A proud Ohio State alumna, Ann Mack (BA, Journalism, ‘97) now spends her time in San Francisco, overseeing Facebook’s Business Solutions Marketing group, which is responsible for inspiring and enabling businesses to maximize their potential across Facebook’s family of apps.
Mack received her bachelor’s degree in journalism from The Ohio State University in 1997. A week after graduation, she joined Mansfield News Journal as its crime reporter.
“It was the best of times and it was the worst of times,” Mack said.
At the time, Mansfield was home to the only death row prison in Ohio, known as the Mansfield Correctional Institution. Mack reported on topics ranging from murder to hit-and-runs and abductions., Mack said it was a constant learning experience and a way to be fully immersed into the world of journalism.
Mack then landed a position at Adweek Magazine covering digital advertising in New York City. She explored the early days of the internet and eventually transitioned into covering interactive advertising centered around major companies. However, Mack said there was something missing.
“As a journalist you can become an insider, and you can talk to your sources, but you are still an outsider looking in,” Mack said.
Mack’s curiosity caused her to take a corporate communications offer from J. Walter Thompson, one of the companies she’d covered as a reporter. J. Walter Thompson was shifting its agency from television into a more digitized organization. Over the next 10 years, Mack’s job became more focused around trends and insights, and she worked closely with researchers to understand the shifts and developments in society that have ripple effects on culture and consumers.
Ultimately, because mobile technology was at the center of the trends she had been compiling and spotlighting, Mack looked for a technology company at the forefront of development and made her next career leap to San Francisco, California. Facebook, looking to launch their insights practice, provided the perfect opportunity. Mack joined as a part of the launch team for Facebook IQ: Facebook’s insights practice that offers studies and resources to fuel marketing and business transformations. It put Mack at the cutting edge of tectonic shifts in marketing trends.
In her current role at Facebook, Mack and her team help businesses big and small connect with customers and maintain relationships that help them grow.
“How you build a brand and a business, for that matter, drive consideration, sell goods and services, measure effectiveness, run marketing campaigns—all of that is changing, thanks to massive changes in technology and consumer behavior. It’s up to us to inspire and enable businesses to turn these shifts into opportunities,” Mack said.
Mack credits much of her success to the habits and dedication she developed at Ohio State. She was given the ability to explore all her interests through various classes until zoning in on a Journalism major, and even kept her passion for theatre by being a member of Glee Club.
"At such a large university, there are so many opportunities and resources right in front of you," said Mack.
Article by student Lindsay Weisskopf.
