Stay Inside Your Clients Comfort Zone - Susie Cha

[00:00:06] Speaker A: Hey, everybody, and welcome to another episode of the worst advice I ever got. I'm your host, Sean Taylor, joined by my producer JB. And today we're talking with Suzy Cha. Suzy is an influencer marketer currently working with Ogilvy in New York City. She's helping brands like Samsung, Venmo, and Coca Cola connect and work successfully with the influencer market space. And if you're wondering what that even is, trust me, I'm right there with you. I asked my daughter about influencer marketing, and she knew 15 times more about it than I did. Susie, thanks so much for being here today. [00:00:45] Speaker B: Thanks for having me. Excited to be here. [00:00:47] Speaker A: If you know about our approach to this podcast, or have heard any rumors, you probably know that we don't beat around the bush. We just jump right into it and say, tell us about the worst advice you ever got. [00:00:59] Speaker C: The worst advice I ever got was to stay within my client's comfort zone. [00:01:03] Speaker D: What do you mean by comfort zone? What does that mean? [00:01:06] Speaker C: Their comfort zones are spaces where they've likely already activated within the marketing space. It's something that they've already done and had proven success. [00:01:15] Speaker D: What's wrong with that? [00:01:16] Speaker C: There's nothing wrong with that. The problem, though, is when you're working with me, I work in influencer marketing for a lot of brands. This is a new space for them. It's just making sure that they're actually looking at the campaign goals and working with influencers through the right lens. [00:01:33] Speaker A: Can you dig a little deeper? I want to better understand the influencer marketplace. So spend just a few minutes elaborating a little bit on the influencer marketplace, if you don't mind. [00:01:45] Speaker C: Influencer marketing is a partnership between a brand who, for me, is my client, and a storyteller who is an expert in their field. Simple as that. Their role is to humanize those key messages that you're looking for to get across in your campaign. And hopefully, in some cases, it's getting that audience excited to buy the product. [00:02:07] Speaker D: It's a crazy job. All the jobs we have in the world. [00:02:11] Speaker C: Now I know who may who does this. [00:02:13] Speaker A: Yeah, crazy job indeed. It makes me think about storytelling. I consider myself a storyteller, and I relate well when people tell me stories about their experiences or about their business. So what's happening is someone comes to you and they want to tell the story, perhaps the way they've always told it, or the way they feel like it's worked, and you're maybe coming at them with an approach saying, hold on just a minute. [00:02:38] Speaker C: So let's take a step back. The idea of pairing a brand with a third party spokesperson has been around in some form it for a long time in pr and advertising, but primarily with actors or celebrities. The difference now is you're working with someone whose brand is their true identity. It's their humor, it's their personal experience. It's that subject matter, subject matter knowledge that they've really crafted and honed. And it's working with them to communicate with their audience in a way that will better help explain your brand and ultimately bring that audience into the conversation. But what happens with this approach is you're looking at influencers for their follower count and really throwing their voice aside and creating something that's unnatural to them. And the audience is smart enough to pick up on that. [00:03:26] Speaker D: Yeah, makes sense to me. So I got to know, who gave you, who gives you this advice? Who says, who is saying to stay in your client's comfort zone? [00:03:33] Speaker C: It's coming from everywhere. It's coming from industry leaders. It's coming from sometimes our clients, when they push back on ideas that they hear from us, it really is still being said all over the place. [00:03:45] Speaker A: Susie, talk to me about the impact this advice had on you. [00:03:50] Speaker C: I've been working with influencers for seven years and see myself as an expert. But what I did seven years ago isn't the same approach I'm taking today. The shift from having no budget to pay influencers and expecting gifted product to be enough to seeing large portions of our clients brand marketing budgets being carved out for influencers is still in the progress. So there are still so many people around me who have input in what I do inside and outside of the walls of where I work. So I'd say this advice is something I'm still hearing every day in my industry and will continue to hear where. [00:04:26] Speaker B: I am right now in my career. I can't just stand up to our senior team and say, no, that's not what I want to do. [00:04:32] Speaker A: How do you find the right balance between respecting that team and sort of pushing back a little bit and saying, wait a minute, we're going to actually underserve our client if we don't do some of this pushing outside of their comfort zone? [00:04:45] Speaker C: I'm in an interesting place, especially in comparison to the rest of the people you've interviewed so far. I can't say that I would just start my own company, but I think the place that you can challenge anyone you're working with, whether it's, you know, your clients or maybe even the influencers, because for a lot of them, they've only worked with brands who are doing this incorrectly. So they think this is the right approach, too. But what I would do is really lay out the storyline and say, this is the goal, this is what the influencer is going to say. Do you feel that that influencer's voice is being represented, and do you feel that this was co collaborated and was there space for them to do that, or was this a script? And that's really where you'll start to understand and push people to get what influencer marketing is. [00:05:33] Speaker A: It feels like that part of what's going on here is the influencer marketplace is still in its infancy stage. Does that somehow lead people to be hesitant to get out of their comfort zone? [00:05:47] Speaker B: You can kind of see this across the board, and I get why there's hesitancy and why people want to work within their comfort zone. One, for a lot of brands, this is a new budget that they're cutting out, that they've never seen success before because it's new to them. So that's a scary place to be. Two, you're working with people and you're saying, hey, I support you in the message that you're getting across, and I'm working with you to then say, you are my brand ambassador. But this is an individual who has a life on social media, who is sharing their voice 24/7 that's a scary connection to make from a brand perspective. And then three, kind of to what your point was. This is a really new space. Influencing has been around for a really long time, but the industry itself is so new and so evolving at this day and age. We still a lot of people, I will be in meetings with other experts and they still get confused on things. A lot of people don't understand the difference between a content creator and an influencer and a celebrity spokesperson, which are all very different roles that they play. And because of this lack of clarity, because it's moving so quickly, it's hard to find a moment to take a step back and say, do I really know what I'm doing here? Am I using this to the best of my ability? [00:07:04] Speaker A: I'm very curious about perception of a client's comfort zone versus the reality of what their comfort zone really is. Does that ever come up in your work with clients or in your discussion with your teams? [00:07:17] Speaker B: It comes up a lot, and I've heard in meetings before in my career, you know, that's a great idea, but we're not going to present this because it's, we're going to watch the client cringe. And there's moments where you have to then say, why is it going to make the client cringe? Is it going to make them cringe? Because it's a bad idea that doesn't work with their brand. It doesn't match their ethos. It doesn't match who they are and their voice? Or is it because they don't know if it will be successful or not? And when you're working with influencers, applying KPI's so strictly in the way that you are, paid media ads is going to be your downfall. You can't just look at everything as, oh, is this going to sell x products off the shelf? Is it going to have x viewership? You really need to say, is this going to influence the way that people are understanding my brand and understanding this product? If so. And is it in the way that we want them to really think about us? And if it is, then let's try it. [00:08:16] Speaker D: It's so interesting that you bring that up because I think that's sort of the point, is that the fear of failure in the asking them to stay in their comfort zone, it's like, well, you know what if it fails? But you're basically saying, I'm guaranteeing this is going to fail if we stay in our comfort zone. [00:08:33] Speaker B: Exactly. There's so much content these days online, so much it takes probably you forever to even see anything that you actually want to see. So when you're staying in your comfort zone and you're just showing the same thing that someone will then look at and say, this is clearly an ad, that's a waste of their time, that's a waste of your money, that's a waste of the influencers time as well. But the campaigns that I see that go, oof, that's really bad, is when I can go to the tag of the product, usually it's the hashtag that they've put for the product name, or, or maybe it's, you know, their ambassador tag, whatever it may be. And I can watch five or six videos and they're the exact same from start to bottom. Yeah, that's so cringy. [00:09:12] Speaker A: Yeah. It's kind of lather, wrench, repeat. It's really more about quantity than it is really. The message is what I hear you saying. [00:09:19] Speaker B: Exactly. There's an interesting thing that's happening with influencers now, where people at first saw them as a different platform to really getting you to shop and to move products off the shelf. But the influence that you actually want is someone storytelling to you, just like you would be a friend. Hey, I bought this. I tried it out for a couple days. I didn't like this part about it so much, but I did really like this, or it was better than this. And I think it's worth trying out. You want someone just to be organic and tell the truth in what they're experiencing. [00:09:52] Speaker A: That's a great point. [00:09:53] Speaker B: If you wanted to follow a brand on social media, you can. You can do that. Yeah, go do that. [00:09:58] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:09:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:09:59] Speaker D: It's a good point. [00:10:00] Speaker A: Yeah, it's an, it's an excellent point. Have you always lived outside of your comfort zone? [00:10:05] Speaker B: So for anyone who can't see me, I'm asian american and I have very traditional parents who want me to be a specific person. I had my job picked out for me before I was even born. It's not, I'm not a pediatrician, as you've been informed, but I think growing up in a space where I was always told to stay within the box that was given to me has actually empowered me to know when I'm uncomfortable and know when something doesn't fit me. And I think I've used that to my ability. So I would always trust your voice in this. [00:10:43] Speaker A: So you mentioned earlier that your client is the brand, but the advice you've been getting is to stay within your client's comfort zone. [00:10:52] Speaker B: There have been moments where I've seen my colleagues, I've seen myself try, and it's failed because you are ultimately working with a client. And in those moments, ideally, what you could do is, again, kind of take the table and say, this is your brand voice and this is the goal you're trying to get across. This is what we're proposing right now in supplement of what you're getting across. You have campaign work going out there. You have ad work that's saying exactly in your brand voice. Let us bring a friend to the table. Let us bring an expert who may be telephoning it. They're not going to hit every word verbatim, but that's not what we're wanting them to do. Because you don't want someone to regurgitate what you're saying. You want someone to say, this is my personal experience and this is how I got to this goal of the message you want. And if they're uncomfortable with that, then we say, I don't think influencer marketing is right for you because this is so new. Because influencer marketing is so new. It's so shiny, everybody's going to put their toe in it. You see every single brand finding a partnership, but that's not actually the best advice. And sometimes it's actually a waste of money for some of these brands. If you're not comfortable co collaborating with influencers, this isn't a space for you. And that's not to say you can't be in, you know, really strict industries. I've worked with technology, I've worked with Pharma, I've worked with tons of brands that have a lot of red lines and red tapes against them and what they can say and what they can't say, they've made influencer work because they're willing to work with other experts in their industry to get the message that they want across. [00:12:32] Speaker A: If I'm speaking with my leadership team about using the influencer marketing place for Smith and Howard's brand to ultimately get the best results is to just be a complete open book. [00:12:45] Speaker B: You would be the best client ever. If that was the case, I wouldn't say that's necessary. It would just be to level set at the beginning. Before we start this work on a page, what are your goals? How do you want to accomplish it? How are you going to monitor the success of it? It's that person and their beliefs and their voice that you're trusting yourself with. That's the comfort zone. If you're comfortable knowing you're entering a conversation, let's go for it. If you're not comfortable with that, you want to have a conversation with yourself, just you speaking to an audience, go that path. But then influencer marketing isn't for you. [00:13:24] Speaker D: Okay, so the brand is your client and the client is a brand. Explain that. [00:13:33] Speaker C: Yeah, so my clients are brands. Yes. But at the end of the day, brands are run by humans and these are people with experiences, and that's where their comfort zones kind of come into play. They're letting their own personal biases dictate how we're coming to life and bringing the brand, this entity, to life with humans who are influencers. And if you stay in your comfort zone, you're going to create really bad work that isn't going to succeed, it's not going to resonate. [00:14:03] Speaker A: What advice would you give to someone who's being told to stay in their comfort zone? [00:14:11] Speaker B: Comfort zones exist for a reason. Let's not say that you should break every boundary and that we should just become a chaotic society. They are there for a reason. I think you need to question, is that reason really supporting what you want to do and your mission now. And is this a space that you can step a little bit outside of it? Do you have that wiggle room? If doctor is doing a medical procedure, I think I'd like him to stay in his comfort zone. [00:14:38] Speaker A: That's a solid point. Yes. [00:14:40] Speaker B: Yeah. But if it's, you know, him challenging or them, then challenging what they're eating for lunch that day, go ahead, be a little bit outside of your comfort zone. Try something new. But just know when to make that move. [00:14:55] Speaker A: That's great advice to anyone who might be thinking, huh? I'm always trapped in my comfort zones, or I'm not brave enough to venture out. [00:15:02] Speaker B: I think an important part of what you just said was my comfort zone. Is it a comfort zone you made for yourself, or is it one that you're following someone else told you to stay into? [00:15:12] Speaker A: That's really good point. That's terrific. That's a great point. I hadn't even considered. Comfort zones are not the same for everybody. Your comfort zone and my comfort zone are completely different. [00:15:23] Speaker B: This is definitely out of my comfort zone being on this podcast. But I'm excited to be having this conversation with you. So thanks for making it easy. [00:15:30] Speaker A: That's terrific. Susie. This has been terrific. I can't thank you enough for joining us today. [00:15:35] Speaker C: Thanks, Sean. Thanks, JB. [00:15:37] Speaker A: Well, that goes into the category of, you learn something new every day. JB, I didn't know as much about influencer marketing as I do now. [00:15:46] Speaker D: Oh, yeah, for sure. I, uh, I kind of understand it. I. But it just, like we said, it's just. It's crazy the different types of jobs people have. And I'm glad we get a. A wide range of guests here on the podcast. [00:15:58] Speaker A: Well, a lot of different backgrounds, and Susie's in a challenging place with having to push back on leadership that's giving her this advice to follow. [00:16:06] Speaker D: Yeah, for sure. It's. We have a lot of people on the podcast who kind of talk about, here's the challenge that I had, and I created my own business, or I did these things and they're in these leadership position. It's really interesting for us to get the perspective of somebody who's still kind of getting the advice. It's bad advice. It's the worst advice she ever got, and she's continuing to get that advice because of the space that she works in. Just a really interesting perspective. [00:16:27] Speaker A: Yeah, she's having to be truly creative. She's having to present new ideas, but she's also being told, do it in a way that's sort of narrow. And sometimes to be really creative and really have a high reward, you got a risk, you know, that you'll throw some bad ideas out there or some ideas that are being conflict with what people's preconceived notions are. [00:16:48] Speaker D: Right. And she said, this might not be for you. You know, if you're, if you want to, if you want to follow a brand, you can follow a brand. If you want to have a tv commercial where an actor says you're lying, you can do that. Like, this is, she's talking very specifically about her space. And I think that's one of the nice things about this podcast, is that we always ask people for their own personal experience. The worst advice to her might be good advice to somebody else, might be bad advice to somebody else. Like, it just changed. Her personal experience is this. And very specifically, in her influencing marketing space, the worst thing you can tell a client is stay in your comfort zone. [00:17:19] Speaker A: And how about her background growing up? She's been used to having to break that mold of, you know, follow instructions and do what we tell you. [00:17:27] Speaker D: Right. Every. I mean, she even said, uh, being on this podcast was outside of her comfort zone. Certainly appreciate her, uh, or her braving the, uh, the outcast waves. [00:17:38] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And one, just general topic that she put out there with these projects, was she saying being level set at the beginning with goals and success monitoring was really the two key factors that are important to the value of this? And I just translate that to any successful project, whether it's an influencer marketing project or any other type of project. Those are two great pieces of advice. Of advice, really, to follow. [00:18:04] Speaker D: Yeah. Find the goals. What are you, what are you trying to get accomplished? And then everybody's making the same thing, doing the same things, rowing in the same direction, and you're going to have a successful whatever venture you're on? [00:18:15] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. Susie's focus of the influencer marketplace aligns very much with what I hope the podcast is doing for our listeners, influencing how they consider advice, give advice, and ultimately learn from advice they got in the past. We hope you continue to be positively influenced by our guests and our episodes. Thanks for joining us this week. Be sure to tune in next week for another episode of the worst advice I ever got.