Marketing | Meet the Marketing department

By the Newsletter team

The Marketing department is the first contact potential students have with GetSmarter. Here’s some more information from the women (and finally one man!) on the front line.

The Marketing team manages the marketing and promotion for GetSmarter’s full portfolio of courses. They aim to inform as many people as possible about our courses through various marketing channels, manage all the course queries received from potential students by email and telephone, and assist potential students in the registration process. They also manage the relationship with past students.

The Marketing department started at GetSmarter’s launch in 2008 with one lonely member, Robyn (now the Marketing Manager). She was briefly joined by Candice (who is now the Course Coordination Manager) in marketing the Stellenbosch University Wine Evaluation course – the only course in GetSmarter’s portfolio at the time.

Since then, Robyn has overseen the team growing from 3 to 14 members (the “largest and loudest” team at the company), and the course portfolio expanding to encompass over 20 courses. Each Marketing Executive contacts between 300 and 400 people personally per marketing campaign and emails can range from 20 to 70 per day. In addition, info packs for each course are downloaded an average of 1,300 times during a campaign.

The Marketing team is divided into several sub-groups and team members have unique roles. Robyn manages overall team activity, communication and planning. Deborah assists as Junior Marketing Manager by managing the website, documentation and online advertising. Karin, as Campaign Manager, ensures that the Marketing Executives have all the tools and resources they need to carry out their campaigns.

The Executives themselves perform a wide range of roles, as summarised by Lyndsay: “Being the contact person for a set of courses, liaising with students on a daily basis, building marketing strategies, and dealing with third parties with regards to various marketing opportunities.” On top of those roles, Louise heads up corporate marketing and general projects, while Emma is soon to move into the role of Media Liaison. The Marketing team also relies on is dedicated administrators, Natasha and Margret, to keep things flowing smoothly.

The marketers universally declare that the best part of their job is working in such a dynamic, dedicated and fun team; “There’s never a dull moment,” says Emma. The job also requires a wide range of proficiencies. “Being involved in so many different things, some very systematic, rigid and business orientated, others much more creative, like writing, which I absolutely love,” says Louise. Then there’s the fun and reward in working with the customers. Amy-Jane says, “When dealing with email queries, it’s wonderful to watch someone go from question to registration and know you helped them find the right fit.”

The Marketing team loves sharing all kinds of quotes, but their perennial favourite is “teamwork makes the dream work” – and they live up to that motto every day.

This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution license. 

Back to SmartyPants Newsletter - Novemeber 2011 Edition