Inside Marketing Design at Surrey Satellite Technology

Charli: Welcome back to Inside Marketing Design, a show where we take an in depth look at how marketing design works at various tech companies. Today on the show, I'm speaking to Emily Kelly, who is the creative designer at Surrey Satellite Technology. So this is a space company, people. It was really fascinating to talk to Emily about how marketing design works within a space company. But it was also really interesting for me to just hear about how the space company itself functions, and what it does, what they aim for, how they work. Emily has been at the company for three years and she said she sort of stumbled into the space industry. She was working at an agency, but then saw this job listing and just thought she had to go for it, because she already had an interest in space, but that's definitely been very solidified in the past three years at the company. Surrey Satellite Technology itself is a company that designs, manufacturers, and tests satellites. Who also works with other companies to get them launched too. They've been around since 1985. And Emily said in the past few decades, they've launched 69 different satellites in 22 different countries. So we are talking very large scale in terms of this company's outputs. I chatted with Emily about how marketing, and marketing design in particular, is used to help win contracts for these satellites that they're building, testing, launching. But some of the things I learned in my chat with Emily was that although the scale of what our companies do is very, very different. A lot of our day to day work is more similar than I expected. So without further ado, let's get into my chat with Emily Kelly and a look inside marketing design at Surrey Satellite Technology. So Emily, welcome to Inside Marketing Design. I'm so excited to have you on the show.

Emily: Thank you for having me.

Charli: Yeah, this is very cool. I got very excited when you applied and saw there's a space company and I was like, "Whoa, how does marketing design work at a space company?" And then my second thought was, "Great, now I get to find out. "I've got Emily on the show." So, that's awesome. Let's start by hearing a little about how the marketing design team at Surrey Satellite Technology. How many other marketing designers are there. And do you sit within the marketing team or a design team? Tell me a little bit about the team structure.

Emily: Okay so, I'm a solo designer in-house. So it's all up to me . I do sit within a marketing team. So we have a PR manager who I report to, and an events manager. So it's just us three within the marketing team. And then we recently have got a head of marketing. So we all sit underneath him and he then reports into the directors of the company. So that's our sort of weigh in, in terms of getting things signed off in bits and pieces like that. So nobody reports to me directly. I just report into the PR manager. So it's just the three of us. It is quite a small team, considering how many people we have.

Charli: It is. What are you marketing? I know that Surrey Satellite Technology, your main thing that you offer to customers is manufacturing satellites, like helping with launches too. So is that what you're marketing? What you're putting out there? And what sort of materials are you usually making?

Emily: So, yeah. We're usually are marketing in terms of doing satellite missions for countries. And we do, like a know how sort mission training for people in country. So we're always keen to do like customer training and get countries building satellites. In terms of what we use to market stuff. There's really like all sorts. I do a lot of print and digital design, a bit of everything.

Charli: This is really interesting for me, because you're like a hardware tech company compared to what I do and what a lot of people do, which is software technology. And so the main things that I design, as a marketing designer, the website is the main thing. The website is kind of like the path that leads to sales. I'm imagining for hardware, at the scale that you have, you're not expecting people to come onto a website and click, buy now, and like purchase. What sort of things do you focus on designing, and what's the mix between digital and print that you have.

Emily: I mean, it would be great if people came onto our website and just bought immediately, but obviously our satellite missions are, tend to be millions of pounds. So yeah, we do have a real mix of print and digital. And at the moment I'm doing a lot of digital stuff. I work on the company's website, which we sort of redesigned when I started. We also rebranded when I joined the company as well. So those were two big things that I had to focus on as soon as I started. In terms of our website and stuff like that, we have to show a range of platforms, and different orbits that we can put satellites into. We're obviously trying to attract quite a big audience in terms of international customers and partners. So it's something we have to keep on top of. And we have to keep in touch with our engineering teams to make sure that we are putting out the right information and the right figures all the time. Obviously things get updated quite a lot. So we have to make sure that we're quoting the right numbers all the time. I prefer digital design in that respect to print design, because things change so much within our industry.

Charli: True.

Emily: So otherwise digital design, I've been doing a lot of social media stuff. And I do a lot of video editing as well.

Charli: Is that mostly for social media videos?

Emily: Yeah, mainly and for our YouTube channel, but also for international conferences as well. We tend to do sort of large scale exhibitions and stand designs. And they usually have a sort of video running on them as well in the background. And then that leads into print design. So the large scale exhibition sort of stuff, and merchandised, and also design posters and stuff. What I find quite interesting is, I do a lot of internal and external designs.

Charli: Ooh, that is interesting.

Emily: Yeah, so I'm not only sort of decorating our buildings, but I'm also decorating, externally and marketing stuff. It's quite interesting because our company is mostly made up of engineers and they think very differently to a designer. And I really want to get across how amazing their work is and stuff like that. It can be quite hard to translate something that's very technical into something that's really visual.

Charli: Right. Yeah, I can imagine that'd be quite a challenge. That's cool though. That's a fun challenge to have. And it sounds like you've got a really good mix of lots of different materials that you're designing. Where would you say the marketing team mostly focuses their efforts? Like for me, for example, it is our website and then also social media I suppose, in content in general, is what the bulk of my work is around. It sounds like you've mentioned events here. Is that quite a big focus for you?

Emily: It is yeah. We have quite a few, some key events for us during the year. There's a couple of small satellite conferences that we really focus on. And there's also something called the IAC, which is the International Astronomical, I think, Congress. So that's just a large gathering of space industry. And that's always a big one, and moves around the world every year. So we like to get out sort of that key messages. We try and work out what we're really trying to say, and what we're really trying to sell. Usually there'll be like a specific platform, or a specific mission that we really want to take ahead. And that will be something that we try and market specifically at events. And things we like to submit papers and posters and things like that. That's like a real space industry thing, having like white papers and technical papers. So it tends to be up to me to make them look good. So there's always quite a lot to focus on. I find that my workload, it does really like change throughout the year, depending on whether we have events coming up. I think in terms of social media, since having me on board, it's been more of a focus because we can put out more stuff. I can quickly design things. Whereas before my manager was having to outsource all the design work to an agency. So now she can literally come up to me and say, "Oh, I need this." And I can just like quickly put it together. So I think without blowing my own trumpet, they benefit from having me in-house.

Charli: Of course they do. They definitely do.

Emily: Yeah, because I can quickly whip something up. Whereas an outside agency was struggling to understand what they wanted.

Charli: Right. It's such a technical and like in-depth subject matter to understand, that having someone in-house is probably really powerful here, because you can get to know the space industry and get to know the engineering speak, I guess, a little more than an external agency coming in could.

Emily: There's so many sort of acronyms and things like that, when it comes to engineering and technical things. So my knowledge is furthering every day.

Charli: Tell me, teach me an acronym. What is a cool space acronym that. What's your favorite one?

Emily: That's a really good question. I mean, even just, there's lots. We have like a whole list on our portal of acronyms that we use. But even things like we have an AIT hall, and that's an Assembly Integration and Testing Hall. So that's where our satellites are built. And so you have to completely gown up to go in. And I always find that really fun, 'cause I get to go and take photos of satellites, in build and it feels very special to see something in person that's literally going to be taking pictures in space. So that's always interesting. I do have to remind people that I don't have an engineering background. It's just a design background. I think a lot of engineers think I have some sort of background knowledge, but I don't, but I'm learning.

Charli: You're just learning there on the job.

Emily: Yeah, exactly.

Charli: Let's go into talking about. You mentioned before that your, was it manager, Head of PR would come to you and be requesting something. Is that the normal way that a project will start for you, that your manager will request it from you. And I'm assuming like maybe someone else in the company has requested it of them. Is that sort of how the flow works?

Emily: Yeah, so I sort of have two avenues, and my manager will come to me and either someone's spoken to her, Head of Engineering or something like that. Or a director has come to her specifically and wants something specific done. Or I'll have an engineering team come towards me, or just a single engineer who says, "I'm working on this, can you help me out?" But a lot of the time it is through my manager and we tend to sit down together and try and work things out, rather than just me going solo.

Charli: Cool.

Emily: That's the one thing I find hard, 'cause I am the only designer. That I don't have any one else to bounce ideas off. But I think having my manager and the events manager. They're from different walks of life, it's good to bounce ideas off them as well. But yeah, a lot of the time it's just an email that comes directly to me. And if I need to, I'll go to my manager and say, "I'm not sure where to start with this." Or I'll just do it myself. I'm quite used to working independently. So that's something I can usually get on with.

Charli: I think that's something that we learn as a. 'Cause I'm also a solo marketing designer. There is other designers in the company, but they work on very different things to me. So yeah, I'm also just used to hearing of a need and figuring it out myself, it's just what we do. I'm guessing you, like me, don't get a fully fleshed out brief for exactly what you need most of the time. That's pretty rare, isn't it?

Emily: Yeah, it tends to evolve and you say, "Is this what you're looking for?" And then they kinda like, "Not quite," and you go back to the drawing board. So yeah, I think in terms of problem solving, I'm definitely getting better at that, because people don't always know what they want, do they? So yeah, it's working out what's best for them.

Charli: And when you work in-house as well, you get to know what people mean when they say certain things too. And then you can get it right the first time, more often than not. I think once you've been there, as you have for three years, which is cool. Who signs off your work? Is it your manager? So they'd ask you to do something. You design it. You bring it back to them for a final sign off, I suppose.

Emily:Yeah, it tends to be my manager, or it will just be our head of marketing, now we have one, if not, it will be the director who sits above our head of marketing. But for things like a rebrand, or when we redesigned the website. So I designed the front end of it, to get sign off for that, that went to our executive team. And then it went to the founder and the managing director. So there's definitely different levels of sign off, depending on how big the project is. But yeah, usually it will just be within my team and the director above me.

Charli: And is that who gives you feedback as well, on work and is that who you go to to get advice, get feedback on your designs?

Emily: Yeah, I think because we're all in, usually in an open plan office, I will go to the director and say, "Is this what you're looking for?" And if not, we will just sit around a table and discuss it. So everyone, the one thing I do like about my company, is that no matter what level you're at, it's very much an open door policy and we have good open plan offices. So I could go and talk to anyone at any level and not feel that I was much lower than them or anything like that. There's no hierarchy in terms of who you can talk to. So that's quite good in terms of figuring out what people really want. I feel I can talk to anyone.

Charli: Yeah, I think that's the best way to get things done. I think that, tell me if you agree, that feedback on designs can get sort of like warped if it comes through too many people. And it's just so good to hear it from the source especially. So let's talk about the website project in particular. You got the brief that you needed to redesign it. Who decided on the content for it? Who decided this is what's going to go on our homepage and who wrote the copy for the website? How did that all work?

Emily: So initially we had a sit down discussion with an outside agency that are local to us, just in terms of them hosting it in the backend, and things like that. So at the moment it's a CMS that we can, both me and the PR manager can go into an edit. The PR manager wrote all the copy for it. We had a look at our old website, which was, I think it was, it was pretty old in terms of. Sort of 10 to 20 years old.

Charli: What?

Emily: So it wasn't responsive. It wasn't responsive at all. And it was more of a. I don't know, it was almost like a site where all our missions lived on. And it was almost like a history rather than innovative feel, which is what we've definitely gotten now. It's much more modern and you can see what we're doing now, rather than. It was almost like an archive, I think.

Charli: Right, archive rather than a piece of marketing material to show things in its best light.

Emily: Yeah, which I think until I came in, they didn't realize it had become like that, until you get someone else's view. So obviously heritage is a really big thing to us, 'cause we've been going for over 30 years. So we definitely still wanted that. So we've managed to have a section for past missions. And I think that's one big thing about our company, is that we would like to focus on our heritage because a lot of the companies within the space industry, are startups. They haven't been going that long. They don't have that experience. So that's something we really tried to focus on in terms of the website. In terms of the design, we've got more of a uniform look across digital and print now, than there was before, because outsourcing, it was all different styles and things like that. But yeah, we add and take away from the website all the time. I think initially we try and pair it back a bit because there was so much content. We really worked on a mega menu style of things, because it was just so difficult to navigate.

Charli: So who was making those decisions about what content to pair back and how to arrange it all? Was that you doing that work?

Emily: I think it was us as a team, in terms of working out how to navigate to things and how far away in terms of reach they were. So more our innovative stuff. And our more recent missions are more at the forefront of our website, whereas before it was. You could see everything and there was just menus upon menus and drop downs and so much. So we definitely simplified it.

Charli: And did those decisions get made? Were you all in a room together having a meeting, do they get made by email? How does that work? These conversations that you're having?

Emily: I guess a bit of both. I mean, us as a small team, we'd every so often pitched what we'd done so far to the exec team and our director and just say, "Look, this is the way we're going. "Do you like the feel, the look and feel of this?" Before we go any further, before we spend money with the agency. So between us as a team, we exchange emails and have weekly check-ins as to what. Are we going in the right direction with this? And then we'd go further and pitch it. And hope that they liked it so that we didn't have to go back to the drawing board. But yeah. There's lots of back and forth, but mainly it's just between me and my team.

Charli: What does a normal day look like for you? You go into an office, I'm guessing, when it's not pandemic times.

Emily: Yes, I do.

Charli: Take us through like a rough outline of the day, in terms of meetings that you have. When you'd get your work done, all that sort of thing.

Emily: I usually work a nine to five day. I'd go in and initially just scroll through my emails to check and see what's going on. And then I have like a running to do list of bits and pieces. We usually have a weekly catch up with my team, but because we all sit near each other, we tend to go to each other's desks anyway. So my manager regularly pops to my desk to ask for social media posts and stuff like that. And says, "I'll send you the copy via email." So I'm used to getting a lot of my work via email. I don't tend to have a huge amount of meetings. And when I do, they're usually an hour, nothing more than an hour sometimes, because I'm part of the business development and sales team. So our marketing team sits within that. So sometimes I'll go to business development meetings, so that we know what we're gonna push later in the year. Or what sort of missions and stuff we're really trying to sell. So that's always good for us to know, in terms of event graphics and stuff.

Charli: Yeah, how big is that team? The business development and sales team.

Emily: That's a really good question. I mean, it's made up of a lot of bids and sales managers and I have quite a few colleagues. So I'd say maybe like probably maybe 15 of us maybe.

Charli: Okay, so it's still like a. Not huge in terms of team size.

Emily: No, no. Other than that, in terms of work, it's quite random at times. So I can be video editing. Doing branding, digital print design, internal design, posters, interior design. So I helped redesign our cafe.

Charli: Fun

Emily: So people come to me for everything. Photography of missions and stuff like that. I get to do mission patches. So when we're launching a mission, I get to.

Charli: Oh my gosh, that must be fun.

Emily: Take mission pictures. It's great fun. All the way to designing stickers for rocket nose cones. So yeah, it can be a poster for a corridor, or a sticker for a rocket. So it really varies, which I love because I don't. Now that I've got into this job, I don't think I could just be a graphic designer, even though I have a graphic design degree. I think I love being a creative marketing designer because I can do a bit of everything.

Charli: Yeah, that makes sense.

Emily: And it never gets boring.

Charli: All of these projects, it sounds like there's a lot. I mean, obviously the rebranding the company and doing the website, those are big projects that take a long time. But what's the timeline look like for something like a mission patch or a sticker for a rocket nose cone. What's the timeline between when someone asks for it, and when you're expected to have it done and finished by, usually?

Emily: In terms of a mission patch, sometimes it can be quite a last minute thing just because the product's being really busy. Or it can be something that they think of right at the start of the project kickoff, because they want to have that look and feel. They want to have a logo for documents. Sometimes they want to do merchandise and things like that. A lot of my mission patches are made into merch. So things like stickers, lunchboxes, things like that. That are like given away at events, or given to our employees. So I do usually have to think about it a couple of months in advance, just so that we get that stock in.

Charli: But how long do you get to design it? Even if it is a couple of months in advance. How long are you able to spend on it?

Emily: Usually it's not that restrictive so I can spend like a week or two on it, if I need to. I bounce ideas to and from via email to my manager before I would go back to the product team and say, "I've got this one." And I know not to give them too many options. To give them two or three options just to narrow it down a bit. Because like I say, engineers think very differently and I think it's better to give them a smaller range of things.

Charli: How do you know when you've done a good job at your work? How's has your work measured or I dunno. How do you know when you did well on a project?

Emily: That's a really good question because a lot of the time I don't always know. It's kind of accepted and moved on, and people are like, "Yeah, great, thanks." But a lot of the time my manager will sit me down and say, "Thank you for doing this." I think if I'm doing something for engineering, they're very busy. They're building satellites. They're building things that launched into space. So I don't always get that sort of feedback, but usually it's quite sort of positive. If I'm doing merchandise for the company, people will come and they'll email me and they'll say, thank you for things like that. So it just depends what it is. But people are always like really positive towards anything I do. Posters in the corridors and things like that. People come to me and say they like them. So that's always good.

Charli: Yeah, that's always really nice. What about in terms of. How do you set goals within the team? Do you sort of just take on the work as it comes? And that's the goal, is just to get the work done. Or like in my company we have every quarter, different goals of things we need to achieve that is set at the start of the quarter. And then at the end we measure how they went. Do you do anything similar to that?

Emily: We do have like performance reviews every. Once or twice a year, I think. So I'll sit down with my manager and we'll discuss bigger goals. So in terms of software I want to learn. Training I want to go on, that sort of thing. So that's more personal to me, which is quite good. And so some of my performance reviews have been. This year we're focusing on the website, and that becomes my main goal. The past year, we haven't had the one big thing to focus on. So that's when I look into training and things like that. So if I do have any quieter periods, I can fill my time. It's a real mix of stuff that just comes in and then becomes a big project. So sometimes a video will become a big project, because it's something we're trying to market internationally. Yeah, it's usually things that just come in that we pick up.

Charli: Is the marketing team held to any particular number of new satellites launched or something, New customers coming in. Is there anything like that. Or the business development team needs to meet, that you're aware of?

Emily: It's difficult to have to have targets, in terms of selling satellites and things like that. Because it can take from kickoff to launch, it can take between two and five years, to get something up there in space. So it is difficult. I mean, as a business, obviously we have financial targets and things like that. But I think within our teams and things, we're always trying to do the best that we can. We don't have set figures just because it's a really weird industry in terms of going from a contract signature, to launching something, can take a really long time.

Charli: Yeah, very different from my industry, where as we offer free accounts for our software. And so we're expected to be getting thousands per day, sort of thing.

Emily: Yeah, it is. It's weird in that respect because I think the first year I started, we had a few launches. Whereas this year we haven't launched anything yet. So in terms of workload, it really does change. So that's something I've had to get used to.

Charli: Yeah. Interesting. You've talked a little bit about what some of the main challenges are for you in your role, in marketing designer at Surrey Satellite Technologies. Being the only designer there, that can be tough. What are some of the other main obstacles that you face in your role?

Emily: I think I do struggle a bit with imposter syndrome, because there isn't anyone else I can compare myself to, if that makes sense.

Charli: That does make sense.

Emily: So obviously I have to stay inspired myself. I have to look online and things like that. So there's nothing.

Charli: Is that why then getting feedback internally, like when someone sees the poster and tells you that they liked it. That must mean a lot.

Emily: It does, yeah.

Charli: Just because that's all you can measure it by, right.

Emily: Exactly.

Charli: Because, like you said, you don't have someone else to compare it.

Emily: Yeah, so it's. I've learned that I can bounce ideas off other people and actually. Engineers are really creative and their minds work differently, but they can still visualize things. But I think the challenges that. If I don't know something, there's no one to go to. I'm very good at looking up things online. I think a lot of designers are aren't they? If you have a query in software or something, you don't know how to do something, you just look it up. So there is that. It would be nice to be able to go to someone, but it's something I've learnt in terms of problem solving that I can usually sort things out myself.

Charli: Yeah, Google is your co-worker.

Emily: Literally.

Charli: Yeah. I know that feeling all too well.

Emily: Yeah.

Charli: I'd love to know what the. 'Cause you have this agency background and now you're working in-house. So that in itself is different. But what are some of any differences you've noticed between the kind of projects you worked on at the agency and the work itself for a space company?

Emily: I was a junior designer at that stage, so I didn't have as much responsibility as I do now. But I think within an agency, I didn't have as much of a say, and I was very much moving logos around designs, and things like that. I wasn't really creating. I was just making for the sake of making a graphic sort of thing. So I do think I am more listened to, and I am more heard. I think it was really good for me to work in an agency, and just see how that worked and see. I think there was definitely more of a hierarchy and it would have been difficult to talk to different people. Whereas now, I think people appreciate that I have design skills and they don't. So they'll come to me and ask me something. So I think it's definitely been like a learning curve in that sense. I don't think I would go back to working in an agency, now that I've worked in-house. I quite like being the go-to sort of person.

Charli: Yeah, it sounds like you've got quite a lot of autonomy in terms of people trusting you as the designer. You are the design expert in the company, you know. Can you come up with your own ideas for projects too? Like, I dunno, say there's a new poster idea you've got, or you've got an idea for a social media post. Do you have the autonomy to just go ahead and make that?

Emily: Yeah, I think I do. I think that's something I've grown to. When you initially start, you're like, " Oh, can I make suggestions?" But yeah, I do. I think when we reached like 10 K followers on Twitter, I was like, "Can we do a little social media post about that? Can I do a graphic for that?" And she was like, "Yeah, sure. "Go for it, do it."

Charli: Cool.

Emily: So it's very much, if I see something and I think, "Oh, we could hop on that." She's very much like, "Yeah, go for it. "Send it to me." I'll put it on social media. So that's quite nice. I feel like I can say, "Oh, I've got an idea," and people will listen, so that's good.

Charli: That's cool. I feel like I'm a little surprised to hear how similar, in a way, our roles are being from completely different industries. In terms of the way we do our work and the workload and all that sort of thing. I just kind of feel like I expected the space industry to be much more strict with controlling your designs and like, I dunno, many levels of approval to get something out there. 'Cause it feels like the stakes are just so much higher than what I do. But it sounds like your company just trusts you and your marketing team to get the work done. So yeah, that's really cool.

Emily: I think if I was working in a bigger space company, that would be much different. But I think we're just 350 people. We're at that nice size, that were not in the thousands. So I think, yeah, we are very trusted, which I do appreciate.

Charli: Yeah, that's really cool. There's a lot of people out there who love talking about design tools. And so I've got to make sure that I include this in the episode. What is the main software that you use for designing in?

Emily: I use Adobe CC. So just the creative suite.

Charli: Yup, all of the things.

Emily: All day, every day, literally live in that. So yeah, I'm the only one in my company who uses that software. So it can be a little bit difficult sometimes to say, "Oh, I want to design it in this," because everyone's used to Microsoft Office.

Charli: Let's end by talking about what you love most about your job. Specifically about working at this company that you're at. What are some of your favorite parts of what you do?

Emily: Well, my favorite part is being able to work on something different every day and having that variety every day. So I'm not just set in one program, I'm doing lots of bits and pieces all the time. And constantly picking up requests from people to do. Videos and graphics and things like that. So I don't feel like I'm just stuck in one.

Charli: Right, you can never get bored.

Emily: Yeah, exactly. And I think also one thing I love is being able to talk to engineers and just having that input because it's something I can always learn about. So I really love having that sort of interaction with people and hearing about what other people are doing every day. And that sort of inspires my work. At the end of the day I'm really just here to make them look good and their work look good, I think.

Charli: Right.

Emily: And some of the stuff they do is insane. So I do enjoy a marketing something totally different. Something that people aren't used to. So I like getting creative with that.

Charli: That's awesome. How does it feel when you see something you've designed on a literal thing that's going to be sent to space.

Emily: Weird, in a nutshell, and just seeing images from the engineers who have taken them at the launch site and being like, "Oh, Emily, your sticker." And I would just being like, "Whoa, that is in India "being launched right now." And it's in like low earth orbit or something. And I'm just like, "Oh my design's in the atmosphere."

Charli: That is so cool.

Emily: I know, I've got to somehow put that on my CV, I think.

Charli: Yeah, I think that might be needed to be the headline on your website.

Emily: Yeah, maybe I should do that.

Charli: Maybe you should. Well, thank you Emily, for sharing all this information. It's been really interesting to me. And like I said, to hear that the differences aren't actually as extreme as I expected between software and hardware. And software tech and space tech. Where can people go to find out more about you? Is there any social media or a website you want to pitch?

Emily: So my website is emilyinspace.design and that has my social media links. And you can also see some of my work. So some of the stuff on the rockets I've mentioned and things like that. If you're interested in having a look.

Charli: And I'm sure everyone will be. I'm also going to leave a link to the article that you wrote on Medium, about your jobs. I think that was really interesting read and people should go and check that out too. So yeah. Thanks for being here, Emily. Thanks for giving us a look inside marketing design at Surrey Satellite Technologies.

Emily: Thank you, thanks for having me.