"As a marketing professional, the world is my oyster"
Do you ever talk to people who are genuinely psyched about their work, sincerely committed to doing a great job, and who seem to pursue their career with an infectious passion? Well, that's how I felt when I had the chance to speak with John Nullmeyer the other day. John is a marketing communications manager represented by Aquent's Washington, DC office. Having graduated from the University of Hartford seven years ago with a degree in communications, he's steadily carved out a career for himself as a marketing professional. "I really enjoy being a marketing generalist," he told me. "I like the collaboration and the creativity. I also like working on marketing problems and coming up with solutions."
Most of the "problems" that he's tackled have called for solutions involving effective communication strategies. He started out working at CIGNA where he served as an associate product manager responsible for developing and producing materials aimed at educating employees on various retirement offerings. After several years, he moved over to Prudential Financial. There he continued his work on "participant education," creating collateral, managing content for the participant website, and developing educational programs to help "demystify retirement plans." One such program, "Women and Investing for Retirement," even won an industry award and was featured on PLANSPONSOR.com.
By the time John left Prudential, he was working as a senior copywriting associate producing everything from financial newsletters to video scripts. This experience positioned him perfectly for his current role with a large financial services company "serving the American home mortgage industry," as their website says. Among his other responsibilities, he was asked to take over and "fix" a newsletter that serves as the company's main vehicle for communication with its clients.
His approach was sophisticated, comprehensive, and included a healthy dose of common sense. He worked with the corporate research department to implement a survey for readers to find out what's on their minds. He then applied "editorial best practices" to the content, making sure that articles were not only relevant to the readership but also concise. Since the newsletter is released electronically, he took the "teaser approach" when laying out the subscriber e-mail, listing summaries for 5 to 8 articles in order of importance, and then rigorously tracked click-throughs to see what was actually getting read.
John has been working on the newsletter for a year and his efforts have paid off handsomely, increasing the number of subscribers by 3,000. More than that, he's striving to ensure that the newsletter plays a more significant role in customer support and marketing activities in general. On the one hand, he's used trends in behavior on the corporate website to develop new targeted content. On the other hand, he's fed the data he's gathered back into the broader marketing organization to increase the effectiveness of e-marketing campaigns. Although he's faced challenges establishing himself as editor of the newsletter, getting people to respect deadlines as well as his decisions about content, he's been able to rely on metrics and the fact that he comes from "outside" to validate what some have viewed as "brash opinions" when it comes to changing dated business practices.
Seven years into it, John is at an interesting place in his career. Having played diverse roles - product manager, marketing manager, copywriter, etc. - in several large, well-established companies, he's learned a lot and is eager to learn more. "I'd love to get more into PR," he says, "PR requires exactly the communication and people skills that I've got now, but will allow me to take them to the next level."
The desire to get to the "next level," to remain open to new possibilities, try new things, and grow, is characteristic of John's drive and positive attitude. He summed it up like this: "I've been presented with some great opportunities and I've made the most of them which is really all we can do."
Amen, brother!
Image courtesy of Shinyai.
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