This is why I decided to invest time and effort on my own digital marketing business.
I’ve been helping startups to grow via Digital Media for the past 7 years. After spending 10 years in academia getting a BA in Journalism and two MA’s in Communication and Digital Media, I’ve worked within a range of industries from Fashion and Luxury goods, Food & Beverage and Hospitality to Fintech.
Throughout my journey, I was able to build a career reputation and reassure myself as a specialist in my field in an extremely fast-paced and competitive environment. Without a doubt, it has been a great learning curve, and that’s the beauty of it. I’ve always been quite creative and analytical and that helped me to pave a successful route within Digital Marketing. Coming up with a strategy and creative ideas without losing focus on metrics and outcomes has always been a priority and soon became my main commodity.
Obviously, like any other corporate career, I’ve found many hiccups along the way. I was fired, discriminated against for being a woman born in South America and still carrying a Portuguese accent. I've faced bullying on many occasions, however, that has never been a reason to depreciate my market value (not for me). I’ve always been passionate about creating a positive outcome and focused on generating short and long term marketing growth impact.
Here are 6 vital lessons I’ve learned to get in tune with a healthy startup mentality
The most valuable asset in a company is product
Many companies these days, especially the ones driven by technology, are focusing more and more on building a flawless product that sells by itself. A lot goes through product development and the people behind it. So ultimately, the second most valuable asset in a company is people.
Make product development participative
We’re living in a fast-paced global mentality where customers are becoming more and more discerning about where they are investing their money (B2B/B2C), therefore it’s practically impossible to rely on sales/marketing to operate miracles if there isn’t a solid product/business development foundation which resonates with the customer values and needs.
Think Lean
That means testing all the time. Work with an agile/lean methodology to deliver short and long term results. Have an efficient tech stack and collaborative environment where all stakeholders take full ownership of planning, executing and delivering the company OKRs as a team, also learning how to manage their tasks individually.
Create a sustainable ecosystem.
Build a sustainable ecosystem inbound and outbound. Focus on a customer-centric company culture alongside a product that has the potential to generate a social impact, supply a demand, solve a problem or challenge a broken business model. I recommend this article if you’re keen to learn more about my favourite examples:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/reshaping-industry-how-financial-services-start-ups-brands-weidlich/
Validate your ideas with data.
When it comes to validating ideas, testing comes before assuming. Take a practical and hands-on approach always looking into metrics and data but also considering customer feedback in order to back up and validate decision making.
Focus on results
When it comes to delivering results, prioritise areas to be tackled to create a consistent growth strategy such as website development; user experience, business partnerships to help leverage the brand amongst its competitors, market research, marketing strategy, defining customer segments, generate engagement to increase brand awareness and sales opportunities, scale and maximize revenue.
Build an amazing company culture
I’ve never worked for a company that I didn’t identify myself with its mission and values. Look at what companies offer in terms of benefits, wellbeing but also how the exchange of ideas is promoted amongst co-workers, that ultimately will reflect on how the brand identity is perceived by its customers. It’s impossible to endorse a company mission if co-workers aren’t able to share those values within the company culture.