This International Women’s Day, we’re pulling back the curtain on leadership. What does it truly take to lead as a woman? To answer this question, we’re putting our CEO, Claire, in the spotlight. She’s been there, done that and rewritten the rules along the way.
In this blog, you’ll get to know her journey, she shares it all – the lessons, the setbacks and the wins.
What drew you to digital marketing?
I actually fell into digital marketing from my very first job. I studied Marketing Management at Manchester Metropolitan University. After graduating, I landed my first job at a company called Moores Furniture Group. At first, I started off as a ‘Junior Product Manager’, but then I transitioned into a brand new role – and this will make you laugh – called ‘New Media Executive’.
Now, if that doesn’t immediately age me, I don’t know what does! My job involved managing websites, emails and social media, which at the time were considered ‘new media’. It was basically a digital role, where I oversaw the implementation of a new website build and launched email marketing into the business for the first time. From there, I’ve always been pretty actively engaged in the digital side of marketing.
Are there any key lessons you’ve learnt that influence your work today?
So many! To be honest with you, I spent a lot of my career in client-side marketing roles, working within organisations to build their marketing teams and strategies. I’ve created teams across the UK and US and helped organisations achieve their goals, even going through management buyouts and investment rounds.
My experience in that space has been something I have been able to leverage massively as a competitive advantage at Trio. I have sat in our clients’ shoes, experienced the challenges they face when working with agencies, and understood how to approach things differently. But I can also bring a very strategic point of view to the discussion if this is something lacking in our clients’ organisation.
Along with this, I found the transition from in-house to agency is a real learning curve. I thought I knew my sh*t before, but I realised how much I didn’t realise when coming at it from a fresh perspective. I think it was a bit of the Dunning Kruger effect!
So learning the technical ins and outs of how things work, particularly in the digital marketing space, was a massive eye-opener. It makes you realise the different levels of expertise between in-house marketers and individual experts. An in-house marketer is expected to be an all-rounder, becoming a ‘jack-of-all-trades’, while individual experts specialise in their specific fields.
What current marketing trends do you find most influential?
There’s no shying away from it, and it feels a bit cliché as everyone is talking about it, but AI. There is no denying that it will completely change and shape the way we work in the next decade (it already has!)
The key thing is for people to really invest time in looking into the ‘how’ of AI disrupting marketing. A lot of people think it will be doing our jobs, which I really don’t believe to be true. I think when used properly, AI can be a marketer’s best friend, helping to automate tasks, prompt ideas, proofread copy – the list goes on.
I believe AI is going to change the game so much for marketing that we’re even investing in building our own AI tool. This will be the way that marketing agencies can gain a competitive advantage in the future.
What do you believe is the next big thing in marketing?
As we embrace more AI and automation, consumers will continue to seek more authentic human interactions. Brands will have to connect with their audiences on a very personal level, no longer adopting a one-size-fits-all, mass communication strategy, and instead going for a very tailored, bespoke experience.
This will include private insider events and closed WhatsApp groups. Businesses will also continue to speak more directly to the consumer and put their employees at the forefront of their brands. We will see the winners in any industry adopt an H2H (human-to-human) approach.
Is there anything you think business owners get wrong with their marketing strategy?
It’s the age-old stereotype that marketing is ‘the colouring-in department’ – they make things look pretty. The biggest mistake any business owner can make is failing to understand the power of marketing and how it can strategically align with a business’s objectives to achieve success.
There’s a quote by John Wanamaker that says “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half” – which perpetuates this issue further and shows a lack of understanding. Marketing should be data and insights led. Yes, it can be creative, too. Don’t underestimate marketing as it’s the best tool you can have in your business to achieve your KPIs.
Do you have any tips for doing an effective marketing campaign?
Make decisions based on data. Anyone with enough time can come up with a great idea, and it’s easy to get excited and run with it. But take a step back and think, what data can be used to support your thinking? Consider revisiting campaigns that have worked well for you and your competitors in the past.
Also, ensure your campaign aligns with your customers’ needs and uses the most effective marketing channels. Using these insights will lead to a more cost-effective and high-performing campaign than one based solely on a creative idea.
As it’s International Women’s Day, tell me about a time when you had to advocate for yourself or another woman in the workplace.
I do find that we still live in a world where there is a lot of conscious and unconscious gender bias. I have faced it my whole career, from the early days of my boss slapping my arse to tell me I did a good job, through to being given recognition as ‘you’ve got balls!’ We often see the notion of “You did such a great job, and we MUST associate something masculine with you as to why you did it.”
But I try not to hold on to these matters too much. I believe the gender conversation is a complex one (specifically talking about feminist issues). On one hand, the more we talk about it, the more we widen the gap. However, we still need to continue talking about this issue as it’s still prevalent.
That being said, I want to focus this section on something positive. When I worked as Head of Marketing at a tech company called Smoothwall, we had a huge disparity between the number of women working in the business vs. men. I don’t believe there was intentional bias involved, it’s more challenging to attract women into tech positions within the tech sectors. Back then, I would estimate that out of a workforce of approximately 120 individuals, fewer than 30 were women (I am basing these figures just from recall so they are estimations and not 100% accurate).
So I wanted to see how I could change that. I got involved with initiatives like the Tech She Can Charter, Lean In and more, and I took hold of the DEI strategy within the business. We empowered women within the organisation and spoke publicly about our efforts to get more women into tech.
We implemented strategies to minimise gender bias in interviews, always ensuring a woman from the business was involved during the process to offer an alternative point of view. Proudly, my initiatives in this area helped lift others and create more opportunities for women in the organisation. I even got nominated as Role Model of the Year twice in a row at the Women in Tech awards!
Looking to work with a women-led business?
At Trio, we’re proud that 61% of our workforce is made up of women. From websites to copywriting and so much more, these talented women are making a real impact across every department.
Contact us today; we’d love to hear from you. Also, make sure to follow Claire on LinkedIn. Not to sound too biased, but we think it’s pretty insightful!