Meet Divya Lulla of DLK Strategy in Midtown

Today we’d like to introduce you to Divya Lulla.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Divya. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Growing up, I knew I belonged to the Humanities – any profession that would let me purposefully use my communication skills was on my radar. I started down the path of getting my law degree until I stumbled into an advertising seminar by some top-notch creative directors in Mumbai. Those two hours in the auditorium changed the course of my career. I steered my education towards getting an undergraduate degree in Mass Communications. My first job was at a global ad firm in India as an account management trainee. I was miserable. I knew I belonged in the industry but had to find a role that not only utilized my technical abilities but also produced an impact on people.

Through a mentor, I discovered the discipline of brand planning. It instantly felt like home. Brand planning is a niche within the creative industry that focuses on highlighting the consumer’s voice in creating marketing communications. It involves framing marketing challenges in incredibly interesting ways to produce campaigns that are provocative and purposeful. I spend a lot of time in the world of consumers, technology and culture to identify smart opportunities for my clients to create highly effective and ROI-driven storytelling. I graduated with my Masters in the field from the renowned ad school VCU Brandcenter and went on to work with brilliant agencies like Wunderman Thompson, Leo Burnett and DDB. Helping brands find their purpose and renew their commitment to that purpose every day is what drives me.

Has it been a smooth road?
As a planner, you need to understand a wide variety of audience types depending on the objectives of your client. It includes quickly familiarizing yourself with data points and cultural nuances that make up their lives while contextualizing that information and gleaning highly usable insights to take to the client and your internal teams. I’ve lived and worked in two diverse countries with different demographics, attitudinal and cultural structures. I learned early on, to be productive, you need to shed your inhibitions, ask the smart questions, ask the dumb questions and be comfortable with not knowing what you don’t know and work fast and hard to figure it out.

We’d love to hear more about your business.
I consult at creative agencies in Phoenix on new business development and strategic planning. I also work with a range of small business clients and non-profits in the city to create smart, sustainable and bootstrapped digital marketing campaigns for their services. Working at large, network agencies allows me to contribute towards wide-reaching, creative brand marketing and working closely with small businesses and boutique agencies helps me dive into granular, local and digital marketing without losing sight of the big picture. When I work with you, I’m quickly able to size out your long-term and short-term priorities and you will never be upsold anything you don’t need at the moment.

Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Phoenix is flowing with opportunities if you know where to look. There are cutting edge tech startups, interesting non-profits, traditional family-run businesses – they all need strategic marketing help. It’s important to network, put yourself out there and test it out for yourself. I only wish there were more local organizations to provide community and skill support for freelancers.

Contact Info:

• Website: dlkstrategy.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divyalulla/

Suggest a story: VoyagePhoenix is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.