#018: Analytics Advice for the Recent Grad

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[00:00:25] Hello everyone and welcome to the digital analytics power hour. This is Episode 18 18. Don’t like what that’s some kind of milestone on today’s show we’ve got my other two cohosts Tim Wilson and Jim Kane and you like like the like they did on its power hour.

[00:00:48] I am old enough to serve in the military and of course I’m Michael Holbeck.

[00:00:53] Well forget drinking Quebec our podcast can drink and tobacco and can I think our podcast can smoke cigarettes.

[00:00:59] In most states right. Now it’s a big big gap. It’s a big episode for this segue here though the first job is. Yeah actually at the age of 18 and older you know that’s where folks are getting into high school getting into college and started to make those career transitions dropping out of college so they can pursue a career and web analytics. Actually that is a great idea because you will relieve yourself of all that college debt and get into a great career boom. Let’s talk about it. Tonight’s topic analytical advice for the recent graduate or person who dropped out doesn’t want to go back to school. All right. Not that we’re anti education because we’re not. Some of us even have degrees. However that didn’t want to talk. I got the degrees of vulgarity when it comes to Mr. Cain. Yeah. Net Matt net is it called something else in Canada swearing. No degree. And so here we just go. You’re like a we’ve got your letters. I don’t know.

[00:02:01] All right. We’ll cut that part out.

[00:02:05] All right. So let’s say you just got into the workforce or you’re just wrapping up a school or somebody who’s looking to hire somebody Junior and just starting out. What are the kinds of tips and tricks people can use to get in this awesome digital analytics space. And this actually is a topic that came to us from a listener Ben Cade’s a listener who said just this topic to us and we’re very thankful. So Ben this one’s for you. All right so guys what does a college grad need to do to separate themselves in this Doggy Dogg digital analytics market.

[00:02:38] Well we talked before about you know some of the courses and programs that are available that you can take as college courses. I just saw what they could find Coursera courses I think either Coursera one on digital analytics. I was intrigued. Those things are fine. Well I would actually recommend looking at doing the schooling after you have the job. When we’re interviewed we talked with the interview discussion about hiring recent grads we hire a lot of recent grads but are looking for people who think a certain way we can teach someone what buttons to click and Adobe. We can talk in more details about certain things but just going right into the do you immediately throw yourself at a bunch of online schooling or college courses or web analytics and by default right now would be no. Just get out there. You guys agree. I agree.

[00:03:26] I think a lot of courses. I think that it generally and this goes beyond digital analytics that it is a lot easier from a post secondary education view. I’ve actually been trying to do something and expose in the real world and the education makes a lot more sense.

[00:03:46] I think there’s also some education out there that sort of operates in an ironically academic or not ironically academic level of these are the things you should be doing and making the leap to the actual application of what can I do day in and day out that’s going to make me better. I think education is great and I’ve taken Coursera courses I’ve gone to conferences I’ve taken you know am a big fan of training.

[00:04:12] I’ve read books but I agree.

[00:04:15] I think that digital analytics almost requires that you’ve got to get your hands dirty first if you’ve never logged into Google Analytics and you go and sit and take a Google Analytics course it’s going to be really hard to absorb as much as if you’ve been struggling through Google Analytics and googling for content about Google Analytics and then go take a course and then you can ask some really smart questions. So from a learning tools. Absolutely. I think you need to dive in first figure a bunch of stuff out and have the handful of things that are bugging you that you want to ask and instructors your classmates.

[00:04:51] But I also think that there’s still a lot of education that is kind of envisioning analytics as maybe it could or should be or as it was eight or 10 years ago and that can be counterproductive. You know much better to say I’m a new grad. I want to find somewhere to add value in my assuming you have a job and that means really two things. One what are people asking me to deliver explicitly. OK let me deliver that and show that I can be helpful and useful but in the second part which is where the development and growth comes from is Do I really really understand the business challenges. Do I understand their business questions and finding ways to try to help them. And am I asking them a lot of questions Am I asking my peers and my manager a lot of questions to try to understand how I can actually contribute to the business. So now I sound like the academic theoretician that I was railing about and I think that’s the other really critical thing.

[00:05:57] Your major is actually not as important as you think it is when it comes to a career in digital analytics. It’s about connecting what you know to what the field of analytics is and being able to show somebody that you can bridge that gap. And so all those experiences whether they be classroom extracurricular or those kinds of things. All of those can be a building block to get you in the door into those kinds of roles. I would also say that more often than not agencies will hire a college graduate before say we’re a company organization will for a web analyst or digital analytics role. And usually you have to kind of think about that because there’s different ways that those roles express themselves but at a large agency versus an organization. That being said I’m a huge fan if you can find it organizations a lot of times. Some organizations have a rotating analyst program where you actually rotate through multiple disciplines and have digital analytics or web analytics is one of those rotations that’s great really had you know you name any of those that have.

[00:07:02] I don’t think I’ve ever seen one where that’s on a rotation. Seems like it’s always just kind of like a service like the the helpdesk know like oh we’re like I was anybody through there.

[00:07:10] And one of my previous employers we had a rotating analyst program that sent folks to accounting sent folks through analytics marketing and merchandising. What was the expected destination role for them. So after that program which I believe was a two year program then they would have some input into where they would let land full time within the organization. So they would go into one of those organizations as part of that program. And it was phenomenal. A The people in the program were outstanding really high quality people and when they rotated through digital web analytics we just made sure to show them why web analytics was so awesome and then we ended up with some pretty awesome talent.

[00:07:55] What was the how long was the stent.

[00:07:58] Yes six to eight months something like that. I think you did three rotations over two years.

[00:08:03] So that’s the one I’m realizing now how often I have been in or seen organizations that have somewhere in kind of the marketing world they have some sort of rotation kind of structurally built in or they have even programs where they kind of send people off to some other ship to kind of get immersed in some other aspect of you know what the intent of rounding them out. And yet none of those organizations that I’ve worked with have included a an actual rotation in analytics and that seems like a phenomenal job although I think we talked on an earlier episode that if you were in analytics and realized maybe it wasn’t for you it was still going to hold you in good stead.

[00:08:43] So I think even people who they don’t find that is their home having 6 months old that it’s going to hold them and make them fantastic just like it would have been amazing if I’d spent nine months in a finance organization early in my career so I would understand some of the things I had to learn the hard way throughout my career. There’s a lot of I would say if your career fairs and things like that really seek out those kinds of opportunities I think those can produce over a couple of years a really well-rounded starting point into the field of digital analytics. You know the thing I want to say is I feel like analytics gets sort of bad rap where people think they’re going to spend their lives feeding punch cards into a mainframe basement somewhere. Probably no one who’s actually a recent grad will even get that reference.

[00:09:29] But hey that’s how that’s how computers used or well actually even before I even read it to you when I was a youngster in an accounting firm my boss told me stories about how that would happen but actually being an analyst is a super sexy role that is so much tie faceted and that’s something that everybody needs to know.

[00:09:50] So if you’re if you are in school now and you’re hearing this podcast for some crazy reason because we went viral because of something Jim or Tim said because it was funny remember that point being in analytics is actually super sexy.

[00:10:05] And also your five year salary trajectory is outstanding right now. Well first your salary trajectory is pretty crappy but after five years you’re going to be doing OK.

[00:10:16] What are the things our that is whatever we talk about career development or skills. I always carry a flag to play and say Does this apply to everybody and everything. And I think this one is kind of exclusive maybe to digital in general but definitely the analytics and that you know there’s a lot we’ve talked about this before with a still good university level programs are what they would call colleges in the United States. You have to get in an apprentice and learn your stuff. And something that I would say is I would bet a lot of people look at digital analytics and go interesting but that’s not my career and what they don’t understand is that digital analytics is a shortcut to a lot of very very senior roles. You know when you look at a big big company and you think you know I want to be a CEO or I want to be a vice president of e-commerce or I want to be more senior senior jobs you’ve got to work your way all the way up through that org and there’s a way to come in and be a very visible dynamic digital analyst and shortcut your way into a lot of places. I’ve seen it. Look you guys have.

[00:11:16] I have not seen.

[00:11:19] Seriously that’s the morbidly working with the people who get passionate about analytics not that they don’t wind up senior and highly regarded. But actually I’m trying to think of the Simos where I know their background or even leaping over to you know head of product marketing or it’s been much more I of just googling a guy who used to work for me who was like really good really motivated and really liked what he was doing and it was clearly kind of driven to be kind of out a little farther out and he successfully made that transition. But I feel like right now the people who really are killing it in analytics really love what they’re doing and feel like their work isn’t done.

[00:11:59] Yeah the thing that I think is worth mentioning about you know considering this career as you come out of other disciplines say you’re a marketing major finance major or you know just a general business degree as you come out of school. The other thing that’s really awesome about digital analytics is that there’s so much room to be fairly entrepreneurial which I think is one of the real strengths. You know this generation of folks millennials or whatever you want to say and I hate to stereotype people and obviously in other episodes we scoff at millennials but we don’t actually hate millennials we love them they’re just different and they expect things to happen more quickly lips was paid. Exactly. But that’s what’s so awesome about this industry is it gives you to your point earlier Jim it does give you room to expand into other roles more quickly. It gives you the opportunity to learn very quickly become an expert in your area over the course of five to 10 years and then be able to be a leader in the space which is very rare for most places. And obviously you know digital analytics is maturing a little bit. We’ve all been in this space for a little bit a little while like it certainly you know 12 15 years ago there was literally five quote unquote thought leaders in the entire industry and now there’s a lot more than that. But you know there are still plenty of room. There there’s still plenty of innovation happening and there’s still plenty of opportunities for people to be very entrepreneurial.

[00:13:24] I was thinking the entrepreneurial different way that when earlier I said that you can do what people were asking you for from deliverables.

[00:13:32] I want a weekly report. I want to pull this number. Can you tell me X or Y. And to me the opportunity for the analyst from an entrepreneur is not necessarily thinking What is my next role where am I going to transition.

[00:13:44] You know how am I going to get out of what I’m doing now. If you’re actually recent grad a new hire and you’re in analytics and saying this is really fun I just want to kind of push my career and I wouldn’t mind pushing it in analytics. The entrepreneurial aspect to me is how can I carve out 10 or 20 or 30 percent of my time. Or how can I just selectively choose which of the things I’m going to deliver what was asked and they will be happy and I will be fine and I will get a check mark and that will lead to advancement you know positive performance reviews. What are the other things that I think oh I can really do something interesting and I don’t know if it’ll work but I’m going to find the time I’m going to definitely clear the bar. I delivered what I was asked for. But I feel like you’ve got to be pushing to where’s my interest. What’s the business problem. How can I use the surprise and divide. What can I do that kind of goes beyond that is my what if we get back to that Ben’s question what advice do you have for new grads. It’s like what don’t do just what you’re asked to do just what you’re asked for somebody who is going to get upset if you do anymore are not exactly pulling exactly the date and the table and the excel spreadsheet they asked for.

[00:14:56] But for the people who actually spend just a smidgen of time articulating the problem they’re trying to solve and telling you what table data they want figure out try to solve their problem and you’ll miss as often as you hit but you’ll learn along the way and you’ll figure out if you really love it and do you want to now move into the role they’re doing or do you want to stay in analytics and keep doing more of that.

[00:15:20] So it’s funny that Ben is asking this one because you know I know the team he’s a part of. He’s on a really bad ass team in a great brand. And he actually got one of the really rare fantastic entry level jobs for an analyst. But let’s say you’re someone who wants to be in the discipline and there’s nothing entry level you can get your hands on. I think Michael touched on it earlier. Pick a companion industry where there is a ton of complementary value and go there for like a day. I want to be a web analyst in two years. So for the next 18 months I’m going to go work for a finance department somewhere or I’m going to be I mean my recommendation is always going to be inside sales just because that worked out for me. But I’m going to go be an entry level sales role for 18 months to ask questions and learn how businesses work and stuff that in 18 months I’m going to use that and take it somewhere else. I interviewed a young woman earlier this week and she has several years of project management experience. She’s ready to take her role to the next level. We were having a great conversation and really a project manager in a business that only does web analytics is basically a specialized Web analyst role in my opinion. So I said hypothetical scenario you’re going into a large company and you’re going to help them implement the tag manager and then an analytics tool in the tag. AJ How would you do it. She said. Oh easy.

[00:16:32] So I would ask these people these things we’d build the requirements and then I make a get chart. There’d be these dependencies and I said Okay so now let’s operate under the scenario that the director of marketing and the Director of Sales fucking hate each other and should be like that’s every single company you ever get to work with and likes. How do you play that Lebovitz. You know the thing is is that a good analyst is going to immediately get the vibe for I need to sit between marketing and sales and here’s how I interact with those people and that’s something that you can learn eventually and you will learn as a web analyst. We kind of live in that weird hybrid lull. But then to be able to take those two groups when you have the midline and build it execute a good project. Having 18 months or two years of digital project management experience a solid goal as a web analyst that’s going to get you places fast. Same thing with 18 months to two years of experience as someone doing like a crappy job in a finance department. Those skills and those chops and those calluses you’ve built up you can immediately turn into value to move your analytics career forward.

[00:17:31] I think some of that that we’re getting back to sort of stumbling into the profession and maybe part of it is it’s useful to have been somewhere else to think something else that’s complimentary time is going to be off on this because we record obviously a bit before we edit and publish but very recently extremely recently from when we’re recording. So yes I know Ryan Ryan Preski turns out his name is longer than that. I did not realize GSV his recent blog post on how it felt my career in digital analytics on Craigslist seven years ago.

[00:18:05] I did see that was a really great article.

[00:18:08] Yeah. So that was I think sort of playing into this and that he was an analytics but certainly not in digital analytics. And then it’s kind of kind of comical at the time symphonic was posting on Craigslist and he wrote a nice cover letter and got in and kind of the rest is history. But I think that’s legitimate. I hate to tell someone who has a new digital analyst that what they should do is go do something other than digital analytics. I don’t think that’s fair advice I’ll call out Ben again. He’s in Philly right Phil. He’s got a hell of a strong group of people and digital analytics firm firms have got ceder interactive as their mass media I think is there are they in Philly. Aaron Moss don’t know if I’m pronouncing his last name correctly. They’ve got the kind of weird balance Wednesday that is fairly strong and that’s the only thing fairly strong because they’re super strong. But I’ve got competitive relative tendencies in Columbus they’ve got Chris Johansen’s so Randy’s which I think there’s a lot of people in Philly and there’s a part that if you’re in a community and start doing a little bit of exploration of are people getting together and talking.

[00:19:25] Are there when be It’s Wednesdays. Are there AMAA meet ups go to meet up dot com or are there tech groups that meet up there. Something to be said for. Don’t think that all of your education is going to come from within your company if you’re out one of these places it’s large enough and kind of forward thinking although these programs have existed for a long time that are doing rotational programs and they’re looking for developing their employees. That’s great. But the fact is most major metropolitan areas have lots of other people who are doing digital analytics and they’ve been doing it for a while. And with block there is some sort of loose community a chapter day symposiums that does make sense to get out and meet those people and you don’t have to go with a you know you’re networking and that sometimes gets the label of you’re looking for a job. No. You’re not looking for a job. Now you might not be looking for a job in two years you might never be looking for a job but I can definitely say in Columbus that it has been. It’s really nice to know that people locally who have expertise in areas that I don’t and I know that for the recent college grads and some of them had been coming to Web sites Wednesdays for the last couple of years of college because we had some awesome professors who were encouraging them to come.

[00:20:44] They’ve got a network.

[00:20:45] I get chatted by a guy who I’ve known since he was a couple of years into his degree program at a local university and he’s now on his third job out of school and doing quite well. And he reaches out to me and I reach out to him. So I think you know millennials are not it’s useful to meet other people it’s part of the reason we like to go to conferences and hang out in the lobby bar. It’s good to make personal connections because jobs there maybe future jobs there. But if you go both ways you could be hiring people bringing it into your organization at your level above your below you. But also you could be saying oh this is somebody who I once had a conversation about with this weird paid service thing. I wonder if they really figured it out let me reach out to them. So I think the nature of our industry is the broader the network you have from tapping into the resources.

[00:21:39] When you hit a challenge and somebody in your organization might not know how to solve it you might not know how to solve it but it’s good to know someone and even better if they’re local who can help you solve it.

[00:21:50] So would you say Tim from a digital analytics perspective it’s always sunny in Philadelphia.

[00:21:57] You’ve got to tune in for us. Well I was wondering if you were about to break out into ROC flag an eagle there. How does that sound like it. If only someone at all.

[00:22:08] I’ll tell you what someone out there knows that song records it for us we will play it on the show on the show. Absolutely.

[00:22:15] Only I know exactly when I hit the record button.

[00:22:18] So that’s right. OK. So you make some really good points and especially getting into industry events and networking. And I think one thing that I would say hope to hope people kind of turn that on its head in their advantage or in their favor a little bit is bring something to that that were doing a lot of times I hear people get into those environments and they sort of ask questions like Well how do you break into the industry. How do you. There’s no breaking into the industry. Just start doing stuff and how something you talk about people will take an interest in what you’re doing. And I think there’s a couple really great ways to do that. The analysis exchange is outstanding. I just saw there were some recent postings of new ones so it’s not dead. It’s actually still alive.

[00:23:05] And that’s all that’s but that’s awesome.

[00:23:07] It is such a great opportunity to get involved with a real deal analytics project working with an experienced mentor who’s going to kind of give you a give you some structure and help you get through it.

[00:23:18] Well let me let me throw one sort of public since I’m kind of loosely affiliated with the Dallas exchange that if you have any nonprofits that you know of or that you work with it works really really well if you say they have a Web site. No one is doing anything with it. You’re a volunteer. No non-profit ever in the history of mankind has said no to a volunteer if they’re doing something that could potentially be productive that if you have a nonprofit you work with and say hey you have a Web site you have to google analytics on and don’t have google analytics on it. I’d love to spend a little time kind of poking around with your site if you help them sort of post a project. Guess what they will select you as the student and then you get a mentor. And just because you’re not a student in a universe in a school like that’s not the intent of an Alice exchange I can be anybody you can be anybody. And even if you’re working and have a day job as an analyst you still absolutely welcome to be a student and then you wind up connecting to a mentor who you can peppered with questions about other aspects of your career.

[00:24:25] And if I get out of the park and that project like it has happened with that mentor has gone on to hire that student like that kind of stuff happens. Sure.

[00:24:33] So Tim what you’re saying because you are loosely affiliated with analysis exchanges let’s say someone wants to start a career measurement and they basically go to a decent non-profit and say I want to sign you up for this if you’ll participate they will for sure be the ones who are students.

[00:24:50] Yeah because the nonprofit gets to kind of pick who they want to work with like the people who apply to be the students and the mentors the organization gets to say oh we got four people submitted. We’d like to go with this one. So yes I assume that is public or no.

[00:25:06] I mean that makes sense. Yeah the organization can choose their team if there’s more than one. Actually that would be a really good test. Tim you and I should apply to be the mentors in the same project Missy who gets paid.

[00:25:18] So is a being. I was just going to be the student. No Jim I plan to keep actually I keep up with you guys more. I’ve actually I’m kind of scared after I started I was like they’re going to pick.

[00:25:34] But I’ll tell you. I mean if you’re if you’re this episode applies to you and you get yourself on analysis exchange I had a mentor to a couple of years but if you go to the Facebook page or whatever and say you know hey guys have da ph I’m I mean they’re all bet while I’m in Grade probably in the late. I don’t want to hear. I actually really enjoyed doing an analysis exchange mentorship. It was something for Doctors Without Borders. And I think it was like three and a half years ago four years ago. Really enjoyed it. I would totally do that again. In fact I get to go check out the site myself tomorrow. Yeah.

[00:26:06] No it’s great. And I have mentored for four or five different projects and loved every time it’s been it’s been really great. It’s one of those just really really great ideas that came out of some of the career building and things like that that was happening in the industry and it’s a great way for someone to get a fresh look at a set of analytics problems you know other things that millennials right out of school try to figure out what I can call these young adults. When you’re coming.

[00:26:35] Coming up straight out of the school is getting involved in Twitter and the measure slack. I think that’s another way even just to ask questions. It’s so great. The measure of slack has really taken off as a great place for people to get information about. Has it really good the way that it started.

[00:26:53] It has started reminding me and this is I’m going to be the old guy now. It is reminding me of what the web analytics yahoo group was. Be still my buddy. Two years ago. Like literally.

[00:27:05] I mean I went on today and it was like I am seeing this weird thing. What the hell. And.

[00:27:12] And I had a two links and a detailed response followed like 4 hours later by another super useful response. So because of the organization of it I absolutely do. And it’s not that it’s not it’s not everybody in analytics right. There are people who were like What. Still what slack. The the ones that are on there are because they’re on there because they are they want to help people and they’re really good at what they do.

[00:27:36] I mean there’s really three keys to digital analytics success today. There’s listen to this podcast. Beyond that measure slack and maybe there are just two keys to being successful digital analyst analyst analyst today that ROC flag and eagle.

[00:27:52] Oh yeah. No I don’t know what the eagle is soar. Learn how to use Excel.

[00:27:59] Did it totally make fun of measures like. Because I thought it was starting to get a little stagnant but I haven’t got. But I’ll tell you that the Yahoo forum kicked off my career as an analyst.

[00:28:08] Yeah that’s where I started my career too and you know we all maybe we all can remember what it’s like to be a friend.

[00:28:16] OK. But you know I was at the beginning of my career. There was this forum with some senior people and some people at my level that it was so you know measures like is turning into something like that that I take back all the shit I just talked you started it off didn’t get in there read everything.

[00:28:31] Which just mean we don’t have to put in the show. No it’s literally it’s a bit early and then it’s add measure slack with capitalized capitally capitalism Capitola s.

[00:28:42] It’s a google form you know get added and even if you don’t get a lot out of the measure of slack you will learn about slack which is just a phenomenal platform. I mean even if you’re if you’re Jim Kane and you log in once every 12 days it’s not as not as awesome but for the rest of us it’s fantastic.

[00:29:01] It’s definitely growing and I think it’s being more and more useful to a lot of people I think it’s great.

[00:29:07] And for podcast planning it would be fantastic if all three of us were raised to name any names Zoriah. Nice to see how that would really be helpful at all.

[00:29:18] I think these Slack’s these slacks they’re there they’re on the Internet and it’s going to be a big thing.

[00:29:25] Yes this internet of Slack’s and llf Slack’s. Well you know I’m using a new tool called trousers and I’m just waiting to see what happens now.

[00:29:35] In Canada it’s called Chesterfield. It’s. It is the next big thing.

[00:29:40] All right. What else. How about somebody who’s looking to hire.

[00:29:45] How would you encourage them to hire because I think that the challenge is you know when you’re a hiring manager you probably actually want to go get somebody with experience. Most of the time when would you be willing to go and take a chance on somebody that’s just starting out in the industry.

[00:30:01] How do you line that up funny if I actually needed to hire. I would go rate agencies if I was a brand new this is something you were mentioning earlier. I think agencies are actually my entire career has been backwards from a what I think it should have been. But I am increasingly finding myself telling new grads or soon to be grads if they can’t get in at an agency and maybe they will love it and they will be there for their careers. In which case they’re probably not fantastic analysts. Maybe it can come out right.

[00:30:32] It is a fantastic way to get immersed because agencies regardless of the role have kind of a reputation well known for two and people up and spitting them out. And if you’re an analyst and you’re Eric Madis off and have an amazing fortitude you last longer than two or three years for your chewed up and spit out. But people at get burnt out. So if I’m hiring I actually would probably be saying Go find the junior analyst at agencies who are ready to put their head through a wall and chances are they will have got five or six years of on the job education in a year or two. And the only risk is that you’ll need to maybe break them of some cabinets.

[00:31:12] Well they already have some wacky title like associate director of strategy and analytics. After four years. Rear Admiral of the API. But yeah you’re definitely for the ones who are frustrated and then you actually probe as to why they’re frustrated so and I don’t disagree with you I think it’s a it’s a very fertile ground because this is the way I describe it to people. It’s the difference between breadth and depth when you’re in an agency you’re going out really broad and you’re getting exposure to lots of different things. If you’re in an industry if you’re in an organization you’re going deep into the problems of that organization and you’re getting a deep look at those particular problems and how to solve them. And that’s the kind of the way that I can look at those very. I mean that’s a really broad description but it’s kind of how I view those two things. And honestly anyone listening whose only ever work in an agency or anyone listening has only ever worked in an organization. There some definite merit to spending a little bit of time on the other side of that to kind of round out your perspectives and exposure and build that capability. But I think you you’ll really learn how to be a great analyst working inside an organization. I think you learn how to be a good supplier of solutions when you’re working at an agency.

[00:32:25] I think you also depending on the agency generally you get a broader exposure to business and business models. So I think that being one who started on the inside a company organization you know I knew high tech B2B digital marketing lead marketing inside. Now when I was in an agency and all of a sudden it is e-commerce and it’s CPG and it’s some B2B I learned probably not as much about analytics but a shit ton more about about business and different businesses and business models than going back. Not that I’ve gone back into a single organization but going going back and say Now I understand because I’ve seen enough different models. How do these different industries make money. How does marketing work differently and. I mean call it crap. Eric was it was it that Razorfish for like six and a half years.

[00:33:18] So we just think there’s two kinds of agencies that we’re talking about right. Was it only do analytics like the analytics age. Yeah no we’re not talking big agencies like let’s say Coys because what he could do anything for local agencies pure play.

[00:33:34] No I don’t want to say bad things but as they mostly just do analytics as a as one piece of a much broader level of service of creative strategy dev than analytics is just like product management.

[00:33:46] That’s part of it that it’s reporting. Yeah it’s a bolt on and you know I’ve got to get all shady about it but it’s just you know it’s to be clear when we’re saying agencies we’re not talking about you know search discovery or a napkin or an extremist to not calling all of us to this to fight it or OK. There are considered dudes in a van in Portland. That’s.

[00:34:07] What I mean that’s the thing is those pure play organizations will typically require some experience probably most of the time because they’re usually operating out a little bit higher level or at least should be operating at a higher level.

[00:34:22] Ok cool. I just I wasn’t I wasn’t sure where I fit into that. When

[00:34:26] you were talking about agency this agency that I think I think analytics I think analytics agencies are a little bit of a a little bit of a true description but I think when you go to nine out of 10 marketers and say agency they’re thinking my digital agency my print agency my braining my my agency of record that analytics agency is actually my stint in an optimization agency. It was kind of labeled as an agency very very deliberately because when they wanted to get in a permanent relationship. So it makes sense to call yourself an analyst agency. But I think when most people and that’s actually another good thing for new grads is that the terminology was fluid and what’s fixed like what do people mean when somebody just generically refers to an agency would have a generally mean when they refer to.

[00:35:17] I mean how I feel like I’m still learning terminology between you X I.A. you know different things like that. That’s the sort of stuff you want to learn which is if you’re in one organization agency or internal they’re probably going to have their own little twist on whatever that terminology is. And there’s another reason to get out and talk to people digitally or in person who are in other areas to sort of learn what what’s kind of the industry norm. Oh you’re you’re a director. Oh it’s an agency. Okay then two years out of school.

[00:35:51] And you know this is great. All right. We need to wrap up before Jim makes another anti agency comment. I just wanted to know what you meant. Is that so hard. It’s so hard.

[00:36:01] This is good. We’ve kind of ranged all over. What would you take away is as a core negative item for the first ever devastating nugget Terry.

[00:36:11] Yeah. Never I would never hire anyone that said no good Harry. I think Ben Cates.

[00:36:15] I hope you enjoyed the first 17 episodes and I’m sorry you now realized that when you actually have a topic that was focused on exactly what you wanted and you get nothing useful out of it and you’ll never listen to it again I’m sorry.

[00:36:29] In this week’s episode of rambling and then found wanting. We discuss news so I think maybe I come from a little bit of a different experience because Canada does have a bit of a different job market. We do have a bit of a different digital market than the United States. But again I really think my biggest takeaway from today would be yet again we’re fostering a mentoring new talent for Naumkin all the time. Take the classes learn as much as you can learn whenever you get the chance to learn by web analytics is just lovely touches all the part. It’s a discipline where it no. You’d never say that two years I spent in supply chain was wasted or that 18 months they spent in web development was wasted.

[00:37:10] It’s one of those that nine months has been a U.S. Postal Service.

[00:37:13] Compliance was it was raw pretty close to being wasted. I worked for Korell for five and a half months so that five and a half months of trying to get people to buy WordPerfect was actually wasted. Everything I’ve done ties into this very nicely so you know if you’re having a hard time finding a digital measurement job but you won’t find something complimentary and you are going to be able to leverage the hell out of it and then finally don’t ever say EA meet you at the beginning of an email or a warm regards at the end of an email. That’s probably the best advice I can give anybody ever. TGF know that that kills right. That’s ETF is TFN warm regard. I think we just found our show signed off. If you ever throw one of those at me you’re on a spam list like immediately. That’s that’s my kryptonite right there.

[00:38:03] I have to stop. There was a guy who worked for me a couple of times and he is he signs off his emails and in a way that I’m like that is just I can’t say what it is because there are too many people who say yep we know who that is. I like that that needs to stop. But I never managed him twice and never got to say now.

[00:38:23] Not that I’m going to throw in the spot with milk toast regards. That’s my favorite.

[00:38:29] If you could have that burning hot regards that’s how Boeing is working on his sign off for this podcast right now. I will throw my one.

[00:38:41] I think my take away is connect with others outside your organization as kind of the one digitally or in person. That and maybe that’s because I look at that through out my career what I’ve grown the most is because I have time for internships outside. You guys are good examples of that. So I’d probably put that put that in. I would agree with that.

[00:39:06] Early in my career I’ve found a few people that I could I could trust that could mentor me and they would play a very important role in my development as a professional and a voice of reason. You know as I tried to navigate throughout my career I still talk to some of those folks today. I would put you in that category. Tim as a friend I would say the other thing is you know we talked about it in the show but the analysis exchange is just unique in its capability to give you real hands on experience and a real project to work on. I can’t say enough good things about it so you know recent college grad and you won’t even try out the space and sort of see what it might be like. Do analysis. It’s a great way to go. Get in there and find a nonprofit that you’re excited about and drag them into the program. Is that why you would be better if your soon to be college grad. Crap Absolutely you don’t know what you’re going to do and say Absolutely yeah you’re staring. Ninety thousand dollars of college debt in the face and you’re gonna figure out what to do. Senior year is a great time to get serious about your future.

[00:40:08] Now there you go.

[00:40:10] All right. Well hey. This has been a great discussion. I think there’s more that can be said. We’d certainly love to hear your comments and feedback especially if you’re starting out in this space. It’s all up to you band. Get this and get this show in the hands of other recent soon to be college grads. See whether or not any of this resonates with them. We can grow the ranks of the digital analytics space and more and more awesome people. Thanks again for the topic and we look forward to hearing from anybody who’s listening. Tell us your stories on Facebook or on Twitter.

[00:40:41] And we look forward to hearing from you and since it was Jim’s turn last time we be my turn this time is Michael just won’t say it.

[00:40:47] But we really could use a few reviews. On iTunes so that does help help spread the word helps other people find it helps provide some credibility. Deserved or undeserved. So if you will listen to more than one and a half episodes and you tilt marginally into positive direction we would love to have you go to iTunes and give us a rating and a review. Positive or not. We’ll take you to one but not really we’d really like the positive ones.

[00:41:15] And while we’re at it you might as well just like our Facebook page too. All right. There you go. Hey why not. And you know what makes Tim’s day is when you say nice things to him on Twitter. He loves that also jail about gyms gyms immune to that sort of shenanigans.

[00:41:31] All right blood for shenanigans for Tim Wilson and Jim Kane Michael and we’re signing out effervescent regards.

[00:41:41] Thanks for listening. And don’t forget to join the conversation on Facebook Twitter. We welcome your comments and questions. Facebook dot com slash and on a six hour all on Twitter.

[00:41:57] All the time. How did it. Work.

[00:42:03] And this is the episode we’re finally nice to moneyless Frank and their Neeve first mouth looking ways. So what is all about how millennials millennial now. Five million reasons to hate millennials. Now. We get a little fighting Eagle flag pole.

[00:42:29] Dance in an apple school or life time. I think we should probably steal that.

[00:42:35] You’re supposed to say no offense but or what. But that flag. Oh. OK.

[00:42:43] That was a sloppy show but it was a lot of fun he said Bert Pasteur’s one through 70.

 

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