Business Strategy: How to win in a crowded market by serving your customer’s customer (podcast episode #128)

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How do you stand out in a sea of competitors when margins are thin and trends shift overnight? For Jaci Volles, the answer is: serve your customer’s customer – and innovate when the budget is tight.

Jaci Volles, Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer at Jelmar shared the lessons and stories from her career journey in this episode of How I Made It In Marketing.

Jelmar is a 50-year-old, third-generation family-owned business that is best known for its CLR and Tarn-X cleaning product brands. Volles leads the sales, marketing, strategy, and product development teams, a total group of 100 internal and external professionals.

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Stories (with lessons) about what she made in marketing

When innovation meets tight budgets, be creative where you look for inspiration

Volles told listeners about one of her biggest challenges in the tabletop glass industry. Volles was working for a company that made beverageware and bakeware, and they had this constant dilemma: every time they wanted to launch a new product, they needed to commit to making at least 240,000 pieces per production run. Not only that, but new product molds would cost them anywhere from $60,000 to $140,000. In this business, margins were already razor-thin.

Here's where it got interesting – retailers, even giants like Walmart, kept pushing them for unique products, but their purchase volumes couldn't justify the massive investment the company would need for new molds. Volles remembers sitting in her office one day, staring at these cost sheets, thinking there had to be a better way. That's when it hit her – what if they could combine their USA-manufactured glass components with mixed materials sourced from China at lower minimums?

This became their breakthrough moment. They started creating unique combinations that gave retailers the differentiation they wanted without the enormous upfront investment. This same challenge led to another interesting innovation in how they approached trends. Traditional market research was expensive, and with their tight margins, they couldn't justify big spending on trend forecasting. So Volles developed a different approach – she trained their internal team to become trend spotters.

They'd carefully watch home décor trends in shapes, finishes, and colors, then translate these into their beverageware and serveware launches. She remembers how skeptical some team members were at first – "We're just a glass company, not a fashion brand!" But watching their brand transform from an opportunistic player to a trend leader in the industry was incredible.

They proved that you don't need a massive research budget to stay ahead of trends; you just need to be creative about where you look for inspiration.

Stand out in a crowded market by serving your customer’s customer

One of her favorite stories comes from working with Longaberger. They came to her team with a specific design they wanted her team to quote on. It was their first major move away from baskets, and Volles could tell immediately that the design they'd proposed just wasn't going to work for their brand. Now, the easy path would have been to just quote the price and move on.

But she took a risk – Volles had their design team create alternative recommendations that her team felt better aligned with their brand identity. When her team presented both the requested quote and her team’s alternative designs, you could see their team's eyes light up. They won the business not because they had the lowest price, but because they showed that her team was invested in the customer’s success. This taught Volles one of her most valuable lessons: serve your customer's customer, and success will follow.

Find your brand’s competitive advantage

Sometimes innovation comes from the most unexpected places. While working as VP of Sales & Marketing at a plastics manufacturing company, they were constantly fighting the commodity game. About 70% of their costs were tied up in resin prices, which meant they were often competing over pennies on million-dollar promotional deals with Lowe's and Home Depot. Volles spent weeks learning everything she could about their manufacturing process, looking for any edge they could find.

That's when she discovered something fascinating – changing colors in their manufacturing process was surprisingly low-cost, yet it could completely transform the product's appeal. What seemed like a simple insight became their competitive advantage. They started winning major promotions not on price, but on their ability to offer unique color combinations that made their products stand out on the shelf.

Respect the brand, history, and people when going through an acquisition

One of Volles’ most challenging leadership experiences came during an 18-month period when their parent company put them up for sale. Their main competitor, located just a couple hours away, was the potential buyer. Volles had to lead her marketing team through this incredibly uncertain time while maintaining their performance and keeping everyone motivated. She made a conscious decision to be as present as possible for her team.

Every day, she spent at least half her time just listening – to their fears, their job search stories, their concerns about the future. They couldn't know what would happen, but they could control how they showed up each day. Remarkably, they ended up having their best trade show ever during this period, and when the sale ultimately fell through, not a single team member had left. They had become stronger through the uncertainty.

Perhaps one of her proudest achievements was helping merge two 200-year-old brands under one umbrella. Both had incredible legacies, and her role as CMO was to bring them together while preserving what made each special. She organized company-wide meetings at both locations, encouraging teams to travel and immerse themselves in each other's culture. What made this particularly challenging was that they were simultaneously preparing to take the company public.

Every day brought new balancing acts between the CEO's vision, private equity expectations, and potential investor interests. But watching these historic brands come together successfully, creating something even stronger than their individual parts, made all the late nights and complex negotiations worth it.

Lessons (with stories) from people she collaborated with

Focus on what you can control to lead through transitions

via Marsha Everton, former CEO of Pfaltzgraff

Volles will never forget one of her earliest experiences with Marsha Everton, who later became CEO of Pfaltzgraff. Volles was the only woman in a meeting, and it was just assumed she would take notes. Frustrated, she went to Everton for advice. Everton’s response changed her perspective entirely – she told her to use it as an opportunity to manage the meeting from the note-taker's chair. This was just the beginning of their relationship.

Years later, when they worked together during the sale of Pfaltzgraff – a fifth-generation family business – Volles truly understood the depth of Everton’s wisdom. Imagine leading a team of nearly 100 people for eight months while keeping a major sale completely confidential. Every day was a balance of maintaining team morale, protecting employees' interests, and managing her own uncertain future.

Be open to new possibilities while leveraging your core skills to break industry boundaries

via Pete Hayes, principal at Chief Outsiders

After decades in the tabletop and housewares industry, Volles found herself facing an exciting new chapter. You might think being specialized in one industry for so long would limit your options, but her experience with Chief Outsiders completely changed that perspective. As a fractional CMO, she was suddenly surrounded by incredible mentors with expertise spanning finance, tech, service, global brands, CPG, and healthcare.

Pete Hayes, one of the founders, helped her see something crucial – marketing skills are truly transferable across industries. This realization led to some amazing opportunities. She found herself working with a women's pharma solution for brain fog, and then with Jelmar, a CPG company where she eventually accepted a full-time CMO role. What makes this transition so special is finding herself in a third-generation, women-owned business with an incredible culture.

Working alongside Jeff Posen, their president, to develop and launch strategies that will propel the company forward – it just feels right. It's proof that being open to new possibilities while leveraging your core skills can lead to unexpected and rewarding paths.

Concentrate resources to make the biggest impact

via Shelly Glasgow

One of the most valuable lessons Volles has learned about managing limited resources came from handling a product development budget that had to cover five different categories. Instead of trying to do a little bit everywhere, she introduced a rotation system – they'd focus their major investment on one category each year, using smaller packaging renovations to keep other categories fresh.

This approach let them make a significant splash in the industry each year, rather than barely making a ripple across all categories. It taught her that sometimes the best way to handle limited resources isn't to spread them thin, but to concentrate them where they can make the biggest impact.

Discussed in this episode

Marketing Pragmatism: Embrace ‘hand-grenade math’ over false precision (podcast episode #101)

Marketing 101: What are decoy marketing and price anchoring?

B2B Marketing Infographic: How are B2B marketers optimizing their funnel?

Value Focus: Which aspect(s) of your product should your marketing emphasize?

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Transcript

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Jaci Volles: So when we were in front of the customer, we said, look, we've got we've got your price, we've got your price. Honestly, I'm not interested in just competing on price either. It's like if you if you give me this recipe, I want to offer more. I want to be the one up. And we hear that might offer up more service.

So yes, I can give you a price on this, but here's what I know about your brand. This is what I understand about your brand. And if we were to take what we understand your brand to be this. These are the kind of the designs we would be looking at. And they took a look at it and they went, you know what?

You're right, you're right. This is our brand. This is authentic. And of course then you stop competing only on price. Now, now you're competing on everything else you have to offer from a design point of view, a service point of view and everything else.

Intro: Welcome to how I made it in marketing. From marketing Sherpa, we scour pitches from hundreds of creative leaders and uncover specific examples, not just trending ideas or buzzword laden schmaltz. Real world examples to help you transform yourself as a marketer. Now here's your host. The senior Director of Content and Marketing at Marketing Sherpa, Daniel Bernstein, to tell you about today's guest.

Daniel Burstein: If you followed Marketing Sherpa for any period of time, I'm sure you've heard our focus on customer first marketing that is sustainable business success lies in putting a customer first. Well, my next guest takes it a step further. And in her career leading marketing departments, she has learned to help her brand stand out in a crowded marketplace by serving her customers.

Customer. Here to share the story of how she learned that lesson, along with many more lesson filled stories, is Jackie Bull's chief marketing and strategy officer at Gel Mart. Thanks for joining me today, Jackie.

Jaci Volles: Oh, I'm so excited to be here, Daniel. Thank you.

Daniel Burstein: Right, before we get into it, I want my audience know who I'm listening to. So I'm going to tell you guys a bit about Jackie's background. She has 30 years of marketing experience. I went through her extensive resume and just cherry picked a few roles that might interest you. If you've been vice president of marketing and merchandise for the Anchor Hocking brand at Google.

Rubbermaid vice president of consumer marketing for Libby, CMO of False Graph at Lifetime Brands. For the past three years, Jackie's been at Gel Ma. Gel Ma is a third generation, family owned business that's been around for 50 years and is probably best known for its Cler and Tonics cleaning product brands. And Jackie at Gel Ma leads the sales, marketing strategy and product development teams, a total group of 100 internal and external professionals.

So, Jackie, give us a sense. What is your day like as Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer?

Jaci Volles: Well, thank you again, Daniel, for having me here. And, I'm so excited. So my days. So my days, Mondays and Fridays. Luckily, we work from home, so that's exciting that we get the opportunity to get up just a little bit later and walk down and, grab that coffee and then sit down right at the computer. Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays I start a little bit earlier.

I'm up and out of the house by 6:00, because I have a pretty long commute here in the Chicagoland area. Grab my coffee, and then I get on the phone, get in the car, get on the phone, and I'm here by 830. And then the meeting start, right. Get it? Get a look for what the calendar has.

Because across these functional disciplines there will be product development meetings. There will be, you know, sales calls, meetings. There will be, working with our ad agency. So there's a broad range, blessed with a broad range of responsibilities and excitement throughout the day. Day ends. I probably head out of here about 6:00, and I'm home by eight.

Daniel Burstein: That's. Is that a two hour commute?

Jaci Volles: Yeah.

Daniel Burstein: I mean.

Jaci Volles: I hit the traffic. I'm just coming from the wrong direction, but that's perfectly okay. We can make car time great, productive time. Sometimes it is listening to a podcast. Sometimes it's listening to the news or talking to mom. And sometimes it's about about talking to people at work.

Daniel Burstein: So everyone listening. If you have a better commute than that, and I bet 99% of you do, that's a way to make your commute productive. I remember being at ABC, the Irish Media Center at I think it's McCormack, and I remember making the mistake of like only leaving three hours earlier or something for my flight to O'Hare and having bumper to bumper traffic the whole way.

I barely make my flight, so I don't know. Yeah, Chicago's got some impressive traffic. All right, well, let's jump in and look at some of the lessons we can learn from your career. Let's see what, good juice we can squeeze out of this career. And see, we could teach our audience your first lesson. You said when innovation meets tight budgets, be creative where you look for inspiration.

So where did you learn this lesson?

Jaci Volles: Oh, absolutely. So when manufacturing, And when you have as many wrinkles as I have there, there are quite a few lessons. So, when manufacturing and customer requirements collide, you have to get creative, right? So in the manufacturing, when I was in the glass industry, glass manufacturing is one of the most complex and interesting. Product models.

I think because you have to run 24 seven, the machines have to run 24 over seven. So every time you run a mold and a mold can cost from 60 to $140,000, you're going to get 240,000 pieces. And even large retailers like Walmart can't justify that kind of production. And the industry just isn't that large. So what do we do when you have retailers, Walmart, target, you know, so many retailers, even the smaller retailers want their own product.

They need to compete in the marketplace. So what do we do, Mike. All right. Well, you dig into the manufacturing process and then you look for other ways. I look for I look for complementing industries that have more flexibility. So in traveling to China, I saw that the ceramics manufacture industry works on much lower marks, like I can do something with 3000 pieces.

So we developed a process that allowed us to take imports, imported ceramic pieces and epoxy it to our glass so I could support the large glass manufacturing bronze designs and small ceramic pieces, put it together to create some beautiful pedestals for our glass. And then we could do something that's unique for each retailer. So it's really challenging yourself to think outside the box, look at what else is out there and how can you combine whatever your pain point is?

Our pain point was large manufacturing runs with something that can be there. That is a small manufacturing run. And how do you make it work together?

Daniel Burstein: Well, let me ask you about I love the story, but what I was thinking is that really goes beyond what people would think of as marketing gets into product development, manufacturing and all these things. And so how did you get this deep into a manufacturing challenge? Because, for example, when I interviewed Kira Kamsky, vice president of global consumer and vendor marketing at the Not Worldwide, on how I made it marketing, one of her lessons was find a business problem and recommend a solution.

And she talked about for the not that was you know, the company strategy was so focused on millennials. She realized, well, we need to change a strategy. And, you know, bring in Gen Z. They're starting to get here. So for you Jackie like you know I know it varies by company, but definitely in some organizations it's like hey marketing stay siloed.

Stay in your lane. Don't get involved in these things. So you kind of walk us through you're in marketing. These are complex manufacturing challenges. How do you how did you even get involved? And get that authority within the company to have them listen to you?

Jaci Volles: You know, sometimes we forget that when we were back in school. Marketing is the four P's product, price, place and promotion. Right. So product is a very big part. And depending on the organization you're working with, you might lean into more, more one of those disciplines. Then another. Right. So sometimes you are leaning into more of the promotion in the advertising, in the branding with other organizations like this one, really the marketing, the creativity came behind how we created the product and differentiated the product with the retailers.

So, and the only way you're really going to get into that is to understand the manufacturing process. So you have to be just as curious with the manufacturing process, because then you know how to challenge the process and come up with new solutions.

Daniel Burstein: I think that's a great encouragement to make sure you understand how the sausage is made, the software is made, the molds are made, whatever it is, to better serve the customer with the unique product. Here's another lesson. You said stand out in a crowded market by serving your customers customers. That's a next level of thinking. How did how did you learn that?

Jaci Volles: So again, I always I'm super curious about the end user. Right. And and I think that's something we love in marketing is why do we do what we do? Why do we buy what we buy? And I was very familiar with the longer burger brand from the baskets. Right. They were they were just a couple. They were just an hour away from us.

So familiar with the product and the brand, and they were extending their assortment into tabletop products. So they were going beyond the basket, and they came to us because we're glass manufacturer. And they said, you know, how about quoting on this product? And I looked at the design and I immediately knew by looking at the design that it was not it would not resonate with their audience because it wasn't closely enough connected to the authenticity of their brand.

So I challenged the team. I said, all right, great. Let's quote them on what they've asked us to to look at. But let's also offer them a couple other recommendations that we think set the brand what the end user of the consumer understands. The longer burger brand to be. Let's offer up a couple other suggestions free of charge.

We're just going to offer up some other suggestions and explain why why we think it's important. So when we were in front of the customer, we said, look, we've got we've got your price, we've got your price. Honestly, I'm not interested in just competing on price either. It's like if you if you give me this recipe, I want to offer more.

I want to be the one up. And we hear that right? Offer up more service. So yes, I can give you a price on this, but here's what I know about your brand. This is what I understand about your brand. And if we were to take what we understand your brand to be this, these are the kind of the designs we would be looking at.

And they took a look at it and they went, you know what? You're right, you're right. This is our brand. This is authentic. And of course then you stop competing only on price. Now. Now you're competing on everything else you have to offer from a design point of view, a service point of view and everything else. So to me, it was let me help them serve their customers and that's how we will win.

So I always want to take it one step beyond how is my customer, whoever that is, internally, externally, who do they have to serve and let me help them do their jobs well.

Daniel Burstein: So what kind of research do you have your teams do? So you can understand that? Because when you're saying this, I think of, you know, when I talk to, a lot of marketers, it's hard enough to get the ICP down. The ideal customer profile, focus on the ideal customer for your customer. Then if you're going to that next layer, that's even so much harder.

So I can see obviously how this is helpful in B2B, even in B2C. I know when I've worked in some bigger, more expensive B2C brands, you have to understand who's the influencer in the purchaser, right? And they're still a customer's customer there. But this is a struggle. I've heard there have been people that have come to us about our brands, marketing Sherpa and marketing experiments and stuff, and they're like, you're so stupid, this, you do this and that.

And I'm like, we don't really understand our strategy. So we, you know, maybe we are do something wrong, but there's a specific strategy to what we're doing. So I think this is some great advice. But like how do you specifically go in and execute on it and research to make sure that these these, you know, consultative ideas you're giving are really on par with their strategy and are serving that next level that customers, customer.

Jaci Volles: There are a couple of ways I look at that. There's so much you can learn about your customers, by exploring just what the what they're doing, exploring their branding. There's so much we put out there. Right. So there are two things I'm going to to share here. One is just with a longer burger company and understanding what they stood for that honestly was exploration and just observation.

Right. Sometimes you do have the money to do segmentation and to really explore market trends. Sometimes you don't. And when you don't, let's use the resources that we have. I always worked with in the glass industry margins are so thin, and we already talked about how expensive it is from a manufacturing point of view. What are the other things that we can do?

What can we explore? All right. Well, let's think about it. You know, the glassware goes on your table. It's presentation. It's design. You care about what you put on your table. Some people care more about what they put on their table as from a dinnerware and glassware point of view, than they do the food. All right, so that's the design.

What other things are in your home that are design furniture? Okay, so I watch furniture trends and I would encourage the team to look at furniture trends. What's happening is it is it big fluffy furniture? Is that the trend that's going on the sink in your, you know, the sink in the sofa furniture trend or is it you'll see trends where everything is has legs on it.

So it's a little more elegant and it's raised. Okay, great. What are other places you can look? Believe it or not, spindles. I would look at anything that had that had kind of a design in it that would have any kind of of shape. And I would start section sectioning it off and saying, okay, if I use this portion, would that make a good looking glass?

Does that follow the trends. So we would just go around and look at furniture. We would look at legs of furniture. I would look at perfume bottles. Because any new perfumes, they also have glass shapes and trends that are important to a brand. So I would look at all these trends and we would come back and talk about what trends would work.

We became honestly, we became kind of number one and color and trend by doing that, because I would offer trend presentations to retailers and just educate, share and educate.

Daniel Burstein: Let's talk about that color element, because I'm surprised in this story. But what, what an impact it made. So you mentioned to you the lesson is find your brand's competitive advantage. And this is a great example, what we do and how I made it, marking some of the lessons I think are kind of surprising. Some of them find your brand's competitive advantage.

You know, someone's asking like, I'm cool if I'm trying to do this every day. That's why I like the store you had, because it's a great example of how to actually do that. So how did color play into that?

Jaci Volles: So color in glass manufacturing is different than another industry that I also worked in, which was plastics. So color in glass manufacturing is much more complex. But we were the leaders in color. Two I made sure we were the leaders in color, but what was really fun is when I moved on to to work in another industry in plastics, I found that it was easier to change colors, and I didn't set out to look for that trend.

But our competitor was really, promoting their product features. Again, I'm going to get into mold discussion. New product features in resin were pretty expensive, so I had to look for something different. Went to compete again, dug into the manufacturing process, spent time out on the factory floor looking at how the product was made, and learned that getting in and out of color in resin products and plastic products wasn't that expensive.

So we started taking custom colors to home Depot and Lowe's and saying, we can be competitive on price, but we can give you the lead, edge and color. And it just exploded. The industry honestly exploded with color, and we started doing a lot of custom colors for a lot of, a lot of, of customers. So, again, digging into what makes you different, where can you find a competitive edge?

Don't try to be your competitor. Don't try to follow them. Set your own pace, find your own nuance. There's a solution in there, I promise.

Daniel Burstein: I do like how you mentioned that in the glass industry, too. It's like you were trying it. You weren't just looking at other glass company. This is what a lot of people do. Look at other glass companies follow that trend. You're like, I'm looking at furniture. I'm looking at these different things. I said that trends. This really interested me when you talk about the color and the price.

So let's talk about price. Can you walk us through the process of how you decided what to price that product? Because as I've written before, markers may use tactics like price anchoring. You know, there's all these different kind of tactics we use. But I think there's sometimes this, misunderstanding that the price is manufacturing cost plus markup and that, you know, there are some specific contracts like that, but that's really rare.

The price is whatever the marketplace says the price is, and that is based on the perceived value that the customer gives to that product. So I love your color example actually, we bought some really nice Adirondack chairs recently. I forget what are called Hollywood or some like that. And the they were different colors and the colors we bought, it was like $60 more for these colors.

I remember telling my wife about it. I'm like, what's the difference between gray and navy blue? I don't care, it's the same chair. She's like, no, no, we need the navy blue. And that shocked me with the pricing power. I ended up spending the 60 bucks. You know the difference for that, for that color. But that gets back to can you walk us through the process of how you set the pricing for that product?

Because, again, it's not just simply, oh, our cost was fixed. And so we just did a x percent markup. It was okay, the retailer has to have that perceived value that the price is right. And the customer the end customer has to have that perceived value.

Jaci Volles: Absolutely. Almost the worst place to start is cost plus, because you can very quickly price yourself out out of the market. Right. So always start with the end user. I always start with the consumer and what the value is and whatever that value is and whatever your competitor has as a price point. The question is, can you offer enough of a perceived value?

So I go back to the plastics, right. If everything in the store is gray and white and navy blue, can I can the consumer and you actually you just proved it Daniel with your with.

Daniel Burstein: You shocked me. I paid that money. It shocked me because I didn't care. Right.

Jaci Volles: Yeah. You get 10% more if we give them an exclusive color. And if we can does that 10% more? Is that covered? Does that cover our manufacturing cost? So I always start with the end user, always start with the consumer and work backwards. Because whatever your cost is, if you really still think that it's a product that you can't get more for, what can you do on the manufacturing side to take a few pennies out?

Always work backwards. Always work backwards. Is there something you can do either from a discount? Maybe you offer less discounts. Maybe to have that exclusive product, the retailer will work on a couple less points in margin, maybe just a little bit. So it's the combination of watching the manufacturing cost, getting every penny you can. Where can you work with the retailer and how much on the other end with the consumer?

Can you get a nickel more? Can you get a little more? So it's it's balancing all of those components. It's a little bit of a math equation.

Daniel Burstein: You know, I really like what you talk to about what can you take out, which is sometimes overlooked because I was interviewing the CMO and I forget the name of the company, but the company makes a very famous food processors, and she was talking about when you look at a lot of those consumer products now, they've got like Wi-Fi built in and AI and all of these things like get a toaster and different things.

And she says, you know, I question how often is that really adding as much value as is adding cost a product? Because as she mentioned, their food processor was there. They're still their best selling product for like 50 years. And she's like, it has three functions on off and pulse. And pulse is just another version of on. But like that's what has value for the customer.

And so that was her big advice to before you're adding an AI and wi fi and some of these other kind of settings and features into a product, is is the pricing power there to make it worth it, or are you just adding cost or not adding value so that that take something away? I don't want people to overlook that.

That's that's a very brilliant lesson. Yes. All right. Well, in the first half of the episode, we talk about lessons that Jackie learned from the things she made. And in her case, I love it. The things she made wasn't just brands and campaigns, it was physical products and good. She got involved in the second half. We're going to talk about some of the lessons she learned from the people we she made them with, because that's what we get to do as marketers, get to make things we to make with people.

Before we get there, I should mention that how I made a marketing podcast is underwritten by McLeod I, the parent company of marketing Sherpa. You can get conversion focused training from the lab that helped pioneer the conversion industry in our AI guild. Grab your free three month scholarship to the AI Guild at Joint Labs ai.com that's joined MSE lab as ai.com.

There's also a lot of great people to collaborate with there in our circle community for the AI Guild. Okay, let's talk about that collaboration. The first person you mentioned was Marsha Everton, the former CEO of False Graph. And you said what you learned from Marsha was to focus on what you can control to lead through transitions. How do you learn this from Marsha?

Jaci Volles: Yeah. So an incredible lady that I had the opportunity to work with on two occasions, actually, when I was young in my marketing career, and then came back and worked with her again when she was the CEO and I was the CMO and and the lesson I learned was my first role, with, with her, I had replaced, someone on the team and I ended up being the only lady in the room.

And it was interesting that the perception was because I was the lady in the room, that I would take the notes, and I was kind of insulted and frustrated. And I went to Marsha and I said, you know, Marsha, I don't appreciate that. The assumption is that I'll take the notes. And she said, Jackie, she said, this has happened to me before.

She said, honestly, this is an opportunity for you. It's an opportunity for you to turn this into you managing the group and you managing the conversation and directing the conversation ended up being one of the most valuable lessons in that, not because I was the only lady in the room and I ended up taking the notes, but it was more of a the lesson of to look at every situation that you're in and look at how you can contribute to being part of the management of the situation.

Right? Contribute. Don't think of yourself. Don't. Don't just sit back and look at yourself as I don't want to say victim. That's not the right word, but look at how you can contribute. No matter what role you're in, you can be the youngest person in the room. You can be the the most junior person in the room. You can be the most senior person in the room.

It doesn't matter. How can you contribute to the effectiveness of of the meeting and the room? And that was such, such a a strong lesson to learn. Very young in my career.

Daniel Burstein: What I really love, what she did with you there in taking that situation, which so we as humans, from what I understand, we assign meaning to situation. Situations exist in the world. We assign meanings are good or bad. They're this or that. And she took that situation. There's a little bit of jujitsu, right? And she's like, how do we turn this into a positive?

So kind of along those lines, I want to ask you, what have you learned in working for all these different types of organizations in your career? What like, you know, different benefits you can find from them? Because I ask, I've seen you work for public companies, family companies, private companies, big companies, small companies. And when I talk to marketers in these different organizations, sometimes they just see the downside, right?

Like if you're in a public company, it's like, oh my gosh, the street is brutal. Every quarter we're reporting and you know, we're just down her neck or, you know, small companies are like, oh, you know, we don't have the resources, but big companies, people tell me, like, I can't get anything done. I wish it was in a small company, you know.

So it always seems like marketers, you know, in whatever organization you're leading. Sure, you could look at whatever downside is, but do you look at the upside of that? Like so I when I spoke on a score webinar recently, it's a bunch of small business and entrepreneurs. And when I told them I had a visual, I made it with eye of the Titanic and a bunch of, the sea-doo little, water personal watercraft going around it.

And I'm like, yes, if you're going across the Atlantic Ocean, it'd be nice to be in a giant ship right? However, they can't turn quickly. So when you're getting close to shore, you've got a little sea-doo buoy. You can just, you know, go circles around them. So from your experience, Jack again has been so broad through your marketing career, public companies, private companies, family owned, big small brands.

You've been a brand leader through all of these companies. What have you learned as the benefits of some of these different types of companies that you've been able to leverage?

Jaci Volles: Oh, I love them all. Forever a student, honestly, forever a student. I love the new experiences. And I think the experiences that you gain from each one helps you in the next scenario. I can take pieces and parts of so many different experiences. And you said it public, private, bankrupt, acquisitions, all of it. And you know what?

There's something that I can take with me and share and help someone else. Because inevitably the next company you're working with, someone is dealing with something that they've never experienced before, and you can help them out. You can help them navigate the situations much better, because you've kind of built that portfolio of experience yourself.

Daniel Burstein: And I think that newness kind of ties into your next lesson. You say be open to new possibilities while leveraging your core skills to break industry boundaries. And you said you learned this from Pete Hays, a principal and chief outsider. So how do you learn this from Pete?

Jaci Volles: So after having spent so many years in the table talk industry right, and finding myself, as a, as a senior marketer, mature, I'll say mature a little bit older, just a little bit, finding myself in a situation where perhaps it was time to go into a new industry. And honestly, that can be intimidating. It can be intimidating and overwhelming.

So I joined Chief Outsiders and, you know, everyone tells you that your skills are transferable. But honestly, I will tell you, after you've been in the same industry for so long, you do question yourself. You do question. So joining Chief outsiders, working with Pete, and being surrounded by such incredible talent with CMO from other industries, I really learned that.

We leaned on each other, we learned from each other, and our skills did end up being transferable. And in a very short period of time, I ended up working with a a women's pharma product, for brain fog. And we launched a product from from scratch. And that was an incredible challenge. Super fun, super fun. I ended up I that's how I ended up with Gel Ma and where I am today.

In working with the group here and in being in consumer products and household cleaning products, totally different industry working with Jeff Posen here as, as my partner and really learning at the end of the day that our core skills are transferable. And not only can we take the experiences that we learned for the type from the types of companies we've worked with, also, the tactical side of marketing and product development is super transferable.

And, it, it offers some new opportunities. So very exciting.

Daniel Burstein: Do you. Yeah. Do you have any examples of how you took something from B2C and use it in B2B situation, or vice versa? Because, you know, we published case studies, marketing trip is known for case studies. And so we're always, you know, that gives specific examples. And sometimes people are so focused on, well, it's not my specific industry, I'm B2B or something like that.

And I noticed like marketers especially break themselves down into these two tribes. But when we've surveyed B2B marketers, a lot of the tactics they use I mean website design, SEO, email content, you know, those are all B2C tactics. I think maybe the biggest difference would be trade shows, right? That's probably a little more specific of a B2B focus.

And when I looked at the gel my website, I noticed I just thought of it as a B2C company, just. But I noticed you have a B2B section on that site, so I wonder, is there any like B2C tactic that you took from a B2C brand and use it in B2B or vice versa? Like how much? How much can you learn from one and share with the other?

When you talked earlier about we're a glass company, we learned from furniture companies. That was a great example right?

Jaci Volles: So the tactics you you hit the nail on the head. The tactics are what what are the, messaging components are very similar, right. Whether you have the website, the marketing, you're marketing to a different audience, but you're still going to use social media, you're still going to develop the database. So all of that is can be similar.

It's just a different audience. It's a different audience. And perhaps the messaging is more educational versus aspirational. Right. Because when you're talking to the consumer, it's more of an aspirational like our current our current commercials are definitely, a fun and less, They're, they're just more aspirational and fun versus in B2B, we are talking features and benefits and, the tactics of selling the product and the tactics of the end user and helping them.

But even so similar same tactics. However, even in the retail space, it's still B2B because you have to sell Walmart, you have to sell target, you have to sell Home Depot before it gets to the end user. So it's much more similar than you think, unless you're in a direct to consumer business like Amazon. And we do that, we do that too.

That's totally different. That is strictly B2C, DTC, but everything else, honestly, if you really think about it as B2B, a lot of what you do is B2B.

Daniel Burstein: So I didn't intend to ask this, but you mentioned your current campaign is aspirational, and I just got to ask how that works. So as I said, me and my wife were cleaning up after this weekend. Cleaner toilets, using sealer I think. Calcium lime rust. Yeah, yeah. And we want clean toilets and that's great. But I didn't think in that experience in an aspirational way.

It's been more of like that really interests me. How do you what are aspirational ads for? I mean, I think most people think of these as chores and not something they, you know, they're aspiring to. I don't know, it's very interesting to me.

Jaci Volles: So in the segmentation work that we did, honestly, we learned that there are six different consumer groups. And of course, we hone in on those that take a lot of pride and feel a sense of accomplishment when their home is clean. Additionally, we did some other research that led to us understanding that, okay, don't laugh when I say this, but that you find your spouse, more attractive if they're helping you clean or if you come home to a clean house.

So these mostly women. But it doesn't have to be only women. Of course, will feel more attractive, like actually 8 in 10 women if they see their spouse cleaning. So now you're really going to want to pull that out this weekend. If if you, if, if you have that help, it helps you relax more. So again, we're appealing to the the consumer that has the mindset that I can relax more when my home is clean.

So what are the situations that help her clean her house so that she can feel more relaxed. So we we put a fun spin on it with the romantic angle. But we did some research and you'd be surprised at the statistics on how much more romantic a lady will feel if her spouse is helping her, or her partner is helping her.

Daniel Burstein: What a great insight. I've love that. And that's true. I would have never I would have not have thought of that though. That's it. So is it like, forget the this Valentine's Day, forget the roses and chocolate? What about some class and really went over your spouse?

Jaci Volles: Yeah.

Daniel Burstein: That's brilliant. I love that.

Jaci Volles: We have some really fun. Roses are red, violets are. I don't remember what they are off the top of my head, but we have some fun ones.

Daniel Burstein: That's brilliant. That's a great example of really understanding your customer and then customer research as well. There's one last lesson. And I like this because again, as I mentioned, I talk to a lot of marketers. I hear their challenges. So I like when there's there's something that really taps into a challenge. And, you know, marketing Sherpa, we have Publix benchmarks, B2C, B marketers, B2C marketers.

We always ask our biggest challenge and every year, good economy, bad economy, B2C, B2B, big, small. It's always budget. That is always the biggest challenge. Everyone always wants more money. So I really love this lesson. Concentrate resources to make the biggest impact. You said you learned this from Shelly Glasgow. How did you learn this from Shelly?

Jaci Volles: So working with Shelly again, I'm going to go back to the tabletop industry because the majority of my career was fair. But the expenses associated with launching new products and making a splash in each category every year is just more than we could afford. So what do we do? You can do a little bit in every category and go to a trade show.

And then in the corner of each category, you have this little introduction that nobody even notices while they walk by the booth. Right. Or you can say, you know what, this year we're going to put all our dollars behind this category. And when someone walks by to the booth, we are going, we are going to look like experts and we are going to be amazing and we are going to be the, you know, the talk of the show.

And so we would rotate. So when working with Shelly, we would rotate our categories and where we would focus every year. And then the other categories would just get a little bit of packaging refresh and we would do other things, but it allowed us to go into the market every year with a major story, something we could feature, get press, get attention because we had a big story to tell.

So when you don't have a lot of resources, think about prioritizing your resources. Think about where you really need to make a splash. And it could be an advertising. We do it in advertising as well. There's only so much money to spend. We have, you know, I'm holding my arms out like anybody can see them. You have a broad range of products, but you can only really hone in on a, on a couple, because if you take your advertising dollars and you spread them across all your products, you're really not going to get the impact in the market.

Focus, focus, get the splash. It'll bring the other ones along.

Daniel Burstein: So how do you use research and or segmentation as well to balance the set? Like is there anything you do there? Because when I've written before about, you know, products and value propositions, there's often multiple elements of value a product can offer customers like, I like to use the example of an electric car, right? Electric car well can save money.

You gas it can be you're a tech savvy early adopter. You're saving the planet performance, quick acceleration. Right? There's so many things you can do. So how do you decide? You segment. You focus. But I interviewed the CMO of SAT by the Mattress Company. Remember, he had this great story early in his career. He told me a master copywriter forgot who it was, showed him what he was doing, and he didn't realize what he was doing with his ads.

And he took this board with all of these nails on it, and he said, take this piece of plywood and, you know, smash it through the nails. And he couldn't do it. And he was like, okay. And then he gave you another two buy for just one nail. He said, now try that. And it went right through because like you mentioned, boy, that focus gets through.

So I just wonder I agree with the focus. But how do you balance that with customer research and segmentation to understand like what other elements of value should you be communicating. Could you be communicating? Or if you were, if you were more tightly targeting?

Jaci Volles: Okay. So. The I I'm going to have to ask you, Daniel, rephrase that with just a little bit for me.

Daniel Burstein: Sure, sure, sure.

Jaci Volles: I had my mind going in a direction and then you started talking and I lost it.

Daniel Burstein: Okay, so one lesson you have here is focus. Focus your budget to get through the marketplace. Right. And so I could envision our audience listening and they're like, okay, I understand that desire. However we have these different elements of value. We have these different products, we have these different internal political struggles, and we have these different segments. So if I do focus and I'm rotating over five years, you know, for four years, I'm overlooking all these different segments, all these different other maybe more minor products, but products still have value.

All these different other elements of value or customer groups within my company. So how do I really balance that out? Like I think like when people hear that like, yes, they'll leave the podcast and they'll be like, yes, I'm going to focus. I'm going to do this one thing. They're going to go in the next meeting and there's going to be these other departments, right?

There's going to be these these other, you know, elements of value that are being added to the product. There's going to be all these other things. And that's where it gets tricky. So is it just, hey, we throw that out the door. No, it's just one thing and that's it this year and that's it. And we'll do something else next year.

Or is there some 8020 ratio of how you budget to be like 80% of our budgets here. But we're not going to overlook these other segments, these other products, these other departments. How do you how do you balance that?

Jaci Volles: It's a combination. So absolutely focus but remain agile. Right. So it's easy to put into a plan. We all put our three five year plans out there and the world is going to be perfect. And it's going to happen exactly the way we have it in the plan. And then two months later, it all falls apart. So focus with the long term plan in mind.

I always have my eye on in three years. In five years, we want to be here. However, I always remain agile. What might be the focus today? So let's say our plan was rotate categories every year and category X shouldn't get a launch and for three years. Oh, but company X one bankrupt or somebody just did this. Oh well let's change that rotation.

So always always keep your eye on the market. The end user, other variables that are happening in the marketplace and remain agile. But stick to the focus now and then. You said the ratio. Absolutely. Here we put the majority of our dollars in the, legacy brand. The clear I have flexible dollars. It doesn't mean you ignore everything else.

We remain flexible. Absolutely. Always keep your eye on the pulse of what's happening, because you might have to change, but I wouldn't. But. But you want to be careful in your change, all right? You don't want to, no big abrupt changes, but keep your eye on the long term and be prepared to pivot. You might have to.

Daniel Burstein: Yeah. And you mentioned stellar briefly. I just wonder how you budget. You have to give me numbers. But is it that okay each brand is kind of independent and whatever the revenue is it's a percentage of revenue. Or is it hey, we're an overall parent company. We have multiple brands. And we're going to decide, like you said, we're kind of going to focus here.

They are independent of, you know, not like the brand is and earning its own keep in terms of revenue. We're just saying like here, here's a growth market. Let's focus here. Right now we're in a new product.

Jaci Volles: I will say that a new product will get a disproportionate amount of dollars, right. Relative sales. Caroline Rust will get a disproportionate amount of dollars because of its distribution. So, I lean in on where the brand equity is because it'll carry the other items. But a new product launch will definitely get a disproportionate amount of, of dollars until it's well distributed.

Daniel Burstein: And when you say carry the other items, are you talking about distributors and retailers and. Yeah, yeah. Jackie, you're telling me that it's so important to respect the brand history and people when going through an acquisition? So how did you learn?

Jaci Volles: That's absolutely one of my proudest achievements. Honestly, was in the middle of an acquisition. Right. Two 200 year old brands that had to come together. So there's a lot of legacy history with those two brands. And so how do we bring two brands together to be to make one plus one equals three. And it really comes down to the people.

It comes down to respecting the people, respecting the history, taking the time as you're bringing, even though it's an acquisition and we know how people feel about acquisitions, even when there's an acquisition, how do how do you work together to take the time to respect where each brand has been? Because that's long history. 200 years, and to bring them together, to be stronger together and taking the the talents of both organizations and merging them together.

So being able to do that with a team was honestly one of my proudest achievements. In, in just working, working together.

Daniel Burstein: So take us through is there anything you did with the CMO or brand leaders on that side personally, to kind of get on the same page as it was going through? Because when I've talked to people who have gone through mergers and acquisitions, you know, a big part, they said is getting those leadership teams on the same page, building a relationship before it's rolled out, during a rolled out, after it's rolled out is a real key.

It's almost akin to like dating or a marriage or something like that, right? I mean, it is a marriage is a merger. So I wonder, like, what did you personally do? Your brand leader there? Brand leader, what did you two personally do or groups do to connect and to kind of get on the same page? So you could respect the people and the history and the brand we eliminated?

Jaci Volles: I eliminated the silos immediately. We had we invited the team from the other company. That was a long distance away to our organization. Did the factory tour, really got engaged in the brand, and then we did the reverse. We did the reverse, and then not too long after that. So that was like right away in the first month, let's make sure we visit each other's factories, understand the history, take the time to see their brand from their perspective.

And then I blended the teams. We ended up with one design team that had people from both one, commute Marcom team, one product team, and we blended the two immediately.

Daniel Burstein: All right, we've talked about so many things about what it means to be a marketer. And I love your parts about getting into manufacturing in the product and going to these factories in China and rolling up your sleeves and figure out how the sausage is made and make a new product. You had to break it down. What are the key qualities of an effective marketer?

Jaci Volles: My favorite question I love. Okay, so I have my it's my three C philosophy, curious, creative, and a connector. Right? Forever. Forever curious, forever curious about everything around you. And it can be, like you said, the manufacturing process. It can be about the consumer, the segmentation. Why do we do what we do? It could be about technology.

It could be being curious about, you know, now we have AI. What is that going to bring forever? Forever curious, creative. Take that curiosity, take all the situations around you and find a creative solution. And it could be product related. It could be messaging related. It could be, you know, we're testing out some new platforms. Always think outside of the box.

To me, if you're following your competition, you're the follower. Learn from what's happening around you, but carve your own path. You have something unique about whatever you're doing your company, your product, your brand. There's something about you that's unique. Find it. Just find it. So be creative and how you look at the competition and everything around you. And then the last one to connector market is we're connectors right.

We're connectors not only with the end user, with the customers that reach the end user, with each other internally. So those are my three. Be curious, be creative, be the connector.

Daniel Burstein: Okay, I love the three C's, but I just want to say if it was a CLR it would have been a bit more on brand, wouldn't it.

Jaci Volles: No, no. Oh he got me. Oh great. Okay. See now I have to rethink that.

Daniel Burstein: We'll have that about at right. In all seriousness thank you so much for your time today. I learned so much for your career. Thanks for sharing it with us.

Jaci Volles: Thank you. It's great to be here, Daniel. Thank you so much.

Daniel Burstein: And thanks to everyone for listening.

Outro: Thank you for joining us for how I made it and marketing with Daniel Burstein. Now that you've got an inspiration for transforming yourself as a marketer, get some ideas for your next marketing campaign. From Marketing Sherpas extensive library of free case studies at Marketing sherpa.com. That's marketing rpa.com and.