The Social Media Marketing Awards (SMMA) winners for 2022 were announced last night in Sydney, and for the second year in a row Sunshine Coast and Newcastle-based creative agency The Creative Collective are proud to have picked up the winning title in the Best Emerging Marketer category.
22 year old Tess Schwieso of Caloundra who has worked as a social media specialist at the Sunshine Coast office for the past 18 months has won this year’s accolade, and follows in the footsteps of former employee Claire Sandhoff who held the same position at the company, and won the title in 2021.
“We are so very proud of Tess for winning this years title,” says company founder and partner, Yvette Adams.
“Tess has grabbed every opportunity that has been presented to her since she started with us and it’s been great seeing her progress from being a great social media content producer to now be running social media ad campaigns, chatbot competitions, delivering social media training and much more,” she says.
Schwieso has worked on a number of well known clients in her time working for the fast-growth agency including Toshiba, Port Stephens Tourism, Destination Scenic Rim, Toowoomba Regional Council, Cairns Regional Council and Stellarossa. Around working full time she has also been completing her Masters of Business (Marketing) at Queensland University of Technology having already completed a Bachelor of Business, (Tourism, Leisure and Event Management) Minors: Marketing & Comparative Studies at the University of the Sunshine Coast in November 2020.
“It’s a juggle working and studying but I’m glad I’m doing both. You learn a lot at University and it’s good to be able to apply it in the workplace, and to also have great mentors at work who give me other perspectives, industry experience and excellent guidance along the way,” says Schwieso.
Adams says the company has always had a big focus on fostering young talent, but in recent years this has become even more important given the talent shortages being experienced in the industry. She says the company plans to continue entering the Social Media Marketing Awards, and specifically, the Emerging Marketer of the Year category, to continue identifying and elevating the young talent they recruit and foster as a company.
“We’ve had a very robust intern program since we began our business in 2007 and host around 10 interns a year, with our most recent one traveling from Monash University in Melbourne to spend 10 weeks with us. We also allocate an annual budget per staff member to engage in professional development and offer regular in-house training and mentoring, with frequent check-ins with staff with how they feel they are progressing in their career. Overall we find the young ones coming through are very ambitious, so it is important to keep challenging them and having regular career discussions with them so they understand the journey and the opportunities we can offer them.”
For any media enquiries, please contact us.