Hi Jessica, tell us a little bit about yourself!
Hi! I'm Jessica, a growth marketer at Zageno, the world's largest marketplace for life sciences. I also head content for Elpha, a community of ~50K women in tech, Harvard in Tech, and Techstars Boston. I work in content with VC funds like Pear VC and TSVC and startups like Bottomless. I also angel invest and scout for a few different early stage funds. For fun, I love to run, hike, and do anything in the outdoors. I grew up in China!
Can you tell us what you do as a Growth Marketing Specialist for those who are unfamiliar?
As a growth marketer, I help manage our content marketing, social media, partnerships, sales enablement, landing page design, product marketing, and events initiatives. Our ultimate goal is to drive revenue for the company.
How did you decide to pursue growth marketing?
Growth felt like a great way to be aligned with true progress at a company while still being strategic and top/middle of the funnel. I like how cross-functional, multi-faceted, and creative growth can be. As an investor (my role prior to this one), I realized that the biggest ask of founders were always surrounding something related to growth whether it be growth in their investor base (fundraising), growth in their team (hiring), or growth in their customer base. So I felt growth was a great skill set to learn to be more valuable as an advisor to and support of startups.
What programs & tools do you use everyday for work? What do you like/dislike about these programs?
I use HubSpot mostly. I like how end to end the platform is and how I am able to collaborate easily with my team members across different departments through HubSpot. I would like to see better support from HubSpot's customer success team.
Any advice on how to stand out and get hired for those starting off?
Be proactive in sharing ideas with companies you are interested in. Don't be afraid of cold outreach. Don't focus on what you aim to learn but rather how you can leverage your existing skill set in innovative ways to help the company.
What are some must-have resources (books, tools, podcasts, etc.) you would recommend for your industry?
I love ...
Invest Like the Best
Reforge
Demand Curve for all things growth!
What are 3 character traits that would make someone excel in your field?
Great growth marketers are creative, excellent communicators, and data driven.
Most satisfying & difficult thing about your job?
The most difficult thing is the outcome, rather than output orientation. You are assessed on things that are not always entirely in your control. You need to couple execution with strategic thinking and be constantly open to failure and learning from failure.
What would you like to say to your younger self?
Don't worry about what others think of you. Stop doing things just to fit societal expectations or check off boxes. Spend more time thinking about what actually makes you happy.
Best advice you've received/heard?
Don't see your career or life as a build up to this ultimate goal. Instead, take a portfolio approach and see everything, good or bad, as an opportunity to add a skill set to your tool box and learn more about yourself.
