Joining the MintTwist team

  My name is Thomas and I have just joined the marketing team at MintTwist, I singled out MintTwist as a growing, dynamic agency I’d love to work for and through hard work and a bit of luck I managed to secure a role which started at the end of January. I’ll now attempt to explain how it is I ended up here. Childhood I was born in Melton Mowbray (the home of pork pies) in Leicestershire but moved to the Isle of Wight when I was just a boy of two. I was the second child and followed by two more. My parents constantly told me that raising four kids was one of the hardest things they’ve ever done. “Just wait till you’re a parent, and you’ll see.” I reckon they’ve only really got themselves to blame, though maybe one day I will see, but today is not that day. My earliest memories are spending gloriously long summers at the beach, making sandcastles and eating ice cream. We had a beach hut that  became a second home between June and August, it would be constantly dirtied with sand and filled to the roof with innumerable inflatables but it still stands today and I make a point of visiting it to reminisce whenever I’m home. We spent our summer holidays in France, generally in the South, often during my birthday, and always in a tent. I’d argue it created within me a dislike of tents and confined spaces, my parents argue it built character and humility. We still disagree and the debate rages on. Education After graduating from university in 2014 with a degree in History I thought about what I wanted to do next. I had always thought about living in another country and after graduating, the desire to be   as far away from the Uni library as possible left me with little choice but to get away. I thought about which skills I had that could help me achieve this goal and it turns out just being able to speak English can allow you to travel the world, how lucky we are! I moved to South Korea to teach English in 2014. For the first month I would wake up and wonder what on Earth I was thinking moving so far away from the comforts of home. The learning curve was huge. I couldn’t speak Korean, I couldn’t use chopsticks and I definitely couldn’t teach. However, by the end up my time In Korea I had learnt that with hard work and having an organised approach to things I could overcome challenges that at first made me think “Oh sugar”. Next Steps After returning from South Korea I began thinking about my next career move. After the crushing realisation that I was never going to play for Arsenal I began looking for a role that would suit me. Digital marketing stood out as a field that would suit whatever natural abilities I have and so I began reading, learning and talking about it as much as possible. With every new area of digital marketing I explored came new ideas and possibilities. The sheer size and reach of digital and it’s growing influence reminded me of the ever expanding universe. Just like the infinitely expanding universe it left me intrigued and just a little bit terrified. I decided I wanted to get on board and so I started looking at a number of agencies. What I liked about MintTwists approach to digital was the way that they tailored a service to suit an individual client’s wants and needs. Due to MintTwist being an independent agency of a relatively small size it gives the opportunity to operate in an agile and reactive environment. Regardless of whether is after a piece of web development or design to a PPC/SEO strategy there is no “one size fit all approach” enabling clients to get the most out of their budgets – with minimal wastage. Now, I wouldn't be writing this blog post if my application wasn’t successful, and I’m pleased to say that I’m now here learning from some seriously talented digital marketing. Future I’m currently learning and working in PPC advertising and whilst it’s important to have a solid understanding of the basics it is clear that the nature of PPC is evolving. Google are seemingly ever tweaking and upgrading their AdWords services and others are generally quick to follow suit. All of the big players in PPC look to be constantly improving user control in order to allow for greater optimisation. Interestingly, Google have been testing a “Back to the Top” button on their mobile device SERP’s rivalling the next page button which shows just how important it is for a company to rank on the first page both organically and paid in order to drive traffic from these channels. Going on into the next year and the next five years it seems that the growing number of tech savvy consumers will keep us all on our feet as we look for the next big thing in digital.