by Nycole Walsh

October marks Cybersecurity Awareness Month, and this year’s theme is simple but powerful: Stay Safe Online. It centers around the “Core 4” security behaviors that dramatically reduce risk for individuals and organizations alike:

1. Use strong passwords and a password manager
2. Turn on multifactor authentication (MFA)
3. Recognize and report phishing
4. Keep software updated

At first glance, these sound like IT checkboxes. But marketers? We’re often the soft underbelly of an organization’s digital operations. We hold the keys to CMS platforms, advertising accounts, social media handles, CRMs, brand assets, media contacts, campaign infrastructure, you name it. And we move fast. Sometimes too fast to stop and think, “Is this secure?”

This post is your cheat sheet. Not the eye-glaze compliance kind, but a real-talk breakdown of why marketers need to care about cybersecurity, how the Core 4 applies to our world, and what teams can do right now to protect themselves without slowing down the work.

Why Marketing Is a High-Risk, High-Value Target

Let’s be honest: marketing is often a very digitally exposed department.

• We log into dozens of platforms daily.
• We onboard contractors and vendors constantly.
• We manage public-facing channels that bad actors love to exploit.
• We’re trained to respond quickly, which phishers count on.

A hacked ad account can waste six figures in a day. A hijacked email domain can tank your sender reputation. A single credential leak could let someone deface your website or exfiltrate customer data.

And the kicker is that marketing teams are rarely included in formal security planning. That’s a problem. It also means we need to take initiative.

The Core 4, Explained for Marketers

1) Use Strong Passwords and a Password Manager

The biggest marketing security fails often come down to reused or shared passwords. You know the ones: “Q4Campaign123,” or worse, “Password1234.”

If your team is still storing logins in spreadsheets or Slack messages, it’s time to stop. Use a password manager (like 1Password or Keeper). Enforce unique, strong passwords across all tools, from Meta Business Suite to HubSpot.

Quick wins: 

• Roll out a password manager org-wide. 
• Require strong passwords for every new login. 
• Rotate passwords quarterly (or after vendor turnover).

2) Turn On Multifactor Authentication (MFA)

MFA is one of the simplest, most effective ways to protect accounts. Even if a password is compromised, MFA can block access.

Marketers manage high-value accounts: your company’s LinkedIn, paid ad portals, even website backends. If someone gets in, they can wreak havoc. Steal data. Hijack your very brand voice. 

Quick wins: 

• Enable MFA for all marketing platforms (Google, Facebook, Twitter/X, Mailchimp, etc.).
• Require app-based authenticators (e.g., Authy) instead of SMS when possible.
• Make MFA part of onboarding for every new hire.

3) Recognize and Report Phishing

Phishing scams are getting sophisticated, and marketers are particularly vulnerable. We get a constant stream of emails, requests, invoices, and outreach. It only takes one wrong click.

Train your team to pause before acting. That weird invoice from “Google Ads”? That “urgent” domain renewal email? Scrutinize it. Look at the sender domain. Hover over links. If anything feels off, report it.

Quick wins: 

• Add a “phishing 101” training to your next team meeting.
• Create a clear process for reporting suspicious emails. 
• Partner with IT to run a phishing simulation.

4) Update Your Software

Marketers loooove plugins. We also loooooooove to ignore update notifications. Outdated CMS plugins, browser extensions, or apps can all be open doors for attackers.

Your team likely uses tools like WordPress, Canva, analytics dashboards, scheduling tools, and more. These tools need to be patched regularly.

Quick wins: 

• Assign someone to own software/plugin updates.
• Turn on auto-updates where possible.
• Audit your martech stack quarterly for stale or vulnerable tools.

How to Embed Cybersecurity into Marketing Culture

Let’s make security a habit, not a hurdle. Here’s how to bake it into your workflows:

1. Make onboarding secure by default. New hires should get added to the password manager, set up MFA for key tools, and review a quick security checklist. 
2. Offboard fast and clean. Every contractor or teammate offboarding should trigger an access review. Deactivate accounts. Rotate passwords. Archive permissions.
3. Normalize the “security pause.” Build a culture where it’s okay to say, “I’m double-checking this link.” Praise caution.
4. Partner with IT, don’t wait for them. Ask your security or IT team for a 30-minute knowledge share. Most are thrilled someone outside their org cares.
5. Revisit access regularly. Set a recurring calendar reminder to audit who has access to ad accounts, social platforms, email marketing systems, CMS and analytics tools, etc. 

Click, Boom — There Goes Your Budget 

Here’s a short list of marketing-specific cybersecurity disasters:

• Hijacked ad accounts that spend your entire monthly budget in hours.
• Brand impersonation via fake social profiles.
• Spoofed emails that trick customers or execs.
• Leaked embargoed news due to poor credential sharing.
• Damaged SEO from a defaced website or spam injection.

These types of breaches happen every day. And when they do, it’s marketing who cleans up the mess.

Security Is Brand Protection

Cybersecurity is so much more than an IT concern. For marketers, it’s brand protection in disguise.

When you make cybersecurity part of your marketing culture, you’re not just preventing disasters. You’re proving that your team is a strategic, mature operator inside the business.

This Cybersecurity Awareness Month, rather than just reminding people to “stay safe online,” show them that marketing leads by example.