From Immigrant to Self-Taught Digital Marketer with Roman Prokopchuk
Roman Prokopchuk is an interesting fellow. Moving from Ukraine to New Jersey in the United States, he was a first generation immigrant. However, he interned with the Secret Service and is now a Digital Marketer, running his business NovaZoraDigital.
Roman is also busy with his podcast, Digital Savage Experience.He cares for his two dogs and lovely foster children. At 35, Roman we take our hats off to you! In this podcast, Roman discusses his entrance into the digital marketing industry and his success as a Digital Marketer.
First steps to becoming a Digital Marketer
Roman was encouraged by a friend to “go and learn SEO.” Now, that is easier said than done, but Roman’s passion for digital marketing, SEO and social media meant he was motivated to be the best he could be.
Given the opportunity, and the desire to learn, means anything is possible. Roman is a beacon when it comes to that. He didn’t know anything about SEO but he ran with the chance he was given.
Ready, Steady, Go…
Roman read up on SEO and digital marketing so that he could get stuck in with his friend’s business. He evaluated weaknesses and he he considered improvements that were high in value. He worked there for two months and was then employed by LexisNexis. The opportunity of a friend allowed him to move onto something bigger. It just goes to show what taking a chance on someone can do!
NovaZoraDigital
There are people out there that do, and there are lots of people who say. These are practitioners and generalists.
However, Roman has hands-on experience with creating different campaigns and he has worked with different disciplines of digital marketing. He’s been a specialist strategist, a manager, director and founder. Also, Roman has worked in different industries. For example he was worked in the financial, life sciences, legal, e-commerce and fitness sectors. His experiences have been great for business. After all, a range of experiences makes for a flexible Digital Marketer. They can apply their knowledge to any company and can make digital marketing work for them. For Roman, this is exactly the case, which makes him an excellent Digital Marketer to go to!
The best ways to improve your digital marketing, now
- Video – a core video can establish who you are what makes you stand out from your competitors. Use video to build your brand and shows what makes you unique in terms of the people, business values, and what you do outside of the office (charitable giving, for example).
- Audio – podcasts are growing. As a business, having a podcast can generate leads and target the specific target-audience more efficiently.
Digital Marketer’s typical engagement path
A lot of Roman’s clients are by referral. They are based on previous results and companies he has worked with in the industry. He runs a free consultation – it is important to create a relationship and trust and this shouldn’t be a paid effort.
If the consultation moves forward, doing an audit is important as a digital marketer. It allows them to know:
- what has been done in the past
- what’s problematic in terms of what the client is doing
- how a digital marketer’s help can improve what has been done
A plan or contract can then be proposed to move forward, whether short-term or long-term.
Digital Marketers and making video
Business videos can be created by the business and be optimised by the digital marketer or the digital marketer can facilitate the making of the video. They can develop a script or a story line depending on what type of video it is.
It may be a branded video which can be kept for a longer duration of time – this usually established business values. It may be a specific product video.
Digital Savage Experience Podcast
Roman has produced 114 live episodes of this podcast. He has also interviewed 80 people; CEOs, start-up founders, athletes, authors and people from all kinds of professions and walks of life.
‘Why the name’ is probably what you’re wondering. It sounds rather, well, savage! The meaning behind it is that you have to be savage to learn and to succeed independently from others. Nobody is going to hand success to you; you have to go out and take it.
Website development essentials
Landing pages are a must – these draw in traffic.
Optimisation is also key. The experience has to match what that desired-person is looking for. If the design doesn’t match but the page is optimised, the search engine is appeased only. The avatar must be appeased to keep them on your site and engaged with your business. You do not want them to bounce to the next result.
Our podcast with Daniel Burstein advises further on how to create solid we pages and the reasons why people bounce.
Self-taught SEO
SEO is Roman’s favourite aspect of digital marketing. He could do it in his sleep! However, being self-taught, it wasn’t easy. Only reading a book isn’t good enough though – as a good writer of SEO, you constantly have to test and see what works across the board.
Four top tips for SEO
- If it’s a local business, have your google local optimised – have the right radius, the right categories selected.
- Content strategy – do research ahead of time, track your ranking and understand user behaviour in order to produce better content.
- Establish and understand your audience – develop a few personas and create content for those personas.
- Make sure to have a social presence – those links are important and give you credibility. Most businesses today have a social media account to build your brand.
Digital marketers and businesses: a partnership
Ultimately, the outcome of Roman’s work is a partnership. Working with reputable companies who share the same values, a digital marketer is an extension of those businesses. If the business or rand succeeds, then the digital marketer succeeds too.
Get noticed as an upcoming podcast
The podcast space is getting a little chaotic. As a business it can help if you already have an established client-base, as this means you have an established listener-base. When your podcast goes live you can email them so that they know, ask them to subscribe and to, of course, listen!
Social media is also essential for promoting your podcast. For business, Roman suggests LinkedIn as they can create a business page for your podcast. This information goes a lot further than facebook, however still use Facebook and Instagram. Every little helps here.
The Next 100 Days Podcast
Our podcast is about us giving. It doesn’t generate a lot of leads but that’s okay, because we are bothered about making a difference. However, it is an interesting question to ask “Should you be more generalist or specific?”
Roman suggests that, if you’re general, you can have candid conversations and engage with a networking opportunity that offers value to listeners. That’s a good answer for us!
Concluding thoughts
Roman strives to be better, constantly. It’s such a positive attitude to have – to learn, to grow and to invest that growth in businesses that makes differences. The start of his journey began with someone giving him a chance. Who can you give a chance?
The next 100 days podcast is sponsored by Linked Professionally and is brought to you by Kevin Appleby and Graham Arrowsmith
