ALICE WASS
Exploring Media

Jen Marscheider has worked in Marketing for 10 years in numerous companies and is currently the Marketing Manager for City of Culture, which Coventry won for 2021.  While preparing for the City of Culture Bid, Jen was the only member of the marketing team, and created all the videos, posters, and social media.

 

Jen explained that young people believe they will have a lifelong job but this is not actually so. More commonly people try out various jobs, until they find what they love. Jen graduated in 2006 with an International Business and Marketing degree, where she discovered her love for marketing. Similarly, while studying Media and Communications I discovered my interest in Radio and TV, giving me a career path to aim towards.

 

While at university Jen took a placement year, working in Marketing at a Tobacco company. Jen emphasised that taking a placement year at university was one of the best decisions as it provided great opportunities. It allowed her to explore her career choice and gave her valuable experience. Hearing this excited me as I am in the process of organising my yearlong placement to be a Radio Producer at UCB starting in September. Making this decision involved a lot of effort but I feel I have made the right decision, and I am keen to learn a host of new skills.

 

After graduating Jen struggled for five years to get a job in marketing, because other applicants had extra training or more experience than herself. This is a struggle many of us face and have to deal with. However, Jen was tenacious and did give up. She acquired a job at Eon, answering phones and worked her way up in the company, hoping to move into Marketing. She then took four weeks off work from Eon to return to the company where she had done her placement, for further unpaid work experience. This helped her get a job in Marketing at Eon as she had gained up-to-date work experience. This highlights the benefits of doing a placement, as if I make a good impression they may offer me more work experience or offer employment.

 

After Jen’s first job in Marketing, she moved onto other companies including: Cogent Elliot, Marketing for Birmingham, Jaguar, Creative Bridge, SSP, and now City of Culture. Although I do not want to work in Marketing, Jen’s different and wide ranging projects did interest me. What most grabbed my attention was how Jen made herself stand out at one interview. She was asked to give a 10-minute presentation on any topic, and chose ‘why chocolate is the best food’. She gave a copy of her presentation on a chocolate bar shaped memory stick, and even designed the packing for a chocolate bar which had her name on the front and instead of ingredients, a list of her skills. This made her stand out from every other applicant and helped her get the job. I was impressed as this demonstrates creativity and inspires me to come up with creative ideas to help me stand out from the crowd too.

 

Jen gave us some tips for the Marketing industry, which are also applicable for my career aim to be a producer. Firstly, she explained the necessity of being ‘tooled up’. This means that I need to constantly be learning new information and skills from training, as the media is an ever changing environment. Next was to ‘be brave’, do not take no for an answer and stick to your belief which shows determination. This links into ‘not giving up’ and being tenacious as getting rejected is difficult and it is important to keep trying. Jen said ‘be curious’, as understanding competitors and the political climate keeps information relevant which is needed to stay at the top of my game. Lastly, she explained the importance of ‘being a nerd’. Although her job is creative, everything needs statistics to back it up, to prove why she produced something, and justify what she wants to do, therefore, it helps to known Microsoft Excel. This is software I do not currently feel confident with and as a producer I will have to be in charge of budgets so will probably use Excel. I will try and build my confidence in the software to add to my skill set once I graduate.

 

Overall, I found this talk inspiring and it opened my eyes Marketing. I found Jen’s experience a good example of resilience and working hard to get the job of your dreams and stay at the top of your industry.