(interview with Viktoria Grom)

“Hello, Viktoria! Can you tell me about yourself? And about your profession?”

“Hi! Yeah, sure. I’m a marketing specialist. Marketing includes different kinds of occupational areas. I was working as a junior brand manager at my previous job. My job responsibilities included administration of social media (SMM) and website, work with any kind of documentation, payment, communication with supplies, event management, cause we organized about 1-2 events a month.

Is there something you want to know more specific?”

“Wow, you had so many responsibilities! Could you tell me more about your SMM experience? What did you – you’ve created content or managed people?”

“Yes, we had a small marketing team due to the company situation at that moment. A lot of work was doing outsource, but still, I had to manage almost all of this work.

About SMM – I managed people, we had a contract with an SMM agency, they created content for us due to content plan. Also, we had a rebranding at the company during the first month of my work there. We had a new design, a new logo, colours, etc. And it was kind of a challenge when you had to understand how to work with this “new brand” and how to explain to your outsource team what you want to do from them.” She smiles.

“So, mostly, your work was about your company’s brand, wasn’t it? What is the ‘company’s brand’ for you?”

“Well, my position was named as a brand manager, so yeah, almost all my work was about the company’s brand. Haha, it’s kind of hard to say it in few words, especially when you know the definition of what is brand, brand management, etc. Okay, first of all, the company’s brand is what people feel, think, and talk about your company. I would say like that:).”

“Okay, but how do you create this atmosphere around your company? Is it about SMM, events, and design?”

“It’s about all of these and more. About SMM, about how employees communicate with clients and suppliers, about the company’s values, about the quality of services, you provide, about events and if they’re useful for your customers, about the way you talk in social media, about colours and logo, even about your tone of voice and smile during the conversation. About how do you think about your company and represent this vision.”

“Could you tell me about some f*ck-ups in brand management? They can be someone else’s;). Do you like to know about the last scandal in ‘Knigarnya Ye?’ ”

“To be honest, there are a lot of f*ck-ups in brand management, just some of them people notice, and some of them not. Of course, I heard about the scandal with ‘Knygarnia Ye.’ I think it happened mostly because of miscommunication and maybe not really high level at communication in general. To push this red button (all that relates to Russia) is very dangerous nowadays, for businesses I mean.

As for me, I always bought only Ukrainian books with Ukrainian translation, and I’m gonna continue doing it at this bookstore chain and others, so…”

“Oh, I see. Thank you for such a splendid and sparkling interview! Have a nice day!”

October 7, 2020