About Drew Garrett
I graduated San Diego State University in 2023 with a marketing degree and a dream. Although I didn’t get my degree until graduation day, I’ve been accumulating experience in marketing since I started high school. I was the president of DECA, winning multiple awards at the state and national level for my written integrated marketing campaigns and performances during the live oral events. I took business and marketing classes through concurrent enrollment at a community college while I was still in high school, then continued on to SDSU to get my degree and follow my passion.
I don’t know if it is because I was born in San Diego or if I just liked the school, but SDSU instantly felt like home. I poured all my energy for the first couple years into myself, my fraternity, clubs, and my studies. I learned how to be leader, how to manage people, how to stay disciplined, and most importantly, how to have fun while doing all of that. The latter half of college I began to focus less on school and clubs and more on my career. I got internships at DISH, PorchLight Realty, and Singular Genomics, learning a variety of marketing tools and methods along the way. I also got to see the difference in how companies operate based on size (Large Media Conglomerate, Small Local Business, and Medium-Sized Startup). After graduation, I took a full time role at Fusion92, an innovate and future thinking marketing agency.
But work isn’t everything. Below is some of my hobbies and experiences that have made me who I am today.
Tijuana Home Build
Senior year of college, I left the country for the first time in my life. I was joining my friends on a journey to Tijuana. The mission? Build a house. I went because I thought it would be fun, which, it was. But I didn’t understand the impact I would be having until I arrived at the house build location.
We were building a house for a family of three – Mom, Dad, and a young boy, around 3 years old. There current living situation was a small shed made of spare wood and tarps. They only spoke spanish, but we had a translator with us so we could effectively communicate. As they spoke to us about their current situation and how grateful they are, I immediately had a new sense of perspective for my life and the problems I think I have. It was incredibly humbling, and gave me a great sense of purpose as we began building the house. This feeling of gratitude has stuck with me long after, always reminding me to avoid complaining and to be thankful for the little things we all seem to take for granted.
It was also incredibly fun. Building an entire house from scratch with your best friends in less than 2 days is truly an experience you will never forget. Using my Spanish III skills from high school to speak and play with the little boy is genuinely one of my favorite memories… even though he still spoke better spanish than me.
Tools: SEMrush, Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, Microsoft Powerpoint
Sigma Chi
If I’m being honest, The story of Drew Garrett can not be told without Sigma Chi. When I joined this fraternity, we did not even have a charter yet. My initiation date happened to be the exact day we became Sigma Chi, and I officially joined as a member of the Alpha class, 64 members. We were the newest fraternity on campus, nobody knew us, we had contributed nothing to the world, and we had 0 accolades. I had one desire: Make this organization into the best version of itself that it could possibly be, becoming recognized and respected locally and nationally.
Sounds like the perfect job for a marketing major, right?
Social Media Manager
I got to work quickly, taking on the officer position of social media manager. I meticulously controlled our Instagram, understanding how important a digital presence is in our current role. I standardized our rush process, ensuring that we had a coherent theme and aesthetic across all of our social media channels, t-shirts, and marketing materials. This quickly set us apart amongst our peers, as no other organization was cultivating a coherent theme at the time, they did not see it as important. This let me utilize my marketing knowledge of branding, marketing communications, and content creation in a fun and unique way that is quite different from a traditional business experience.
Assistant Rush Chair
Satisfied with how our social media was, I trained my successor then looked towards my next challenge. I took on role of the Assistant Rush Chair, becoming a critical component of one our most important processes. I ensured that the release of marketing materials and communications were launched at the right place and time to best reach our target audience. I also wrote and created most of the communications and graphics that were sent out during rush, ensuring that graphics were high quality and copy was easily digestible. You would be surprised how many otherwise great organizations fail purely because they just don’t know how to market themselves.
Social Chair
This all culminated to my final and most important role – Social Chair. This is role basically made me the CMO of a company with my own $40,000 budget. I was responsible for all digital communication, messaging for all social channels, event planning, philanthropic efforts, and brand partnerships.
We ended up using that $40,000 well, hosting some of the best events and excursions at the whole school. I worked with a team to plan a 2 night trip to Las Vegas as well as a Formal trip to the Del Mar Derby. That year, we won the Chapter of the Year award at our school, a reflection of our efforts in strategic financial and event planning. I spearheaded the planning of our philanthropy, Derby Days, our chapter’s main purpose and most important cause. We raised a then school record $68,000 for cancer research in one week. That record was broken my senior year, when we enhanced our efforts and raised $120,000, the 6th highest in the nation.
WIP