A Marketer’s Journey with Corina Maria Scheianu

Welcome to Marketer Interview, the leading blog for marketing professionals seeking valuable insights and inspiration.

In today’s interview, we enjoyed speaking with Corina Maria Scheianu, a highly accomplished Chief Digital Officer at Digital Star.

With a diverse range of content, leadership, and advertising expertise, Corina has significantly impacted online communication strategy, social media marketing, and media relations.

How did you enter the marketing field, and what sparked your interest?

My marketing journey was serendipitous, sparked by a fortuitous stint at an avant-garde digital newspaper during my university years.

My mentor’s encouragement to implement university-learned strategies led me to discover a passion for digital marketing and laid the groundwork for my professional pursuits.

Surrounded by passionate individuals with a startup mentality, I’ve developed my skills, translating complex concepts for our clients and implementing marketing strategies that would shape my career trajectory.

One of my earliest responsibilities was building and organizing a massive database. This task honed my technical skills and laid the foundation for my ability to translate technical concepts into layman’s terms for our clients.

During this time, I also started to implement marketing strategies for the magazine, which I studied at university, and this was my first significant foray into the world of marketing.

What responsibilities do you handle daily as a Chief Digital Officer at Digital Star?

As the CDO at Digital Star, I strategically orchestrate our digital marketing campaigns.

We are shaping our campaigns to feel like music, and our role is orchestrating it. This entails an in-depth understanding of our business and market to align our digital efforts with our overarching goals. I also guide and develop our team, fostering an environment of creativity, innovation, and problem-solving. Additionally, my role extends to nurturing client relationships, ensuring we consistently deliver gold-standard digital solutions.

Beyond this, I’m tasked with managing and developing our digital marketing team, ensuring they are constantly evolving in their skills. I’ve built a fantastic team over the past five years that thrives on innovation, creativity, and problem-solving.

Each small success we achieve collectively contributes to our growth and reinforces our reputation as a digital agency capable of providing solutions for any business challenge.

In your experience as an online project manager, how do you effectively coordinate internal and external efforts to develop successful online campaigns?

When managing online projects, I’ve found that the key to success lies in two critical elements: communication and planning. Internally, setting clear objectives and defining everyone’s roles helps keep everyone on the same page.

Setting clear objectives ensures internal alignment while engaging with our clients, enabling us to capture their vision and translate it into our work. Every team member is imbued with a sense of responsibility, leading to effective collaboration and resolution of issues.

Creating an environment that encourages creative problem-solving and collaboration is also essential. Externally, our clients need to feel engaged and heard throughout the process. This involves regular updates, understanding their vision, and accurately capturing it in our work. Developing successful online campaigns often involves complex processes, and, as I often say, “If it was easy, anyone could do it.”

As a key account manager, what strategies do you employ to maintain strong client relationships and deliver measurable results in online communication services?

As a key account manager, I subscribe to a client-centric approach, maintaining strong relationships by understanding client’s needs and expectations.

Our approach to client relationships is based on transparency and collaboration. We position ourselves as partners rather than just service providers. We’re committed to creating lasting relationships with clients who value this approach.

While no relationship is perfect, we continually strive to enhance our interactions and deliver measurable results that align with our client’s objectives.

Business development plays a crucial role in driving growth. Can you provide insights into how you identify and tap into business growth opportunities within the digital communication landscape?

Business development is indeed a vital factor in driving growth.

To identify opportunities, I keep my finger on the pulse of industry trends and advancements as it’s my passion to attend big conferences (both local and international) actively, write monthly articles about Digital news (on our agency’s blog), and engage with people smarter than me.

Knowledge is power; being aware of shifts in the market can reveal avenues for potential growth. After identifying these opportunities, the next step is strategizing how to tap into them, which could involve developing new service offerings, realigning our marketing strategies, or forming strategic partnerships.

What approaches do you take as a team leader to motivate your teams, assign tasks, and ensure timely project implementation while fostering a creative environment?

My approach to motivation is built around respect, empathy, and empowerment. I recognize individual strengths within the team and assign tasks accordingly to promote growth and job satisfaction.

Encouraging a collaborative and creative environment helps spark innovation and keeps morale high. Regarding project implementation, I rely on efficient project management tools and methodologies to ensure timeliness without compromising quality.

I believe in cultivating creativity within the team. It’s not a trait you’re born with: It’s something to nurture through reading, participating in events, and staying informed about market trends.

This process motivates the team, stimulates innovative ideas, and ultimately leads to successful project implementation. We work as a unit where every team member understands their responsibility, which facilitates task assignment and timely execution of projects.

With your expertise in media and blogger relations, could you elaborate on the importance of these relationships in the success of online campaigns?

Collaborating with influencers and media outlets is crucial to the success of our online campaigns. These relationships serve as bridges, connecting brands to a broader audience.

Building and maintaining these relationships involves understanding their needs, offering value, and creating synergies. The aim is to gain exposure and create lasting partnerships that benefit both parties.

We’ve established internal processes that enable us to move quickly when an influencer collaboration is required and to ensure that our briefs are thoroughly understood to minimize the need for feedback rounds. This efficiency has allowed us to launch campaigns at impressive speeds. We maintain a database of influencers we update every three months, which lets us promptly respond to requests.

How do you approach media planning and copywriting to ensure cohesive and engaging messaging across various digital platforms?

Media planning and copywriting are two sides of the same coin in digital marketing. It starts with understanding our target audience, their preferences, and behaviors.

This information drives the media plan, choosing the right platforms to convey our message. Copywriting is about creating compelling, coherent messages that resonate with our audience, ensuring consistency across all platforms to maintain our brand image.

The campaign we are currently running for Hochland – mentioned above (in collaboration with other agencies – as we are all in this together), is an excellent example of a well-coordinated effort across multiple platforms, including TV.

We’ve found an excellent opportunity to integrate our campaign into a popular TV show, “Love Island,” making our messaging highly contextual. Regardless of the medium, we’re always mindful of the context and explore it thoroughly. At times, digital is just an expression, as we don’t live only in the digital world; we understand the need for cohesive messaging across all platforms.

Can you share some effective strategies for social media marketing that you have implemented throughout your career?

Regarding social media marketing, my strategies are always centered around engagement and authenticity.

The strategy in social media marketing is similar to life: providing solutions creatively. This can involve many tactics, from creating compelling and relatable content, organizing interactive polls or quizzes, and collaborating with influencers who resonate with our brand.

Every successful campaign we’ve developed was grounded in deeply understanding our target audience and their needs. We’ve always focused on engaging them with creative content that doesn’t just capture their attention, solve their problems, or answer their questions.

What essential tools and software do you rely on for your job as a Chief Digital Officer, and how do they contribute to your success?

We use various platforms, from social listening to inspiration and analysis tools. Google Analytics, Sprtinklr, FameUp, and Hootsuite are among the many we utilize.

These tools provide us with a comprehensive view of our efforts, allowing us to draw conclusions and identify areas for improvement. The combination of these insights contributes significantly to the success of our agency and our campaigns.

As an active presence on social media, how do you leverage your brand to provide insightful digital communication expertise and strategic planning?

As I have an active presence on social media, I leverage my brand to share insights, provide expert commentary, and facilitate discussions around digital communication. I believe in the power of thought leadership to enhance my personal brand and contribute to the broader industry discourse.

I’m more of a get-things-done person, and my approach to any issue is with a sense of humor, whether it’s from my personal life or professional sphere. Therefore, my profiles usually contain theater plays or book recommendations or feature contextual and amusing content. In addition, on my blog, I share travel recommendations as I am an enormous travel enthusiast, and I believe this stimulates creativity.

As for the agency’s blog, I share industry updates there, as all these activities not only allow me to express myself, contribute to the industry, and provide valuable insights to my followers.