EP30 - Redefining Brand Value with Peter Rodriguez and Bruce Symbalisty

Is the brand still relevant? In this episode of CMA Connect, the CEO of the CMA, Alison Simpson, sits down with two of the CMA's Brand Council members. Peter Rodriguez is the Founder and CMO of Brand Igniter Inc., and Bruce Symbalisty is the Chief Solutions Strategist at Reality Engine. Tune in for insights from Bruce, Peter and Alison as they discuss what a brand is, how it creates value, its relevance in today's marketplace, and how to effectively measure how it drives business results.

[00:00:00] Narrator: Welcome to CMA Connect, Canada's marketing podcast, where industry experts discuss how marketers must manage the tectonic shifts that will change how brands and businesses are built for tomorrow, while also delivering on today's business needs. With your host, CMA's CEO, Alison Simpson.

[00:00:22] Alison Simpson: In today's episode, we will explore brand's critical role in driving business success. As the marketplace continues to evolve at an incredibly rapid pace, it's even more important than ever for marketers and for business leaders to truly understand the value of a strong brand. Joining me today are two industry experts and members of our CMA's brand council.

[00:00:43] Alison Simpson: They bring unique perspectives on the power of branding, and this is promising to be a great conversation. Peter Rodriguez is the founder and CMO of Brand Igniter Inc. And Bruce Symbalisty is a chief solutions strategist at Reality Engine. Peter and Bruce will share their insights on how brands create value and also contribute to long term business growth.

[00:01:02] Alison Simpson: Throughout our discussion today, we're going to tackle a whole host of questions and issues, starting with the question of brand relevance. In the light of the tsunami of change that's impacting our profession, how relevant are brands today? We're also going to discuss how marketers can effectively measure the impact of their brand building efforts.

[00:01:21] Alison Simpson: Peter and Bruce will share their thoughts on the critical role of marketers in ensuring that brands are seen as mission critical to business success. And how they can help bridge the knowledge gap among executives by speaking the language of business. There's certainly some debate in the global marketing profession today, questioning whether brands are still relevant in today's marketplace.

[00:01:41] Alison Simpson: So we'll tackle that in our discussion as well. It's clear that we have a lot to cover and two brand leaders with diverse opinions, which is sure to make for a great conversation. So welcome today, Peter

[00:01:50] Peter Rodriguez: and Bruce. Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here. It is also a pleasure to be here.

[00:01:56] Alison Simpson: I want to kick things off brand, depending on your [00:02:00] background and your point of view can have surprisingly many, many different definitions.

[00:02:05] Alison Simpson: So I'd love to have you each start by sharing how you define brand. How does a strong brand create value for a business? Peter, why don't you kick things off?

[00:02:14] Peter Rodriguez: Of course. Thank you very much. And brands are incredibly valuable. And in my opinion, there are three pillars that define a brand. One, it's a promise.

[00:02:23] Peter Rodriguez: Two, it's a shortcut. And three, it's an asset. It's a promise of consistent delivery, no matter what. Every time that you interact with the brand, it's a shortcut to understand value. Instead of having to repeat the attributes or benefits of a product, the brand does the shortcut so that we understand it, that we can create value.

[00:02:46] Peter Rodriguez: And the last piece is probably the most important. It's an asset. It's an asset, not only because it can be seen on our. Statements, but because it creates value. It is the one thing that enables an organization to [00:03:00] create higher margins by virtue of offering a higher price point versus others. And that is an engine for financial performance.

[00:03:10] Peter Rodriguez: So in the definition that best works for me. Those three pillars have become crucial in order to understand what the importance of this is for the economy, for companies, for us marketers. And the better we understand how to use this as an asset, we can create that value that our organizations pay us to create.

[00:03:35] Peter Rodriguez: It is more than just the Concept about promotion. It is the asset that enables us to succeed as an organization.

[00:03:44] Alison Simpson: That's a great definition, Peter. And Bruce, how would you define brand?

[00:03:48] Bruce Symbalisty: Well, when we look at brand and it's actual, the word itself, Origins. It comes from the Norse, actually, and it means to burn.

[00:03:59] Bruce Symbalisty: So then when [00:04:00] we look at kind of historically, what was it used for? I mean, we know that ranchers and cowboys branded cattle to identify it. And this is what's very important is when people saw that brand, they would know what that cattle livestock who it belonged to. And Also, when you saw that brand, you also knew whether that was a good person or bad person.

[00:04:25] Bruce Symbalisty: So this is why a brand actually does the heavy lifting of an organization because the brand in and of itself makes a business memorable. It helps encourage customers to buy from you and it supports marketing and advertising. And it has a lot of extension through organizations to all its stakeholders.

[00:04:47] Bruce Symbalisty: Holders internally and externally.

[00:04:50] Alison Simpson: So I would love for you each to share an example of a brand that is known for really driving business impact.

[00:04:59] Peter Rodriguez: [00:05:00] Well, I love to kick in with one example that continues to amaze me every time I talk about it. And, um, it's Apple. I continue to give them my money. Not because it's a better product, not because it's the better phone, but because the brand has captured what I want.

[00:05:18] Peter Rodriguez: They understand exactly what I want and not what I need. And I think that this is a very important distinction. We try so hard to get people to buy the things that we think they need. When in reality, people buy and pay a premium for the things that they want. And usually those wants Are the source of this economic value that brands create the value that you perceive from Apple.

[00:05:44] Peter Rodriguez: That's what you pay for. And I'd like to make this the key example. It's perceived value that separates brands. It's not product value. And one of the things that I'd like to share as part of the value that I perceive from Apple is the [00:06:00] simplification of technology. I am not a techie guy. I don't know much about it, but I know that if I have Apple on my side, They will take care of me.

[00:06:08] Peter Rodriguez: I will call a human. We'll always answer. They will stay with me until I fix my problem. And that value is priceless. Will I throw in 2, 000 for a new phone? Yeah. Next time I will. And with a smile, I will be very happy to drop that money because of the value I perceive from them. Might not be the value of the product, but the perceived value is crucial.

[00:06:29] Peter Rodriguez: So that to me is one of the many examples that I think that I, as a marketer can learn from, it's not the product. Okay. It never is. It's about the perceived value that we get from the brands.

[00:06:41] Alison Simpson: That's a great example. And the fact that they can command such a premium and we're willing to pay it with a smile speaks volumes.

[00:06:47] Alison Simpson: So Bruce, what would you add to that?

[00:06:49] Bruce Symbalisty: Apple has invested a lot into their brand. Apple created the unboxing experience through brand and people created anticipation and love [00:07:00] for it. And so that's what I think is very exciting about how they, they have made changes by springboarding off of what their brand means.

[00:07:10] Bruce Symbalisty: But, you know, if, when we look at other consumer brands, like I'll say Fenty cosmetics, they changed the world of cosmetics by introducing 40 shades of foundation in beauty for all. And in making, making it an inclusive product line, but interestingly enough, almost every other brand in the world now has followed suit and expanded their brands because of it, because it recognizes the consumer demand and value in individuality and a personal connection to their brand.

[00:07:44] Alison Simpson: Those are both such powerful examples and examples of literally billion, in one case, trillion dollar businesses that brands have helped build. So with those sorts of success stories, it's a bit surprising for me that in today's rapidly evolving [00:08:00] marketplace, it's being questioned, are brands still relevant?

[00:08:03] Alison Simpson: So two part question, why do you think the relevance of brands is being questioned today? And then let's answer the question, are brands today still relevant?

[00:08:12] Bruce Symbalisty: We live in a world where the time to tell stories now is shorter, attention spans are shorter, and so the marketplace has become very quick to make judgments because the access to information through social media channels, internet and websites, people can collect, choose and determine whether they trust you.

[00:08:35] Bruce Symbalisty: And so from a branding perspective, a brand needs to be strong, but people are questioning it because of the speed of the market is moving so quickly. Does a brand have time to take hold? Well, this is why it's even more important than ever to invest in brand. For that long term, long tail approach to an organization and a company.

[00:08:59] Bruce Symbalisty: And [00:09:00] so that's why I think it is relevant, but it's being questioned because organizations want short term results. They want, uh, they have to answer their quarterly stakeholder reports and those kinds of things. And they just don't perceive it as a deep value item. And this is coming as a generalism.

[00:09:19] Peter Rodriguez: I would add that one of the biggest challenges that we encounter is that, uh, in order to be relevant, we need to talk about what people care about.

[00:09:29] Peter Rodriguez: CEOs and CFOs care about the business results, care about the balance sheet and the cashflow and the profit and loss statement. Our brands are the engine. Any brand, not only our brands, any brand is the engine that generates that. And it's not the top line sales only. That's where I think that we have missed the boat.

[00:09:51] Peter Rodriguez: The conversation is not about creating volume at the top line. The biggest impact that marketing does is in creating that gross [00:10:00] margin. Gross margin is really when, when we start talking. And every time I have the opportunity to speak with CFOs or CEOs, the moment we start talking about margins, then the conversation becomes strategic.

[00:10:12] Peter Rodriguez: It becomes, help me. Increase my margins. How can I make them accretive? If we bring forward recommendations as marketers that can do that, then we get the center of attention. As in many organizations, that's still the case, so I don't think we're gonna, we're losing relevance and maybe brands are losing relevance because they're spoken outside of that correlation, causation.

[00:10:37] Peter Rodriguez: Between brand value in the minds of consumers, willingness to pay, and gross margins, which is what business leaders care about.

[00:10:47] Bruce Symbalisty: There are branding leaders, and then there's a, I'm going to call it a mushy middle, where there's a lot of. Branding that is occurring, either me to branding or, uh, [00:11:00] uh, where it is not as advanced as a brand that has been invested in.

[00:11:05] Bruce Symbalisty: And I think that that mushy middle has a lot of competition, a lot of confusion, and, uh, there, there's no leadership in that space.

[00:11:16] Alison Simpson: And there's such opportunity in the mushy middle for someone to actually. apply good business and brand principles and really differentiate themselves. Now, Peter, you've spent a lot of your career in top tier global brands, a lot of time with the C suite, and also living by the rule of quarterly results are paramount.

[00:11:36] Alison Simpson: So, you've got some great experience, and I'd love you to share how can marketers effectively measure the impact of Of brands on driving business results and what are the metrics that they should really be focused on?

[00:11:49] Peter Rodriguez: That's a great question. I, um, to your point, that was one of the biggest debates that we always have in the C suite and my, what I've learned is [00:12:00] that the conversation.

[00:12:02] Peter Rodriguez: Gets better when we start defining who is responsible for what, and I think that there is a big need to identify that the short term, the operating plan is mostly in the hands of sales for delivery, and it's not necessarily in the hands of marketing. It is, there is some level of that. Of impact. But the way that I have seen it happen in the companies where I've worked is that we need to create the environment so that the short term can happen.

[00:12:36] Peter Rodriguez: So marketing creates the strategies that will help create this value that we can convert every year into profit in the measurement of ROI. Has shifted from measuring the overall marketing mix, which includes product development, research and development, pricing, and all of the mix that we control down to just the ROI on [00:13:00] campaigns.

[00:13:00] Peter Rodriguez: And that should be in the tactical Area of the conversation. So I saw that and I still see today that when the conversation can be more clearly articulated in terms of, is this an operating thing that we're talking about for the quarter and we need to lap next year's quarter and make sure that we deliver growth.

[00:13:21] Peter Rodriguez: That's a whole different conversation. Then do we create the environment so that next quarter, like, A year from now in two years from now, we have the assets that allow us to deliver those results. That is the realm of strategic marketing. And when we start talking about those things. In collaboration with sales, then it becomes a much more measurable thing.

[00:13:47] Peter Rodriguez: So there are things that we are measuring that are not relevant. So for example, measuring only campaigns is limited, but for example, we're not measuring top of mind, share of mind, which is a [00:14:00] precursor of market share. Market share is one of the things that allows us to have longterm success. Those things.

[00:14:06] Peter Rodriguez: Are in the realm of marketing, those things are usually not talked about as the metrics in the short term. For example, repurchase rates. How are we predisposing people versus last year to prefer this brand at a higher price? That is an indicator of success next quarter and next year's quarters and the change in customer lifetime value.

[00:14:30] Peter Rodriguez: That is rarely talked about because those changes actually tell us if our marketing initiatives from product distribution, pricing, et cetera, are working. So, net net, I think that that conversation about incrementality. It's usually now outside of marketing. We don't get invited as many times. We are just like, well, here's your budget and make it happen.

[00:14:55] Peter Rodriguez: And what I see, unfortunately, is that now when we [00:15:00] call performance marketing, marketing, it's not really marketing. It is sales with a Facebook account or with an internet access, because they're working on the short term. They have to deliver now, which is great. We provide the foundation so that people want to pay more.

[00:15:18] Peter Rodriguez: Today, because we built that two years ago. And I think that that's a part that would benefit the conversations in the collaboration between sales and marketing. I clearly can see that in the operating plan and then marketing being primarily driving the strategic plan.

[00:15:35] Alison Simpson: Now, Bruce, you and your role from an agency perspective have worked across very diverse brands, very diverse industries.

[00:15:42] Alison Simpson: So I'd love you to share your thoughts on. What are the ways to effectively measure the impact of brands on driving business results?

[00:15:50] Bruce Symbalisty: Within the, the brand space, there's many metrics to be able to kind of look at how well a brand is doing over time, both [00:16:00] short term and long term. But the flip side of this particular coin is then moving into things like all the organizational financial metrics, of course, and that profit margins and, and revenue growth and those kinds of things.

[00:16:15] Bruce Symbalisty: And then aligning things that are customer acquisition costs. People often don't think about what happens. Let's say you're selling a very sophisticated product and it takes a year to encourage somebody to sell. If you were able to shorten that timeline to six months, that has a huge impact on an organization and brings customers in faster.

[00:16:39] Bruce Symbalisty: And if a brand supports that. To the sales team, that's a powerful metric. So there's many others as well, but these kinds of metrics, I think, support the case for a brand working with other departments in an organization.

[00:16:55] Alison Simpson: Now, Peter, earlier in our conversation, you shared your, part of your definition [00:17:00] of brand was it's a shortcut.

[00:17:01] Alison Simpson: I would build on that and say a brand is also. Protects you against reputational risk. And certainly we've got examples from years ago with Tylenol, a Canadian example with make believe where there was a significant business issue that many companies never would have recovered from, but the power of their brand was a key.

[00:17:22] Alison Simpson: Asset in their ability to recover. So do you want to share a little bit about that?

[00:17:27] Peter Rodriguez: You mentioned Tylenol and that is very close to my heart. That's one of the brands that I've had the privilege of running. And I had the opportunity to learn the Credo, the Credo from J& J. Started to be even more relevant because of that horrible situation that they had to face in the eighties when someone tampered with the product and there was human impact to the worst of the worst kind.

[00:17:55] Peter Rodriguez: But the one thing that I took away from learning the [00:18:00] creator is that what did the CEO do when things go bad and there is a need to leverage the brand value. To save a company. He went on live TV at that time. There was no social media. He immediately said, we're recalling everything. And then we're going to take action to make sure that you are safe.

[00:18:20] Peter Rodriguez: So he took care of the brand first. He said, Tylenol is going to be out for a while. I don't know for how long, because we're recalling everything, but we will come back and we, your trust is the most important thing. And within a lightning speed period, they came back and they relaunched the brand and they recovered all of the market share and they became the top brand again.

[00:18:44] Peter Rodriguez: And it was not the product. At the end of the day, the product, um, had to, you know, some safety measures had to be. Updated, but the value of the brand rested also on how people reacted. And that taught me [00:19:00] something. It is not what we sell. It's not what we say. It's how we say it. It's how we do it. And it's how the brand does things.

[00:19:07] Peter Rodriguez: They said, this is how we're going to make it stand for you. This is how we're going to fix this. And this is how you're going to love it again. So I think that that level of. Commitment in understanding the value of branding from the highest levels of our organizations. Is something that will help not only our profession, we in Canada are facing a crisis of productivity.

[00:19:34] Peter Rodriguez: Why? Because we are not creating enough value. In my opinion, by creating this value with brands is how we start reversing that. This is how we start creating something people want to pay more for. Not only in Canada, but we can do that with the globe.

[00:19:50] Alison Simpson: Now the three of us have built our careers on.

[00:19:55] Alison Simpson: Understanding and leveraging the critical role that marketing has in driving [00:20:00] business success. And we all fundamentally believe in the very important role brands have in delivering on that. Many, many of our listeners, if not all of our listeners will feel exactly the same way. Yet when you open it up to the broader business community, that is not as obvious or evident.

[00:20:17] Alison Simpson: So Bruce, I'd love you to kick off the answer to this question. As marketers, what do we need to do to ensure that brands are seen as mission critical to business success?

[00:20:27] Bruce Symbalisty: I know that brand in and of itself is misunderstood within organizations. And so having Education and having a concerted effort within an organization and with internal stakeholders is paramount to really kind of ingrain the understanding of how brand Integrates within an organization and has a lot of touch points, everything from [00:21:00] the strategic planning within an organization with strategies and innovation and how it communicates to the organization's Culture, which helps kind of build that team relationship of working together for that result of value driven results within an organization, but it goes beyond that, Allison, you know, product innovation, the consumer experience, the moment of purchase.

[00:21:30] Bruce Symbalisty: And then ultimately business results is when brand is working with all of them. And what I, what I would suggest is, you know, even just a listening ear to have this ear of branding to what work is being done with an organization can actually be very powerful to generate ideas and move things forward.

[00:21:56] Alison Simpson: Well, very well said. Now, Peter, I know. You and I connect on the [00:22:00] importance of speaking the language of business. So I would love you to add your thoughts too.

[00:22:04] Peter Rodriguez: Of course. Yeah. You know, one of the things that I will build on the point before, uh, of literacy in the C suite, knowing our audience is crucial, our audience is not speaking the language that we speak internally as marketers.

[00:22:21] Peter Rodriguez: Therefore, if we speak this dialect of marketing, if I, If I may use that word and don't translate it into the common business language. We don't have to go crazy about the numbers in order to explain what we say, but we have to be very clear in using one very simple tool. The biggest tool that I have used as a marketer in order to persuade the decisions on investment in marketing is a Proforma P& L.

[00:22:52] Peter Rodriguez: A Proforma P& L is the simplest, most powerful slice. That will get [00:23:00] the attention from the C suite. My suggestion is that we marketers could use only five lines. Top line, cost of goods, gross margin, marketing, investment, and EBITDA. In other words, before interest, taxes, and depreciation. If we can show those two, one without my idea.

[00:23:19] Peter Rodriguez: One with my idea side by side, there is no way that people will not stop and listen in the C suite. So when I say speaking the language of business, I don't mean we have to speak cash flow all the time. No, it is just one of the biggest advocates for one of the biggest relaunches I had the opportunity to do in our market was a CFO.

[00:23:42] Peter Rodriguez: And he wanted me in his office because I only spoke about by making these changes, by doing this, we're going to get people to buy more for more money, more frequently on a higher margin. This is [00:24:00] how your P& L is going to look like. Don't do it. And we're going to end up this way. That simple, and it was one page and it was the page that I was using all the time for that.

[00:24:11] Peter Rodriguez: And that was a major shifting strategy because it would shift this brand from a cash cow into an investor and obviously they listen because we were talking only the business, the language of business. We're not talking, make this brand bigger, make this brand more relevant. No, we were talking about, this is what's going to happen with everything that we're doing at language of business in action, I believe is something that would benefit all of us.

[00:24:36] Peter Rodriguez: Because it's irresistible. Actually, it is the most charming piece of communication. We can have is a proforma PNL

[00:24:44] Alison Simpson: that is such a powerful example, and it also reinforces as marketers. One of the core skills we have in areas of expertise is our ability to analyze the situation, analyze it. And audience and understand how to be [00:25:00] relevant and compelling to them.

[00:25:01] Alison Simpson: So we do such a good job of that in our external efforts, but we don't always take the time or make it a priority to really do that with our internal stakeholders and truly understand what will be compelling to them and speak in a language that a CEO can understand. So Bruce, I'd love to turn it over to you.

[00:25:20] Alison Simpson: We've talked a little bit about performance marketing. The reality in a good economy and even more so in a challenging economy is that delivering short term business results is mission critical as well as ensuring that the business is well positioned for long term growth. So how can marketers balance that pressure for short term results and quarterly performance along with the need for long term brand building?

[00:25:47] Bruce Symbalisty: The ability to design a preferred future and model where you want to go strategically Is part of that overall or overarching [00:26:00] strategy, the marketplace is going to determine and look at the brand of itself and choose whether to authenticate it. And trust. We have to remember, although we're selling business to business or business to consumer, we're still selling to humans and humans are emotional.

[00:26:20] Bruce Symbalisty: Humans make choices. Like Peter said, though, there are the humans that look at analytics and data and make choices based on that, but when I look at it from an internal perspective, it is about education. And when Peter's talking about literacy, he's talking also about education, and I really do believe that.

[00:26:43] Bruce Symbalisty: Uh, as marketers and as branders, networking internally within your company with other departments and people and let them understand the value that you drive within an [00:27:00] organization as a brander and as a marketer, and I know that those are soft skills, not necessarily analytical skills, but what they do is they start to build consensus.

[00:27:12] Bruce Symbalisty: And within an organization, the greatest thing you can do is have everybody rowing in the right and same direction. And that's consensus. And then that's how, that's how I look at it.

[00:27:24] Alison Simpson: Great perspective. And I would also add to that the power of any short term tactical marketing, any performance marketing will always be stronger when it's leveraging a strong, powerful brand and a deep relationship with the consumers that it's trying to attract.

[00:27:40] Alison Simpson: Peter, I'd love your thoughts on this as well.

[00:27:42] Peter Rodriguez: When there is bad marketing, when there is lazy marketing, there is no way that we can deliver the short term. Then that's when we start delivering it. You know how? Price, and that's the worst place where if you want to be now, I think that when we do have a [00:28:00] strong, the opposite that I said before, when we do have a foundation of a strong brand value plan, and we can prove as marketers that we have persuaded people to be predisposed to paying what the value of the brand is, then sales has a much easier order.

[00:28:19] Peter Rodriguez: Thank you. Not easier, but better way to do things. The biggest challenges that I have encountered in my career in this company is when I come to a place where they say, well, we're having a hard time and we cannot reach the quota for the quarter and we don't, we don't, we don't have promotions. We only have loyalty programs that we can push is it?

[00:28:41] Peter Rodriguez: Well, what are we saying? When we have nothing to say about the brand, that is the worst thing, because that should have started two years ago, three years ago, building that value so that we can capitalize on that. But you know, that strategy is, cannot be made in one quarter, not even in one year. Sometimes it has to be proven, tested, [00:29:00] developed, changed, updated.

[00:29:02] Peter Rodriguez: By the time we go to the reset, the shelf reset, then sales is so powerful. That they get what they need. And we sell a lot more and we sell at a higher level and we sell at a higher price point. What we do with pricing and validate the pricing structure takes time. Distribution or availability of services or products or whatever is it that we're selling takes time.

[00:29:29] Peter Rodriguez: But when it's done well, then sales can go and execute the quarterly gains in the targets don't become so hard to achieve if we have that foundation.

[00:29:40] Bruce Symbalisty: Going off of what Peter was talking about is generating value in the short term, you know, immediate sales and driving traffic through campaigns. Those kinds of things are going to continue to remain, but what we're seeing is a transition to a long term relationships.

[00:29:59] Bruce Symbalisty: And [00:30:00] a very current example is Jameson Vitamin Supplements. Is actually now investing into their brand by taking investors behind the scenes on how they manufacture their product with high quality ingredients, because they are actually seeing that the marketplace is requiring that and demanding that.

[00:30:24] Bruce Symbalisty: And I believe like what Peter said, they're looking into the future. Several years. They're setting the table for that because that's what a leader does.

[00:30:35] Alison Simpson: Thank you both. That's very valuable insights were shared through that and Peter building on your comment around the drug of discounting. It's obviously not good from a margin perspective.

[00:30:45] Alison Simpson: The other risk following that strategy is you're teaching your consumers that if they want your product, just wait another week or another month, because it's bound to go on sale. And that's really hard to recover. I knew the time would fly by with the 2 of you. And that has definitely been the case today.

[00:30:59] Alison Simpson: So before I [00:31:00] let you go on with your busy days, I would love to close off today's discussion by having you each share a piece of advice that you would provide for our listeners. Bruce, why don't you kick us off?

[00:31:10] Bruce Symbalisty: I believe that the greatest thing to do is to give it away. So give away your knowledge, share your knowledge, mentor people within your organization on branding.

[00:31:24] Bruce Symbalisty: I believe that this will be highly influential. And building a strong culture around what it means to belong to a brand, to a company, and that will have a halo effect that will affect everyone and be very powerful and influential. I believe. The greatest skill is to work together and to collaborate to create new spaces for creating value.

[00:31:55] Bruce Symbalisty: And that's how companies of the future will succeed. That's how [00:32:00] marketers will succeed is through collaboration and working together and lifting each other up. And I think that that is, that is my advice.

[00:32:12] Alison Simpson: That is great advice. Thanks, Bruce.

[00:32:15] Peter Rodriguez: One of the biggest piece of advice that I would give is go and spend time with your consumer.

[00:32:20] Peter Rodriguez: Don't try to know them through research. I mean, research is good and I will always support it. But just go out and do shop alongs. If you sell stuff for, Breakfast, go have breakfast with them and just watch them spend time in. If you are in consumer packaged goods, just spend time in off rails, in food basics, in Metro, in Costco, and just watch people.

[00:32:42] Peter Rodriguez: I do, I still do that. I just go there and I'm just watching people. So I find it fascinating how. They make decisions. And the last thing, be passionate about marketing, love marketing,

[00:32:53] Bruce Symbalisty: breathe marketing, eat marketing, but, but don't freak, don't forget to sleep. [00:33:00] Okay. Dream marketing. Yeah.

[00:33:04] Alison Simpson: Remember it's a marathon and sprinting a marathon.

[00:33:06] Alison Simpson: I know from firsthand experience is virtually impossible. So great advice to both of you. Thank you for a really wonderful conversation. And I hope you have a great afternoon.

[00:33:15] Peter Rodriguez: Thank you very much. I really appreciate the opportunity and thanks for, thanks for having me. Thanks, Bruce. Thanks, Allison.

[00:33:22] Bruce Symbalisty: Thank you, Allison. Thank you, Peter.

[00:33:28] Narrator: Thanks for joining us. Be sure to visit theCMA. ca and sign up for your free MyCMA account. It's a great way to stay connected and benefit from the latest marketing thought leadership, news, and industry trends.