Passionate about how new media and technologies create opportunities for brands and impact the overall customer experience, Teresa is a sought-after thought leader. Both an author and speaker, Teresa has been quoted in leading publications like Harvard Business Review, USA Today, NPR, and Forbes on how businesses can succeed in our evolving digital marketplace. She speaks at numerous marketing events, including CMOUS, Mediapost, and AdTech. Her work has been recognized by leading awards such as Cannes Lions, Clio Awards, One Show, Effie Awards, and Radio Mercury. Teresa worked with leading Publicis Groupe agencies such as Razorfish and Moxie before joining the Johnson Group as President in 2022. 

In this episode of The Backstory on Marketing, Teresa speaks on the topic of transformational leadership in an ever changing industry, touching on the intersection of data and creativity. In addition, Teresa shares advice she gives to first-time CMOs and women leaders, stressing the importance of acting with confidence and seeking out mentors in all stages of one’s career. 

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Hi, I'm Guy Powell and welcome to the next episode

of the Backstory on Marketing. If you haven't already done so,

please visit Prorelevant.com and sign up for all of these

episodes and podcasts. I am the author of the just released

book, The Post-COVID Marketing Machine: prepare your team to

win. You can find more information on this at marketing

machine dot prorelevant.com. Today we'll be speaking with

Teresa Caro. She is passionate about how new media and

technologies create opportunities for brands and

impact the overall customer experience. Theresa is a sought

after thought leader. Both an author and speaker Teresa has

been quoted in leading publications like Harvard

Business Review, USA Today, NPR and Forbes on how businesses can

succeed in an evolving digital marketplace. She speaks at

numerous marketing events, including CMO US media posts and

ad texts. Her work has been recognized by leading awards

such as Cannes lion Clio awards, won show Effie awards and radio

mercury. Teresa worked with leading publicist, publicists

group agencies such as Razorfish and Moxie before joining now the

Johnson group as president now in 2022. Welcome, Teresa.

Thank you, guy.

Yeah, it's great to have you really appreciate it.

And you've certainly got a great background. And so definitely

looking forward to our chat. So tell us a more little bit more

about how you got into marketing.

Well, I sort of fell into it. And yes, I'm going

to admit how old I am. In the early 90s, and as we discussed

last night, Guy, and your book launch in the early 90s, on the

east coast, and potentially the Midwest, going through some

difficult times. And so graduating school, I just took

the first job that I could find, thankfully, it was with Ford

Motor Company. But I realized very quickly that from a sales

perspective, that wasn't my jam. And working with consultants and

talking to a lot of people, I realized that I loved supporting

the sales process, through marketing, not so much being the

front end of it. So thus was born my marketing career. From

there, I discovered that I love brands, I've worked with a lot

of great brands, but I love the energy and the excitement and

the diversity of advertising agencies. So as you look through

my my resume my LinkedIn profile, you'll see various

things that I've done throughout my career. But I keep coming

back to the advertising agency world. And I'm excited that Joe

Johnson has invited me to help him lead his organization of 26

years- the Johnson group.

Yeah, absolutely. So you were just named the

president of the Johnson Group, but also the chief dragon slayer

it looks like so group and, and how you're gonna slay some great

dragons?

Well, we we definitely love slaying our

giants. Yes, we are an advertising and marketing firm.

We have been around for 26 years. And you may think with us

and yes, it says it right here. You may think that giant slaying

means that we are we help small brands compete against the big

brands. And and that's really the analogy of David and

Goliath. And that how we use that. But in reality, if you

look at the story between the Giant and David, this is really

a huge challenge that everyone was afraid to tackle, right. And

then David comes along with a very simple creative solution

and kills Italy's the Giant, right. And that's what the

Johnson Group has been doing for over two decades really working

with key brands, leaders in their space, and figuring out

who are their giants? Who do they need to slay? And how do we

come up with creative ideas to go about doing it? So it's very

exciting, but I'm able to join such a well-established

organization and help them take to help take them to the next

level.

Yeah, absolutely. You know what, I really liked

the analogy with David and Goliath kind of the young

upstart versus the entrenched big leader and, and you know,

it's interesting when you think about Goliath and and, you know,

in the bigger brands and as a small brand, you're always

afraid of the big brands because you think they're just going to

crush you, but they're also just stuck in their own momentum. And

you really do have the opportunity to slay dragons,

slay dragons. And so I really liked that. That analogy.

Yeah, and it's not necessarily we work with some of

the big giants in the space. But what's interesting is, those

giants have their own giants. And you talk a lot about it in

your book, guys, it's that it's not only your competitors, but

some of those giants might be economic factors, cultural

shifts, brand misperceptions, because something that's going

on. And so how do we, how do we work with giants in the space to

help them overcome their own personal giants, it's a very

exciting time, especially now, there are a lot of nervous

people what's going on? Personally, I nerd out about the

space right now. Because we don't know where it's going. And

to try to get ahead of it and come up with those simple

creative solutions. That's where agency partners such as

ourselves really come into play.

Yeah, and I think it's not only creative nowadays,

in terms of, you know, coming up with a great concept, you know,

the Aflac Duck or whatever it happens to be. But it's also

how, especially in digital how you mix that creative concept

with how you actually bring it to the to the audience. And it's

that combination of creativity on both sides, that I think that

can really make a difference.

Yes, absolutely.

Yeah. So I saw an article. And it's always

interesting, you know, when you hear people talk about data, and

I'm a data driven guy, my book is about data and building more

a marketing machine on using data to really help drive sales

through what marketing does and using analytics. And there was

an article in media post, and there were a couple of things,

which kind of stood out. And one was that, that CMOS 42% of the

CMOS say that data can inhibit creativity. And then there's 41%

that say exactly the opposite. And and so how do you see that?

So can data driven companies? Or do you see data driven analytics

really hindering? Or do you see it helping creativity?

So it's interesting one, it made me chuckle the

article, because 42% say one thing, and 41% said another, so

it was what was what the article was saying, except for the fact

that marketers can never agree, the thing that I did when when

you share the article with me, it's I'm a bit of a word nerd,

in that I have found through my career, that different people

define different words differently. So the first thing

I wanted to do is what does creativity mean? And and if you

look at it, the definition of creativity is actually pretty

dull. I'll read to you for a second... defined is the

tendency to generate or recognize ideas, alternatives,

or possibilities that may be useful in solving problems,

communicating with others, and entertaining ourselves and

others around her tell definition, when to say. And

then you have data. And that definition is factual

information, such as measurements or statistics, used

as a basis for reasoning, discussion or calculation. When

you combine those two things together, and yes, I'm pandering

to the interviewer here, you have a whole section in your

latest book around data, and how data doesn't necessarily mean

dashboards, you have a whole section on that and, and how

data means what's going on in the world. It means competitors,

like we just talked about it, I'd love to explore and whole

idea of how how culture can can be an important data point. And

then you take that, and and those are the data things, you

need someone smart enough to distill that down-tell a story.

And then spark creativity. So if you take like creativity, I

believe we can all agree creative is going back to what I

said in the beginning of what's the challenge that we're trying

to solve? What's the objective that we're trying to achieve?

And how do we go best doing it? And how do we make a difference,

and everyone else will data if used correctly, if not just

numbers, but other aspects are distilled down, you spark that

creativity, then great ideas come out of that. In terms of

the ones that say that it doesn't work, then my argument

would be then you don't have the right person distilling down the

data and really bringing it to life and something that gets

someone to be creative. There's nothing worse guy than white, I

call it blank paper syndrome. We all get in a room with all of

these blank whiteboards and sticky notes, and an assignment

brief which assignment briefs are important saying that we

need to increase sales by 20%. Here's our budget. And we have

demographic data as you know, we're going after 35 to 55 year

old females. Okay. But what else? What makes this particular

audience important, unique? What cultural factors are going on?

What are the competitors doing? What's the wind space? How can

we really get the creative people in the room thinking

creatively, that's when it works. And at the Johnson group,

we like to say that we dig for big, well, we really dig into

the insights and pull out something unique that no one

else has thought of before. And then we come up with that

creative idea to differentiate us or our, our partners from the

rest of their competitive some really achieve those objectives.

Yeah, and I think, to your point about

understanding, well, first of all, the definition of creative

versus the definition of data, but really, really good creative

is also many times has the foundation of good data. And

data doesn't necessarily mean numb. I mean, of course, it

means numbers, but it doesn't necessarily mean we sold, you

know, 20 units last week, and we're gonna sell 21 This week,

and things like that. But when I think of data, and great,

absolutely great creative, I think back at the Campaign for

Real Beauty With, with Dove and with Unilever. And when they did

the research, they came up with these, this concept of self

esteem for basically teenage girls, and the lack that they

have. And they then use that one piece of data, and then blew it

out of the really blew it out with their whole campaign for

real beauty. And I think that's, that is a great example where on

the one hand, you're using the data, you're using the research,

and then you're driving your creative based on that, that

critical research.

And that's a key thing, guy, because how many

people when they see the word data, or they hear the word

data, think numbers? No, there was no numbers in in the real

beauty inside this is really understanding what's going on

culturally, in the world. And, and that was the beginning of

this, the self image of, of filters and, and just altering

of what truly is real beauty and really leaning into that to the

point that now dove is known for real beauty, you say real

beauty, you think stuff you don't think anybody else. And so

they truly owned that space through a key insight through

that data point. That wasn't actually a number.

Yeah, absolutely. And then they also transition

that not only for the young, but also for I don't know if I want

to use the word old, because I don't consider. But then they

also have, you know, be comfortable in the skin you're

in. And and all of those insights and all of that and I

do cold I just like you do I call that data as well. That is

just critical stuff to know. And then when you're putting that

that creative together to really understand how your consumers or

how they how the culture is affecting your consumers how

you're advertising and messaging, and then how they are

going to respond to that. I think that's, that's really,

really critical.

Great. Great.

Yeah, so Well, let's change the topic here a little

bit. So tell us what's it like? And what kind of advice would

you give to a brand new client side CMO?

Oh, yes, well, first, no pressure. Brand new

CMOS only lasted about six months. First time, CMOs only

lasted about six months. So the biggest advice I would give to a

first time CMO is hire an executive. That is the first

thing that you do, you're going to need that that trusted

sounding board to get you through it. Know that it's going

to be fun. The first 3045 days, everybody's excited that you're

there. They believe that you're going to solve a lot of things,

know that it's going to be hard. That second phase is truly hard.

Because you are going to bring in new ideas that no one else

has thought of you are going to be investing in change. And

sometimes that change impacts people and their jobs. They're

your peers. You're your own boss because your own boss has a

preconceived notion of who you are and what he or she expects

of you. And then you even your own employees, you will in order

to make an impact which you've probably been asked to do, you

will have to make change and change is hard. Change is

painful. Change is stressful. But then the third thing is no

one's if you are confident in yourself. You take the time to

hear people out. You Do you do that, that bridge building that

consensus building that, that storytelling, once you get

through the hard part over the other side, it's, it's really,

really a fabulous, fabulous time I have throughout my career

either both on the brand side and on the agency side, being

considered that transformational leader, that growth leader, I'm

usually not brought in to replace someone I'm usually

brought into, to grow something to change something. And that's

really what I've seen. And I'm in that second phase at the

Johnson group now, and every single one of the people at the

Johnson group would say love to have Theresa here, but change is

hard. But I have learned and I have grown confident in the fact

that once I get over that hump, what's really going to be smooth

sailing from there, and very, very exciting.

Yeah, and it's actually interesting, I kind of

think about a brand manager, if the brand manager is not

bringing about change and disruption in the marketplace

with the consumers of their brands, then they will most

likely not be successful, if they're just gonna go steady

state make no changes, then they're more or less on the way

down. So they're, they're incentivized to make changes.

But the difference then for the CMO, especially a new CMO, or a

first time CMO, is you're know, you're not only making changes

on the outside, but you have to make changes on the inside. And,

and making changes to the team and making changes to the

broader team, which is the whole company. And those changes are

very, very painful. So I really like your point. And, and I like

your point as well about having an executive coach, because you

finally have a person that you can really trust as a trusted

adviser that doesn't have any skin in the game, other than to

make you successful. And that really makes a lot of sense.

Absolutely, absolutely. And it's interesting

that you've pointed out, Guy, that it is external change, but

also an internal change. I have found throughout my career, and

it's no different now it's people focus on the work, how

are you going to improve the that that deliverable itself,

people forget that in order to improve about on that

deliverable, you need to clear the way. For those creative, we

just talked about creative, you need to clear the way for those

people to do some great creative thinking, you need to set them

up for success, you need to get them the right tools. Which

means really, the first step of being successful is people

process and plumbing, really evaluating those and getting

them in the right place. That takes time, you may move as

quickly as you can to get those fixed, but it's not fast enough.

And so there'll be a lot of pressure for you to skip to the

work itself. You use the real beauty example in that cmo went

on to Burger King. And now he's gone on to do other things. I

have a huge fan of his real beauty was there before he got

there. So it hadn't really taken off, can you imagine the amount

of pressure he must have been on to make that hugely successful?

Burger King, the same thing, they took a risk to do something

within the Burger King app. So they could go up against

McDonald's from what I read. And obviously it wasn't there. Nor

was I lucky enough to be part of that agency. But it took over a

year more of development. That's if we're if we move slow, if we

go slow to go fast, which is a great link and President Lincoln

quote, now you're gonna make an impact. And so going back to

your original question of how do you become a successful CMO,

stick your stick to your guns, be patient, be thoughtful. And

also just make sure people come along for the ride. They

understand what you what you are doing. You do have all of those

ingredients. That is a true recipe for success.

Yeah, and I, I like you're one of the statistics you

gave before for a new CMO-a first time CMO- their average

tenure is six months. I hadn't heard that one. Normally it's

it's been over the last couple of years, maybe 24 months, I

guess for a seasoned CMO, maybe longer for a more seasoned CMO.

And one of the interesting things about six months is if

you're a new CMO, and you only have six months tenure to be

able to then prove yourself to get that seven month you're

unfortunately inheriting everything that the guy before

you was fired for your change your speed to make changes

significant and meaningful changes is really really under

the gun for that number one and number two, you know you have to

then at least If you if you can't make changes fast enough,

and certainly bigger brands are harder to make changes very

quickly, you have to then really develop that vision in the first

six months so that you can buy that, that seven month in that

eighth month,

I would argue that vision needs to be defined

within the first couple of months. That's, that's really,

yeah, gonna be cute and get any everybody behind that vision.

And understanding the steps in that vision, you do not have a

lot of time to do that. And marketing is one of those things

that we've always struggled with, and that everybody thinks

that they can do marketing. You try to argue with an accountant,

all of us know that we can't do accounting. But marketing,

everybody feels like they can, they can do it. And so everybody

questions, everything that you're doing. We've spoken Guy

and pass conversations about when budgets are cut, and

usually cut from marketing first. And so making sure,

again, people process some plumbing, making sure your

plumbing since in place, so when the CEO comes to you saying we

need to cut $3 million, you can say very, very quickly and

succinctly will, based on this report, if you cut 3 million,

you're going to impact X number of million in revenue. That's

the plumbing piece. So making sure the right people are in

place, making sure that there's a process in place. So those

people can be successful and making sure the plumbing is in

place. So you can be successful you have the data, you have the

information to show that you are making an impact on the

organization. And if you are any member, or any budget dollar

goes away, there is a direct impact on the organization

itself.

Yeah, and that is a and that's kind of what our

business is about connecting marketing to selling and

connecting marketing to actual incremental sales. And and

that's a critical piece. And I used to we used to work with

Donna people's a long time ago when she was in Atlanta Gas

Light. And she did exactly like what you're saying the CEO came

to her and said, Listen, we need to cut a million dollars out of

your budget. And she says okay, yeah, no problem, then we need

to cut, you know, whatever it was $20 million in sales out of

the sales budget. And the CEO said, Oh, we don't?

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

So we went to the next C suite, so to speak, and

took it somewhere else. And you know what, it's funny, too. It

is really unfortunate that quite often companies think about

cutting marketing first. And and even now with the hints of a

recession and the hints of reflect inflation. You know,

we're seeing that in the industry where the the marketers

are then doing everything they can to defend their budgets, and

realizing that even though maybe their effectiveness of their

marketing might go down in the recession, it's still better

than not doing the marketing at all. And that's a really

critical argument for the for the whole marketing team.

Well, and it's so interesting that you use the

Donna people's example, I've had similar experiences being on the

agency side where the agency budgets are cut, and we're all

disappointed and annoyed. And my point back to my team was, well,

then we didn't do our job proving that we were making an

impact that we were just spending the the clients money.

And yes, it looked pretty. And we received a lot of engagement.

But the numbers that mattered. We were looking at the metrics,

the things that we tested and optimized and improved over

time. But the numbers that mattered, the key performance

indicators, we weren't rolling that back up and showing in a

way that the CEOs understand and appreciate how that's going to

make an impact. CEOs know that they need social media, and they

need to be engaging with their audiences. But when it comes

down to tightening that bell, and they're starting to ask why

it's like, okay, that was a nice to have, not a need to have. So

that's not going away. We all know intuitively as marketers

that when that piece goes away, brand awareness goes away, and

we lose control of the brand perception message. We know that

intuitively, but an intuition doesn't pay the bills and

doesn't get what the CEO needs for his or her board of

directors. We need that definitive proof that when this

goes away, then this will also go away. So why not get the

pieces in place, get the plumbing in place, do the

turning off turning on tests before that actually happens? So

you control the message before the message controls? Yeah.

Yeah, how true and it's interesting that you, you

bring up the CEO and the board and so the CEO is coming to you

and saying, Well what happens If we cut, and if, as the CMO or as

the agency, if you don't have the answer that says, yes, let's

cut a million dollars out, and we're going to lose 20 million

in sales. The CEO needs that argument, because his job is

just as much on the line when he goes to the board and says,

Well, it, yes, we're going to have to cut somewhere. But if we

cut marketing, not only are we going to lose the 20 million,

and then to your point as well, we're also going to lose the

future. Because you've marketing to not only drive sales in the

short term, but you need marketing to drive sales in the

future, and cutting off your brand. Investments is a sure way

to then cut off that that future that you might have once you

come out of that recession. Great. Right. Absolutely. So

yeah, great point. So. So now, switching topics just a little

bit. So what kind of advice would you give to a female

leader?

Oh, wow, do we have a whole other podcast guy?

We do we do. We could certainly continue this.

But let's, let's go from there and see what we've got.

It's so interesting. Being a female

leader, I so I'm a member of chief, which is a for profit

organization, really focused on bringing curating female leaders

that you have to be an actual certain level of leader for a

certain amount of, of years to be first invited. And then yes,

it's a it's a paid membership, I bring that up. Because

yesterday, we had this great, amazing session around executive

presence. And, and what's fun about this is, is with Zoom, you

get to do, you get to hear the presenter, but then you get to

chat with everybody, to the to the side, and it was really just

an overall great dialogue. And what we were bringing up is how

to be your authentic self of how women are known to talk too

much, or our squeaky voices, or we can't be heard or we're too

defensive, or we were too aggressive. And what she was

recommending is really be your authentic self, which to a

certain point, I agree. But I also because I've spent so much

time in the agency and consulting world. I'm a big

believer of mirroring that person as well. And so why do I

bring up all of these things, it's really this idea of

communication. As a female leader, as any leader,

especially in the agency and consulting space, how you

position yourself, how you hold yourself, how you communicate,

is incredibly important. I don't care if you're male or female,

you can't come across as defensive, I don't care if

you're male or female, female, you can't use crutch words, or

speak too quickly, or use lingo. And really doesn't matter if

you're male or female. If you work for me, I will call it my

taboo session. And all of my employees for past years are now

laughing right now, as they listen to me. We all sit in a

room, they get to pick a topic that they can present on, it

doesn't matter what it is, can be something they're comfortable

with that they enjoy. And then it needs to be one of those. You

know how it works. It's 20 slides five minutes, and the

slides automatically progress. And I get to be the person back

of the room with the taboo. But the moment you start speaking

too quickly, or you're using too many crutch words or lingo, I

buzzed you, and what was really interesting ended up being a

guy, he got so frustrated with me that he was sarcastically

slowing himself down to the point that I stopped it and

said, Okay, now what does everybody think of this guy? And

they said, Wow, he sounds amazing. He sounds so

authoritative. Yes, communication is key. I don't

care if you're female or a male. If you are going to be growing

up in this business as an executive, you need to learn how

to hold yourself, you need to take a position of authority of

competence. The next time I hear a researcher interviewed on NPR,

a female researcher interviewed on NPR about her research and

she says, I think I will explode. Never say I think she

has spent five years doing this research. She knows it is what

it is it says it in the data. And so having that taking that

that position of power is is the number one thing that you can

do. I don't care if you're male or female.

Shifting more to a female perspective. Yes, there are

going to be things that either in reality or in perception,

things like mansplaining and and gaslighting and all of those

kinds of areas and you're going to be frustrated. Come up with

techniques, there's a lot of great articles out there, again,

hiring an executive coach, join a membership and take lessons,

there are techniques that you can use that again, put you in

position of authority, you are going to have that mansplaining

kind of thing or someone who's, who doesn't listen to your idea.

But as soon as the guy says it, there's that perception that

everybody's now listening to him, well use techniques to say,

George, I'm really happy that you shined a spotlight on that

idea that I just talked about, let me even take that a step

further and go back to these points that were saying. So

that's, again, it may be my point number two, but it does

really come back to communication and communication

style. And, and again, not being defensive, but going in with a

position of authority and confidence. And, you know, I

think three is just find your people. Those people can be men,

those people can be women, I have found a lot of great

mentors in men, a lot of great organizations, there's a great

IBM example that I use, that will bring me to my final point

guy on on what to do is around this idea of having confidence

in yourself. I attended an an IBM session once. And IBM is

doing a really great job in cultivating their female

leaders. And one of those leaders, a man tells a story

about how he had a job opening. And it really came down to two

people, a man who had maybe you're enough experience and a

woman that if you looked at if you checked all the boxes, she

checked, every single one of the boxes, and they're both up for

this position. The woman just happened to be part of this,

this cultivating female leaders program. So she had a mentor.

And this leader comes back to the mentor and says, let me

explain to you what just happened. The guy came in and

said, I can do this job here this, here's the skill set I

have how this is how it translate, Uber confident was

all in, he can do it. The woman came in and said, I don't know,

am I ready? Do I really have all the skill set, maybe I need a

couple more years of experience. That happens time and time

again, we we keep saying that we want equal rights that we want

equal opportunity? Well, we are now being given equal

opportunity. And many times because of our imposter

syndrome, our self doubt, we don't take it we don't there's

been females that I have given opportunities to even recently,

and those females didn't take it because they didn't think they

were ready. And that that's an issue. And we really need to

work on that. So she's

Yeah, and I, I have seen that. And I unfortunately,

I've seen that so many times, where, you know, the so as an

example, and this kind of gets outside of marketing, but my

son's big into climbing. And he rented this movie and the movie

had individuals doing some really interesting climbing

feet, you know, a rock wall or a bridge or this or that. And, and

the men were just confident and say, well, there's going to be a

problem here or problem there. But I think I know how to get

around it. And and the women were exactly like you're saying

is I don't know if we can do this, you know, they they they

often tried it but the first thing out of their mouth was

that lack of confidence. And and you know, it's it's not I don't

know what causes that but you would you would think that in

college or something they were maybe even in high school if

somebody has to then you know, have a have a thing that says

okay, you know, women, you have to do this, and you have to you

have to show confidence. Now the men of course, were faultless,

except for all the other faults. And we need the same kind of

thing except different. And that's actually a piece that

you're talking about. I hate to say it I I think you're right.

Yeah, it's it's it unfortunately happens to where you have a

woman that is much more qualified and yet they they do

have that reticence to say that yes, I'm ready to it. So

Yeah. And that's, that's really what it comes down

to. So if any of your listeners are female, and would like some

mentoring, please reach out to me, you can find me on all the

social medias.

Yeah, and I and be honest with you, as part of the

AMA the American, the American Marketing Association here in

Atlanta. I've been a mentor, I don't know for three or four

years now. And I think it's the it's the most fun thing that I

do to help young marketers both both male and female. And, and,

and that's one of the big things as well. And so, and even, you

know, whether it's whether it's your own employees or whether

it's Yeah, you know, outsiders like mentees or whatever, you

know, I think, you know, helping people to get that confidence

that yes, they can do the job and, okay, they may have some

doubts on one area. But yes, you know, go for it, go for it, go

for it. So,

Right, well and shout out to AMA in the

mentor-mentee program. Shout out to Joanne Harold. She was my

mentor. I was gonna teach myself. I was working on I was

in marketing. So I had figured out that I wanted to do

marketing. And I was at a fax machine. And at that time, AMA

was faxing its announcement, announcements, words

mentor-mentee program, and I right away, I'm a big I was

always been taught to work with mentors. I don't know if it was

something my father taught me or something. And right away, I

signed up for it. And I actually wasn't assigned. Joanne

initially I was given another mentor. And we did this, I think

it was some kind of volunteer event. And we switched because

the guy was with was better with someone else. Joining was better

for me, and I am here today. Because of that, then those

opportunities that Joanne opened me up to and the coaching and

counseling that she has given to me throughout the years.

Yeah, yeah, she's, she's definitely a great person

to have as a mentor. And congratulations. That's so

that's so fantastic that she was able to help you. Wow. So we've

talked about kind of the new CMOs and, and what their

challenges are. And we've talked about female leaders. There's

one other dimension that goes into marketing, and that is the

pace of change. And I like to say, you know, it's it's not

just that change is happening all the time. It's that

accelerated change is now happening all the time, that

time between a new technology and a new capability seems to be

shortening and shortening. And I think the the good news is that

that leaves a lot of opportunity for marketers that can figure

out how to use it early on. But, but just staying up with that.

So what what do you recommend to the marketing leaders today in

terms of how they should handle the disruptive technologies and

the new technologies that are that are streaming right in

front of them?

Well, I would say, don't panic, just because we're

using the word disruptive doesn't necessarily mean that

it's going to be fast if we think about personally

identifiable information, because I would when you asked

me to answer this question, guys started doing some research on a

lot of the latest technologies out there that are sometimes in

some ways, helping marketers and other ways hurting marketers in

this whole idea of haves and have nots. You know, I reached

out to my CTO about this to see what he was thinking of. And he

brought up ad guard and pie hole and I wasn't going to use the

examples but I liked the opportunity being able to say

pie hole on your podcast, so I love this company name that

company vital. All of you will not forget what it is. But what

it is just before I move on, but these are companies that are

blocking client side, tracking implementations and forcing

companies to go server side it's this whole idea of what does a

third party cookieless future look like? That's become sort of

this tagline. This is something I think kind of dude, people are

gonna think I am so old after listening to podcasts. But do

you remember in 1999, the double click and abacus merger that

happened in 2000 All the lawsuits began. That's when I

started at Razorfish and Razorfish because of the the

drive, so drive PM, Razorfish and a third company that is I'm

forgetting, but really because Dr. pm was so focused on cookie

based tracking, and then you had Razorfish that was focused on

using that tracking, and because of abacus and and double click,

there was a lot of urgency around not connecting PII with

the cookies. Well, you fast forward to today, two decades

later, and that's really what's happening. And it's become so

easy to do that. And with great ease and great, actually results

comes great power, and it is used for nefarious purposes. And

so now the government's having to catch up and put in different

kinds of things like GDPR. Well, GDPR I don't know if you saw the

latest article, but a lot of the GDPR guidelines are going to be

rolled back and there's expected to be a billion pounds savings

for these companies because the amount that's been put on them

so it's just it's two decades now. added to a lot and and

there's a lot to think about and a lot of work to be put in

place, we were going to have complete, no third party

cookies. Thankfully, we got a little bit of a respite there.

But if you think about it, it's really only Google left, a lot

of the others Safari Firefox have already gotten rid of this.

So we say disruption, but there is many times there is a bit of

time to catch up, you just can't wait. Because if you do wait,

then it is going to be sudden, it is going to be expensive. And

it is going to be a wildfire that you're going to need to put

out so don't to to get back to your original question around

what should marketers do? Marketers should be looking out

to the future as much as they can. They should be looking at

the past and saying what can we learn from the past. And then

they should be applying that to the future. An example of past

or future is if you look at Google, when I grew up, and

Google was big search engine optimization all out, I'll go

the rhythms, all organic traffic, that was 100%, of what

they did. And that's still very much in play today. Heck, third

school SEO agencies focused on that. But at one point, Google

realized that they could charge people and they could do paid

advertising. And so then paid became a big part of the

algorithm. Fast forward to Facebook. Well, those of us that

went through the Google could see what was going to happen

with Facebook with Twitter, Pinterest, every time one of

those social media platforms comes out and says they're not

going to do paid. We don't believe them. And so learning

from the past and applying that to the future will help you be

prepared for the future. Seeing that Firefox and Safari have

eliminated cookies and don't have to fact check. I believe

I'm correct on that right guy. That's what Yeah, yeah. So

knowing that they've already done that, doesn't that lead you

to believe that Google's going to be doing the same? And so

thinking about where you're supposed to be going in order to

address that? Don't wait, because what feels like

disruptive isn't necessarily disruptive, you starting to see

the signs COVID, with people wanting to actually order food

and get it delivered to you. Companies had been starting to

prepare for that. And thankfully, thankfully,

companies like churches, had already hired people like Alan

to actually fix that now, Allen's budget went from a nice

to have to Oh, my goodness, fix it now. But can disruptive isn't

as disruptive as we think it is disruptive is only truly

disruptive and equaling urgent, if we let it be that way, we

need to always be looking at the past and figuring out how it

will impact our future.

Well, that's an interesting point I and I do

like that. But so does that then mean that the marketing leader,

the CMO needs to have a function, which is marketing

technology. So that someone maybe it's not a full time or

maybe it is for a larger brand. But somebody then that is really

tracking and making certain that the company is staying up to

date with whatever those those changes in technologies are

going to be? Well, traditionally,

that's been why agencies still exist. Every time

there's articles going out saying that agencies are going

to go away. I am hesitant to say that that's a good idea. Yes.

Will your partnership with your agency shift? Should agencies so

let's use an agency example. The commoditization of social media,

community management, brands are going to figure out that it's a

lot less expensive to hire a 55 $60,000 resorts to do the day to

day community support for their social media, not hire an

agency. And the agencies from a strategic perspective, need to

be those partners to help prepare the brand's been saying

for several years now how are you? What are the steps you're

taking? In order to prepare for this cookieless future? Let's

get your cars, your first party data all in one place. let's

consolidate your data, your customer data into one

warehouse? Let's start considering CDP's. Let's start

looking at these things. I've been talking about that since

I've been at Atlanta codes because I knew it was coming.

And so let's prepare for it. So we have several years to prepare

for it. Not...okay, it's time and Google's going away and your

advertising that you've been depending on was now out the

window. And so that's where agencies not to be self serving

because I lead an agency but that's where that's what you

should expect your agency partners to do is to be the

person that helps you look across your space, look at

culture and competitors and all those areas. It's also easier

for us to do it because we don't We deal with the same people

every day, we're looking across many different industries, many

different clients. So we actually have the benefit of, of

different things coming to us different questions being asked

different perspectives versus having to do that one set of

things every day.

Yeah, interesting. And that is a great point in

terms of having the agencies to be the external experts,

because, and that's one of the challenges that we have as well.

And I'm sure you have it as well as that we can have analysts

working for us and and we could then be brought in house or

analyze the they could do our work, they could do it in house.

But those analysts in House wouldn't get the exposure that

the that the agency person would have. Because the agents person

just like ours, our our team, they're working across multiple

clients across multiple industries and different

challenges. And it's that advantage that we bring in

certainly for an agency and certainly then for this, this

element of, you know, following and tracking technology is

definitely something that that that the technologists within

the agency can really shine, as opposed to trying to do that

internally. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. So we're about

towards the end here. And I could we could go on for hours,

and always enjoyed talking with you, Theresa. One thing I do

want to mention to the audience, my first book, which is over my

shoulder right there, Theresa was one of my first editors, my

my first beta reader, and she gave some really great advice.

And I will never forget that and and I'm always thankful for

that. And since that book, I've now written four more. So this

last one is my my fifth book on the on marketing. And, and and I

think it really is something that that really helps are can

help marketers to improve their overall operations and prove

them that they're delivering on the success that they have been

charged with. So is there anything else that you'd like to

mention or any comments that we left off or anything that comes

to mind?

So a few things one is, Guy has been a great mentor

and partner to me throughout the years, go ahead and look at that

photo and see when that was and look at my LinkedIn profile. It

was a little itty bitty marketing manager backend back

then, I thought I knew it all. I'm realizing all these years

later, I didn't. But that guy's been someone who has been a

persistent part of my life. And a big part of helping me think

through marketing, return on marketing, investment, all of

those areas. So again, going back to your question about

female leaders in any leader, for that matter, having that

that partner in lots of different areas is is incredibly

important. So that's number one. Number two against again,

pandering to the interviewer, I was able to read guy's book

while I was I was traveling for volleyball this week. And it

will be something that I asked to surprise guys, the analytics

and strategy team, this is going to be required reading and

discussion group. I really love this version of guys book

because of that aspect that we covered quite thoroughly earlier

in this interview around the fact that data isn't just

numbers, data is research, it's insights, it's telling that

story in order to spark creativity, in order to make

sure that when the CEO comes to prove your budget, so she can go

with them back to her board and prove it to the board, making

sure you have those pieces in place. All of those things are

so important. And then my hope is is that at some point, we can

go back and have another discussion guy, I believe you

and I talked a lot about traditional versus digital and

full full funnel to really put a bow on that as we sum things up

for for your listeners is guy and I talked a lot about

agencies and brands and the partnership. We also talked

about people process plumbing, if you are a new leader, do your

best to break down the silos. Traditional is now becoming

digital, full funnel this idea of awareness and perception and

that impact and how it makes them performance based

marketing. We have grown up in these silos and the silos have

gotten worse. And we need to make sure to break down those

silos to truly become integrated. So if there's one

big takeaway coming from this interviews is really looking at

your current organization and see how can you make it more

integrated and more of an integrated approach so you can

set yourself up for success?

Yeah, that's a good point and Thank you, and thank

you so much for the endorsement, I really appreciate it you've

been, you've also been a great person to bounce ideas off of

over the years and, and really always appreciate your your

input. But to your point, though, about the data silos,

one of the things that, that marketing analytics if done,

right, and there's a lot of people that don't do it, right,

it has to break down the silos, because to your point, it's not

just the the consumer data and the consumer research that has a

data point or the you know, the the the other activities in the

environment that are taking place, but it's also getting

data from sales, from marketing, from operations from customer

service, whatever it happens to be. And having that clean data

across the entire organization is really the best way you can

get the the best results so you can really drive the business,

the business forward.

I agree wholeheartedly. Well said.

Thank you. So yeah, Teresa, thank you so much. I

really appreciate it. And with that, let me close so you can

find more about the Johnson group at Johnsongroup.com

Johnsongroup.com. That's where Teresa is now leading the charge

and slaying those dragons. And otherwise, please stay tuned for

many other videos in this series of the Backstory on Marketing,

please visit marketingmachine. prorelevant.com to download this

blog and you can also see it on the popular podcast providers

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please rate it five stars and I'd really appreciate it

otherwise. Thank you and Teresa, thank you so much.