The marketing industry is increasingly influenced and led by prominent women marketing professionals. In an effort to call attention to these powerful voices, we are releasing a regular series of blog posts highlighting the inspirational stories from women marketing leaders.

The stories, advice, and lessons featured today are from marketing leaders at Eaton, Little League International, and LIONSGATE. 

Meet the leaders: 

Q1: What inspired you to pursue a career in marketing?

Arnold: As a child, I was drawn to stories and writing. I loved creativity in many forms—I remember thinking I wanted to be an author or a jingle writer. (Think “Juicy Fruit, the taste will move you!”). Early in college, I watched the show “Mad Men” and pictured myself becoming an advertising executive working with a variety of companies to propose exciting new ad pitches. Once I began learning about advertising, sales, and marketing, I realized that marketing is the bigger picture. It’s stepping back, being strategic, seeing the short-term and the long-game for a company and/or product, and then piecing together that full story. I feel fortunate to be able to work in this field and tell effective stories to help bring success to meaningful products.

Brown: Throughout my childhood, my parents had a number of small businesses in addition to their “regular” jobs. My dad worked as a high school administrator and coach, spent weekends in the Naval Reserves, and worked with my mom (physical education and special needs educator) on our furniture business. I remember their work ethic being paramount and their reputation being their best marketing asset. We were also a sports family – whether it was my dad as a coach or my participation in many sports including field hockey through college; and our family roots in baseball - my grandfather was a professional baseball scout for 50+ years. The idea of staying connected to sports and the “business of sports” always intrigued me growing up.

Q2: Are there specific challenges you have faced as a woman in marketing and how did you overcome them?

Brown: Of course. They are the same challenges many women face, particularly those that creep in when you are the only woman in a room. To start to overcome these challenges, you have to be able to identify what they are and why they exist; like the ones that are challenging you even before you speak. As a starting point, I invested in educating myself to further my knowledge and understanding. The biggest learning is that a title doesn’t help you overcome any of it. You have to recognize the factors at play, be steadfast and resilient in your work and learn how to manage through these situations. I’ll always remember this piece of advice from a professor - "be relentlessly pleasant.” For me, these moments create a momentum to keep going, learn and build on my expertise and connect with really smart people for guidance.

Arnold: I work in an industry (automotive) that does have more men than women, but that has inspired me to make sure my voice is included even more. Sometimes I am that only seat at the table representing the female viewpoint, so I have a responsibility to share my perspectives. Diversity of thought makes each project stronger, and results in more success overall in my experience.

Liston: Being a woman in business is tough, and being a mother in business is perhaps even tougher. It’s a constant balance and inner battle to make sure you are giving yourself the space and allowance to not be 100% at everything every day. It has taken me a long time to get to the place I’m at today where I understand that I simply can’t be the best at everything every day.  Some days I might be a great boss, others a great mom, and hopefully - for my husband's sake – a great wife. But very rarely when I lay my head down at night do I feel like I’ve been great at all 3 at the same time. So I’ve stopped beating myself up about that – and now I just try to make sure I show up in the best way I can. 

Q3: Who is someone that helped you on your current path to becoming a marketing leader? 

Arnold: There are many people who have helped me in my career. Having a great marketing team to brainstorm with is the best – we are so much stronger as a creative collective! However, if you have that one leader who believes in you, that can change everything. I have been so fortunate to have several supportive leaders, including my former manager. He empowered me to become a leader by encouraging me to manage more and more of my own projects and to trust my instincts when decision making can be ambiguous.

Brown: There isn’t just one person, there are many that are still helping me today. I had the opportunity to work with individuals like Jeff Snyder (Inspira Marketing Founder), Harlan Stone (former CSM Chairman), Glenn Horine (sports industry leader) and Grace Robinson (CAA), who are all leaders in their field, but more importantly, just really good people. 

Now I’m purposeful in connecting with and meeting new women in all different life experiences and industries, who offer amazing perspective and insight. Connecting and lifting up fellow female professionals, and expanding the network of accomplished women, has become increasingly important to me throughout my career. Especially in a year like we’ve had...those influences are important in grounding me as a professional leading a team through challenging times. I started a virtual group to connect women right as the pandemic was happening – this “circle” started as 3 industry women connecting and is now 18 strong and growing. We meet monthly and just share our personal experiences in the business, get advice from each other, network on business opportunities and just have spirited conversations about what’s happening in the world.

Liston: Yes. I don’t think I would be where I am today without the mentorship of my former boss Andre Caraco. He is truly an inspiration in every way – from dealing with difficult people, to inspiring his staff, and he always had the ability to find the humor in every moment – no matter how stressful it might have been. He is kind to everyone – even when he has to be stern. I can remember a couple early moments where he had to have some very tough conversations with me because he thought my performance in an important meeting was out of line or not effective. Because I respected and trusted him so much, his words always rang true to me - even when they were tough for me to hear. To this day, there are moments that define my ability to be self-reflective and emotionally intelligent enough to check myself - to realize when I’m not bringing my best self to the table, and they have shaped my ability to deliver information and communicate in a more effective way. 

Q4: What advice would you give to the next generation of women marketers?

Arnold: Don’t be afraid to go into traditionally male dominated industries, and don’t feel like you have to work at a company that you identify as the consumer for. I always envisioned working for a consumer brand like my favorite handbag company — wanting to market products that I am an absolute fan of. While this is great, there is an opportunity for us to bring our talents and perspectives into all sorts of industries that require marketing communications strategy. Not only do you develop the marketing messages, you can help shape the business strategies during the collaboration process. Get to know the customer, the industry, the market. Use your creativity and your empathy skills, and you’ll find a rewarding experience in which marketing can make a big difference in your organization.

Brown: First, you are a marketer that just happens to be a woman. My advice is to make the most out of every situation because whether it's a success, failure or an uphill battle, you are learning. Life’s too short - find your passion and surround yourself with good people. And don’t stop until you do. A piece of advice I received that is priceless – “be in a place that celebrates you, not tolerates you.” Someday, hopefully in my daughter’s lifetime, we won’t see gender but see authenticity, integrity, work ethic, drive and compassion as most valuable.

Liston: To demand that they be given the financial benefits, the upward mobility and the access that their male counterparts do. And should they be interested in having children, to align themselves with a company that understands and supports what it means to be a parent. And most important – to support other women. 

Q5: What were pivotal moments in your career that contributed to your success?

Arnold: There are probably a lot of little moments that led me to my current marketing leadership role. My first internship gave me a lot of experience — it was for a small community credit union and I had a very supportive, direct manager who communicated what I was doing well and where I needed to grow. I learned not to take anything personally, especially in a creative field where projects can be subjective. This is an important lesson and I was lucky to learn it early on. Having a growth mindset that is open to feedback, not defensive, is vital to success in a marketing role. Projects are always better when there is collaboration. Another lesson came later on, once I was working in a larger corporation — I kept hearing co-workers say “that’s not my job.” Solving problems outside of my scope, and stepping up does several things for a career. It expanded my network, enriched my experience, and eventually led to that next promotion. You never know if the project you’re turning down could actually be an opportunity presenting itself.

Brown: I’ve always worked in small business environments, where you are constantly learning and have the unique opportunity to lead new initiatives just due to the resources that are available. In 2011, I was leading Little League's Market Research Study, evaluating the factors that were contributing to a decline in youth sports participation. Many of the findings are still being utilized today and are useful in our day-to-day work as an organization. I had limited experience in research, but was trusted to lead the project, which produced insightful outcomes that impacted almost all aspects of our business, including our resources and communication to parents, our curriculum for Tee Ball coaches to encourage volunteerism, and our evolving digital and social strategy.

Q6: What emerging marketing trend excites you?

Arnold: There are so many exciting trends happening in digitization for marketing. There are many projects that have soft metrics – think trade shows – that it is truly wonderful to work on digital campaigns that offer trackable data. At first, data can seem tactical, but it is actually empowering to know how effective our campaigns are, or if we need to rework a bit. I also find it exciting to see the creativity happening in the digital world while we are limited on in-person interactions. Businesses have been forced to modernize and develop solutions like virtual environments, website enhancements, augmented reality interactions, where they would not have before. They would have relied on traditional in-person methods to interact with customers, whereas these new digital channels can have an even broader reach. Turning lemons into lemonade a bit! I also love to see the business-to-business (B2B) realm becoming more human and adapting marketing tactics of B2C. At the end of the day, we are all compelled by the story of the product or service, whether at the business level or personal level.

Brown: I started my career in event and experiential marketing, when it was a new and emerging business. After a year of social distancing and limitations on gathering, I believe there will be a resurgence in the experiential marketing field, as people crave a return to human interactions and want to experience brands with their friends and family. Brands have a unique opportunity to be the reason people come together. While consumers may be experiencing “zoom and digital fatigue,” consumers will still continue to use all these tools that are now staples in their daily lives but in a more blended way. This hybrid model of live and virtual experiences/extensions will give marketers some exciting opportunities and connections to develop brand advocacy. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Show up in the best way you can.

• A positive attitude can fuel you when things get hard.

• Check yourself to make sure you’re bringing your best self every day. 

• Support and form groups to lean on one another. 

• Embrace projects that aren’t under your jurisdiction in order to learn and grow.