‘Collaborating with James Bond was such an achievement’
Abigail HealyA self-confessed people person unafraid to challenge the status quo, Black Tomato digital marketing manager Melissa Roberts shares her career trajectory so far
Just like inquisitive Alice in her Wonderland, Melissa Roberts is rather fond of stumbling down a rabbit hole. The 29-year-old senior digital marketing manager at luxury tour operator Black Tomato says the best part of her role is being encouraged to think of new ways to approach everything that the business is doing.
“Whether it is revitalising our email preference centre or refreshing the comms we send out so we know we are hitting people with the right thing at the right time – I’m never fully satisfied,” Melissa laughs.
“I fall down rabbit holes all the time. It’s like, ‘I’ve tripped and stumbled down a rabbit hole. Beware everyone – there will be work coming our way!’
“That’s where Black Tomato is great. My ideas are always welcomed and I’m never told, ‘That’s just how we do it.’”
PATH TO SUCCESS
In 2018 Melissa was working in interior design PR where she discovered what she enjoyed. “I liked to combine creativity and analytical skills,” she quips.
Making the decision to uproot her life to Manchester, where she had been at university, she faced the challenge of finding a new job within a month. A recruiter she was working with flagged a role at tour operator Carrier. Melissa took a look and thought: “Wow, how have I never thought of this before?”
Realising she could have a career in travel was a revelation and now, fully ensconced, she says the industry is a natural fit for her extroverted character and chatty nature.
“It’s great to be able to go out on research trips and integrate into the community. In other sectors I might be tucked away behind a screen somewhere,” she recognises.
The stint at Carrier saw Melissa build her confidence. “Starting out in my career, I knew this was what I wanted to do but being able to test ideas out and realise they were good really gave me that confidence boost,” she explains.
She moved on to Black Tomato three years ago. “Those years have been so transformative and I’ve gained so much confidence in myself. It has reaffirmed that I’m really in the right industry,” she asserts.
NEW CHALLENGES
A career highlight for Melissa came in the guise of a collaboration with the James Bond franchise – for which her team delivered the website. “Seeing the Bond logo on things that I’ve worked on feels like such an achievement. It is the most high-profile collaboration we’ve ever done.”
Another achievement was when she stumbled down one of her rabbit holes, having spotted growing demand in the family market and opportunities to dominate search results. Melissa worked with the product team to create family-friendly itineraries, optimise copy and implement family-specific nurture programmes, developing a well-rounded marketing strategy. As a result, they saw a huge uptick in traffic to family pages, ultimately growing it by 300%.
“Family travel is such a huge cornerstone of the industry. It’s not just parents and kids. It can be older parents and fully grown-up children or multigenerational families and it’s about knowing how to speak to those different groups and create trips and experiences that resonate with them,” Melissa says.
Looking to the future, she says that as a “people person”, her aim is to run a team of “really excellent marketing creatives who are always thinking of ways to change what they’re doing”.
She says she has loved being a part of TTG’s 30 Under 30 and that she gets excited when she sees things other members of the cohort are doing. “It’s great to feel part of something – a group of people who have a complete variety of talents and many with very different stories to my own.”
A humble but vivacious professional, Melissa seems intent on finding plenty more rabbit holes in the future and who knows where they may take her.
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