Tag: The CMO Awards

What to Do When the Circus Finds You

Posted on by Drew Neisser

If you’ve seen at least one Cirque du Soleil show, then you know this is not your grandfather’s circus. In fact, thinking about shows like Love and O, one might even forget to use the word circus when attempting to describe them.  So with such a differentiated product, you might think marketing could take a back seat and indeed this was the case for many years. But with competition rising, Cirque has had to up its game on the marketing front, adding talent like Alma Derricks, VP Sales and Marketing of Cirque’s Resident Shows Division.

In our extensive interview below, Alma shares some of the challenges she faced at Cirque, differentiating a portfolio of eight shows in Las Vegas, rebranding one of the shows, creating new customer experiences and even establishing a new line of business entirely.  It is little wonder that Alma garnered the Customer Experience Award from The CMO Club.  Read on to discover the high wire act of the modern marketer.

Drew: How did you end up at Cirque Du Soleil?

Alma: The circus sort of finds you, Drew. I can’t say that 10 years ago this was on my roadmap. It appeared as an opportunity. One of the throughlines in my career is that I run towards moments of inflection and Cirque, with its new private equity ownership, was definitely at one of those points when I joined last July. I love getting to ask questions, top to bottom, without any regard for how things have always been done. And that’s what I walked into.

Drew: So let’s talk about the Resident Shows Division at Cirque de Soleil. 

Alma: There are two major divisions at Cirque de Soleil. There’s the Residents Shows Division which oversees shows that are nailed down including our eight shows in Las Vegas and Orlando. We also have another team, the Touring Shows Division, that oversees shows that move around in the big top tent or tour in arenas.

Drew: That’s a lot of shows and seats to fill. 

Alma: In Las Vegas, we sell as many as 20,000 tickets a night. It’s a lot of inventory in a very, very busy town. My job is all about keeping our shows top of mind. For us, that’s usually an interesting continuum. Because we’re based in resorts, it’s not likely that you’ll see one of our shows more than once a year so, it’s important to stay in your peripheral vision. Once the decision is made to visit Las Vegas or Orlando, it’s really important that for us to break through the noise and remind you that we’re the most exciting thing that you can do in the evening. Cirque is over 30 years old. For the mass majority of those years, Cirque grew organically because it was new, different and dazzling. For example, a show like O, which is our flagship show at the Bellagio in Las Vegas, was sold out for two years when it opened. Marketing thinking is a relatively new thing for Cirque but incredibly important now that we’re not the newest kid on the block.

Drew: So what now?

Alma: Now, we’re in a different stage of life because we’re more established and face a lot of different challenges in the market. Vegas has gone through a number of reinventions over the past 30 years. Today, there’s a brand new 17,000 seat arena that hosts major concerts and will soon be home to a new hockey team. Special event residencies like JLo, Britney and Celine have emerged as an important part of the competitive landscape. So we have to keep reinventing ourselves in a space that, as you know from visiting Vegas, is a really busy place. We have to always make the loudest noise in that environment and make sure that visitors are still aware that we’re around, that we’re exciting and that we’re vital.

Drew: Must be a challenge from a portfolio management standpoint, right? Do people go to see a Cirque show or a specific show?

Alma: It’s a great question. What you’re hitting on is something really particular to Las Vegas because we have so many resident shows in one place. I’m always troubled when customers say that they don’t understand the differences between our shows. Some people think that there’s ‘O’, which stands out as “the water show”, and maybe one other production. One of the real challenges we have is needing to flip the brand script in Vegas and emphasize the show ahead of the Cirque brand. We need explain the differences between these shows. They all have very, very different personalities. And the thing that I’ve been working on quite a bit is, how do you communicate that each show is the only show you have to see.

Drew: Interesting. So how does this play out in places like social media?

Alma: I think one of the next new frontiers for Cirque is allowing customers behind the curtain a little bit more. It’s something that our founder was very, very cautious about in the early days of social media. But the world has changed and the expectation that an audience has about peeking behind that curtain is something we can’t put back in the bottle. So we’re trying to find ways to facilitate that via social media and social content and by creating events in Las Vegas that are complete behind the curtain experiences.

Drew: What would you look at now so far and say that oh, I’m really proud of this from a marketing standpoint that we were able to get this done and you been a relatively short period of time?

Alma: From a marketing standpoint, I think our highest profile achievement was actually rebranding our show The Beatles LOVE. I didn’t completely understand until we were well into the process that Cirque has never rebranded an existing show. For the tenth anniversary, we made quite a few changes to the show, the music, the technology and the visual identity. It was really interesting to rethink the entire way we were approaching getting that messaging out. I’m proud that we got through it and succeeded at so well.

Drew: What else?

Alma: I’m also really excited about offerings that give customers behind the scenes access. We’ve actually created an entire line of business called SPARK that serves as a learning laboratory for corporate teams. We provide business training, team building and will even create a customized curriculum. We’ve hosted companies like Adobe and Google onto the stage and into our training spaces so they can interact with our performers and production teams. It’s both an amazing bucket list moment and a chance to really learn about trust, team building, operational excellence and customer service in a very tangible way.

Drew: Very cool. I love the fact that as a marketing person you were so involved in creating a new revenue stream.

Alma: Thanks. Part of the process that I go through when I’m new to an organization, especially when I’m tasked with being a change agent, is to seek out these kinds of opportunities. I love the fact that we are able to build SPARK by leveraging our core business, our custom theatres, our performers, and our production teams. It’s taking off like a rocket, and has not only created a new way access the brand but also makes a strong statement about who we are.

Drew: By the way, I saw LOVE twice many moons ago. There you dealt with the common marketing challenge of taking a beloved brand and refreshing it.

Alma: True. With the refresh, especially if you are a Beatles fan, we’ve given you a new reason to see it again. We also recognized that technology changes and improves a lot in 10 years. Cirque has always taken pride in its fusion of technology and artistry so it seemed very natural as the tenth anniversary approached to rethink the staging, effects, and imagery. The original show was very nostalgic. Today it’s more colorful and, at the same time, showcases the fact that The Beatles are as relevant today as they were in the 60s.

Drew: Let’s talk metrics. Which ones matter?

Alma: Ticket sales are, of course, number one. Put that one in bold! But we also think about how our performers are evolving as creators and artists. Many artists like contortionists have a relatively short performing career. We are always thinking about what else interests them and how we can involve them in other ways with things like quasi-internships in marketing or sales. It’s an unusual thing but we’ve failed if we haven’t taken that into consideration along with our other marketing activities.

Drew: Do you have some advice for fellow marketers as they look ahead to 2017?

Alma: The first thing that comes to mind is proportionality. Just because the world is talking about spending more and more on digital doesn’t mean that it’s right for your business. For us, the real battle begins once a visitor to Vegas sets foot on the ground at the airport or drives into town. So, things like taxi toppers, building wraps, marquees and all those great out-of -home things will never stop being a priority in our marketing mix. It’s not about being modern or not, it’s about knowing your audience and understanding your context.

Drew: Totally agree. I’ve talked to a couple of CMOs that have pulled back their digital spend of late because it wasn’t performing as well as a mix with more TV. Do you have a recommend don’t for 2017?

Alma: Don’t get too absorbed by chasing big data, especially if it’s not relevant to you. Don’t let the pursuit of big data cause you to lose sight of the importance of instinct and intuition. It’s still the hallmark of what we do as marketers. You still have to have a gut instinct. Big data becomes a fantastic tool but, at the end of the day, you still have to know your products intimately and you still have to recognize a great idea even if you don’t have stacks of information to go on.

CMO Insights: The Undeniably Power of PR

Posted on by Drew Neisser

An apology is in order. Probably not the only one that you’ll see from me on this blog but certainly one that is a long overdue.  This one goes out to the thousands of public relations professionals, particularly the ones who almost always find a way to plant the seed that becomes a story, who uncover the news when others just see a plain old brief, who instinctually know a potential buzz machine from the proverbial blind alley.  To these fine folk who helped drive the success of many of Renegade’s classic guerrilla marketing successes (BankCab anyone?), I officially apologize for omitting Public Relations as an Element in my book, The CMO’s Periodic Table: A Renegade’s Guide to Marketing.

Please note that this was not a conscious omission but rather a statistical anomaly.  In retrospect, it seems impossible that PR wouldn’t become front and center in one of the over 150 interviews with senior marketers I conducted prior to finishing the book.  To make amends, not that any of you are all that upset or not used to receding from the marketing spotlight, I am thrilled to present part 1 of my interview with Caralene Robinson, CMO at Vh1. A recipient of last year’s CMO Award for Creativity, Caralene was kind enough to share her thoughts on the importance of PR and how that aspect of marketing is so critical to the success of VH1 programming.

Drew: Last year you won The CMO Club’s creativity award. Can you talk about a program you’ve done at VH1 that you’re particularly proud of?

The sheer volume of projects times rate of change demands constant innovation. So there are many programs I quite proud of. For example, the launch of our original scripted movie, Crazy Sexy Cool: The TLC Story. TLC was cultural phenomenon that came to life in the most authentic way. It was an incredible multifaceted campaign. The film and the campaign were used as momentum to launch a new TLC album. Epic Records saw the opportunity, decided to release an album simultaneously, and this collaboration amplified the impact. In general marketing has changed so much. When I first started, there was no such thing as social media and print was the big thing. The dynamics of the marketing mix have completely changed. I am particularly proud of campaigns where we effectively partner with Press, which I see as a critical part of the marketing mix. I have a great consumer marketing team that constantly looks for activations designed to get people talking in a very unbiased way.

Drew: Is there another example you’d like to share?

Dating Naked is a great example. For Season 1, we released a viral video that generated more than 2 million views. What we spent on that is nominal compared to the views. So creating adjacent content that captures the pop culture zeitgeist and gets people talking is huge. For Season 2, we created an outdoor board in Hollywood that was essentially peel-off stickers. Consumers could walk up and peel for prizes, eventually revealing the two nude leads of the show. I like the stuff that gets people talking.

Drew: My book The CMO’s Periodic Table covers 64 elements of marketing but there is one element that I know I haven’t really covered very well, and that’s PR. Could you talk a little bit more about the role that PR plays in your business, and how you make sure that your marketing is buzz-worthy and press-worthy?

Since the beginning of my career I’ve always considered Press part of the marketing mix. We can’t survive without our amazing Press team, which reports directly to our President, Chris McCarthy. Press is equally as important as paid media, social and on-air. So there is never an instance where we’re not walking hands-in-hand with the press team, regardless of where it lives in the organization. Extending the overall strategy via press not only on the consumer side, but also the trade side as well is crucial.

When you’re evaluating a potential marketing campaign, do you compare them based on how much press one might get over the other?

Well, I think we all do that. We look at a number of factors and prioritize launches. In terms of press, some shows are stickier than others. But that’s why our press team is really good at what they do. They figure out the starting point and ask the right questions – what do I have to work with? They look at everything–the actual concept of the show, the talent, our marketing plans, etc. Then they figure out how to create excitement.

Drew: It’s got to be easier to get press for VH1 than it would be for Coke. Are there some lessons that you think that someone outside the entertainment space could draw from your experience at the VH1 in terms of getting press coverage?

I’ve had projects where it’s easy to get press, and I’ve had projects where it’s difficult to get press. It really depends. I’ve marketed carbonated beverages, dish liquid, and cell phones. I’ve gone from selling tangible products to intangible content. It varies on a project-by-project basis. In terms of press as a crucial part of the overall marketing mix, I think it’s important to customize pitches to verticals. Our VH1 press team is extremely good at this. What you pitch to a Fast Company is different than what you might pitch to Billboard, and different than what you might pitch to The Wendy Williams Show. And I don’t always feel like the brand needs to lead the story. It could be a pitch to the New York Times about adult millennials, for example. And if we’re just referenced in the article, that works for me too. Because that means we’re perceived as being culturally connected or culturally cognizant.

CSR: Global Food for Thought

Posted on by Drew Neisser

Paul HillenWith the Empire State Building glowing in the background, I wondered what was on my own horizon that evening.  The cocktail party in a chic midtown hotel had just begun, the award-winning CMOs were pouring in and my curiosity was starting to peak.  Who were these people?  Sure I could read their name badges but what were their stories and more importantly, would I have time to discover them in between the chit chat?

Shortly thereafter I met Paul Hillen, CMO of what turns out to be the largest privately held company in the US, Cargill. As Paul told me about this global agricultural powerhouse, I became more and more intrigued, especially at it relates to their abundant CSR activities.  So, of course, I followed up with Paul.

These days, one expects global companies to have a reasonable amount of charitable activities and to show some level of environmental responsibility. What I didn’t expect is that in addition to things like building 75 schools in developing nations, Cargill became so well versed in Responsible Supply Chain Management that they turned this into a service they offered their clients. You’ll find that surprise and others in our comprehensive interview below.  Cheers.

Drew: What is your overall approach to corporate social responsibility?  

I am a big proponent that whether it’s philanthropic, an investment in a community or a partnership that it is all an extension of your business strategy. It’s just like branding. If branding and marketing are not an extension of the overall business strategy, then they are probably doomed. And so when approach CSR programs, I start by asking what are the things that we can do where we operate that are linked to good business? And the first answer to that has to be a direction extension of your business strategy and how CSR can continue to deliver on the expectations that our board and our shareholders have in terms of the growth of the company.

Drew: As a private company, a lot of folks are unaware of the size and scope of Cargill.  Can you talk about that a bit and how it impacts your CSR activities?

We have over 2,000 locations with operations in over 70 countries around the world. And in many of those places, we tend to be one of the top employers, thus our presence in each community is critical. The reason we’ve invested in those communities is so that we can maintain a great workforce, as well as help educate and nurture a future workforce. I was recently in Côte d’Ivoire in Africa and I visited four different village where we had built schools and helped drill wells because those are two of the biggest issues that have there–clean water so that they don’t have dysentery and educating kids so they have something beneficial to do during the day (and not become part of the child labor workforce).  We’re going to be opening our 75th school in Vietnam for similar reasons. So for us, corporate social responsibility is about improving people’s lives and doing it in a way that is directly linked to the business.

Drew: Could you talk about a specific CSR program that you feel is really representative of the kind of initiatives that work for Cargill and your constituents?

Sure. It’s built around sustainability and responsible supply chain management, which is one of our core competencies. We’ve created a tool in partnership with PwC [PricewaterhouseCoopers] called the Cargill Responsible Supply Chain Framework.  This program is unique in that it helps our customers in three ways:

  • We work with our customers to help then take costs of their supply chains identifying where they can do things more sustainably and hopefully reduce costs in the process;
  • We identify areas in which the customer is already doing things in a sustainable manner enabling them to take some credit where credit is in fact due;
  • We help them take some of the risk out of their supply chain by identifying non-sustainable practices that should be addressed.

All of these things help our customers to build their businesses in a more social responsible way and helps us as this a fee-for-service business. So we turned “responsible supply chains” into not just a nice phrase but also a service that we provide to our customers.

Drew: That’s really interesting in and of itself. How did you know that you had that expertise in the first place? I mean, how did you develop a sustainability practice such that you could actually not only educate your customers but also create a service that you could sell them?

Well, it’s a model actually that we’ve done for years. We are celebrating our 150th anniversary this year, and this has given me an opportunity to really learn a lot more about the heritage of the company, and a lot of our businesses were born this way. We take capabilities that we’re really good at, and then we say, hey, we could turn this into a business because if we’ve got this need, then so do our customers. We’ve been doing supply chains for 150 years. It started when our founder in Iowa opened a grain warehouse because it was all about helping farmers to get their grains to market in a more efficient way. Instead of everybody doing it on their own, W.W. Cargill built it. We understand most supply chains around the world because we have an ocean transportation business, we’re one of the largest users of railcars, we understand the trade flows and the flow of goods, and then we understand it more at the micro level. We understand exactly what the supply chain is. Planting a soybean all the way until it’s bottled and branded by one of our customers as an example. Or in other parts of the world, we bottle our own — we have our own consumer brands. So it really is a core competency of ours, and we are now extending that to our customers.

Drew: One of the big reasons that companies talk about CSR is because it makes employees feel better about working at the company. How do employees get involved in Cargill programs and how important is that to retention?

Yes, employee involvement is very important. First of all we give employees credit for and ask them to track all of their time regarding time, talent and treasure that they contribute to their communities. Our food scientists actually created the highly nutritious recipes for the pre-packed meals that are sent to Africa for Feed My Starving Children. One of the things that we did in conjunction with our 150th Anniversary was to involve employees in “learning journeys.” Two years ago, we did one on Brazil. In 2015, we did one in Africa and another one in China, where we get all of the different stakeholders who are interested in important issues like hunger and sustainability, and we have them live together for a week.

Drew: Has your past life at P&G had an impact on your approach to CSR?

One of the things that I think might be different with me, relative to other CMOs is that I had P&L responsibility as a business leader for seven of my fifteen years at P&G and many of my 14 years at Cargill.  I’ve only been in this current role for about four years and try very hard to avoid using the typical marketing clichés like “doing good is good business.”  My background has trained me to think of CSR in the context of other efforts making sure they are directly linked to the business strategy and the P&L.

Drew: What is Cargill’s purpose and how does this impact your CSR activity?

Our aspiration is to be the global leader in nourishing people; that’s our stated corporate purpose. So most of our CSR efforts are built around nourishing people. As an example, we have a very strong partnership with CARE, not only do we donate significant contributions to them but also our employees are heavily involved on a local level.

Drew: How does your brand purpose translate into marketing messages? 

It all extends from our purpose to be the global leader in nourishing people while translating into a more specific brand promise – helping you, the stakeholder, be more successful with Cargill than with anyone else. And it’s based on how the stakeholder defines success. Then that leads to our brand expression – Thrive.  Our commitment to helping stakeholders thrive (the highest level of success) works on many levels. For example, if you do a public-private partnership with Cargill to develop a village, to develop schools, to drill wells, to do water filtration systems, we believe that you’ll have the best chance of thriving. I chose Thrive because it works with our purpose–if you’re not well nourished, you can’t be successful and because it supports a broad range of initiatives across our many business units and countries of operation.

Drew: How do you measure the effectiveness of this program? As a truly global company, do you have a global brand health tracking in place?

From my P&G experience, I really like to conduct brand health research and when we couldn’t find an existing template, we built our own.  In the fall of 2013, right before we launched our new brand promise and brand expression, we fielded the first survey wave in 22 countries among all nine of our stakeholder groups. By the way, this was the first time ever in the history of Cargill that we’ve had a single brand promise and a single brand expression in all 196 countries where we do business.  We picked the 22 countries (now 24) because it represents about 80 percent of our business. That was our baseline and now, two years later we’re in the middle of a second wave of tracking to see if we’ve moved the needle, to see if we actually own the brand promise and to what degree against our nine stakeholder groups.  We also work with the 66 individual business units to identify their top three or four stakeholders that are critical to building their business help them with their own brand and reputation studies locally.

Drew: What’s on your to do list?

We have to now improve awareness of what we do, and why people would partner with us because in a world where you can’t hide anything, you better have nothing to hide, right? So we have to do a much better job of defining who we are because if we don’t tell our story, somebody else will, and it’s probably not going to be accurate.

CMO Insights: How to Market a Baseball Experience

Posted on by Drew Neisser
Photo by Sarah Conrad
Photo by Sarah Conrad

Marketing a sports team is a rather tricky affair.  Any given day the on-field performance can vary wildly.  This is especially true in baseball.  Even the best of the best win 60% of their games which in the course of 162 game season means 60 or so losses, 30 of which happened with home field advantage.  A favorite player can have a bad night which is often the case for hitters in a sport where going 1 for 3 all season is considered greatness! Compare this to the consistent experience consumers have with a typical packaged goods product and you’ll begin to have some sympathy for the sports marketer.

All that said, you won’t hear Dan Farrell, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing for the St. Louis Cardinals complaining.  First, he knows he’s riding, as they say, a great horse.  The Cardinals are arguably the winningest team in baseball this century with 11 playoff appearances, 4 National League pennants and 2 World Series rings. And second, he’s built his marketing around the entire customer experience at Busch Stadium rather than just the players on the field. In doing so, Dan has helped the Cardinals become the 2nd most attended home team in baseball in the last three years (behind the LA Dodgers) attracting over 3.5 millions fans the last two seasons. For these efforts, Dan also won the Customer Experience Award from The CMO Club and a chance to be interviewed by yours truly! Batter up…

Drew: Congrats on winning the Customer Experience Award.  Can you share the kinds of things you did to impact the overall customer experience in 2015?  

The Cardinals operate Busch Stadium based on the premise that attending a baseball game in our ballpark ranks as one of the premier attractions and serves as a genuine destination for millions of fans throughout the Midwest.  Our franchise draws from a very broad region, and while we recognize the value and importance of our local fans who average somewhere in the range of attending 8-10 games per year, we also draw nearly 1 million fans from outside the St Louis metro area.  Accordingly, we approach each game with the understanding that we will have fans who will be attending their first game at Busch Stadium, so we strive to consistently provide the highest quality guest experience possible.

The basics in our guest experience model are probably no different than most other entertainment venues: cleanliness, food and beverage quality and service, safe and secure atmosphere, helpful and out-going usher staff, entertaining scoreboard and fan engagement initiatives for pre-game and between innings, efficient ease of access, etc.  If we have a specialty, I believe it comes from a dedicated and very tenured staff that strive for superior customer service with a keen attention to detail.

Drew: How do you measure your customer experience?  How do you know if Cardinal fans are having a great experience? 

We conduct regular in-park surveys seeking fan feedback on a variety of topics, including guest satisfaction and ranking of our various service sectors. We monitor and track the data on a year to year basis to check for consistency. We also hold regular pre-game forums with our season ticket holders and our group leaders and we invite feedback and share information with these core groups of fans who are very important stakeholders of our product.

Drew:  A lot of studies suggest that only 1 in 10 unhappy customers will share their complaints with a brand. How do you process customer complaints and make sure that a systemic issue is not overlooked?  

We have a very active guest services department who monitor online complaints and also we encourage our game day usher and support staff to submit complaints or offer suggestions for service improvements.

Drew: Obviously on-field performance of the team has a big impact on customer satisfaction and you’ve been blessed with a great team for several years now. What have been your top marketing priorities in the last few years and how have they evolved?  

The Cardinals have made significant changes to our promotion programs over the past few seasons.  We have increased the number of in-park promotional dates, increased the amount of money we invest in the promotional giveaway items, increased the quantity and quality of items we give away, and focused our advertising to highlight the promotions, more of a “retail” strategy vs a brand-oriented campaign.

Drew: What other company do you think is doing an amazing job with CX and why?  

Kindle by Amazon; AT&T U-verse (surprising but I am impressed how they can trouble shoot a technical  issue in your system from a remote customer service location), Bank of America.

Drew: Looking ahead to 2016, what is the single biggest challenge that you’d like to overcome?  

Continue to learn how to monetize the digital and social media content that is so significant for a professional sports franchise.

CMO Insights: Redefining Marketing Success

Posted on by Drew Neisser

2885a7aAs many of my readers know, I’m a big proponent of Marketing as Service, an approach that seeks to replace polluting ads & messages with marketing that delivers genuine value.  Marketing as Service is categorized as a Noble Pursuit in my upcoming book, The CMO’s Periodic Table and is represented by my interview with John Hayes of American Express.  AmEx, by the way, has been taking this approach for years, providing small business with advice and support via a variety programs including Small Business Saturday, Open Forum and Membership Rewards.

At this point it would be fair to ask, “why are you telling me all of this Drew if not just to plug your book–again?” Well, the answer will soon be apparent as you read my interview with Missy Walker, Vice President of Brand Strategies and Communications for Strayer University.  Now in her second year at Strayer, Missy is helping the world, including Webster’s Dictionary redefine the meaning of Success, an effort that I absolutely define as Marketing as Service.  In addition to being a newsworthy idea, the program included events and even coaching services. This effort also earned Missy recognition by The CMO Club as a Rising Star at this year’s CMO Awards. Read on to find out how she got this program off the ground and more…

Drew: Can you talk about one of your marketing initiatives in 2015 that you are proudest of? 

One of the many 2015 marketing initiatives that I’m most proud of is The Success Project, a long-term initiative aimed at breaking down the perceived barriers that keep individuals from succeeding in their personal and professional lives. This is a unique campaign in a category that is riddled with cookie-cutter marketing efforts. As part of this campaign, we partnered with Steve Harvey to launch our Success Coaches and hold a Success Summit, which we produced as content for TV and our social channels; and partnered with Rainn Wilson’s company Soul Pancake to produce two inspiring video series exploring people’s views around success and what it means to them.

Additionally, we found through a commissioned survey that 90 percent of Americans define success as being happy and having a strong support network, which differs greatly from the definition in Merriam Webster’s Dictionary, which focuses instead on fame and wealth as measures of success. So we’ve launched a national petition to get Merriam Webster to change their definition of success to better align with American’s values.  The results have been amazing, both in the conversations we’ve started and engagements with the brand, as well as the impact of The Success Project on all key brand metrics we track.

Drew: You’ve achieved quite a bit in a short period of time. To what do you attribute your success thus far?

I attribute my success to loving what I do, having a positive can-do attitude and a great support network. I am not the type of person who says “we can’t do that,” I will always try to find a way to do something that I think is right for the business and right for our students. I am also blessed with a supportive boss and high-performing team at the office, as well as a great husband and supportive family who take care of things on the home front when times get crazy at work.

Drew: If you were addressing a bevy of marketers at the beginning of their careers, what advice would you give them to help them reach the CMO position? 

Take your time in the early stages of your career learning the ropes. Spend time learning from those around you – both in your office and in your field. Don’t say no to any opportunities that come your way.  Learn about your customers. Talk to them. Walk a mile in their shoes and really try to understand what motivates them to choose your product above all others. Learn to love them and be their champion – even if they are nothing like you or anyone you know. Use your own product. Working to cultivate this deep understanding is one of the most important parts of your job as a marketer.

Drew: Do you have a mentor or is there a person in your career that has been particularly helpful? How important is having a mentor?

Mentors are incredibly important and I have had many invaluable mentors at different stages throughout my career. One of my first mentors allowed me to spread my wings and try out things that were uncomfortable for me as a person or a young professional. She let me make mistakes at times, but was always there to support me and teach me how to improve the next time. She really never gave up on me, even when I wanted to give up on myself at times.

Drew: As you look back on your career, what was the biggest risk you took that worked and what emboldened you to take that risk?

I’ve spent the majority of my career as a client working for large, established tech companies such as Aol and Sprint. Switching to the for-profit higher education space felt like a huge risk at the time,as many bad actors had been revealed. I decided to take the risk because of the incredible leaders I met in my initial discussions at Strayer and the sense I got that Strayer really was trying to change higher education for the better.  Making that leap was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.  I’ve been able to witness first-hand that Strayer is a good actor in the space with remarkable people who work tirelessly to innovate higher education to better serve our students and continue to change their lives. We work to make a difference for people in ways no previous industry I’ve worked in really has. It’s amazing to be a part of it all.

Drew: Looking ahead to 2016, what is the single biggest challenge that you’d like to overcome?

Strayer University is unique among other for-profit institutions. We are constantly seeking out ways to innovate the learning experience to create successful graduates that are ready to compete and thrive in the workplace. Our leaders are lifelong learners who are deeply invested in uncovering how people learn and how we can teach important skills that other institutions don’t – like grit, persistence and curiosity. Our biggest challenge in 2016 will be cutting through the noise in our space to be able to showcase our truly innovative culture and how it benefits our students.

CMO Insights: Why Kidzania is Marketing Nirvana

Posted on by Drew Neisser

Before Cammie Dunaway became the CMO of Kidzania, she was Head of Marketing at Nintendo; so it’s safe to say she understands what kids like. She’s also quite talented when it comes to marketing, helping to expand Kidzania from a predominately local company with only seven locations to a global operation with 16 locations across the world, and nine more under development.

During this period of rapid growth, Cammie’s secret weapon has been her peer network, which served as a sounding board for her new global marketing initiatives. This willingness to connect with other CMOs not only helped her stay on top of a rapidly growing brand, it also helped her win a President’s Circle award at this year’s CMO Awards, sponsored by The CMO Club.

Drew: You were the head of marketing at Yahoo and Nintendo before joining KidZania in 2010. What are the most notable differences between marketing a giant corporation and marketing a smaller, more experimental venture?

Whether the company is large or small the role of marketing is to deliver profitable growth by understanding your consumers and delighting them with your product or service. At Y! we provided content and services that made our users lives easier. At Nintendo we made it possible for everyone from gamers to grandmas to enjoy video games. At KidZania we are empowering kids and training them for future success. Small companies tend to move more quickly and limited resources make you sweat each decision a little more, but the challenges of being relevant to consumers and accountable for financial results are really the same.

Drew: KidZania has plans to expand into the United States in the next few years. How has having such ambitious growth plans impacted your role as CMO?

The expansion of KidZania is truly exciting. When I started we had 7 locations, currently we have 16 open and 9 additional under development. The diversity of cultures and norms from Mumbai to Sao Paulo to Seoul creates some unique marketing challenges. Fortunately we see that parents everywhere want to equip their children for future success and kids everywhere love learning through role-play. I really think the US market is ready for KidZania’s unique blend of education and entertainment and I can’t wait to bring it to our kids. Being able to travel around the world as CMO has given me lots of great ideas for what we can do in the US. I want to take the best practices from all of our KidZania’s and create an amazing experience here.

Drew: Can you talk a little bit about KidZania branding and how that extends to employee titles and roles? While you are at, feel free to talk about your efforts to get the entire company engaged?

Story is at the heart of everything we do. We believe that KidZania exists because kids were frustrated with how adults were running the world and decided to create their own city to practice for the day they will take over from us and improve things. We bring this story to life in all aspects of our business from our titles (I am a Minister of Communication and a Governor not a CMO and President!) We have a national anthem, monuments, our own special language and holidays. Infusing this into our culture starts with hiring practices – we have to hire people who really like kids! Then we constantly reinforce the culture through training and our daily practices. Everyone from the CEO down spends time in the facilities working with the kids. If employees are having fun and constantly learning then they will be fulfilling our mission to empower kids.

Drew: What role does social media play in your marketing efforts? Are there any networks that are working better for your brand than others?

Social media is huge for us. KidZania is really a marketer’s nirvana. We have a great experience that our guests want to share with their networks. We just need to ignite the spark. Our marketers spend a lot of time creating interesting content and interacting with our fans. The most effective networks vary by country. For example in Kuwait Instagram is the most important while in Chile it is You Tube. Facebook, however, is pretty consistently important across the globe.

Drew: Customer experience does not always come under the control of the CMO yet can have a dramatic impact on the brand and ultimately the believability of your marketing initiatives. How have you been able to impact the customer experience in your current role?

As a CMO you have to spend a tremendous amount of time partnering with your peers. You really need to find a way to bring the voice of your customer into the conversation so that you can impact parts of the experience that lie outside your direct control. I sometimes have to remind people internally that we don’t need to just rely on our own perspectives. If in doubt ask the kids. We have a kid’s CongreZZ in each KidZania. It is essentially a group of children chosen annually that help us stay current and provide feedback on our experience. As long as I am channeling them, I am usually able to move us in the right direction.

Drew: Loyalty programs can be tough to get off the ground. If you have one in place, can you describe the program and talking about the costs/benefits of the program?

Our loyalty program, called B·KidZanian, is one our most powerful marketing tools. Our CEO recognized that the investment, which was quite significant for a company of our size, would provide benefits both in more deeply engaging our kids and in developing an efficient new marketing channel. In our program, kids become Citizens of KidZania and receive a passport and stamps for the different activities that they do. The more often they visit and the more they participate, the more privileges they receive. Parents opt into the program and receive very personal communication about their children’s activities and offers geared to their unique interests. We have been able to demonstrate a measurable lift in visits and spending among our members and, most important, kids love the program.

Drew: How important is having a strong peer network to your ability to do your job well? Can you describe an instance in the past year when your peer network helped you?

Wow, I can’t imagine doing my job without my peer network. I think most CMOs are very relationship oriented and yet within our companies the job can be pretty lonely. You want to always project a sense of confidence and yet with all the changes in marketing over the past decade you can’t possibly know everything. I use my peer network for supplier recommendations, talent management, and most importantly for honest conversations about challenges that I am facing. I don’t think a day goes by that I don’t either ask for help or give help to a peer.