Fellows meets Cara Verwholt of Inovia
Cara Verwholt
of Inovia takes time out of her day to talk with our independent
correspondent, Rochelle Sampy. So, what is involved in working for one of the
largest service providers in Intellectual Property?
Cara graduated from Elon University in North
Carolina with a degree in Corporate Communications. After graduating, she found
a role at a large company that handled customer acquisitions in North Carolina
as a marketing analyst.
Utilising knowledge gained from her degree by working
with clients in the fields of home service and energy, she was able to expand
upon her marketing experience. Currently, she is completing a Masters degree at
NYU while working full time at Inovia.
Describe your first role
My first role didn’t involve working long hours but,
each day was tough as it was a company that was doing very well at the time and
moved at a quick pace. At university I’d had a number of internships giving me
a good background in marketing, allowing me to learn quickly in my new role. These internships had helped me realise that I
wanted a job in marketing once I graduated.
Why did apply you for a role at Inovia?
Coming from New Jersey I wanted to move to New York
City, moving away from North Carolina. While looking for a job through LinkedIn,
I came across the marketing manager role at Inovia. Intellectual Property
wasn’t an industry I knew anything about, but Inovia sounded like an
interesting company and so I decided to apply for the position there.
You got a job through LinkedIn which isn’t the
traditional route for applications. Can you talk us through the process?
I made a lot of LinkedIn connections through my
last role at a large company which involved working with an internal and
external network of partners. I had
applied for a lot of jobs in the traditional way, but a lot of them weren’t
going anywhere. LinkedIn allowed me to build a personal relationship with an
employer. When applying to Inovia through LinkedIn, I was able to direct my
application towards the relevant person in the company and heard back from them
straight away.
What were your goals at Inovia when you
first started?
My first goal was to learn about Intellectual
Property, which was a challenge in itself. I had to learn a lot of information
about the processes involved in IP in order to be effective in my position. My
increased knowledge meant I was able to attend domestic and global trade shows to
represent Inovia. These provided me with really great exposure and allowed me
to make important connections in the industry.
What is the most exciting thing about
working in the IP industry?
I like working in the IP sector as it is a very
relationship driven business compared with product services industry as in my
first job. There I was selling directly to consumers and the marketing was
associated with price or very specific features. The business was often very
competitive as a result. Due to the B2B nature of the IP business, you are able
to make those connections at trade shows and build relationships. We could be
talking to a potential customer for a year or more before they consider doing
business with Inovia and so relationship building in IP can offer a longer
buying cycle.
Can you give us some examples of when you
have to develop these relationships?
When I went to my first trade show, I met a couple
of patent attorneys and service providers.
Over time as I continued to attend these trade shows, I was able to have
regular conversations with individuals and build my relationship with them. Inovia
has a large agent base worldwide, so we continually develop relationships with
our agents as they are handling work on behalf of our clients.
What were the challenges of the job at Inovia,
if any?
My initial challenge was learning about the IP
industry itself, as it was difficult for me to have an impact on the brand
without fully understanding the concept and ethos of it. I had to also learn
more about Inovia’s place in the IP industry so as to better communicate our
services to prospective clients. Once I understood that, it did get better but
of course, there are always other challenges. We are trying to grow our market
share in the space, trying to bring on more clients and grow our brand over
time. But these are exciting challenges and it is this makes the job
interesting on a day-to-day basis.
Was it difficult to balance work and
personal life?
Balancing my work and personal life hasn’t been
difficult as Inovia is a great place to work. At least once a year we, the
global sales team, all come together from New York, Sydney and Munich to talk
about what we’ve been doing and what our challenges might be for the future. Saying
that, attending trade shows can be difficult especially if you are at a trade
show in Beijing for a week. You can’t just go there, turn around and then come
back!
Working and living in Manhattan also makes the
balance easier. Although I have to admit that until my recent wedding, I had to
balance work, wedding, grad school at NYU and my personal life, which was a fun
and interesting challenge.
What qualities should graduates possess to
get in to the marketing industry?
For marketing roles, individuals should be able to
learn quickly. While I had great experiences and an internship during my
studies, it is impossible to learn everything at college. Flexibility and
multitasking skills are important especially when working in a smaller
company. Creativity is essential whether it is picking up new ideas for
campaigns or new methods to reach prospective clients. A strong analytic background is needed to balance this creativity so that you can learn to
evaluate campaigns and make future recommendations.
When not working at Inovia, what do you
enjoy doing?
I love getting out into the city of New York. In
the summer, it is wonderful to go to Central Park. My husband and I also have a
little dog named Wilson who is almost two years old. He takes up a lot of our
time and we just enjoy having him around.
Fellows and
Associates would like thank Cara for her time. We hope that you all enjoyed
getting a glimpse behind the scenes at the goings on at Inovia. If you’d like
to find out more about Inovia and the services they offer, please visit www.inovia.com. To share your views, comments and suggestions on this article email us at [email protected]