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The official CEO.com podcast featuring unfiltered conversations with the leaders shaping our world.
Clint Betts: Leslie, thank you so much for coming on the show. You’re the founder and CEO of ICED Media. Tell us what ICED Media is and how you became the founder and CEO.
Leslie Ann Hall: Absolutely. And first off, Clint, thank you so much for having me. It is such a thrill to join you. I’ve been catching up on all of your episodes, and it is an honor to be among such esteemed guests you’ve had on the show.
As you said, I am Leslie Ann Hall. I am the CEO and founder of ICED Media. We like to say we are beauty’s best digital agency.
It’s been quite a fun journey getting here.
For many years—gosh, over 20 years running the business—we were really generalists in an industry where I’ve come to learn specialists truly have an advantage.
It probably took me a little too long, but around 15 years in, we really figured out that when we specialized in beauty and performance marketing, we were unmatched in our acumen.
That specialization created a flywheel effect for the business. It allowed us to become best in class, work with the top beauty brands in the world, become a Meta Business Partner, a TikTok Marketing Partner, one of the first TikTok Shop partners in the U.S., and ultimately become a thought leader at the intersection of beauty and social shopping.
Today we really help beauty brands future-proof their businesses, especially in this AI landscape that we’re all preparing for.
Clint Betts: AI touches every industry, of course, and it’s top of mind for every CEO, founder, and company builder.
How do we integrate it? How do we use it? And maybe most importantly: how is it going to affect our business?
How are you thinking about those questions?
Leslie Ann Hall: It’s such a great question and honestly probably my favorite topic right now, so thank you for asking.
There are really two ways we think about AI at ICED Media.
The first is internally:
How are we using artificial intelligence and machine learning to create tools, technologies, and systems that empower our team?
Earlier this year, we created a learning agenda for our leadership team to understand how best to roll out AI tools internally.
As a digital agency, we don’t put products on shelves. Our business is fundamentally about people.
So we wanted to understand:
If AI automates certain tasks, what should our people spend more of their time doing?
The answer was overwhelmingly:
collaborating with coworkers and building deeper relationships with clients.
That’s what makes us better partners.
Understanding that AI allows us to reinvest in ourselves as humans is a really powerful opportunity.
So we’re very excited about automating systems internally.
But where we’re most excited—and what I talk about constantly—is what AI means for beauty discovery.
I genuinely believe this is the single biggest disruption in our lifetimes in terms of how consumers discover beauty products and services.
We are at the dawn of a completely new era of discovery.
ChatGPT now has over 700 million weekly users, and consumers are actively going there asking questions about acne, hyperpigmentation, GLP-1-related skin issues, and more.
That creates an unbelievable opportunity for our clients to compete directly against legacy beauty giants in entirely new ways.
At ICED Media, we’ve built an entirely new discipline called Search and Discovery.
We’re partnering with Shopify, and we’re actually hosting an event next week educating the beauty industry on GEO—Generative Engine Optimization—which is essentially how brands rank inside ChatGPT and large language model results.
And then Shopify announced this week an exclusive partnership with OpenAI and ChatGPT around what we call agentic commerce or conversational commerce: the ability to transact directly within the chat interface.
That’s really the beginning of what we’re calling the “zero-click era” of commerce.
It’s wildly exciting.
I think it’s going to democratize digital selling for beauty brands and create entirely new ways for brands to communicate with consumers.
Clint Betts: What does a typical day look like for you?
Leslie Ann Hall: I’m a very early riser.
I like to start my day with exercise—which I’m usually good about, though not always.
That’s important for me mentally and emotionally.
These days, much more of my time is spent on thought leadership, public speaking, and trying to be a resource to the beauty industry.
About five years ago, I made one of our longtime employees—someone who had been with us around nine years at the time—an equity partner in the business. She’s now our Chief Client Officer and runs much of the day-to-day client and team management.
That has allowed me to focus more on evangelizing digital tools and technology and becoming a thought leader in the beauty industry.
So today, a lot of my time goes toward:
thought leadership,
new business development,
public speaking,
and then the operational side of the business—which isn’t always the fun part, but absolutely needs to be handled.
Clint Betts: I love it.
How do you think about relationships and culture?
And maybe answer that in two ways:
Internally with your team and externally with clients and partners.
How do you build culture both inside and outside the organization?
Leslie Ann Hall: That’s a great question.
Every year, I kick things off with a goals presentation for the team. Usually there are three major goals for the year ahead.
I think it’s important as CEO to establish the vision and get everyone aligned.
And I always say our number one goal never changes because we are a service business:
employee retention and client retention.
If we don’t retain employees, we won’t retain clients.
I’m incredibly proud that in both 2023 and 2024, we achieved 100% employee retention.
That’s almost unheard of in the agency world, especially with younger employees early in their careers.
So our culture is really rooted in accountability.
And I think that starts from the top down.
Whenever there’s a mistake or hiccup internally, you’ll hear multiple people immediately say:
“That was my fault.”
“Here’s what I could have done better.”
I personally believe everything is my responsibility because it’s my company.
When people trust each other and collaborate deeply, they feel empowered to do their best work without fear of being human.
So our culture is built on:
accountability,
collaboration,
trust,
and humanity.
Externally, I think that absolutely translates to our client relationships and our partnerships with companies like Meta and TikTok.
We consistently hear feedback about the kindness, humanity, and collaborative nature of our team.
And honestly, that makes me incredibly proud.
Clint Betts: What are some of the biggest challenges facing your industry right now?
Leslie Ann Hall: There are several.
First, there are macroeconomic challenges.
Tariffs have been extremely difficult for the beauty industry because beauty products rely on globally sourced ingredients, formulations, packaging, and manufacturing.
Very few beauty products are entirely domestic from start to finish.
So tariffs absolutely create pressure throughout the industry.
The second challenge is simply the speed of change.
Consumers are discovering products differently almost constantly now.
I mentioned ChatGPT with its 700 million weekly users.
TikTok Shop became the fastest-growing beauty retailer in America in just two years and is already the sixth-largest beauty retailer in the country.
That pace of change can feel overwhelming for marketing leaders and executives trying to stay profitable while also making sure they aren’t left behind.
Clint Betts: What do you read, and what reading recommendations would you have for us?
Leslie Ann Hall: I’m a huge reader.
Mostly nonfiction—business, biographies, what we used to call self-help books.
A few books have genuinely changed my life.
The first is Stillness Is the Key by Ryan Holiday.
I reread it every January.
That book really led me toward Stoicism and eventually Buddhism, both of which have deeply shaped my life and career.
It’s such an important reminder that in modern life, distraction is constant—not just from social media and technology, but from our own minds.
Stillness is really about learning to be intentional with your thoughts, your body, and your time.
Another incredibly meaningful book for me is The Book of Joy, which is a conversation between the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
These are two people who witnessed unimaginable suffering yet remained profoundly joyful.
The book is really about how we process suffering and use it to show up better for others and ourselves.
It’s probably the book I gift most often.
And then more traditional business books:
the Steve Jobs biography, which I’ve reread multiple times,
and Good to Great by Jim Collins.
Those are big ones for me.
Clint Betts: What are some projects or experiences you’re especially proud of?
Leslie Ann Hall: Honestly, the thing I’m most proud of is probably my advisory board and the thought leadership work that came from it.
For most of my career, I operated more as a practitioner than the public face of my company.
But I had built close relationships with very established leaders in the beauty industry, and eventually I thought:
“What if I formalized these relationships into something more intentional?”
So I created an advisory board made up of some of the most accomplished people in beauty.
We meet quarterly, always in person when possible, with formal agendas and structured discussions.
It gives us the opportunity to pressure-test ideas, discuss industry changes, and get outside perspective on the business.
Very early on, the board gave me a major piece of advice:
They told me that they could advocate for our agency externally, but it would never carry the same weight as me personally stepping into thought leadership.
That really changed my trajectory.
It pushed me to become the public face of the business and to openly share knowledge, case studies, and education with the industry.
Today I speak in front of audiences of thousands of people, and what I love most is the opportunity to be a trusted resource in an industry where misinformation and fear-mongering can be very common.
Clint Betts: What advice would you give other leaders or CEOs who want to step into thought leadership but maybe feel hesitant, anxious, or unsure?
Leslie Ann Hall: I was absolutely one of those people.
At first, it felt deeply uncomfortable.
I’m not naturally someone who enjoys attention or being boastful.
But eventually I realized that my greatest joy comes from giving to others and helping people learn.
That changed everything.
But I’ll also say this:
thought leadership is a tremendous amount of work.
It’s basically another full-time job layered on top of running a business.
So people need to find something about it they genuinely love.
The other piece of advice comes from a woman on my advisory board, Joy Eglow, who is an incredible entrepreneur.
She always says:
“Having no shame is a superpower.”
And honestly, I think especially for women, we’re often taught to make ourselves smaller or quieter than our male counterparts.
Sometimes success requires simply continuing to ask.
I’ll give you an example:
One of my major goals was speaking at Shoptalk, one of the biggest conferences in digital marketing.
I believe I contacted the head of programming 17 times.
Seventeen.
Eventually, he put me on stage.
If I had stopped after two emails because I thought, “He probably isn’t interested,” I never would have gotten that opportunity.
That experience created countless new opportunities afterward.
So honestly:
keep asking,
keep trying,
and don’t let rejection discourage you.
Clint Betts: That’s incredible.
Leslie, I want to be respectful of your time, so we end every interview the same way.
At CEO.com, we believe the chances one gives are just as important as the chances one takes.
When you hear that, who gave you a chance that helped get you where you are today?
Leslie Ann Hall: I love that question so much.
I’d love to give a shoutout to Andrea Nagel, who runs programming for Cosmetic Executive Women, the largest professional networking organization in the beauty industry.
I’ll never forget our first meeting.
At the time, I was very green in terms of public speaking and thought leadership.
She basically told me:
“Not many people know who you are yet.”
And honestly, she had every reason to say no to me.
But I pitched her a webinar idea anyway, and she gave me a chance.
That webinar ended up becoming one of their best-attended webinars ever.
And that opportunity completely changed the direction of my career.
It was really the beginning of me learning how to become comfortable as a public-facing leader and industry resource.
I’ll always be grateful to her for that opportunity.
And I hope I can give similar opportunities to others throughout my own career.
Clint Betts: I think you absolutely have.
Thank you so much for sharing your experiences with us. We definitely need to have you back on again.
I’m incredibly impressed by what you’ve built, the leader you are, and the impact you’re having.
Thank you so much for coming on CEO.com.
Leslie Ann Hall: Thank you for having me, Clint. This has been so much fun. So nice to meet you.