Advertising Research Foundation: Young Pros Bootcamp (2019)

“Be open to opportunities and don’t be afraid to veer from your plan! Zig and zag ... You can still get to your career. You just may have to go about it a different way.”

- Donna Speciale

Meteorologists predicted low temperatures, high gusts of wind and issued a blizzard warning in New York City on Wednesday, January 30th. However, that did not stop the Advertising and Media professionals, including myself, from attending the Advertising Research Foundation’s Young Pros Bootcamp at Fordham University that day. Either we were open to the opportunities that this bootcamp had to offer or maybe we were just that dedicated. Can you say dedication? Say it with me … D E D I C A T I O N. Maybe, just maybe, it was all of the above. With sponsors such as Viacom Media Networks, Turner and Univision Communications Inc. and a participatory presence from industry heavy hitters such as OmnicomMediaGroup, I was certain that we were in for a treat. Boy, was I right!

At 8:00am, students and industry leaders from different professional walks of life, shared their stories and networked over breakfast. What once started as nervous silence turned into fruitful conversations before being respectfully silenced by a warm welcome and a series of exciting announcements. Shortly after, the presentations segment of the bootcamp kicked off with Bob Pearson, Senior Advisor of W20 Group, who led his presentation on “Navigating Your Career: What Matters”.

The first round of presentations, which ranged from 15 minutes to 30 minutes, lasted until lunch time which was then followed by breakout sessions where we were divided into small groups to explore in a more engaging space. We had the choice of going to up to two breakout sessions that covered topics such as Storytelling with Data, Negotiations, Making Data Work For You: Achieving your Business Objectives and Excel Training. I chose the last two topics because using statistical analysis as a basis for storytelling always intrigued me and you can never get too much training in Microsoft Excel. Believe it or not, as of recently, I spend more and more of my time immersing myself in data that live in excel spreadsheets so it was only right that I joined in on that session.

There were two presentations that I enjoyed the most. The first one, “5 Things You Should know About Influencer Marketing from Influencer Marketers”, was led by Scott Moscatelli, Senior Director of Account Management at Univision. In this presentation, he shared the following best practices that Univision’s partners should know about influencer marketing:

1. Find the right influencer
2. Spend time
3. Listen
4. Maximize content creation
5. Continuity

For the Continuity criteria, he strongly suggested that brands work with influencers more than once “ … because you learn and they learn. They learn about your brand and you learn about them. You learn what works and what doesn’t work. Then you’re going to apply those learnings which is a step we don’t always get to take because we’re just doing one video for one campaign. Those learnings can be invaluable and I promise you that it’s likely that you can apply them to other influencers and maybe even to your own publishing … Make sure you get an investment out of it and that you're learning from it as a brand or Marketer, and not just learning what the results were.”

The second one was “Young Pro to Established Pro: Lessons Learned Along the Way” which was led by Keynote speaker and President of Turner Ad Sales, Donna Speciale. Here she shared these five valuable lessons:

1. Be open to opportunity
2. Say “yes” 
3. Knowledge is power -- keep learning!
4. Challenge the status quo
5. Don’t be afraid to hire someone smarter than you

With every gem that she uncovered, I felt like I connected with her more and more. Her personal journey and empathetic intuition was more than enough confirmation that I was at the right place at the right time -- surrounded by like-minded individuals who will, too, become change agents of this forever evolving industry. So many gems and so many takeaways yet three of my favorite takeaways from this conference were: (1) There is a missed opportunity when you (or in this case, companies) don’t listen. Think about the power that it holds and the impact that it can have on a community. Moscatelli really made me think -- imagine having a “storyteller talking to another storyteller -- you get a brand new depth of brand meaning from that conversation alone”, (2) Don’t be afraid to add an extra path, or two … or three, to the career road map that you once create for yourself. Make detours or take the scenic route when you come across a bump in the road. All in all, be patient and trust your personal and professional journey. (3) It is key to “put yourself out there and to go to events where you might not know people. Everyone you meet in your career is going to help you along the way”. Mrs. Speciale's words made me think about all the times when I heard that growth lives outside of our comfort zones and while veering off into the unknown can evoke fear within us, there is something rewarding about it too. If there’s an opportunity to do something different that will elevate your intellect or accelerate your career, take the risk or lose the chance to grow. So while the weather forecast didn’t seem to work out in our favor, our professional forecast was filled with knowledge showers, high resiliency with a 100% chance of success.