Episode 221 / Tatyana Jones / Bausch + Lomb / Director, Consumer Marketing
Podcast: Why Use Simple Marketing to Cut Through the Noise
Today’s marketer has too many data sources, distractions, and strategic advice to sift through in order to create a powerful brand identity. According to Tatyana Jones, Director, Consumer Marketing at Bausch + Lomb, the real challenge is to keep it simple instead. Her Shiny New Object is simplicity - doing the common, uncommonly well.
Tatyana’s playbook for excelling at simple marketing is formed of three pillars: being open to reinventing your brand, innovating (incrementally and boldly), and working with your stakeholders effectively.
The best organisations are not afraid to reinvent their core business when they need to. This can be done via your communication strategy or through incremental changes or additions to your core product. In CPG, something as simple as adding new flavours to your chocolate can go into new news stories, new campaigns, always something new and exciting for the end consumer. It’s a way to keep your brand top of mind. If you don’t do it, your competitors most likely will.
Secondly, innovation pipelines are invaluable for growing a successful brand. “Penetration is a leaky bucket,” Tatyana warns. Once you’ve acquired consumers in CPG marketing, your creative effectiveness needs to keep them interested. This means either offering them new products, new variations on what they currently have, or being bold and looking at extending into new markets.
Thirdly, a good CPG marketer knows their stakeholders well. The end consumer is just one part of the equation. Retailers are a big, much more important stakeholder, and should be treated as partners to grow brands together. In Tatyana’s experience, growing the Dove chocolate brand in partnership with Walmart in the US gave her access to the store’s consumer insight and to their own strategic innovation ideas. This led to stronger, more enduring brand building for both parties.
It’s easy to jump on trends and new methods and platforms on a regular basis. However, going back to basics and following the simplicity playbook can deliver more effective brand development for CPG marketers.
Get more insights into how Tatyana proposes that marketers follow the simplicity playbook and hear what she thinks are the worst pieces of marketing advice out there, on the latest episode here.
Transcript
The following gives you a good idea of what was said, but it’s not 100% accurate.
Tatyana Jones 0:00
Don't get me wrong I think as marketers, we do have to be rebels. But in order to rule break, you really have to know what the rules are.
Tom Ollerton 0:15
Hello, and welcome to the shiny new object podcast. My name is Tom Ollerton. I'm the founder of the creative effectiveness platform, Automated Creative but today we are doing the podcast and the shiny new object podcast is interviews with senior marketing folk about their journey and their vision. And I have the absolute pleasure to be on a call with Tatyana Jones, who is director consumer marketing, at Bausch + Lomb. Tatyana, for anyone who doesn't know who you are and what you do. Could you give us a short overview of your career to date and what you do now?
Tatyana Jones 1:08
Yeah, absolutely, Tom. And first and foremost, thank you so much for having me on your podcast. It's an absolute pleasure to be here. I'm so Tatyana Jones, like you said, I kind of started my career at Johnson and Johnson, spent about seven and a half years there, and really wanted to get into brand management and marketing and really kind of on the path to become a general manager ended up going back to school, to NYU Stern. And I actually did it as a part time gig. I remember there was a full time student telling me I was taking more classes than him in a given semester. And it's funny, I was, so I essentially ingrained myself into that experience and used that as a catalyst to kind of change my career into brand management. Coming out of that I did a general management rotational program with Mars Wrigley. And it was rotations kind of all over the country, but across all sorts of commercial functions from global innovation to being on the account team at Walmart, to kind of ending my career there on the Dove chocolate brand, where I did everything, you know, from running the p&l to doing some innovation and really restaging that brand. And kind of reinventing who it appealed to and how it appealed to those consumers.
Tatyana Jones 2:43
During that time, I actually, so this was actually during COVID. I wanted to kind of, you know, got an itch to go into a new category, wanted to not only make consumers lives kind of happier but also healthier. So I ended up transitioning to GSK consumer healthcare, they're now known as Haleon, I was on a brand called Theraflu, where I did essentially built their innovation portfolio from scratch, when I got there there was really, really very little going on. And with that we restaged that brand to, to back to growth, first of all, and then to appeal with younger millennial consumers. After about a year or so I actually went into my first role global in nature. I went into the US market, where this was the biggest market for the brand, I led a team of marketers, ran the p&l. And then essentially commercialized all of the innovation that I had come up with in the prior role. I've kind of been feeling like I've been in a pivotal point of my career for the last few years. So I wanted to kind of go and you know, use all my skills that I that I got during the rotational program. And the last few years, I felt like my learning was really accelerating with a strong base. I wanted to potentially go into a smaller business where I got to kind of build something from scratch. So I got a lot of actually really, you know, interviews that I thought that I thought I was probably under qualified for there were some cmo roles for mid sized startups. But the feedback that I got fairly consistently was, you know, we love your experience. We love your passion and we love your personality, but we really need to see a little bit more experience in growing consumer demand from scratch. So essentially from zero to it being $100 million brands. And so that kind of gave me my task and I knew what I had to do actually didn't care which industry, I should go into next as long as I was helping consumers in some way. And so that actually brought me to my current role. Where I've run consumer marketing for Bausch + Lomb on the pharmaceutical side of business, I'm actually the first and only consumer marketing in pharma here. And we have some really exciting things that are coming, that will actually allow me to essentially grow that consumer demand from scratch and kind of prove myself out as that you know, person that's able to grow existing brands, but then also brand build from scratch. So that's kind of me in a nutshell.
Tom Ollerton 5:52
So across that really broad range of experiences, what are the things that you've heard that you'd consider bad recommendations in the industry?
Tatyana Jones 6:03
There's actually, there's actually two that come to mind. One is kind of more high level strategic and one is tactical. So I'll start with a strategic one. The first thing that you know, as the first thing you learn, especially in CPG, as you begin your marketing career is that you're a general manager. So you're not your kind of, you know, a general manager that's responsible for also marketing, and we do all of our work through agencies. And it's really easy to forget, you know, you're in that intersection of driving feasibility driving viability of your business and then driving desirability, it's very easy to forget that actually, our first and foremost job is to drive desirability. And so what does that mean, right? Driving desirability, desirability to me is really around making sure that you know, the consumer kind of inside and out, there needs to be a deep consumer insight in everything we do. And you see, you know, it's easier said than done, because I've been with really great organizations that don't necessarily do this. There is a lot of conversations around, well, our lines can make this product. So for innovation, for example, we should move forward with this. And then you build backwards, you know, that consumer desirability story and kind of test does does the consumer really want this? And I've also seen it the other way around as well, where, okay, this innovation that we're trying to do is not margin, accretive the viability is not there. But you're entering a new business opportunity that will drive your top line in kind of a significant way. So that's kind of also a silly, silly thing to dismiss just based on, you know, not being marginal creative. So I think, especially as I coach younger marketers in their career, the one thing that I like to remind them is, we are a desirability led function, yes, we need to make sure that we're considering all of these other things, and we are absolutely stewards of the business. However, our main job is really just to be so focused on what that desirability is, what the market is, it is, it is consumer driven, and all of these other things are, they're kind of in support of consumer. So it's really it really means, you know, I can't stress this enough, it really means you have to be as a as a good marketer, you have to be consumer obsessed, you have to understand, you know, what is that deep human insight? And why does your consumer behave a certain way? And not just the interactions with your product, but what is that consumer's hobby? What did they have for breakfast, it's all relevant. And I think what makes me a good marketer is actually you know, my genuine interest in people and understanding, you know, beyond your job or beyond the task at hand, who are you as a human being? So I think net net is my best marketing advice is be super crystal clear on kind of what your reason for being is and be completely obsessed with with kind of that consumer that you're you're servicing where your business is servicing. And essentially, you know, make sure that you're kind of not not getting distracted by Some of these other things that also have to work. So that's kind of like the big strategic, the slightly less strategic and more tactical, I think I mentioned, we work with a lot of agencies to bring a lot of our strategies and tactics to life. It, you know, it's around kind of the agency tactical recommendations. A lot of times, the agencies will bring me a tactic, you know, a shiny, shiny new object, if you will. And it's the hot new platform that appeals to, you know, this, this kind of smaller target audience or potentially even a larger target target audience that doesn't necessarily overlap with my, with what I'm trying to do with the brand. So I think TikTok is a good example, although it's not new or shiny anymore. But our agencies will recommend that quite a bit. And if the conversation with the agency is something along the lines of Well, hey, Tatyana you know, besides, we know it doesn't appeal to your current consumer, because your consumer is let's say, 50 or older. But you know, besides the conversion driving for this short term for this year, next year goal, you also told us you want to brand build, and you know, 10-20 years, this will be your future consumer. Oh, and by the way, consumers form their kind of brand repertoires, or two to three go to brands in their teenage years. So this is actually perfect, because, again, consumers will think of you, you know, 1020 years down the road. If that's the answer, then yeah, my answer is, let's do tick tock, absolutely. However, I think where the bad recommendation comes in, is, if, let's say, I'm in a pharmaceutical business, and my patent expires in 20, you know, 10 to 20 years, and my consumer is that older consumer, you know, 50 or 60 years old, and I get a tactical recommendation of doing something like TikTok where majority of the target audience is on the younger side, then, you know, that's, that's a little bit off strategy. And I would essentially push back on that and, and kind of tell my agency partners to come back with either a better recommendation or really kind of think, think through. Again, it's going back to that consumer who is who is our true consumer now and, and then the future.
Tom Ollerton 12:44
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Tom Ollerton 13:21
So we're gonna talk now about your shiny new object, which is simplicity, doing the common uncommonly well, which sounds like a beautiful written line, I want to know more Tell me, why is simplicity, your shiny new object?
Tatyana Jones 13:37
I think, in today's world, you know, simplicity is the shiny new object, because literally in every single job that I've been at your issue is not not having enough information or not not having enough things to do. There's new platforms or new technologies that are happening. And launching every single day. As I've been in these new roles, you know, I've been in quite a quite a few roles. And in the 15 years of my experience, I think the biggest challenge has been literally looking through 1000s and 1000s of pages of research to try to figure out, Hey, what is that main thing? What is what does my consumer care about and coming up with a brand strategy there? So I think in the modern world, simplicity is really like taking all of that information, taking a myriad of different things that you can do, and just breaking them down to their basics. Is is the shiny new object, and that is a skill and I've seen really great leaders do that well, and I've seen, you know, very senior people not do that while and kind of be I guess an analogy a good analogy of a bad business leader would be kind of like a floating plastic bag that changes its direction with the headwinds, you need to be crystal clear on kind of what you know what your brand strategy is, what your brand is, why do you exist? Who is your consumer? How are you different from the competition? We're all kind of so desperate to throw out that playbook. When I think in today's world, it's actually revisiting the playbook is is the thing that we should be doing. And don't get me wrong. I think as marketers, we do have to be rebels. And that is my true personality. I love to rule, rule break, within ethical bounds, of course. But in order to rule break, you really have to know what the rules are, you need to know the base steps. So and I've mentioned, I've been a part of a few different brand restages. And it's really always kind of where do you start when you're trying to create a strategy for the brand that's not necessarily doing well. I've been a part of a few different brand restages. And what you really have to kind of when you're coming in almost putting your consulting hat on, how do you get to that simplicity, you look at the business, and if the biggest either the biggest skews within your brand, or the biggest brands within general business are not growing, that is a big, big red flag, because your core business generally is essentially what drives the rest of the business, the rest of the smaller brands, that may not necessarily be the focus brands. So you really have to make sure that some of you know the business driving parts of your business, your core, so to speak, is growing and is growing in a healthy way. It's not just growing due to price increases, it's really growing through, you know, that consumer demand that we've been talking about. So then, so that's kind of like the big strategic piece. And then when you get down to the basics of Okay, so what what does that mean for a brand? How do you kind of create a strategy, that's a winning strategy that makes sure that your bigger brands do grow and drive the organization? I kind of think of it in three different pillars. And by the way, if your strategy has more than more than three, I kind of challenge you to be a little bit more focused, you know, it's so easy to say yes to everything. We all can say yes to everything. But I think real strategy comes from really understanding what your core competencies are and what aren't. So going back to the three kind of pillars of what it takes to do the common uncommonly well, first and foremost, for any brands, you know, we are so scared to kind of cannibalize our own business. But if you look at the best CPG brands, they are consistently reinventing themselves, and not even CPG brands, the best brands that are consistently reinventing themselves. And you can do so through your communication strategy. You can also do so through, you know, some things, some innovation that isn't necessarily so incremental to your business, when I was in chocolate, for example, our incrementality, for any given new flavor was about 30%. So it wasn't this major, major thing. But we consistently delivered new flavors and new news, both with retailers and with consumers. You have to also look at your your brand, does your visual brand language appeal to the current target audience and to the audience that you're trying to appeal to? They're not always the same. I am very much against kind of changing packaging or changing the visual brand language every year, I don't think it should be done often. But as part of every single brand restage that I've been at, we've actually determined through a variety of a series of testing, that it was really necessary to kind of refresh and make sure that we're appealing to really younger and more modern consumers. So really, you only do that if you can prove growth and if you can prove that the consumer it would actually you know, drive a better connection with your consumer. But again, it's that first pillar is all about reinventing yourself because if you don't and if you think some These things will be cannibalistic to your business. Someone else will do it for you. And that will not be your company, there'll be a competitor. So that's pillar one. Pillar two, I would say is really just making sure, you know, once you've got your core business growing and healthy, I've seen again, most of my experience come from CPG. The really good businesses have really a strong innovation pipeline, that's three to five years out. And it's both incremental innovation to maybe a little bit more extending into new areas potentially growing in the consumer base. And then maybe even with a touch of a little bit less, but a touch of breakthrough innovation. So really having a strong innovation pipeline. A lot of times with innovation, right? Like, it goes back to that core competency question, you will not necessarily be growing your profitability, because a lot of times you have to go out to different co manufacturing partners. So that will generally reduce your profitability. So again, it's really about growing your top line and expanding your brand to kind of be a mass consumer brand. Because penetration is a leaky bucket. So if you don't do the first pillar, and if you don't appeal with consumers with your, with innovation, you're going to lose your current consumers. And you're not going to gain the consumers that you've already lost. So we kind of have to renew them consistently, through through all of these efforts. And the third, I would say, and last is really around making sure that you understand who your key kind of gatekeepers are, and stakeholders are. Again, I've kind of been in on a lot of CPG brands, and people kind of forget that, how big and how important of a role retailers play, that we actually in CPG, as everyone knows, we actually call them customers. Consumers are kind of like your end user shoppers are the ones that shot the shelves. I guess in the Omni omni channel world, it could be someone that's shopping online. But it's really you know, it's so complex, in probably a variety of different industries, where it's not, you know, it's not just a direct sale to your end consumer.
Tatyana Jones 22:44
So we actually did this really well, with Dove chocolate, we were kind of a smaller brand, we were about a three $50 million brand, in retail in retail sales. But but as a smaller brand, we were on a four way with Walmart, which is, you know, the biggest retailer in the world. And the way that we did it was by really partnering with them, making sure that they are aware of what our strategy is making sure that they're involved. And not just at the at the tail end of it. But in all of our innovation efforts. In some cases, we actually would partner with them, you know, insight to fruition, involving them incorporating their feedback along the way along testing, to really understand, you know, they know their shopper best to really understand how between the two of us can we really engage with that shotgun that consumer. So So I think the last the last, I guess advice that I have for everyone is really make sure you know who that stakeholder is, and make sure you're leaning in and building them into the process versus just you know, at the tail end of it just selling it to them. So I think if we stick to those three, doing the common uncommonly well will kind of, you know, become simple and easy. Especially now for the brands that kind of need a little bit of restaging to do like the ones that I've been on.
Tom Ollerton 24:20
Fantastic. Well, look, there's been so many great insights there. And it's so refreshing. You talk with such conviction and passion about this, and they've given me new ways to think about simplicity. So thank you so much for being on the podcast. And I guess if the listeners want to reach out they can connect with you on LinkedIn.
Tatyana Jones 24:36
Yes, absolutely. Please connect with me on LinkedIn. I love having conversations, I don't always need to be agreed with. I love pretty much anything any anything marketing related. The only thing I ask is that when you send me a message just mentioned that you found me through the podcast that will help me just filter through the messages
Tom Ollerton 25:00
Fantastic Tatyana, thank you so much for your time.
Tatyana Jones 25:03
Thank you so much, Tom, it was a pleasure, I really appreciate it.
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