Building a Marketing Department that grows the business

I’ve spent a lot of my career improving marketing programs that already existed. But one of the experiences that taught me the most was walking into a company where the marketing department didn’t exist at all.

I was the first marketing hire.

There was no established team to inherit and no existing marketing structure to simply optimize. I had the opportunity to help build it — implementing technology, developing processes, creating greater consistency across the portfolio, and eventually hiring three Regional Leasing & Marketing Managers to support a portfolio that grew to as many as 72 communities.

What I learned from that experience had very little to do with advertising.

I learned how to build.

You have to determine what actually needs a process and what doesn’t. You have to choose technology based on the problem it solves, not because it’s the newest platform. You have to hire people who can think independently. And you have to create enough structure to scale without creating so much structure that people can’t move.

Most importantly, you learn that a marketing department can’t operate on an island.

Marketing touches sales, operations, technology, customer experience,

and ultimately revenue.

That experience changed the way I approach every role I’ve had since.

When I walk into a challenge today, my first instinct isn’t necessarily to ask, “What marketing should we do?”

It’s to ask:

“What are we actually trying to solve?”