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Marketing to Analytics Engineering: DBT, SQL, Data Modeling & Career Playbook
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Marketing to Analytics Engineering: DBT, SQL, Data Modeling & Career Playbook
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Episode Overview
How do you transition from digital marketing into analytics engineering—and master DBT, SQL, and data modeling in the process? In this episode, Nikola Maksimovic shares his complete career transformation journey, from startup marketing roles in London and Berlin to growth marketing at Ecosia, and ultimately his pandemic-driven pivot into BI and analytics engineering. Nikola reveals the step-by-step learning path that worked for him—SQL fundamentals, hands-on BI projects, strategic conversations with internal data.
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Chapter Summary
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- 0:00 - Episode Overview: Switching from Marketing to Analytics Engineering
- 0:32 - Early Career & Startup Experience: London, Berlin, Movinga
- 1:04 - Marketing Role at Ecosia: Generalist Tasks and Responsibility Growth
- 2:53 - Performance Marketing: Rapid Feedback Loops and Data-Driven Optimization
- 7:18 - Career Pivot During Pandemic: Moving Toward BI and Analytics
- 8:45 - Preparing for BI: SQL Course and Marketing-Analyst Bridge
- 9:53 - Internal Pathway: Conversations with BI Team and Required Skills
- 11:02 - Core Skills: Advanced SQL, Data Pipeline Familiarity, Python Basics
- 12:50 - Transition Phase: Balancing Marketing Work and BI Projects
- 14:14 - Current Responsibilities: Analytics Engineering, Product Support & A/B Testing
- 18:34 - Data Modeling in Practice: DBT Migration and Transformation Layers
- 20:34 - Analytics Tooling Stack: Snowplow, DBT, Looker, Redshift, Airflow, Airbyte,
- 22:08 - DBT Implementation: Leading a Migration Project and Data Modeling Learnings
- 23:12 - Looker & LookML Experience: Reporting and Dashboard Building
- 24:51 - Infrastructure Choices: Self-Hosted Tooling vs DBT Cloud
- 25:06 - Role Definition: Analytics Engineer vs Data Analyst — Overlap & Organizational
- 28:40 - DBT’‘s Influence: How DBT Shapes the Analytics Engineering Role
- 30:28 - Data Modeling Theory: Wide vs Narrow Tables and Incrementalization Tradeoffs
- 33:46 - Learning Data Modeling: Practical Resources, Blog Posts and Mentorship
- 35:30 - Nontraditional Background: Classics to Data — Just-In-Time Learning and Udemy
- 38:27 - Product Analytics Focus: Growth, Retention, RFM Analysis and NLP Experiments
- 39:36 - Domain Knowledge Advantage: Marketing Funnel, User Journey & Empathy
- 41:50 - Transition Playbook: Excel, SQL, Dashboard Practice and Small Projects
- 45:09 - Mentorship & Sponsorship: Internal Champions, Confidence and Representation
- 50:23 - Networking Channels: LinkedIn, Meetups and DBT Slack for Mentors
- 52:10 - Reading List: Analytics Newsletters & Blogs (DBT roundup, Lenny’s, Locally
- 53:46 - Contact & Wrap-Up: Finding Nikola on LinkedIn and Episode Close