Time for Talent with Martina Welander

Meet Martina Welander aka Documentina 👋 Our super talented Technical Writer, who goes beyond words to come up with creative ways to document our tools and processes. But we’ll let her do the talking – read her full story below (it’s a good one!).

Tactile: Hi Martina, could you tell us a bit more about what you do at Tactile?

Martina: I write ✨ technical documentation ✨ on a fabulous team of one. I write everything from system architecture overviews to user tutorials to API documentation. My days are spent ferreting around in codebases, hunting down precious morsels of context in the dustiest corners of Slack, and thinking up ways to make stuff like security protocols fun to read about. And pestering my fellow Core Teamsters for information, of course.

Tactile: What was your journey to becoming a Tech Writer?

Martina: It just happened – I did a history degree and never really had a plan. I wrote my first line of CSS on neopets.com in 2000 (Neopians unite) and accidentally became a backend developer because I needed to create a database for all my RPG characters. This eventually led to several Serious Jobs as a developer and technical consultant, which turned into blogging a lot about the stuff I figured out, and now I write for a living. There were probably more steps but it felt very ‘whoopsie poopsie guess I’m a writer now’.

Tactile: What do you like the most about the team you’re working with?

Martina: They are good eggs. Patient, kind, smart, a lil’ bit weird, a lil’ bit sassy.

Tactile: What is the most rewarding part of your job?

Martina: Variety. Sometimes I write songs about A/B tests, sometimes I draw cartoons about API keys, sometimes I code, 🎵 SOMETIMES I RUN, SOMETIMES I HIDE 🎵, and sometimes I actually write things down (that’s the hardest part about being a writer). It makes my day when I hear that my work helped someone or saved them time, particularly new starters.

Tactile: For people who would like to start their career, what do you think are the most important qualities that every (tech) writer should have?

Martina: Curiosity. If Tactile decided to pivot into making croissants I would go all in on explaining the chemistry of butter through the medium of dance; learning is fun, kids! If you want to write for developers, I think it really helps to have at least some experience with programming – either as a hobby, or by working as a developer or in QA. If you are starting from scratch and want to be seen, try to figure out how to do something that interests you (a recipe app, a to-do app) and blog about the challenges you encounter.

Time for talent with Ivan Aguilar

Today we’re inviting into the spotlight Ivan Aguilar – a key part of our Data Science & Analytics Team! Read more about his story below & don’t miss out on his advice for those aspiring to work in data science or analytics 🙌

Tactile: Hi Ivan, could you tell us a bit about what you do at Tactile?

Ivan: I work as a Data Scientist for the games team. My job mainly consists of supporting Product Managers and Level Designers with data insights, helping them to create and monitor experiments, interpret results, find signals to support/reject player behaviour hypothesis, and a bit of everything data related.

Tactile: What was your journey to becoming a Data Scientist?

Ivan: I studied computer science and had the luck of immediately getting involved with data analysis jobs early on in my career. Afterwards, I did a lot of data analytics consulting, which allowed me to try a lot of different industries and work cultures. More recently, I completed a master’s degree in data science which complemented well my previous experiences.

Tactile: What do you like the most about the team you’re working with?

Ivan: They are all very friendly and cooperative, but also open and honest when there are differing opinions. The team is diverse which makes it possible to have a well rounded view on any topic we work with.

Tactile: What is the most motivating part of your job?

Ivan: The most motivating for me is learning the logic behind things and then understanding how data can help you modify, predict or explain those things. It is like constantly solving puzzles. Having those “aha” moments when solving the data puzzle is very enjoyable. At times, even if you don’t get to a definitive solution or answer, the journey is an enriching experience.

Tactile: For people who would like to start their career, what do you think are the most important qualities that every data person should have?

Ivan: There are some basic things that are quite useful, such as a background that can provide exposure to programming and math concepts. On the more subjective side, I think is good to have a certain degree of discipline when approaching problem-solving, a constant self-assessment of your work to keep facts checked and an open mind to learn new things.

Tactile: When you’re not at work, you are …

Ivan: Taking photographs with my analog cameras, playing some version of Zelda and listening to music obsessively.

Ever wondered how creative minds keep coming up with cool ideas? We decided to ask Pontus Börjesson, who leads our animation team, to spill the beans on how they keep on getting inspired for new marketing creatives. Let’s dive deeper into this process and find out what fuels his and the team’s imagination.

Tactile: Can you tell us about your background and your role at Tactile?

Pontus: I´ve been making video creatives at Tactile for five years and I work as team lead for the animation department of Creative Marketing. I share this position with Anne, who is team lead of the graphic artists of this department. All in all, we’re about ten people who are divided into different disciplines from graphic artists to animators and a programmer who creates playable ads. Each animator on the team takes the project from idea all the way to finished video through storyboard, direction, animation, asset creation and rendering. We value and nurture that independence in our team members to make sure that we avoid bottlenecks in our production. This helps us stay dynamic and able to react fast to market trends.

Tactile: What is your creative process for generating new ideas?

Pontus: I try to sit in a chair away from my workstation, put on headphones on high volume, and close my eyes until something fun comes to mind. Then I will draw my storyboard. But of course, I do take input from both internal data of the performance of our own ads, as well as the performance of competitor ads in the market. Then I use some imagination to come up with scenarios that I think are impactful whereupon I show the idea to my team who will tell me if it makes sense or if it’s complete nonsense. Since everybody in the team is involved with data analysis as well as creative production, the input will be based on the same things that I use for coming up with the idea, but from their professional perspective. The input will be based on both technical aspects, but also on creative and emotional responses.

Tactile: Do you often have brainstorming sessions with the team?

Potnus: Yes, we all make a storyboard for each project that the whole team looks at and comes with input on. The storyboard can be scribbles on a post-it or a more developed animatic. It doesn’t need to have any sort of artistic high level to it, as long as your idea is conveyed clearly. 

We also do meetings every two weeks where we discuss competitors’ videos and overall strategy.

Tactile: Do you collaborate with other teams within Tactile on that?

Pontus: Mainly our great User Acquisition team. They are good at supplying us with concepts that work well in the market and for our competitors. If for instance they say that right now, boat-themed ads are performing super well for our competitors and by every metric, then we will make boat ads.

Tactile: What role does data analytics play in your creative process? How do you balance data-driven decisions with creative inspiration?

Pontus: This is the art of creative marketing! We sit on the crossroads of art and business and these decisions influence every choice we make: what works according to the data, and when should we ignore the data completely to try to break new ground? 

By only following the numbers, you will be led to a point with a very specific story being told in a very specific way and with very particular visuals. But when the performance of that concept starts declining, we need to cast a wider net, creatively speaking. We explore different ideas, see if something sticks and then pursue that direction while monitoring our KPIs.

Sometimes you may get a win by working against analytics as well in my experience. If the data is telling you that every competitor is working on Christmas themed ads due to the current season, that’s the time to push a Valentine’s or Halloween ad. I believe that in performance marketing, it is more important to stand out than to make sense.

Balance is not easy and it ebbs and flows, as it probably should. Sometimes we need to be more data oriented, and sometimes we need to be more creatively oriented.

Tactile: What sources or practices help you stay updated with trends?

Pontus: Paying attention to advertising out in the wild helps you stay updated with what’s hot at the moment. But only following will never make you a leader, so at times it can be just as important to shut out the noise and spend time thinking about what has an emotional impact on you as a human being and let that influence your creative decisions.

Tactile: What has been your personal favourite project where you felt really inspired and proud?

Pontus: I always liked an old video I made where Lily is getting an ultrasound while calling her boyfriend on the phone. To me there is so much heart-breaking symbolism in trying to share such an important moment in life with somebody who won’t even answer their phone!

Thanks, Pontus, for giving us a sneak peek into the world of making creatives and sharing a bit more on where art meets business.