In the late ’90s, my experience as a sportswriter for a small Savannah newspaper taught me the importance of accuracy, storytelling, and audience connection and gave me the chance to combine two of my earliest passions, writing and math, into a career in digital marketing. These experiences carried me from jobs in print advertising to online marketing agencies and continue to guide the digital marketing consulting services I offer clients today through Vast Interactive Consulting.
Coach Clarence
It was the summer of 1997 and I had just returned to my hometown after my sophomore year at Duke. And, like most college students on break, I needed a job. In school, I was on a science and math track majoring in Psychology, but my favorite classes were the English and creative writing courses and discussions. My job search began by scanning the classifieds in the newspaper and reaching out to former teachers, friends, and family connections. I let market opportunity guide my next steps.
One of those connections led me to Clarence E. Wilson, an assistant coach from my high school varsity basketball days. He was now the Sports Editor at The Georgia Guardian, a local paper for Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) that covered City of Savannah community news. Clarence and I connected on a landline telephone and chatted about school, writing, and Duke Basketball (a topic we had bonded over many times.) Then he asked if I was interested in writing articles on local sports as a freelancer. Hell yeah. He paid me $35 an article.
A Buffet of Local Sports
Clarence became my first mentor. He was a great storyteller and a bit of a talker, which I loved. Like a coach, he taught me the context and the detail. He taught me AP style, the interview questions that mattered, and how to write an article of a certain length week over week. I learned the review and editing process of a print newspaper and saw the printing press in action. I met the rest of the team who wrote about the arts scene and managed the ads, and lent to the buzz of the office. After a few weeks of reporter training, Clarence sent me out on my first assignment: covering a surf competition on Tybee Island.
For the next two years, I freelanced for The Georgia Guardian over winter and summer breaks. I loved covering the variety of weekly stories and turning facts about games, leagues, and people into something relevant and entertaining for readers who couldn’t be there.
Writing about sports felt natural to me. I had grown up an athlete and loved playing and watching nearly every sport (I still do). I started playing YMCA soccer in kindergarten, often as the only girl on the team, and went on to captain my high school varsity basketball and soccer teams, earning All-Region and All-State honors. I also grew up watching Duke Basketball, which deepened my appreciation for the relationships between coaches and players and the arc of a season. The competition, the athletic achievements, and the big picture meaning gets me out of my seat every time. Playing gave me discipline and teamwork, while watching taught me how narrative arcs build anticipation and loyalty, both essential elements of content strategy work today.
In 1997, I became the beat reporter for Savannah’s first indoor men’s soccer team, the Rug Ratz, in their summer league. Indoor soccer came with new-to-me rules, like three periods of play and hat tricks, similar to hockey. I would flash my press pass each week, interviewing the coach and players before and after the games, trying to make their losing season as interesting as possible.
I covered a few Savannah Sand Gnats minor league baseball games from the press box at Grayson Stadium (now home to the Savannah Bananas), a landmark in Savannah baseball history that had hosted legends like Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron in exhibition games. By tracking players, stats and standings, I built an early foundation in accuracy, organization, and recognizing how numbers tell a story
By the time I graduated from Duke, I had reported on a wide range of sporting events, players, and leagues. I had interviewed athletes, bus drivers, business owners, and kids. From charity golf tournaments and summer basketball tournaments to spotlights on female Olympic hopefuls and high school athletes aiming for college scholarships, these early experiences as a journalist taught me how to observe closely, tell a story with truth, and find the joy in detail.
These experiences became the foundation of my POV on marketing and advertising.
Writing Transcends Time, Industries, and Jobs
During the late nineties, local newspapers were the trusted source for community information, publishing everything from election results to box scores to wedding announcements. Accuracy wasn’t optional; it was the standard journalists were expected to uphold, and like math equations, the details had to add up every time. Each article had to be clear, precise, and engaging, without assumptions or personal opinions.
Today, anyone can publish anything, instantly, creating both opportunity and chaos. There are still reporters and news outlets committed to accuracy and standards, but there are more independent authors and groups publishing opinions stated as fact. This means the responsibility falls on readers to discern what information can be trusted and what is entertainment. The core values of journalism — clarity, trust, and truth-telling — are now only upheld by personal choice.
RIP Printed Newspapers.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s recent announcement that it will end its print edition on December 31, 2025, was a foregone conclusion. We all saw this coming. And this is a testament to innovation, which should be embraced.
In digital spaces, stories can be told with greater depth by integrating video, photography, data, and resources that add context, interactivity, and dimension.
At the same time, there’s something grounding about the physical feel of print. Newspaper clippings tucked into shoeboxes serve as tangible reminders for later generations that a story mattered, that history happened. Even as formats evolve, holding onto that commitment to craft ensures stories, whether online or on paper, will always be worth more than the medium they’re delivered on and the author who wrote it.
RIP Newspapers.
The Moment Vast Went Interactive
My path has always combined storytelling and analysis. As a sportswriter in the late ’90s, I learned that box scores only tell part of the story—the rest comes from how you communicate what happened.
After working at several digital agencies, I launched Vast Interactive Consulting in 2007 because I wanted to deliver agency-level digital marketing to small and mid-sized businesses without the hefty retainers. I also wanted to skip the layers of bureaucracy so I could be hands-on with every campaign and digital asset, from initial concept to performance analytics. So I did and built a career around my two favorite subjects.
These are the same skills I use today as a digital marketing content strategist, translating data into trustworthy, compelling stories.
Accuracy, storytelling, and connecting with an audience became the foundation of my career in digital marketing. Math was always part of the mix, but over time I learned how to combine it with writing to create an impactful story, which shaped my work and inspired me to start Vast Interactive Consulting, a company helping businesses turn data into compelling stories that drive growth and meaningful results.
So... What?
Just like reading box scores teaches you to see the story behind the stats, the lessons you pick up early stay with you as you build a deeper skillset.
The biggest lesson I’ve learned from working at the intersection of writing and numbers is this: both are most powerful when they work together, almost like a conversation between data and insight. Numbers alone don’t tell the whole story, people do. Metrics reveal behaviors, preferences, and patterns, but it’s our interpretation that turns them into action. The real value comes from asking why something works, not just what works. Use these insights to guide decisions, prioritize initiatives, and create content that serves both your audience and your goals.
In the end, it’s not so different from reading box scores back in the press box. The stats only mattered when they connected to the human story unfolding on the field. Today, that same balance of analysis and storytelling drives digital strategy, and it’s what turns numbers into wins.
