167: CMO at Hootsuite, Penny Wilson, on Social & Privacy

08/21/19 • 32 min

During this episode of “Marketing Today,” Alan interviews Penny Wilson, the chief marketing officer at Hootsuite, the social media software company that enables users to integrate digital profiles and share scheduled content, run online campaigns, and manage analytics. With a degree in computer science, Wilson offers a unique perspective on social media and marketing that is steered by data.

Wilson talks about Hootsuite's growth, going from 10 million users to 18 million users. She also offers her understanding of the importance of being customer-first and helping them add value and mature in their social media usage. Learn why she believes employees are the most important source of information about a company, reasons why marketing will become not just more personalized but also more permission-driven, and what it takes to increase trust in social media.

Wilson defines the type of marketer she is by stating, “I am very data-driven as a marketer. So, I look for tying whatever I do to the results I can drive.” She highlights her marketing approach by sharing, “I use an acronym called ‘ACE,'...A.C.E. The ‘A' stands for ‘advocacy.' The ‘C' stands for putting ‘customers' at the center of everything you do, and then the ‘E' stands for building an ‘ecosystem' so you can really use the information effectively.” If you need a reason why customer service is key to your company, take Penny's word for it, “customers have very practical reasons for giving us their attention on social. They have a moment of need. Customer service is typically ranked as the number reason that they want to talk with a company.”

Highlights from this week's “Marketing Today”:

Penny Wilson introduces herself and explains her career path. (01:32)
How does her degree in computer science impact her marketing work? (04:03)
What was Penny's transition into marketing? (04:37)
While at Hootsuite, what has Penny been focused on? (08:11)
Penny shares her perspective on the need for companies to use social media. (09:15)
What is driving Hootsuite's growth? (15:09)
What advice does Penny have for marketers as it pertains to privacy? (16:52)
What does Penny Wilson see as the biggest trends for social media? (18:30)
Are there any experiences in Penny's past that have helped define who she is today? (21:59)
What advice would Penny give to her younger self? (25:10)
What currently fuels Penny to keep going today? (26:13)
Are there any companies, brands, or organizations that Penny Wilson believes marketers should pay attention to? (27:18)
What does Penny Wilson feel is the future of marketing? (29:40)

Resources Mentioned:

Consumers Yearn for Privacy, and Marketers Will Need to Respect That in 2019 (Adweek)

Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/marketingtoday

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Highlights from this week's “Marketing Today”:

Penny Wilson introduces herself and explains her career path. (01:32)
How does her degree in computer science impact her marketing work? (04:03)
What was Penny's transition into marketing? (04:37)
While at Hootsuite, what has Penny been focused on? (08:11)
Penny shares her perspective on the need for companies to use social media. (09:15)
What is driving Hootsuite's growth? (15:09)
What advice does Penny have for marketers as it pertains to privacy? (16:52)
What does Penny Wilson see as the biggest trends for social media? (18:30)
Are there any experiences in Penny's past that have helped define who she is today? (21:59)
What advice would Penny give to her younger self? (25:10)
What currently fuels Penny to keep going today? (26:13)
Are there any companies, brands, or organizations that Penny Wilson believes marketers should pay attention to? (27:18)
What does Penny Wilson feel is the future of marketing? (29:40)

Resources Mentioned:

Consumers Yearn for Privacy, and Marketers Will Need to Respect That in 2019 (Adweek)

Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/marketingtoday

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Previous Episode

166: Penny Baldwin CMO at Qualcomm on 5G and Impact on Marketing

This week on “Marketing Today,” host Alan Hart interviews Penny Baldwin, the senior vice president and chief marketing officer at Qualcomm. Baldwin is actually the first CMO ever at Qualcomm, a leading cellular technology company that specializes in wireless solutions and is an architect of 5G technology. Baldwin's past career experiences include general manager, global brand management, and new technology group marketing at Intel, as well as CMO at McAfee, and senior vice president of global brand strategy and marketing at Yahoo!.

Baldwin talks about the growing excitement and capabilities around 5G technology and what exactly that means to marketers. She clearly explains several 5G capabilities like browsing the web five times faster and being able to download a movie in a minute, and how 5G can be used in entirely different industries like healthcare, retail, and autonomous vehicles. She discusses her early years in advertising and even opens up about her upbringing, having two deaf parents.

Baldwin discusses her wide-ranging advertising and marketing experience by saying, “Once you cross over from the agency side to the client side, you come to realize that marketing is so much more robust than any one discipline or channel.” She continues by stating, “the entire marketing mix needs to be orchestrated on a much bigger stage and no one component apart is more important than the other.” 5G isn't the first time Qualcomm has created a large technological advancement. Baldwin says, “thanks to Mobile GPS, we gave rise to Uber as an entirely new business model. Riding-sharing didn't exist before 4G technology was available.”

Highlights from this week's “Marketing Today”:

Penny Baldwin introduces herself and how she began her career in advertising. (01:18)
What was Penny's experience like at tech companies like Yahoo and Intel? (01:54)
What does Qualcomm do and how does it fit into the global technology ecosystem? (02:36)
What is 5G and what makes it so transformative? (04:48)
What does it mean when your brand becomes the industry standard? (07:05)
How does Penny market all of this advanced technology to the marketplace? (08:01)
What are some new uses and experiences that 5G will enable? (09:37)
What does Penny's marketing team organization look like? (12:35)
What applications in marketing can be related to 5G? (15:20)
Is there an experience of Penny's past that has made her who she is? (19:37)
What advice would Penny Baldwin give to her younger self? (21:47)
What fuels and motivates Penny these days? (22:22)
Are there any companies, brands, or organizations that Penny Baldwin believes marketers should pay attention to? (23:21)
What does Penny Baldwin feel is the future of marketing? (24:07)

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Next Episode

168: Anas Ghazi from Kantar on WPP, Growth & Data

During this episode of “Marketing Today,” Alan Hart interviews Anas Ghazi, Growth Officer at Kantar. Ghazi's path to Kantar stems from his background in computer programming, his work in data analysis at TransUnion then data analytics and digital marketing platforms at American Express. He then headed to WPP, working on their data alliance initiative, of which he eventually became CEO of, before his current role of driving growth and partnerships at Kantar.

Ghazi discusses growing up in Wembley outside of London, watching a lot of Sylvester Stallone movies and initially becoming an actor. He then talks about transitioning to becoming a data engineer at TransUnion in Chicago and working on portfolio reviews for customer banks. Ghazi also opens up about his move the New York and American Express work, as well as, his early days of digital data at WPP working on the company's data alliance initiative. We also cover the current state of WPP's proposed sale of a majority stake in Kantar and how Kantar is transforming and consolidating under the parent brand.

What did Ghazi do when he went from Chicago at TransUnion over to New York City, the center of the world's financial markets, to work for American Express? “I was a part of the analytics and capabilities group, and for about four weeks where my role was to pretty much oversee the relationships with the credit bureaus.” He quickly was tapped to help the company's digital transformation efforts for risk management and card management units and bringing in data partnerships with outside partners. Anas then made another leap over to WPP, “I started off as a director and then I began doing these partnerships and then began doing expansion and then moved my way up from director to global director to managing director and then to CEO in about three and a half-ish years.” Anas on his latest role at Kantar, “we are in really exciting times at Kantar. We are a data, insight, and consultancy firm. We do all three, and we do them well.”

Highlights from this week's “Marketing Today”:

Anas Ghazi introduces himself and his experience once pursuing a career in acting. (01:24)
Anas talks about his business experience at TransUnion. (04:33)
What was the prompt for Anas to go from TransUnion to American Express? (11:13)
Has data been the common thread for his career? (14:52)
Anas talks about his transition into WPP. (17:00)
What was it that brought Anas over to Kantar? (23:34)
Multi-skilled people that think outside of the box are often overlooked in the business world. (30:30)
What types of thoughtful and meaningful work is Kantar doing? (33:02)
What does the recapitalization of WPP mean? (35:35)
How can businesses effectively apply diversity reports? (37:26)
Is there an experience in Anas's life that has defined who he is today? (38:00)
What advice would he give to his younger self? (45:15)
What fuels Anas to keep going in his career and life? (46:08)
Are there brands that we should pay attention to? (46:56)
Where does Anas see the future of marketing going? (50:48)

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.