Latest / The Marketing Career Podcast with Fexingo: Marketing Jobs, Skills, and Career Growth / How Marketers Build Internal Influence Without Authority
Transcript
- Lucas: Look, if you are a mid-level marketer, you probably spend half your day trying to convince people who do not work for you to care about what you are doing. It is the classic dilemma of lateral influence. You have no direct reports, no budget authority, and often, no formal power over the people you need to collaborate with. Luna: Exactly. And usually, those people are product managers or engineers who just want to build stuff and be left alone. They view marketing as noise until it impacts their sprint goals. Lucas: Right. So today we are talking about how to build real influence without a title. Not the fluffy 'be a thought leader' advice, but the gritty mechanics of earning trust in a room where you are technically an outsider. The key insight here is that influence is not given; it is borrowed. You borrow it by solving problems before they become yours. Luna: So instead of asking for favors, you provide value upfront? Like doing the research so they can just make the decision? Lucas: Precisely. Let me give you a concrete example from a campaign I watched recently. A senior brand manager needed engineering support to implement a new personalization feature. Instead of sending a requirement document and waiting two weeks for feedback, she spent three days shadowing the customer support team. She identified three specific friction points that were causing churn. Then she went to the engineering lead with data, not a request. She said, 'Here is where we are losing money, and here is how this feature fixes it.' That shifted the conversation from 'do we have capacity?' to 'how fast can we build this?' Luna: That makes sense because she spoke their language—churn and revenue—instead of marketing jargon like engagement metrics. Lucas: Spot on. Most marketers fail here because they talk about vanity metrics. Engineers and product leads care about stability, speed, and retention. If you can translate your marketing goals into their operational concerns, you stop being a nuisance and start being a resource. But there is a second layer to this, which is consistency. You cannot just do one big win. You have to show up repeatedly with small, reliable contributions. Luna: Like showing up to meetings you don't have to attend, just to listen and take notes? Lucas: Yes. It sounds minor, but it signals respect. When you consistently show up to understand their constraints without demanding anything in return, you build social capital. Over six months, that capital pays dividends. When you finally need a favor, they remember that you were helpful, not just transactional. It is the difference between being a vendor and being a partner. Luna: I see. So it is really about relationship equity. You deposit trust before you withdraw it. Lucas: Exactly. And this brings us to a common mistake. Many marketers try to force alignment through hierarchy. They escalate to their boss, who escalates to the other boss. That burns bridges. Real influence happens when you bypass the chain of command and go directly to the person doing the work. You build a direct line of trust with them, and then the organizational structure becomes irrelevant. Luna: But doesn't that feel risky? Going around people feels like office politics. Lucas: It only feels risky if your intentions are selfish. If you are genuinely trying to solve the company's problem faster than the bureaucracy allows, people will appreciate it. The trick is transparency. You tell your own manager what you are doing. You say, 'I am working directly with the product lead to unblock this launch.' Good managers prefer that over hidden agendas. Luna: Okay, so visibility is key. You want credit for collaboration, not credit for stealing thunder. Lucas: Right. You give public credit for private conversations. When the launch succeeds, you tag the product lead in the post-mortem. You highlight their contribution. This reinforces the behavior. They know that working with you is safe and rewarding. That builds a cycle of cooperation. Luna: That is actually a really practical way to handle ego. People want to feel valued. Lucas: Absolutely. Now, let's pause here for a moment. I want to share something real with you about how this podcast operates. Luna: Sure. Lucas: We run this network without ads. It is entirely supported by listeners who chip in monthly through buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. That small group keeps the servers running and the scripts written. It is the only reason we can keep producing daily content like this. Luna: Yeah, it is great to have that community backing. It lets us focus on quality rather than chasing clicks. Lucas: Exactly. Anyway, back to influence. There is one more critical piece: emotional intelligence in conflict. When you don't have authority, you cannot mandate compliance. You have to negotiate. And negotiation requires empathy. Luna: So you have to understand their incentives. Why do they resist? Lucas: Usually, resistance comes from fear. Fear of broken promises, fear of extra work, fear of looking bad. If you can address those fears explicitly, you remove the barrier. Say, 'I know this adds two weeks to your timeline. Let me see if we can adjust the launch date to accommodate that.' Suddenly, you are not asking for sacrifice; you are offering trade-offs. Luna: That shifts the dynamic from adversarial to collaborative. You are protecting them. Lucas: Yes. And that protects your reputation. You become the marketer who makes life easier, not harder. In a large organization, that reputation spreads fast. People start seeking you out. That is when you have truly achieved influence. Luna: It sounds like a slow burn. You can't rush this. Lucas: You can't. And that is why many marketers quit. They want quick results. But lateral influence is compounding interest. Every small win adds to your balance. Eventually, you have enough leverage to drive major changes without ever raising your voice. Luna: So the metric isn't speed; it's depth of trust. Lucas: Exactly. Depth of trust beats speed of execution every time. Because when trust is deep, execution becomes easy. When trust is shallow, every step is a battle. Luna: I like that. Deep trust means less friction. Lucas: Right. Let's look at a specific tactic for building that trust early in a project. It is called pre-mortem alignment. Before you start, you gather the key stakeholders and ask, 'What could go wrong?' You invite them to identify risks. By validating their concerns, you show that you respect their expertise. Luna: So you let them critique the plan before it even starts? Lucas: Yes. It disarms them. If they criticize it later, they already agreed to the flaws. But more importantly, it makes them co-owners of the outcome. Shared ownership reduces resistance. They are no longer passive recipients of your marketing; they are active participants. Luna: That is smart psychology. It gives them skin in the game. Lucas: Exactly. And it works for remote teams too. You might not have coffee shop chats, but you can use asynchronous video or detailed memos to replicate that clarity. The medium matters less than the message. The message must always be: 'I am here to help you succeed.' Luna: Because ultimately, everyone wants to succeed. They just need to know someone has their back. Lucas: Yes. And that is the core of lateral leadership. It is not about power. It is about service. You serve the mission, and you serve your colleagues. When you do that consistently, titles become irrelevant. Luna: It flips the script on traditional management hierarchies. Lucas: It does. And it is becoming more important as companies flatten out. Remote work and agile structures mean fewer layers of management. If you cannot influence peers, you cannot advance. Your career trajectory depends on your ability to navigate horizontal relationships. Luna: So this is a survival skill now, not just a nice to have. Lucas: Absolutely. In fact, I would argue it is the most critical skill for the next decade of marketing. Technical skills can be automated. Creative skills can be generated. But human influence? That is uniquely yours. No AI can build trust between two skeptical humans. Luna: That is a powerful point. Technology handles the tasks; humans handle the trust. Lucas: Exactly. So my challenge to you is this: pick one stakeholder you struggle with. Identify one small way you can add value to their world this week. Do it quietly. Do it consistently. Watch how the dynamic shifts over the next month. Luna: A simple, low-risk experiment to test the waters. Lucas: Yes. Start small. Think big. Influence is a marathon, not a sprint. But every step counts. Luna: And it starts with listening. Lucas: Always. Thanks for tuning in.