In March, the Client Outreach team collectively added 458 companies and 534 people to our database, updated 1,637 companies and 1,598 people, and sent out over 487 custom emails to producers, creative directors, marketing managers, and photo editors around the world.
Last month, I continued my work with Parent Companies, in which I assessed both parent companies and their subsidiaries to research potential prospects and gain deeper insights into their organizational structure. We continually review and update these big companies and their children to better understand how they all fit together. When we find a large parent company, I look into its child companies or divisions to see if they could be good for our overall client outreach efforts. With many large corporations operating multiple brands and/or divisions, I’ve noticed it has become increasingly important to keep up with changes like when companies get bought or merged, so we don’t lose touch with important contacts in the industry.
My focus in March was on People Without Companies. The main part of the role is to check people’s LinkedIn profiles and see if their job status has changed. I have come across many profiles that were marked for deletion, meaning the person has retired, hasn’t been employed for a couple of years, or is no longer connected to the photo industry — or in some cases, their job title or company is too small or no longer relevant. I liked this role because for every next person you don’t know what you will find. It takes time sometimes to dig more and find all the information. In some cases, if the person works for a large enough company that we don’t have in our database, I added them. Overall, this role was interesting. It definitely requires attention to details, which I like!
My Client Outreach role in the month of March was working on Brand People, focusing on those marked with the Star keyword, and those with Marketing job titles, and Producers and/or those in production positions. Also last month, I had a capabilities call with a creative director at The Agency Network at MJH Life Sciences. We recommended photographers and bid on a multi-day shoot. Additionally, I connected with an art producer at The Martin Agency in Richmond, Virginia, and was able to present Wonderful Machine’s services to them. Lastly, Bill and I had a capabilities call with a creative director at Bose.
In March, we coordinated multiple event coverage and headshot projects for Cencora. Beyond that, we set up a six-city corporate lifestyle shoot for the brand Fortive in the US and Netherlands. We also began working with Kohler to coordinate a weeklong activation documentation project for Design Week Milan.
Last month, I worked as the Client Outreach Librarian. My responsibilities included: meeting with the Client Outreach team to shed light on documentation, address questions and discuss edge cases; keeping our internal documentation updated and our staff members up to date; and going through the Client records with the Delete keyword.
In terms of scheduling, I was finally able to have a call with Vid for the OOO (Out of Office) role during Librarian Office Hours, as well as my regular calls with Matea, Valentina, Hanna, Andrew, Luka M, Luka C, Mihael, and Antun. I also met with Craig and Bill to discuss building records for legal resources. I later met with Marianne and Luka C to discuss Apollo Personas and how to use it for the Client Outreach team.
During March, I had two separate roles in the Client Outreach department. The first one was analyzing and updating data records that are focused on companies that are publications. For the second role, I focused on updating agencies. These roles have given me a greater appreciation for the art of research, and a chance to hone my skills, for instance, using social media (eg. LinkedIn) to find the best workers to link and match with our client data records.
Last month, I started working on two types of client companies: agencies and brands. Initially, I focused on updating the oldest profiles and those lacking employee numbers. I felt more confident evaluating each profile and pinpointing the right people for each company by determining the most suitable job titles. Additionally, I assessed the number of client companies for each brand and identified the most suitable profiles to include in the database. Over the month, I gained valuable insights into Apollo Personas and its strength as a research tool.
I spent the month of March working on updating our Industry Database. Specifically, I’ve been creating a detailed list of all the industries currently found on LinkedIn, indicating which ones are still active and which ones are obsolete or have undergone a name change. LinkedIn changes the names of their Industries very often, and we have to know which ones are active now and need professional photography services. I reviewed every industry to determine their viability for our photographers. Then, I examined each company under each industry, checking their size, and information updates.
We determine the number of companies we want to keep track of in each industry and give priority to companies that will surely need our services often, no matter where they are in the world. We rely heavily on Sales Navigator on LinkedIn and Apollo as essential tools in our client outreach processes. Our list of industries has expanded from 240 to 452 as a result of these efforts during February and March.
A few months ago, I worked on compiling definitions for all of the vertical markets that we track. In March, I worked on updating our “Verticals Guide” article to include these definitions, examples, and the categories that we sort these markets into. Since companies can define themselves by their service, customer base, or a variety of other factors, our research needs to have a clear understanding of how we organize their photographic needs. We also wanted to make this information available to our members so that as they progress in their careers they are refining their pitches and finding the right clients. One of my favorite features of the updated guide is the ability to look at two different markets to cross-compare how they operate, as it’s not always clear how an Architecture Firm differs from a Real Estate Developer.
Last month, I went through our list of member photographers and systematically found those with the oldest promotional date in our database. I then sent emails on their behalf to clients in our system. This process ensures that our promotional cycle remains consistent and no one falls through the cracks!
At the beginning of March, I shifted my focus from updating clients who work for agencies to those associated with brands. This involved ensuring accuracy in our database by updating individual profiles and their respective brand affiliations. As per our standard outreach process, we continued to inform clients about our website through targeted emails, showcasing our member photographers.
In the middle of the month, I transitioned to managing LinkedIn Industries. This entailed maintaining a comprehensive list of LinkedIn’s industries in Google Sheets and reviewing each one to ensure alignment with our database goals. We assessed the number of companies we desire versus those currently in our database for each industry. Subsequently, we inspected the companies within selected industries in our database to determine their suitability as a prospect. For those that didn’t meet our criteria, we conducted searches on LinkedIn Sales Navigator to identify potential prospects. If a company in our database didn’t qualify as a good prospect, we removed it.
This March, I took on the role of People (Publications). The process consists of updating the company the person works for, then updating the individual’s record and sending them an email promoting one of our member photographers. Mid-month, I transitioned to People (Agencies). The process was the same, except for a slightly different email sent at the end, but still promoting our photographers. The most challenging part was when I couldn’t find the person’s email. I updated all the data with the utmost care and made sure everything was up-to-date.
During the past month, my main focus was to update and maintain the profiles of individuals employed at different brands. I made sure that all the information about each person and the company they work for in our database was current. After reviewing the updated information, I identified potential prospects and reached out to them via email to initiate a conversation. I also searched for people in various positions such as marketing communications directors/managers, photo editors, producers, and art directors to add to our database. Our goal is to connect with these individuals on a personal level, understand their requirements better, and also share our capabilities.
Last month, I went through our Vertical Markets Tracker on Google Sheets, particularly focusing on the earliest updates. I took some time to understand what each market represents and identified notable companies within each category. Following that, I proceeded to update our database records. If a company was already listed, I simply assigned the appropriate Vertical Market category to it. However, for those not yet in our records, I added them along with their corresponding Vertical Market classification. In cases where a market had less than 50 companies listed, I actively sought out more prospects to include. My focus was on companies categorized under labels such as “Education: Music, Performing, Visual Arts School,” “Fashion: Retailer,” “Financial Services: Fintech,” “Firearms Brand,” “Food/Drink: Snack Brand,” “Gaming: Online Gambling Brand,” “Gaming: Video Game Company,” “Hemp Products,” “Outdoor: Skiing/Snowboarding, Surfing Brand,” and “Agriculture: Crops.”
Moreover, I also contributed to integrating AI into our research processes to enhance our capabilities in exploring vertical markets. Additionally, I assisted in updating our Verticals Guide to encompass the new markets we explored during the month.
In March, my primary role was once again focused on Out Of Office replies, or rather on updating any and all relevant information sent automatically to us by client people who were OOO at the time that our emailers were sent. This month there was an increased number of people changing companies which I found interesting, which also put my detective skills to work to be able to find other valuable prospects to add to our database. Thanks to Denise’s teaching me how Apollo Industries work, this process was smoother and easier than ever, and made certain we would be able to add the perfect prospects for any Company. I managed to clean up the majority of OOO emails, which felt very fulfilling.
Towards the end of the month, I was put in the Evaluate role, which for the most part entails updating Company profiles from scratch, once again using the same process from previous roles, only with a little more investigating.
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