Shannon Greene of Elite SEM -- A 1stFive Profile

With dreams of working in the sports and entertainment worlds Shannon spent much of her time in college working internships with the former New Jersey Nets now the Brooklyn Nets the Philadelphia 76ersamp160and Madison Square Garden From her experience she learned that a corporate atmosphere wasn39t the right fit but having enjoyed marketing in past roles Shannon shifted gears and pursued an internship with search marketing firmamp160Elite SEMquotThe way I applied was by emailing everyone whose email I could find on the website and askingamp160to come in and learnquot she says of her ambitious beginnings with the company As a college junior Shannon was a newbie to the digital world She worked in the New York office under the wing of thenSenior Account Executiveamp160Marc Weisinger who brought her up to speed quotI owe the majority of my success in this industry to himquot says Shannon quotHe definitely pushed me and set the bar highquot Two promotions later and now an account executive herself in the Atlanta office Shannon has worked to create the current more formal intern programIn addition to Marc her mentors include Abby Stone Elite SEM39s Vice President of Paid Media and her parents quotAbby has had an enormous impactquot Shannon shares quotBeing a woman in business and at Elite she39s totally paved the way for me and has been a huge support system and great friendquot Her mother and father have also had a huge influence on her providing support and encouragement Both of Shannon39s parents worked their way through school Her mother has since worked for their church for the past 30 years and her father is the Senior Vice President of Healthcare Lending at TD Bank quotTheir overall parenting style was hands off I still don39t know how my sister and I turned out okayquot joked Shannon mentioning that the most important thing her parents taught as it pertains to her career has been how to adapt to adversity and to work hard Shannon below left is pictured with colleagues from Elite SEM opening a library in Nicaragua in February 2016Shannon is now back in school for her MBA at the Georgia Institute of Technology in addition to working full time quotI wanted to get a better idea of other areas of business and not be so siloed in marketing specifically searchquot she says quotI39m taking classes to make me a better account manager and to understand the wider scope of business amp8230 reading financial statements pricing adjustments and operationsquotquotIt39s three hours a night three times a week in class and a lot of weekends meeting up with peer groups to work on papers tests and assignmentsquot explains Shannon of her academic workload She says that her role in the marketing and advertising industry demands much more than a standard 40hour work week alluding to an quotalways onquot 247 media landscape but that her company has been extremely supportivequotWe have a great culture at Elitequot she says quotI can work from home whenever I need to and we have unlimited leave days As long as I39m getting my work done they39re 100 for itquot The company has won a host of awards for its company culture ranking 1 in Entrepreneurcom39s 2015 Top Company Cultures list While they have the perks to prove it including corporate trips and free lunches Shannon says there39s more to it than freebies Elite SEMamp160founderamp160Ben Kirshner requests for new employees to submit bucket lists making it his goal to help each team member accomplish some of their goals in one way or anotherquotMy favorite part about working in the industry is using my brain every day and working with great peoplequot says Shannon quotIt doesn39t matter what we doamp160every day if I39m able to be creative think about strategy and be in a great environment with a great culturequot Shannon in the Santa hat is pictured above with the Atlanta Search Team at Elite SEM39s 2015 Holiday PartyElite SEM has quadrupled in size since Shannon first started now employing around 140 people across eight offices Shannon39s daytoday involves managing clients39 digital marketing budgets devising strategiesamp160and implementing initiatives to help clients reach their growth and efficiency goals quotWe provide industry insights and guidance and we39re an extension of their marketing teamquot she explains Elite SEM works with major search engines such as Google Bing and Yahoo and social players like Facebook and Twitter to implement search retargeting and display efforts for clients in a range of industries including hospitality finance home services ecommerceamp160and retailIn working with clients Shannon monitors customers who may have visited the website but didn39t complete a purchase quotWe see their activity onsite and target ads toward them to make sure they39re going back to follow through with our desired actionsquot she says explaining that tracking trends and analyzing data is also fundamental to her work which she uses to develop further strategies A major challenge Shannon foresees in the data realm is attribution She hasamp160noticed that there are few ways to track how different metrics interact with one another The saying quotcorrelation does not imply causationquot holds trueMillennials should not be viewed as a monolithic group Shannon believes that Millennials chiefly want to be a part of something bigger than themselves which involves continuously learning new things and adding value within a supportive environment quotA lot of people are really willing to go above and beyond as long as they feel like they39re appreciated and actually making a contributionquot she concludesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated bloggers amp160amp160

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Shannon Greene of Elite SEM -- A 1stFive Profile

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