ABOUT

So what do you actually do?

I’m an Account Manager at FCB Inferno, working on BMW alongside working on Arts Emergency. During my time here i’ve also worked on the Premier League.

In a sentence, my main role is being the link between the agency and our clients, making sure that their campaigns are being delivered and created, and the objectives are being hit.   

What has your career path been?

Five years ago I definitely didn’t think I’d be where I am now.

Growing up I always thought that I would go into a ‘traditional’ job role, because it was all I knew. It went from being good at Maths in secondary (to then realising that I was horrible at it and dropping it in college), to dreaming of being a lawyer after watching Suits. We’ve all been there.

But it was in university where I realised what I actually wanted to do. I remember scrolling Twitter one day and I saw someone retweet a job-post from Yahoo Sport UK, who were looking for fan bloggers for Premier League clubs.

I had never written anything before outside of academia, but I thought I’d give it a shot. And I managed to get the job, writing blogs about West Ham United for three years and I ended up publishing over 150 pieces on their site.

During that period, I completed a six-week summer internship at EY and luckily received a graduate job offer to work in audit during my second year. I am SO glad I didn’t end up working in audit, because my life would be very very different right now. But I initially took the job and signed the contract, because it provided me security going into my third year of university.

It then dawned on me that I did not enjoy my summer internship at all, and I loved writing about football. So I decided to look for something in that space, and look to do something that I would actually enjoy for my job. And once again, at some point during my third year, I saw a job post from this company called Clifford French on Twitter (yes, I spend a lot of time on Twitter). They were looking for an Account Executive to work on EA SPORTS and EA GAMES, and it sounded like the dream. I spent a year there, and I loved every single minute of it.

I worked on two FIFA launches, got to travel Europe watching football games and creating cool content, and it taught me a lot. I then got an offer to work at advertising agency FCB Inferno (where I work now), to work on Premier League and InBev and I couldn’t turn it down.

During all of that, I wrote freelance – writing scripts for YouTube videos and managing social channels too.

What is the best part of your job?

Seeing cool campaigns come to life.

Working in account management means that you are involved in every step of the process, from the client briefing to delivery of the project. Going through that entire process, and eventually seeing something that you have worked on go live for people to consume is a great feeling.

One that I will always remember is working on the Premier League’s ‘No Room For Racism’ campaign. I’m a huge football fan and sitting down to watch football, and seeing something that I have worked on come up on Sky Sports was amazing.

Why do you do your job?

This is definitely going to sound cliché, but it makes me happy. I work on things that excite me, and I work on cool brands.

My summer internship showed me that regardless of money, status, and all those things – if you don’t enjoy what you do, you’re not going to be happy.

I’ve always loved watching ads and seeing cool campaigns. I would watch the Nike Joga Bonito ads over and over as a kid. And being able to work on some of the brands that I love, and create cool things and be a part of this space is a position that I am very fortunate to be in.

But the reason as to why I still want to be in this industry has definitely changed over the past few years. I’ve realised that I love working on campaigns which make a real difference in society, and has an impact on people’s lives. And marketing and advertising has shown that it can definitely do that, and I hope that throughout my career I can make a positive contribution, and give back.

One piece of advice for someone starting in your role?

Definitely to ask questions, especially as a junior.

No one expects you to know everything when you first start out, so don’t worry about that. Ask questions about anything and everything. People will be more than happy to help you out, and it helps build relationships too. I have definitely asked really stupid and basic questions over and over, but you should if you don’t know something.

It definitely seems scary and daunting, and I was definitely afraid at points, but you will learn so much and learn faster too.

Check out Zak’s socials below!

DAY IN THE LIFE

I am writing this the day before Day of Wrk launches. And it has been a busy one.

I’m going to try and give a typical ‘average’ day because my tasks definitely vary day-to-day.

During the pandemic, I have continued to set my alarm for 7am. I don’t actually wake up at 7am. But every day, without fail, I set it for then. I’m always super tired after playing Call of Duty all night (massive COD fan btw) so I have to snooze for 30 mins or so.

When I finally decide to open my eyes, I spend most of my pre-work time scrolling social media, catching up on WhatsApp messages, and a recent theme has been spending a lot of time on TikTok. A lot. I’m currently stuck on sweet-shop TikTok and it is great.

I work in my bedroom so after showering and all those other things, I sit at my desk and begin the day.

My routine in the morning is always the same – I check my to-do list, prioritise tasks that I need to do by the projects that I’m working on, and this sets me up nicely for the day. I literally need to write everything down otherwise I forget, so this makes sure that I don’t forget about something crucial. It definitely gets messier and messier as the day progresses, but I try to stick to it. P.s. TickTick is a life-saver.

Disclaimer: at the moment, I am not working on any campaigns that are about to launch in the next month or so, so my day-in-the-life is quite different to what it would be when we are about to launch a big campaign. Much less manic, much less pressured, and much more relaxed.

I probably can’t name the exact projects I’m working on until they launch, so I’ll have to be careful. But we are working with the charity Arts Emergency on a campaign to raise awareness and create a real movement to grow the Arts Emergency Network, so I spent time this morning reviewing the latest creative ideas for that campaign. This is a common task across the various projects that I work on, and we usually will have WIPs (basically a meeting to discuss the ideas) with the creative team, strategist, and other people working on the campaign to see how the campaign is shaping up and what we will create.

It’s important to make sure that we deliver the best, and most exciting work possible but this needs to align with the client brief and objectives so I have to keep that in mind when reviewing work.

I then move on to speaking to our social team on BMW Motorsport about a brief that we need to write. We had some feedback from the client on a project that we are working on, so it was just making sure that that we had all of their comments noted and the direction they wanted to go in. We then put in a call with the creative team to go through this and talk them through the feedback, and eventually we would present back to the client. The brief is basically a bible and houses all the information on a campaign and what needs to be done in terms of the creative direction, deliverables, and messaging.

I slowly get on with a few random tasks and I take out some time to do admin-y bits. Stuff that I have pretty much been putting off until I force myself to do it. This includes status documents for client calls, where we update on the progress of various campaigns. Also filling out resource sheets, to make sure that I have the design, creative, and strategy time that I need to create things for campaigns that we are working on. And then finance. No one likes finance. But part of my job is also making sure that we have enough money to create the campaigns, so some of my time is spent doing that.

I have a lot of calls today so a lot of my time today is spent speaking to clients about campaigns that we are working on, updating them on the status, and being briefed on new projects.

I also have design resource booked for today to create some social assets for BMW UK Motorsport, so I get on with writing the brief for everything that needs to be created for the various social channels and then brief in the designer. He then creates everything a few hours later and I check the assets along with the creative team, run them past the client, and they are then ready to be posted when needed.

I am also part of FCB Belong, which is FCB Inferno’s C&I committee and we have our weekly call to talk about ways in which we can improve the agency from this POV, and being a part of this means a lot to me because it means that we are trying to enact positive change in our agency in various ways, and finding ways in which we can be better.

So that’s pretty much my day. As I said, this is a much more relaxed period for me and it varies a lot, but I’m hoping this gave a picture of what an account man gets up to during a typical day.