Meet Our Guest Speaker
As a former Longhorn and Moody graduate, Dayle Magill gave us some great insight into her career journey. Although she has her dream job as VP, Client Operations & Data Services at PMG now, it was not always that way. Magill had to experience a lot before discovering her dream company and role. Coming from someone experienced in the marketing industry, it is nice to hear that the reality of many career trajectories is not linear. There are a lot of ups and downs before you find where you belong. So don’t worry if you don’t know what you want to do! You have all the time to figure it out. Magill provided us with her own story as an example in the hope that it would help to inspire others.
Undergraduate Experience
Dayle Magill’s undergraduate experience was very versatile. Here is what her undergraduate experience looked like:
-Marketing Intern at Book People
-Sales Associate at Ann Taylor
-Advertising Intern at Kolar
Although they all differed, Magill emphasized that she appreciated every one of her experiences. She said that even in her role at PMG, she carries what she learned from these jobs as an undergrad. Skills like creating and uploading book descriptions to a CMS helped her with organizing data, distributing flyers provided grassroots experience, customer service helped her develop skills for people-facing roles, and the list goes on.
The moral of the story here is don’t discount what you are learning as an undergraduate student! All experience is good experience. So don’t sell yourself short.
Post-Graduate Experience
Dayle Magill’s first job post-graduation was with Captura. She described this experience as her intro to paid research, which as we know is a huge deal just a few years later. Here are some of the invaluable skills she learned with Captura:
•SEO
•Web Development
•Account Service
•Paid Search Management (in Google and Yahoo)
•Optimization Strategy
•Copy Writing
•Reporting Insights
If you are interested in a similar career to Magill, these hard skills are a great place to start. But what learning experiences did she take away from Captura besides hard skills? Well, working with a small company gave Magill the ability to understand campaigns in a more in-depth hands-on way. Being at a smaller company gave her a lot of autonomy, allowing her more freedom to explore the ins and outs of the process. A great piece of advice she gave on this was that “for a lot of jobs you don’t have a rubric, don’t be afraid of that.”
“For a lot of jobs you don’t have a rubric, don’t be afraid of that.”
Dayle Magill, VP, Client Operations & Data Services at PMG
Working at a small company like Captura made the transfer to Range a big change for Magill. Going from a team of 5 to a company that works in 80 countries taught Magill about the importance of making employees feel valued. During her time at Range, she described feeling more like a number. This influenced a lot of her work now at PMG, where she makes sure to make every employee feel like their contributions are unique and appreciated. She described this form of leadership as servant leadership.
Now, at PMG, Magill can apply all her previous experience with account management and campaign execution. She described PMG as a place where employees are allowed to forge their own way and a place where she can bring to life her ideas with the help of the great minds at PMG.
About PMG
“Be the most respected global independent digital company powered by technology and amazing people.” This is PMG’s vision and the basis for its company culture. As you can probably tell from this statement, PMG deeply values the contributions of its employees. Here are some of PMG’s most admirable qualities:
-No shareholders (company focus is not diverted!)
-Not worried about investments
-Did not lay off a single employee during the pandemic
-Think of themselves as a company, not an agency
-People are considered their biggest asset!
-AdAge #1 best place to work
PMG’s Core Values
A company’s core values are always a good indication of its culture, and PMG’s core values are no exception. Below I have listed them out so you can decide for yourself.
PMG’s Core Values: Do the right thing, Always change for the better, Embrace challenges as opportunities, Be inclusive, and Have fun
For starters, I think we can all agree that Have fun is the best core value ever made. But in all seriousness, PMG takes its core values very seriously and makes sure to implement them into its daily company culture. Shared values motivate PMG’s work, and help them to align with their goals.
PMG’s partnerships are also a good reflection of its core values. Their partnership with Tarrant County College, a school composed mostly of women and BIPOC students, works to ensure that career opportunities and resources are available to the undergraduates there. They also pride themselves on their partnership with PMG parents, where they focus on facilitating working parents and providing support for them. These are just two of the dozens of awesome partnerships they currently have, so check out their website https://www.pmg.com/ to learn more!
Beyond their philanthropic involvement, PMG prides itself on its data tech-driven performance. In fact, their very first hires were two engineers. Their investments in data warehouses, their significant tech infrastructure, and their 500 industry-leading professionals, really prove their commitment to tech focus. PMG even sits on advisory boards for Facebook and Google, making them an integral part of building a vision for the tech industry.
Their engineering resources make them especially equipped to deal with integration hurdles. PMG was one of the first organizations to work first-party integration into the Google Ads platform. Plus, they organize hackathons! This is where computer programmers, software developers, and other people in the tech industry, work on a wide array of software projects with their combined knowledge. With data tech at the forefront of the company’s interest, this event is a super productive way to get creative. The best part is that PMG can use all this data to make decisions since there are no stakeholders to consult!
Beats by Dre Case Study
In a super informational case study provided by Magill herself, we can see just how PMG handles a new client, and the progress impact they have made over time.
In 2014, PMG onboarded the notorious headphone brand: Beats by Dre. They came in intending to reach new audiences, so that is what PMG focused on. To execute their goals, Magill listed some key collaborations that had to take place:
-Hero storytelling
-Creative + media informing each other
-Global + local led strategy
-Full e-commerce approach
By approaching their tasks holistically, embracing fluidity, and rejecting rigidity, PMG succeeded in curating a successful campaign. After the launch of PMG’s Beast by Dre campaign, they became the #1 selling headphones. Not only that, but they increased e-commerce sales by 3.5x since Beats by Dre first became a client.
Graduate Leadership Program
If you’ve come this far and you’re thinking PMG might be the right fit for you, I have some great news.
PMG offers a Graduate Leadership Program for graduates interested in getting some hands-on experience. As a part of this program, you get to work alongside PMGers and start working with brands. You will also have access to exclusive media certifications, leadership staff, and even Harvard business professors. If you or someone you know is interested but will be graduating from a master’s program, don’t fret! Those with a master’s degree are welcome as well.
To give you an idea of how the program operates, there will be 8 weeks of the immersive curriculum where you get to learn about media, analytics, strategy, and consulting. At the end of the first 8 weeks, there is a matching process. Based on skillsets you will be assigned to a team. Then you get to start working with brands!
During this 12-month program, you will be put into cohorts, and within those cohorts, you will get a small group. This provides a nice support system for you to have throughout the PMG journey. The entire journey can be summarized in four major phases.
Orientation: Here you will get your cohort and small group
GLP and Track Onboarding: Now you get assigned a track
Capstone Project and Development: This is where you get to learn and show off your skills
Continued Development within Teams: This stage allows you to explore your full potential
Here is where you can apply: https://www.pmg.com/glp
Bits of Wisdom from Dayle Magill
•Lean on all experiences
•Figure it out along the way
•Value strong business fundamentals and vision
•Sometimes you need to outwork them
•Lead by example/Servant leadership
•Be a good partner across the business
•Embrace the challenge
“Your past experience does not dictate your future potential.”
Dayle Magill, VP, Client Operations & Data Services at PMG
WRITTEN BY LAUREN MADRIGAL
TEXAS AMERICAN MARKETING ASSOCIATION 