April 16, 2025 • 41 mins
Marc Viale takes us on a fascinating journey through the evolution of digital marketing, from the early dot-com days to today's AI revolution, revealing profound insights about growth strategy that challenge conventional wisdom.
Starting in Philadelphia before moving to San Francisco in 1991, Viale's path from direct mail shops to founding Lab415 wasn't straightforward. His breakthrough came when he taught himself SQL database marketing in the late 90s—a skill most marketers avoided. This technical foundation allowed him to access customer insights directly without waiting for engineers, giving him a significant competitive advantage throughout his career.
At The RealReal, Viale helped solve a fundamental trust problem in luxury resale. While eBay operated as a "buyer beware" marketplace, The RealReal differentiated itself through authentication, taking possession of items and verifying their authenticity before selling. This product-focused approach to marketing created a thriving ecosystem where sellers could quickly liquidate luxury items and buyers could purchase with confidence. Perhaps most surprising was his counterintuitive discovery that as marketing spend increased, customer acquisition costs actually decreased—a phenomenon he attributes to proper full-funnel marketing that continuously expanded their audience.
Now with Lab415, Viale helps companies think beyond just Meta and Google advertising. He emphasizes the importance of brand pillars, content strategy, and top-of-funnel awareness—elements often overlooked by companies focused solely on performance marketing. He's also passionate about helping marketers craft compelling narratives about marketing performance for boards and CFOs through media mix modeling that demonstrates correlations between marketing activities and business outcomes.
For today's marketers, Viale's advice is clear: never stop learning, especially about AI and emerging technologies. While he sees tremendous value in AI for content creation and personalization, he maintains that human judgment remains essential. Ready to transform your marketing approach? Start thinking beyond performance metrics to build a brand that scales through trust and innovative storytelling.
This podcast is proudly sponsored by USC Annenberg’s Master of Science in Digital Media Management (MSDMM) program. An online master’s designed to prepare practitioners to understand the evolving media landscape, make data-driven and ethical decisions, and build a more equitable future by leading diverse teams with the technical, artistic, analytical, and production skills needed to create engaging content and technologies for the global marketplace. Learn more or apply today at https://dmm.usc.edu.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Joseph Itaya (00:01):
Welcome to Mediascape Insights from Digital
Changemakers, a speaker seriesand podcast brought to you by
USC Annenberg's Digital MediaManagement Program.
Join us as we unlock thesecrets to success in an
increasingly digital world.
Hi everybody and welcome tothis week's episode of
(00:25):
Mediascape Insights from DigitalChangemakers.
And today we're really happy tobe joined by Marc Viale, and
Mark is the founder of Lab415,which is a marketing company for
the dot-com marketing space tohelp pre-IPO companies overcome
their growth challenges, andhe's going to tell us a whole
lot more here at the DigitalMedia Management Program at USC,
(00:46):
thinking through storytelling,challenges, strategic challenges
and opportunities is really oneof the main pillars of our
program, and at USC Annenberg,where we're constantly thinking
about how to createcommunication that is both
intimate and personal but thenalso has global possibility, and
(01:07):
I'm sure that those are thekinds of things that you're
thinking about as well.
But, mark, why don't we get toknow each other just a little
bit?
Could you take us back to thebeginning of your career?
How did you first?
Marc Viale (01:18):
get started.
Thanks for having me on, joseph.
And my career started way backin the 90s, you know, when this
whole dot-com boom was startingto happen in the Bay Area.
So luckily I made this.
You know I grew up inPhiladelphia, I went to school
in the Midwest, at Marquette,and I came out here in 1991 just
(01:41):
to, you know, be in the SanFrancisco experience.
And you know I was justplanning on being a student.
You know I was taking gradcourses in history and that I
decided wasn't really for me.
But you know I've always thoughtback that a lot of my learning
comes from, you know, just beinga very curious student and
(02:02):
history and like understandingtrends and they, you see how
they repeat themselves and youknow different empires and
things like that.
And so everybody's like, howdid you get into marketing?
And it's like, well, you know,going into history and learning
about different cultures and youknow currencies sort of helps
you with marketing.
And so you know I startedworking at a direct mail shop
(02:24):
when direct mail was stillreally you know it's still
actually plugging along back in1983.
And then I would say around 97,I went into the advertising at
an agency and then I was like,oh my goodness, what's all this
dot com stuff?
So it was just booming aroundme and I'm like I'm sitting in
(02:45):
this agency just helping oldstalwart clients plug away and I
wanted to get into the big.
You know what was happeningthen and you know this whole new
trend in digital marketing.
And so in 99, I went to work forOfoto, which was, I think, you
know, the modern day companythat you know.
(03:06):
It sort of transitioned intowas Shutterfly shutterflycom,
where you get your Christmascards and stuff like that.
But the whole like photosharing thing was like a huge
disruptive force.
And photography with Kodak itsort of brought down Kodak.
You know Kodak was a hugedinosaur that came down.
But I learned so much One thingI always talk about with
(03:30):
students and also people thatthey're out of work or whatever
when you have a time off alittle time off between the
advertising agency and Ophotoand I started to learn about SQL
and I started to dig into likehow to, because the new
marketing back in 99 was aboutdatabase marketing.
(03:50):
You know how could you like allthis data is coming structured
data is coming online and it'seasy to have these data sets
versus this offline component,and that really pushed me
forward, because a lot ofmarketing back in 99 was brand
marketing, not really aboutresponse and direct performance
marketing, and so I didn't wantto wait for the data from an
(04:15):
engineer.
As a marketer, I wanted to havethat data in my hand so I could
understand the trends, and solearning SQL and database
marketing was sort of a linchpinfor me to really unlock a lot
of opportunity.
Joseph Itaya (04:30):
It sounds like we're still fairly early on in
the story of your professionaljourney, so we can jump around a
little bit.
There's a question I'd love toask, because you're beginning to
talk now about technology.
It's interesting that you wentfrom direct mail, which, as you
mentioned, is still pluggingalong, and still plugging enough
but that's pretty non-techversus where you began to head,
(04:54):
which was pure tech.
So can you talk about yourmindset related to looking
towards what's next?
Is there some advice that youcould share about how important
that is?
Marc Viale (05:08):
I think that's so important for today's marketers
to really, you know, one isalways, you know, be reading
about the current trends, youknow what's going on.
And I think that was sort of.
You know, they were putting outsequel books back in the
nineties and like how you couldsequel for dummies and things
like that that you couldactually learn and pick up, and
(05:28):
I think a lot of marketers werescared of it.
But that was something thatreally intrigued me and I think
it's sort of, you know, I camefrom an educational background.
You know, my dad was like abiophysicist and he was able to
do computer models in the 1970s,and so I was very intrigued
about learning, constantlylearning, and I think that's
sort of been my career is.
You know, I've been constantlylearning, reading a lot of books
(05:52):
.
I mean.
A lot of folks you know thinkyou have to.
You know you have to actuallylearn on the job, but you can do
a lot outside of work where youcan learn about what's going on
with the AI revolution that'sgoing on.
Like my big message to a lot ofstudents out there is like
learn as much as you can aboutAI.
(06:13):
And you know, back in 22, whenit started to.
Really, you know it's beenaround forever, but in 22, when
it started to come out for chatGPT, I started grabbing books
about.
You know how does this all workand why does it work?
And it was just so intriguingto me and I think that's sort of
been my story throughout mycareer how does SEO work?
(06:33):
What's going on there?
But really, digging in beyondthe surface, I think a lot of
folks I noticed in my careerwill just say that's some other
department to do.
You know, and I don't need toknow, how SEO works.
But you really do.
In order to create a strategy,you know you have marketers.
You know for an SEO program,for instance, you have to
(06:57):
understand what a contentstrategy looks like.
And then how does that comeinto a purpose to actually win
with SEO?
But yeah, I mean so Ofoto wassort of a.
You know I was there till 2005.
We were really lucky that Kodakinvested in us during the
dot-com crash in 2001.
And so we were able to survivea little bit and you know that
(07:20):
kept going.
I wanted to take some of thatexperience to a retailer because
, you know, all the retailersafter the dot-com crash were
starting to get involved indigital marketing.
They wanted to understand itbetter and so I went to work for
a company in the Bay here Ithink they're in LA now BB
women's retailer.
Everybody remembers BB and Ihelped them with database
(07:42):
marketing and also just sort ofreally integrating and this is
sort of you know, back in theday this was sort of a novel,
but I think it's still novelwhere we were taking store data
and putting that into ourdatabase at corporate and being
able to use that online,multi-platform, you know, and
(08:02):
offline.
And so we really developed, youknow, just by using a loyalty
program.
And so this whole databasemarketing thing continued to be
a really big advantage for mebecause I was able to leverage
this into stores, online catalogand loyalty.
And then, you know, just witheverything in these boom and
(08:23):
bust cycles in 08, I mean, westarted 08, 09, we had the
equity crisis and again, anothergreat opportunity for everybody
.
Even right now, when there'sall these recession fears and
there's so much movement andeverything's moving so fast with
AI, it's always an opportunity.
(08:43):
I always look at these busts asa opportunity and what I
noticed is gaming was huge.
I don't know if you rememberback in 08, 09, but Zynga was
like the talk of the town, youknow.
So I went and worked for themakers of Second Life, linden
Lab, and so you know that wasthe virtual world of its day and
(09:05):
it's still.
That's still going reallystrong actually.
And you know you hear about Meta, the virtual world that
Zuckerberg is working on, andall that, and you know that
really came out of Second Life.
You know a lot of the engineersthat were critical in the early
days went over to Meta to helpFacebook on that, and then you
(09:26):
know that was sort of a wholedifferent world to me because it
was all virtual.
It was the most bizarreexperience.
We could talk you know hoursabout Second Life, but it was
sort of amazing in that it wasvirtual goods you know that were
on this market, that we had allthese content creators and they
(09:49):
were creating amazing things inworld and then selling them on
a marketplace that people wouldbuy.
And I mean back then you knowit was their economy in the
Second Life in-world experiencewas hundreds of millions of
dollars.
It was sort of crazy.
And then the cool thing aboutSecond Life is these content
creators could actually cash out, not in game currency but cash
out in real dollars and so itreally was an attractive to a
(10:13):
lot of early content creatorsusing 3D animation and that kind
of thing.
You know, second Life started todie down around 2012 because it
just wasn't growing with.
It was too hard and it waslaggy and people couldn't move
around.
So so it was obvious that, youknow, the writing was on the
(10:35):
door that I had to think about,I had to pivot and I got.
You know, the CEO of LondonLabs Second Life, mark Hengden,
had left the company and he knewJulie Wainwright at the Real
Real and Julie, you know,reached out to me and she wanted
me to come out to Sausalito andcheck out their warehouse, you
know, and see what was going on.
(10:56):
I'm like, ok, what's this crazything?
You know, because I'm like youknow this Julie Wainwright I
don't know if you heard of her.
She's she was the founder ofPetscom, which had a huge boom
and bust during the dot-com era,and then she created this, the
RealReal, which was even biggerthan Pets, and the RealReal was
(11:20):
sort of this you know, it wasthe penultimate startup.
It was in a garage over inSausalito.
You know where all thosehouseboats are.
I don't know if you know thearea.
It's in the Marin and it wasfunny because it would always.
Every once in a while it wouldflood and it would get closer
and closer to our warehouse andwe'd freak out.
Joseph Itaya (11:36):
Flooding's not great when you're dealing in
luxury consignment.
Marc Viale (11:39):
Exactly, exactly.
Joseph Itaya (11:59):
So yeah, of course , the real deal is what you know
.
We were dealing with luxuryagain, things that are not
digital at all.
Fast forward a couple ofdecades and you find yourself
back, strangely, in a similarsort of place where one of the
big pillars of your career hasbeen taking tangible some of
these items are luxury, some ofthem are old and then figuring
(12:21):
out how to bring them into adigital marketplace.
I just love that, but you canexplain it better than me.
Just give us a quick highlighton what was the real real and
what made it great, before weget into the story.
Marc Viale (12:32):
Yeah, so the real real was sort of answering the
problem of eBay.
So eBay was this hugemarketplace of clothing and cars
and watches, but it was alwaysbuyer beware, it was not
authenticated, right, it was.
So it's a marketplace of buyersand sellers.
And Julie saw, you know, thishuge white space opportunity for
(12:56):
luxury goods, a focus on luxurygoods, mainly apparel.
We started out with women's andmen's and moved into watches
and jewelry apparel.
We started out with women's andmen's and moved into watches
and jewelry.
But she saw this huge whitespace opportunity where you know
buyers need to know that it'strusted and real.
It's not a fake, you know, andso you know.
I think now you see eBay reallycoming on strong with the
(13:18):
authenticated message and sothey sort of you know it was so
funny back in those days eBaywould actually let us advertise
on their platform.
So the real world was reallyanswering the question of it was
a trust issue out there.
And the other thing is, youknow you could every once in a
while you found some Chanel andHermes on eBay, but it was far
(13:42):
and few between on eBay.
But it was far and few betweenand a lot of this was sort of
like what you were saying withKodak, where people were taking
photos online.
They were going to brick andmortar, you know, and so it was
funny.
I used to.
You know it's sort of sadactually, but I used to say
those photo processing placesare all going to go out of
business soon and it's all goingto be online.
(14:03):
And I would say we're going totake a big piece of offline
consignment because that's wherepeople, people trusted that
consignment store that hadsomeone that was knowledgeable
handbags and fashion.
So, julie, you know, julie gotthe big idea when she went out
to Palo Alto to a store with afriend and her friend was sort
(14:26):
of well-heeled and a venturecapitalist and instead of
looking in the front of thestore where the retail was, she
went into the back right awaywhere the consignment was, and
Julie was like, oh my God,you're buying consignment.
And she's like, julie, it'sChanel, it's not consignment, it
doesn't matter.
And so that just popped an ideain her head that like there's
(14:49):
all this inventory out here butit's not online, you know, and
that was just a sliver of it.
Most of it's in people's closetsowners of fashion and watches
and jewelry and outlet, and alot of these people didn't need
money.
They just sort of liked money,you know, and so and and they
(15:10):
wanted to buy for the nextseason.
So this gave them a really goodidea of like I could buy last
season, once I'm done with it, Icould consign it and then make
money and buy it the next season.
So it really worked well withretail.
And again, you know, theconsignor didn't care about
authentication but the buyer did, and so it was this perfect,
(15:31):
you know, seller buyermarketplace where the seller was
happy because things would sellsuper fast and it was such a
huge consumer base and the buyerwas happy because it was
authenticated and you know theywere inspected, you know.
So you weren't going to getsomething really smelly in a box
coming, you know, and you knowa cigarette burns on them
(15:54):
because they've been inspectedand we took possession of the
goods.
It was unlike anybody elsebecause we actually took
possession of the goods toinspect the item before we would
actually sell it.
Joseph Itaya (16:06):
This is a fascinating story and for any of
our students who are listeningand we talk about product
marketing a lot I hope thateveryone listened to the story
that Marc told just now, becausethat wasn't a story about
marketing, it was a story aboutproduct.
It was a story about product andwe tell our students all the
time that in order to be a greatmarketer and storyteller, you
(16:27):
have to understand the productinside and out, as well as the
product managers, the productdesigners, do, because you have
to crawl inside the soul of thatproduct, also have to
understand this target audience.
So what you just shared, mark,is so fascinating and that was
like a case study in what Ithink great marketing can be,
(16:50):
because you really understand,really went deep.
And could I just ask you aquestion also, mark, that I you
know, as such a veteran expertmarketers as you are, that
through the process of tellingthe story, through the marketing
and then going and findingproduct market fit and finding
that audience, did thoseinsights, as a marketer, help
(17:14):
shape the product?
Did you bring those insightsback to the product team and say
, guys, here's what we're seeing, here's how we can make this
product even better, thatsymbiotic relationship between
marketing?
Marc Viale (17:26):
Absolutely and I, you know, I would.
I would say, you know, when youtalk about this whole, I think
a lot of people when I, when Igo talk to a lot of companies
that are under the a hundredmillion range and they haven't
really cut through, they don'tknow how to talk about their
company in terms of the productand how it sort of integrates
(17:46):
with the brand.
And one thing we were reallystrong about our brand pillars
and they connected really to theproduct.
So one, what was thedifferentiation?
You know, and they connectedreally to the product, you know.
So one, authentic.
You know what was thedifferentiation?
How do we differentiate ourbrand from all these flashmark,
the thread ups?
There were so many at the time.
You know, how do wedifferentiate?
(18:07):
We wanted to make sure that wesort of echoed that message over
and over again.
And so one was authentication.
Nobody else was authenticating,everybody was.
You know they may say, you knowwe look at it through online
pictures, but you have to smellthe bag.
You got to touch it, touch it,understand if it's the metal is
(18:28):
actually the real metal.
And you know, if the Cartierlove ring has, you know you can,
you have to get it under a lubeto actually make sure it's an
accurate ring, because they'rereproducing these all over and
you don't want that fake.
It's a very embarrassing momentwhen you take that to a jeweler
.
And so authentication was numberone.
(18:48):
Luxury resale was number two,where we had this amazing you
could compare the retail priceand the resale price, and so
people love to see you know.
So one of those things was weknew people wanted a deal right
and we couldn't just discountall day because that would upset
(19:11):
the sellers, and so we wantedto be able to communicate the
deal they're getting Right, andI guess there's a lot of
companies out there doing thatreally well.
Today is like Quince.
I don't know if you know Quince.
com Some of your students mayknow about them but they're
doing really good of comparingtheir cashmere sweaters against
big name brands in the industry,and I think that's really good.
(19:33):
So you don't have to constantlydiscount.
So people have this impliedsavings.
So, yeah, that Chanel handbagis expensive.
Maybe it's $4,500, but it was$6,500 at retail, you know.
So we really worked withproduct to be able to show those
differences and also that wewould have the luxury managers
who went out and secured thisproduct, would you know, get
(19:55):
receipts, so we would know theprice and, like the, the buying
price and we could see what it'sgoing for now.
Joseph Itaya (20:13):
Another couple of quick questions, because I see
that when you were finishing upat the RealReal, you were the
chief growth officer.
You moved from VP of integratedmarketing to SVP of marketing,
but then you moved into thisplace of more than just the CMO,
(20:35):
which was sort of the brandthing.
Marc Viale (20:39):
I wanted to sort of bridge brand and performance
marketing into growth.
And one thing that also youknow I was, I worked really
tightly with businessintelligence and so you know it
was sort of bridging businessintelligence and marketing.
So you know it was sort ofbridging business intelligence
and marketing.
And then, you know, eventuallytowards the end of my career at
(21:01):
the Real Real, I took on thesales part, was actually going
out and you know we would takeleads from marketing.
It was really interesting.
One thing that we do at the RealReal is everybody used to think
like, hey, you got to go outand get consigner leads, but
nobody wants to consign, theywant to buy.
And so, like I want to buyChanel, I don't want to consign
(21:24):
it.
And so what we would do is wewould always lead with the
buying message and it wouldalways be much more attractive
from a performance standpointthan a consigned message.
And we would get, you know,every marketplace has like four
to one buyers to sellers.
You know, maybe it varies alittle bit, but we would always
have more buyers and sellers andso out of those buyers they're
(21:47):
able to buy Chanel.
They already had Chanel right,and so we would use that
database to mine for sales leads, and so we would actually look
at that and talk about data.
You look at zip codes, you tryto figure out who lives near
Anima and Marcus and Saks andthey're going to be your best
sellers and then we would putthose into a CRM application for
(22:09):
outbound selling.
So eventually, more than thebuying but also the selling part
, how we CRM those part, thoseleads, came under my area of
expertise and so it was sort oflike the full buyer seller
situation.
Joseph Itaya (22:25):
Now, mark, it seems like every entrepreneur's
dream but maybe it's also alittle bit of a nightmare to
have a company that becomes sosuccessful that now you start
thinking about IPO and goingpublic.
I've seen it on both sides.
Can you tell us about thatprocess going public?
I've seen it on both sides.
Can you tell us about thatprocess for you as you guys were
taking it?
Marc Viale (22:41):
Yeah, so you know going IPO is like an amazing
process.
You know it's just like you'redoing the roadshow of analysts
and it's sort of amazing.
You know you're being filmedand to talk about the company
and like it's sort of a once ina lifetime thing.
Hopefully I'll be able to do itagain one time.
But you know, after you go IPOit's like you've done this big
(23:07):
push to get there and you sortof are a little bit worn out.
You know, and so you'll seethis often with most IPO
companies.
Eventually the folks, thefounding team, moves on and you
know it's sort of thatopportunity to all that vesting
that you did in stock.
You're given a chance to sortof sell it at some point.
And also I think sort of someof the decisions that you have
(23:32):
to go through when you become apublic company are a lot
different.
Like it's so focused on thequarter rather than the mission.
You know it's like we got toget earnings in, so let's not
grow so much this quarter.
Let's cut marketing a littlebit to get our earnings looking
good.
But you know, make sure we havesolid growth.
(23:52):
And you know, and so you're notthinking about how do we take
over the whole industry.
You're really marching towardsthe quarter.
And so I see of a lot ofcompanies and you know, a lot of
times you'll see earnings callsthey'll do layups in terms of
forecasts because they don'twant to overshoot, because then
(24:13):
they'll get nailed in the nextcall and so it really slows down
a company, you know, and I lovea fast-paced company.
And also, I think, because whenyou're a public company and
there's so many people you haveto answer to, you have customers
, you have investors, you haveyour board and you have to be
(24:33):
really conservative in yourthinking, you know.
And so for me, I'm a serialstartup guy and so you know I
want to sort of push theenvelope, try things and fail,
and that's not a thing you cando as a public company.
You know it's too risky.
I mean, right, look at Tesla,right.
And so you know it's too riskyto do that.
(24:55):
And so I had this urge to one, Iwanted to relax and unwind from
the big IPO process.
And then, two, I wanted torethink my next path and so I
did the CMO thing for a whilewith a caregiving company,
carewellcom, and becausecaregiving is such a huge
(25:16):
industry right now, with thehuge boomer All the baby boomers
, yeah, and tried that for awhile.
It was an interesting concept,but then I wanted to.
I wanted to sort of be my ownboss a little bit, and so Lab
415 was always in my head Likehow can I get companies past,
especially like under a hundredmillion dollar companies?
(25:39):
How can I get them pastthinking about just meta and
Google, you know?
How can I get them thinkingbigger in terms of you know what
their brand pillars are?
How does that relate to acontent strategy?
Oh, by the way, there's a wholetop of funnel thing about
awareness that you miss onGoogle, right, and like
everybody spends a lot of moneyon Google.
(26:01):
But the big thing for the real,real to to get beyond people
searching for consignment was toexpose the idea to a larger
population, and that we did thatwith TV.
And today, you know, tv stilllike direct mail, still plugging
along.
And then there, you know,there's podcasts as well.
Podcasts are like the big piecetoday, and so I try to expose
(26:25):
people to more of a full funnelwhere they're thinking about top
, where these are people comingin with less.
They're not doing a consideredpurchase at that point, but
they're thinking about you, youknow, and then you know.
Then you have your middlefunnel, which is your, your
engagement on on social, andthen you have your bottom of
funnel, which is your Googlelike hey, I'm searching for
(26:46):
Chanel handbags and I'm ready topurchase now.
So I think that sort of gettingcompanies to think a little bit
more about the bigger picture.
And also, when you start doingthat, when you start going to
people beyond your bottom offunnel, that's where the product
thing really comes into play,because you're learning through
your messaging that, hey,product folks, we have to make
(27:09):
this a little bit easier forpeople that are not in the
buying consideration cycle atthis point.
We have to and you really haveto do that earlier in the game
to understand how to scale yourbrand, because if you're down in
the $300 million range and youdon't know how to scale your
brand, you've been just doingGoogle and Facebook and growing
(27:30):
10% a year.
That's where you get in trouble, because investors are like you
don't know how to, you can'tmove this 50 points.
And that's something that youneed to start thinking about.
What are your big levers whenyou're under a hundred million
and then when you get investment, because these a lot of
investors want to scale you,they want to get payback, and if
(27:52):
you can only move the business10% every year, nobody cares,
you know, and so, but a lot ofthat's changing, you know.
I would say venture capital haschanged a lot.
Joseph Itaya (28:03):
Oh, yeah, yeah, so hard time for venture right now
.
Marc Viale (28:06):
Yeah, there were a lot of firms before and it's
starting to consolidate and alot of them are moving more into
the AI B2B sector.
So it's tough in retail todaythe AI B2B sector.
Joseph Itaya (28:20):
So it's tough in retail today.
So, mark, take us now andyou've been talking about the
strategy with Lab 415.
You know, this is the lastquestion I want to ask you
specifically about your career,and then I'd love to ask some
more general, pointed,philosophical things.
Marc Viale (28:30):
Yeah.
Joseph Itaya (28:31):
But with 415, tell us why you decided to start
that company and tell us youknow it looks like you're about
two years in now and how's thatgoing?
You're back a bit in the Iwouldn't call this an agency,
but you're not tied to onespecific company anymore.
Right, you're fractionalizingyour work.
Marc Viale (28:53):
I think it really came out of the need, for when I
was on the brand side, therewere never true growth partners
that you could work with, andthat's what Lab 4 and 5 is.
We're a growth accelerationcompany, so we're not invested
in selling you media.
You know we don't make money onthe media.
We're invested in helping yougrow and so whatever that would
(29:16):
be.
So if it's not Google, you knowwe're not going to make a point
or two on Google.
We're really sort of helpingthat CMO, that CEO, on some of
the challenges they're goinginto A lot of.
You know the funny thing aboutmarketing a lot of times it's
(29:37):
how you tell the story.
You know, and like you know howdoes, because you know
everybody's trying to figure outattribution of your customers
and it's like it's a really it'snot an exact science.
You know it's a lot ofcorrelation.
Like we spent money onpodcasting and Google search
(29:58):
actually improved, and so youhave to understand these
correlations that hey, the topof funnel is bringing in a lot
of brand search and you knowfrom people hearing about the
brand on TV or radio or podcasts, it's helping Google out and
like, how do you tell that story?
Because a lot of times when youlook at the peer attribution,
(30:18):
oh, podcast and TV, that's a$2,000 CAC.
Throw it away.
So the CFO will be like tounderstand that you know we
spent money there and CAC wentdown and customers went up.
(30:42):
One of the biggest thing thatinvestors could never understand
, the real real is like as wespent more, our cost of
acquiring customer went down andthey were like that makes no
sense, it should go up as youscale.
And it's like no, because wehad a full funnel working where
we were always bringing peopleat the top and eventually they
would get to the bottom, youknow, and we would convert them,
(31:03):
and so you're expanding youraudience, and so I think that's
the big thing about Lab 4 and 5.
And the message I try to tellpeople is like hey, I'm going to
help you beyond selling yousome media.
I'm going to help you figureout this growth.
I'm also going to help younarrate the story with your
board and the CFO so that youcan continue to spend and do the
(31:26):
correlation.
It's really called media mixedmodeling, where you're looking
at spending and correlating itto activity, and there's lots of
great AI tools out there todaythat can help you with that.
But you have to craft thatstory, and so I do a lot of that
with helping them with theboard and explaining that.
(31:47):
And then, lastly, I would sayit's always you know we've
talked about direct mail andthings like that it's always
what is old is new again always,but it's like a nuance, you
know.
And so direct mail you knowit's so funny, gen Z loves to
receive direct mail because theydon't get any, you know.
And so if you find out theright message to get to them,
(32:08):
they're going to open thatdirect mail and they're going to
be like amazed, right, and sothat you actually looked out for
them.
And then you know emailmarketing.
I mean, I used to think emailmarketing was so hard because
you had to constantly do thatmessaging.
And you know I'm a bigproponent of daily emails at
some companies.
But with AI it's become so goodthat you have no idea that
(32:34):
there's a machine writing it.
It's so much better than ahuman, though.
It's just like.
So you can actually really crafttrue one-to-one communication
with AI, with email marketing.
And, you know, talk about like,oh, you're in Paso Robles today
, you know the weather's great,you know.
And, like you know, I noticedthat you've been shopping for
these kinds of things.
Are you ready for a reorder?
(32:55):
And so AI brings that all intoplay in a one-to-one play, and
so I think I'm also part of theLab.
41 5 technique is also trying tobring in new technologies that
they may not think about,because when you're in a company
, you get siloed Right andyou're not really.
You don't know what's going onunless someone in the company
(33:17):
tells you about it, and so Ihave the time for eyes and ears
of what's going on.
What's the trend, and I thinkfollowing the trend is so
important in terms of what'shappening in marketing and
sometimes they die, sometimesthey come back, but it's a
constant education.
(33:38):
Got it.
Joseph Itaya (33:39):
All right, Marc, as we're getting ready to wrap
up, I just want to ask you somebigger picture questions.
Many of our students are in themiddle of career pivots, where
they're trying to find their way, and for you it sounds like for
many folks in tech andentrepreneurship, it's not a
straight path.
Path it takes some winding.
I'm sure you've had plenty ofsetbacks, things that came out
(34:02):
of nowhere even though you'retrying your hardest, and
suddenly you found that you'vehad to pivot.
So, in terms of career advicefor students who are getting
started off and want to followin your footsteps and become,
you know, like you one day, toachieve these great heights as
an entrepreneur, but also as agrowth marketer with really
substantial companies, is therea piece of career advice,
(34:26):
something that really stands outto you, that everybody should
keep in mind, regardless of whatindustry they're in?
Marc Viale (34:31):
Well, yeah, I think it's regardless of industry.
I think to me it's always beenlike something I could.
You know I could see thatothers would love it.
You know I'm not a handbaglover, of course, but I could
see the market.
I know.
You know people out there areinto it and you know I could see
it.
Back in 08 and 09 with SecondLife that people wanted to
(34:54):
escape from the recession and gointo gaming and, like I think
it's really being aware ofsociety and what's going on, you
know, and also just doingsomething that really is
tangible.
You know, I love tangiblethings that, as we were
discussing before, that you canbring online and sell them in a
(35:16):
scalable way.
And I would also say that if Iwas out there today, I would
just be digging in with allthese AI apps.
They're, you know, they're notthat expensive because they're
they're startups and so they'redoing a lot of trials, and I
would just be digging into youknow, some of these.
You know you could even justuse chat GPT to start doing
(35:40):
blogs, using Canva to do videosand you can use AI with Canva
and all that good stuff.
Yes, I would just say, you know, and poor folks that are in
between, just sort of reallyrefine their skills with what's
going on today with AI.
So AI content is, you know,front and center for marketers
(36:03):
today and I got to say you knowit's going to give people that
embrace it an advantage, youknow, and if you know the
insides and outs, it's going tomake you be able to talk, to
talk about it, much better.
You know there's a great bookout there.
It's called Shoe Dog.
It's by Bill Knight, who wasthe CEO of Nike and you know his
(36:27):
whole thing was grow or die.
And I think you can sort ofthink that from a company
perspective, where you've got tokeep on growing and pivoting
and to keep going, like I'malways.
You know Nike may be down for alittle bit, but they keep going
.
You know they keep reinventingthemselves.
Maybe down for a little bit,but they keep going.
You know they keep reinventingthemselves.
And I think, as a person youhave to do that too that I have
to keep on learning.
(36:48):
You know when you leave school,that's not the end of your
learning.
You're constantly reading, likeyou know.
Another great book right now is, you know, forgive me if you
don't like the person, but isWalter Isaacson's Elon Musk.
I mean just learning about thejourney that he went through and
, you know, pushing forward.
Now I wouldn't say he, you knowhe's the best example, but it's
(37:13):
good to hear all these thingsand understand what you can
change, you know, in terms ofhow you go about.
Even there's a book on Uber'sTravis Kalanick and like you can
say he was a horrible personand all that, but what he went
through to take over thatindustry and change the way we
think about taxi cabs is justamazing.
You know, yes, and you know tome, if I were you, I would
(37:34):
figure out how to get a job atWaymo.
You know Waymo.
I don't know if you guys haveit in LA.
Yeah, waymo is this robo taxiindustry and there's a couple of
them.
I think Amazon has one, butWaymo was nurtured by Google and
I just started taking them inSan Francisco and there's just
like this amazing experiencewhere I've never had such a good
(37:55):
driver.
You're right.
And you don't have to hear theUber driver tell you how much
they hate their job, and so it'sjust amazing experience.
They play mood music and theyactually can learn from your
YouTube account, you know, interms of what kind of music you
like and, and so Waymo is anamazing thing and they're going
to you know, they're going topop up in every city and to me,
(38:18):
the biggest thing is, just likewe did, the real.
Real is the trust you have tobuild.
The trust, you know, becausepeople are going to be freaked
out about Waymo, right, andthat's how we all felt about
Airbnb, for instance, in thebeginning, yeah, or even Uber.
Joseph Itaya (38:31):
You know, it's the first thing that you teach your
kids is don't get in the carwith a stranger.
Don't go to a store how youscale.
Marc Viale (38:37):
those things is all about trust.
You know, and I think you know,airbnb did a great job, uber
did a great job, the real realdid a great job and I think that
is like the linchpin.
But, you know, findingsomething amazing like a product
like Waymo which can usemarketing to break through.
(38:57):
You know, like if I was amarketer at Waymo, I'd be trying
to figure out how I can helpthem keep their cars clean.
Because you know, when you getin a car and somebody left a
beer can in there and you'relike, oh, you know, like, how do
you deal with that issue?
Joseph Itaya (39:11):
But let's see, that's interesting, Marc, that
you say that, because thereagain you're coming back to
thinking about the product, yes,and you're letting your
marketing drive how the productactually changes and evolves and
becomes more optimized.
Marc Viale (39:25):
Yes, and you have to understand how you can scale
that.
And so I think you know there'sso many interesting
opportunities out there todayand I, you know people are
saying that marketing.
You know there's not going tobe as many jobs out there, but I
disagree.
Know there's not going to be asmany jobs out there, but I
disagree.
I mean there's always going tobe a human factor with AI.
Like I can't just releasecontent that comes back to me
(39:47):
through chat GPT.
It's not good enough, you know,and so it's really good.
But you know, sometimes you gotto put the human factor in
there, and so I think there'salways going to be a need for
that.
You know, just thinking about,if I asked chat GPT to give me a
media plan today, it wouldn'teven touch TV.
But I got to tell you, if Iwant to address 80% of the
(40:09):
wealth in this country, you'regoing to have to talk to Gen X
and boomers and guess what?
They're still courted and so,like you know, you may want to
have a TV play and so you haveto have the human part to all
these AI pieces.
And I think that's.
I don't think people should befeeling dejected or like they're
(40:29):
not going to be able to make ittoday, it's.
There's always an opportunitywith technology.
Joseph Itaya (40:35):
Marc, I want to thank you so much for coming and
spending this valuable timewith us.
My big takeaway is what youstarted with and that rolled
through your Real Real processand you said it right there at
the end is the word trust.
That's what made the real, realwork, because suddenly
(40:56):
consumers could trust that itwas real.
And when we we see so muchnoise and we hear so many things
and we live in this era of fakenews and we're all wondering
what's real information ormisinformation, or
disinformation?
If you can create a marketingstory, as you mentioned, that is
trustworthy.
Boy, that is an amazing placeto start.
(41:17):
Yeah, mark, we're going toshare all of your socials with
people so they can follow yourcompany and make sure that they
come and see what you're up to,and we'll track your progress
and your journey.
But we want to thank you forbeing a friend to our program
and for caring about studentsand for sharing some of these
wonderful insights today.
Thank you so much, mark.
Marc Viale (41:37):
Thank you, joseph, it's fun, thank you.
Thank you, joseph.
Joseph Itaya (41:39):
It was fun.
Thank you, to learn more aboutthe Master of Science in Digital
Media Management program, visitus on the web at dmmuscedu.
Welcome to Mediascape Insights from Digital
Changemakers, a speaker seriesand podcast brought to you by
USC Annenberg's Digital MediaManagement Program.
Join us as we unlock thesecrets to success in an
increasingly digital world.
Hi everybody and welcome tothis week's episode of
(00:25):
Mediascape Insights from DigitalChangemakers.
And today we're really happy tobe joined by Marc Viale, and
Mark is the founder of Lab415,which is a marketing company for
the dot-com marketing space tohelp pre-IPO companies overcome
their growth challenges, andhe's going to tell us a whole
lot more here at the DigitalMedia Management Program at USC,
(00:46):
thinking through storytelling,challenges, strategic challenges
and opportunities is really oneof the main pillars of our
program, and at USC Annenberg,where we're constantly thinking
about how to createcommunication that is both
intimate and personal but thenalso has global possibility, and
(01:07):
I'm sure that those are thekinds of things that you're
thinking about as well.
But, mark, why don't we get toknow each other just a little
bit?
Could you take us back to thebeginning of your career?
How did you first?
Marc Viale (01:18):
get started.
Thanks for having me on, joseph.
And my career started way backin the 90s, you know, when this
whole dot-com boom was startingto happen in the Bay Area.
So luckily I made this.
You know I grew up inPhiladelphia, I went to school
in the Midwest, at Marquette,and I came out here in 1991 just
(01:41):
to, you know, be in the SanFrancisco experience.
And you know I was justplanning on being a student.
You know I was taking gradcourses in history and that I
decided wasn't really for me.
But you know I've always thoughtback that a lot of my learning
comes from, you know, just beinga very curious student and
(02:02):
history and like understandingtrends and they, you see how
they repeat themselves and youknow different empires and
things like that.
And so everybody's like, howdid you get into marketing?
And it's like, well, you know,going into history and learning
about different cultures and youknow currencies sort of helps
you with marketing.
And so you know I startedworking at a direct mail shop
(02:24):
when direct mail was stillreally you know it's still
actually plugging along back in1983.
And then I would say around 97,I went into the advertising at
an agency and then I was like,oh my goodness, what's all this
dot com stuff?
So it was just booming aroundme and I'm like I'm sitting in
(02:45):
this agency just helping oldstalwart clients plug away and I
wanted to get into the big.
You know what was happeningthen and you know this whole new
trend in digital marketing.
And so in 99, I went to work forOfoto, which was, I think, you
know, the modern day companythat you know.
(03:06):
It sort of transitioned intowas Shutterfly shutterflycom,
where you get your Christmascards and stuff like that.
But the whole like photosharing thing was like a huge
disruptive force.
And photography with Kodak itsort of brought down Kodak.
You know Kodak was a hugedinosaur that came down.
But I learned so much One thingI always talk about with
(03:30):
students and also people thatthey're out of work or whatever
when you have a time off alittle time off between the
advertising agency and Ophotoand I started to learn about SQL
and I started to dig into likehow to, because the new
marketing back in 99 was aboutdatabase marketing.
(03:50):
You know how could you like allthis data is coming structured
data is coming online and it'seasy to have these data sets
versus this offline component,and that really pushed me
forward, because a lot ofmarketing back in 99 was brand
marketing, not really aboutresponse and direct performance
marketing, and so I didn't wantto wait for the data from an
(04:15):
engineer.
As a marketer, I wanted to havethat data in my hand so I could
understand the trends, and solearning SQL and database
marketing was sort of a linchpinfor me to really unlock a lot
of opportunity.
Joseph Itaya (04:30):
It sounds like we're still fairly early on in
the story of your professionaljourney, so we can jump around a
little bit.
There's a question I'd love toask, because you're beginning to
talk now about technology.
It's interesting that you wentfrom direct mail, which, as you
mentioned, is still pluggingalong, and still plugging enough
but that's pretty non-techversus where you began to head,
(04:54):
which was pure tech.
So can you talk about yourmindset related to looking
towards what's next?
Is there some advice that youcould share about how important
that is?
Marc Viale (05:08):
I think that's so important for today's marketers
to really, you know, one isalways, you know, be reading
about the current trends, youknow what's going on.
And I think that was sort of.
You know, they were putting outsequel books back in the
nineties and like how you couldsequel for dummies and things
like that that you couldactually learn and pick up, and
(05:28):
I think a lot of marketers werescared of it.
But that was something thatreally intrigued me and I think
it's sort of, you know, I camefrom an educational background.
You know, my dad was like abiophysicist and he was able to
do computer models in the 1970s,and so I was very intrigued
about learning, constantlylearning, and I think that's
sort of been my career is.
You know, I've been constantlylearning, reading a lot of books
(05:52):
.
I mean.
A lot of folks you know thinkyou have to.
You know you have to actuallylearn on the job, but you can do
a lot outside of work where youcan learn about what's going on
with the AI revolution that'sgoing on.
Like my big message to a lot ofstudents out there is like
learn as much as you can aboutAI.
(06:13):
And you know, back in 22, whenit started to.
Really, you know it's beenaround forever, but in 22, when
it started to come out for chatGPT, I started grabbing books
about.
You know how does this all workand why does it work?
And it was just so intriguingto me and I think that's sort of
been my story throughout mycareer how does SEO work?
(06:33):
What's going on there?
But really, digging in beyondthe surface, I think a lot of
folks I noticed in my careerwill just say that's some other
department to do.
You know, and I don't need toknow, how SEO works.
But you really do.
In order to create a strategy,you know you have marketers.
You know for an SEO program,for instance, you have to
(06:57):
understand what a contentstrategy looks like.
And then how does that comeinto a purpose to actually win
with SEO?
But yeah, I mean so Ofoto wassort of a.
You know I was there till 2005.
We were really lucky that Kodakinvested in us during the
dot-com crash in 2001.
And so we were able to survivea little bit and you know that
(07:20):
kept going.
I wanted to take some of thatexperience to a retailer because
, you know, all the retailersafter the dot-com crash were
starting to get involved indigital marketing.
They wanted to understand itbetter and so I went to work for
a company in the Bay here Ithink they're in LA now BB
women's retailer.
Everybody remembers BB and Ihelped them with database
(07:42):
marketing and also just sort ofreally integrating and this is
sort of you know, back in theday this was sort of a novel,
but I think it's still novelwhere we were taking store data
and putting that into ourdatabase at corporate and being
able to use that online,multi-platform, you know, and
(08:02):
offline.
And so we really developed, youknow, just by using a loyalty
program.
And so this whole databasemarketing thing continued to be
a really big advantage for mebecause I was able to leverage
this into stores, online catalogand loyalty.
And then, you know, just witheverything in these boom and
(08:23):
bust cycles in 08, I mean, westarted 08, 09, we had the
equity crisis and again, anothergreat opportunity for everybody
.
Even right now, when there'sall these recession fears and
there's so much movement andeverything's moving so fast with
AI, it's always an opportunity.
(08:43):
I always look at these busts asa opportunity and what I
noticed is gaming was huge.
I don't know if you rememberback in 08, 09, but Zynga was
like the talk of the town, youknow.
So I went and worked for themakers of Second Life, linden
Lab, and so you know that wasthe virtual world of its day and
(09:05):
it's still.
That's still going reallystrong actually.
And you know you hear about Meta, the virtual world that
Zuckerberg is working on, andall that, and you know that
really came out of Second Life.
You know a lot of the engineersthat were critical in the early
days went over to Meta to helpFacebook on that, and then you
(09:26):
know that was sort of a wholedifferent world to me because it
was all virtual.
It was the most bizarreexperience.
We could talk you know hoursabout Second Life, but it was
sort of amazing in that it wasvirtual goods you know that were
on this market, that we had allthese content creators and they
(09:49):
were creating amazing things inworld and then selling them on
a marketplace that people wouldbuy.
And I mean back then you knowit was their economy in the
Second Life in-world experiencewas hundreds of millions of
dollars.
It was sort of crazy.
And then the cool thing aboutSecond Life is these content
creators could actually cash out, not in game currency but cash
out in real dollars and so itreally was an attractive to a
(10:13):
lot of early content creatorsusing 3D animation and that kind
of thing.
You know, second Life started todie down around 2012 because it
just wasn't growing with.
It was too hard and it waslaggy and people couldn't move
around.
So so it was obvious that, youknow, the writing was on the
(10:35):
door that I had to think about,I had to pivot and I got.
You know, the CEO of LondonLabs Second Life, mark Hengden,
had left the company and he knewJulie Wainwright at the Real
Real and Julie, you know,reached out to me and she wanted
me to come out to Sausalito andcheck out their warehouse, you
know, and see what was going on.
(10:56):
I'm like, ok, what's this crazything?
You know, because I'm like youknow this Julie Wainwright I
don't know if you heard of her.
She's she was the founder ofPetscom, which had a huge boom
and bust during the dot-com era,and then she created this, the
RealReal, which was even biggerthan Pets, and the RealReal was
(11:20):
sort of this you know, it wasthe penultimate startup.
It was in a garage over inSausalito.
You know where all thosehouseboats are.
I don't know if you know thearea.
It's in the Marin and it wasfunny because it would always.
Every once in a while it wouldflood and it would get closer
and closer to our warehouse andwe'd freak out.
Joseph Itaya (11:36):
Flooding's not great when you're dealing in
luxury consignment.
Marc Viale (11:39):
Exactly, exactly.
Joseph Itaya (11:59):
So yeah, of course , the real deal is what you know
.
We were dealing with luxuryagain, things that are not
digital at all.
Fast forward a couple ofdecades and you find yourself
back, strangely, in a similarsort of place where one of the
big pillars of your career hasbeen taking tangible some of
these items are luxury, some ofthem are old and then figuring
(12:21):
out how to bring them into adigital marketplace.
I just love that, but you canexplain it better than me.
Just give us a quick highlighton what was the real real and
what made it great, before weget into the story.
Marc Viale (12:32):
Yeah, so the real real was sort of answering the
problem of eBay.
So eBay was this hugemarketplace of clothing and cars
and watches, but it was alwaysbuyer beware, it was not
authenticated, right, it was.
So it's a marketplace of buyersand sellers.
And Julie saw, you know, thishuge white space opportunity for
(12:56):
luxury goods, a focus on luxurygoods, mainly apparel.
We started out with women's andmen's and moved into watches
and jewelry apparel.
We started out with women's andmen's and moved into watches
and jewelry.
But she saw this huge whitespace opportunity where you know
buyers need to know that it'strusted and real.
It's not a fake, you know, andso you know.
I think now you see eBay reallycoming on strong with the
(13:18):
authenticated message and sothey sort of you know it was so
funny back in those days eBaywould actually let us advertise
on their platform.
So the real world was reallyanswering the question of it was
a trust issue out there.
And the other thing is, youknow you could every once in a
while you found some Chanel andHermes on eBay, but it was far
(13:42):
and few between on eBay.
But it was far and few betweenand a lot of this was sort of
like what you were saying withKodak, where people were taking
photos online.
They were going to brick andmortar, you know, and so it was
funny.
I used to.
You know it's sort of sadactually, but I used to say
those photo processing placesare all going to go out of
business soon and it's all goingto be online.
(14:03):
And I would say we're going totake a big piece of offline
consignment because that's wherepeople, people trusted that
consignment store that hadsomeone that was knowledgeable
handbags and fashion.
So, julie, you know, julie gotthe big idea when she went out
to Palo Alto to a store with afriend and her friend was sort
(14:26):
of well-heeled and a venturecapitalist and instead of
looking in the front of thestore where the retail was, she
went into the back right awaywhere the consignment was, and
Julie was like, oh my God,you're buying consignment.
And she's like, julie, it'sChanel, it's not consignment, it
doesn't matter.
And so that just popped an ideain her head that like there's
(14:49):
all this inventory out here butit's not online, you know, and
that was just a sliver of it.
Most of it's in people's closetsowners of fashion and watches
and jewelry and outlet, and alot of these people didn't need
money.
They just sort of liked money,you know, and so and and they
(15:10):
wanted to buy for the nextseason.
So this gave them a really goodidea of like I could buy last
season, once I'm done with it, Icould consign it and then make
money and buy it the next season.
So it really worked well withretail.
And again, you know, theconsignor didn't care about
authentication but the buyer did, and so it was this perfect,
(15:31):
you know, seller buyermarketplace where the seller was
happy because things would sellsuper fast and it was such a
huge consumer base and the buyerwas happy because it was
authenticated and you know theywere inspected, you know.
So you weren't going to getsomething really smelly in a box
coming, you know, and you knowa cigarette burns on them
(15:54):
because they've been inspectedand we took possession of the
goods.
It was unlike anybody elsebecause we actually took
possession of the goods toinspect the item before we would
actually sell it.
Joseph Itaya (16:06):
This is a fascinating story and for any of
our students who are listeningand we talk about product
marketing a lot I hope thateveryone listened to the story
that Marc told just now, becausethat wasn't a story about
marketing, it was a story aboutproduct.
It was a story about product andwe tell our students all the
time that in order to be a greatmarketer and storyteller, you
(16:27):
have to understand the productinside and out, as well as the
product managers, the productdesigners, do, because you have
to crawl inside the soul of thatproduct, also have to
understand this target audience.
So what you just shared, mark,is so fascinating and that was
like a case study in what Ithink great marketing can be,
(16:50):
because you really understand,really went deep.
And could I just ask you aquestion also, mark, that I you
know, as such a veteran expertmarketers as you are, that
through the process of tellingthe story, through the marketing
and then going and findingproduct market fit and finding
that audience, did thoseinsights, as a marketer, help
(17:14):
shape the product?
Did you bring those insightsback to the product team and say
, guys, here's what we're seeing, here's how we can make this
product even better, thatsymbiotic relationship between
marketing?
Marc Viale (17:26):
Absolutely and I, you know, I would.
I would say, you know, when youtalk about this whole, I think
a lot of people when I, when Igo talk to a lot of companies
that are under the a hundredmillion range and they haven't
really cut through, they don'tknow how to talk about their
company in terms of the productand how it sort of integrates
(17:46):
with the brand.
And one thing we were reallystrong about our brand pillars
and they connected really to theproduct.
So one, what was thedifferentiation?
You know, and they connectedreally to the product, you know.
So one, authentic.
You know what was thedifferentiation?
How do we differentiate ourbrand from all these flashmark,
the thread ups?
There were so many at the time.
You know, how do wedifferentiate?
(18:07):
We wanted to make sure that wesort of echoed that message over
and over again.
And so one was authentication.
Nobody else was authenticating,everybody was.
You know they may say, you knowwe look at it through online
pictures, but you have to smellthe bag.
You got to touch it, touch it,understand if it's the metal is
(18:28):
actually the real metal.
And you know, if the Cartierlove ring has, you know you can,
you have to get it under a lubeto actually make sure it's an
accurate ring, because they'rereproducing these all over and
you don't want that fake.
It's a very embarrassing momentwhen you take that to a jeweler
.
And so authentication was numberone.
(18:48):
Luxury resale was number two,where we had this amazing you
could compare the retail priceand the resale price, and so
people love to see you know.
So one of those things was weknew people wanted a deal right
and we couldn't just discountall day because that would upset
(19:11):
the sellers, and so we wantedto be able to communicate the
deal they're getting Right, andI guess there's a lot of
companies out there doing thatreally well.
Today is like Quince.
I don't know if you know Quince.
com Some of your students mayknow about them but they're
doing really good of comparingtheir cashmere sweaters against
big name brands in the industry,and I think that's really good.
(19:33):
So you don't have to constantlydiscount.
So people have this impliedsavings.
So, yeah, that Chanel handbagis expensive.
Maybe it's $4,500, but it was$6,500 at retail, you know.
So we really worked withproduct to be able to show those
differences and also that wewould have the luxury managers
who went out and secured thisproduct, would you know, get
(19:55):
receipts, so we would know theprice and, like the, the buying
price and we could see what it'sgoing for now.
Joseph Itaya (20:13):
Another couple of quick questions, because I see
that when you were finishing upat the RealReal, you were the
chief growth officer.
You moved from VP of integratedmarketing to SVP of marketing,
but then you moved into thisplace of more than just the CMO,
(20:35):
which was sort of the brandthing.
Marc Viale (20:39):
I wanted to sort of bridge brand and performance
marketing into growth.
And one thing that also youknow I was, I worked really
tightly with businessintelligence and so you know it
was sort of bridging businessintelligence and marketing.
So you know it was sort ofbridging business intelligence
and marketing.
And then, you know, eventuallytowards the end of my career at
(21:01):
the Real Real, I took on thesales part, was actually going
out and you know we would takeleads from marketing.
It was really interesting.
One thing that we do at the RealReal is everybody used to think
like, hey, you got to go outand get consigner leads, but
nobody wants to consign, theywant to buy.
And so, like I want to buyChanel, I don't want to consign
(21:24):
it.
And so what we would do is wewould always lead with the
buying message and it wouldalways be much more attractive
from a performance standpointthan a consigned message.
And we would get, you know,every marketplace has like four
to one buyers to sellers.
You know, maybe it varies alittle bit, but we would always
have more buyers and sellers andso out of those buyers they're
(21:47):
able to buy Chanel.
They already had Chanel right,and so we would use that
database to mine for sales leads, and so we would actually look
at that and talk about data.
You look at zip codes, you tryto figure out who lives near
Anima and Marcus and Saks andthey're going to be your best
sellers and then we would putthose into a CRM application for
(22:09):
outbound selling.
So eventually, more than thebuying but also the selling part
, how we CRM those part, thoseleads, came under my area of
expertise and so it was sort oflike the full buyer seller
situation.
Joseph Itaya (22:25):
Now, mark, it seems like every entrepreneur's
dream but maybe it's also alittle bit of a nightmare to
have a company that becomes sosuccessful that now you start
thinking about IPO and goingpublic.
I've seen it on both sides.
Can you tell us about thatprocess going public?
I've seen it on both sides.
Can you tell us about thatprocess for you as you guys were
taking it?
Marc Viale (22:41):
Yeah, so you know going IPO is like an amazing
process.
You know it's just like you'redoing the roadshow of analysts
and it's sort of amazing.
You know you're being filmedand to talk about the company
and like it's sort of a once ina lifetime thing.
Hopefully I'll be able to do itagain one time.
But you know, after you go IPOit's like you've done this big
(23:07):
push to get there and you sortof are a little bit worn out.
You know, and so you'll seethis often with most IPO
companies.
Eventually the folks, thefounding team, moves on and you
know it's sort of thatopportunity to all that vesting
that you did in stock.
You're given a chance to sortof sell it at some point.
And also I think sort of someof the decisions that you have
(23:32):
to go through when you become apublic company are a lot
different.
Like it's so focused on thequarter rather than the mission.
You know it's like we got toget earnings in, so let's not
grow so much this quarter.
Let's cut marketing a littlebit to get our earnings looking
good.
But you know, make sure we havesolid growth.
(23:52):
And you know, and so you're notthinking about how do we take
over the whole industry.
You're really marching towardsthe quarter.
And so I see of a lot ofcompanies and you know, a lot of
times you'll see earnings callsthey'll do layups in terms of
forecasts because they don'twant to overshoot, because then
(24:13):
they'll get nailed in the nextcall and so it really slows down
a company, you know, and I lovea fast-paced company.
And also, I think, because whenyou're a public company and
there's so many people you haveto answer to, you have customers
, you have investors, you haveyour board and you have to be
(24:33):
really conservative in yourthinking, you know.
And so for me, I'm a serialstartup guy and so you know I
want to sort of push theenvelope, try things and fail,
and that's not a thing you cando as a public company.
You know it's too risky.
I mean, right, look at Tesla,right.
And so you know it's too riskyto do that.
(24:55):
And so I had this urge to one, Iwanted to relax and unwind from
the big IPO process.
And then, two, I wanted torethink my next path and so I
did the CMO thing for a whilewith a caregiving company,
carewellcom, and becausecaregiving is such a huge
(25:16):
industry right now, with thehuge boomer All the baby boomers
, yeah, and tried that for awhile.
It was an interesting concept,but then I wanted to.
I wanted to sort of be my ownboss a little bit, and so Lab
415 was always in my head Likehow can I get companies past,
especially like under a hundredmillion dollar companies?
(25:39):
How can I get them pastthinking about just meta and
Google, you know?
How can I get them thinkingbigger in terms of you know what
their brand pillars are?
How does that relate to acontent strategy?
Oh, by the way, there's a wholetop of funnel thing about
awareness that you miss onGoogle, right, and like
everybody spends a lot of moneyon Google.
(26:01):
But the big thing for the real,real to to get beyond people
searching for consignment was toexpose the idea to a larger
population, and that we did thatwith TV.
And today, you know, tv stilllike direct mail, still plugging
along.
And then there, you know,there's podcasts as well.
Podcasts are like the big piecetoday, and so I try to expose
(26:25):
people to more of a full funnelwhere they're thinking about top
, where these are people comingin with less.
They're not doing a consideredpurchase at that point, but
they're thinking about you, youknow, and then you know.
Then you have your middlefunnel, which is your, your
engagement on on social, andthen you have your bottom of
funnel, which is your Googlelike hey, I'm searching for
(26:46):
Chanel handbags and I'm ready topurchase now.
So I think that sort of gettingcompanies to think a little bit
more about the bigger picture.
And also, when you start doingthat, when you start going to
people beyond your bottom offunnel, that's where the product
thing really comes into play,because you're learning through
your messaging that, hey,product folks, we have to make
(27:09):
this a little bit easier forpeople that are not in the
buying consideration cycle atthis point.
We have to and you really haveto do that earlier in the game
to understand how to scale yourbrand, because if you're down in
the $300 million range and youdon't know how to scale your
brand, you've been just doingGoogle and Facebook and growing
(27:30):
10% a year.
That's where you get in trouble, because investors are like you
don't know how to, you can'tmove this 50 points.
And that's something that youneed to start thinking about.
What are your big levers whenyou're under a hundred million
and then when you get investment, because these a lot of
investors want to scale you,they want to get payback, and if
(27:52):
you can only move the business10% every year, nobody cares,
you know, and so, but a lot ofthat's changing, you know.
I would say venture capital haschanged a lot.
Joseph Itaya (28:03):
Oh, yeah, yeah, so hard time for venture right now
.
Marc Viale (28:06):
Yeah, there were a lot of firms before and it's
starting to consolidate and alot of them are moving more into
the AI B2B sector.
So it's tough in retail todaythe AI B2B sector.
Joseph Itaya (28:20):
So it's tough in retail today.
So, mark, take us now andyou've been talking about the
strategy with Lab 415.
You know, this is the lastquestion I want to ask you
specifically about your career,and then I'd love to ask some
more general, pointed,philosophical things.
Marc Viale (28:30):
Yeah.
Joseph Itaya (28:31):
But with 415, tell us why you decided to start
that company and tell us youknow it looks like you're about
two years in now and how's thatgoing?
You're back a bit in the Iwouldn't call this an agency,
but you're not tied to onespecific company anymore.
Right, you're fractionalizingyour work.
Marc Viale (28:53):
I think it really came out of the need, for when I
was on the brand side, therewere never true growth partners
that you could work with, andthat's what Lab 4 and 5 is.
We're a growth accelerationcompany, so we're not invested
in selling you media.
You know we don't make money onthe media.
We're invested in helping yougrow and so whatever that would
(29:16):
be.
So if it's not Google, you knowwe're not going to make a point
or two on Google.
We're really sort of helpingthat CMO, that CEO, on some of
the challenges they're goinginto A lot of.
You know the funny thing aboutmarketing a lot of times it's
(29:37):
how you tell the story.
You know, and like you know howdoes, because you know
everybody's trying to figure outattribution of your customers
and it's like it's a really it'snot an exact science.
You know it's a lot ofcorrelation.
Like we spent money onpodcasting and Google search
(29:58):
actually improved, and so youhave to understand these
correlations that hey, the topof funnel is bringing in a lot
of brand search and you knowfrom people hearing about the
brand on TV or radio or podcasts, it's helping Google out and
like, how do you tell that story?
Because a lot of times when youlook at the peer attribution,
(30:18):
oh, podcast and TV, that's a$2,000 CAC.
Throw it away.
So the CFO will be like tounderstand that you know we
spent money there and CAC wentdown and customers went up.
(30:42):
One of the biggest thing thatinvestors could never understand
, the real real is like as wespent more, our cost of
acquiring customer went down andthey were like that makes no
sense, it should go up as youscale.
And it's like no, because wehad a full funnel working where
we were always bringing peopleat the top and eventually they
would get to the bottom, youknow, and we would convert them,
(31:03):
and so you're expanding youraudience, and so I think that's
the big thing about Lab 4 and 5.
And the message I try to tellpeople is like hey, I'm going to
help you beyond selling yousome media.
I'm going to help you figureout this growth.
I'm also going to help younarrate the story with your
board and the CFO so that youcan continue to spend and do the
(31:26):
correlation.
It's really called media mixedmodeling, where you're looking
at spending and correlating itto activity, and there's lots of
great AI tools out there todaythat can help you with that.
But you have to craft thatstory, and so I do a lot of that
with helping them with theboard and explaining that.
(31:47):
And then, lastly, I would sayit's always you know we've
talked about direct mail andthings like that it's always
what is old is new again always,but it's like a nuance, you
know.
And so direct mail you knowit's so funny, gen Z loves to
receive direct mail because theydon't get any, you know.
And so if you find out theright message to get to them,
(32:08):
they're going to open thatdirect mail and they're going to
be like amazed, right, and sothat you actually looked out for
them.
And then you know emailmarketing.
I mean, I used to think emailmarketing was so hard because
you had to constantly do thatmessaging.
And you know I'm a bigproponent of daily emails at
some companies.
But with AI it's become so goodthat you have no idea that
(32:34):
there's a machine writing it.
It's so much better than ahuman, though.
It's just like.
So you can actually really crafttrue one-to-one communication
with AI, with email marketing.
And, you know, talk about like,oh, you're in Paso Robles today
, you know the weather's great,you know.
And, like you know, I noticedthat you've been shopping for
these kinds of things.
Are you ready for a reorder?
(32:55):
And so AI brings that all intoplay in a one-to-one play, and
so I think I'm also part of theLab.
41 5 technique is also trying tobring in new technologies that
they may not think about,because when you're in a company
, you get siloed Right andyou're not really.
You don't know what's going onunless someone in the company
(33:17):
tells you about it, and so Ihave the time for eyes and ears
of what's going on.
What's the trend, and I thinkfollowing the trend is so
important in terms of what'shappening in marketing and
sometimes they die, sometimesthey come back, but it's a
constant education.
(33:38):
Got it.
Joseph Itaya (33:39):
All right, Marc, as we're getting ready to wrap
up, I just want to ask you somebigger picture questions.
Many of our students are in themiddle of career pivots, where
they're trying to find their way, and for you it sounds like for
many folks in tech andentrepreneurship, it's not a
straight path.
Path it takes some winding.
I'm sure you've had plenty ofsetbacks, things that came out
(34:02):
of nowhere even though you'retrying your hardest, and
suddenly you found that you'vehad to pivot.
So, in terms of career advicefor students who are getting
started off and want to followin your footsteps and become,
you know, like you one day, toachieve these great heights as
an entrepreneur, but also as agrowth marketer with really
substantial companies, is therea piece of career advice,
(34:26):
something that really stands outto you, that everybody should
keep in mind, regardless of whatindustry they're in?
Marc Viale (34:31):
Well, yeah, I think it's regardless of industry.
I think to me it's always beenlike something I could.
You know I could see thatothers would love it.
You know I'm not a handbaglover, of course, but I could
see the market.
I know.
You know people out there areinto it and you know I could see
it.
Back in 08 and 09 with SecondLife that people wanted to
(34:54):
escape from the recession and gointo gaming and, like I think
it's really being aware ofsociety and what's going on, you
know, and also just doingsomething that really is
tangible.
You know, I love tangiblethings that, as we were
discussing before, that you canbring online and sell them in a
(35:16):
scalable way.
And I would also say that if Iwas out there today, I would
just be digging in with allthese AI apps.
They're, you know, they're notthat expensive because they're
they're startups and so they'redoing a lot of trials, and I
would just be digging into youknow, some of these.
You know you could even justuse chat GPT to start doing
(35:40):
blogs, using Canva to do videosand you can use AI with Canva
and all that good stuff.
Yes, I would just say, you know, and poor folks that are in
between, just sort of reallyrefine their skills with what's
going on today with AI.
So AI content is, you know,front and center for marketers
(36:03):
today and I got to say you knowit's going to give people that
embrace it an advantage, youknow, and if you know the
insides and outs, it's going tomake you be able to talk, to
talk about it, much better.
You know there's a great bookout there.
It's called Shoe Dog.
It's by Bill Knight, who wasthe CEO of Nike and you know his
(36:27):
whole thing was grow or die.
And I think you can sort ofthink that from a company
perspective, where you've got tokeep on growing and pivoting
and to keep going, like I'malways.
You know Nike may be down for alittle bit, but they keep going
.
You know they keep reinventingthemselves.
Maybe down for a little bit,but they keep going.
You know they keep reinventingthemselves.
And I think, as a person youhave to do that too that I have
to keep on learning.
(36:48):
You know when you leave school,that's not the end of your
learning.
You're constantly reading, likeyou know.
Another great book right now is, you know, forgive me if you
don't like the person, but isWalter Isaacson's Elon Musk.
I mean just learning about thejourney that he went through and
, you know, pushing forward.
Now I wouldn't say he, you knowhe's the best example, but it's
(37:13):
good to hear all these thingsand understand what you can
change, you know, in terms ofhow you go about.
Even there's a book on Uber'sTravis Kalanick and like you can
say he was a horrible personand all that, but what he went
through to take over thatindustry and change the way we
think about taxi cabs is justamazing.
You know, yes, and you know tome, if I were you, I would
(37:34):
figure out how to get a job atWaymo.
You know Waymo.
I don't know if you guys haveit in LA.
Yeah, waymo is this robo taxiindustry and there's a couple of
them.
I think Amazon has one, butWaymo was nurtured by Google and
I just started taking them inSan Francisco and there's just
like this amazing experiencewhere I've never had such a good
(37:55):
driver.
You're right.
And you don't have to hear theUber driver tell you how much
they hate their job, and so it'sjust amazing experience.
They play mood music and theyactually can learn from your
YouTube account, you know, interms of what kind of music you
like and, and so Waymo is anamazing thing and they're going
to you know, they're going topop up in every city and to me,
(38:18):
the biggest thing is, just likewe did, the real.
Real is the trust you have tobuild.
The trust, you know, becausepeople are going to be freaked
out about Waymo, right, andthat's how we all felt about
Airbnb, for instance, in thebeginning, yeah, or even Uber.
Joseph Itaya (38:31):
You know, it's the first thing that you teach your
kids is don't get in the carwith a stranger.
Don't go to a store how youscale.
Marc Viale (38:37):
those things is all about trust.
You know, and I think you know,airbnb did a great job, uber
did a great job, the real realdid a great job and I think that
is like the linchpin.
But, you know, findingsomething amazing like a product
like Waymo which can usemarketing to break through.
(38:57):
You know, like if I was amarketer at Waymo, I'd be trying
to figure out how I can helpthem keep their cars clean.
Because you know, when you getin a car and somebody left a
beer can in there and you'relike, oh, you know, like, how do
you deal with that issue?
Joseph Itaya (39:11):
But let's see, that's interesting, Marc, that
you say that, because thereagain you're coming back to
thinking about the product, yes,and you're letting your
marketing drive how the productactually changes and evolves and
becomes more optimized.
Marc Viale (39:25):
Yes, and you have to understand how you can scale
that.
And so I think you know there'sso many interesting
opportunities out there todayand I, you know people are
saying that marketing.
You know there's not going tobe as many jobs out there, but I
disagree.
Know there's not going to be asmany jobs out there, but I
disagree.
I mean there's always going tobe a human factor with AI.
Like I can't just releasecontent that comes back to me
(39:47):
through chat GPT.
It's not good enough, you know,and so it's really good.
But you know, sometimes you gotto put the human factor in
there, and so I think there'salways going to be a need for
that.
You know, just thinking about,if I asked chat GPT to give me a
media plan today, it wouldn'teven touch TV.
But I got to tell you, if Iwant to address 80% of the
(40:09):
wealth in this country, you'regoing to have to talk to Gen X
and boomers and guess what?
They're still courted and so,like you know, you may want to
have a TV play and so you haveto have the human part to all
these AI pieces.
And I think that's.
I don't think people should befeeling dejected or like they're
(40:29):
not going to be able to make ittoday, it's.
There's always an opportunitywith technology.
Joseph Itaya (40:35):
Marc, I want to thank you so much for coming and
spending this valuable timewith us.
My big takeaway is what youstarted with and that rolled
through your Real Real processand you said it right there at
the end is the word trust.
That's what made the real, realwork, because suddenly
(40:56):
consumers could trust that itwas real.
And when we we see so muchnoise and we hear so many things
and we live in this era of fakenews and we're all wondering
what's real information ormisinformation, or
disinformation?
If you can create a marketingstory, as you mentioned, that is
trustworthy.
Boy, that is an amazing placeto start.
(41:17):
Yeah, mark, we're going toshare all of your socials with
people so they can follow yourcompany and make sure that they
come and see what you're up to,and we'll track your progress
and your journey.
But we want to thank you forbeing a friend to our program
and for caring about studentsand for sharing some of these
wonderful insights today.
Thank you so much, mark.
Marc Viale (41:37):
Thank you, joseph, it's fun, thank you.
Thank you, joseph.
Joseph Itaya (41:39):
It was fun.
Thank you, to learn more aboutthe Master of Science in Digital
Media Management program, visitus on the web at dmmuscedu.
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