Adventures in Digital Marketing Club
I would like to start this blog post with a short introduction. If you have stopped by at The Shortcut Lab over past few months we probably have seen or even exchanged few words with each other. My name is Monika. As a Communications and Social Media intern, who had a hunger to learn numerous things I fully dove into The Shortcut’s energetic atmosphere. However, this post is not about me. Well, at least not directly. What I would like to share instead, is one of many projects that I created together with a team — Digital Marketing Club.
For a while, you could hear some whispers about creating events and workshops related to marketing in the corners of The Shortcut Lab. Digital Marketing Club was a new concept built from the ground up for everyone interested in marketing in general. A club where you weren’t intimidated by strict rules and which didn’t require a membership or consistent attendance. Instead you were offered: knowledge and marketing expertise from people who live and breathe it daily. But let me start at the beginning by telling you how and why we initiated this club in the first place.
After people shifted to the internet, traditional marketing means such as advertisements in printed media, tv and radio lost its value and marketers had no other choice than to just follow the crowd. Moreover, a lot of companies don’t have resources for big campaigns. Now, in order to reach a desirable audience they have to juggle data, social media, e-mails, search engines and another hundred things. And let’s be honest, to perceive and manage all of it, is not a piece of cake. We started the Digital Marketing Club because we believe that more people should be literate in marketing especially in the startup world where lines between different positions blur and you may have to contribute, in many different ways, to your marketing team.
I had a few conversations with team members, received several words of encouragement and soon I was rolling up my sleeves. I started by creating a concept, a timeline considering possible topics, speakers and promotional material. Of course, it wouldn’t be so easy to get things done if not for my own desire to learn more, to connect with professionals and get experience in building something from scratch. By gathering a few times a month we sought to boost knowledge sharing, learn new practices, encourage discussion and network no matter your role and connection with the marketing industry.
Our first session with experienced advertising and marketing leader Delfin Vassallo attracted a huge crowd to our Lab with his presentation on “Digital Customer Journey”. Luis Orozco Head of Data for Embassy of Design, involved the participants in his discussion about importance of data when making decisions. Meanwhile, Beto Guzmán Abundes fashion blogger and content editor at Neverthink emphasized the significance of visual content for social media channels. Our only woman speaker, Alexandra Petrova, marketing professional and speaker, currently executing online and offline B2B marketing activities for Fluido, prepared a hands-on workshop about marketing automation and drip campaigns. The participants were enabled to create a drip campaign for different made-up cases.
Harish Venkatesan storyteller and builder of next-generation technology products, delivered a very interactive presentation about the first steps to take in content marketing and last but not least, Terho Laakkonen, Technical Account Manager at Smartly.io, explained Facebook’s native analytic tools and how to use them to understand business results and audiences.
So, what did we get out of these six sessions? The keen interest shown by participants and speakers proved that digital marketing is a hot topic. I personally learned something every step of the way on this journey. I was truly happy to run this show and hope that what I started a few months ago will continue in the future.
If you are interested in learning more about The Shortcut and how you can get involved, join the Open Meeting happening every Tuesday at 17.00 at The Shortcut Lab.
Keep up to date with our future events, blog posts, and other learning opportunities by subscribing to our newsletter!
