Six years ago, I was focused solely on institutional sales. My kids were young, and I worked part-time. Digital marketing? It wasn’t even on my radar.

Then the world shifted—and so did I.

I still remember setting up our first Instagram account and feeling a rush of excitement after posting that very first image. Sharing a story, resharing a post—each small step felt like a milestone. Then came the day I opened the backend of Shopify. It looked like a control room with a hundred buttons I didn’t understand. But I dove in anyway.

Sending out that first email campaign felt like a big deal. Listing a product on Amazon, figuring out how to optimize it, creating bundles, collecting reviews—every one of these was a breakthrough moment. Creating our first ad for performance, writing that first blog post—those felt like another level unlocked. I was building muscle memory with every new platform, every new challenge.

My sibling and co-founder was learning on the job too, and we figured things out. We made mistakes, tried new things. upgraded our website, branched out into new platforms and new geographies- Google became our mentor, YouTube our classroom. We learned by doing—while selling, while building, while growing.

Today, terms like ROAS, conversion rate, click-through rate, user-generated content (UGC), A/B testing, funnels, landing pages, Meta Ads Manager, SEO, keyword targeting, content calendars, app integrations, and automated flows are all part of my everyday world. What once felt like overwhelming jargon now just feels like daily work.

I’ve never really used my academic background in any of this—but I now understand what people mean when they say it’s not the subject you study that matters. It’s the skills it builds. The truth is, it's not about what you learn—it’s about learning how to learn. Learning how to figure things out when there’s no manual. Learning to work hard, teach yourself, manage your time, meet deadlines—and even create them for yourself.

It’s the resilience, the persistence, and the unglamorous effort of showing up every day, even when things feel uncertain.

This journey hasn’t been linear, and it definitely hasn’t been easy. But it’s been real—and incredibly empowering. I’ve gone from part-time sales to swimming in a fully digital world, one step at a time. And I wouldn’t trade the growth, or the lessons, for anything.

To anyone just starting out or feeling behind: You’re not. You just haven’t started yet. And when you do, you’ll be amazed at what you’re capable of.

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