Did you know that as of this month you can do our training courses from anywhere in Europe? Our training is completely remote so location doesn’t matter! Within six months you could be retrained and working as a social media manager remotely from home around family life.
Over the last year we have been testing the practicalities of doing our education programmes from abroad and piloted it with a select number of international mums. We’re really pleased to say that it has been a huge success! This means that as of this month we are now officially offering our training to any mums within the EU.
So If you’re currently living abroad our Diploma in Social Media Marketing could be just what you need to get you back into work or find flexible work from home, or #WorkThatWorks as we call it at Digital Mums. In fact, such is the nature of Social Media Management that, if you wanted to, you would still be able to work for clients in the UK.
And If you’re reading this and live in the UK, having just experienced what has seemed like the longest winter EVER (although we're loving the sun right now!), these stories from brilliant international Digital Mums who are living the #WorkThatWorks dream really show the world is your oyster. Read on to hear from five of our graduates who tested out doing the training abroad and have gone on to forge amazing careers in social media.
“I’ve had social media clients consistently since graduating”
Jo O'Meally, 40, did our training from Barcelona and has two children Ruby Grace, 6, and Jake Blaze, 3.
“My background is working as a TV Producer/ Commissioner. The lifestyle and hours didn't feel compatible when I had my daughter, so I left a well paid job, we packed up our car and moved abroad to Barcelona for a better work/ life balance. Pretty crazy looking back!
The time difference (Spain is an hour in front of the UK) actually worked in my favour as our weekly hangouts at 8pm GMT were actually at 9pm for me - meaning I had more time and less pressure to get my kids into bed, which is more suited to the Spanish later bedtimes anyway. My course campaign was called @BeMindfulBCN, I'm also a yoga teacher so a mindfulness campaign was the perfect fit and taught me lots for now promoting my yoga business @graceandblazeyoga.
I've been working consistently since graduating in March 2017. My first client was quite a well known on screen 'personality' who needed some help with their social media. This client has a following of 200K + on Instagram, almost 100K on Twitter and 70K on Facebook and I managed all of these channels for many months. This gave me a lot of confidence that I could do it.
Then in September 2017 I started a small agency, Naked and Social, with a friend, also a mum, who has a PR background. Since then we have worked with a variety of clients: a VPN Telecoms company, an author, a production company, a mindfulness coach to name a few. There's a real entrepreneurial community here in Barcelona many of whom work for or want to appeal to international clients/ customers. Finding work in English hasn’t been a problem. It's also been great working with someone else, to have their support and be accountable to someone else, just like we did on the Digital Mums course.”
“Training from outside the UK was seamless”
Lucy Murphy, lives in Portmarnock, Ireland and has two children Henry, 6 and William, 12.
“Location is not a barrier when it comes to learning online. I met my peer group The Tallulahs, online once a week. We also had a WhatsApp group which was hugely helpful plus there was the Mothership which gave great support too, so I never felt alone.
Since finishing the training, I started working for an award winning daily news service based in London called Energy Live News. It was a great account to start with loads of fresh content every day. I even received a nomination for Best B2B Campaign of the Year at the DM Collective Awards for it.
I also kept my course campaign Futurewise Fingal going and produced a number of strategy reports for various clients. Recently, I’ve started working with a company called Mumager, based in Dublin, who help mums and employers deal with the common issues that arise when women return to work after maternity leave. The next project in the pipeline is a big company launch in Dublin - they have an impressive new product they’re bringing to market which is really exciting to be part of.
I’d encourage anyone to do this course regardless of where you live - it has a been a life changer for me.”
“I have forged the perfect remote career”
Rachael Le Marquand, 45 is from Jersey, Channel Islands and has a daughter Mia, 7.
“Within three days of being offered voluntary redundancy from the telecoms company I’d worked at for 20 years I was signed up on the Diploma in Social Media Marketing - the first ever student from Jersey!
Since graduating in March 2017, I have completed such a variety of social media projects. I have a regular web designer client plus I have completed social media audit/strategy/coaching work for clients in the tourist, alternative health, music school, law and real estate sectors. My background is in training, business analysis and project management so it is great to be able to use these skills too.
I have launched my social media business, Social Wing, helping businesses to fly online. You’ll find me on Twitter and LinkedIn. I have also kept my grassroots Kids About Jersey Campaign going on Facebook. This year, I am setting up my own Alternative Health practice and would really love to provide Social Media support to like-minded businesses that make people happy, motivated, inspired and healed.”
“I have found the perfect job”
Sarah Drewer, 38 did our training from Ibiza and has two children Willa, 7 and Mickey, 5
“I had been racking my brains about how I was going to work ‘remotely’. I didn’t want to get into tourism as the seasonal work and crazy hours just wasn’t conducive to a young family. When I heard about Digital Mums I figured I could retrain then find remote work for UK based charities (my work before kids). As it happens though, I have found loads of work on the island!
Since graduating I have worked for some really interesting organisations. I did some work for a Dutch friend for her music events agency. Plus there was consulting work for Corona Sunset Festivals about becoming a plastic free festival. It set something off in me as I realised how passionate I was about the sorry mess we find ourselves in with plastics pollution.
A few good paying clients later off island and I heard about a new Ibiza based project - Love Ibiza Now - bringing people together to create long-lasting solutions to the islands’ environmental needs. So here I am! I manage their social media platforms, which is a total joy as there is endless brilliant content that people are very responsive to. I help organise events with them - cleaning beaches and raising awareness so that Ibiza can become a cleaner more sustainable island. We are campaigning hard for a #plasticfreeibiza and people are listening and our community is uniting. It’s really cool. I’m very happy.”
“The support you get is amazing”
Namitha Rajan, 40, also did our training from Ireland and has a son, Daniel,3.
It never felt like I was doing training from a different country! Since graduating, I've been working with the Westonbirt Charities Fair. I also worked with The Gut Stuff for six months managing their Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
I am still running the campaign I started in training, EchtLife. I also do food photography and am currently working with a recipe creator, helping recreate her recipes and photographing them. She will be featuring them on her website later this year.
Through the DM Collective I've been able to connect with others who've done the course from Ireland and the support has been amazing. And I am able to do all this while not missing a moment with Daniel. I really couldn't ask for anything more.”
The details: To do our training from abroad all we ask is that you have a good internet connection, a laptop/computer with a functioning webcam and a smartphone. You’ll be put into a peer group with other mums (one of the best bits of our training!) so you’ll need to commit to UK GMT timings for virtual meetings.
Admissions for this course are currently closed.
