Meet the team – Holly Dear

Holly Dear, Digital Marketing Executive, describes how she brings creativity to the world of data

What does your role involve?

I’m in charge of all the social media accounts and posting regular content, such as creating blogs and posting those out weekly. I also help with email newsletters and launching successful campaigns.

I help collect leads and look after the SEO on the website, so it’s a very varied role with lots of responsibility. LinkedIn is our main focus, but we also use Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. 

What are you working on at the moment?

One of our projects is The Happy Customer podcast. In the past couple of months, I’ve taken the reins on that. I organise the clients we want to speak to, keep in contact with them, write the questions, organise the recording and edit the podcast. I’ve never done podcast recording before, so it’s a new skill that I’m learning on the job and I love it. I had a little experience using iMovie when I was at university, but it wasn’t until I started editing them myself that I was able to use that knowledge and learn more about the process.

I’m also working on some Business Development campaigns. I help Vicky [Bradford – Head of Marketing] and Tim [Chisnall, Managing Director] gather leads. We then send out personalised campaigns to gather a connection with these people and build a relationship with them.

I’m always working on creating new graphics for social media. That’s ongoing.

Another thing I do is the monthly newsletters. I really enjoy these, as I can get creative with the design.

How do you think up the different strategies for social media?

Each month, Vicky and I plan which elements we want to talk about. From these keywords, I’ll source topics, titles and content to use on our social media, such as Q&As involving these keywords.

We choose a main topic to highlight, and I release a post each week with questions relating to this subject. For example, last month’s topic was Salesforce Service Cloud. The first post asked ‘What is Salesforce Service Cloud’, followed up with an explanation. The next week’s asked what its features are.

What are the biggest challenges in your role?

The biggest challenge involved with marketing is that social media and trends are constantly changing. Keeping on top of that and making sure our content relates to what’s popular at the moment and what works well with our audience is tricky. We have to go back and forth, trial and error, constantly making sure it’s working.

 What are the highs and lows in your role?

The high is my team. I love working with the people. I’ve always wanted to go into marketing and they’ve made my journey so amazing. I love the creativity and being able to take control of designs and put my own stamp onto things. I’m currently redesigning the website. Working with different colours, and seeing what works well on the page ­– that’s really fun.

The low is that there’s never enough time to do everything I want to achieve. There’s just so much to do. With marketing, there are always ways to promote the brand, campaigns to oversee, social media posts to schedule and newsletters to write. There are many things to keep on top of.

What’s your favourite thing about working for Cognition24 and for Premier Mission?

Working with the team. We’re like a little family. I’ve learned so much about marketing since graduating. It’s crazy how you finish uni with a degree, but it’s not until you do it in the real world, that you realise how much you don’t actually know! But they’ve been great at teaching me and I’ve done a few courses to build my knowledge even more, which they’re very supportive of. I’m constantly enhancing my skills, which I love about the job.