May 24, 2024 • 32 mins
What is Experiential Marketing and how does a 5'1 (and a half) female ex-army officer, master the art while teaching other women to harness their own bada$$ery and command a room? Oh, there is much knowledge being dropped in today's show. We speak with Sheila Rondeau and yeah, she said what she said.
Connect with Sheila:
Like the show? Be sure to Like, Subscribe, Review and Share! Interested in being a part of WEE? Reach out to our group liaison, Kelli@WomenExcellingEverywhere.com
Connect with Sheila:
Like the show? Be sure to Like, Subscribe, Review and Share! Interested in being a part of WEE? Reach out to our group liaison, Kelli@WomenExcellingEverywhere.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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(00:09):
Good morning, good afternoon, goodeveningwhere you ever you are listening or whenever
you are listening to the Women ExcellingEverywhere Podcast. I am Julie Anderson,
your host, and I am soexcited to be here with another powerful interview.
And this is a topic that womenentrepreneurs need to know about. So
this particular pod is going to bedealing with that of those of you out
(00:33):
there who are entrepreneurs. We aretalking marketing more and we're going to get
into some very specifics on that.But let me go ahead and introduce the
other friendly face on the screen,Sheila Rondeau. Sheila, welcome to the
Women Excelling Everywhere Podcast. Thank you. I am happy to have you here.
(00:55):
And before we get into the interview, let me read for the audience
a little bit about Sheila. Okay, So, Sheila is the CEO of
mog XP, which stands for MarketingOperations Group Experiential and it is a small
experiential agency that specializes in creating memorableexperiences for brands and consumers. They offer
(01:18):
wide range of services including marketing strategy, event planning, fractional CMO services.
Mog XP's mission is to improve thevalue relevance and impact of experiential marketing for
the benefit of the brands, ofbrands and customers. She is also a
retired first sergeant from the Army.Once again, Sheila, welcome very much
(01:42):
to the Women Excelling Everywhere podcast.Thank you Julie it is this is such
a great topic. We were visitinga little bit before I hit the record
button, and I feel that oneof the things that I try to coach
my clients on when I'm working withbusiness owners is you stay in your lane.
You stay in your lane, youdo what you do best, and
(02:05):
the rest of it you need tooutsource. And one of the things that
sometimes women entrepreneurs want to carry themselvesbut can be very time consuming is the
marketing aspect. And just because wecan learn how to do something doesn't mean
we should. That's a great lessonbecause there are a lot of people who
(02:27):
get really bogged down in marketing andthey're not using their time wisely. So,
for example, you take something likesocial media, social media you need
to have a regular cadence with youhave to have a true brand presence,
and social media isn't the end allbe all in marketing, but it is
(02:50):
really easy to spend hours and hourson it when it shouldn't and those who
know how to do it well cando it very quickly, very efficient and
show you a return that you won'tget alone. So true, so true,
agree with you one hundred percent.There before we talk a little bit
(03:13):
more about this about the marketing andthe industry that you're in, and some
advice that we have for some ofthe listeners here, what let's tell us
because retired army sergeant turned into marketing, there's a story there, so okay,
us a little bit about let usknow who Sheila is, Like,
(03:34):
what's a little bit of your background, what you know encouraged you to go
into the services, and then whatmade you when you retired decide, hey,
I want to jump in and becomea chief marketing officer that outsources to
other companies. What's connect the dotsfor us? So I hadn't planned on
joining the military. I was aweek away from college and some things changed
(03:59):
in my life and I just Idid, Okay, I'm going to pay
for college myself. And after spendingsix years on active duty, where I
learned about operations and logistics and reallyunderstanding the power of teaching and training and
repetition. I learned about the processesand so as I was coming off of
(04:23):
active duty, I went to school. I went to the National Guard,
but I also got offered a jobat Anheuser Busch. And when I joined
the position, it was actually fortheir in house marketing agency. So I
was going to be an administrative managerthat managed the production assistance and the business
(04:44):
admin team, the secretarial pool,basically for their in house agency. Well,
a short time into my time there, they had a program that was
operationally focused and they were really strugglingwith it. What I find is creative
people tend to be the worst atoperations in logistics. It's not how their
(05:08):
mind works. So for me,I walked into that position and it happened
to be for beer school. Sofor Anheuser bush I ran beer school.
So I had four large mobile displaysthat traveled the country and did over two
hundred events a year, and Ihad crews at each of the events.
(05:29):
They had to be there on time, they had to get set up,
they had to have local labor,all of those things that were required.
And then we started having success withit, and that fleet of four vehicles
turned to ten vehicles and we gotspun off. And when we got spun
off, we took on Vitamin Wateras a client. And they were pretty
(05:51):
Coke. So they were doing samplingin markets across the country. They had
a handful of mobile marketing vehicles thatwere doing sampling in a handful of markets,
and they wanted to do a lotbigger. So what they asked us
to do was to come in andincrease their fleet, create a program for
(06:15):
them, hire all of their fieldstaff and train them all and then operate
those mobiles in I think it wasfifty cities and it was fifty three vehicles,
which wow. Yeah, that waspre purchased by Coca Cola. A
short time later, they were purchasedby Coke for four point two billion dollars
(06:39):
because we created so much stir inthe industry that it was easier to buy
them than it was to compete againstthem. Smart Move Coke, Smart Move
that is. So you really havequite quite the organizational and marketing. You've
(07:00):
done a lot of both. Sonow you then started your own market experiential
marketing. We're going to talk aboutthe experiential piece in just a minute,
But what made you decide Okay,I want to go out on my own
and start this company. So Ihad been at several good size agencies,
(07:23):
and what I realized was I didn'tlike how it was done. I found
that I was working with companies likeProcter and Gamble and Kellogg's and GM and
Toyota and all these big names,Sony Electronics and Activision. I could list
some of the biggest who's who inthe world, but when it came down
(07:44):
to it, their marketing was good, but it was inconsistent. It was
always really targeted, and it didn'tnecessarily fit the niche that they needed.
I also found that it was reallyexpensive for small companies to enter into it.
Some of the big companies could doit and they had the budget for
(08:07):
it, but small to medium sizedbusinesses couldn't even consider it because the markup
on it was one outrageous But therewere so many levels at the agency's and
so many hands, and the processesweren't good and it was unreliable. And
so I took that on because mybrain works differently, and my analogy for
(08:31):
that is, think about creatives beinghelium balloons, and I hold the strings
to the balloons. And if youhold them too tight, the balloons don't
move, so why do you havehelium in them? You just if you
hold them too loosely, they flyaway. So it's about finding the right
(08:52):
balance of creative with operations to makesure that it's one something that can meet
a budget, two it is somethingthat can be replicated day after day with
consistency, because your consumers deserve thatand every accountability to be able to know
how many people should be sampled,the amount of time in which they're sampled,
(09:16):
the temperature in which you're going toprovide the sample, all of those
things that matter to the brand beforethey ever commit. So prime example,
working with a client who comes toyou and says they want to do a
sampling program and find out that theway they want to sample their product they
(09:37):
simply cannot get there for their budget. So how do we find it?
How do we want find another wayof doing it allows them to do it,
and you give them those options,and if that still doesn't work for
them, maybe you go an entirelydifferent tactic that still gets them to their
end goal, but does it througha completely different tactic that they hadn't thought
(10:01):
of and brings the budget down alittle. Yes, well it brings it
to within budget, but more isdid it fit the goals objectives? And
did it did we do it forthe budget that they had? Yeah?
That's excellent. I love that.Now the name of your business is mog
(10:22):
XP, which is the Marketing OperationsGroup Experiential. So help us understand that
what is the difference between marketing?I mean looking at the name experiential marketing,
that to me that makes me feelbecause I teach on the brain and
how the brain learns and the brainlikes to learn and experiential ways meaning that
(10:43):
they get their hands into it andexperience it. How does that apply?
I'm thinking it's similar but different inthe way in the marketing industry, Like
what is the experiential piece to yourto what you do? It can be
so many things, but it isany time you bring a brand and a
(11:05):
consumer together. Reseing is very oftenyou do it digitally and you can't smell
it or taste it, or feelit or just really connect with it.
And any time that you have abrand ambassador and a product being introduced to
a consumer, first of all,what you're doing is you're allowing people to
(11:26):
see how it fits in their lives, so they can smell it, they
can taste it, they can whateverthat product is, they can experience it
so they understand how it fits theirlives, and you're taking the risk out
of the purchase. But more sois that you then create a relationship between
(11:48):
the brand ambassador and the consumer.And people do business with people they know,
like and trust, right, soif they one like your product,
two they can feel figure out howit fits their life. You take away
the risk in purchase because you're notputting out money for something you haven't seen
and haven't touched and haven't tasted.But also you're doing business with somebody you
(12:13):
like. That's the experience. Soabout anything from concert tours, so lots
of times brands choose to just puttheir logos up on the concert venue,
so it's on the stage, it'son the speaker, scrims and all of
(12:33):
that. But what I explain toclients is most of the time, when
you have a sponsorship, you alsohave the right to do a sponsorship activation
in the concourse, So not onlyyour brand around, but you can do
a meet and greet so you canconnect your retailers to your product and give
(12:56):
them a VIP engagement, you canallow consumers to win the opportunity to be
backstage for a meet and greet withsomeone, an entertainer, or whoever they
choose to. But then you alsogive them an experience in the concourse where
for example, I took Guitar Heroto American Idol. People got to play
(13:18):
Guitar Hero in the in the concourseand people playing Guitar Hero on the stage
and they got to interact like that. So for another brand, took them
to the same venue and they wereit was Kellogg's, it was pop Tarts,
and they got to interact with thecostume characters. They got to dance
(13:41):
around and have fun and be silly. They got to have the cannons shoot
t shirts into the crowd. Thelogos were everywhere. We did a nice
meet and greet, but as everyoneleft the venue, everyone was handed a
Pop Tart m so they got tosample it to true experience. So we
met them on multiple levels. Theygot to engauge with it and they got
(14:05):
to try the product. That's very, very very cool. I have this
image of a memory of mine becauseyou've mentioned Anheuser Busch and the experience I
have to slide this in here.This little story. It's kind of disconnected,
but it's fun. One. Mybrother in law back in the day,
so we're going back thirty five yearsago, thirty seven years ago worked
(14:30):
for Anheuser Busch and part of whathe was was the Spuds McKenzie dog.
Absolutely part of his job was togo to restaurants that served Anheuser Busch projects
and he would dress up as thedog and he would, you know,
just be present and mingle with thepatrons there. And so the fun part
(14:54):
of the story is that I wasabout five months pregnant. I went to
dinner, not knowing my brother inlaw was there. Went to dinner,
my husband and I at this restaurant. Now, my husband did not know
that my brother in law did this. He knew my brother in law,
but he didn't know he did this. And at one point you saw this
pregnant woman and Spuds mackenzie dancing onthe dance floor. It was quite hilarious.
(15:18):
Talk about an experience, but yes, I know, I see what
you're getting at with that experiential thingwhere you're out there and interacting the brand
is interacting with potential clients and customers. It can be in all types of
ways. It can be gorilla marketingwhere you're sampling a product like we did
for vitamin water. It can bea pr stunt where it's the world's largest
(15:43):
cookie jar. It can be Sharmanrestrooms in Times Square where literally little kids
are doing potty dances, because weall know little kids do potty dances,
but we put them on stage andput them with the costume character and had
twenty luxury restrooms that were the cleanestrestrooms in the world. So those types
(16:03):
of experiences, but it can alsobe you know, really down and dirty
and all the way to very verylofty. We do cose marketing where we
created a hot air balloon and wedid it on behalf of a charity.
So we did it for Folds ofHonor, which is a charity that provides
scholarships to children who have lost orhave either lost a parent or a parent
(16:30):
has disabled due to military service,and so the biggest differentiation in their future
is education. So they get scholarshipsfrom elementary at all the way through college.
And so we ask children to drawpictures of what they wanted to be
when they grew up. We createda hot air balloon using those pictures as
(16:55):
the patchwork quilt to the hot Airballoon, and we called it the Dreamship
and we sent it all over thecountry and it was out for about two
and a half years and raised awarenessand a ton of pr for a great
charity. And we had four greatbrands that were involved. It was Right
(17:17):
Aid, Unilever, Johnson and Johnsonand Nesley, and those brands gave almost
seven million dollars to Folds of Honorto help them with their objectives and then
turned around and brought this awareness tothis charity. So it can be in
so many different ways. But theidea is that it's about bringing brands and
(17:41):
consumers together in some kind of memorablemoment. I love that. And for
the listeners or watchers, if yougo to maggexp dot com, on the
sliding banner on your homepage is apicture one of the is that hot air
balloon that you just mentioned. Inoticed that when I was watching looking at
(18:04):
it earlier. It's it's impressive andit's nice to know now I know the
story behind it, so that's prettycool. It's a cool story now looking
at your journey to help inspire.So we've kind of got the picture.
We know that women need to thinkabout and kind of tweak their their brains
to see how they can come involvedin this. And you do. You
(18:26):
do have a book coming out thatwe're going to talk about before we close
up the show, so that'll alsobe a resource as well as we We
will make sure that everybody has contactto get in contact with you if they
want to retain your services or havemore questions. But let's inspire a little
bit here and what you this isa marketing and advertising is typically when I
(18:52):
wear my other hat and I'm notworking with entrepreneurs. I'm working with corporates
and organizations. And we know thatthat is the C suite cmos of CFOs.
A lot of those positions are heldby men more so than women.
And the advertising space, marketing advertisingspace, the men outweigh the women in
(19:15):
it. There's more in that space. So you're pretty much in a male
dominated industry. What are some ofthe strategies. What are some of the
things that you have done to overcomethe challenges that you come up with in
this industry and create a very successfulbusiness. I think it's not just in
(19:37):
this industry. I mean I wasin the military was male dominated and having
the fleet of mobile marketing vehicles,I mean all the guys drove the trucks.
When I managed that initial fleet itwas twenty guys in me. And
then really diving into the marketing sideof it. First of all, it
(19:59):
is about square your shoulders and speakingup. If you can say something,
if you feel like you need tosay something, it's it's about saying it
with confidence, but also saying itloud enough to be heard. It's so
often that we mumble or or talkor among ourselves instead of just taking the
(20:26):
floor. So you can talk aboutit, you can complain about it,
or you can do something about it. And for me, I chose to
start my own business because I didn'tlike how the industry was doing it.
However, anywhere I've been it waslooking for ways to improve it and then
speaking up. And if you don'thave something to say a value, shut
(20:49):
up. Ye. Why you bootspeak and you speak loud and clear,
you are heard. Yeah, Andyou don't speak just for this to speak
and to be heard, to sayanything, save it, use it and
be powerful about it. But thereare also some tactics that women need to
(21:14):
know that as they're getting prepared towalk into a meeting, when they're getting
ready to take the floor. Oneof the things you need to know is
that men even set differently than wedo, and that allows their voice to
be heard in a way that's differentthan women. One is, okay,
I don't know how much you cansee in my chair, but men tend
(21:36):
to sit with their arm over theback of a chair and there's kind of
sprawled out. They open their chest, and by opening their chest, what
it does is it gives them acalmer voice. They have air in their
lungs and they push that out andthey are heard. Women tend to sit
(21:56):
like this in meetings. They crunchdown and they need to put their shoulders
back. The other is before youtake an important phone call, you walk
into an important meeting. I driveto my event or wherever I'm going to
be with my arm around the otherchair. But when I drive, I
drive like this. Before I goto my call, I literally stretch my
(22:19):
arms out on the ceiling of mycar. If I'm going to take a
call where I need to have astrong voice, I stand up and put
my hands on my hips and pushmy shoulders back. It's about opening up
your chest and being able to getthe air in and calm the nerves the
other you're going to take the stage, always do a sound check. And
(22:42):
I don't care if you have amic on or no mic and you're sitting
around five people, you always callout as far back in the room as
you can and ask if everyone canhear you okay. And the reason you
do is it pushes the nervousness fromdown in your stomach up and out and
you'll feel the butterflies go away.That calming voice makes all the difference in
(23:07):
the world. Women tend to speak, especially when they're under pressure, with
high squeaky voices and fast and fast. Is that men immediately take as panic.
Yeah. I literally have clients saythat when I am in the room,
the pucker factor goes down because immediatelythere's a calm Yeah, I'm not
(23:34):
worried, they're not worried. Yeah. And so if you can have that
in your voice, in how youstand and to be able to look people
straight in the face and talk.And I hate women who did little that
little girlfriend handshake. If you wishno shake a hand, you shake that
hand. Absolutely. I am notbig in stature, I am five one
(24:00):
and a half and I have commandedlarge formations of hundreds of people. Yeah,
and you either own it or youdon't. And if you're not willing
to own it, then step awayand let someone else. I like that.
I like that. One of thethings that I teaches the brain,
lady, is the three piece ofthe platform. And a lot of what
(24:22):
you just said is very similar,you know it is. It is literally
engaging the brain in the right wayand taking it out of that fear center
and moving it up into your thinkingportion and really really engaging that and owning
your message. And when you dothat confidently and you do those prep things,
I always do the you know,shoulders back, diaframatic breathing, you
(24:45):
know, really open up. Itchanges the chemistry and your brain. And
then that change is the way you'reperceived when you walk in the room,
when you walk on the stage,when you walk into a male dominated area,
you know, you're not seen.Not that we want to give up
by femininity. We can still befeminine and be powerful and confident all in
(25:06):
the same time. So I likethat. I like that advice. I'm
very sure I'm allowed to use thisword, but in the army for so
many years because I was small,but I commanded troops, so I was
called the B word on a regularbasis. And someone explained to me that
(25:30):
I wasn't there to make friends.I was there to teach and to empower,
and I couldn't do that being meekor mild. That I had to
step into it. So I wasexcuse me, but I was told to
own. So the military is allabout acronym stands for boys. I'll take
charge here and you either own itor don't. But the first time I
(25:55):
was called it, I was likeand after that, after my little kick
in the but I was basically told, you know what, own it.
They will either respect you or theywon't. But they're much more likely to
respect than a little wallflower. Yeah, yeah, they're very true, very
true. That's excellent, excellent advice. As we write, this conversation is
(26:21):
going so wonderful, but we areabout it that moment where I should really
wrap it up. I want toyou just gave a really good piece of
advice, so I don't want toask you for another piece of advice,
but share, share with us.As you've gone on this journey and you've
created this, and we've gotten intoso much more than just advice on marketing
(26:45):
right. We've covered a lot oftopics and I could even see us having
a future conversation on that confidence piecebecause I think a lot of a lot
of women especially need to really stepin and own that with more power.
But what for you, out ofout of these many life experiences that you've
had in this new role, what'smost rewarding for you? You know,
(27:11):
I love to work with small tomedium sized businesses. I look at it
as a puzzle and I look atall the things they're doing, and it
tends to be a shotgun approach.And for me, I look for all
the nuggets and look for how dowe measure each of these and figure out
what works and what doesn't. Howdo we engage people and push the envelope
(27:33):
to do new things. But moreso, if something you're doing is working,
invest more in it. If something'snot working, stop it. But
you have to measure it first,and that's where the operations in marketing operations
come. You measure everything. Ialso tell business owners that if you are
(27:53):
a new or a small business,and truthfully, anybody who is his cash
flowing a business should think about thefact that you don't spend money on a
business unless it either brings you awareness, brings you opportunity, or lands a
deal. I measure your ROI everywhere. If it doesn't do that, walk
(28:19):
away. It's so easy to walkinto organizations that all want you to spend
money with them, even getting involvedwith something like the Chamber of Commerce.
And so you have to look atif you don't go to the meetings,
if you don't get business out ofthose meetings, don't stop paying the fees
(28:42):
to go to things to belong somewherethat you don't use. Yeah, I
agree with you one hundred percent.I agree with you one hundred percent.
Measure your return on investment on everything, everything, whether it's a coach,
it's an organization, long to Yeah, be sure that you do all of
(29:03):
that someone that you hire. Okay, all right, So tell us a
little bit about the book, becauseyou have a book coming up. It
hasn't launched yet, but we willput all of the contacts ways for people
to stay in contact with you sothey can be sure to get information about
the book when it launches. Itis called the art of experiential marketing.
Tell us a little bit about that, and we'll also, like I said,
(29:26):
we'll connect you with her LinkedIn account, so I'm sure it'll be out
on LinkedIn when you do it.But tell us a little bit about the
book. Well, for me,it is about understanding why experiential is so
important that there are so many waysof investing money in businesses. But when
it comes down to it, goto your consumers, have one on one
(29:48):
meaningful engagements and leave them feeling likethey know you, they know your brand,
they know how it fits into theirlives. And then as you go
through the book, each area ofexplaining the importance of experiential marketing and the
dos and don'ts will be case studiesof programs that I've done over the years,
(30:14):
and then a couple that I haven'tdone, but I have a ton
of respect for Got it that soundswonderful. I look forward to getting it.
We'll have to we will connect withyou. I will connect with you
on LinkedIn, So a great wayto know when that book is actually launched
and ready to be ordered. Youcan connect with Sheila at on LinkedIn as
(30:34):
Sheila Rondeau. Now it is rO N d Eau. I found out
that is the French spelling, butit's pronounced no rondo. Well, Sheila,
thank you so much for being onthe Women Excelling Everywhere. You are
a shining example of a woman whohas excelled in your field and mini fields
(30:59):
actually throughout your life, and it'sbeen a pleasure to have you here as
a guest on our show. Thankyou so much. It was a pleasure,
absolutely, And I said, Isee a future conversation coming. We're
gonna, we're gonna, we're goingto do something on the whole confidence piece.
I think that's important too, allright, And for those who are
(31:19):
listening, thank you so much forspending the time. We're honored that you
took the time to be with us. Be sure to check out Women Excelling
Everywhere Everywhere that we're at. Checkout our private membership site. Women Excelling
are Women's success collaborative. That isour Women Excelling Everywhere private membership where for
a small fee, you are apart of a group that is constantly getting
(31:44):
neuroscience based data and information and beingable to grow yourself personally as well as
professionally. So check that out.All of those links will be in the
show notes for today's show, andas I like to close out every show,
I want everyone to roll those shouldersback, take a nice deep breath,
(32:06):
go out there and simply enjoy everymoment. Thank you for being with us.
Good morning, good afternoon, goodeveningwhere you ever you are listening or whenever
you are listening to the Women ExcellingEverywhere Podcast. I am Julie Anderson,
your host, and I am soexcited to be here with another powerful interview.
And this is a topic that womenentrepreneurs need to know about. So
this particular pod is going to bedealing with that of those of you out
(00:33):
there who are entrepreneurs. We aretalking marketing more and we're going to get
into some very specifics on that.But let me go ahead and introduce the
other friendly face on the screen,Sheila Rondeau. Sheila, welcome to the
Women Excelling Everywhere Podcast. Thank you. I am happy to have you here.
(00:55):
And before we get into the interview, let me read for the audience
a little bit about Sheila. Okay, So, Sheila is the CEO of
mog XP, which stands for MarketingOperations Group Experiential and it is a small
experiential agency that specializes in creating memorableexperiences for brands and consumers. They offer
(01:18):
wide range of services including marketing strategy, event planning, fractional CMO services.
Mog XP's mission is to improve thevalue relevance and impact of experiential marketing for
the benefit of the brands, ofbrands and customers. She is also a
retired first sergeant from the Army.Once again, Sheila, welcome very much
(01:42):
to the Women Excelling Everywhere podcast.Thank you Julie it is this is such
a great topic. We were visitinga little bit before I hit the record
button, and I feel that oneof the things that I try to coach
my clients on when I'm working withbusiness owners is you stay in your lane.
You stay in your lane, youdo what you do best, and
(02:05):
the rest of it you need tooutsource. And one of the things that
sometimes women entrepreneurs want to carry themselvesbut can be very time consuming is the
marketing aspect. And just because wecan learn how to do something doesn't mean
we should. That's a great lessonbecause there are a lot of people who
(02:27):
get really bogged down in marketing andthey're not using their time wisely. So,
for example, you take something likesocial media, social media you need
to have a regular cadence with youhave to have a true brand presence,
and social media isn't the end allbe all in marketing, but it is
(02:50):
really easy to spend hours and hourson it when it shouldn't and those who
know how to do it well cando it very quickly, very efficient and
show you a return that you won'tget alone. So true, so true,
agree with you one hundred percent.There before we talk a little bit
(03:13):
more about this about the marketing andthe industry that you're in, and some
advice that we have for some ofthe listeners here, what let's tell us
because retired army sergeant turned into marketing, there's a story there, so okay,
us a little bit about let usknow who Sheila is, Like,
(03:34):
what's a little bit of your background, what you know encouraged you to go
into the services, and then whatmade you when you retired decide, hey,
I want to jump in and becomea chief marketing officer that outsources to
other companies. What's connect the dotsfor us? So I hadn't planned on
joining the military. I was aweek away from college and some things changed
(03:59):
in my life and I just Idid, Okay, I'm going to pay
for college myself. And after spendingsix years on active duty, where I
learned about operations and logistics and reallyunderstanding the power of teaching and training and
repetition. I learned about the processesand so as I was coming off of
(04:23):
active duty, I went to school. I went to the National Guard,
but I also got offered a jobat Anheuser Busch. And when I joined
the position, it was actually fortheir in house marketing agency. So I
was going to be an administrative managerthat managed the production assistance and the business
(04:44):
admin team, the secretarial pool,basically for their in house agency. Well,
a short time into my time there, they had a program that was
operationally focused and they were really strugglingwith it. What I find is creative
people tend to be the worst atoperations in logistics. It's not how their
(05:08):
mind works. So for me,I walked into that position and it happened
to be for beer school. Sofor Anheuser bush I ran beer school.
So I had four large mobile displaysthat traveled the country and did over two
hundred events a year, and Ihad crews at each of the events.
(05:29):
They had to be there on time, they had to get set up,
they had to have local labor,all of those things that were required.
And then we started having success withit, and that fleet of four vehicles
turned to ten vehicles and we gotspun off. And when we got spun
off, we took on Vitamin Wateras a client. And they were pretty
(05:51):
Coke. So they were doing samplingin markets across the country. They had
a handful of mobile marketing vehicles thatwere doing sampling in a handful of markets,
and they wanted to do a lotbigger. So what they asked us
to do was to come in andincrease their fleet, create a program for
(06:15):
them, hire all of their fieldstaff and train them all and then operate
those mobiles in I think it wasfifty cities and it was fifty three vehicles,
which wow. Yeah, that waspre purchased by Coca Cola. A
short time later, they were purchasedby Coke for four point two billion dollars
(06:39):
because we created so much stir inthe industry that it was easier to buy
them than it was to compete againstthem. Smart Move Coke, Smart Move
that is. So you really havequite quite the organizational and marketing. You've
(07:00):
done a lot of both. Sonow you then started your own market experiential
marketing. We're going to talk aboutthe experiential piece in just a minute,
But what made you decide Okay,I want to go out on my own
and start this company. So Ihad been at several good size agencies,
(07:23):
and what I realized was I didn'tlike how it was done. I found
that I was working with companies likeProcter and Gamble and Kellogg's and GM and
Toyota and all these big names,Sony Electronics and Activision. I could list
some of the biggest who's who inthe world, but when it came down
(07:44):
to it, their marketing was good, but it was inconsistent. It was
always really targeted, and it didn'tnecessarily fit the niche that they needed.
I also found that it was reallyexpensive for small companies to enter into it.
Some of the big companies could doit and they had the budget for
(08:07):
it, but small to medium sizedbusinesses couldn't even consider it because the markup
on it was one outrageous But therewere so many levels at the agency's and
so many hands, and the processesweren't good and it was unreliable. And
so I took that on because mybrain works differently, and my analogy for
(08:31):
that is, think about creatives beinghelium balloons, and I hold the strings
to the balloons. And if youhold them too tight, the balloons don't
move, so why do you havehelium in them? You just if you
hold them too loosely, they flyaway. So it's about finding the right
(08:52):
balance of creative with operations to makesure that it's one something that can meet
a budget, two it is somethingthat can be replicated day after day with
consistency, because your consumers deserve thatand every accountability to be able to know
how many people should be sampled,the amount of time in which they're sampled,
(09:16):
the temperature in which you're going toprovide the sample, all of those
things that matter to the brand beforethey ever commit. So prime example,
working with a client who comes toyou and says they want to do a
sampling program and find out that theway they want to sample their product they
(09:37):
simply cannot get there for their budget. So how do we find it?
How do we want find another wayof doing it allows them to do it,
and you give them those options,and if that still doesn't work for
them, maybe you go an entirelydifferent tactic that still gets them to their
end goal, but does it througha completely different tactic that they hadn't thought
(10:01):
of and brings the budget down alittle. Yes, well it brings it
to within budget, but more isdid it fit the goals objectives? And
did it did we do it forthe budget that they had? Yeah?
That's excellent. I love that.Now the name of your business is mog
(10:22):
XP, which is the Marketing OperationsGroup Experiential. So help us understand that
what is the difference between marketing?I mean looking at the name experiential marketing,
that to me that makes me feelbecause I teach on the brain and
how the brain learns and the brainlikes to learn and experiential ways meaning that
(10:43):
they get their hands into it andexperience it. How does that apply?
I'm thinking it's similar but different inthe way in the marketing industry, Like
what is the experiential piece to yourto what you do? It can be
so many things, but it isany time you bring a brand and a
(11:05):
consumer together. Reseing is very oftenyou do it digitally and you can't smell
it or taste it, or feelit or just really connect with it.
And any time that you have abrand ambassador and a product being introduced to
a consumer, first of all,what you're doing is you're allowing people to
(11:26):
see how it fits in their lives, so they can smell it, they
can taste it, they can whateverthat product is, they can experience it
so they understand how it fits theirlives, and you're taking the risk out
of the purchase. But more sois that you then create a relationship between
(11:48):
the brand ambassador and the consumer.And people do business with people they know,
like and trust, right, soif they one like your product,
two they can feel figure out howit fits their life. You take away
the risk in purchase because you're notputting out money for something you haven't seen
and haven't touched and haven't tasted.But also you're doing business with somebody you
(12:13):
like. That's the experience. Soabout anything from concert tours, so lots
of times brands choose to just puttheir logos up on the concert venue,
so it's on the stage, it'son the speaker, scrims and all of
(12:33):
that. But what I explain toclients is most of the time, when
you have a sponsorship, you alsohave the right to do a sponsorship activation
in the concourse, So not onlyyour brand around, but you can do
a meet and greet so you canconnect your retailers to your product and give
(12:56):
them a VIP engagement, you canallow consumers to win the opportunity to be
backstage for a meet and greet withsomeone, an entertainer, or whoever they
choose to. But then you alsogive them an experience in the concourse where
for example, I took Guitar Heroto American Idol. People got to play
(13:18):
Guitar Hero in the in the concourseand people playing Guitar Hero on the stage
and they got to interact like that. So for another brand, took them
to the same venue and they wereit was Kellogg's, it was pop Tarts,
and they got to interact with thecostume characters. They got to dance
(13:41):
around and have fun and be silly. They got to have the cannons shoot
t shirts into the crowd. Thelogos were everywhere. We did a nice
meet and greet, but as everyoneleft the venue, everyone was handed a
Pop Tart m so they got tosample it to true experience. So we
met them on multiple levels. Theygot to engauge with it and they got
(14:05):
to try the product. That's very, very very cool. I have this
image of a memory of mine becauseyou've mentioned Anheuser Busch and the experience I
have to slide this in here.This little story. It's kind of disconnected,
but it's fun. One. Mybrother in law back in the day,
so we're going back thirty five yearsago, thirty seven years ago worked
(14:30):
for Anheuser Busch and part of whathe was was the Spuds McKenzie dog.
Absolutely part of his job was togo to restaurants that served Anheuser Busch projects
and he would dress up as thedog and he would, you know,
just be present and mingle with thepatrons there. And so the fun part
(14:54):
of the story is that I wasabout five months pregnant. I went to
dinner, not knowing my brother inlaw was there. Went to dinner,
my husband and I at this restaurant. Now, my husband did not know
that my brother in law did this. He knew my brother in law,
but he didn't know he did this. And at one point you saw this
pregnant woman and Spuds mackenzie dancing onthe dance floor. It was quite hilarious.
(15:18):
Talk about an experience, but yes, I know, I see what
you're getting at with that experiential thingwhere you're out there and interacting the brand
is interacting with potential clients and customers. It can be in all types of
ways. It can be gorilla marketingwhere you're sampling a product like we did
for vitamin water. It can bea pr stunt where it's the world's largest
(15:43):
cookie jar. It can be Sharmanrestrooms in Times Square where literally little kids
are doing potty dances, because weall know little kids do potty dances,
but we put them on stage andput them with the costume character and had
twenty luxury restrooms that were the cleanestrestrooms in the world. So those types
(16:03):
of experiences, but it can alsobe you know, really down and dirty
and all the way to very verylofty. We do cose marketing where we
created a hot air balloon and wedid it on behalf of a charity.
So we did it for Folds ofHonor, which is a charity that provides
scholarships to children who have lost orhave either lost a parent or a parent
(16:30):
has disabled due to military service,and so the biggest differentiation in their future
is education. So they get scholarshipsfrom elementary at all the way through college.
And so we ask children to drawpictures of what they wanted to be
when they grew up. We createda hot air balloon using those pictures as
(16:55):
the patchwork quilt to the hot Airballoon, and we called it the Dreamship
and we sent it all over thecountry and it was out for about two
and a half years and raised awarenessand a ton of pr for a great
charity. And we had four greatbrands that were involved. It was Right
(17:17):
Aid, Unilever, Johnson and Johnsonand Nesley, and those brands gave almost
seven million dollars to Folds of Honorto help them with their objectives and then
turned around and brought this awareness tothis charity. So it can be in
so many different ways. But theidea is that it's about bringing brands and
(17:41):
consumers together in some kind of memorablemoment. I love that. And for
the listeners or watchers, if yougo to maggexp dot com, on the
sliding banner on your homepage is apicture one of the is that hot air
balloon that you just mentioned. Inoticed that when I was watching looking at
(18:04):
it earlier. It's it's impressive andit's nice to know now I know the
story behind it, so that's prettycool. It's a cool story now looking
at your journey to help inspire.So we've kind of got the picture.
We know that women need to thinkabout and kind of tweak their their brains
to see how they can come involvedin this. And you do. You
(18:26):
do have a book coming out thatwe're going to talk about before we close
up the show, so that'll alsobe a resource as well as we We
will make sure that everybody has contactto get in contact with you if they
want to retain your services or havemore questions. But let's inspire a little
bit here and what you this isa marketing and advertising is typically when I
(18:52):
wear my other hat and I'm notworking with entrepreneurs. I'm working with corporates
and organizations. And we know thatthat is the C suite cmos of CFOs.
A lot of those positions are heldby men more so than women.
And the advertising space, marketing advertisingspace, the men outweigh the women in
(19:15):
it. There's more in that space. So you're pretty much in a male
dominated industry. What are some ofthe strategies. What are some of the
things that you have done to overcomethe challenges that you come up with in
this industry and create a very successfulbusiness. I think it's not just in
(19:37):
this industry. I mean I wasin the military was male dominated and having
the fleet of mobile marketing vehicles,I mean all the guys drove the trucks.
When I managed that initial fleet itwas twenty guys in me. And
then really diving into the marketing sideof it. First of all, it
(19:59):
is about square your shoulders and speakingup. If you can say something,
if you feel like you need tosay something, it's it's about saying it
with confidence, but also saying itloud enough to be heard. It's so
often that we mumble or or talkor among ourselves instead of just taking the
(20:26):
floor. So you can talk aboutit, you can complain about it,
or you can do something about it. And for me, I chose to
start my own business because I didn'tlike how the industry was doing it.
However, anywhere I've been it waslooking for ways to improve it and then
speaking up. And if you don'thave something to say a value, shut
(20:49):
up. Ye. Why you bootspeak and you speak loud and clear,
you are heard. Yeah, Andyou don't speak just for this to speak
and to be heard, to sayanything, save it, use it and
be powerful about it. But thereare also some tactics that women need to
(21:14):
know that as they're getting prepared towalk into a meeting, when they're getting
ready to take the floor. Oneof the things you need to know is
that men even set differently than wedo, and that allows their voice to
be heard in a way that's differentthan women. One is, okay,
I don't know how much you cansee in my chair, but men tend
(21:36):
to sit with their arm over theback of a chair and there's kind of
sprawled out. They open their chest, and by opening their chest, what
it does is it gives them acalmer voice. They have air in their
lungs and they push that out andthey are heard. Women tend to sit
(21:56):
like this in meetings. They crunchdown and they need to put their shoulders
back. The other is before youtake an important phone call, you walk
into an important meeting. I driveto my event or wherever I'm going to
be with my arm around the otherchair. But when I drive, I
drive like this. Before I goto my call, I literally stretch my
(22:19):
arms out on the ceiling of mycar. If I'm going to take a
call where I need to have astrong voice, I stand up and put
my hands on my hips and pushmy shoulders back. It's about opening up
your chest and being able to getthe air in and calm the nerves the
other you're going to take the stage, always do a sound check. And
(22:42):
I don't care if you have amic on or no mic and you're sitting
around five people, you always callout as far back in the room as
you can and ask if everyone canhear you okay. And the reason you
do is it pushes the nervousness fromdown in your stomach up and out and
you'll feel the butterflies go away.That calming voice makes all the difference in
(23:07):
the world. Women tend to speak, especially when they're under pressure, with
high squeaky voices and fast and fast. Is that men immediately take as panic.
Yeah. I literally have clients saythat when I am in the room,
the pucker factor goes down because immediatelythere's a calm Yeah, I'm not
(23:34):
worried, they're not worried. Yeah. And so if you can have that
in your voice, in how youstand and to be able to look people
straight in the face and talk.And I hate women who did little that
little girlfriend handshake. If you wishno shake a hand, you shake that
hand. Absolutely. I am notbig in stature, I am five one
(24:00):
and a half and I have commandedlarge formations of hundreds of people. Yeah,
and you either own it or youdon't. And if you're not willing
to own it, then step awayand let someone else. I like that.
I like that. One of thethings that I teaches the brain,
lady, is the three piece ofthe platform. And a lot of what
(24:22):
you just said is very similar,you know it is. It is literally
engaging the brain in the right wayand taking it out of that fear center
and moving it up into your thinkingportion and really really engaging that and owning
your message. And when you dothat confidently and you do those prep things,
I always do the you know,shoulders back, diaframatic breathing, you
(24:45):
know, really open up. Itchanges the chemistry and your brain. And
then that change is the way you'reperceived when you walk in the room,
when you walk on the stage,when you walk into a male dominated area,
you know, you're not seen.Not that we want to give up
by femininity. We can still befeminine and be powerful and confident all in
(25:06):
the same time. So I likethat. I like that advice. I'm
very sure I'm allowed to use thisword, but in the army for so
many years because I was small,but I commanded troops, so I was
called the B word on a regularbasis. And someone explained to me that
(25:30):
I wasn't there to make friends.I was there to teach and to empower,
and I couldn't do that being meekor mild. That I had to
step into it. So I wasexcuse me, but I was told to
own. So the military is allabout acronym stands for boys. I'll take
charge here and you either own itor don't. But the first time I
(25:55):
was called it, I was likeand after that, after my little kick
in the but I was basically told, you know what, own it.
They will either respect you or theywon't. But they're much more likely to
respect than a little wallflower. Yeah, yeah, they're very true, very
true. That's excellent, excellent advice. As we write, this conversation is
(26:21):
going so wonderful, but we areabout it that moment where I should really
wrap it up. I want toyou just gave a really good piece of
advice, so I don't want toask you for another piece of advice,
but share, share with us.As you've gone on this journey and you've
created this, and we've gotten intoso much more than just advice on marketing
(26:45):
right. We've covered a lot oftopics and I could even see us having
a future conversation on that confidence piecebecause I think a lot of a lot
of women especially need to really stepin and own that with more power.
But what for you, out ofout of these many life experiences that you've
had in this new role, what'smost rewarding for you? You know,
(27:11):
I love to work with small tomedium sized businesses. I look at it
as a puzzle and I look atall the things they're doing, and it
tends to be a shotgun approach.And for me, I look for all
the nuggets and look for how dowe measure each of these and figure out
what works and what doesn't. Howdo we engage people and push the envelope
(27:33):
to do new things. But moreso, if something you're doing is working,
invest more in it. If something'snot working, stop it. But
you have to measure it first,and that's where the operations in marketing operations
come. You measure everything. Ialso tell business owners that if you are
(27:53):
a new or a small business,and truthfully, anybody who is his cash
flowing a business should think about thefact that you don't spend money on a
business unless it either brings you awareness, brings you opportunity, or lands a
deal. I measure your ROI everywhere. If it doesn't do that, walk
(28:19):
away. It's so easy to walkinto organizations that all want you to spend
money with them, even getting involvedwith something like the Chamber of Commerce.
And so you have to look atif you don't go to the meetings,
if you don't get business out ofthose meetings, don't stop paying the fees
(28:42):
to go to things to belong somewherethat you don't use. Yeah, I
agree with you one hundred percent.I agree with you one hundred percent.
Measure your return on investment on everything, everything, whether it's a coach,
it's an organization, long to Yeah, be sure that you do all of
(29:03):
that someone that you hire. Okay, all right, So tell us a
little bit about the book, becauseyou have a book coming up. It
hasn't launched yet, but we willput all of the contacts ways for people
to stay in contact with you sothey can be sure to get information about
the book when it launches. Itis called the art of experiential marketing.
Tell us a little bit about that, and we'll also, like I said,
(29:26):
we'll connect you with her LinkedIn account, so I'm sure it'll be out
on LinkedIn when you do it.But tell us a little bit about the
book. Well, for me,it is about understanding why experiential is so
important that there are so many waysof investing money in businesses. But when
it comes down to it, goto your consumers, have one on one
(29:48):
meaningful engagements and leave them feeling likethey know you, they know your brand,
they know how it fits into theirlives. And then as you go
through the book, each area ofexplaining the importance of experiential marketing and the
dos and don'ts will be case studiesof programs that I've done over the years,
(30:14):
and then a couple that I haven'tdone, but I have a ton
of respect for Got it that soundswonderful. I look forward to getting it.
We'll have to we will connect withyou. I will connect with you
on LinkedIn, So a great wayto know when that book is actually launched
and ready to be ordered. Youcan connect with Sheila at on LinkedIn as
(30:34):
Sheila Rondeau. Now it is rO N d Eau. I found out
that is the French spelling, butit's pronounced no rondo. Well, Sheila,
thank you so much for being onthe Women Excelling Everywhere. You are
a shining example of a woman whohas excelled in your field and mini fields
(30:59):
actually throughout your life, and it'sbeen a pleasure to have you here as
a guest on our show. Thankyou so much. It was a pleasure,
absolutely, And I said, Isee a future conversation coming. We're
gonna, we're gonna, we're goingto do something on the whole confidence piece.
I think that's important too, allright, And for those who are
(31:19):
listening, thank you so much forspending the time. We're honored that you
took the time to be with us. Be sure to check out Women Excelling
Everywhere Everywhere that we're at. Checkout our private membership site. Women Excelling
are Women's success collaborative. That isour Women Excelling Everywhere private membership where for
a small fee, you are apart of a group that is constantly getting
(31:44):
neuroscience based data and information and beingable to grow yourself personally as well as
professionally. So check that out.All of those links will be in the
show notes for today's show, andas I like to close out every show,
I want everyone to roll those shouldersback, take a nice deep breath,
(32:06):
go out there and simply enjoy everymoment. Thank you for being with us.
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