Northwest faculty member Jacquie Lamer spent time this summer job shadowing staff at UMB Financial Corporation to learn about search engine optimization trends and ways she could translate them to her classroom teaching. (Photo courtesy of Terry Kincheloe/UMB Financial Corporation)

With a desire to stay updated on the latest digital marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) trends, Northwest Missouri State University faculty member Jacquie Lamer job shadowed this summer at UMB Financial Corporation.

Lamer, a senior instructor of mass media, contacted longtime friend and UMB Executive Vice President of Interactive Marketing Terry Kincheloe to arrange a day she could shadow the UMB interactive team in Kansas City. Her goal was to step into the “real world” and see an interactive department up close to ensure what she teaches in the classroom is relevant to today’s working world.

“My interest is very broad,” Lamer said. “I asked him to get me not only into the web publishing area, but a specific topic that is all encompassing in the web publishing class – SEO.”

Lamer met with several members of UMB’s interactive team, including a content creator, a marketing manager, and a programmer, and also sat in on a conference call with UMB’s SEO firm, Vizion Interactive.

“It was good for me to do that because it’s become too difficult to build competitive websites just sitting on my sofa,” Lamer said. “I need to go into an operation and observe it, and UMB let me do that. The nice part for me is that I was happy to find that my level of understanding is pretty good.”

After reviewing some of Lamer’s class assignments, members of UMB’s marketing team confirmed the concepts she teaches align with the professional arena.

Lamer said it’s important to know all sides of the industry, even when she is teaching the basics.

“I was able to confirm that all of the students that take my web publishing class are indeed going to be part of an SEO team, regardless of their specific area of study,” Lamer said. “I saw it in action this summer at UMB.”

She encourages students to job shadow and use an online platform such as LinkedIn to share about their experiences, creating a portfolio piece and a public thank-you note.

“Find someone like Terry Kincheloe who is in a position to say yes, but also listen to the needs of the student,” Lamer said.

Lamer joined the Northwest faculty in 2001, and her academic interests include user experience (UX), SEO, web publishing, advertising, media planning and marketing. She has a master’s degree in project management from Keller Graduate School of Management and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Bowling Green State University. Lamer is a co-advisor for AdInk, the advertising, marketing and design club at Northwest.

To learn more about Lamer’s experience, click here to read her blog post.