[00:00:00] Phyllis: I had our team do a marketing AI hackathon last quarter where we just like cleared out two days think it broke us out of our thinking. [00:00:06] we always forget that it takes time, right? It takes time to tinker with something, creating space for that time, celebrating those kinds of actions is what I think is gonna foster curiosity [00:00:16] Phil: you mentioned just a few years ago, a lot of folks still saw privacy as a blocker, How do you see this kind of evolving as we're entering more AI enabled things [00:00:26] Phyllis: the data life cycle, that in and of itself is, Compounding in complexity, right? we start to layer in AI, that becomes continuous interconnected. And that's where you need to have this kind of systemic approach to permissioning and preferences. you're gonna be collecting, a user's consent about their data at some point here that will then, feed into some kind of training model that then generates other data that then feeds into something else. And that like, so it's going to be harder and harder, I think for us to just track that user choice across the life cycle. [00:00:57] ​ [00:01:23] In This Episode --- [00:01:23] Phil: what's up everyone? Today we have the pleasure of sitting down with Phyllis Fang, head of Marketing at Transcend. In this episode, episode we cover lessons from her four years at Uber Running Lifecycle Programs and ~how~ working on Uber's safety product marketing ~shaped her Trust First Marketing Playbook.~ [00:01:34] We also cover building a Marketing Trust act and why consent management can be a revenue lever. Because permission data systems improve personalization performance. Phyllis also shares how she's designing marketing teams for freakish curiosity and what skills define great marketing operations, all that, and a bunch more stuff after a quick word from two of her awesome partners. [00:01:57] ​ [00:03:53] Phil: Phyllis, thank you so much for your time today. Really excited to chat. [00:03:57] Phyllis: Thank you. I'm excited too. Phyllis and Phil are [00:04:00] just here to talk. Talk all things marketing. It's gonna be great. [00:04:05] Phil: I love it. Um, one of the things that I wanted to start by, uh, chatting with you about is the background and some of your role, um, some of your roles at Uber. [00:04:13] 1. Uber Safety Marketing Shaped A Trust First Marketing Playbook --- [00:04:13] Phil: So during your time at Uber, you had kind of one foot in the marketing operations world, you're running Lifecycle and CRM programs. [00:04:21] But you had another foot in more like high level product marketing role. You were shaping uber safety product narratives. That's kind of a cool 360 view, if you will, of, of marketing at a pretty big brand obviously. How has like toggling between hands-on and big picture PM role kind of influenced the way you tackle marketing challenges today? [00:04:40] Does having that like breadth give you an edge in connecting dots between like the strategy and the execution that a lot of like siloed specialists sometimes miss? What are your thoughts there? [00:04:50] Phyllis: Yeah, definitely. I mean, I, I'd hope to, I'd hope to think so. Um, that's definitely part of the reason I took my career in that direction because I wanted to [00:05:00] have a different altitude, a different perspective. I think a lot of, um, CRM lifecycle growth, marketing ops, like you are very hands on keyboards. It's very system driven. [00:05:13] Um, there, there's certainly a lot of like very granular strategy and, you know, big little details. Um. But then when you transition over to PMM, especially to your point at such a global, big tech company, it's very heavy in influencing, in advocating. Um, I remember just almost thinking like, this is crazy. [00:05:33] I'm, I'm like, we're all in the same company, but I'm convinced you, like, I need to convince you to do this, or I need to like, get your resourcing here or there. But that, that means that, um, your strategy. Your messaging, your campaign structure, all of that gets scrutinized from all the channel experts in the case of Uber regional leaders because we would have a global, um, and regional marketing model. [00:05:53] And yeah, I think it's just a, you know, iron sharpens iron and it really helps push the, the, [00:06:00] um, the craft of remarketing forward. [00:06:02] Phil: So let, let's dig into that, uh, PMM role at Uber specifically. It's, it's really interesting for the topic of our conversation today, because you were leading marketing for some of Uber's core safety initiatives. Um, some of the features you helped launch were like in-app emergency assistance button, and during the COVID era you also had a mass verification feature. [00:06:22] So you're basically like marketing a safety feature, essentially marketing trust for a lot of users, I guess you could say. How did working in these like high stakes, trust centric products for such a big brand shape your approach to marketing and growth today? Any like takeaways from your Uber safety days that you're applying, uh, now that you're a transcend and you're marketing privacy and permissioning technology. [00:06:45] Phyllis: Yeah, definitely. Um. Safety is a, was a special, um, sliver of product marketing at Uber because it is probably the one product or the one family of products. We're not actually trying to drive any adoption. We don't want daily active users. It's, it's a very kind of [00:07:00] antithesis to the core, you know, playbook and foundations. [00:07:03] Um, of PMM, to your point, that's a lot of marketing trust. It's a lot of building, um, brand favorability. Not only within your direct user base, so your rider drivers, deliverers, but also the general population because there was definitely that, uh, that, you know, the brand sentiment would carry through there. [00:07:22] And then also very critically, uh, like policymakers, regulatory bodies. And I think that's the kind of through line that I've brought over into Transcend. Transcend. We got started in the data privacy space, so it's a lot of, um, our like OG core buyers. General counsel, head of legal, like chief privacy officer, people that are by nature just due to the, the, the demands of their job, uh, more risk averse. [00:07:49] They're operating in re, you know, regulated industries with more scrutiny and more enforcement. And I think that, um, it's, it's [00:08:00] honestly, I think a fun space to market in. You know, there's a lot of, um. The, the proof that you share really matters. How you demonstrate that proof really matters. I actually just saw something that a Pierre was posting recently about how when you talk to the lawyers, the big little details matter because it, they are like, you know, going through things with a fine tooth comb, but you also need to prove the top line story. [00:08:23] Um, I think that holds true for all marketing, right? The proof really does matter, but even more so here in the sense that stick messaging won't work. You can't just kind of chase people down and say, you're gonna get fined. You're like, you know, the auditors are coming after you. You really need to get to know the human, behind the user. [00:08:40] What are their personal pains, personal motivation, career aspirations, all that kind of stuff. And nine times out of 10, that has nothing to do with your product, with your tech, with your, like, feature function. Um, so that, that's just been the through line in, in, um, positioning safety at Uber. And now being at Transcend and, and talking to [00:09:00] our, um, our customer base. [00:09:02] Phil: Yeah, I've only had the pleasure of working with a few legal counsels, uh, in my marketing, in-house roles, um, especially in like the more regulated industries where I worked at. And a lot of them are like super cool people. Like they're really relaxed on paper. They have to be risk adverse because, you know, it's, it's part of the gig and they have to like, ask a lot of questions and cross those t's. [00:09:26] But at the end of the day, like they're not. Their role isn't to slow down growth. And I think that's a lot of the, the political aspects of needing to like, get legal to approve this crazy marketing campaign idea. Um, but it creates a lot of tension sometimes that isn't really necessary, but it's just like, it's a part of thing, like, especially if you're in like health tech or in like FinTech, like these companies. [00:09:49] Phyllis: a lot of sensitive data. [00:09:51] Phil: A hundred percent. P-H-I-P-I-I like, uh, a lot of folks that are in like SaaS, B2B, SaaS tech, like they don't always have to deal with that stuff. But, [00:10:00] you know, we're talking about AI and personalization today and I think that, you know, more folks are opening up their eyes to this. And it's not just folks in regulated industries. [00:10:09] When we were chatting before, um. We did the interview, like [00:10:12] 2. How Permissioned Data Systems Power Personalization at Scale --- [00:10:12] Phil: you actually observed that when marketers treat privacy and data infrastructure as seriously as things like creative strategy, personalization stops being superficial and it becomes sustainable because the systems of permission are what make personalization possible. [00:10:30] Uh, I'd love for you to just unpack that for us, like maybe touch on what it takes to actually build those underlying systems of permission. What does that mean? [00:10:38] Phyllis: Yeah. Yeah. Um, this is a great topic 'cause there's so many layers and I really think this is where the future of marketing and, and digital like experiences is going. So, um, when we say systems of permission, first of all, permissions means user choices. In marketing speak. That's, you know, preferences. Am I signing up to get emails about men's clothing or, or women's clothing? [00:10:59] That's [00:11:00] opt-ins, unsubscribes, that kind of language, which, you know, we're all familiar with. Your, your listeners are as well. Um, on the privacy side, those terms are things like consent data, subject rights, um, the ability to delete someone's data, do not sell their data. But either way, we're talking about, um, this level, this layer of user controls that determine what personal data. [00:11:21] The company collects on them, how they collect it, how it's stored, how long it's stored, what's shared, what's enforced, what's, you know, pushed across to connected systems, that whole layer, that is what we mean by permissioned user data. And it's really like the lifeline to all digital initiatives. Um, people at Transcend, we'll work with customers and they'll ask us, you know, how do I, how do I build this? [00:11:45] Like, where do I even start tackling data permissioning because. It is a, it, it, it's a infrastructure piece, right? Um, and I think there's a couple, a couple phases to this. The first one I'd probably, especially from a marketer's point [00:12:00] of view, the first one I'd push folks toward would be just a full like audit, dissection, and alignment. [00:12:07] So look at, look at your, you know, your buyer journey, your customer experience. Think about all the data touchpoint that come from marketing, come from product, come from privacy, third party partnerships, like we're in a very connected omnichannel world, so that that spans a lot of, you know, a lot of surface area. [00:12:24] And then the next layer is just how do you operationalize that consent? So you need to make sure that preference signals that are being captured, um, then pushed down into your MarTech stack, your CDP. Um, so, you know, your CRM, your email marketing, your, your text marketing analytics tools, all of that is then operating and building audiences, um, sending out, you know, real time notifications, all of that off of compliant and live data. [00:12:54] Phil: I love it. Yeah, so like two step approach. Start by auditing and making sure that everyone [00:12:59] [00:13:00] has. Alignment and like getting a good overview. I'm a big fan of just like whiteboarding all the sources of customer data. Sometimes some teams are using like list imports and like that's not really tracked on the website, and sometimes the data team just rolled out something new in the product analytics tool and we're tracking first party data that the marketing team doesn't know about. [00:13:21] And so. Doing this like period of interviewing different folks, figuring out what first party data are we collecting, what zero party data are we collecting? And just like getting a sense of, of all of that. I think it's such a misunderstood part. Like sometimes you join a team and you're just like, ah, the data team's just gonna like map that out for me. [00:13:39] They're just gonna tell it. For me. The data team doesn't always spend that time with all those teams and, and they don't always like, have a full understanding of all the data we're currently connecting. Is that fair? Has that also been your [00:13:51] Phyllis: I'm actually really glad you brought this point up because I think from the data and the technical point of view, there are tools, ours included, where you would go in and just [00:14:00] automatically scan connected systems, code bases, SSO, et cetera, to figure out where that data even [00:14:05] Phil: Mm-hmm. [00:14:06] Phyllis: That's, that's all good and fine, and actually a really critical input to this. [00:14:10] But I think as marketers, we think we, hopefully, we're all thinking like people first and experiences first, and there's a lot that doesn't show up in that. Bottoms up data discovery piece. Um, and I think, you know, there's benefit. This isn't just a like data governance, uh, exercise. I think there's a lot of benefits when we think about how we wanna build. More thoughtful, more connected, more integrated campaigns. You're probably doing an exercise similar to this anyways, where you're whiteboarding all the various touch points. Is this actually speaking here? Are we missing an opportunity? So you're also thinking about it from a business lens, which is why I do like pairing this with the, to your point, the like data engineering first approach of, you know, probably using a tool to get to that, um, that, that overall map quicker. [00:14:57] Phil: Yeah, I love that you have the [00:15:00] enterprise experience of being at such a massive company and then now being at a smaller company like the startup space [00:15:07] for some of these things and the tasks and priorities that you have is such a different world than like the massive enterprise that you were working at before. [00:15:14] And you know, some folks listening are across enterprise and, and some are in startups. So, uh, one thing I wanted to ask you about is this idea of. [00:15:22] 3. How Consent Infrastructure Improves Personalization Performance --- [00:15:22] Phil: Like prioritizing or getting other people to care about things like privacy in infrastructure. Um, do you have an example of like a robust privacy infrastructure that actually helped elevate a personalization strategy from something that was just really cool on paper to actually effective? [00:15:41] Um, yeah, curious if you have an example. [00:15:43] Phyllis: Oftentimes, especially at the enterprise and, and certainly at smaller companies where privacy just isn't like stood up or as you know, invested in those are pretty disconnected, right? Like, what does privacy infrastructure mean and how does that connect all the way to the other side of the org? [00:15:59] When we talk [00:16:00] about marketing the systems that power marketing and the personalization that we wanna deliver, um, really bringing that together has a ton of benefits and I think we've seen a lot of customers. A lot of our customers, um, effectively activate this. So one big one has been personalization across media. [00:16:19] A lot of retailers today are just getting into the media space, getting into media commerce, being able to then deliver those personalized experiences to their users and sell that to advertising partners. That is, that is huge. And that's actually probably one of the areas where you really need that data to be as specific as you can, you know, deliver it in real time so that your advertisers can, can activate on that accordingly. [00:16:42] Another big one, especially in consumer industries like, um, like, uh, travel, um, retail is around omnichannel marketing and campaigns, even health tech. Will we see some folks, um, utilizing us in that space [00:17:00] for these outcomes. So personalizing both the content that you receive, but also the channel and distribution. [00:17:06] How much of that is, you know. In a clinic or at an office versus in store versus in a mobile app and being able to personalize where you think you're gonna get the best engagement off of that user based off of either historical or, or, you know, lookalike data. Um, software and consumer tech. That's also a big one because we, um, you know, I think you and I and your listeners are all probably seeing and feeling this like the AI fication of all of SaaS right now. [00:17:37] Like everyone is. Doing it to different degrees, but, but definitely slapping the name on AI driven personalization just requires massive amounts of personal data to train on. And so you need something like this permissioning, like the systemic programmatic permissioning layer to ensure that the data that you're collecting from your users is consented for training purposes. [00:17:57] Or that they're giving you the right type of data [00:18:00] that's actually going to improve the model that you're building and training and using to drive this personalized experience. [00:18:06] Phil: Yeah. Yeah, a hundred percent agree. Um, the example is really cool, like, uh, consumer tech versus B2B. It's, it's a different space. Like a lot of B2B teams don't think about it as much because. The volume of users is much [00:18:19] Phyllis: Yep. Yep. [00:18:20] Phil: And like the second that you are, you're in a B2C org and you see the volume of people, like, it's way more of a volume game than anything. [00:18:28] And the data that comes in is, is on a different scale than just like account based marketing. And we have like five core people in that account that we want to get to. And then you go in B2C and a customer engagement tool and there's [00:18:39] like, like 15 million people in the database. And we're talking about different scales, right? [00:18:45] Phyllis: Yeah, [00:18:45] it's a hundred percent a different scale, which is why you also, you know. We're talking a lot about permissioning in terms of honoring user choices and their preferences [00:18:55] and rights, but there's a huge business benefit to this too, right? You want to [00:19:00] be looking at and processing and storing and paying for storage costs on the data that's relevant to you. [00:19:05] Especially when we get into LLM training, like there's a lot of junk out there that just gets thrown out and like eats up your data team's time if you're not more specific in what you actually need to drive, whatever innovation or personalization you're building for the business. [00:19:20] Phil: Yeah. [00:19:20] 4. How to Audit Consent and Compliance in Marketing Data --- [00:19:20] Phil: Well, a lot of marketers like to think that they're like data driven or data informed, but they don't actually have a full grasp on the data foundation and how fragmented or worse. How non-compliant the data actually is. Um, what advice do you have for marketing leaders to start addressing that gap? [00:19:40] Or at the very least, like taking a first step at figuring out how compliant their data even is. [00:19:47] Phyllis: For sure. I think, um, some of the steps are probably akin to what I was chatting about above, like looking at your journey, making sure all those collection points are, um, you know, are built into UI effectively or done [00:20:00] transparently. But I find it actually really helpful. Um, I'm gonna try to take us like. [00:20:05] Through, through a bit of a diagram right now, because I think it's helpful to think about the flow of data in this, in this kind of use case. So there is the first layer, which is just data capture. How are you collecting someone's preferences, their consent, the, the kind of like obvious example here is when you can go to a website and there's a cookie banner that, that's a big one. [00:20:24] Um, but this is how you're collecting, you know, first party data, zero party data. A big input here is also inbound integration. So how is that data being collected elsewhere? And then pulling into this data capture layer. Now on the privacy side for MarTech, um, professionals as you work, you know, with, with your ciso with privacy officers. [00:20:44] This also, this layer also includes, um, what we call like proof of consent or record of, of consent, and that that's like just a hard and fast requirement in several privacy laws where you need to be able to capture that. So that's, um, capturing user preferences. That includes that layer also [00:21:00] includes data withdrawal too. [00:21:01] So if someone changes their mind or withdraws consent, but you think about like the first column being, uh, data capture, then you have this control layer, and this is where the complexity increases as you move up the enterprise, as you have different geos and sub-brands and you know, OEM businesses, all of that. [00:21:19] So there's certainly, um. Identity resolution and identity enrichment. That is, that is not, you know, easy, that is quite robust. Um, custom rules, functions or policies that you would then apply based off of things like geographies or brand preferences. Um, just different rule sets within your business. Right? [00:21:39] And there is a bit of like cleanup workflow that needs to happen in that, in, in this control layer. All of this, of course, is generating like real time source of truth and like audit blocks too for the compliance side. And then you move over, move over to the third column where you have data activation. [00:21:54] So that's pulling those unified consent, um, permissions, data preferences, and [00:22:00] those profiles downstream into marketing systems. This is all of your, you know, YouTube ads, Google ads, like all of your, um, advertising stack, uh, your MarTech stack feeding, um, ML pipelines with permission data sets to train on anything that touches like clean rooms or partnerships. [00:22:16] This is the whole activation side. And so there's like, there's three really like key pillars to this data foundation. And I think like as we're talking, it's really clear that this isn't just a MarTech problem, right? This is, this touches every part of, um, of an enterprise's data infrastructure. So I think my, my advice to marketers who are tackling this is to start with, you know, something like a user journey and, and do like audit your data that way, but definitely just. [00:22:46] From the jump day one, get tight collaboration with your CIO, with your CISO whatever org that's owning data infrastructure. Typically it's, you know, your CIO because this extends far beyond the marketing and advertising stack. Like if it was just marketers, we would be [00:23:00] looking at like tech on the website, right? [00:23:02] And then just like what's happening in terms of ad tech systems and there's a lot, there's a lot of layers in between. [00:23:09] Phil: Yeah. I think one thing that helps like get more folks to, to care about this is stop seeing permissioning and privacy as like a blocker to stuff like privacy doesn't add. Have to be a blocker. Like you mentioned just a few years ago, [00:23:24] 5. What Consent Management Does Across AI Data Lifecycles --- [00:23:24] Phil: a lot of folks still saw privacy as a blocker, something to keep the lawyers happy and defines a way. But over time in the last few years, it's evolved into like more of a connective tissue between compliance, data activation, and it's impacted not just. [00:23:40] The lawyers and the compliance folks, but also the marketing teams. How do you see this kind of evolving as we're entering more AI enabled things like what are your thoughts there? [00:23:50] Phyllis: Yeah. Yeah, we're definitely, um, definitely in it. It's, it's happening and evolving quickly, so you're exactly right. Um, even just. As recently as a [00:24:00] couple years ago, the major, the, like majority thinking from the privacy and the legal side is that this is a linear process. It's reactive for the most part because it's, it tends to be under-resourced, but because it's linear, it, it's like a checklist, right? [00:24:16] So you have, you know. Ideas being built, campaigns being built, product being developed, and then you get to the final stage of like someone's, you know, there with a clipboard and saying, oh no, this actually, like you, you're ingesting completely, like unethical data. We need to go back. And, and so it was this like really linear, inefficient process. [00:24:35] Um, we're definitely seeing folks like, you know, wanting to change that narrative for a myriad of reasons. Um, both in terms of like personal kind of. Influence within the company, but also very much because it is like a operationally efficient, inefficient, excuse [00:24:53] me, um, way of operating and just kind of hurts the business overall. [00:24:59] I think [00:25:00] that that second layer is just gonna be more and more, um, aggravated as we, as we race towards ai. Because if you think about like the data life cycle, that in and of itself is, is just. Compounding in complexity, right? Like that used to be something that was linear, contained. You collect data somewhere, you store it, somewhere, you use it. [00:25:20] Maybe we're collecting a lot of data with a big data explosion, but it, it is still like generally kind of follow, follows that path. And then, you know, as, as we move to more and more digital, as we start to layer in AI, that becomes continuous interconnected. And that's where you need to have this kind of systemic approach to permissioning and preferences. It's gonna, it's gonna get more and more, um, cyclical, right? Like you're gonna be collecting, uh, a user's consent about their data at some point here that will then, um, feed into some kind of training model or, or, or AI power tool that then generates [00:26:00] other data that then feeds into something else. And that like, so it's going to be harder and harder, I think for us to just track that user choice across the life cycle. [00:26:08] So the linear way, the like. Guy with a clipboard way just fully breaks in this scenario. But I think we'll also just see ourselves challenging how we build product to solve something like this, to have that visibility through the cyclical, you know, cyclical data life cycle. [00:26:23] ​ [00:28:26] Phil: Uh, you actually shared an article on LinkedIn written by Kevin McGee [00:28:29] 6. How to Build a Marketing Trust Stack --- [00:28:29] Phil: that kind of posed a question, okay, you've got a tech stack, but what about your trust stack? [00:28:34] And he basically hinting that like, companies need a. Dedicated layer of tools and practices to cultivate user trust. What would you include in, uh, a marketing team's trust hack and, and how should kind of marketing ops leaders go about building and integrating that trust layer into the existing mix of MarTech tools that they have today? [00:28:53] Phyllis: yeah, for sure. Um, I love that article. It's a great one. We work with Kevin on some of the, um, cybersecurity stuff at [00:29:00] Microsoft, but I think that's exactly right, like tech Stack. Um. Especially within the marketers and the mar like mar ops world is predefined. And it, you know, we, we, we've, we're, we're looking at our own channels and we're looking at our own tech stack. [00:29:16] If we expand that out and think about user trust as it travels throughout, um, their experience with your brand, a lot of that comes back to what I was talking about earlier where we have this like three pillar flow of data from data capture or data withdrawal. Into the control layer where you're, you know, identity resolution, applying rules, policies, um, and then downstream into data activation. [00:29:39] That, that is like just architecturally how I would think about a team's trust stack. Um, now to your point, there are tools transcend, you know, we, we do this, we, we stitch together everything, um, from that data capture layer all the way downstream into data activation, and we make that middle control layer.[00:30:00] [00:30:00] More streamlined, clear and auditable. Um, there are ways to your point where companies are stitching this together themselves. There are probably companies who are looking at this and saying, that's, that's far too complex for me because it is complex. Like it is complex. Especially when you get to the enterprise level. [00:30:17] The, the, um, the upside is, is, is significant, which is why people invest in this. Um, I would think about for any marketer, like regardless of what stage you're at, when you think about like a trust end, I would probably start with those three layers. Your data capture, your control layer, your activation layer. [00:30:33] If it's a tool like Transcend that can address it all, great. If you wanna stitch pieces together or you know, do a crawl, walk, run, that's also doable. But it, it is just kind of principally those three columns. [00:30:46] Phil: So folks that are listening, uh, to you Phyllis, that are thinking like, how, [00:30:49] 7. Consent Management as a Revenue Lever --- [00:30:49] Phil: how do I become like a champion of data consent within my company? I work at a startup or maybe even a bigger team, and I'm slapped with like revenue targets or even in B2B I have like an MQL target and every time I bring up data consent, everyone's asking me. [00:31:05] Phil, like what is data consent gonna do to hit our MQL goal tomorrow? You know, like we're trying to keep the lights on for the business here. So, um, you've actually shown that like the missing ingredient behind better ROI can be something as simple as respecting user preferences. How can marketing ops professionals become effective champions for initiatives like consent management and preference centers? [00:31:27] Any tips for getting other departments on board for making user trust a company wide priority instead of just like this grudging obligation? [00:31:35] Phyllis: Yeah. Um. I love this question because it's actually usually the opposite, particularly at large companies where, um, your legal, your privacy, your GRC, they're the ones trying to chase down marketers and get them to comply. So I think just full stop being, um, leaning in and being proactive in that sense is already a great start. [00:31:56] And you'll probably pleasantly surprise your, your counterparts there. [00:32:00] To your larger question, though, there is, this isn't just like marketing and privacy, although those are, are very key, um, stakeholders in this, and you need to convince a, a broader, um, a broader organization about why, why it's worth investing here. [00:32:13] Um, the biggest one, the biggest upside definitely is your increase, your potential increase in tam. Um, you have a larger marketable audience if you're able to do things like offer them ways too. Opt down instead of fully opt out and up unsubscribe, um, by sharing lists with different sub-brands or partners. [00:32:34] Um, there's some really great calculators out there that kind of help you kind of right size this based off of, you know, your audience size, your existing kind of metrics, industry benchmarks, um, even things like average order cart. But I think just being able to like do that, do that scoping exercise to understand what the missed business opportunity is. [00:32:55] Will get, you know, your will, get your leadership team's attention like that, that [00:33:00] is where your C-suite, that's where your board wants to go, right? They wanna grow the business. So being able to show the market up upside there is really powerful, especially when you think about, um, from a marketer's point of view, it's so much easier to increase, um, like your a CV, your average order size. [00:33:20] Uh, and then go out and acquire new customers, right? And so this is actually a really thoughtful way for you to protect your audience base, get one, you know, increase your audience, um, your marketable audience from relevant tangential audiences than having to go out and build that new product to acquire net new customer in a whole nother industry. [00:33:40] So I think that is really, that's really appealing. Um, the other piece to this is like. There certainly is a layer of, um, brand trust, feeling like, you know, a brand feeling like you can trust them to, you know, collect your data to action on it. I've, [00:34:00] I think that's actually really powerful for consumer companies. [00:34:03] And of course this varies with, you know, your culture and your, what space you're in, but I've actually found this to be a pretty uphill battle internally, even though we all might know and recognize, like, as you know, we're all consumers out in the world. We, we recognize that that matters. Like, I mean, lived experience from my time at Uber. [00:34:21] We needed, we need Dara, we needed the CEOs backing to say like, safety is the company's number, um, priority. I'm gonna shift attention and resources in place. Otherwise, it's always gonna be this longer term gain where we're like, well, to your point, we have numbers to hit this quarter. This feels like a long-term thing. [00:34:38] Let's just start it next quarter. [00:34:40] Phil: Mm-hmm. [00:34:40] Phyllis: We all, we all kind of know that, um. So the, the trust piece is sticky, even though it's always part of the story. But I think the biggest one is around, you know, increasing your addressable market. And then there's certainly like systemic ones too, driving down latency or data flow issues, reducing cost to marketing automation, improving your ROAS because [00:35:00] you're not targeting, you know, unconsented, irrelevant, irrelevant people. [00:35:04] So I think you, you tailor the message based off the audience, but high level, like it's a business opportunity. [00:35:10] 8. Designing Marketing Teams for Freakish Curiosity --- [00:35:10] Phil: Now I wanted to ask you, Phyllis, about like how you're designing teams for trust. Like given these new trusts and privacy priorities for marketers. Um, you know, how you think about designing your team for these priorities is really interesting. So I had a look at, uh, some of the job postings on Transcend Site, and it looks like, you know, obviously you're hiring. [00:35:32] For more than just mindset, as much as skill. And I noticed that like transcend looks for people who are freakishly curious and they crave bold simplicity in how they work. What qualities for you personally, um, and roles do you think a modern marketing team needs to succeed in this like, trust focused AI enabled era? [00:35:53] And, and how do you as a leader, foster those values and skills on a day-to-day basis with your team? [00:35:58] Phyllis: Yeah. Yeah, [00:36:00] those two. Um, freakish curiosity and bullet simplicity. Um, those are two of my favorite, like transcend values. So curiosity, first of all. The market's changing fast. This is true outside of, um, just marketing. Like even when we looked at where Transcend started in data privacy, that was a really fast moving space. [00:36:21] Now, um, as we get into more permissioning and more work with digital officers and CIOs, it's similarly a really fast, um, moving space. A with AI buyer. Mentalities are changing, behaviors are changing. The old playbooks just simply don't work anymore. So I think fundamentally, and this goes for like. Frankly, everyone at Transcend rather than just the marketing team. [00:36:44] Curiosity is a great skill to have. It's a great skill to foster because you're going to go look, you know, you're gonna question things. You're gonna go look for, um, unfair advantages. You're going to think about new ways to, to approach things. And that's just like a general skill that I think is [00:37:00] pays off in spades, especially at, um, at our kind of working culture. [00:37:05] Um, simplicity. This is, this can be the hardest one, I think especially as a, um, as an org leader because you really need to fight for it, right? Simplicity translates to prioritization and focus on work projects. When you're at a growth stage startup, there's like, your, your todo list will never get done, right? [00:37:25] There's always gonna be more ideas than people, but this is a good, like, reminder and forcing function. To find out, you know, to find the signal to, to, to make sure you're putting, uh, your resources in the right areas. I also love like the boldly simplified value for marketing and for anyone on the go to market side because it just reinforces where we need to land on our messaging. [00:37:46] Like it's a noisy environment, the cleanest message is cut through. Um, and, and, and so that's a good reminder. In terms of how I foster that and really like create a, a productive environment for that on the [00:38:00] team. It's, it's, it's being a guardrail and I think this is probably what every, um, org leader feels of filtering out requests or ideas or chatter that's not relevant. [00:38:13] Making sure I'm protecting my team's time so that there is time. For, you know, catching up on this thread and, and having the curiosity come out of that. There is time for us to, um, you know, like make sure that our messaging is clear and simple and our emotions are obvious and, and like strategically sound. [00:38:32] So I think that's the biggest one, and that's the one that I, that I, um, see and take seriously for my, my team curiosities also, um, I've been thinking a lot about this because we're also a fully remote company. So being able to foster this in an, in a remote environment can be trickier than just like, you know, water cooler. [00:38:53] Right. Um, a fun one that we did, I, I had our team do a marketing AI [00:39:00] hackathon last quarter where we just like cleared out two days and I was like, we did a fun brainstorm about, you know, day-to-day problems, business problems, and gave everyone access, you know, and some chimp change to spend on tools that they needed to. [00:39:13] And we just were trying to pack away and build something. I'll be honest, nothing that we built on that day in those two Actually, no, no, no. There was one thing that is, is live and humming, but a lot of that never made it to production at, at least at a team level. But, but that's okay because I think it broke us out of our thinking. [00:39:30] I think especially now with, um, everyone racing towards AI adoption, we always forget that like, it takes time, right? It takes time to tinker with something, to build a custom GPT that works at the same level of like. Your manual, old school way of working. And, um, from a, from a team perspective, creating space for that time, creating expectations, celebrating those kinds of actions is what I think is gonna foster curiosity [00:40:00] in the long run. [00:40:01] Phil: I love your answer there, fellas. This is super cool when you usually think of like managerial roles. I agree. Like cover fire for the team, making sure that, you know, new initiatives aren't coming in and like folks are able to stay focused. For me it's like. To stay on the list that they have and the priorities, but I love how you coined that as also, so they focus on their priorities, but they also have time for curiosity and flexing those muscles and, and trying new things because like, when do you find time to prioritize like an AI hackathon when you're continuously just. [00:40:36] Opening up fire from other departments about new requests, especially in marketing ops, like we're often these like ticket sender teams there. Um, but I, I wanted to ask you about like, who thrives in this like AI era? Like you, you just said you did like an AI hackathon, um, and you've actually used that like. [00:40:53] Creation is no longer the scar skill in marketing. And instead, what will set people [00:41:00] apart in marketing is how well they can filter the signal from the noise, craft a compelling story, connect those dots across systems. When you're building your team, uh, at transcendent or like advising other marketers, what skills or mindsets are you emphasizing to ensure they thrive in this like. [00:41:17] Crazy landscape that we live in. Um, [00:41:19] 9. Skills That Define Great Marketing Operations --- [00:41:19] Phil: what abilities do you think will differentiate great marketing ops, pros? You already mentioned curiosity, so anything but curiosity? [00:41:25] Phyllis: Yeah, I mean the curiosity piece definitely applies to connecting dots across systems, and I think that's one, especially in like a hackathon environment, [00:41:33] Phil: Mm-hmm. [00:41:33] Phyllis: a bit more time to, to tinker with and, and, and see, um, how things can get plugged in together. So I think that that's the big one, particularly on marketing ops, is being able to just tinker with systems, um, and the curiosity that drives that. [00:41:48] To your earlier point about creation being, um, being just table stakes, right? Like AI can generate a dozen and a [00:42:00] half headline, ad headline or, or blog, full blog articles, white papers, like the creation itself actually is not going to be what, how marketers win and how they move forward. The shift is definitely going to be towards editing and curating that content. [00:42:17] Same thing with like the storytelling. It's not just about like from a pm m's perspective, it's not just about, you know, getting the right messaging and positioning. You need to have the full story to back that up. Um, I, I think about this a lot because I, I think right now, like for instance, when I look at my own career, I had many years where I was able to get the reps in where I was doing like the entry level work where I had a brief scrutinize for a month before we even hit go on something and like, it, it's that like. [00:42:47] Um, it's that like stickiness that really, when you're earlier in your career helps you develop that skill so you know what good looks like. You see other people, um, build and ship it, and you're able to then we're in an AI powered world [00:43:00] shift to the editing and curating and, and and reviewing piece. And we're, we're definitely, I'm not gonna doomsday us, but we're definitely like losing that a bit more on the entry level. [00:43:10] Um, like as people are earlier in their careers. But I think, I think it's really up to marketing leaders, the rest of the org and the culture that you set to, to make sure you create space and like expectation around that learning so that that cycle is still there. Um, so it starts with the feedback loop, right? [00:43:31] Like what type of feedback are you giving? Are you giving references so people can, you know, pattern match to what's good or like understand, um, you know, where the bar is at. Then, like I mentioned before, making sure there's that this isn't rushed, because I think this is like, it's critical in the long run. [00:43:50] Like it's so easy to say, I've got this project and I'm gonna review this, and I'm just gonna give you like off the cuff responses to get this to, you know, an [00:44:00] a a plus state so we can ship. But like longer term it's, it's like getting on a huddle, sitting down. This is, this is what I meant by this. Do you see what I see? [00:44:09] Like, it's, it's those little pieces. That, that, that take time and take humans. Um, I think the other piece of this is also like really well complimented by non-marketing activities. Like I think there's ways to basically set yourself up well in the AI era outside of just like work and, and reps on projects, right? [00:44:32] Um, from an, a more academic lens, I really think about like content creation and storytelling. Journalism, um, even folks who've been in life sciences, 'cause you're really like forced to look at a lot of noise, a lot of content and discern what's most valuable. Discern where the story is, where the through line is. [00:44:51] Like, there's definitely, you know, we hopefully get reps of that even in grade school. And then in terms of like life experiences, [00:45:00] um, same thing. What experiences are gonna give you that, that exposure to. A lot of noise. Being able, being, having to like discern what, um, what is relevant, craft that into a story gets them like minimum viable storytelling or motivational, you know, speaking. [00:45:16] So things like sports coaching, living internationally. I think there's a lot of ways that these soft skills come up, but I do think they extend into marketing, especially as we race towards this AI era. [00:45:28] Phil: I love it. That's such a cool answer. Um, kinda related to this, like you. If you like, [00:45:33] 10. Why System Level Marketing Experience Builds Career Leverage --- [00:45:33] Phil: you started your career or like part of your career at Uber and you were kind of like in this like ops CRM Lifecycle role, then you went PMM, now you're leading like the full function of marketing at Transcend. Um, so I guess it's fair to say you started in a specialist route and you kind of moved into like more strategy [00:45:53] Phyllis: Yeah. [00:45:54] Phil: If you were to like rewind your career, like knowing what you know today. Do you [00:46:00] go the specialist route? Do you go the generalist route? Like with all the AI craziness today? Like what advice do you have for kind of like mid-career marketers that are at this weird crossroad? Like I was just on email, slack, uh, community the other day and this like technical email developer was actually seriously considering. [00:46:18] Quitting their role in ops and going back to school to study and get like, like to become a veterinarian. And they were like asking people for advice because they were afraid that in the next couple of years, like doomsday, you know, like we won't need someone to like code emails, blah, blah blah. So like, I don't know if you're like starting from scratch today, knowing what you know, like specialists, is there specific areas in specialists, like more generalists? [00:46:45] What open-ended question there. What are your thoughts? [00:46:49] Phyllis: that's a good one. I definitely think it's combination of both. Like I, and I don't think I have a strong point of view on if it's like [00:47:00] specialists first, or you start off as just a general marketing manager and you see all kind of campaigns and functions. But I do think, like I, I do think the leaders that get furthest know the craft, at least to some degree in some kind of channel or system because that, that stuff you just can't skip over. [00:47:19] And like, like we've been talking about all today, like that powers a lot of the infrastructure and the foundation for, for, um, you know, for outside success. So I do think like, whether it is something like email marketing, um, you know, in-app growth loops, like I, I do think there's like a system level, um, experience that, that helps you better, better see like 360 marketing strategy and, and marketing resources required longer term. [00:47:46] On the generalist side, pm m's. A great one. PMM also, I'm, I'm very like, I'm very cautious about this because PMM means so many different things in so many different companies. And I think personally pm m's also going [00:48:00] through a bit of an identity crisis right now. So maybe it's PMM m but maybe it's something that's like, um, strategy and ops, product management. [00:48:10] Like, I think there's a lot of views where you get a bit closer to understanding. What is the market I'm trying to go after? How do I best set myself up for that? And then what is the message and the motions that I build and to support that? Um, but I do think those two combo really well. Like I've, I've worked with some really great marketers who've been sales engineers in their past lives, and they bring that kind of technical knowledge and like the systems thinking over and they're quite successful. [00:48:35] Um, so I think it's both. also, I know this is not the point of this podcast, but I also do think meds will continue to do well. [00:48:44] Phil: Yeah. No, a hundred percent. I agree. Um, we actually did a fun episode last year, uh, with my co-host and I just like riffing on what roles in marketing or skills in marketing we think are like the most future proofed for, for AI or like AI resistant. [00:49:00] And PMM was one of the ones like I was arguing for because. [00:49:04] Any role in marketing that is close to customers that have to like come up with copy, but like also these like, you know, ideas that come from empathy. Like actually chatting with users like LLMs can come up with crazy things, but they don't chat with your actual users, your actual ICP. And I think the role of the customer marketer or the PMM is really AI resistant in that sort of coin. [00:49:31] But I don't know if you agree. [00:49:32] Phyllis: I think that's fair. I think that's totally fair. I think community fall probably falls into that, um, that vein too, but it's the. It's the IRL connection point, right? That that really matters. Um, do your cohost have a contrarian view? [00:49:47] Phil: Uh, no, he is like, uh, marketing ops like, uh, centralist. So he was like arguing more for like data foundations and marketing ops and, you know, I don't think there's a wrong answer and I think there's a lot of self [00:50:00] pres preservation in, in a lot of [00:50:02] Phyllis: a little biased. Yeah. Yeah. [00:50:05] Phil: Yeah, definitely. Um, Phyllis has been super fun conversation. [00:50:08] I feel like we, we could keep, uh, riffing on this, but, uh, mindful of time here. Um, [00:50:13] 11. System for Happiness --- [00:50:13] Phil: you're obviously an ops minded privacy first marketing leader. Really appreciate your time. Uh, at home. You're also a mom and you love creating physical things. You're into oil painting, pottery, and various DIY projects at home. [00:50:24] Uh, one question we ask everyone on the show is how do you decide what deserves your energy? At any given moment and what's your personal system for staying aligned with what actually makes you happy? [00:50:35] Phyllis: Mm, this is a good one. I actually, um, was telling myself before we got on Phil, I was like, don't make this a full therapy session. Um, I, I don't have this fully figured out, like, I'll just be completely honest there. I do. To your point, like I love creating things with my hands and. I haven't picked up an oil painting brush or, you know, thrown on the wheel for a couple years. [00:50:59] Sadly, [00:51:00] maybe now in my toddler driven life, it is just like playing with Play-Doh. But I do think there's something about, like, for me at least, the tactical feedback and just like building something tangible that's not on a deck or on a Zoom call, that's really satisfying. Um, in terms of like protecting that time. I live and die by my calendar, so I do need to like, I need to block it off if, if it's gonna get done. And I think. Again, easier said than done, but in the same like personal finance. Um, speak of like pay yourself first, I think. I think you need to like block off time for yourself first. And for someone who is, um, a recovering, um, I don't know, recovering, overachiever, people pleaser, I, I think you also need to just like tell yourself that. [00:51:52] This makes you a better person. This makes me a better mom. I can show up better for my kid. This makes me a better leader. This makes me a better marketer. And like [00:52:00] that is the, that is the like mantra that I need to hold, um, you know, hold close to my heart in order to like actually honor and preserve the time that I've carved out for my own happiness and wellbeing and all that good stuff. [00:52:15] Phil: No, I really appreciate that answer. Phyllis is, um, super good. Two and a half year olds will really make you calendar. Blog. What, what, like, last, last question. [00:52:24] Phyllis: Yeah. [00:52:25] Phil: Like, I think this idea of like blocking off your calendar is good in theory and people go off and they actually do it, and then inevitably people just like ignore it and they book over it even though you have blocked off time and then you get into this mode of like, really. [00:52:43] You know, mindful about it, but then like, you know, your boss asks you to like block that calendar block, [00:52:48] like how, how do you like stay true to it, but also like still stay flexible for people that are trying to find them in your calendar. Like, what's the secret there? I. [00:52:58] Phyllis: Phil, I don't have one. [00:53:00] Um, but if anyone does and, and drops in the comments, I'll, I'm very keen to try out new emotions, but I don't, I don't have a good answer. I think it's like partially like setting the expectation, you know, when, when things get asked to, to be prioritized over. Um, I have a colleague who actually does this pretty well, where she doesn't do just like work block or, you know, like happiness block. [00:53:23] She, she'll, she'll show you like, this thing is, I'm planning to spend an hour on this will take an hour and a half. This takes 30 minutes. I think it's helpful for her in just like making sure she doesn't overbook herself or over commit. But I think even for, um, someone else looking at your calendar, it's helpful to understand like exactly what's going on. [00:53:40] And a lot of times people can self triage, right? Like, oh. No, I think actually, you know, bill needs to be doing all this stuff and, and, and mine can probably just be a Slack note or, or I can figure this out or maybe this is more important and, and so I'm gonna push for it. That's what I've seen work elsewhere. [00:53:58] But again, I certainly am [00:54:00] not saying that I've got this figured out. So if folks have good ideas, DM me. [00:54:05] Phil: Love it. Awesome. Phyllis, I'll let you go. Thank you so much for your time. This is really fun. [00:54:09] Phyllis: Yeah. Super fun. Thank you, Phil.