As the owner of Hook Agency, I’ve had a couple years now to go from individual working alone in a tiny office, to being in a slightly less tiny office – and have two awesome employees – my wife Bea who is our Brand Strategist, and Seth Epstein our SEO Specialist.
Time flies when you’re having fun – and we’ve had a lot of fun! I think rather than doing it with themed rooms, or kegs on Friday like I’ve seen at some agencies, my take is that we try to make the work fun. Whether it be learning new stuff for a super-niched client, or just finding more work doing cool stuff for clients we love. The challenge is part of what makes our every day office lives in digital marketing industry.
So we thought it would be interesting to share 3 perspectives on an average day in the office – for those curious.
Day in the life of Seth Epstein – SEO Specialist:
I get in at 9 a. m. and usually jump into conversation with Tim about or Bea about something new I think we should be trying for Hook and our clients until I remember my first priority is to brew a cup of coffee. Then, I’ll head into my office and prioritize what I need to get done for the day. Every day is different, and typically requires attempting new things that we can apply to our clients work. As much as there is repetition to monthly activities, I always want to incorporate new strategic/creative thinking. Suddenly it’s 1:30pm and everyone is itching to stretch their legs, so we take a late lunch walk to the river, regardless of the weather. To wrap up the day I like to ‘think out loud’, so, I find time to talk with Tim and leave feeling excited for new things to accomplish the rest of the week.
Day in the life of Bea Bonte – Brand Strategist:
As brand strategist at Hook Agency, my role consists of many changes and pivots and is continuously evolving. When Tim and I first teamed up, we had a loose definition of what my role would be, and even in one year, it’s drastically different from what it began as. Through tweaks, and growth, I have become more and more efficient, and am able to see the work provide success for our clients.
My daily tasks rotate depending on the timeline of the month, but on an average day I split my time between managing and strategizing on my clients social accounts, and project managing our SEO and web design clients.
Morning:
I start my day by doing an audit of social profiles, and scheduling posts for the week ahead. I try to keep these in a continuous rotation so that our clients feeds are always fresh and regularly producing valuable content. I use a great tool called buffer that schedules out social posts and provides ideal post times, so that content is seen when the audience is likely online. It’s a great tool for agencies, as well as business who are trying to DIY their social media. I don’t like to say it’s “set and forget” because, I always like to check in on comments, responses, etc. but it is a good way to know what your posts will look like for the week ahead.
Afternoon:
In the summer we love to take a mid-day walk. This is a great way to refresh my energy, and reset for the rest of the day. Working in the North Loop is awesome, and the walk along the river can’t be beat! After our walk I like to switch gears to brand/content strategy for our SEO. This consists of me scheduling and posting blog posts that we’ve had written for their site, or adding content to landing pages. I also work with Tim and Seth to develop and mold the content strategy for the upcoming months and assign content to our copywriter. This process is ever evolving as we work to make it better and better for our clients, and tailor content to what is happening/trending at the time. Being able to make the pivots in a timely matter is one of my favorite parts of working in a small team. Working in a corporate office prior to this, I saw how slowly everything moved, and how long it took for changes to happen. Now, if we determine an opportunity for improvement we can implement it relatively quickly. That means more success for our clients!
End of the Day:
The last hour of the day I like to do a clean up of any loose ends I might have missed during the day. I also take this time to go through my list and see what I accomplished during the day, and what I’m going to work on the next day. With all of the changes throughout the day it’s nice to have to-do lists to look at and refocus. I wasn’t a list maker for a large part of my life, but now, I find them essential and almost relaxing!
A Day in the Life of Tim Brown, the Owner
I show up around 8 a.m. every day and tend to our own sales and marketing before starting in on client work – make a few calls, perhaps publish a video on Facebook (like our GoogleLikesIt.com series), and sometimes tend to ‘digital emergencies’ like if a client needs something quickly. I try to make myself super available, because that’s something I didn’t like about previous agencies I’ve worked for – lack of clear communication. Yes that means I’m at people’s beck and call, but it makes for a better process I think.
I have a buffer hour at the beginning of the day 9-10, and 4:30-5:30 for this kind of stuff, and to be available to Seth and Bea. I then get to work on whatever the meat and potatoes work of the day is – whether it be wire-framing a website design, strategizing about the placement of elements – or working on processes to upgrade our content strategy for clients. To me it all feels like one thing – answering the question “how can we make the most effective websites possible for our clients.” Sometimes that’s technical SEO, sometimes that’s content strategy and back-linking efforts through outreach – and sometimes that’s redesigning a website or a page to convert more of their traffic they are getting into paid customers.
I usually have a meeting or two – whether it be with a client or referral partner / a kickoff project or a monthly check-in sometime in the afternoon, and maybe a sales call at some point. We also work with highly trusted contractors for things like blog post writing, and some busy work on design and website development – and so I have days and hour periods where I work directly with them getting details cleaned up, or helping make things easier to use, or more targeted at the key strategic goals for the clients. I think of my efforts with the 80/20 rule, where I spend as much time on those crucial 20% of the details and strategy that are responsible for the most positive results.
