Rex Roberts, E-commerce Manager! It’s Our “In It for the Money” Feature!

This is usually what I'm thinking about while I work.

For our weekly “In It for the Money” feature, we’ll be introducing you to the kick-ass Knock Knockers who make everything go, from creative to sales to logistics to . . . everything! Note—everybody answers the first five questions. After that, they have about fifteen wild-card questions from which to choose.

1. Name and title? Rex Roberts, e-commerce manager.

2. Originally from? Orange County, California (the Disneyland side, not the MTV’s Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County side).

3. What the hell do you do all day? Basically, I manage everything that has to do with Knock Knock’s online presence. So it’s managing and optimizing the website, running email marketing campaigns, getting our site to show up on search engines as much as possible, etc. Another big part of what I do is keep an eye on our website metrics and analyze the data to find opportunities for improvement. There’s more, but I want to keep this post under 600 words to comply with our blogging best-practices SOP.

4. Favorite thing about working at Knock Knock? I really enjoy working for a company that makes products that people love. Also, the cool people here, fun atmosphere, etc.

5. Favorite hobbies outside work? Sports. I’ve been a volleyball and basketball player for most of my life and try to find an open gym to play at whenever I can.

6. Did your professional life exist before Knock Knock? Before Knock Knock, I did similar things at Dermstore.com, and before that I worked at Shopzilla.com for a bunch of years. I actually still play softball with the Shopzilla team on occasion.

7. Favorite TV show? Currently, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is at the top of my list, with Community coming in a close second. But I’m also a proud reality-competition show junkie: So You Think You Can Dance, American Idol, Project Runway, Top Chef, The Sing-Off (this list could go on much, much longer, but I’ll stop).

8. Interesting factoid no one would know about you from first glance? I always—literally always—have some song, melody, or rhythm stuck in my head. My wife can vouch for this because I constantly annoy her with my inadvertent humming or tapping while we’re in the car, eating dinner, or whatever. Most people don’t know that I’ve been a musician my entire life (kazoo, trumpet, piano, percussion, guitar—learned in that order) and that I majored in musicology at UCLA (musicology is basically music history, but with a good deal of music theory and performance mixed in). Also, one of my front teeth is totally fake and I can pop it in and out whenever I want to.

I got this magnetic man at a online marketing conference three years ago. One day, when I was bored, I made him a sword out of a paper clip. He became a magnetic fighter.

9. What’s in your music rotation right now? I listen to anything and everything. Today I had a mix of the Beach Boys (my favorite of all time), Muse, Rise Against, Mumford & Sons, and Lil Wayne playing while I worked. Yesterday, it was the soundtracks from Rent and Wicked back-to-back all day (I’m not afraid to admit that I love Broadway). It’s really rare that I listen to the same thing two days in a row, but the stuff I listen to most often is drum corps music (mega band-geek stuff—DCI.org if you want to check it out) or film scores (John Williams has been my hero ever since the day I saw E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial at a drive-in theater with my parents when I was three).

10.  Favorite website? Geekologie.com is where I go when I want to be amazed and entertained. Their sister site, IWatchStuff.com is pretty good too.

11.  Favorite Knock Knock product? I’m a big fan of all our funny flashcard options, but Slang Flashcards is probably my favorite product right now.