A Digital Marketer Manager is like a conductor; many players, a lot of shiny noisy instruments and a big audience. It means understanding the nuances of the new web paradigms and how they interact. It’s about knowing about how each of the social and digital channels operate and interact with each other and the synergies that creates. Our next guest shares his experiences as a Digital Marketing Manager.
Please introduce yourself to our readers…
My name is Eric Rohrback.
Can you tell us what company you work for?
Currently, I’m working at HubShout, but I’m also writing and running my own internet marketing tests from my blog.
What is your title there?
Digital Marketing Manager.
What are the exact responsibilities of your job?
At HubShout, I manage the PPC, SEO, and Social Media teams. I work with analyst teams to develop strategies to help our clients grow online, train on any new changes in the industry, and work with Account Management and clients to effectively communicate the strategies. What I love most is diving in and finding why a client might not be ranking, or help them solve a technical problem with the site.
My off the clock projects and experiments revolve around onsite optimization techniques, link-building experiments, and just trying to get sites to rank in Google. When one becomes successful, I can take that back to present to the office and find a way to utilize that strategy for our clients.
What is it about your job that makes you love it?
I think it’s the fact the landscape is always changing, so I kind of feel like I’m part scientist, part developer, part artist. Clients come to us with a problem, and it’s our job to find a way to give them a viable solution. At times it’s not easy, and not obviously clear what the answer is. That’s half the fun of the job, though!
We get tasked to investigate, research, and find a way to help businesses grow their business online. Helping the small business owners that we work with across the country definitely makes the job great, because you know you’re not only helping that business but you’re helping that business owner’s family.
What particular skills or talents are most essential to completing your tasks?
Understanding onsite optimization, the local ecosystem and how it’s affected, write great content, and how to build relationships online. I don’t think there’s any one skill-set that anyone needs to have to be successful, but it’s really a combination of skills that will work for client needs.
What level of education would you say is required to perform your role?
I think a Bachelor’s degree, but honestly if someone has the skills for the job and has real world experience, then I’m not sure it matters. This is one of those roles that if you know what you’re doing, know how to teach people, and know how to communicate effectively, anyone can do it. As long as they have the drive to be successful and takes it seriously to keep learning, I think anyone can do well.
Do you find that you bring your work home with you? (And is that a good or bad thing?)
Yes! As I noted above, I run a lot of tests on my own blog, so when the “work day” ends I’m still playing and testing. I think it’s a good thing because I really have fun with the work I do, and I think the only way to really know if something works is to test it yourself. Reading blogs or books is great, but to really understand the mechanics, you need to really work with your hands.
How does this job compare to other jobs you’ve held in the past?
I’ve learned so much from working at HubShout, and I really don’t think I would have anywhere near the same skill-set or passion for the industry if I didn’t start here three years ago. The whole team gets together and reviews experiments, we band together to solve client problems, and celebrate the big wins when we make client sites successful. How does this compare to other jobs? Blows all the rest out of the water.
What is your favorite food?
BBQ! I love summer cookout food, and BBQ pork, chicken, or beef is a staple of summer.
Thanks for sharing Eric! Be sure to connect with Eric on LinkedIn and Twitter.