Getting Your Ducks in a Rowe - Fractional C-Suite Retreat - Episode # 022

Growing a business is hard, but it does not have to be.

Once a week, we take a break from the hustle and bustle in business to talk about innovations and what's new in the C-suite. This is the Fractional C-Suite Retreat, and I'm Joseph Frost. Pull up a seat at the fire, grab a drink, smoke a cigar, and just join me as we relax, learn, and get inspired. This retreat is sponsored by Your CMO, helping organizations grow with better marketing strategy.

Welcome everybody. Today's guest, he is an innovative industry expert, has been in this industry for many, many years, uh, has a specialization in helping craft brand growth. He's the author, CEO, CMO at Jim Roe Marketing. Welcome Jim Roe. Jim, how are you?

I'm good, Joseph. Thank you very much for having me.

Great. I'm super excited for this talk. I always love having fellow marketers on the program, because we can geek out for a long period of time, just about. But what I want to start with is this same question I ask a lot of our guests. It's from your perspective, what's an opportunity that you see at the C-suite level that maybe other C-suites aren't seeing, or that you want to focus on, because you see it as such a great opportunity?

Well, I'm surprised, you know, years ago I probably wouldn't have said this, but to me, I think the C-suite has to recognize that some real fundamentals are missing with recent grads coming out of school. And it's been going on for so long. So some of these recent grads are no longer recent grads, and that is the issues with critical thinking and communication, because unfortunately managers are seeing this as a major issue with the recent grads. And, and, you know, so that's a problem. But on the other hand, the students aren't aware of it. They think they're very proficient at it. So they're calling it the skills gap. And I think it's a big issue that is, you know, everybody anecdotally speaks about it, but there isn't really this— I feel like it's under the radar.

So how is it showing up in different organizations? Give me some examples.

Well, what happens is, is that, you know, if you can't think on your feet and think critically to outline an argument or a plan, the communication issues that come with that are significant. So, for example, over the last several years, there's been some studies done, and Inc. magazine has been reporting on it. Grammarly's CEO indicates that, I think it's $400 billion a year is being lost due to poor writing skills. And so the impact of those kind of things is that the corporations have to start doing training. And now there's estimates of they're spending $3 billion a year on remedial training for writing and basic communication skills. What's happening too is we all grew up having this issue, being taught how to do these kinds of things. And for some reason, I don't know what the reason is, but I found a study and there aren't a lot of them. It's called the Nation's Report Card on Writing. And this was done back in 2011. And at that time, 73% of 8th graders and 12th graders were rated below below proficient in the ability to write. And when they got to be freshmen in college, it was 60%. And by seniors, still 40% were viewed as below proficient. And there's recently been a book, and for the life of me, it just popped out of my head, but they just recently said that two-thirds of college students won't be writing any better by junior year than they do freshman year of college because nobody's really training them in this discipline anymore. It's just assumed. It's just assumed that everybody, because we we can talk and we can write, that we're good at it. And, uh, if you haven't been trained, you're not there.

Yeah, that's fascinating. What do you think caused that?

Well, I mean, everybody, uh, speaks to— and I'm sure it has some, uh, effect on it— is that because social media has become so prevalent, we've all become very casual about the way— particularly young people, they use it a lot more than we do— and they've become pretty casual about the way, uh, they communicate, You know, lots of you have to make it short and brief, but there's no commitment to a structured process anymore. You know, us in marketing, we're actually usually pretty good at it because that's our job, and we all use some very, very important tools like a marketing briefing document that kind of gives you that structured outline. What I have found is, is that as part of a good marketing program, particularly for this topic, I decided to tie in with a charity. And it's called the National Writers Project. And so it's— you can find them at nwp.org. These folks are— they've been around for 20, 25 years. They are teachers teaching teachers to teach writing. And it's so prevalent that they need this organization. I think there's about 190— over the summer, 190 colleges across the country where teachers get together and talk about ways that they can, um, uh, help different levels of students, uh, and they, and they go from preschool all the way up through college. I think the bulk is really junior high and high school, maybe even younger students. And it's a big issue. We just don't teach it well. And I listened to one of their podcasts recently from somebody who's been with the NWP many, many years. She's a teacher, now she's a professor in, uh, somewhere down in the South. And she wrote a a book on it. And as I was listening to the podcast, she said, you know, teachers aren't really taught how to teach people to write. So I think that says a lot right there. You know, I had the good fortune of being trained early on in marketing. I had a very, very bright father who, just by him speaking, you learned how to talk that way. And I went to Fairfield University, which was a Jesuit college in Connecticut. And, you know, those Jesuits, they were all about critical thinking and structured writing. So to me, to me it was kind of second nature by the time I got out of school.

Do you think it used to be taught more prevalent, or, or it was just, uh, never taught and there was other ways that it developed outside of the school system before?

That's a great question. I'm not sure that— so you asked me what I think. I think it was taught, um, more often in the early grades, uh, and in school. And I think part of it, if you go to the colleges, you know, um, the things I've I was really not into the education world. I was a marketing guy like yourself. But in going through this process of writing the two books, I have learned that the, the college is under a lot of pressure to deliver for the organizations, the corporations that hire their students, to teach them the hard skills, teach them, you know, particularly with all this new technology, you know, learn how to do this, learn how to use all the Microsoft suite products and coding and all these different things. They're taught those skills. And so something had to give. So I think what happens is that they have started, and now you see the backlash where the managers are being surveyed and you've got 3 major studies, PayScale, Inside Higher Ed, and the American Association of Colleges and Universities are all discovering that managers think these kids You know, the students— I shouldn't call them kids— the students are poor at these skills. And the number 2, the top 2 things that a manager wants, even before the hard skills, is the ability to think critically, to solve problems, and to communicate, particularly in writing. So I think what happened is, is there was a, oh, we need to teach all these students these skills, and they jumped over the soft skills. So now everybody is saying you need to get them back. And I think that's a big part of it.

Well, we're not going to solve it on this podcast, but what do you think is the solve? What are some of the ideas, or maybe what are some of the things that you see organizations are doing today to fill those gaps?

Well, as I indicated, they are creating all these training programs. In fact, there's a, there's an MSNBC video that I'm about to put up on my website as an example that is a woman from MSNBC who's interviewed some of these managers. And I think it was, well, it was one of the big— I won't say the name because I may be wrong, but it was one of the big finance companies, you know, one of the big brokerage houses. And they are literally having to train people. And she indicated— and it's not just, you know, kids from, you know, local community colleges. She indicated that there are Ivy League students they are needing to teach you know, proper writing skills. And she indicated she was surprised by that because you would think somebody who has achieved some of the heights of education graduating from an Ivy League school gets out of that Ivy League school needs to be taught. So I think that's a big issue.

Do you— are you connecting critical thinking and writing as a kind of— as a cause and effect or just a complementary skill set or—

Oh, I am so glad you asked that question because I use on my letterhead to Write is to think, and, uh, they are absolutely connected. And, you know, we all, um, and none of us would ever suggest not to, we all recognize the importance of reading, right? Reading is critical, it helps expand the mind, but reading is passive. Somebody's already done the hard work. And, um, the beauty of writing is it forces you to think. You have to put your thoughts down. And I, I don't think that people give that enough credit. And on top of putting your thoughts down, you know, I've been doing this for over 45 years, and every day when I'm writing, I'm editing as I go along, saying, that doesn't sound right, I should— I could do this better, I could shorten it, I can make it clearer. Um, you know, I, I focus on, um, the fact that I think a lot of people just take writing and critical thinking for granted. And, uh, If you look at some of the things that give a sort of a metaphor here is Tiger Woods and I both play golf. He's a lot better than I am. He's actually, as we all know, some people consider him the greatest of all time or certainly up in the top 5 or 10. Yet he's constantly going to the range. He's constantly getting coaching. And if for that skill set, you need to continue to do that your whole life, writing and critical thinking is the same kind of thing, and they are inextricably linked. You know, to write is where the rubber meets the road.

Yeah, so what's the opportunity then? Build a really great training program?

Well, you know, this is why I wrote my books, Get Your Ducks in a Row. I saw that there— this actually came initially to mind back in the early 2000s when I read a book called Who Moved My Cheese? And most people are, you know, of our generation for sure are aware of it. And it was a very simple book. It was a fable, as you know, and it was about, you know, the net takeaway is things change, you need to learn how to adapt. And how many times do you you to look at a business book and it's 200 to 300 pages and there's so many suggestions in there that it's a little dry and you go, like, what did I— you have to take notes and what do you have to— what did you really learn? I loved Who Moved My Cheese? because it had a core point, a very simple message. It was about two, you know, a fable about two mice and two men in a maze. And the two men were called Hem and Haw. And one day their cheese wasn't in the room they always went to, and they hemmed and hawed, and the mice just went out and you never hear from them again because they went and found new cheese. One of them, hammer-haw, gets up and moves along. I remember telling my daughter this story and giving the kids the books, and she would go to work. She was a reporter before she got married and had kids, TV reporter. And she would call me because the organization she worked for, there was a lot of changes. And she'd call me and say, Daddy, The cheese is flying all over the place. So I remember reading that book and saying, that is a brilliant way to teach somebody. Because in my career, I was very fortunate. I had a very, very bright, you know, in addition to great education, all that. My first brand marketing boss, a woman named Connie Humphrey, that was— had gone, you know, grew up in the Bronx, went to Sarah Lawrence, went to the London School of Economics, and then came came home and got her dual MBA in finance and marketing from Columbia. And she was my first boss, and I wasn't supposed to be— I was in research, and I was not supposed to be moved for 2 years. I promised them I'd be there, but the research director called me in one day and said, I have to tell you something. I know I promised— I made you promise to keep you there for 2 years, but you need to get the benefit of this woman's experience. So I was able to move over into brand management, and one of the first things she did is sit down with me and taught me the basics of a marketing brief, which is a structured way of looking at a problem and communicating that problem and forcing you to write it clearly, succinctly, so that you can get it down to one page. And then she helped me with, you know, then now you take that and present it to a, you know, a room full of executives, but it's the same core idea. So taking that core idea You know, um, I started writing the book in 2004 or '05, and then, uh, long story, but I lost it pulling out a, um, a flash stick one time without saving it properly. Yeah, tell me about it. And so I put it away in my mind for saying, well, obviously this is a bad idea. Somebody up there is protecting me from making a fool of myself. And so I put it away. And then when I retired from the agency I co-founded with two other guys after 27 years, I decided I had had enough. I started to to write it again. I had some, you know, snippets left over. I rewrote it, and then I started looking, saying, is this really needed? And I found all this research, which really gave me the impetus to keep going. So what I wrote is called Get Your Ducks in a Row. It's a fable about ducks in business and inspired by Who Moved My Cheese. It's a very simple, quick read. It's about 100 110 pages. You can read it in about an hour, a little bit more. And I did it that way because I think people read best from stories or learn better from stories. And as I mentioned, my first boss, Connie Humphrey, taught me so much and we're still friends. So I made her the hero of the book and her name in the book is Connie Duckfrey. And it's a story about, you know, ducks in business. And I won't go into the basic story. And I've had a few people tell me when they first read it, This is kind of simple, isn't it? And my, my response has always been, that's the point. You know, it is a 10-step process. There's 10 words. You can put it on one piece of paper. And if you follow— the book gives you the perspective as how to do that. And, you know, all the thoughts, the meetings, and the way to go about and think through those 10 points and those 10 words. But once you do that, you can then, you know, think on your feet. You can, you can do that in your head. And I guarantee— I've been teaching it to young marketing people for many years— I guarantee it works.

So the 10 points or 10 words, are those the kind of framework or outline for critical thinking?

They really are. Um, so I'll give them to you because, uh, you're gonna know them. And it starts with really, who's the audience and what is the purpose? Why are you writing this document to them? So the first one is purpose, and it goes into a little bit about knowing your audience. The second one is background. What do the people in the room know? If it's internal versus external, you need to make sure that they have some background information that they maybe were not aware of. With that, you move to the next step, which is What are the issues? What kind of problems are they facing and what needs to be addressed in order to move the business forward or whatever project you're working on? And it doesn't have to be business. After the issues, what are your objectives? And I spend a fair amount of time about the benefit of the importance with objectives to put metrics attached to them. You know, you, you can't just say, I want to build awareness. You know, you need to have, I want to grow sales by X percent or reduce costs by whatever it may be. And then The next important thing is the word would be the strategies, which to me, and most of the marketing people are going to know this, but the young people don't. And a lot of people that aren't marketing don't think in this critical process. So the strategies are to me where the rubber meets the road, where you really have to think through and problem solve and say, okay, here's our problem. What are the things? And it's, you know, you need to do analysis, you need to deduce conclusions and come up with a creative idea or plan to address these things. And then it moves into the tactical. Elements like what are the tactics, how much are they going to cost, what's the ROI, what are the next steps, what's the timetable. And then the final, you know, point is really, you know, make sure you go back and measure it and then refine it. So it's a really, it's a great format and it is an outline, but it helps you think critically. And within that structure, you learn how to write to those points. And I remember I actually saw Connie. I don't see her very often, but we were down in Florida last week, and we saw her down there and I went to visit her. I gave her a little present and she said, you know, you're not just teaching them to write, you're teaching them to think. And I think that's the— and so the subhead of the book is Think, Write, Present, and Sell.

Are you going to do more than just a book with this?

Well, it's interesting. Yes. Well, first of all, let me jump into— I started writing that. I wrote 2 books and the other one should come out in May. And what I did was, after I wrote the first book, I sat down and started saying, I should really have said this. I really want to get this across. And so I said, well, I need an appendix. And the appendix grew into about 10 or 20 pages longer than the first book. And I needed to have a— you know, we're brand people, right? So I needed to have some structure to it, and I had all these great thoughts that I wanted to communicate. And I decided to come up with an acronym that each one of the words in this acronym is a chapter. And I call it Learn the ADAPTER Method. And ADAPTER stands for Analyze, Deduce, Author, Perform— not present, perform— Tackle or Execute, Evaluate, and Refine. And Connie, what— she's the hero of that book as well, even more so. And she goes to her alma mater, Columbia Duck University, and makes a presentation The Studex and goes through each of the steps and things I've learned over 45 years, because that's what we all do. You need to analyze the business and what are some ways and important components when you're doing analysis. Make sure you have the right kind of data, and then you just don't report on findings. You need to analyze those findings and say, what are your conclusions? And then after your conclusions, what are your implications? So it's a book that kind of takes you through more of the detailed steps of each of those aspects. So put the two of them together, and I think it's a wonderful package. And it's not just for marketing people. It's a package for, I think, anybody in business. So now the question is, the hard part I thought was writing the book. The interesting thing here is it's an interesting marketing challenge because, as I mentioned before, the college and recent grads, 80% of them in these three studies where the managers had issues, 80% of them think they're perfectly proficient at this. So they're not looking to get out of college and go to Amazon and look for business books or books on business writing. They're just not doing it. And so I actually have to go through gatekeepers to reach the target audience. And the target audience are two. It's young people in school, students, and from high school through college, as well as these recent grads that are working in organizations. So I'm working with the NWP, the National Writing Project, and I've actually— I'm creating a page for teachers within my website under books to show them how the Get Your Ducks in a Row process can actually be a training tool. It's a very simple read. It's 10 steps. Once you read it and understand the process with the ducks, what I'm recommending is that teachers take this process and and work with the students and give them assignments based upon things that are relevant to them. Raising money for the Boy Scouts, going on a school trip, or even for college students landing that first internship. Take each of these problems, make a problem out of it, and then demonstrate how you're going to write the process. So that's for the students and the teachers, the educators. I'm also thinking about— I've had some recommendations that I should to the colleges to actually do workshop training. You know, instead of becoming a professor, which I don't think I'd have the time nor the, at this age, the patience for, you know, grading papers, I think going in and making a 2-hour presentation and doing a workshop and taking them through these processes, that's, I think, a good way of marketing. And then, you know, once I get with the, finish with the educators, I also at the same time really have to talk to the, you know, small businesses, small CEOs, as well as the training departments. Of the major corporations because they're looking for help. And sometimes some of these courses and they bring in consultants can cost tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. And I think this is a very efficient way, particularly for the smaller, you know, small and mid-sized companies. This is a very efficient way to help train your team.

Yeah, I would think if the managers know they have a problem with the newer grads, then they would be the target audience potentially more than the grads themselves from a marketing standpoint.

That's why I say the gatekeeper. I got to get through them.

And, uh, so have— has there been— I'm just— the other thought I had was, has there been any studies that show that people are advancing in the— in their careers, uh, are correlated to higher writing and critical thinking skills?

You know, that's a great question. I, uh, I haven't done a big search on that, but clearly I think anecdotally most of the You know, the top people at most of the bigger companies, or any company really, usually the leaders of these companies are pretty good at communication and they're pretty good at critical thinking. And some of it are— we're just smart to begin with and knew how to do it. Some of them probably had good training. It's not like everybody's a mess, but I think those are the ones that rise in the organization. And so I remember talking to a friend of mine who was has been a board member of one of the biggest banks in the world. And, you know, very, very successful guy, is retired now. And he read the book and he thought it was great. And he said, but, you know, the senior execs, they all know how to communicate. And he's, he's been dealing with some of the top executives in the world. Yep.

Yeah, I was just thinking that there could be— if you could show that correlation, that's a great point. So you could start to build the the proof points to the audience that if you want to exceed in the workforce, you want to grow and develop your career, this is one area where we've shown some correlation. And then you can almost figure out an assessment. So assess your current critical thinking skills with this 10-question, you know, assessment.

Well, actually, it's interesting you bring that up because the— I've had two guys that I've worked with in the past that were both sales guys when they saw the book they both read it, and separately, they don't know each other. They both said to me, I could use this with my sales team. And so I'm actually working with one of them. And my— I came out of research. I am kind of a numbers guy, and I am a big believer in having some foundation of research, which is why I went and found these studies. I've actually created a 25-question survey that would be the first step. In other words, if you want to learn about the book, You want to learn about how it can help you. The first thing I'd like you to do is, you know, to the managers, please fill out this survey and maybe even have the team fill out the survey to get this foundation of where are they and to make them understand this isn't just Jim Rose's point of view. This is actually happening in your organization. And I think that'll help both the managers sell it in and the employees and the team say, you know what, this isn't a bad idea.

Yeah, well, it's, it's, uh, exciting. I mean, writing a book, marketing a book, uh, that's, that's hard enough on its own. We are actually trying to change a significant issue in our society with, with critical thinking and writing.

You know what, it's, it's actually— I didn't start that way, but as time went on, that's exactly what I'm trying to do. I'm— I've got one client I've been working many years. I don't need any more clients. I don't even need the one client, but I like— I like having a client, and he's a good per— good guy And I think the brand we're working on is very cool. So that's part A, but this is gonna be my focus for the rest of my career. It is probably the most fun I've ever had. And what I tell people is I'm trying to help young people rap, and they just stare at me. And I say, I want them to be respected, to be admired, and to be promoted. And that is my focus. If I can help, I love going and talking to students. I've been a frequent guest lecturer at some colleges in New York, and I like going in and, and giving them some advice based upon 45 years of experience. I'm no Ivy League grad, but there's a lot to be said for experience. And teaching them the fact that this is structured thinking, helps you think on your feet, the values are really tremendous. And it'll help them with their interpersonal skills as well. And on top of it, they refer to these as soft skills. I, I call them life skills because it's going to help you with whatever you do. In fact, I've had people say to me, do you talk to your kids with 3-ring binders back in the old days when we didn't have PowerPoint? And I said, well, sometimes.

Yeah, sometimes. Very, very fun. Well, it's a good— it's a good way to spend your time, especially if you've got a lot of passion for it. Your experience sets you up well to communicate it for sure. What are some of your— thinking about your marketing agency, 20-some years, you said?

Well, the MME, which I co-founded with two other guys in 1990, I left in 2016, right, right before the end of 2016. So pretty much 27 years there. And then I've been doing— then I retired in the end of 2016, tried a little e-commerce thing, and then had an opportunity and started Jim Rowe Marketing in 2018. So I've had pretty much a continuous, except for about a year and a half, agency life experience. And it's, it's nice having your own, uh, being able to call your shots and only deal with freelancers instead of employees, that kind of thing.

Yes. So what has changed the most in marketing over the last 20-some years?

Oh, well, that digital, you know, uh, I was, um, working on a project for somebody which I won't get into but the thought was, you know, agencies and their tenure and what are their issues that they need to deal with. And back in the '80s and '90s, you know, the average agency tenure was about 7 years, and now it's around 3 years. And the reason for that is, you know, in the old days, I remember being brand manager on Coke and sometimes looking at the commercials and the campaign and going, I'm not sure it's really working. And the agency would say, well, you need to give the creative time. It needs time to build. And so that's why I think the agencies lasted 7 years. And some of them, you know, tremendously more. We were very good at keeping clients a long time. We had, when I retired, I think by that point we'd had 4 or 5 that lasted over 20. But the digital, because it, and it keeps changing as we all know, and it seems like a simple thought when you think about about it, to me, the average CMO tenure is 3 years or less, and it's all about driving results. You can really drive results now, and you can determine very quickly whether it's working. I mean, we've all heard the term optimization. So, you know, one of the things I started to do, it would have been really nice if I let out the book and Amazon and the sales on Amazon just started buying, and I'm spending all the money. I did all the right things, hired a consultant to do all that. Your average click-through rate is 0.5%. It's a small market for people who look for business books. You're never going to sell a lot of books that way. You have to look at different things. But digital allows you to say, okay, let's move on and try and find something else. And you can do it pretty quickly. You can do it almost on a dime.

Yeah, it's a whole nother world for sure.

The hardest thing to me is because I've always hired somebody to do it is SEO. You know, everybody's telling me, I get a lot of contacts saying, you know, we need to help you with your SEO. And you have to make a pretty substantial, for an independent person, you need to do a pretty substantial investment over the long term because SEO doesn't happen overnight. And there's a lot of people out there that will charge you and I'm not sure they really know how much they're doing anyway. So it's that to me is probably the hardest thing. So many of the other things, I think a lot of people have the digital, you know, the typical basic digital advertising down at this point. But, you know, it's just every, every month you read about some new platform that's come out and AI and all these other things. So it's— and I'm never going to try and learn. I think what's fun about what I'm doing now is I've got the fundamentals. Regardless of what you do, you need to do this and I know how to do it. I don't have the time, the energy, and probably the expertise to try and learn learn all those new things. That's for somebody else to figure out.

Yeah, I think just knowing the fundamentals of marketing, and you can apply it regardless of the tactics. Exactly. You need to know who the audience is, what their problems are, and how you're different. It's not rocket science, but then when you get into digital tactics, there could be some rocket science.

Well, that's— yeah, I think that's exactly right. That's where the, uh, the rocket science comes from. I Yeah, I think the one thing that gets overlooked sometimes— I've really spent a lot of my focus in my career on the branding aspect. You know, there's a lot of people do different types of marketing, and I've done all the basics, you know, from sampling and all those kind of things. But I think not every— you see some big brands out there and a lot of smaller brands where you look at the branding and you scratch your head. So a lot of what happens is in my career, and maybe it's just because that's what I focus on, if somebody comes to me me and said, or somebody recommends for me to talk to somebody, and the first thing I do is I go in and analyze their business. And usually it requires some really pretty significant rebranding, repositioning, to make sure that they have the basics right, particularly because I deal at this point in my life with smaller companies. And so they, you know, they knew how to run a restaurant, or they knew how to do this, but they didn't know anything about marketing, and they hired a couple of designers to put something together. So I find that smaller companies have more issues in that area. And then a lot of the smaller B2B companies too.

How do you assess somebody's brand?

Well, I always look at what the competitive set is. You start there. Okay. Say, okay, and who's the consumer? And then you look into the, you know, some of it is just, and this is very personal to people, you know, if they've created a name or they've created a logo and an image, you have to make sure I, you know, if somebody is dead against this is what they're going to do and I look at that brand and say I'm going to waste my time, I wouldn't take the client. So I think analyzing the business, just like anything you want to do, what I often will try to do if they're not sure, well, we've had this, is I show them options or I suggest to them why don't we take some time, put together some other options, and then go out and do some qualitative research with it to get some feedback from both their customers and their competitors' customers. And I do focus groups, I've run scores of them myself, and I do them very different. You know, focus groups and qualitative research gets a very bad rap because, and I think rightfully so over the past, because they would say, well, that one person in the room, that person was doing all the talking and she influenced everybody. Or, and at the same time, everybody behind the one-way mirror has a different agenda and a different point of view, and they're going to say, "No, no, I heard this one." So what I've always done is, and because of those two things, I always make the people in the room, if we're going to show them something, I ask them to be quiet. I ask them, I'm going to hand it out, I want them to think about it. At the same time I hand it out, I hand out pieces of paper that lets them rate it, rank it, and say, you know, what they liked and what they didn't like. And I make them write it first. So there's 5 minutes of quiet time in a focus group. And that way everybody's committed to something. Then you ask them to read what they wrote. This way they feel a little bit more comfortable speaking because they don't, you know, this is what I thought. They realize that everybody has a different point of view. And you still get somebody who's going to talk more than another. But then what I do is I have everybody hand them back in. And if I do 2 a night, I get maybe 20 people, and then we refine. And if I do that 2 more times, I've got 60 quantitative studies or results that I can have a much better feel as to what we should do. And I find that we also record them all the time, and I find that that really helps the client understand the process. And take it to another level and say, okay, I see what you're saying.

Yeah, I think that's one area where almost universally I see clients lack the most of is just a real understanding of their customer, whether lack of focus or attention or resources around research, a lot of assumptions, a lot of boardroom personas, you know, hey, let's, let's, let's build a persona of our client. And unfortunately, I see that driven a lot by niche agencies, tactical agencies that just need to get through to build the box of checklists so they can go execute on their tactic. And it's a real problem, I think.

Yeah, I actually had a— I won't say who the client is, but it was one of my larger clients at MMA, and they were owned by a family. So there were 6 owners, and it was a big company, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars. And I walked in, it was myself and the 6 of them, and they had just hired Landor, which is one of the big brand identity firms. And they said to me, and they, before we were hired, they knew they had a branding issue. So they were looking at alternative names for the company. And Landor had put all their different names up there. And the 6 owners all had a different point of view. And they all looked at me came to me and said, which one would you go with? Like I was going to be the expert. And I looked at them and I said, do you think I'm stupid? Because no matter who I select, which one I select, one person, that person's going to love me and the other going to hate me. So what I suggested is doing exactly what I just went through. Well, why don't we do some research? And we flew up to Boston and did several groups up there. I wasn't running them at that time. And I think we did another set in New York. And by the time it was over, they all understood and they had a better perspective. You have to, you have to get the customer's perspective. And you're right, getting, getting them to understand who their customer is and what they think is critical.

Yeah, for sure. Have you been following the kind of movement towards fractional CMOs and fractional marketing?

Sure. I kind of position— I refer to myself as an, as an embedded CMO on really like an embedded marketing department on my site. I think it is the perfect approach to— bless you— I think it is the perfect approach to, uh, for smaller companies. And I've done it. I've been a fractional CMO even when I was at MME. I sometimes had business cards, um, as, you know, uh, outsourced CMO or fractional CMO of the client's company because we'd go to a, um, uh, you know, a big conference or something, and I needed— if I just shared my card, they wouldn't know who I was. So I would make a card up that way. And I think it's a great way for smaller companies to benefit from senior-level expertise that if they had to pay for everything, pay for the CMO, typically, you know, a really high-quality CMO could cost them more than what they're paying for the agency fees. But, you know, something like myself, yourself, we don't need to be working on the client 40 hours a week. We can guide the team and then use the, you know, the account people that have been a couple of years out of school to help them execute. You know, you work with the team and obviously the first 3 to 6 months are always the heaviest amount of input. But if you do it right, then it can be very efficient for both the agency as well as the client.

Yeah.

What do you think the biggest challenge is with fractional versus full-time?

Well, for— let's look at it from both sides. I think for the client is early stages, it still can be expensive. They don't— they, they don't see it. What I find, you know, that because you're still going to want to charge them to make it reasonable for the agency. You're still going to want to charge them the cost almost of a full-time CMO. The difference is they're getting an agency behind them and they don't, they, they don't understand the breakdown of hours and who spends how much time on what, particularly if they've never done and dealt with an agency before. So that is something I always found I had to explain, and then they kind of absorb it and they see the value. The challenge on the agency side is not going broke because, you know, we all like what we're doing and get in with the client and you start realizing you're spending— certainly the owner or the senior person spends more time than you'd like sometimes on these things. That's part A. Part B is, particularly myself, I find, and I'm okay with it at this stage of my life, is after the heavy rebranding and all the heavy lifting and that kind of stuff is done, you get to the point where you wanna continue the business and maintain that it's profitable. But a lot of what's needed is day-to-day, you know, social media posts and some of those kinds of things that are no longer heavy strategic issues. And they may be, the client often realizes, you know what, thank you for all the work you've done, but I can pay somebody $40,000 or less, someone just outta school and have them sitting next to me all day long every day and doing social media posts and all this little stuff that I could never ask you to do. Right.

Yeah, that scope creep where they bring in a fractional CMO and then over time expect them to start tweeting and working the website is— it's not the best use of that person's time. And so it's a catch-22 there. Sometimes you just have to say goodbye to that client then and go on to another one that needs that.

Yeah, and I, and I think, you know, one of our things at MME was to always try to— I mean, we, as I indicated, we, because we were 3 clients, we were interested in doing, uh, not doing great work, which a lot of the big agencies say, um, we were interested in doing work that works. And, uh, so the repositioning stuff depends upon the type of client. If there was a need for ongoing heavy creative, constantly churning out stuff, I think the agency usually can, you know, after you reposition, then they can keep doing the creative. And that's why clients typically hire them. But if it comes down to just simple, you know, simple creative stuff that they can have a junior person do with the templates that you've created, you just have to accept that that's okay. And at my point in life, I'm okay with that. Yeah, exactly.

What do you think the maybe top 2 or 3 criteria are that a company should look for when hiring a fractional marketing person?

It would be the two things I think is the background and skill sets of the, of the key point person. From the standpoint of, well, let's go back to what I was talking in the book, the hard skills. Do they, do they know this stuff? But also the soft skills. There has to be, particularly when it's a fractional CMO, there has to be that chemistry industry that, you know, the communication, all that kind of stuff that people feel comfortable with, and they really embrace you to be part of the team. And if you— if the CMO or the client doesn't feel like you're going to be part of the team and you're going to sit there and be in all the key employee meetings and all the big decisions, then I don't think that's going to work. So I think that's probably one of the biggest those things.

Yeah, yeah, I think I hear that a lot. Fit is a big deal. And, you know, that's kind of the soft skill of fit the values and the culture of the organization, have a good rapport with the senior leadership team. If you can't— you can be as competent of a resource out there, but if you can't have those soft skills and connect with the other senior leaders on the team, that engagement doesn't last very long.

Yeah, I always— I spend so much time with my clients as a sort of this outsourced CMO, particularly You know, one person who actually hired me 4 times at different companies, that you just, you feel like you're just part of the team. It's just, you almost feel like you work for the client, then you realize you go back and work on your other clients. The other thing I meant to say as another, I think it's very important to do reference checks just like you would with a, you know, a candidate. I, that's why on my site, uh, we didn't do it at MME because lots of reasons, but, uh, and there was 3 guys and we all have different points of view. But on my site, I was actually kind of touched. I went out and spoke to a lot of my old clients and said, you know, I'm starting my own, uh, uh, embedded CMO, uh, agency from home. Would you mind giving me a testimonial? And so I, I probably have 8 to 10 of them on there, and they were enthused to do it. And that was kind It was very emotionally rewarding to know that these people that I had spent so much time for, one in particular said at the end, something like, "There was nobody more I trusted to go into battle with." So when you get that kind of response, and I think what has happened was when I send people, if they want to know information about me, I always put the Jim Rohn Marketing/testimonials link in the email for them to check out. And you know, that's not an unusual thing for anything. If you're ordering something from a book in particular from Amazon, the early stages when you write a book is you want to try and get as many reviews that are 5 stars as possible. So the first week when I've only been out there since the end of January, the first week when I only had 1 or 2 reviews, I'm like, I'm not going to sell anything. But I'm up to 23 5-star reviews and every week there's like another 1 or 2 that in there from people who've had a chance to read the book. And anybody on Amazon will tell you that's the most important thing. So why is that concept the same for consumers and people, whether they're hiring an agency or buying a book?

Yep, 100% agree. So we'll switch gears. What do you like to do for fun, Jim?

I'm having a blast these days. I have been playing guitar since I was I was 12. And, um, and, uh, I, I'm also a golfer, but I'm a horrible golfer. Um, you know, I occasionally, I shoot in the 80s or the mid-90s, but I can, I can easily get over 100. Um, but I, um, I've been in a lot of bands, and I've been in one now for 10 years. And one of the guys that started with me, uh, has retired and moved to Florida. But, uh, we are called the Song Island Band for two reasons. I live on Long Island, and it was a play, and the logo is a, um, sort of a fish-shaped version of Long Island because Long Island looked like a fish to me. But also because I, um, I'm very particular about the songs we choose. So, uh, and we are 3 guys, 3 guitars, 3-part harmony. I've been in bands. I was— I've been in a band. I saw them last night perform, but the first time in 6 years I haven't. It was 25 people for a long time. Oh geez, 25K. And, and it was a fantastic experience. There was a brass section and all this kind of stuff, and like 8 female singers. I mean, you know, doing Ray Charles and having 8 female singers saying, "That's right!" behind you was cool, but I was the oldest guy there, and, uh, the amount of rehearsing and lifting equipment and moving— I just finally opted out this year, which is why I like the current band, uh, 3 guys. Um, we rehearse every Tuesday night. We played last Saturday night at a small restaurant in Floral Park. I'm playing this coming Saturday night at another restaurant in Freeport, which is right on the water. It's called the Nautical Mile there. And I've got gigs at the, uh, this summer at the wineries out east. And that is my, um, you know, one of my most favorite things to do.

What, uh, what kind of music you guys play?

Uh, we play a lot of the old classics. Uh, you know, we're— I'm not the lead singer, but I'm a pretty good harmony singer. Um, and so we'll do, you know, Beatles, Eagles, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Grateful Dead, Allman Brothers, um, most of that genre. But we'll throw in Zac Brown and Kenny Chesney and that stuff. And so I find, um, and you know, as a marketing person, um, they'll always— the most important thing is you have to have a great product. And to me, this, um, we didn't have that many people coming as a Friday night, and the bartender called me and said, you know, there's not many people coming. Uh, I said, well, we'll play, and let me go out. And, um, uh, and I didn't realize it was the Final Four. So anybody that used to come wasn't coming. There was— they were glued in front of their thing. So I, I just made a lot of calls. The three of us made calls, and, um, it was not a big place, but we probably had 40 people there. And in a small place, that was cool. He was thrilled. But the most important thing is having people coming up to you saying, oh my God, you guys are amazing, that was great, where are you playing next? And, um, and you— we have a good product.

Yeah, that's awesome. That's a lot of fun. I always wanted to be a musician of some sort. I just had never had the gift or the time to try to figure it out. But I have a great deal of respect for people that are musically inclined. My kids are, but I never was.

Well, I'm very proud to say my, my sons are both tremendous musicians. And my middle guy Um, I still think he could be a star. He can sing, he can write, he can play piano. And I said to him one time, I don't know how— I mean, I used to play piano in one of the bands that I, I saw him play, and I just said, you know what, work on guitar. And I said, I don't know how you know what you're doing there, because he just looks at the, the words and he has a chord above it and he just starts going. He goes, I'm not sure really either, it just kind of happens. So I'm not one of them, I'm, I'm a journeyman. I had to work really hard at it, but I'm the lead guitarist, and you know, so I'm I'm, uh, I guess in golf I'm a 25 handicap and in guitar I'm a 10.

Yeah, that's awesome. Well, good. Well, it's been great having you on the show. What's the best way for people to get in touch with you if they want to reach out?

Well, first of all, thank you very much. I've enjoyed it. Um, and it was the first time I've been interviewed by a fellow marketing guy, so that was a good part of it as well. Um, you know, the best way is to go to jimrowemarketing.com, R-O-W-E. Uh, that's the difference. I kind of branded the book by calling it my last name. And I didn't initially think about it that way, but when I was looking for a URL, so jimrowmarketing.com, you can look at the agency side and it's all, you know, pretty much on the page, it's split into two. And then, or you can go down the book side and be glad to talk to you about either one.

Great. Well, thanks again. Thank you to our viewers. Reach out to Jim if you want to learn more about getting your ducks in a row or playing bad golf or where's next gig.

I give people lessons on doing bad golf.

I'm sure you'll hear some, some people will be sharing stories about bad golf. That's something that we have an awful lot in common, I'm positive.

We all do.

Yeah. All right.

Well, thank you, Joseph.

And that's a wrap. There's another successful episode of the Fractional C-Suite Retreat. See our show notes and more episodes at fractionalcsuitretreat.com. .com. This podcast is sponsored by Your CMO, helping organizations grow, save time and money with better marketing strategy and fractional execution. Visit them at yourcmo.com. Your CMO dot com, spelled wrong on purpose.