2018 marks the end of my apprenticeship at BDB and what a journey it’s been! With an exciting career ahead of me as a digital executive, I’m ready for more. In between busy days in the office creating new social media campaigns, or proofing html emails, I have successfully completed an industry recognised Level 3 qualification with The Juice Academy. During my time as an apprentice, I have acquired a range of invaluable skills and knowledge, which has enabled me to move to the next chapter of my career with the BDB team. Here are the top three lessons I’ve learnt while working as an apprentice at BDB:
- Learn from the experience of others
Being part of such an experienced and diverse team has been extremely helpful for my professional development. Through one-to-one meetings and training sessions, I have been able to pick up useful tips from other members of my team. In addition, as we are an integrated agency, I get to work with people outside of the digital team, enabling me to widen my knowledge of the entire marketing spectrum. My time at The Juice Academy has also given me the opportunity to learn from leading industry professionals. Every other week I would attend the Academy for a day’s training session, where I would study more about the sector and its latest trends and developments.
- There’s no ‘one-size-fits-all’ when it comes to social media
Over the past year, I have gained a lot of experience in social media marketing, both paid for and organic content. One of the key things I’ve learnt is the importance of timing. For instance, for a campaign to be successful, you need to identify when your target audience will be online, such as commute times or lunch breaks, so you can catch their attention. Timing also needs to be taken into account when creating international campaigns across different time zones. In addition, tone of voice is something you need to consider when posting content as it needs to resonate with and appeal to key audiences, and reflect their language and culture.
- Check, check and check again
The third lesson I’ve learnt is how imperative proofing is when creating marketing material. Since starting my career in the digital team, I have taken on the task of html coding, which goes hand-in-hand with editing emails for different clients. As part of this activity, proofreading is one of the key stages we go through to ensure that the emails have no errors in them. Working with a large number of international clients means we regularly check emails written in different languages – we’ve even had the challenge of proofing complex languages such as Russian and Arabic!
I’m looking forward to progressing my career at BDB and learning more about the marketing industry and I know that my apprenticeship has given me a solid grounding for the challenges ahead.
We’re always on the lookout for skilled and talented people at BDB. If you’re interested in starting a career with a leading marcomms agency, email [email protected].