completes this reputed course. Depending on the work experience you have and the job position being offered, the pay is really good here. 

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2. For IT Support Professional.

If you want to get a job in the IT support industry, pursuing the Google IT Support Professional Certificate is your best bet. According to Google, there are more than 340K job openings in the field of IT, and this online certificate will help you build the necessary skills to work as an IT support professional. But is this course worth it? Surely, it is! The Google IT Support certificate is one of the most popular Google career certificates that opens up new career opportunities. It’s perfect for beginners with no prior experience in IT support. It’s one of the professions you can do from home. The need for IT support specialists is high in demand and constantly increasing the first step toward obtaining a more specialized certification and earning a higher salary. To get certified, you need to complete 5 courses:

1. Technical Support Fundamentals

2. The Bits and Bytes of Computer Networking

3. Operating Systems and You: Becoming a Power User

4. System Administration and IT Infrastructure Services

5. IT Security: Defense against the digital dark arts

Best of all, once you become Google IT support certified, you can apply for several jobs, including help desk technician, systems analyst, support specialist, database administrator, IT technician, and computer user specialist. Companies pay good salaries to people who are experts in this field.

3. To master Ads Searches.

Google Ads (formerly Google Adwords) is the most popular PPC platform and one of the major sources of income for Google. To educate marketers on taking advantage of all Google Ads features, they created several Google Ads certification courses delivered by Google Skillshop for free. One of the Google Ads courses worth pursuing is the Google Ads Search Certification. This course can help one acquire the necessary knowledge and skills to run search ads campaigns on Google. It’s a requirement if you want to become an official Google Ads Partner. It’s one of the most recognized certifications in the marketing industry. To become Google ads certified, you must pass a 50-question multiple-choice exam with a score of 80% and above. Exams are taken via Google Skillshop, and they are free. To prepare for the exams, you can use the study guide and resources provided by Skillshop or register for a third-party Google Ads course. One is preferred for the job profiles of Google Ads specialist, PPC manager, PPC specialist, and SEM specialist if one completes this reputed course. Depending on the work experience you have and the job position being offered, the pay is really good here. The average salary of a Google Ads specialist is decent.

4. To enhance UX Design Skills

User experience is a key factor for the success of any physical or digital product, including websites and mobile apps. The Google UX Design certificate will help you build the skills needed to design interfaces that offer a great experience to users. To become a certified UX designer, you need to complete 7 courses.

1. Foundations of User Experience (UX) Design

2. Start the UX Design Process: Empathize, Define, and Ideate

3. Build Wireframes and Low-Fidelity Prototypes

4. Conduct UX Research and Test Early Concepts

5. Create High-Fidelity Designs and Prototypes in Figma

6. Responsive Web Design in Adobe XD

7. Design a User Experience for Social Good & Prepare for Jobs

The cost for getting this Google career certificate is $39 per month, and the estimated duration is 6 months (allocating 10 hours per week). Now, the question arises that why should one opt for this course. First things first. No prior experience is needed to follow this course, but it’s not for everyone. If you feel you don’t have the creativity and vision to design interfaces for the web or mobile, then you better choose a different career path. This is a great course for people who like and have the talent to work with design tools and concepts. Wondering what jobs you can get post-completion? Jobs you can do with a Google UX Design certificate include a product designer, UX designer, UI designer, and Web designer. The average annual salary is pretty decent.

5. For IT Automation with Python Professional.

Python is the most in-demand programming language for the web. Python courses are popular on all online learning platforms, and the need for Python programmers is constantly increasing. By taking this Google career course, you’ll learn how to use Python to create programs/scripts for automating common administrative tasks. The cost of getting this Google career certificate is $39 per month, and the estimated duration is 4 months (allocating 10 hours per week). It is to be noted that this is a specialized professional certification, and although no prior coding experience is required, it’s for people who want to learn to program. If you find programming too confusing, it’s better to choose a different career path. If on the other hand, you want to start exploring the exciting world of computer programming and become a Python expert, this course is a great starting point. As of now, more than 50,000 jobs are available in this domain in India alone. Skilled people are usually hired as  IT automation specialists, IT support specialists, junior system administrators, Python programmers, web developer.

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There are a number of professional certifications that are considered alternatives to Google certifications and can help you learn new skills and secure an entry-level job in various industries. The most popular are the Meta Certifications, Microsoft Professional Certifications, Google Cloud certifications, and Coursera certifications. However, it is noteworthy that the value of a Google certification or course is unrivaled and indisputable.