Tom Walsh is head of marketing at digital product agency Tangent.
With over seven years of industry experience, Walsh started his career in hospitality marketing with Hilton before transitioning to the marketing services space in 2018. He then spent over five years in senior in-house marketing roles at agency group UNLIMITED, now part of Accenture Song.
Walsh joined Tangent in May 2023 and has already made a big impact, recently shortlisted as Prolific Marketer of the Year at the Prolific North Marketing Awards 2024.
From job skills to marketing challenges, he shares his career journey with some words of advice…
How did you first get into your industry?
After graduating, I joined Hilton on a graduate programme designed to fast track for management. But near enough every day on the job I found myself leaning more and more towards tasks oriented around business development and marketing – I set the hotel up on Instagram, took charge of the TripAdvisor page and web page maintenance and rolled out seasonal offers to drive revenue in the outlets. When I recognised I had a taste for it, I left my role and pursued a Master’s in International Marketing and diploma in hand I was able to take my first step on the marketing ladder.
What do you love about your job?
I get to be creative every day in my job. Whilst I do appreciate that’s not everyone’s idea of a good time, it’s definitely mine.
Even some of the less sexy or glamorous parts of a marketer’s remit that appear to be void of any creativity on the surface can have hidden layers that are rich territory for an injection of creativity, when inspiration strikes…
What are the biggest challenges about your job?
Marketers, especially in-house marketers like myself, more often than not have an extremely wide remit that spans content production, PR, email marketing, paid and organic social, face to face and online events, PPC, SEO, awards, sometimes even design and this is before you take into account planning, reporting and managing a team or any third party support services.
Having the time and headspace to commit 100% to each discipline every time is a rarity. Equally, the demands of agency life often mean focussing on those endeavours that deliver revenue in order to hit targets and deliver financially for the business, at the cost of other areas you see value in but can’t necessarily give your all to.
I’m blessed to work at an agency that values the full marketing mix (even when it is not pure lead gen) and is open to experimentation, and my advice to managers and CEO’s out there would be to definitely challenge your marketing teams and definitely not compromise on the commercial drive, but also to give them freedom and resource to explore and think outside of the box.
What skills have been the most crucial to you succeeding in your career so far?
I’ve always taken an evolutionary mindset in how I approach marketing (and actually, my life a little bit too). Are there new ways for me to reach my audiences? Are there tools or techniques old or new that we’ve yet to try or could put a new spin on? Can we push the boundaries on this a little bit further? With each campaign, I ask myself what could I do differently or how could I cleverly make this cut through the increasingly cluttered marketplace.
I think it’s so important to keep evolving your craft both to drive results for the business, but also just to keep yourself stimulated! And, by extension, you too can evolve in your role. After all, there are few marketers I know who get truly excited by doing the same thing, the same way every single time…
What was your first salary and what could someone getting into the industry expect to earn nowadays?
When I started in marketing in 2017 I was working in South West London and paid £22k, though this was in the hospitality industry which is not a famously well paid industry, especially among juniors. When I made the move to B2B agency land as an in-house marketer in 2018, my salary rose to £30k.
It’s my opinion that marketers – and many other professionals – are expected to know too much and have years of experience up front at entry level and be paid too little for it as well! Depending on education, prior experience and location variables, as well as what is to be expected responsibility-wise of the incoming candidate, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to see a junior marketer paid between £26-£32k. And let me tell you, most of them will work hard for it and bring a thirst/energy that will invigorate your team – something you can’t put a price on!
What education or training would be most useful for someone looking to follow your career path?
In truth, when I started in marketing most of my activity called more on what I knew innately/instinctively rather than anything I had studied. I’m grateful to have my Master’s and while I did learn a lot and consider it one of the crucial credentials that qualified me for my entry position and made me stand out from competitors, I think it’s important to stay true to your own instinct and judgement too as you make decisions in your job and around your career progression.
If you’ve chosen this path, it’s more likely because you’ve recognised that spark of creativity – or whatever else it is internally – that has pushed you towards marketing, rather than anything you’ve read in a book or studied at school or university. Honour and nurture that and it will steer you well.
What advice would you have for someone looking to follow your path?
It’s important to absorb everything you can from those around you, keep an open mind and continuously hone your craft through evolution and experimentation – it will serve you down the line.
Marketing is notoriously difficult to demonstrate return upon and as a result it’s very easy to be drawn towards the “fluffier” parts of marketing and forget that we still need to prove our value and drive return on investment. Persevere and look for the business impact in every marketing endeavour you undertake.
