Marco Valentinsig, a different view of marketing
Born in Gorizia, a small Italian town, Marco Valentinsig graduated from IUAV in Venice before becoming the youngest marketing manager in all of northern Italy. With his desire to grow personally and professionally, Marco earned a doctorate in visual communications arts and created the first marketing office in one of the largest design companies in the luxury sector.
Always passionate about marketing, he trained on the net by himself and then participated in speech numbers in the sector. After seven years of managerial management, he opened his company called Beliked, a marketing consultancy company formed by creators and influencers who oppose the web agency tradition that has now saturated the advertising market.
Tell us about you and what you do.
I am 32 years old and I live in the northern part of Italy on the border with Slovenia. I’ve always been interested in the digital side of things and communication has captured my attention from the first moment I met it. I grew up with social networks, forums, and portals and I started working for the creation of online communities at the age of 14. Today I have a company called Beliked and I mainly deal with B2B social communication.
What inspired you to pursue a career in marketing?
People inspired me. My relationship with marketing was born in a personal field, I have never been able to express myself well either at school or with family or friends, however, I realized that changing what I was saying also changed the reaction I got, I began to get interested in the discipline. The marketing sector is very similar to the communication of people, everything is the same and nobody tries to change.
What kind of management style do you prefer?
In recent years I have seen different managerial typologies, many still adopt a vertical style, I prefer horizontal management. I am referring to internal company communication, therefore with my collaborators and suppliers both as regards the communication strategy that I recreate for my customers. Top-down management as far as I’m concerned is dead and it’s about an old and poorly performing business model.
What do you think are the three essential skills for a career in marketing?
In my opinion, there are no three standard skills, everyone can work well in marketing and take different forms. The great thing about this sector is that it gives the opportunity to become extremely different professionals capable of bringing value to the market. However, information certainly plays a key role regardless of the skills you have, it is a very dynamic profession and what binds us as professionals is information.
What social media channels are you familiar with?
I work on all social media, I have worked a lot with Snapchat and Twitter and at the same time always with Facebook and Instagram. Today I’m focusing a lot on Tik Tok and Tripadvisor, they are two marketing pearls and few have understood it, in fact, I was the first to launch a course for companies on these two platforms in Italy. I really like the world of tourism, I believe that catering and hotels have yet to fully flourish and I want to help these sectors take a strong position online. I like to go where others aren’t there yet.
How would you manage a new product launch?
Before launching a product, you need to know the company you work for. The product must not only have excellent communication but must also be accompanied by commercial support, pr and above all, it is necessary to find a trigger on social media that is able to recreate a flywheel of attention so that the community promotes in a way independent the message. Furthermore, the launch does not only concern the initial part but above all the final post-launch part, in which the follow up must be decisive.
