Just a warning – this is going to be a slight detour from Dan McKintosh’s Prêt sponsored blog post!
My work day usually starts by me speed walking out of Holborn station having professed to have found a quicker way to work in my second week at STEAK.
Arriving, I take a minute to scan through my emails to spy anything urgent, before grabbing myself some toast with a cup of coffee, which I proceed to eat at my desk through the comments of disgust from my team, some of who, surprisingly still don’t know that I dunk my toast in my coffee. In my defence, it’s efficient.
I then feel evolved enough to tackle the task of undertaking my daily reports and optimisations, ensuring everything’s on course with budget, sales and revenue from the previous day.
Having made my tweaks to keyword bids, I move on to the more meatier tasks consisting of strategic or tactical campaign proposals, which I then translate into French and German (tip of the hat to the native speakers who proofread these by the way – you know who you are).
Other client-facing tasks involve status updates on tests currently being carried out on ad copy and landing pages – for which, my fellow PPC AM, Jenny’s magical confidence calculator is now a vital part. Based on the results, client communication is sent detailing the completion and initiation of the next phase of the test along with estimations of the duration of the test.
Before I know it, it’s lunch time and I’m out wandering the streets of Covent Garden looking for gastronomic inspiration…but usually end up in Café Verona, Sainsbury’s or Abokado for a sandwich, soup or salad of some sort. (I did tell you it was going to be a slight detour from Prêt).
Upon my return to the office, I typically mull over the day’s Google Alerts and industry news titbits before launching back into optimisation-oriented tasks, such as restructuring the accounts for efficiency, or in preparation of new activity due to go live, which often involves background analysis and ground work before the final execution of the restructure.
Depending on the time of the month, the day will also be spent dipping in and out of preparation for monthly reviews, for which the data is pulled daily and therefore “only” needs to be put into a digestible, clear and concise (and pretty) format for the client.
By 6pm, today’s to do list is (mostly) highlighted green and I’m working on tomorrows, ready to hit the ground running again when I come in.
After a much less speedy walk back to Holborn station and trying my hardest to avoid tube rage on the central line, I sit down (50% of the time), relax with a bit of Bonobo and fall into a light coma until my stop.