Are there clear boundaries between the marketing and operations branches of your business? If not, how should these two incredibly important parts of the business collaborate in an effective way?
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Today, we have Veronica Romney here to talk all about how marketers and operators come together inside of a business.
Meet Veronica
Veronica Romney is a Dream Team Architect helping online entrepreneurs dial in their teams, develop phenomenal company cultures, and profitable bottom lines. She’s a former Speaker and Trainer for Tony Robbins and Dean Graziosi and the former Chief of Staff of mega-brand BossBabe. She’s no stranger to the stage and has been in the online marketing world for over 15 years, having been featured in places like Forbes, Inc, Huffpost, and more. When she’s not helping her visionary clients scale to 8-figures plus and develop their rainmaking marketing leaders, you can find her wrangling her two man cubs in the beautiful oak trees of North Carolina.
What are the overlapping beliefs we have when it comes to building businesses?
- We are both against “Frankenstein roles,” which is the idea that one person can perform multiple different functions, and should shine at all of them
- This happens a lot in the online space and creates a lot of burnout
- This happens with online business owners and often transfers to everyone they hire in the process of trying to scale
- It gives the industry a bad reputation
- Marketing and operations get badly discombobulated
- Marketing is a very prospect centric activity (front side of business)
- Operations/Fulfillment is very customer centric (back side of business)
- You need to look at your skills and gifts and determine which side fits you best and own that space
- The reason businesses fail so frequently in the first 5 years is because business owners try to keep it so lean and then they get overwhelmed
- It’s really difficult to scale a business, be the face, and be the singular source of decision money/making making activity
“It is not normal to have gifts and abilities in both sides of business…” – Natalie Gingrich
“Your business is your baby… but at some point you shouldn’t be the only one worrying if the baby is getting fed.” – Veronica Romney
How do the two disciplines of marketing and operations come together inside of a business?
- There is a trifecta with the visionary, the marketer, and the operator
- The leader will eventually become the person who is spending more time out of the house, speaking on behalf of the mission and vision of the company
- There comes a time when the visionary has to let go of the day to day operations
- You need someone who will nurture the prospects, and someone who will nurture the customer
- They are equal to one another, but exercising different zones of genius
- They are managing very different personnel and teams
“When you let [the day to day operations] go, you don’t want to transfer the overwhelm and the burnout from yourself to one single person… that’s not fair.” – Veronica Romney
What is a Rainmaker?
- Veronica was a part of a corporate company who encouraged teams to have its own flavor and personality
- When she started as chief of staff at BossBabe, there was a lot of turnover and burnout, so she wanted to revitalize the marketing team and referred to them as the “Rainmakers”
- When she goes to masterminds, one of the chief complaints is that biz owners can’t find good marketers, and she decided to create a program (The Rainmaker Residency) to develop marketers to learn how to effectively market in the online space
- She makes DOO’s and marketers best friends so the operator is not alone, carrying the weight of a scaling business
Operators and Marketing
- Operators often come in as a strategic partner to the visionary, and marketing conversations have to take place
- But there is a gray area when it comes to marketing operations, and operators have to have really good boundaries
- An operator needs to be a part of the marketing conversation, but not in charge of the strategy
- You want to help the business get to the place where they can bring in their own Rainmaker
- When you have clean delineated roles, everyone is in their zone
“I caution you to be aware of where you see the overlap (of marketing and operations) and stop it before it ever starts.” – Natalie Gingrich
“You want two leaders with separate but equally valuable KPI’s… that’s the super power of unlocking the frontside and the backside” – Veronica Romney
Revenue Implications
- Some of the best innovation comes from the front lines
- If the operators are intimately aware of what the customer is struggling with/needs/wants, it influences the marketing
- If the operations leader is crushing it by multiplying the revenue that the marketer brought through the front door, there is less pressure to have to launch every month
- A beautiful synergy develops where revenue is pouring out of all sides of the business
“When you have strong equally distributed leadership outcomes and responsibilities, the revenue is found in more than one department.” – Veronica Romney
Advice for hiring a marketer
- When you are thinking about hiring a Rainmaker, the best place is to find them within your organization
- If you can’t see anyone in your organization working out, go through a recruiter
- Look for someone who has proven themselves in individual contributions
- Also someone who has an affinity for people management
- A marketer is a different type of person than an operator
- Most effective marketers are smart creatives who often have ADHD/ADD, are empaths, or are highly sensitive people
- You need to be the kind of people manager who can learn how to navigate these people through writer’s block, overwhelm, etc (more like “people development”)
About the Rainmaker Residency
- It’s like an MBA had a baby with a mastermind
- MBA in that it is like a masters in marketing leadership
- Also has mastermind components of coaching, etc
- Leadership development for two: She requires for the visionary to go through it with the Rainmaker
- The program is for businesses that already have a marketer inside that they are looking to develop
Connect with Veronica
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