Latest / Two in Twenty / with Paul Zettl

Transcript

with Paul Zettl · Two in Twenty

• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to another episode of Doin20, the podcast from Alpha Agency hosted by me, Twig Field.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm looking to set a new record for the shortest intro so we can get straight to the conversation with Paul Zeppel, my long-term friend and really experienced global head of marketing.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: So straight to that.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: Paul, hi, it is so good to talk to you today.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for taking the time.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: I was thinking before we jump into some questions, maybe you could ground us in a little bit of your career to date, where where you've traveled from in your in your um various career steps.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thanks, Twink.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh great to be here with you.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, as far as my career goes, I guess I would start with the agency that I worked with at Boston.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: It was the precursor to Digitas called Bronner Slosper Comfrey, and it was my foray into financial services.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: It was a leading agency, helped me be a much better client, relationship builder.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: But there was a guy in my team that went to Fidelity Investments to join their RIA custody business, which at the time was rapidly growing, being invested heavily upon from the founder, Mr.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: Johnson.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: And they knew that the RIAs would be the fastest growing channel in wealth management.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I had an opportunity to work with him to join Fidelity in their RIA custody business to really establish marketing communications.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: They needed somebody who had process orientation, great client management skills.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: And that was my entrance into financial services in a big way.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing about Fidelity is so, you know, I learned about the RIAs.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: I learned how to market investment solutions, technology platforms, because Fidelity was the original FinTech company.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I learned about the different business models in wealth management, from brokerage to bank trust to RIAs to clearing custody and capital markets.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I found that I loved learning all these new channels, customer segments, uh, investment products, and spent 10 years just um eating up all of those opportunities.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing is Fidelity was a serial reorger.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: It reorganized all the time, merged business units together, and that was an opportunity for me to also learn how to adapt to change and meet new people.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: And that was also pivotal on my career.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: So Fidelity was a great place for me to start my career.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: I did every aspect of marketing from marketing communications to digital to business strategy to market research.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: And that helped me after 10 years to really be a well-rounded marketing executive, and whereby TD Ameritrade hired me to be their first CMO of their RIA custody business.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: And um and that was an exciting opportunity, allowed me to move to New York from Boston, work in Jersey City, and have managed teams in Denver and Omaha, Nebraska, and really learn how to navigate different cultures that were melded together through acquisitions, as well as help elevate the brand of TD Ameritrade as the fastest growing brokerage firm.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: And that was an incredible opportunity, very fast-paced environment.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was publicly traded, so I had to learn the nuances of a publicly traded company versus a private company.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: And it was, we had a very successful run on the institutional business, elevating that brand.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was the second largest in relationships, you know, custodian, fast-growing firm.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: The president of TD moved over to the retail business, and he brought me to run retail marketing.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: And that was an opportunity for me to learn the retail investor and to really help elevate TD's brand from an active trader market leader to a long-term investor market leader.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that was incredibly rewarding as well, and actually built the business case to get on social media platforms and do sponsorship marketing in a more formal way.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I had a great, great opportunities at TD Ameritrade at a time that was during the financial crisis, and it was it was an incredible, incredible experience.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: It was there because I had that unique combination of retail investor experience and advisory experience, in particular RIA and institutional experience from T D that T Row Price hired me to set up and establish their first integrated marketing business and their center of excellence around advertising and media.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: And that was that was really, really exciting.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: And after you know, the Advertising Center of Excellence and Integrated Marketing, I did have an opportunity to establish some value-added programs and run portfolio construction, do some diversity work that was also unique and it had an impact on a great culture.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: And then six and a half years ago, I had an opportunity to come back to New York and be the global CMO of Cohen and Steers, and that allowed me to focus on a leading specialty manager in alternatives that was getting into private markets.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: And as I had mentioned, I love to learn, I love new opportunities, and I love helping brands really elevate.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: And Conan Steers, you know, allowed me to build and transform the marketing organization, elevate the brand, and launch new exciting products and really learn the alternative space and the private market space.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so that was super exciting as well.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, so that brings us all up to date, does it, Paul?
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm already panicking that 20 minutes is nowhere near going to be long enough.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: There's just so many questions I want to ask you as you walked through all of that.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you could indulge me a little bit because I think going all the way back to the beginning of that agency life that you mentioned, and obviously we see many different businesses looking to really optimize their structure, kind of where they're looking to kind of add value through having key people internally, but also sort of thinking about that relationship with agency.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: How do you get the best out of those third parties and working with agencies given you've been on both sides of that line?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: What's your kind of recommendations around that?
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: Working at an agency made me a better client of an agency.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: And the best agency relationships I found is when the client and the agency had a strategic partnership and were really extensions of the team.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: What I learned is kind of the headline thought is you get what you give.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: So you really need, if you're on the client side, you need to help the agency learn the business objectives, learn about the business, transfer as much knowledge as you can.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: You need to give them really solid briefs, you have to inspire them through information sharing.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: And you also have a responsibility to clarify how the different people within the client interface with the agency.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: So you need to be inclusive.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I had a centralized function where I manage the agencies, but I always brought in experts to talk to the agency, to brief the agency, so that there can be information sharing versus a lot of the centralized marketers kind of it's command and control.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: They don't want outsiders, interfere, and I found that's not a best in class.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: So the power of collective wisdom happens through facilitating and um bringing them together.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: So you get what you give, you got to communicate proactively, you got to give feedback, it's got to be honest and uh and open, and it has to be from both sides.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: If you're managing an agency or agency relationships, you need to make a point of asking, how's it going?
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: What else do you need?
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: Is there scope creep?
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: Is there help with prioritization?
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: How are you doing with the billing?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: So again, you get what you give, it's on both sides, be inclusive, and that's how you get the most of it.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think to your point around kind of walking in each other's shoes a bit, being able to be sort of acutely aware of the different dynamics and pressures going on sort of in those different businesses and how they come together and stay motivated together to deliver the best outcome.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, you got to think about an agency probably has multiple clients.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_01: You're not the only one.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: So I always kind of made it how can you be the favorite client?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: How can you capture the mind share of the agency professionals by making it fun, celebrating success, and sharing the results?
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: So you created kind of that gravitational pull towards your account.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: The wise man, definitely.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: A question that we often get asked again is just particularly in this environment where people are thinking about the size of their teams, the value of their teams, sort of again back to kind of what capabilities they have.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Is there anything, any learnings that you have just broadly around sort of trying to get to that sort of optimum marketing structure?
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Just kind of the lessons along the way, I guess, in terms of the team that you build and some reflections on that?
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think you know, marketing structure, first of all, financial services firms are so diverse.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: You have to honor and respect the organization that marketing resides in.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Now, clearly, I've seen, and as a CMO at Conan Steers, it was a centralized function where I had every facet of marketing.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: But that's not always going to work in other organizations.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have corporate advertising and branding, corporate PR, but you're in a business unit, you have to be optimally designed within functions that you're responsible for, but also be able to work with the corporate functions.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: And the same techniques that I talked about with the agency relationships apply to corporate functions.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're a marketer, you really need to lead and manage all the different groups.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: If there is a gap, then build the case.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: Find your allies within the organization to build the case for adding that capability.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: At Cohen and Sears, it was paid media we didn't do.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I built the case for that.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: At TD Ameritrade, sponsorship marketing or social media.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: And just like we talked about earlier, you build your coalition of advocates and you build that case.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that means talking to CTOs, CEOs, heads of sales, CFOs on how do you effectively build the case.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I've never uh shrank from if I saw a need to lean in and build the case to make that capability happen.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: And you got to do it with passion, persistence, and it eventually it eventually happens.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because it can it can feel overwhelming, can't it sometimes, when you're looking to really sort of drive these new initiatives through in a business.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I wonder whether we could maybe add into that the kind of value-added programs that you you mentioned.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: I know that uh you did some fantastic work at T-Row Price around that.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe just for those outside the US that maybe kind of don't know exactly what that kind of entails, you can give a bit of a flavor for that.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and also what drives that sort of success.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because to your point, around really bringing the business along, the investment that was required, you know, how how you went about that?
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so you know, thought leadership or value-added programs are really important, especially for asset managers.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: And at T Row, there were a number of disparate value-added programs.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of them might have been wholesale driven, they weren't really strategic and unified.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: And they also had a portfolio construction group that wasn't really commercialized.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I saw the need, I understood the power of practice management early from Fidelity and my RIA custody days.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I built the case for establishing a business unit called offer management that would basically own portfolio construction and value-added programs.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I'd say the guiding principle for any thought leadership or value-added programs, there's kind of three common threads that are really important to get that buy-in.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_01: One, you have to create value for the client.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: Two, you have to create value for the firm.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then lastly, it's got to be true to the brand.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: You can't just do it because others are doing it.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's not going to be credible and it certainly isn't going to be unique.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: And it can be simple.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: It could be simple like at Cohen and Steers, it's education around our asset classes.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: And it leads very directly to allocating portfolio, making portfolio decisions, and leads right to product.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: And that's how you get buy-in from the sales organization because the thought leadership creates value for the clients and commercial value for the firm and makes their job easier.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: So it's win-win across the board.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: At T Row Price, we had the portfolio construction services, which was highly technical, a team of CFAs, but the wholesalers loved it because they brought in the experts.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: The experts analyzed the advisor's portfolio, and it led to, after that analysis, a 24% increase in fund placements.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: So the wholesalers loved the fact that they were getting paid a differential for that service.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: And then lastly, I would say that we also looked at, you know, as an educational leader, we looked at one of the number one needs that advisors have is to grow their business.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: And we saw through the resources at EuroPrice to actually conduct research on millennials, on women, and on the LGBTQ community.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: And we recognized that they were underserved.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: Financial advisors were going to lose them upon a divorce or inheritance, and they were open for advice.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: So through unique insight, we created programs to help advisors who wanted to grow their business, how to serve underserved markets that were quite significant.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, think about in the United States, women are 50% of the population, but 70% of them state that they're going to fire their husband's advisor because there's no relationship connection.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: So for like-minded advisors, these weren't woke programs.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: They were for advisors and firms that wanted to grow, that felt that this was an opportunity for them for some white space to go and grow their business.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: T-Row created very simple educational programs, and the wholesalers and the advisors loved those programs.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: It can be done, but the three guiding principles of creating value for the client, value for the firm, and true to the brand are so critically important.
• 16:17
  unknown: Absolutely.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I loved your reference to kind of the research as well, really getting to genuine insight that will then root it in need or a gap.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I think sometimes I don't always see, shall I say, that type of research and critical insight really playing through in terms of a platform of thinking or even a sort of a campaign.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think so much creativity is so dependent on finding that insight in the first place.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, you're sort of swimming around in a slightly nebulous place trying to come up with a sort of big idea that isn't rooted in that type of insight and value that you mentioned.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: The research was really important because we didn't start with that big idea.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: It started with the research that then led to the insight that created the spark of the program.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: Then it was partnering with an agency to how do you, through infographics, through a seminar, through toolkit, make it easy for the advisor or the wholesale wholesaler to deliver the program.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the and what it did was it elevated the strategic importance of marketing to add value for sales and the client, but it also crystallized the relationship with the agency and the marketer.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: And in many cases, the marketer became the SME and would present as well.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: And that also elevated the strategic importance of marketing.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: But it always starts with key insights.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: I love that because I think also, you know, that really rich platform of thinking that has so many layers and so much longevity to it, then when you're able to really bring that insight through, I think there's always, well, there can be rather a tendency to rotate quite quickly through sort of thought leadership or through a campaign of such.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that type of longer-term layered, deep kind of program and platform is something we're probably going to see more and more of.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's where people are really sort of traveling to and looking to really build their brands around.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I just wonder whether, you know, I know you are a great content man, a great thought leadership man, whether you have any reflections on that thought leadership, how you get to that genuine place as opposed to a kind of proliferation of sort of articles with shorter sort of shelf life.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I completely agree with you.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: If you think about JP Morgan's Guide to the Market, that is a long-term value-added program that's best in class.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I think if you're you're a financial, you know, asset management marketer that's developing thought leadership, you have a responsibility and you can think about the platform in a long-term way that you'll always establish a point of view related to what's going on in the market.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: So you need a framework that's lasting, and it could be what's going on in the market.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: What does it mean for that asset class in today's market?
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: And what ways can you implement the asset class in a in a way that's going to add value and build better portfolios?
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: So you can create a lasting framework that you run every time, and then you become known for the firm that does it in a simple, sophisticated way, and you become the go-to for the asset classes that you specialize in.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: But then it should be factored into the strategy.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: How long are you going to keep something going, even before you write the piece?
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this sort of ties us into that thought leadership and positioning, and to your point around and love for elevating brands, that kind of relationship is obviously so key in terms of the kind of marketing and brand strategy.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: Given you were recently at Cohen and Steers, and many people, many, both traditional asset managers but also the kind of specialists are obviously really focused and playing hard on growing their market share in private markets.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just curious what your reflections are on that market as sort of clients' needs are evolving, and it feels like a sort of race to be the best known, the better-known asset manager and leader in those in those markets.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think the key trend is the democratization of private markets.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I think there's never been a better time to be a financial services marketer because of trends like this.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: Again, like marketing organization, there isn't one one way to approach this.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: I think you're going to see more interesting and exciting partnerships like we're seeing with KKR and Capital Group, where you're leveraging the power of two brands coming together to deliver value.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: Certainly T-Row Price and Goldman Sachs recent announcement is an example of that.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: So you're going to see partnership models continue where you have traditional or the public markets and the private markets coming together, and you have two brands coming together to create unified solutions that add value to clients.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: I think you're going to see build models of great brand in the public space can also be a credible provider if they're a specialty manager like Cohen and Steers in the private real estate market, right?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: You have a real estate leader.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so what they did was they they did that through a team approach by bringing a Team back, the the former CIO of Cohen and Steers, who went to private markets, came and built the team within.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a natural brand extension.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: So that's that's another way of building it.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: And then there's there's MA activity that you're gonna uh continue to see with traditional managers or the private firms acquiring or merging.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: Again, there's no wrong way.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's an exciting opportunity for financial services marketers to think about the story that you need to tell, the brand.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then there's one other piece that's really exciting in our industry, which is retirement markets and the addition of private within retirement plans.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: So you're gonna see more retail retirement providers thinking through this challenge, either through the the same build, buy, or partner approaches.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: And what it means is a democratization of private markets and meaning that more access to these solutions to build better portfolios.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: There's so much going on, isn't there?
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I think to your point around just making sure you're sort of you stay so authentic to the brand that kind of whether it's build by partner, that kind of whichever route you're going, you're able to really demonstrate that that is a sort of great extension or a kind of natural uh strategic uh initiative that that kind of works in alongside the kind of the brand strategy.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm conscious, I'm conscious of time.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: I knew I knew the clock would be against me.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: You did you mentioned you know being an exciting time for marketers and financial services, and so one of the questions I've been asking everybody on this podcast is sort of what you think success looks like for marketing and financial services.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I wonder whether you could just give your view on that and before we look to sort of sadly wrap up our conversation.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I think it's uh this has been fun and it's uh it's a great question.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, success in marketing has to be number one, marketing has to be connected to the business strategy.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: We're communications professionals, so you have to communicate with clarity and uh avoid the techno babble and the jargon that we always use as marketers and speak the language of the business.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: So successful marketing is going to speak the language of the business, be connected to the business.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's going to leverage analytics and be an efficient organization.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: I often talk about there's a lot of interest in working with marketing across the organization.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: Do you speed up the metabolism of the marketing organization so you can deliver efficiently?
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: AI is a great provider of solutions to help marketers be efficient and elevate quality.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_01: So those are I think success in marketing is a results-driven, ROI-driven, connected organization that communicates effectively with simplicity and clarity.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: That is the perfect wrap-up, I think, Paul.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was gonna ask about any other sort of tips for careers, but I think if everybody just keeps that clarity in mind, speaking the language of the business, they can't go far wrong.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for sharing your experience, your expertise, and and walking us through some of those sort of really interesting areas of your career.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Twink.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: Take care.