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Why TikTok Marketing with Hootsuite CMO, Maggie Lower

• Kyle Kaplanis / Maggie Lower • Season 1 • Episode 73

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Let's talk TikTok for Marketing with Maggie Lower, CMO of Hootsuite

Guest:

Maggie Lower
CMO - Hootsuite

TikTok: @hootsuite
Instagram: @hootsuite
YouTube: @hootsuite

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Kyle Kaplanis:

Welcome back to another episode of BizTok for TikTok. I am really, really, really excited about this episode because I have a very special guest in the studio today. Her name is Maggie Lower. She is the CMO of Hootsuite and she brings over 20 years experience of modern marketing and a leader in this space. We're really excited to hear more about her origin story and of course, to talk about TikTok as she is an LGBTQ plus advocate. And she personally sees social media as a democratizer and playing a new ground and form of authenticity. So Maggie, welcome to BizTok for TikTok.

Maggie Lower:

Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. I'm excited to talk to you, Kyle.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Absolutely. A lot of people who are listening love to hear origin stories. So tell me your origin story. Maggie, who are you and gimme some backstory here.

Maggie Lower:

Maggie Lower grew up in St. Louis, Missouri. It's an important part of my story as you get to know me better. I have been in marketing or some version of commercial development for 20 plus years, which feels. Great. And a little crazy all in the same sentence. Right. I started actually on really more the strategy side. I started in financial services and I spent a good 13 years in financial services, specifically with Bank of America. And then from there had gone to graduate school and started gravitating towards marketing and an executive that I had worked with, sponsored me essentially and said, I think you could take on a marketing role. I think you're ready to try something new. What I really need is a change agent, I need a corporate athlete, which was what I had done. I was sort of the person sent into the hard hairy problems to go in and try to fix them. which I gravitated to, which says probably more about me than it does about the work. And so I ended up working at a company that's was headquartered here in Chicago. It's now headquartered in London, called Aon. And from there, I was the CMO of one of their largest operating divisions. And so I just got hooked. I loved, loved everything about marketing. Definitely have sort of a love the art and the science of it. I love the creativity of it, but I also like the stats and the quantitative level of operation that drives excellence in marketing. And so, fast forward, I've been able to work in several different industries. I think it's a very portable profession. And I'm really passionate about B2B and B2B to C marketing. I think that it's an area that, B2B has to start running faster at how B2C has been operating from a marketing perspective. And I think this is a super exciting time to be in marketing. So that's why I'm, that's why I'm here and continue to be excited about the opportunities at Hootsuite. It's a phenomenal company I've been here, literally had my one year anniversary last week. Congratulations, Which we call our "Whodiversarys". We're very committed to the owl thing. So that's my story, that's my quick run overview Kyle of my last 20 plus years.

Kyle Kaplanis:

I love that. And what's gonna make this, conversation so much more interesting is the fact that you do have a lot of experience. So you have seen over the years, the changes in marketing, right? Like we've come a long way from blogging where it was just like text only to, bringing in new forms of visual kind of content to long form content coming on YouTube. And now we're in the short form game, short form content is king. We're seeing that across all platform shifting. And so talk to me a little bit about what are the most interesting things that stand out to you from how marketing has shifted over the last 20 years and why you think it's important for the future.

Maggie Lower:

Yeah. I think there's a number of different things. People are getting their information from their phones. Right. And so that's a major shift. I mean, if you can believe it, when I first started working, people were using Palm pilots. Right. And that was something incredibly exotic at the time.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Right.

Maggie Lower:

I lost my phone actually in New York a few weeks ago, and I literally felt like I'd lost a limb. Right. Mm-hmm , I mean, that houses so much of your life when you lose your phone.

Kyle Kaplanis:

So true.

Maggie Lower:

I think it's changed the game completely. You have very little time to get people's attention. And I think depending on the targets that you're going after, you really have to think about how you're gonna use that time. And it's sort of horrifying from a marketing perspective that I have two and a half seconds, which is the average time people spend on an ad to get somebody's attention,

Kyle Kaplanis:

right.

Maggie Lower:

At the same time, it's really invigorating challenge. What's my intention. What do I wanna communicate in that two and a half seconds? How do I, as a leader in marketing. Come from a place of authenticity and joy instead of fear, and trying to sell through fear. And I think those are things that are really positive developments. I think the industry's really coming full circle around being grounded in your purpose and being grounded in your mission and making sure that everything you do connects back to those core values. And that's hard. That can be really challenging. I think you have to make difficult decisions. In the moment about how you're gonna show up as a company, but people are looking for that. That's why they buy from you. They wanna know that the things that you say you do are the things that you're going to do. And now I think those are good challenges for marketers. Selling is critical. Selling more things to more people is critical, but you now have to do it the right way. Mm-hmm like, it's not, it's not delivery at all costs. And I think that's why people are gravitating towards mediums, like video and TikTok, cuz they wanna connect. They wanna connect.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Exactly. Exactly.

Maggie Lower:

So compelling about it, which is why it's the most downloaded app in the past three years and has billions of users. It connects with people in a different way.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Exactly. The things that stood out to me was that how marketing is shifting from what you've seen is, people are now craving authenticity and they're craving that connection. And I a hundred percent agree, like that's the most powerful thing right now is community. And that word might be such a buzzword right now, but it's so true. Like community, community, community, no matter who you are, if you're a brand business or personal brand, it's all about that. And people are wanting to see the real things, not just an ad that doesn't connect to us as a human. We want to connect to people on a human level and just really hear their authentic voice. And we're seeing that. People who are brands and businesses who are using TikTok right now, and are doing it the right way are sharing their story, sharing their voice. And that's, what's driving people to connect and want to be a part of that. I mentioned brands and businesses, but it's bringing that level. And brands I think, are having a hard time with that. Do you think right now like that, do you think that there's, that, that level of disconnect of some people who are just not getting it yet, figuring out, how to share their story in an authentic way?

Maggie Lower:

Yeah, but I think it's because people are in learning mode. I don't think people are trying to do it poorly. I think they're trying to figure it out. Right. And I think that's something we talk a lot about in marketing, at least on our team that, there's a big difference between failing and learning. If a failure to do something, then it's been really powerful. Right. And it gets you the ability to move on a bunch of other things to try. I guess I'm an optimist. I like to think people are trying to do it the right way, but I do think that there's a really important need to go back to your core marketing training, right? Are you doing something because it actually connects to the rest of the agenda that you have around, your business strategy or are you just throwing stuff out there and hoping it'll resonate with someone cuz if that's the strategy. Then you're probably not gonna, hit the targets that you wanna hit because you haven't been targeted or thoughtful about the way you've created the content. And so I think it's this interesting shift for marketers of, yeah. There's new media, but the rules of marketing haven't changed. Right. For sure. And so I think it's really important for people to understand that core training. Around really understanding your customer is becoming even more important. It's not a nice to have anymore. It actually sits at the center of everything that you do. And I think that's the best and most powerful development even of the last two years, three years of COVID. You can't sit on the sidelines anymore. The digital workplace is where you're getting all of your interactions in many cases,

Kyle Kaplanis:

mm-hmm. Maggie Lower: And to your Even people that wanna work from home, that doesn't mean they don't wanna be part of a community. Absolutely.

Maggie Lower:

These platforms give you a chance to virtually participate in a way that's comfortable for you. And it doesn't keep people out. And I think as somebody that's, been historically from an underrepresented group, that's the most powerful thing about social. We can spend a lot of time, talking about some of the negativity that exists there and it's there. Right. Like it can run from it. It's why at Hootsuite, we focused a lot on mental health and mental wellness, because you need to have the right relationship with technology and with social. Same time, social's a place where you can take your side hustles and you can turn 'em into a living. It's a place where people are welcome. You can have a platform, even if you've been silenced, you can start a movement. Those are the things about social that we need to be talking more about. And that's from where we sit at Hootsuite, we'd like to see more people help us take back social and have it be a place of joy and a place of learning. And I think TikTok is a great representation of that. People are gravitating to things that are fun, that are funny, that are unexpected. right. Mm-hmm . And so I think that's part of what keeps it so compelling. You think about like work talks and plant talks and all these different things.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Exactly. All the different talks.

Maggie Lower:

Right. And I think that's why people are there. They feel like they're part of something they feel seen. And I think that's why this rise of the creator is on an electric trajectory in my opinion.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Absolutely. I think that it's so true. I was having conversations with so many people this last week, actually around this subject of people are taking back power of the world really is because especially gen Z gen, Z's really stepping up and saying, I'm not afraid to speak my voice, speak my message, and really taking this back. And I think that's great because we have a platform that can organically reach people, even on your first video. If you have a really powerful message in your first video. Traditionally back in the, the days of when social media really started kicking off with YouTube and all that, it took a long time to build that message, right? Like it took a long time to build those communities, but TikTok gives you the power that your message can be seen and heard within your first video, if it's something powerful and then the communities draw around that message and come forward. It's true. I personally work very closely with a lot of creators that are in the LGBT community and they're using this right now to really harness that community and let people know that there is a place for them and that they can feel safe and that they can share their messages well, of what they've gone through. And I think that because of that, we're seeing a massive shift is specifically gen Z, like people in those communities are normalized to them. Like it's not an issue to that generation. I'm excited about that for the future. And I think that, marketers are really taking grasp with that too and saying, holy, there's something here that we can share too.

Maggie Lower:

That's. Yeah, I think marketers sit in a really unique position to help influence that conversation. Right? We are working really hard on representation in media and, we just did a rebrand a couple weeks ago, Kyle, and one of the most important principles was that everything was gonna be social first and that we were gonna use influencers and ask influencers to work with us around this rebrand to make it really more powerful. We didn't want everything to feel overproduced or like it was done with professional actors. We used social media influencers and we picked probably some unexpected, folks to be a part of it. And I'm so proud of that work because it's one thing to say, you're gonna drive, representation in media. It's another thing to do it. And it can be a little bit scary and the team just really rallied around it and wanted to make that happen and were equally committed to it. And, across the spectrum, like not everybody, obviously on the team is L G B T or, a person of. Right. Everybody wanted to see more faces like the ones we see in the world. And I think that part of it became just a really special part of the work that was done. And I think to your point around creators, they're really the next iteration of influencers. And I think influencers put themselves in the center of the community. With creators, it's really about interacting with that product in a way that person would mm-hmm . And people are flocking to that creator because of the way they interact with things. Cuz they see something that they can relate to. And they're kind of the perpetuation of the fandom. It's that creation it's that creativity. And so I think that's part of what makes this so exciting. There are people that never, would've had a platform that have a platform and that are influencing and helping to move culture forward. And I can't really think of anything like that today.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Right? Exactly.

Maggie Lower:

And so quickly and so quickly.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Exactly. I wanna take my hat off to Hootsuite because. There's a lot of companies that understand creators, but they wanna work with them, but it's almost like they're not really connected. It's like they keep them over here and then their brand's over here. But you guys seem to have merged together and because I'm a massive advocate of them. Those that are building and have built their audience. They've learned the skills on building community and working with them, like Hootsuite bringing them on board, you're able to learn from them from their experiences and, harness their authenticity to the communities and showing products or services in a way that people can understand and relate to. And that's right there is the hugest message showing people how it can relate to them because, you know, and I don't want to go off on a side tangent, but like ads, In the past. And I think this is why like specifically gen Z hates them is because they were so disconnected on a human level that I never really had a commercial really make any sense to me. And I don't think I've ever bought anything based off of a commercial or a billboard ever, but on TikTok I'm buying so many things. And my household is run literally by what TikTok says I have four kids, right. I have four of them and they're all telling me, we need to get this. We need to buy this. And it's just because it's so real and it really hits us that we need to have all the things. So I really think since, specifically 2020 until now, our house is literally run by what's happening on TikTok. Versus traditional media

Maggie Lower:

to do it. Right. Right. Yeah. It shows you a lot of different, a lot of different things that you might not be thinking about. And I think it's fun. I have a five year old and 11 year old and it's very similar in our house. If we wanna take a break and do something fun, like we'll watch TikTok for five minutes, right. We're probably gonna get a lot of parenting troll emails after this, but they do have limits on tech. We are very structured around how they interact with technology but, TikTok is the place where, I feel like you can go , and as long as you've, really thought about your algorithm and the kinda content and then attracts based on your viewing, you can have a lot of fun with it for, for sure. I think that's uncommon with social, right? Yeah. That's you don't know what you're gonna get and you don't know what's gonna be served up and it can be a little bit scary. And I think, that's part of. I think again, makes TikTok stand out. And I think there are other platforms that are doing a great job as well. I think that everybody's trying really hard to navigate things that are difficult. It's really difficult to control negativity. It's really difficult to screen content. It's really hard to try to corral billions and billions of users into using their platforms responsibly. That's really hard to do.

Kyle Kaplanis:

For sure.

Maggie Lower:

But I do think sort of the operating principles for TikTok are a little different because it's actually the content that drives things. Mm-hmm, , it's the quality of the content. Exactly. I think that keeps some of its purpose, a little pure. we'll see, you know, change all the time. Right. But that seems to be where we are. And I think, no for sure. So interesting and so compelling. And I just think the rise of the creator is so important to the future of marketing. We partnered with this phenomenal photographer, Amy Lombard, who's worked with some really phenomenal brands, , Wall Street Journal, and Google. And one of the things that we got comfortable with really quickly, we did all of our research and we said, we think this person could really partner with us well that this would be a partnership and not a one-sided transaction. And that's what we did. We had her share her pitch of where she thought we should go with it. And we trusted your vision. Like you don't hire, thank you. And then tell them how to do their job. exactly you hire them and you ask for their ideas. And I think, the reason things are coming out the way they are. is that we've mission alignment with the people that we're working with. Right. And that's the most important thing. They wanna work hard for us because we wanna work hard for them. Mm-hmm and you put that above rate card and all of these other traditional metrics of how your agency strategy is working. Yep. I think you find, you get outsized returns, no matter, the actual rate.

Kyle Kaplanis:

I love that, , you know, it's interesting. Okay. I'm gonna mention this, but we've talked before on a podcast and we talked about CMOs are one of the toughest positions right now because of the changes that are happening rapidly, specifically, even during COVID really kickstarting that really fast. There's going to be a disconnect of CMOs who get it and understand this new space. Like you Maggie to me have really understood this and made sense. And then there's gonna be those who are still stuck in the traditional media aspect of things and not really grasping that. And those are the ones that maybe hire creators, but try to drive everything that they're doing, where I appreciate you, because again, I'm a huge creator advocate. And I just love the fact that you said we have hired these creators to let them give us their opinion on how this is gonna work. And it's true. The creators know their audience, the creators know their community. They know what works for them. By you doing that, it shows that Hootsuite is really understanding this new space is gonna be a forefront runner, in this new creator economy. I take my hat off again and I think that's fantastic. I love that.

Maggie Lower:

Thank you. I have a wonderful team. It is not just me. there are a lot of people that work really hard on this that I learn from every day. But yes, I do think that we sit in this unique position of having created this social media management category. And so there are always people on our team looking for what's around the corner. And that's a fun place to be in terms of being the CMO of a function. That's already thinking about what's coming next. Absolutely. I feel fortunate to work with just a phenomenal, phenomenal team. And I have a boss that trusts me. You hear about these CMO tenures being short and they're gonna continue to be one because the industry's changing so quickly. Mm-hmm . In most downturns, you see marketing quietly move off the balance sheet that has not been the case in this particular, set of circumstances. People are realizing they need marketing and comms more than ever. So that's right. That's a really wonderful development, I think for our profession. But it continues to be is hard job. Right? Mm-hmm I mean, you're pulled at every single function in the firm. I actually own half of revenue in my job, so I have a P and L role as well. Okay. And I love that. I think it makes a big difference. But I do think marketing continues to be a tricky profession, but it is one that if you can navigate it, you really have to understand how everything in a company works to be an effective marketer, and you have to understand the market. And I think that puts you at a level of business IQ. That's really different from other functions, but you gotta stay on top of it. You gotta watch where the market's going. You gotta pay attention to signaling and you're gonna screw some things up and you gotta get comfortable saying, you're sorry. exactly a lot of places where you can build, that rapport with your audience and with your team. Just by being human and saying, you know what, sometimes you get things wrong. Right? Totally. People are much more willing to forgive than they are when you don't take responsibility for making some really bad decisions.

Kyle Kaplanis:

No, absolutely. That's huge. just the human element. Now people want to see that. It's almost like, podcasting or whatever, like before people were so stuck on, if they screwed up, said something wrong and people actually love seeing that stuff now, like in videos and stuff, people are not even editing things out. They're just leaving it because it just, I don't know. It just connects as somebody being like, oh, that sounded so human to me versus marketable, which is fun. What are some things that you guys are working on at Hootsuite right now that's exciting?

Maggie Lower:

We just launched our partnership with TikTok. So that's something that we're obviously, that's huge, super excited about. It's huge. I mean, that's a big development, there's lots of training going on around that. The rebrand is an event, but we did do it under NDA. So we had, a small army of people that were working on it for the past six months, we're now bringing everybody else into the fold. So that's a huge area of focus because, we have a really strong perspective in marketing that marketing has to live everywhere in the firm. And so there's lots of training on voice and visual identity and how to communicate in the Hootsuite way. And so that's a big area of focus for us. We always have lots of campaigns going on. We just dropped our stat, snapshot, which has lots of interesting data in it. So if you haven't read it yet, Kyle, I hope you will. Cause there's lots in there about TikTok. We're going into strategy season where we'll be designing kind of everything that we wanna focus on in 2023. There's no shortage of things happening, in Hootsuite and particularly in marketing at Hootsuite right now. But the rebrand, those are never once and done activities will be super focused on, rolling other elements of that out over the next few months. So there's lots of exciting stuff. We just hired a chief product officer about six weeks ago, Natalia Williams, who came to us from MailChimp, she's making, you know, right. strides quickly. Keep an eye out. There's lots of really interesting stuff coming, over the next, six to 12 months.

Kyle Kaplanis:

No, that's really, really, really exciting. And taking somebody from MailChimp is great too, cuz they've been doing some phenomenal things in this space. So I mean her knowledge I'm sure is gonna really bring, Hootsuite up and all those things. So that's really exciting, Maggie. There's a lot. Incredible things that you shared, with us. And is there any like last minute things that you would just love to tell the audience that it is listening today? This is your time to share any message you like.

Maggie Lower:

I think there's a couple things. One of which is, , I talk a lot about this idea of courageous creativity and kind of overcoming fear and imposter syndrome and just, you know, creating brave spaces. And I think that, TikTok is a really good place to do that. It can be really intimidating. So a way to start is just get out there and get familiar with it. Like start playing with it, download the app. Yes. Figure out how it works. I don't think TikTok is gonna go away fast enough for people to be dismissive. Like, I just don't see it happening. I think that it's a platform that's gonna be here. As we know, there will be other entrances cuz there always are there probably one launched while we've been on the phone. Kyle. Exactly. No for sure. Um, so you know, I do think that we always have to stay on top of what's coming, but if you're not spending time trying to figure out these short form video platforms, you're gonna be so far behind mm-hmm you're gonna be so far behind. I think that's really important. You still. Need to understand classic marketing, know your target audience, align your goals with your business objectives, get creators that are the right fit. We talk about relevance, reach and resonance mm-hmm . So are they relevant to what you actually sell? Do they have the reach that you wanna actually accomplish and are they gonna resonate with the people that you're. Trying to sell too. I think those are just important things to think about. I think this idea of vigilance, I know we just had pride month in June and there's this whole campaign around queer all year. Right? Mm-hmm , I do not become less gay on July 1st so I think that's really important for people to stay vigilant around, the fact that we need to be more inclusive and create a sense of belonging. And one way that I know that Hootsuite can do that is by doing it online.

Kyle Kaplanis:

I love that.

Maggie Lower:

And so I just would love to see more. More people, really think about that and make some decisions to demonstrate their support for it.

Kyle Kaplanis:

I love that so much. That was a great last message. I wanna take back what you said as well, because it's the truth. Anybody who's listening. A lot of people listen cuz they're curious. Right? This might be their first podcast episode that they've listened from me. And because I've said this so many times, but it's so true. The first step you should really take is just jump in, understand, learn the platform. Maybe , make videos, yourself, make a couple, see how it is, get embraced in it like right now, what I mean by that is do it today because. Again, the more time that goes by the harder it is to catch up. Cuz we are moving so fast. It really, really, really is important to just embrace it. If you don't have TikTok downloaded and you're listening to this right now, that should be what you're doing right now. Just stop listening to this podcast and download that because you're gonna need to know, what we're talking about. And it's so funny how many people are not taking that step yet of just even creating themselves for the first time. I really think that makes you a better marketer in general, even if it's not your area focus, like just doing it yourself, gives you better ideas and things like that. So I think that's really cool. Maggie, where can people follow you on socials or.

Maggie Lower:

I'm most active on LinkedIn. Okay. So that's really what you can find me the most active I'm on Twitter, but not as active, but it's at Maggie Lower, but I'm pretty easy to find on LinkedIn. So just Maggie Lower on, on LinkedIn and that's where I find I get the most content that I need to do my work. And then I am on TikTok. I just posted my first. TikTok video two weeks ago. Oh goodness. If you're gonna get up and tell people to be brave, you better be brave yourself. I love that. Thank you. We did do one with ally. No, I probably have a little bit of cleaning up to do in my TikTok account too, because I think my 11 year old hijacked it. And I think so. I love that for me. But yeah, that's how you can find me and I am very active. I always love hearing from people and talking to people and, it's a channel that I stay very much on top of.

Kyle Kaplanis:

Awesome. People who are listening right now, what you could do is go to the description notes of this podcast. I'm gonna have links straight to Maggie's LinkedIn, because believe it or not, 90% of my audience are more in the marketing spectrum. So they're all gonna be on LinkedIn. So they're gonna want to connect. Then I will connect your, TikTok account and show that video that you did to give people, a moment right now to be brave as well, stand up, be brave, be a creator, to understand more of what they're doing in this space and understand where we're moving. And I think that's really important. I will also connect the Hootsuite links in there, so that way people who have maybe never heard of them, could take time to go through that and read about them and see what they're doing in this space.

Maggie Lower:

And there's tons and tons of resources that we've launched. We've got a culture guide. We've got newsletters that go out and, I'll leave you with this, Kyle, cuz I think these are stats that people need to know. 38% of Hootsuite customers we're already using TikTok and 60% of them plan on being on TikTok in 2023. Wow. So, I think it's really important to get people a little bit amped up about if you're not paying attention to this, go pay attention to it.

Kyle Kaplanis:

hundred percent. Those are great stats. Thank you so much for sharing that with me. This was a phenomenal episode. I think that, Maggie shared so many great insights about you as yourself. What, Hootsuites doing and the importance of a CMO in this position in this time and era. So thank you very much for your. I'm really pumped about this and thank you to the audience who are listening each and every week to BizTok for TikTok and remind you guys, everybody who's listening right now. We started a new podcast with my co-founder of PRJT Z over on Tomorrow Today. And we're doing some great things on teaching people about, marketing as a creator or what's gonna be happening in the future that you need to be focused on today. So be sure to go listen to tomorrow today, where you'll see and hear way more awesome insights from other people in this space. So thank you, Maggie.

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