Meet a Marketing Professional
We caught up with Vivienne Corcoran, who has more than 30 years’ of experience in Business Development and Marketing, Vivienne has a reputation for strategic and practical communication across a diverse range of sectors including legal, finance, the arts, and public and community health. Vivienne recently facilitated a series of workshops on developing and implementing a cultural change for improved results for the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD). Her book, Growing Your Professional Practice, has been described as the ‘must have’ manual for professionals. Vivienne is a Fellow of the AICD and the Australian Marketing Institute.
1.What courses did you study to become a Marketing Professional? And tell us a bit about your current role?
I completed an Arts Degree at The University of Melbourne, then a Graduate Diploma in Business (Marketing) at Monash University. I have also completed the Company Directors’ course with the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD). I continue to study on a regular basis and commit to a monthly amount of time spent on my professional development as I do for my staff. This includes attending seminars, workshops and courses with a number of professional associations including Australian Marketing Institute, Australian Professional Service Marketing Association, Australian Legal Practice Management Association and AICD.
In my current role, I work as a consultant for a range of clients. Sometimes this involves one-off projects or reviews of their marketing strategies and measuring the effectiveness of their strategies and campaigns, but more often it includes acting as their Marketing Director on a part-time basis or as required.
2.What does a Marketing Professional do on a day-to day basis?
We look at the services or products a company or organisation is offering, the markets they are offering them in, and the results they are achieving. Based on the results, we think of ways in which the offering, price, promotion or market could be changed, improved or rethought for optimal results. We are the customer’s champion inside the business – seeing things from the outside in – and from that perspective we help our clients inside the business understand their customers.
Vivienne Corcoran from Marketing Logic
3.What do you think are the skills a Marketing Professional should have?
- Listening – knowing how to hear what is being said regardless of the language or the format of the message. We need to really hear the customer to understand their, often, complex and very different needs.
- Insight – the ability to look past the numbers and results and understand not just what is happening, but why and how they could be changed.
- Multi-tasking – being able to manage all the aspects of the job at once.
- Persuasion – the ability to bring people in the team who might not see things the way you do along for the ride.
At least as important as skills, though, are personal qualities:
- Passion – you need to believe in and care about what you are doing.
- Persistence – you need not to be easily put off. If you believe something, you need to have the patience and fortitude to work until the very end of often complicated processes.
- Constant learning – you need to have a passion and appetite for learning new things so you can understand how things work and what can be done to make them better.
4.What are your favorite things about working in the Marketing Industry?
I enjoy working on a wide range of products and services for a huge range of people and organisations around the world. I have marketed funerals, lawyers, telecommunications, healthcare and IT along the way. I enjoy meeting people who are the best at what they do, and working with people who want to make a difference. I often find this aspect of my career inspirational.
5.What advice would you give students aspiring to work in the Marketing industry?
- Look for products, companies, organisations and people who inspire you and approach them. Offer to work as an intern or to do a project they need to get done but do not have the resources to do, and take it from there.
- Ask for feedback on every project you complete. Listen, learn and improve.
- When you find someone you admire and aspire to be, ask them to be your mentor and learn as much as you can from them and their network.
- Never be afraid to ask people for help. Most people will appreciate the request and be keen to help.
- If you cannot get a marketing role, get any job in a good organisation and work towards marketing from the inside.
Thank You, Vivienne, for sharing your story with training.com.au.