Allison Cisneros

Virtual Sales Associate

I am a Virtual Associate of Yearbook Sales at Walsworth. Prior to this position, I was a yearbook adviser turned Walsworth Sales Rep. My job now is to help Yearbook Reps with requests that can help them be even more efficient in their role. I was a yearbook adviser for four years, and then I was a Sales Rep in Texas for five years. This is my 10th year in publishing and my sixth year working for Walsworth.

When reps need a little extra help – maybe more time to complete things or assistance with communication – they reach out to me. I do a range of things, from creating graphics to gathering data to flowing portraits and everything in between. It allows me to do the parts of the Sales Rep job that I absolutely loved and also do some of the smaller tasks that I remember taking up so much of my time. Now, I’m able to help Sales Reps free up some of their time to go out and prospect and spend more time helping their customers.

When I started my job as a Yearbook Adviser, I had no background in yearbooks. I was at a BIG school with a BIG yearbook, and I had no idea what I was doing. My Walsworth rep at the time was the one who taught me what I needed to know. She was the one who invited me to teach at national conventions and made me feel confident in what I was doing. After a few years, I was curious about the job of a rep, and I thought, “That seems like something I would be good at”. I loved how Walsworth made me feel like a member of their family when I was a customer, and I wanted to be a bigger part of that.

The thing I loved the most about my job when I was a Sales Rep was solving problems and helping people. So the best part of my job as a Virtual Associate is that I still get to solve problems and help people. I get to work with reps to help make their jobs easier, and I even get to work with some of their customers and do training or critiques.

My personalized coffee mug would say: “Whatever you are, be a good one.”

A fun fact about me is that I have built up a recipe book over the last few years. When I meal plan, I find recipes that are budget-friendly and easy to make with two babies hanging on me at all times. When we find one we like, I write it out in the specialty pages that I ordered, and I put it in the notebook. I even have friends and family who text me and ask for recipes, so I just take a picture from the book and send it to them.

My family consists of my amazing, supportive husband and two beautiful little girls. Charlotte is two (going on 13), and Eleanor is seven months old. They are happy, outgoing, loving and they are the reason I do everything I do. My husband has supported me throughout my career, whether that meant working crazy long days or changing positions and completely changing how we do things in our day-to-day life.

My main activity outside of the workplace is taking care of my home. I have a few hobbies and interests (mostly crafts), but my time is spent with my family. I never saw myself being a stay-at-home mom when I was growing up, but once I had my children, I couldn’t imagine not spending as much time as possible with them. I am a homemaker. I build our budget and meal plan. I get the groceries and clean the house. I do the laundry and put away the girls’ toys (which probably takes the most time because they’re a hot mess). For some people, this might sound exhausting – and it is – but I absolutely love taking care of my family and my home.

Walsworth always told me they are a family company, and I believed that from what I saw. But when I joined the team, I really felt it. Since I started working with Walsworth, I have gotten married and had two babies. Through every change, I have been supported. If I had an insurance or HR issue, I could always get with someone and get it resolved promptly. If I had a family emergency, I was always given grace in taking time to handle things. When I had both of my girls and needed to make a change, I was met with solutions and not with resistance. Walsworth has supported me through my big life changes in ways I couldn’t have imagined when I first started.