International Women’s Day (IWD) is the perfect opportunity to celebrate successful women in the digital marketing and web design industry. To mark this day, we reached out to a few inspiring women we know (through their agencies’ work with Duda), to provide their thoughts on a number of topics regarding their success.
We are honored to highlight these three awesome, independent women here and present their answers. Read their responses below.
1. How did you get started in the industry?
I studied art and graphic design at college, and part of a Fashion Atelier degree at UCA, then eventually progressed into teaching myself how to build websites because I had an idea I wanted to pursue. I then found myself in a marketing department, designing and managing websites for a company that used a very outdated design platform - so after convincing them we needed to move, we literally tried every alternative out there until deciding to migrate and rebuild nearly 200 websites over to Duda. Then, a few years later, Covid-19 hit, and I moved across the country (Kent to Cornwall) and started
Ethos.
2. Who’s a female hero of yours? How does she inspire you?
My mum, Cheryl. Single parent to me and my sister, she worked full time whilst she earned her degree and became a teacher. She’s been my confidant and the greatest support of my life, who always encouraged me to experiment and explore and never judged me for changing paths along the way.
3. What advice would you give to women just getting started in digital marketing or web design?
Just keep chipping away. Have something you want to achieve and figure it out as you go. Forget about all the distractions. As amazing as all the information is out there, try not to go down the rabbit hole
too much - it's easy to get overwhelmed and distracted by it (got the T-shirt). The best learning is by diving in and just doing. Release needing everything to be perfect too - you can grow as you go!
4. What’s the best career advice that’s been given to you?
"Everyone is just totally winging it." As long as you have honesty and integrity in what you do, try not to get lost comparing yourself to others all the time. This is why I’ve decided not to be on Instagram, I figured you don’t HAVE to do what everyone else is doing. If something doesn’t resonate, trust that and do it your own way.
5. What’s a proud moment from your career?
Working for myself and how happy it made me along with how much my creativity expanded. I love helping people put their ideas out into the world! I also started a blog (zerowasted.co.uk) alongside Ethos and reaching my first 5k views a month just from organic traffic made me realize you don’t need to have all the bells and whistles in place to get started. Just quality content that you love creating is KEY. Hands down it's the single best thing you can do for your SEO.
1. How did you get started in the industry?
I was in IT for 20 years living the corporate dream. I was managing the IT department of a London private bank, and traveling to New York a couple of times a year to catch up with my colleagues there. But I was good at art… that part of me needed attention, so I started going to night classes learning Photoshop and Dreamweaver (showing my age ).
Then there was a husband, a baby, and a move to New Zealand, and priorities changed. So building websites on the side became the main gig, and with my art background and technical skills, it was a great match. And things just grew from there. More websites, more services, more people… and working with people directly to help build their businesses fills my cup. Happy days…
2. Who’s a female hero of yours? How does she inspire you?
I have a short memory for these things… but my latest is Margaret Atwood, the author. At 82, she has more than earned the right to lock herself away in an ivory tower, but she keeps jumping into the mud. She is impassioned, fearlessly stands up for her beliefs, and has an uncanny futurist view. And most importantly, she shows critical thinking and will listen to all sides and still argue her point, and ask questions with genuine curiosity.
She is top of my dinner party ‘wish list’ at the mo!
3. What advice would you give to women just getting started in digital marketing or web design?
Be courageous. Be curious. Know your strengths and use them in the best way possible for your customers and your business.
4. What’s the best career advice that’s been given to you?
I was the head of IT in a private bank in London for a few years, and when I was called in to say I had the job, my new boss gave me some words of wisdom that I will never forget.
“… don’t try to be a man in a man’s world. Be a woman, and bring your ‘woman’ skills to the table”. Of course, I ignored him, and tried to be ‘the man’.
The wisdom was lost on that version of me, but it came out to play in the older and wiser version. A story for another day
5. What’s a proud moment from your career?
Being made head of IT at a private London bank at 31, but to be honest, as cheesy as it sounds, every time I present a client with their website and they love it so much they gush, it’s a rush.
And when I am talking to clients and we delve into their ‘why’, sometimes there is this moment when they realize what they want, what they want to be, or what they want their business to be. Their eyes light up, eyebrows shoot up, and there is this smile… OMG magic moments!
1. How did you get started in the industry?
We [Margherite and her sisters and partners, Maria LaMorte-Wright, and Angela LaMorte] always talked about working together to create a family business. The pandemic made us realize that life is short and we should be living our dreams.
At the time, Maria was running a managed services IT company, I was
operating an e-commerce store and Angela was figuring out her next move. The thing we kept hearing in our respective businesses was how hard it was for a small business to find an affordable, high-quality web designer that they could trust.
Over and over we heard the stories of how they’ve been let down or were charged exorbitant prices for low-quality work. So we combined our superpower skills of tech, marketing, and administration and set out to create a better business model. We were pleasantly surprised by how quickly we could get up and running working with Duda.
Fun fact: Our business name is a blend of all our names MARia + MARgherite + anGELA.
2. Who’s a female hero of yours? How does she inspire you?
There are so many women that inspire us on a global level, but the one that’s nearest and dearest to our heart is our mom. We come from a long history of kick-ass women who overcame great personal odds.
Our Nonna on our dad’s side was one of the first female entrepreneurs of our family. She delivered goats’ milk in her small village every morning at 5 am to make a living for her family. Our Nonna on our mom’s side lost her husband in WW2 and raised 3 small children – our mom was just 9 months – on her own while working as a day laborer harvesting crops.
When we immigrated to the USA from Italy, our mom left everything behind –- family, house, everything – in order to make a better life for her kids. She didn’t know a word of English but taught herself by watching Sesame Street. And she was so clever with finances. On our dad’s small salary, she was able to buy a house and send all of us to private school.
Seeing her take chances and get out of her comfort zone has inspired all of us to go out into the world with the knowledge that we can do anything we set our minds to.
3. What advice would you give to women just getting started in digital marketing or web design?
4. What’s the best career advice that’s been given to you?
Collectively, we’ve all had high-stress ‘corporate’ jobs. The best advice we’ve gotten really applies to living a purposeful life, above and beyond ‘work’, and that is to approach everything you do with your whole heart and soul.
5. What’s a proud moment from your career?
From our agency standpoint, it was signing our first client right away and validating that we had a good business model.
In addition to the women presented above, keep an eye out for our magnificent celebration of the women of Duda. This International Women’s Day we’ll be featuring on our social channels Duda female employees that really shine, and share their thoughts and inspirations.
