Julie Huval, director of marketing and communications for Beck Technology, spends her days juggling and loves every minute of it, especially the analytics and digital efforts.
My role as Director of Marketing & Communications involves wearing many hats. I may sport as many as three to four different hats on a daily basis…sometimes multiple at once. Today is one of those days.
As I prepare for an all-day sales meeting with my team, I’m reminded of just how much opportunity lays in store for Beck Technology. In before and after as well as during the planned breaks, I’m actively keeping all the balls rolling.
Allow me to take you through a day in my life with Beck Technology, a typical hat rotation, if you will.
Reading & Writing
Like most professionals, my first task of every day is to check my email. I quickly respond to information requests from our clients and team as well as connect with our PR consultants. I’ve learned that most of the key opportunities happen early in the day so I need to be as responsive as possible to everyone.
My second order of business is to review the analytics for our various social media, like Twitter and LinkedIn, as well as Google Analytics. Regularly monitoring our performance is a great way to see what is working, and what isn’t, to get a better idea of what we need to do differently. While monitoring, I also spend time replying to prospects and clients who may have posed questions or commented on our various channels. Again, the faster the response time, the better.
I wear my writing hat all day long. Today, I’m penning this post and also working on more creative projects like coming up with thematic topics for monthly guest blog series as well as some necessary internal report writing.
Planning & Researching
Planning and research are the first steps to any move you make in the marketing world, and as such, these aspects have hats within hats. I create plans and delegate out marketing tactics to my team members, along with mentoring them as needed. As part of our sales meeting, we discussed upcoming industry events and conference plans. It’s important that I secure input from our account teams who are speaking with our clients and prospects daily, so that we can identify the best ways to join and lead conversations about changing the industry.
On the advertising side, I research ad words for Google Ads for suitable audiences and for better engagement. Additionally, I check and update my budget to actual numbers and look at new opportunities to evaluate the potential costs for reaching and acquiring new customers.
Networking Internally & Externally
Before lunch is an ideal time to put on my social hat and touch base with coworkers and clients. I join our instant message platform with coworkers throughout the day to get, and give, quick feedback on questions. But even more, I find that taking the time to make a real phone call is a good change of pace for me and can also brighten the day of the other person. Today, I took time to chat with a couple of fellow marketers at our clients’ offices. In my fast-paced world, I love to share and hear best practices and network. It’s all about building and maintaining relationships across all channels.
I feel like I’ve already accomplished so much today, and its only lunchtime! I quickly walk to a nearby restaurant and bring my lunch back to the office. The walk gives me time to stretch my legs and get some fresh air. I join with our services team in the break room as we all have lunch and catch up on the projects they are working on. Then, it’s back into the sales meeting for the afternoon session.
Speaking of building relationships, I’m an active member, chair, and speaker for the Society for Marketing Professional Services (SMPS), which provides marketers with a wide variety of resources from educational materials to conferences. I’m helping plan the SMPS national conference so spend time on email and online research with conference planning on my own as well as polling my committee members. While it takes a significant commitment of time, I find immense value in networking and learning from these industry marketers.
Closing Out the Day
After today’s sales meeting, I set up various calendar invites that came up during the meeting and created the appropriate marketing campaigns in our CRM system. I also quickly sent multiple queries, action items, and follow-up emails to colleagues and external providers.
While it’s non-stop action, I love my job. I get to be a team player, a mentor, and a leader all in one day. Wearing many hats may not be for everyone, but I like to think I’m pretty stylish. Now, it’s time to head home…a rare treat with my travel schedule.
