The world wouldn’t turn without account managers there to hold it on its axis.
The Influence Agency’s account management department is made up of 12 extremely talented individuals who thrive in any situation thrown their way. Acting as the main points of contact between our clients and operations specialists, they are essential to providing helpful insights so we can execute strategies that WIN.
In this blog, our two department leads—Kitty Lana Carr, Account Director, Creative Services and John Bastawrous, Account Director, Digital Marketing—share the work that the account management team helps execute for our clients. Let’s dive right in!
The Client Success Manager (CSM) team at The Influence Agency is responsible for managing all of our active clients. Each day, we communicate with clients and liaise with the operations team to ensure tasks are completed and we are supporting our clients’ marketing with the latest and most thoughtful strategies.
These are a few of the tasks the CSM team executes:
CSM: John Bastawrous & Kaela Johnson
When it was announced that NCAA athletes would be permitted to sell their name, image, and likeness (NIL) and enter into paid endorsement deals for the first time, our client Six Star Pro Nutrition immediately approached us with a “My First Dollar” campaign. The client came to us on June 30th and was looking for content to go live on July 1st at midnight. We immediately reached out to notable college athletes for the campaign and were able to confirm Edgar Padilla Jr. who was able to deliver work within the tight turnaround. He made the first post at midnight on a historic day.
This monumental campaign earned TIA a mention in a Sports Business Journal article and the client decided to move forward with contracting additional college athletes!
CSM: John Bastawrous
Staples Canada engaged The Influence Agency in late 2021 to support the launch of their Top Gifts for the Holidays Guide. Upon receiving the request, we instantly suggested working with notable Canadian influencers in each of the “Top Gifts” spaces in an effort to appeal to every demographic Staples Canada was looking to reach. In less than 30 days, the Top Gifts campaign was live and TIA worked with the likes of Emily Durham and Andres Vidoza, just to name a few. The campaign was a huge success generating over 1.6M impressions and a whopping 36% engagement rate!
A month later, Staples Canada re-engaged The Influence Agency for another influencer campaign in February to support their in-store giveaway: the Great Home Office Upgrade Giveaway Event. To align with the theme while making it more appealing to social users, we coined our campaign: the #LoveWhereYouWork Giveaway. We partnered with influencers across Canada to showcase a transformation of their old home office spaces into new and improved home office spaces, with a little help from Staples’ modernized work-from-home, home office products. The results were once again incredible! We generated over 2.2M impressions and a low cost-per-engagement of $0.05. The rest is history.
Since these campaigns, The Influence Agency is now officially Staples Canada’s social media management and influencer marketing agency!
CSM: Kitty Lana Carr
KOHO is a FinTech company rooted in the belief that better financial solutions for all Canadians exist.
In this campaign, influencers created stories documenting their shopping day and created a static carousel post at each of their favourite stores with their KOHO card. We leveraged micro and macro-influencers in various categories including gaming, finance, lifestyle, and food to speak to the unique value propositions KOHO offers for each category. We saw over 2 million impressions and an engagement rate over 175% higher than the industry average.
This campaign drove relevant brand awareness in key target demographics and educated consumers about the benefits of KOHO.
CSM: Jackie Tambosso
HelloFresh is a healthy meal-kit company that delivers convenient, delicious, and easy-to-make food to your door each week!
HelloFresh signed on for an influencer marketing program to generate awareness around their yummy and healthy meal kits. The Influence Agency worked with macro-influencers across Canada in the food, parenting and lifestyle space to promote a meal of their choice on Instagram. After a successful campaign, we generated over 1 million impressions, and saw engagement rates 200% over the industry standard!
When the company first started, the four partners (or VPs) were managing all of the client accounts. They hired their first CSM and intern a year and a half into the inception of the company and focused on developing processes and building out each service offering.
Today, the CSM team has 12 members, each managing a variety of clients across different industries and business sizes. The Influence Agency has really been focusing on acquiring clients who are looking to execute a variety of services. As CSMs are trained to know the ins and outs of SEO, paid media, influencer marketing, content marketing, web development, etc. This allows them to provide a holistic digital marketing approach to their clients.
The one thing that each CSM has in common with one another is passion! Each CSM contributes hours of energy brainstorming, ideating, and project managing the production of award-winning work that keeps accounts thriving and clients satisfied. That passion is what makes each team member so special, and so integral in helping uphold The Influence Agency’s mission statement: one thriving company that elevates our clients and enriches our people.
Why don’t you get to know our team members?
Kayla always has a smile on her face and goes the extra mile to connect with her clients. Whether you are chatting to Kayla about the latest episode of the Bachelor, or she is helping you nail your influencer marketing, she will always make you smile!
Sonia is a ray of sunshine and is never afraid of getting deep into the numbers and analyzing results to tell a meaningful story. She always takes extra time to provide a personalized touch to her client interactions to make sure they feel special!
Dave is one of our digital marketing gurus! He’s got a knack for interpreting data from many different angles and has the ability to extract key insights that when actioned, yield a positive impact for his clients. He also loves craft beer and pizza. Who doesn’t!
Ace brings incredible energy and confidence to the team with her thorough knowledge of digital marketing. She takes time to understand things, gets to know her surroundings very well, takes tons of notes, and, most importantly, has a killer fashion sense from head to toe!
Jackie is vibrant, detail-oriented, and there isn’t much that can be said or done that will throw her completely out of whack. She is relaxed in the face of any contention and has insightful conversations with her clients that consistently yield better performance. Her account management skills and her shoe game have one key thing in common: both are simply FIRE!
Sari is a ball of energy with an energy that is simply contagious. Her people skills make her a fan-favourite with her clients and the many influencers that she works with for her campaigns. You won’t catch Sari without a Starbucks in hand, and you best believe she got some good credit card points with her purchase!
KJ is a force to be reckoned with who is organized and driven to deliver the best possible client service. She has brought confidence and drive since day one at The Influence Agency and is always challenging herself to level up.
Ethan is a confident coordinator who is always shooting for the stars. He’s the first to raise his hand during group discussions and asks many questions which the ultimate intent of bettering himself. Be sure to like, comment, and subscribe to his YouTube channel to REALLY get to know Ethan!
Chelsea is our silent assassin in the CSM Department! She takes the time to get to know her clients very well and does everything in her power to contribute to their success. Bonus: If you catch her at the office there’s a good chance she’ll have some chocolates on hand for ya!
Sarah is such a sweet member of the TIA Team! You can always count on her to have an adorable puppy on her lap in any given meeting. She is also the go-to for all that is trending on TikTok!
This wouldn’t be a department spotlight without some input from TIA’s VP of Business Development, Tom Yawney! Here’s what he has to say about our two directors of the CSM department:
When you set out to start a business, you are mostly thinking about survival. Kitty was the fourth person to join TIA back in late 2018, and she joined right as we were shifting from survival into a growth stage. It is especially fun and gratifying to reflect on Kitty’s growth because it mirrors that of this entire group.
Kitty did not study marketing in school, and she wasn’t media trained in a traditional fashion. But she always had raw talent and skills that were very transferable to this industry. It was clear during her interviews, and she hasn’t looked back ever since! Kitty’s career path at TIA is also a great lesson for young people starting their careers. There was a time that Kitty was extremely uncomfortable speaking in a client meeting—but now she leads with conviction and certainty. With some hard work, patience and a willingness to try—it’s amazing what an individual can accomplish. Kitty’s confidence, knowledge, and overall abilities have continued to grow and expand, and she is really just scratching the surface. We are very lucky to have Kitty on the team and excited about what the future holds.
John represents the rare type of person whose efforts line up exactly with his ambitions. There are a lot of people out there who want great things, but aren’t willing to put in the work or make the sacrifices. Alternatively, there are lots of people who have all the talent in the world, but lack the conviction and self-belief to make it happen. If you spend time with John, you will be struck by his dedication, determination, work ethic, and ability to connect.
John has always had a vision for his professional career, and he has been dogged in his pursuit. He is a great example of an individual that has actively worked to grow and improve. When he is dealt a setback, he doesn’t dwell. John quickly pivots toward solutions—which is one of the most important abilities for anyone working in account management. John sets a wonderful example for the CSM team, and we are very lucky to have him here at TIA!
Thank you, Tom! You can have the mic back now, John and Kitty 🙂
The biggest accomplishment our department has achieved is the high retention of our clients and that our largest clients come back to TIA year after year with up to double the budgets as they know our team will bring incredible results and be there to support them.
Our department always has our ear to the ground when it comes to platform updates, new features, and best practices when it comes to our programs. With new features on TikTok and Instagram being released regularly, our team is excited to take advantage of those for our clients.
Knowledge sharing is a big goal for our team as each CSM has a different skill set. We are looking forward to learning from each other and lifting each other up as a team!
The people! We all work together so well and no one has an ego about how things should be done. At the end of the day, we all want the best for our clients and that shines in the work we do and the client relationships we have built!
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