July 10, 2025
This piece is sponsored by Click Rain.
Chelsea Redinger, director of media at Click Rain, understands that working in marketing means working in the business of people. Her work is methodical, operating behind the scenes to reach a business’ core audience online with targeted messages. Following consumer behavior and knowing where and how to reach them with the right message are key drivers of a marketing campaign’s success.
“We look for more than the demographics. We want to know where they spend their time, both online and offline, and what kind of content they engage with — it’s more than age and gender. I think we do a really great job through the tools and expertise we have,” she said.
Click Rain is a digital marketing agency headquartered in Sioux Falls. Offering a full spectrum of online marketing and website solutions, Click Rain partners with clients in various industries across the region.
As the head of the media department, Redinger helps her team deliver strategies that produce real results. While it’s often assumed that media strategy requires strictly black-and-white thinking, Redinger said there’s plenty of room for flexibility and fresh ideas.
“Media is a big puzzle, and in a way, you do have to be creative, but the beauty is that there is not one exact right way to do it,” she said.
Redinger strives for three key objectives in her role: making complex information easy for clients to understand, staying current with the ever-evolving digital world and approaching a business’ marketing campaign holistically, ensuring that its targeting, media placement and creative are aligned.
Delivering metrics that matter, simplifying digital
One of Click Rain’s core functions is to deliver metrics that matter. This means Redinger and other team members will sit down with clients to pinpoint the hurdles they’re facing and link them back to the key ways Click Rain can provide solutions to help them reach their marketing goals. Once the goals are defined, Redinger will create a strategy that centers on attaining those benchmarks, along with the metrics it will take to get there.
“A lot of thought and insight go into providing marketing key performance indicators, and we at Click Rain actually work to meet those goals, striving for excellence,” she said.
Not only does Redinger work with clients at the start of their campaigns, but also she accompanies them throughout, providing performance reports and ensuring that Click Rain is helping them achieve their objectives.
“There’s not a magic curtain where we gatekeep everything. We are open to sharing anything, and we have tools that allow our clients to have that real-time view, which I think is unique. It’s a partnership more than anything else.”
Delivering on metrics that matter isn’t just about building lasting relationships, but also about instilling trust so clients can be confident that their business and budget are in good hands.
While Redinger’s role focuses on the nuances of digital media, she often needs to communicate that information to clients in a way that is easily digestible. Her work largely involves simplifying digital — developing a plan for media tactics, the strategy behind it and providing a market analysis where she divulges information on a client’s target audience and how to reach them.
“There is so much thought, expertise and training that goes into every single thing we do to ensure we are truthfully delivering on those results,” she said.
“We try to instill that trust so our clients can know that we have everything taken care of and they can get back to running their business.”
Kate Kotzea, vice president of products and services at Click Rain, reflects on Redinger’s mastery of simplifying digital.
“Chelsea has a gift for taking complex strategies or data and simplifying them into clear, actionable next steps. She sets a high standard for excellence, innovation, creativity and results on every project and ensures we deliver,” Kotzea said. “She’s an absolute joy to work with and to dream up new possibilities alongside.”
Ever-changing, boundless world of digital media
In digital marketing, the sky is the limit. According to Redinger, “If you can dream it up, likely it can be done.”
A campaign strategy can take many different directions, depending on the media the team deems most efficacious. Tactics, platforms and technologies are constantly evolving, making marketing goals somewhat of a moving target. For example, changes to data collection and advancements in technology can significantly impact a campaign’s performance; therefore, being mindful of these developments is essential for Redinger.
Media budget — does it affect performance?
First of all, some assume a small budget can hurt performance, meaning a business won’t get anywhere in the digital sphere, but Redinger disagrees.
“A $500 campaign can be just as exciting as a $1 million campaign. There are ways to be strategic to use dollars efficiently and effectively, no matter the size,” she said.
Budget impacts are minimal as long as calculated decisions are made regarding an advertisement and it reaches and appeals to the intended audience.
Adjustments to consumer privacy, data collection
The digital landscape is changing constantly, meaning media tactics and platforms are evolving with it.
“The methods we utilize to collect data on users are changing,” Redinger said.
“Privacy and data-specific advancements that are still on the horizon will be interesting to see shake out.”
Changes to privacy and data gathering for users can impact how clients reach their audience and affect the type of information they can find about them. If Redinger doesn’t watch out for those changes and modify her media strategies accordingly, her clients’ campaigns can take a hit.
AI innovations
AI is making significant strides in the digital marketing scene, driven by new developments, but Redinger and her team have been utilizing it for years. Within paid media platforms, AI now can be used to create visuals, video, copy and anything in between, but it also can be used to automate the way digital media is placed, which is something Redinger is all too familiar with. While AI is still improving, it can be especially useful when working with media platforms to optimize digital placement and automate tasks.
A client’s marketing goals are taken into account with every strategy, but choosing the avenues in which to reach those goals are endless. It’s an essential function of Redinger’s position as director of media to stay up to date on changes in the digital world, enabling her to deliver campaigns with profitable results.
Aligning business to marketing
“The biggest thing for businesses is to make sure you have focused objectives,” Redinger said.
If a business wants to increase its follower base, grow engagement and build awareness, it can be challenging to accomplish all these things simultaneously. Solidifying one marketing goal ensures that the team is working toward the same thing without compromising resources.
“By having clear objectives, your message and dollars won’t be spread thin,” Redinger said.
Marketing and business can go hand in hand, but marketing can take a business only so far if it doesn’t have other resources or creative to support its goals.
“If your media is great but the website we’re sending traffic to is lacking, you won’t get the engagement you’re looking for,” Redinger said.
She suggests that businesses prioritize their online reputation by modifying elements such as their website, graphics in ads and social media accounts to better represent their image.
“Click Rain does a really nice job of closing the loop and showcasing the end result data so we can show the impact of marketing all the way up to business,” Redinger said.
The best way to see if marketing strategies and initiatives are effective is to look at the results. Did the online ads draw users to the website? Did the business receive increased engagement? Did it reach marketing goals? Business leaders and their marketing teams can see all of that in the reports that Redinger helps produce at the end of every campaign. From there, Redinger and the rest of the team can modify and optimize the next campaign based on the findings to further improve a business’ online performance.
Fostering balance, excellence
Click Rain stands on four core values: balance, integrity, excellence and others before self. Balance sticks out the most for Redinger. Emphasizing balance as a core value encourages employees to adopt a healthy lifestyle that helps them avoid burnout at work.
“I appreciate that the leadership here understands that working in overdrive might work in the short term, but it’s not feasible in the long term,” Redinger said.
But according to her, giving employees flexibility and freedom does not diminish the standard.
“Even though balance is one of our core values, our excellence factor remains.”
Redinger applies that standard of balance and excellence to her role as director of media. Her appreciation for Click Rain’s emphasis on a healthy work-life balance trickles down to her team, where she encourages those same values. She ensures that her department operates in a way that is healthy and most beneficial for the client. If her team is feeling the weight of a heavy workload and is running on steam, they may struggle to effectively produce a profitable campaign strategy for a client. Fostering balance while maintaining a high standard is the key to her department’s success.
She also ensures that everyone in her department is included when discussing new initiatives or strategies to use with clients. She values the opinion of everyone on her team.
Levi Scott, associate media strategist at Click Rain, said Redinger’s mentorship, standards of excellence and trust she has in her team make her a respected leader.
“Coming to an agency as my first job out of college, I was worried my youth might be seen as a liability; Chelsea, however, has totally quelled those anxieties through her leadership and inclusion of younger employees. She frequently comes to me for different outlooks on new platforms and strategies, making me feel like a valued part of the team since day one,” he said.
Through her people-centered, results-based approach, Redinger delivers quality work to clients and leads her department with excellence. Simplifying digital is more than explaining the numbers behind a campaign — it’s ensuring clients receive the best strategy for their business, optimizing to reach their goals, delivering those results and celebrating every win along the way.
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