[00:00:00] Phil: Loblaw operates on this massive national scale. In Canada, you're generating over 62 billion in annual revenue. [00:00:07] You're serving millions of Canadians through hundreds of different retail brands. like Loblaws, like Shoppers Drug Mar, presidents Choice, Canadian Superstore [00:00:16] Like there's like. Million plus transactional messages a year. Right. How do you even like begin to think about digital comms [00:00:23] Megan: For us, transactional messaging span all of our channels, email or push or an SMS we spend a lot of time thinking about how often a customer hears from us. So whether it's, upstream governance, data-driven kind of prioritization or staggered deployment. we've considered what the customer shouldn't, see. AI can definitely be. It's a driver of a lot of volume and a lot of speed. But I think innovation, the ingenuity of a lot of it, there's something to be said about human instigation for ai and then something around governance. [00:00:59] ​ [00:01:26] In This Episode --- [00:01:26] Phil: What's up folks? Today we have the pleasure of sitting down with Megan Kwan, director of Digital Customer Communications at Loblaw Digital. [00:01:33] In this episode, Megan takes us deep inside the messaging engine behind Canada's largest retailer. We cover how they structure teams into customer journey pods, how they assign MarTech tool ownership. Why change champions are essential to MarTech adoption and how they manage transactional messaging across dozens of brands and millions of customers. [00:01:53] All that and a bunch more stuff after we, super quick word from two of our awesome partners, [00:01:57] ​ [00:04:00] Phil: Megan, thank you so much for your time today. Really excited to chat. [00:04:04] Megan: Stoked to be here. [00:04:06] Phil: ~Uh, we're both big fans of the winter season.~ [00:04:06] We're both based in Canada, uh, which is fun. Usually talk to a lot of us folks. But, um, [00:04:11] 1. Building a Career Around Conversations That Scale --- [00:04:11] Phil: let's chat about your role right now. So you're at one of Canada's largest retailers and you're doing a ton of stuff around customer comms. You've had a cool journey going from Kii, but actually starting at Loblaw and then going back to Loblaw. [00:04:26] Love to just start by like having you walk us through your current role at Loblaw and like maybe touch on. The career path, like that span, top of funnel to middle of the funnel, e-comm, FinTech, retail. How did that kind of prepare you for your position right now? Chat about that for a bit. [00:04:41] Megan: Yeah, absolutely. So right now, digital customer communications, I oversee the digital messaging ecosystem's done for Loblaw, the thing, email plus SMS across the enterprise for a variety of different programs, marketing and [00:05:00] transactional content. We do a whole gamut. We work with a lot of different business and divisions across the entire organization. [00:05:08] So we make sure their strategies and programs come to life through the customer life cycle. Um, and we bring also new ways to start or continue to conversation with our customers, uh, back to our stakeholders. So there's a lot of really great kind of relationship building that we give it as well. Mm-hmm. [00:05:24] When I think about how I got here, uh, I stumbled a lot of my time building, uh, businesses brand. Um, and growing different, uh, products and services through my career. So I am actually a boomerang, like you mentioned. I started my career at Loblaw, um, had the privilege of being part of the online grocery business while it was growing and scaling. And then I've kind of done a few different things, uh, whether it be paid media, um, lifecycle, ERN, across multitudes of industry, general FinTech [00:06:00] marketplaces, retail. I think a lot of that kind of comes full circle for me because where I've landed is bringing all those different pieces together, different aspects of product marketing, growth marketing, and very technical kind of marketing functions as well. [00:06:16] Um, and that kind of allowed me to join the team when they're about to start a really cool evolution. So, yeah. [00:06:23] Phil: Awesome. Appreciate you sharing that. Like one. [00:06:25] 2 . Customer Journey Pods and Martech Team Structures --- [00:06:25] Phil: One of the reasons I'm really excited to chat with you today is the scale in which you're operating right now. Like for folks that don't know. Loblaw operates on this massive national scale. In Canada, you're generating over 62 billion in annual revenue. [00:06:39] You're serving millions of Canadians through hundreds of different grocery and, and drug stores and retail brands. There's well-known brands like Loblaws, like Shoppers Drug Mar, presidents Choice, uh, Canadian Superstore. Like I, I learned this just recently, like when I was researching for the episode. Uh, when you think about like digital comms at scale. [00:06:59] [00:07:00] Maybe chat about like two or three systems or processes that your team can't live without in this like crazy scale that you're operating in. [00:07:09] Megan: Yes, I mean. A lot of my teens spend their day like in the platform of tools that we use so that the bread and butter of our day to day. But outside of that, to manage the size, scope, and scale of the programs and ecosystem that we manage, uh, we lean really heavily into a lot of our systems. So for us, we lean a lot into the data that we gather and that we have active to. [00:07:34] That pretty much drives almost everything that we do. We all will use that analytic system to help understand the different real time signals across the various different properties and platforms that we have to help drive a lot of the experiences that we're crafting and the channel that we operate. When I think about process, it's a little bit different. My definitely expansive, [00:08:00] they cover all the different divisions, the brands that we have within the enterprise envelope. So for a team of my size, uh, the team of my size, uh, a lot of our process and tools are about how we stay connected and together and in sync. [00:08:14] So we use a lot of tasks and ing through Jira and got a lot of documentation and coda. So everything that we do, we share that knowledge back and and forth so that we can continue to learn off each other. Um, and we actually are really big Slack or innovation, real hand update us. We love a good black emoji. for us that made sure that no matter where anyone on the team is, whether it's in the same office working on a different thing or in a different office working on the same thing, um, that we can actually stay in sync throughout the week. That's really important to us as a team, just with the way that we're structured and the way we operate. [00:08:53] Phil: Very cool. So is it like a big central org for comms that is. Kind of [00:09:00] surfacing at like a dispatch layer almost for all of these different brands that, and then maybe you have like a couple of folks that are focused on just one of those brands. [00:09:08] 2.2 Martech Team Structures --- [00:09:08] Phil: Walk us through like the, the structure there, like you said before, um, we kinda chatted that like Loblaw's exec teams like heavily lean into the capabilities that MarTech and Rev Tech can kind of unlock for your teams. [00:09:22] Maybe chat about like how your teams are organized under the hood and, and get the most value out of these tools. [00:09:28] Megan: Yeah. Um, historically the team. Before even my time was very like business focused. So if we've got a pharmacy business, a grocery business, an eCom business, they were structured very much in that vein. It almost was a little bit like a mini agency, [00:09:45] Phil: Hmm. [00:09:46] Megan: and we retain a little bit of that, right? There's a lot of nuances with the businesses and brand that we operate and we need that level of expertise and partnership with. [00:09:54] There is specific team. Um, in their needs. But most recently what I've done is I've [00:10:00] also set up a secondary, more primary structure now, which is more aligned to the customer journey. So my team actually also looks over what we call pause, um, whether it be around onboarding and registration or shopping and post-purchase, sort of a discover phase and the lifecycle and those pod and those activities within those structures are much less business focused and they're much more customer centric. I did that by design because there's a lot of goodness across our ecosystem. That's one of our really cool, um, traits is an enterprise of our size and scale, and there isn't a reason why we shouldn't be able to leverage that and be able to shed those learnings across the different brands that we have. On those pod structures really allow us to think about the customer and then layer in all the learnings and goodness that we know about our brands, and then put forward strategies or [00:11:00] touch points or new programs that allow us to be more relevant to the customer, a certain part of their shopping and discuss journey with us. So that's a little bit about how my team is structured today. And there's a lot of excitement around that, uh, to reduce and break down of both silos that come with just being kind of one way [00:11:23] Phil: Super cool. [00:11:23] 2.3 Customer Journey MArtech Pods --- [00:11:23] Phil: Are, are those pods like set in stone in a way where like, you know, people come in, they just work on that pod, or do they have like a separate team and the pod is just like part of the work? Like who is in that pod? Like maybe like point in on, on one and unpack that pod? Really curious. [00:11:41] Megan: is a bit of both. So really good example. And um, and I've done it a bit intentionally where, um, in one pod we focus and obsess over how the customer discovers and engages with our experiences, but before they even shock or out to cart, like what are they [00:12:00] doing with us as engaged member of our ecosystem or maybe an unengaged member of our ecosystem. [00:12:06] Um, that same pod is also the business lead for our loyalty programs. That, so that was a little bit of like an intentional dual, uh, dual setup for me because where are we gonna get the most energy from, and then where can we then use that as a jumping board for the rest of the, we misses, and that's true for all the pods that we have. And they're staffed accordingly and they've been given their dedicated missions. Um, but then what we've done is we've created flexibility within our resourcing within RT so that there's constant consideration for the different needs across the engine firms, which allows a lot more fluidity and connectedness as. [00:12:54] 3. How to Assign Martech Tool Ownership and Drive Real Adoption --- [00:12:54] Phil: Can you chat about like, ownership for MarTech tools, like when your team is adopting a [00:13:00] new platform or maybe migrating to, to something else? Like, uh, I know you guys are using, uh, mo engage on the customer engagement side for some of the transactional comms that you're doing. Like who. Owns the tool and the outcomes that that tool is meant to drive when you're like buying it, like how do you assign responsibility so that there's clarity on who manages a tool, who's accountable for results. [00:13:22] You just mentioned this like pod structure that you have. I'm sure there's a bunch of different pods that are using the same tools. Is there like a separate like ops layer that kind of owns the admin for that? Maybe chat about that for a bit. [00:13:34] Megan: Yeah, I think um, for us it's very unique. So we are the ultimate accountability party for platforms around messaging. Where like another example is our analytics team is responsible. And works heavily with their analytics tools in terms of the actual like ownership of like who pays for it, that [00:14:00] doesn't differ case by case within our enterprise for a variety of reasons. [00:14:05] But by and large, when we think about assigning accountability, it ultimately comes down to. The team and the structure that is going to be driving the levers of value for that tool. So in the case of our messaging platforms, we become the ultimate responsible party for the tool. And how would leverage, how are we using it? [00:14:26] What's the kind of general governance around the tool? What are the house of the tool? Are we using it to the best of our ability? All of that is something that rests with the responsibility of of my team. Largely because the technical capabilities sit within our team as well as the processes and the actual accountability to send the actual deployments out, and that's kind of how we've defined responsibility for us on the messaging side. [00:14:54] 3.2 Martech Training and Onboarding --- [00:14:54] Phil: I am guessing that training and adoption is probably another mandate that, that falls under your [00:15:00] team there. I'm curious to have you unpack how do you approach training and, and onboarding to make sure that your team across all these pods is actually used? New MarTech in their like day-to-day work and is using them effectively. [00:15:13] Maybe chat about that. [00:15:16] Megan: For me, new tools can always be like a 50 50, at least in my career and my tie. I see them be wildly successful. I seen them being kind of like half and half out. [00:15:29] Phil: Yeah. [00:15:30] Megan: Uh, for me, the big difference of what I bring into my teams now in my day to day from the learning, uh, tying the onboarding and training of a tool, choose something tangible like an outcome, like an initiative, like a deliverable. [00:15:46] And sometimes it's most of the time actually a customer facing. But sometimes even, it could be something internal, but attaching it to something that is actually very tangible and a, and a very [00:16:00] physical outcome for the team, really motivate the individuals or the teams or the pods who are working on onboarding themselves to really get there in a, in a manner that is protic where they can realize value for themselves. Um, and then to support them, what we do is we actually bring experts in where we can. So where we have partners, uh, within the tools that Leon onboard, we do leverage, uh, the resources we have available. So they've got use cases, if they have support staff, if they have demos, training module, things like that. [00:16:35] We do very much try to give that accessibility to. Uh, it just depends on how much learning has to take place to successfully help us. [00:16:47] Phil: It makes a ton of sense. I spent most of my career in like the, the B2B side of the world. So when I, when I ask people questions about like tool adoption and training, my mind usually goes to like the c. [00:17:00] CRM, like being the ops person, supporting the sales team and like a pseudo rev ops role there. Like I just have so many like painful stories about like rolling a new tool that integrates and pushes data in the CRM and then just seeing the sales team just not use, like anything that kind of came out of that. [00:17:18] Maybe chat about like on the B2C side, like there, there isn't often a CRM. The, the customer engagement tool usually ends up being that like main tool. Obviously there's a bunch of other stuff also, but like, [00:17:30] 3.3 How To Integrate New Martech Into Daily Habits --- [00:17:30] Phil: how do you integrate new tools into daily habits of your team and like the workflows of the marketers on the team? [00:17:37] Do you have like routines or check-ins or, I, I've sometimes even used like incentives for like, some folks to encourage them to actually go in there and, and use it. What are your thoughts there? Like how do you get people to actually use the thing that you just spend a ton of time like. Building and integrating within the stack. [00:17:55] Megan: I, I will say like for us, everything is use case [00:18:00] driven before you even build it. We've identified or bought it. We've identified what is that use case and the path to even getting it going is usually tied to some sort of tangible outcome. Then for me, like making sure there's no friction is really kind. [00:18:18] The big priority is once the made and we're doing this check-ins, outcomes, celebrations, even the smallest milestone can be really good positive, like validation that, hey, the thing that I'm doing is going in the direction that was planned. It's faster than expected, is as affected. I've learned something. So we really use those like little nuggets along the way to make sure that we're positively reinforcing the use of that tool. Um, maybe not quite an incentive, but an emotional one at that. Um, and then because we attach them to cases, we as an organization [00:19:00] do a really good job of celebrating milestones. [00:19:02] So we have channels, we have shout out, we've got a really great, um. Mindset within the organization of just in real kind, because we are in office most of the week. Um, acknowledging like to each other in person, like, wow, that was really awesome. I'm so excited for you. Congratulations. Nothing really be that because that really then is a positive feedback loop. [00:19:29] Been through the day to day. [00:19:32] Phil: Very cool. Yeah. Sometimes easier said than done, but I feel like especially on the, on the B2B side, like something that's worked really well is this idea of having. Someone that you take aside, they become like your champion, so to speak. And like you walk them through the use case, spend a lot of time with them one-on-one, they get it, they understand it. [00:19:53] You like walk them through how to do certain things. They start using it. They're like your Guinea pig in a sense. [00:19:59] 4. Why Change Champions Work in Martech Transformation --- [00:19:59] Phil: Um, I know you're also a big fan of like these champions when it comes to. Changing things internally and like transformation wise. Um, when you're rolling out a new platform, sometimes you create like internal change champions. [00:20:13] How does your change champion operate for you? And like what impact have they had on adoption for MarTech or like peer to peer support across different folks on your team? Maybe chat about that for a bit. [00:20:25] Megan: Yeah, I'm a, I'm a huge believer in change champions. They. They've been a very big part of any change that I've had to navigate through across my entire career, and I think change is really varied, even if it's a really good change because it's so ambiguous and it's so unknown. And if it's not something that you're used to having to face all the time, which votes, most people are not. Even if it's a really exciting change, there's a lot of anxiety around it. So when I think about a change [00:21:00] champion for me and the ones that I do have within my team, I really think about the person first and foremost. For me, it's really around like, do they have a little bit of that extra open mindedness to this change? [00:21:12] Like how did they react the first time they heard about it? Could this be a really good challenge for their own development? Like is there. Is there something in it for them that really makes it motivating and self-driving and then spending the time with them to make sure that they have all the tools to succeed? [00:21:28] So do they need extra training? Do they, do they need dedicated time and space throughout the week that we can make work? Um, so they can really get in deep with what it is that they're actually facilitating. And then from there, they're really letting that flourish as organically as possible because it has to be authentic to them as well. I find as much as possible, I try to create change champions within the team. So there's a lot of peer-to-peer outcomes for me, a lot of my team [00:22:00] is very much in the weeds and very much in the day-to-day operating mode. And so any sort of change champion external or even if it's from like a leadership position, um, yes, very effective sometimes, but I think more than not, there's nothing more comforting and. [00:22:19] Kind of like humanizing about change then if someone else who can relate a lot to your day to day said, next year. No, no. Like it's actually not that bad. Or like, oh, I'm actually this way, not that way. And we face a lot of that. Our organization is constantly and constantly challenging the status quo of what we've got going on. [00:22:39] So for me, those are really big moments. That help define individual teams, especially mine. [00:22:49] Phil: Yeah, sometimes having a champion who is a bit more senior, like sits at the top and has the ability to like quote unquote force their teams to. To basically [00:23:00] like go through it and actually use the thing. But yeah, I, I totally agree. I think the most effective ones are the ones that are sitting peer to peer on the same level. [00:23:10] And there's a lot of like, competitiveness with like your peers in that same team, right? Like, um, I don't know, for you, like in the B2B world as. Especially in sales, like there's a bunch of like leader, leader dashboards and like you can see yourself next to KPIs that everyone cares about, like how you're stacking up. [00:23:26] Like that's how like a lot of sales teams run. I don't know how it is for, for your team, but having someone be an early adopter of something and being successful with it and it showing up and translating into the metrics and everyone else on the team just being like, oh. Crap. Like Megan is really doing that thing, like I've been resisting it. [00:23:45] 'cause like I'm busy, I've got a bunch of things on my plate, like I don't want to change this new thing. I finally just got like comfortable with what I'm doing right now. But that, that might be that incentive that that person needs because like, you know, like we're not doing this just. To like create [00:24:00] friction in your work. [00:24:00] The ops team is rolling this out because there, there's efficiencies to gain here and you will be better in your role if you just take a bit of time to go through that. So yeah, like when you talk about this, [00:24:11] 4.1 Change Champion Example --- [00:24:11] Phil: is there like an example that comes to mind? Um, I don't know how much detail you're able to share, but like, I'm sure when you're talking about like a change champion, someone who's like helped you implement something new, whether it's like process-wise or tool-wise. [00:24:25] Like what's the first, first thought that comes to mind there? [00:24:28] Megan: Yeah, I think. As I mentioned at the top, like we're going through like a pretty cool time on the team, a lot in changing a lot, um, very dynamic right now. Um, and when it comes to even like changing team structures or adopting new processes, I really love to someone on the team to take the lead in, in helping kind of debunk the myth that is whatever this change. [00:25:00] Like I have to seen, even just like micro example, the, you know, if we need to change a process around how we share our business, resolve and to our stakeholders, which is very important to us. We're definitely a marketing team first, but we're very and analy, analytically driven organization. And so my bias is always to tie our results back. [00:25:25] To, um, whatever it is that we're aiming for from a financial results perspective, the we mold business reviews and that's something new that my team has never done before. And so how do you create the motivation to con, to think about your, your space completely differently and be accountable to you with a completely different lens? [00:25:48] And I was able to kind of nominate a couple of different folks on the team to really. Drive and adopt the style in which they wanted to present that, um, they had the space and the freedom [00:26:00] to really like, iterate on what that looks like, um, and ultimately work together to, to essentially self-drive what that space looks like. [00:26:10] And we come a long way. Um, if something that we share outwardly to leadership regularly now and feel the team does a lot of praise for it, which is really good to hear. And for them to get that positive feedback loop, but that they really just like even on an internal example of how we create change champions. [00:26:27] ​ [00:28:25] 5. How To Manage Transactional Messaging Across Multiple Brands --- [00:28:25] Phil: I wanna chat a little bit about transactional messages, like the, the, the messiness or the craziness with like, all the messages that are, that are going out, uh, under the parent umbrella here. Uh, we, we mentioned at the top of the show, like Loblaw operates on this crazy massive scale in Canada. [00:28:41] Like there's hundreds of groceries and, and, and drug stores and like a bunch of digital channels that you're operating under. Some really well known brands there, but there's like. Million plus transactional messages a year. Right. How do you even like begin to think about how are we gonna orchestrate digital [00:29:00] comms at Loblaw? [00:29:01] I know you're using Mo Engage on, on the tech side for a lot of transactional stuff. Can you chat about transactional messages? Is it just email? Is it things outside and SMS? Is it push? Like what are your thoughts there? [00:29:16] Megan: For us, transactional messaging span all of our channels, but you could definitely receive a transactional message by way of email or push or an SMS It really is dependent on the business and it is dependent a little bit on the use case as well. So what is it that we're trying to say and how important is it to get to the customer and what's the fastest, most secure, most relevant approach? [00:29:44] We take all of real bank into consideration. Uh, we spend a lot of time thinking about how often a customer hears from us. I think a very interesting nuance about our business, a lot of our business units that are different and also [00:30:00] different brands. So we do get a little bit of leeway because our customer is definitely hearing from us from different brands, and the voice to the customer can take different shape. So that does help us a little bit with the way that we approach, um, our messaging governance. But even beyond that, within a single business unit, you could have a variety of different use cases for which a customer would receive a transactional message from us. And in that vein, there's a lot that we've done to create that sent the seamlessness to the customer. [00:30:33] So whether it's, um, upstream governance, so calendars, processes, governance meetings. Yeah, data-driven kind of prioritization or staggered deployment. A lot of those as we take upstream so that by the time we get to the point of deployment, uh, we've considered what the customer shouldn't, shouldn't see. [00:30:56] There's also sometimes like, um, to relevancy. A lot [00:31:00] of actual methods are timed to release essentially right away. Um, so think about like an order confirmation email. You're gonna wanna know that your order is placed pre, uh, immediately. Um, or if you need to return something, you're gonna wanna know fairly quickly if that refund has been fulfilled. [00:31:20] So we work really hard to make sure that the entire workflow is seamless, and that if there are conflicting or RS and fidgets that could overlap each other, uh, that we plan for those as much as possible ahead of time. We also do work really strongly with our analytics partners on this, though, beyond just transactional messages, even in the marketing space or just messages in general. [00:31:44] For us, we do look at what is the downstream engagement with a customer when they receive the fast point from us. It's not just did you open or click it, but if you're opening everything, clicking on everything, and nothing's happening all the way up the end. Um, to [00:32:00] us that's not even good enough though we do balance like what the results are with what the channel is saying. [00:32:06] And we've even gone so far as in some cases to say, Hey, you haven't engaged in this channel for many, many weeks. We're actually just in as a press for while you're clearly not engaged and is not the right space to be speaking to you a. Um, and you are engaging in other things. So let's think about meeting you where you are, which is really important to us to be relevant and timely in the space of the customer. [00:32:31] Is comfortable hearing from up. [00:32:35] 5.2 Frequency and Recency Capping --- [00:32:35] Phil: Yeah, frequency capping and like recency, like caps and like all of the suppression lists, like it's complicated enough when you run one business with one. Business unit and one product, like I'm trying to, in the back of my head, figure out the instance that you're using to, to map all of these different brands. [00:32:57] Like can you touch on like how you think about this [00:33:00] from like a system level, like maybe some folks listening like have two or three products in there and that's already like a bit complicated for folks. Like how do you. Like even unbox this, for all the different brands that you have under Loblaw, like are they all under a single platform? [00:33:16] Do you have different instances of different brands within the same platform and there's overlap of people, and then how do you do the frequency capping? If there is overlap of people within. Different audiences. Like you said, like someone might be shopping at Choppers Drug Mart, but they might also be like a frequent Loblaws customer. [00:33:35] Like how do you decide too many emails from one brand versus the other? You're canning all of them. I have so many questions, Megan. [00:33:44] Megan: Uh, we, we definitely lean into our data, first and foremost to help guide those decisions. We do track our channel health metrics. We do track. Um, what the customers are actually doing and engaging with, and we use those [00:34:00] as powerful feedback loops to actually prioritize because we have a pretty robust, um, set of tools and platform. [00:34:08] It's almost if possible, to just rely on the tech itself. There is a lot of strategy that goes into. Um, so if we know that, you know, someone shops, grocery doesn't really engage with another touchpoint, if we know that, um, you know, we have a very important message that's going out on a particular day of the week, we make sure that there's prioritization filter to our deployments. [00:34:32] And, and if weekly, see any of our metrics really deflating or degrading over time, um, we do take pause sometimes and say, Hey, look like. We need to take a beat. We need to really understand what's happening here. Um, and we make some pretty informed decisions from that perspective as well. And very honestly, sometime like you really just has to make a call. It comes down to, we say [00:35:00] a lot to our customers very regularly. Um, and we are very multi-channel. Even outside of the channels that I operate, I had tons of partners across the enterprise who are working press collaboratively with us. We're always coordinating broadly around like what's being said, what's the core message? [00:35:19] What tier messaging are we really going after right now, um, and how do we ensure that through the various targeting, timing, prioritization that we do, how do we make sure that the customer sees the most relevant to them first? Even if they have to hear from us again throughout the day from another brand, from the same brand, what have you, that we, we've made a very intentional provision around what they have to hear from us first. [00:35:48] So that is, that's a big, that's a big concept of like urgency within our organization. We always prioritize those conversations from the get go. [00:35:59] 6. Why Shared Ownership Improves Transactional Messaging --- [00:35:59] Phil: I find it really [00:36:00] cool that you have essential org that owns, or at least is responsible for all of digital comms. Um, I, I've been part of companies much smaller scale, even like, interestingly way smaller scale, and there's been. A lot of internal debates about who should own transactional messages. I think everyone agrees that, you know, marketing messages should be owned by the lifecycle team or the marketing team, whatever. [00:36:25] But when it comes to transactional messages, I've been part of a lot of internal debates where I've, I've joined companies where the product team owns. Transactional messages and oftentimes, you know, it's set up with an ESP, but there's no like actual automation tool in the middle. It's just like connected directly to SendGrid and it's just like API based triggered from the backend and the dev team, just like where the product team owns all of transactional messages, but then. [00:36:52] When you dig under the hood, it's like, what are the metrics of that? It's like, oh, well we don't really know what the metrics of those transactional messages are. We legally, we have to [00:37:00] send them probably compliance reasons, and so we don't really track if they're doing well or not. And so maybe chat about that. [00:37:06] Like how did, like did you were. At Loblaw really early on, and I'm sure that's like transformed a lot throughout the years. Uh, but you're also at Kii, like I know, I'm sure you guys were doing a lot of transactional messages there too. What are your thoughts on like what team should be owning this product versus lifecycle versus digital comms? [00:37:24] What are your thoughts there? [00:37:26] Megan: Yeah. Uh, it's a, it's been a longstanding conversation no matter what function of marketing that I've worked under, it seemed transactional and who and what, and always make an ever present conversation. Um, we've got a really cool model. I think of the cool model. I don't know, think that I get the cool model where we have like built almost like a fail fake partnership with our product and development teams. [00:37:56] Um, where there is a co-ownership [00:38:00] of and in transactional touchpoint that goes out, there's a reliance on product and depth, there's a reliance on digital messaging and there's even a relying on marketing. Um, to make sure that we're not setting things up with no knowledge, that we are actually talking to the customer in that moment. [00:38:19] Um, we're also in a really cool position where we have a lot of really cool brands and we wanna make sure that they're, um, that they're represented well in our channels as well. Um, so we've actually, by humid design, created, um, an interdependency with our transactional messaging. So that it's a constant conversation of is this a point where we need to send something? [00:38:45] If so, what do we say? How do we say it? What are we supposed to say? What do we need to say? And that there is actually then just, even if it's for a, that the ability to say, is this the right thing to do for the customer? Um, so [00:39:00] there is a lot of that intentional design for us, which I think plays a really cool part in all of this for us. I don't wanna say that you won those internal battles, like maybe you did, but I'm sure there's some listeners that are just like, I wish I was able to get to a stage at my company where all messages are. Under lifecycle or digital comms and we've got top of funnel marketing stuff and we've got transactional stuff 'cause we're able to lump all of those things together. [00:39:28] Phil: How, like what advice do you have for those folks that they, they're like stuck in those battles about areas of responsibility and the product team is pushing for this and the engineers don't understand anything lifecycle does. They don't even know what it means. They think anything labeled as marketing is spam and like it should be out of their reach and they should own transactional stuff. [00:39:49] Like what advice? Like clearly you've gotten to a spot where, um, you're comfortable, you're happy, and I'm sure some listeners are just like, Megan, how did you do it? How did you get there? [00:39:59] Megan: Uh, [00:40:00] big invite in context is everything. So. For me, I think a lot of where I've been able to like find success, um, because we've created that interconnectedness and dependency around a transactional touchpoint, um, I think there's a lot of opportunity for conversation and context setting as to why are we saying one thing versus the other. [00:40:30] Or you know why like hearing a Deb out and saying like, why do you feel that this is the way that it needs to go? It feels intuitive and for a lot of people are thinking, well, who has the time? 'cause I don't. That's buying. Uh, but spending the time not front needs you. Save the time down the line. That's what I've learned both along and the hard way in a lot of instances. [00:40:57] Hmm. I think context [00:41:00] is key. Taking the time to like, share your context and share your perspective. Uh, and then build a process that works for everyone, right? Like no one wants to be burdening the shoulder, like shouldering the burden of it, sorry, um, all the way and then realize that they missed key partners. [00:41:18] So. Identify what part of that partnership you feel like you can own. Uh, for us, like we've identified like, hey, as a messaging team, we are very much prepared to own this piece. Um, and we are prepared to be partners along the rest. And coming to that consensus and agreeing means that everyone got a little bit of skin in the game now. [00:41:41] Um, and it means that everyone's just gonna be that much more willing to have the conversation. [00:41:47] Phil: Such a good answer, Megan. Yeah. Appreciate you sharing that one. [00:41:50] 7. Why Human Governance Still Matters in AI Messaging --- [00:41:50] Phil: One thing I ask a lot of folks on the show, and I've chatted with people that are at different stages of. Adoption or even willingness to explore with AI when [00:42:00] it comes to customer comms. Um, a lot of folks think that the future is machine led digital comms, where, you know, the human is still kind of in the loop, but when it comes to figuring out. [00:42:13] What is the right message to send to what segment of people? A lot of people think that like that message is just gonna be in this big database of potential messages to deliver, and the segment is just gonna be all machine learning led where there won't be a lifecycle or digital comms person deciding. [00:42:33] Okay. We're gonna do a back to school campaign in September. This is gonna be the copy and the list we're gonna pick is this SQL Query, because like in the past this resonated, like instead it's just gonna be like you log into a tool and the machine tells you, Hey, we should do back to school tomorrow. [00:42:54] Press yes to agree or not. And then behind the scenes, they're the ones picking this segment. They're the ones [00:43:00] deciding. Who is likely to be receptive to this message or not based on a bunch of historical data, but there's like propensity models built in. It's like predicting the likelihood that someone, what are your thoughts there about like, that, that whole part of, uh, like digital comms do, do you see yourself kind of evolving to that? [00:43:19] Do you think it's kind of crazy, there's always gonna be a human needing to decide what are, what are your thoughts? [00:43:24] Megan: Oh man. Hot topic. Um, my personal take on it is you're always gonna have, like, you can't be some kind of hue. Component to this. Do I think that there's gonna be a crazy amount of efficiency, a crazy amount of like output with the rise of ai? Absolutely. I think we're kind of already there, um, to some degree. [00:43:53] That being said, I think, I think there is some merit to the fact [00:44:00] that AI can definitely be. It's a driver of a lot of volume and a lot of efficiency and a lot of speed. But I think the innovation, the creativity, the ingenuity of a lot of it, um, I think there's something to be said about like human instigation for ai and then something around like governance. Do I, at some point AI is gonna like out SMI most things probably. I'd be remiss to say no, but you know, like I do think that it is getting to a place where like iterations are gonna be like a non-starter for ai. Like there's just nothing that beats something that's going to spit out with a hundred new things in like 10 seconds. [00:44:49] I don't even think I could think of a hundred words in it was like, it's just not possible. Um. So I think there's a speed advantage, but I think [00:45:00] if we can think about AI as like your partner in crying versus like the thing that's coming for you, that's probably where we're gonna get the most out of it. [00:45:10] Um, because then you learn to live with it and learn to utilize it and harness it and use it as a, as a jumping board and you'll be dropping a lot. It was kind of my thought process around it. But it doesn't have to replace. Um, I think that is a debate that's probably still going on. Um, I think the jury's up on like where everything lands with AI and how much adoption and too much adoption, but we're really excited about it at Loblaw. [00:45:42] We spend a lot of time getting excited about it. Um, we're doing a lot of really cool things with it. Um, and my team is just scratching the surface on how they can get benefit and value out of it, which they absolutely can. Um, so my way to [00:46:00] keep the human, but um, find a way to, to make it work for you. [00:46:07] Phil: Yeah, I, I totally agree with your, your perspective. I think there's, there's probably a bit of like self preservation in, in like our perspective with like, you know, we've been doing this for decades plus, like we understand like the, the human's role in this and you know, we didn't even touch on like empathy and the role and, and communications and, and all that stuff. [00:46:27] Right. But yeah, there's a lot of excitement. For everyone who is excited about, you know, using AI as a tool and like a superpower for you. You log onto LinkedIn and you just see like seven people just post about, they just laid off like 70 people on their team and they're now just like. Three people, and their goal is to do this and do that with just like three people on the team and all these like AI agents and people sharing like org charts of AI agents. [00:46:56] And you can't help but feel like you're so [00:47:00] far behind when you log onto those tools. And I'm sure a lot of those people posting all that crap, like they, they're not really as advanced as like they're, they're making it seem to be. Um, but like [00:47:11] 8. Why Curiosity Matters in Adapting to AI --- [00:47:11] Phil: what advice do you have for folks that you know are feeling. [00:47:15] A bit behind, like you work at a massive enterprise, like huge scale. You understand like the practical realities of the pace of change and transformation at enterprise. And like we can't just say, yeah, we're gonna roll out AI agents that are just gonna do all of our digital comms for all of our brands, for like billions of messages that we do like. [00:47:36] How can you reassure the humans here that like, yeah, AI's changing stuff. Like you need to like, you know, be curious and, and learn, but, you know, relax. Like the stuff that you're seeing on LinkedIn, like, we're not gonna be, uh, like out of a job in five years, you know, knock on wood here, but what are your thoughts there? [00:47:56] Megan: I, I do, I have this conversation a lot, like in [00:48:00] my personal life, I [00:48:01] Phil: Mm-hmm. [00:48:01] Megan: um, it's such a hot topic and, um, it's obviously very prevalent professionally, but I do, like, my tagline is just chill. Um, in the sense of like, it is very difficult, like in all seriousness to not think about the possibility. But I think when. [00:48:23] When you're faced with something new and disrupted, much like most of the last, call it 25 years have been, uh, since the end of the century. Oh, yeah. I think like the natural curiosity of like, how do I see myself in this? Like what do I engage with, how do I engage with it? What could I do with it? I think that's the part of it that if. [00:48:51] If there's a bit of time to lead into that would be where I would say spend time there. Spend time just hanging out with Chad, [00:49:00] GBT and see what happens. And not in like a just hangout, but like seriously think about like, I have a question, I want an answer. Like get really pointed with it because it doesn't have to be scary. [00:49:16] I kind of said it before. Change is scary. AI is change. Um, and it could be really cool or it could be really scary. Um, but it's changed nonetheless. So I try to be a student in a lot of these, like change times and all these different trends. I, I'm usually pretty curious about like, how could it affect my life professionally and personally and, and do I care for it? [00:49:39] And that's the other thing, like you can decide how much you want to care for it. I think organizations are making decisions if that's one thing. But at a personal level, like you are still a customer to someone. You are still an individual to someone, um, in that way. Like if you're not [00:50:00] enjoying something or you're curious about something, like share that feedback. [00:50:04] Don't be shy about that because that for me. way that we keep driving it forward is when people start engaging with it and give their feedback of what's good and what's not. Uh, that will probably make the biggest difference on the trajectory of where some of these changes are going. And the last that I'll say is like, I, I don't know how best to phrase this. [00:50:28] Sometimes the, the best way I can say it is, I don't know where AI is gonna get that, like, spark of an idea from somewhere out of nowhere. I think that is something that maybe we don't put a lot of stock into, but AI can do really cool things, but can it replicate that random moment while you are riding a streetcar or in the car or talking to someone where you're just like, had an idea and then ripping off that [00:51:00] and, uh, deciding if you wanna care about it or not care about it. All of those level and those moments. I haven't seen that yet in the AI space. No doubt. I'm sure some version of it is coming. Um, but that's why I think like humans are going anywhere because especially in marketing, like a lot of really cool things come from those little moments. Um, it can't really beat that sometimes. [00:51:28] Phil: Yeah, all those like shower thoughts that just randomly come to you. Uh, I had a cool episode with my, my cos Daryl, about like, what are some of the roles in marketing that are potentially best positioned to. Resist like all the change with ai. And one of them that I made the case for based on your idea there is like, you know, product marketers, customer marketers, lifecycle marketers, people that need to focus on empathy, like they're like the empathy barometer of customers. [00:51:58] Like no one is closer [00:52:00] to. Why do we exist? Like what are the pains that we're solving? And these people need to come up with like leap of faith ideas and an LLM can come up with some cool stuff, but it's, the ideas and the suggestions are all based on things that have already been done. And maybe it's like two things that have already been done together and it's still kind of new, but it's not like the leap of faith that comes from someone that is so close. [00:52:26] It's so empathetic with the users. Like you talk to five people every day that use the product. And I don't know, like I feel like that part is, is really AI resistant and, uh, yeah. Folks on your team are probably, uh, pumped about that, that perspective. [00:52:40] Megan: Definitely, I could not agree about that. I've been thinking a lot about the product marketing space recently and that that is really where a lot of my thoughts have been is like the valuing product marketing delivers around understanding the needs and the dynamicness. [00:53:00] Needs for a customer. So cool. [00:53:04] Phil: Megan, this has been a super fun conversation. Uh, it, it's fallen by. I really appreciate your time. [00:53:08] 9. Creating Sustainable Energy in Marketing Leadership --- [00:53:08] Phil: We got one last question for you. You're a marketing comms director at one of Canada's largest retailers. You're a team leader. You're a keynote speaker, but you're also super active. You're. Biking, golfing, uh, during the warmer seasons and here in Canada, and the snow comes. [00:53:24] You're a tried and true snowboarder skier. One question we ask everyone on the show is, how do you remain happy and successful in your career, and how do you find balance between all the stuff you're working on while staying happy? [00:53:36] Megan: How do I stay happy in my career? I think for me, I, I stay happy by staying present. Your career is a pretty long road. Not linear by any means. Um, early on I felt a lot of stress, like trying to look ahead and being, making sure planned and making sure that I'm, you know, working from all the right things. [00:53:58] That's just like the [00:54:00] nature of ambition. But, um, my happiness is really just enjoying what I'm doing, looking ahead every so often, but really just enjoying what I'm doing and making the most of it. Creating some boundaries like I do very intentionally, like walk away at certain parts of the day and remind myself that I really need to work on my golf weight sometime and you know, spend some time outside. [00:54:27] And that for me creates a lot of balance. I extremely extroverted and I have a lot of energy usually, so I need places to put them. Well, if I've got plan to golf or to snowboard or to get out for a bike ride, usually that keeps me pretty happy. [00:54:45] Phil: Awesome. Really appreciate that. Megan. Thank you so much for your time today. Um, yeah, really had a fun time. [00:54:51] Megan: Thanks stuff. It was awesome.