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I work at a marketing and public relations agency that specializes in the entertainment industry, namely with directors, musicians, and a few small production houses; my position is Junior Account Manager. As of 2012, I have three years of experience working in this field.
Many people believe that working in the entertainment industry is a glamorous job that involves lots of travel and working with top celebrities, and although it's a fun job, it's not always as exciting as some people may think. I am usually in meetings with co-workers developing new marketing strategies, analyzing past and current marketing campaigns.
A lot of my work involves researching and planning, especially as I just recently joined a new agency. The rest of the time is usually spent speaking to journalists, advertisers, clients, and vendors. I would say that only about five percent of my time is spent travelling or attending events.
On a scale of one to ten, I would rate my job satisfaction at an eight. If I could change anything about my work, I would really love to be able to work on more accounts and attend more fun events! Luckily, after I've been working with this company for a little longer, this change will soon happen.
I am proud to say that I love my job and I know without a doubt that this is my calling in life. I am one of the few lucky people who wake up excited to get to work. Not everyone can work in the entertainment industry or in marketing, but it is the perfect fit for my personality.
One thing people need to consider is that I was fortunate enough to move to another country and start my work in a large, international city that has a great market and need for this field - something that someone who lives in a more rural area or cannot commute daily to a large city may not be able to achieve.
I got started in this line of work by chance. I started off by looking for internships in marketing while I was in college. The first was for a musical theater production company. The next was for a movie production and distribution company. After that came two marketing and public relation agencies that had several musicians and directors as clients.
I did not intend to find work experiences in the entertainment industry, but those are the ones that I kept finding. Eventually, one of the internships hired me back a couple of years later and my career took off from there. I would not change a thing about my experiences, though!
One hard-learned lesson that I had while working is that proper organization and attention to detail can really make or break your plans. While working on a campaign, I accidentally sent out information to a few vendors with the wrong dates on them without realizing it - needless to say we ended up having those vendors missing on the day they were meant to show up for an event and almost had to cancel!
The most important thing I learned about the working world since leaving school would have to be that motivation is everything. Since I went to school in another country, my student loans were pretty high and that was a real motivator for me to find work that paid well soon. When I first started working, I wasn't paid enough to pay off my loans as fast as I would like, so it also motivated me to work even harder and get a promotion as soon as possible.
The strangest thing to happen to me at work would have to be on one April's Fools Day when a band that I worked for decided to play a prank on me. They pretended to be really angry with my work and quit! Maybe not so strange, but it was definitely not the funniest prank on my end!
I think being able to see all my hard work really pay off (and have the public see my hard work pay off, too) really helps get me up in the morning. My most proud moment would have to be my very first big accomplishment which was a 40% increase in sales for one band's clothing line in just a month. The next month it increased by another 30%. Knowing that I was able to help increase those sales by so much was such a great feeling.
There are always challenges in this field. A lot of it has to deal with bad media coverage, low sales, or upset clients. I think anything that has to deal with the media really makes me want to pull my hair out because it's usually the hardest to fix.
My job is not always stressful, but there are times when I have to work very late every night for a month. Overall, it's not so bad.
At my current position and level, someone may be paid around $38,000 to $50,000, depending on the company, area, and type of clients. It's definitely enough for me to live comfortably.
I don't really take much vacation, not that I am not allowed to take it, I just like to stay in the office when I can. Even if I am on vacation, I do sometimes get calls and have to do a couple of things while at home. On average, I take at least a week vacation a year.
I have a bachelor's degree in marketing communications and a master's degree in Internet marketing. I am also great with most computer programs and have taken both speech and public speaking classes. I feel that these skills and degrees really helped me to be successful in my career.
If a friend wanted to get a job in my field, I would recommend them to be prepared to do a lot of work, and remember that some of it may be boring at first. I would also tell them to remember to keep a sense of humor; I think it's important to have a good sense of humor in most fields.
If I could decide what I would be doing in five years, I would say that I would like to own my own business and have a lot of successful clients.
Career entertainment marketing image from Stockvault
