Advertising’s Rising Star

Raquel Wilbun was shocked when Adweek named her its 2021 Media Rising Star—and she was doubly surprised when she saw herself on the cover of the publication’s April 12, 2021 issue. “The award meant a ton to me. I always felt like I came into the industry late,” says Wilbun (CGS’12, COM’14). That honor recognized her work as an integrated media supervisor at the creative agency Mediahub, where she helped companies like Ulta Beauty, the NBA and Wyndham Hotels deftly pivot their campaigns to weather the pandemic. “It feels good to be seen and appreciated for the time and the work that I put into clients and into the agency, because it was a lot of blood, sweat and tears.”

Look at Wilbun’s resumé, however, and it’s no surprise that her work is being recognized. Although she didn’t plan to go into advertising when she graduated from BU, Wilbun quickly climbed the ranks at Mediahub, from media planner to senior media planner. She had just been promoted to media supervisor when the pandemic broke out. “It was a really hard hit for us as a team at Mediahub, but also for the clients of course,” she says. “We took a beat to reevaluate how we can make a difference in such a tumultuous time.”

For Wyndham, her hardest hit account as people suddenly stopped traveling, that meant taking an even more targeted approach, she says. First, her team moved quickly to cut budgets. Then, they focused on monitoring the ever-changing travel restrictions. “We decided to put together this campaign that was regionally and locally led,” Wilbun says. That meant tracking the local COVID restrictions near Wyndham hotels, as well as the outdoors attractions drawing people to those areas even in the midst of the pandemic. “It was thinking about how we can reach people to drive them to ultimately book the hotel in a short window during little road trips.”

According to Adweek, Wilbun and her team created a campaign that “delivered an average of 10 times more direct conversions (consumer actions taken) during a period of deep uncertainty than Wyndham’s previous campaign.”

This kind of quick, creative thinking has defined Wilbun’s award-winning media career. But her path hasn’t always been easy.

Finding Her Path

Wilbun grew up in Memphis, Tenn. Her mother is a BU alum, and frequent visits to Boston inspired Wilbun to attend her mother’s alma mater. At COM, Wilbun says she “kind of fell into” PR. A friend had taken the introductory Principles and Practice of Public Relations course and told Wilbun how much she enjoyed it. “So I was like, ‘Sure, why not?’ I took the class and also loved it. I felt like it utilized my strengths.”

At the time, she was watching the ABC show Scandal, in which Kerry Washington plays Olivia Pope, the head of a Washington, D.C. crisis management firm and a former White House communications director. Wilbun also secured an internship at the community affairs office of then-governor Deval Patrick, where she got to be involved in a lot of on-the-ground community-building programs. The show and internship got her thinking about going into a government-related PR role.

“That internship showed me I didn’t just want to write press releases,” says Wilbun. “I knew I wanted to be more involved and have a stronger understanding of my impact on the world.”  

According to Adweek, Wilbun and her team created a campaign that “delivered an average of 10 times more direct conversions (consumer actions taken) during a period of deep uncertainty than Wyndham’s previous campaign.”

After graduation, she landed a job in PR and communications for the City of Chicago. “I saw this idealistic type of field for myself where I could go into local government and really make a difference in helping candidates or initiatives,” she says. But Wilbun became disillusioned with the reality of the job, which wound up taking a toll on her mental health. In an essay for Mediahub’s blog, “The Pieces Unseen: The Professional Journey of a Black Woman,” she called out the position’s “excruciating” hours and “extremely toxic environment.”

Wilbun left the job after just under six months and regrouped. “I asked myself, “What am I good at? Where can I take the skills that I’ve learned and transfer them?” She landed an account assistant role at the Chicago print buying division of the Omnicom Media Group, where she helped clients with media plans. “I honestly didn’t know any of what that meant at the time, but felt like it would be a good fit,” Wilbun says. “It turns out it was, and I had no idea what it would eventually grow into.”

After taking on another role at Omnicom, as a strategist with PHD Media where she worked on campaigns for SC Johnson, Wilbun moved back to Boston to work at Mediahub. Among her first accounts were Chipotle and Wyndham. Drawing from her experiences with racism and microaggressions in the industry, she also helped found the group Black@Mediahub, which provides a safe space and support system for employees of color. 

Even after receiving national recognition for her work at Mediahub, Wilbun is still on the move. She returned to Memphis during the pandemic, and after a year-long sabbatical, accepted a new position in April 2022 as a product marketer for Pinterest, focusing on helping businesses advertise on the social media platform.

“I think that we build our entire college careers around our majors and then we assume that we will build these long-lasting careers around whatever we major in, but that’s not always the case,” says Wilbun. “But I do think that PR was a foundation for me to move into all the different avenues and all the different positions that I’ve been able to, and one of the things that I’ve learned over my time is that good skills transfer no matter what you do. Being a good communicator, being a good listener, understanding how to work as a team…. I always try to remind myself that I have to stay true to my values and to those core skills that I’ve learned. Everything else will fall into place.”