Speaker 1:

If I actually was working at a company right now in house as a marketer, I would make sure that leadership understands what marketing really means, and what you’ll need to do to get there, and that they have the patience and the strategic insight, if you will, to be able to hold to that. And sadly, if they don’t, if I was a marketer, I wouldn’t work at a company like that. And I’ll tell you why, because it’s really shooting yourself in the foot to stay somewhere that does not understand why what you do is important. And so many times at companies I’ll see this, especially at B2B, marketing ends up being like the on demand collateral center for sales. So like, “I need this, I need this.” Marketing is not an asset creation house. Yes, that may be a part of what marketers do, but that makes it a very tactical position. It makes it… Heck, you can use Canva to do that. Do you really need…

So if I was a marketer in your position, I would one, make sure that I’m really connecting my strategies and our tactics to outcomes. And you can totally do this by the way. And then of course, if you continue to find that your leadership doesn’t get it, honestly, I’ll be very blunt and say you deserve better because right now is your moment. There are companies that really, really want good marketing talent. So if you understand this world and you are willing… And by the way, just you listening to this and spending your Thursday evening here tells me that you are among the top 1%. I mean, you’re already committed. You’re asking these questions. Clearly wouldn’t be doing this if you didn’t care about your job or care about the brand you’re building.

So I would say use your strengths and play to them where they’re appreciated and where you have a good runway and where you can actually deliver results. Because of all the marketers that I know, the most frustrating thing across the board that they all have in common, regardless of whether they’re in tech or healthcare or manufacturing, is feeling like they can’t make a difference because they’re so limited by what they’re allowed to do or what they’re held to. So one of the things I always like to say is good marketing is a privilege, and that privilege comes once you… Especially for tech companies, which we work with a ton, it comes when you have product market fit. It comes when you have customers already in the door. It comes when you have some level of traction. It’s very hard to market when you are literally hunting to eat. So you’re killing to just get food on the table. There’s no better recipe for burnout than that, in my opinion,