Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. (Atglen, PA) is a family-owned publisher with more than 5,700 titles in print and a broad catalog of books, including non-fiction books on art, decorative arts, architecture, design, antiques, military history, maritime subjects, photography, fashion, house and garden, food, history, crafts, woodworking, regional topics, and more. Located on the Schiffer Book Farm near the Chester/Lancaster county line, we are two miles from the Parkesburg station on Amtrak's Keystone Line.
Marketing Lead
The Marketing Lead achieves results through creating and executing creative marketing strategies for the company, imprints, and publications that create discoverability and sales. A strong initiative, competitive drive, excellent communication skills, deep industry knowledge, and the ability to stay results focused when market conditions change are all essential.
The leader of the marketing team is focused on developing and implementing practical, timely solutions, and utilizing tools and strategies that have proven results. Making prudent decisions on a variety of activities that enable messages to stay on point and in front of the audience is key. Self-assurance and innovation are critical to purposefully drive results. Problem solving and engaging the commitment of others is essential.
Fostering a strong collaboration between the internal marketing team and our authors to align the marketing plan with the audience and the author, leveraging and/or developing their platforms to successfully launch and support their publication.
Lead the marketing team to achieve goals through proactively motivating, teaching, and engaging the team. Through outgoing, poised and persuasive communication, the Marketing Lead will build rapport within the company, the authors, and relationships with industry and subject matter influencers. Due to the nature of the work and evolving market, effective delegation and the ability to quickly and thoroughly digest information is critical. Proactive outward facing coordination and relationship development with Authors to engage and direct them through their work to market their publication to their audience.
The Marketing Lead must act independently and collaboratively. This position requires confidence and flexibility to handle a variety of challenges with a sense of urgency. A full commitment to the success of the organization and a devotion to high standards are expected in this role. The employment of effective systems through and with people will achieve desired results.
Role and Responsibilities
- Responsible for leading the marketing team and providing strategy and execution of companies marketing.
- Provide direction to the company and members of the marketing team to optimize discoverability of publications, categories of publications, imprints, and company to both B2B and B2C.and ensure a positive ROI
- Oversight for all marketing activities across imprints including but not limited to: digital marketing, email, social media, publicity, advertising, ecommerce platforms, trade shows
- Align and implement marketing programs to create discoverability, generate interest and demand
- Work closely with Sales, Editorial, and Imprint teams and authors on campaigns, events, and digital marketing
- Develop skills of the marketing team to ensure they are utilizing necessary tools and strategy effectively.
- Ensure all publications have a comprehensive marketing plan that will launch and connect to core audience
- Overarching Marketing Strategy
- Actively participate in company strategic planning, operations, and leadership meetings
- Oversight of company branding strategy, brand messaging, industry/trade communications, direct-to-consumer communications, digital marketing outreach.
- Manage individual title strategy and key author relationships as needed
- Outreach to both new and current markets.
- Identify and communicate trends, provide continuing education for team and evaluate marketing systems and tools, identify potential pitfalls and troubleshoot solutions
- Foster strong connections between marketing team and industry contacts to ensure messaging is consistent
- Develop and nurture relationships with media and journalists, arranging and attending in-person meetings to pitch titles as applicable
- Manage departmental budgets, including but not limited to advertising, digital boosts, promotional (swag), travel, show, departmental subscriptions & resources
- Collaborate with Sales Team to develop strategies seasonal front-list marketing to align with sales initiatives in line with top-line company goals
- Lead, manage, and develop the marketing team including title assignments, advising on author engagement, troubleshooting, and serving as an advocate, supporter and mentor for the team.
- Manage strategy for marketing corporate and industry relationships and serve as point-of-contact (i.e. Co-Ops, PW, Book Riot, etc.)
- Collaborate with department heads to accomplish monthly, quarterly and annual goals
- Attend industry and category specific shows
Qualifications and Education Requirements
- Bachelor’s Degree
- Minimum 5+ years of book marketing experience
Preferred Skills
- Leader and team motivator
- Strategic-thinker bringing creativity to a diverse range of marketing initiatives
- Confident; able to make effective decisions quickly on an independent basis or with minimal feedback from Publisher
- Strong problem solving and conflict resolution skills, able to constructively level-set expectations comfortably
- Solid understanding Schiffer company policies and individual team roles across company
- Core understanding of what information needs to be communicated to ensure business continues uninterrupted
- Engaging personality and strong interpersonal communication and skills
- Social; active listener; open-door policy
- Comfortable working under pressure; enjoys trouble-shooting problems
- Capable problem-solver and actively thinks outside the box
- Strong time management skills and ability to prioritize tasks independently and effectively
- Able to see goals through the tyranny of urgency to prioritize important tasks. Unafraid to ask for clarity when goals are hazy.
- Willingness to learn and accept feedback
- Tolerant of change and uncertainty
- Understand ROI and KPI metrics to inform projects and resource allocation
- Good sense of humor and ability to have fun while staying on task
- Enjoys working independently as well as with the team
Customer Care Representative
The role of Customer Care Representative at Schiffer Publishing is an integral part of the business efficiencies that occur daily. The main focus of this job is to provide each caller, whether a customer, vendor, or author, the best experience possible. The person in this role must be patient, and conscious of producing high quality, detailed work based on established procedures and guidelines. Because this role requires processing orders, payments, and email requests, not to mention staying on top of inventory, consistent, error-free work output is essential. Although this person must have a strong ability to multi-task, they must also learn to complete a single assignment and prioritize correctly in order to ensure accuracy. Job knowledge and competency are built through structured step-by-step training and positive, supportive coaching from management and peers. Communication with others is based on knowledge of repetitive job routines, and makes this person a “go-to” for team members who may have particular questions about a book. Because of the repetitive nature of tasks, this person will quickly become an expert, technical in nature, who’s role is critical to the team’s and business’ success.
Role and Responsibilities
- The ability to ensure a positive experience with our customers (and authors) by working to give each caller or visitor the highest quality of service. This includes placing orders, answering product and service questions, and solving problems, when they occur, in a courteous and professional manner.
- Manage inbound communications
- Answer phones professionally and with respect
- Forward, answer, or process emails received to main email address, website, and voicemail
- Support inside sales initiatives, make outbound calls to connect with current customers and prospects
- Process orders including those faxed, emailed, mailed, internal, and EDI
- EDI – Pull orders, confirm, edit, and update in Vendor Central for Amazon
- Process credit card orders daily and transmit credit card payments
- Print, sort, and deliver orders to the warehouse
- Process customer returns and coordinate credits
- Credit Application – process/check/approve
- Maintain up-to-date records and contact information for customers and authors
- Schedule incoming containers delivery with freight forwarder and coordinate with warehouse
- Create records for new books and manage all books in inventory management system
- Prepare and release customer backorders for new releases and inventory
- Communicate new releases to each external rep and in-house team member
- Prepare spreadsheets for external reps and in-house team to alert them of new titles arriving
- Update product metadata management to customers
- Upload images to customer portals including Amazon, Schiffer, Barnes and Noble and Edelweiss
- Keep warehouse inventory up to date/accurate
- Month-End processing of orders and inventory
- Catalog Requests and Weekly catalog mailing
- Complete any projects given to them by the Customer Care Manager
- Assist with special projects
Qualifications and Education Requirements
- High school diploma
- Strong computer skills in order processing and inventory/order management
- Previous experience in Customer Service preferred
Preferred Skills
- Good communication skills
- Able to work independently, as well as work with the team
- Microsoft Office application experience a plus
- Detail oriented; able to work fast paced with minimal mistakes
- Strong level of organization; able to manage time and prioritize tasks
- Excellent problem solving skills
- Good verbal communication
- Multi-tasking is a must
Physical Requirements:
- Might be in a stationary position for a considerable time (sitting/standing)
- This person in the position needs to move inside the office to access file cabinets, office machinery, etc.
- This person will need to be able to interact with the warehouse and be able to a pull a book if needed.
