EPISODE 13: Rachel Klausner Says Growth Still Runs on Relationships (Even in an AI World)

Speaker A: Making Google Slides and PowerPoints and Pretty Things, uh, is not how I got here in the industry either. But I'm also the one that's facing clients and the experience that's showing on the screen behind me is a preview of the experience that that customer probably is thinking in their head they're going to have working with me. And so if it's not sexy, uh, you know, if it doesn't have a little bit of an essence of cool, because they might think like, oh, that's going to be a boring platform to work in because your slides are great. So I just am trying to figure out how to prove business value from Vibes, and that's a really, really hard thing to do early on.

Speaker B: Hello and welcome to the first episode of the second season of the Last Word on Product marketing. I now have one year of podcasting under my belt. So to kick off the year, this episode is going to focus a little more on the sales and growth side of market. My guest is Rachel Klausner, who is currently SVP of Commercial Growth at Swim AI. If you don't know swim, it's kind of a cheeky acronym for stop wasting your money. And I love how candid and straightforward that is. To be more specific, Swim's AI platform gives brands and agencies full control over how their media is sourced, curated and optimized. So basically they make it much easier to help marketers identify and activate higher quality digital advertising opportunities. Rachel has a history of leading high growth businesses in digital advertising and martech. Before Swim, she was Chief Revenue Officer at Genuine SVP of Sales and Data Marketplace at Captify and Global Head of Growth at Open Slate, which is part of DoubleVerify. Now I'm excited to talk to her about all things marketing, sales, AI and ad tech. Welcome to you, Rachel.

Speaker A: Thank you for having me, Liza. Ah, excellent intro. Would you like a sales job at Swim? That was really good. So thank you for that.

Speaker B: Maybe we could talk about that afterwards. Um, so yeah, um, I want to start off by asking you a little bit about how you came to Swim Swim. Um, you're kind of coming in as a seasoned sales leader into a company that's still solidifying its go to market. So when you first arrived, what were some of the non negotiables you wanted to make sure to get right in the go to market motion before anything else?

Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, look, I've handled go to market everything from a company where I was on the initial founding team through to somewhere that I have joined 350 people in. But was entering a brand new country. So there's certain things that, you know, I've definitely learned throughout my career that are important to assess when you're taking a new role, when you're bringing something new to market, whether that's an existing brand or whether it's something completely new. And with swam and it is actually not only a newer company. We just had our second birthday from like the founders literally having the idea, um, but it's a new concept in programmatic and how sort of programmatic curation works. So the first thing that was really, really important to understand was, was nothing about our actual product. Um, I think it fell in with my expertise. People kind of get it, but it was learning what our customer needs. What do they not even know that they need that we can bring to the table to solve their problems? How do we educate them? And then you get the internal leadership team really aligned on how to meet them with that product, with the narrative. Um, I was really excited to come on board because it kind of added and enhanced something that I built at my last company for five years and added an entire layer of AI into the mix that isn't helping humans do a job like we think about AI that's helping us be more efficient, but actually helping the marketing work better within its own ecosystem. Bringing that kind of opposite way of thinking about programmatic curation was something that I learned very quickly. Clients or customers just hadn't done before. Uh, and you know, sometimes they have to take certain steps that make the AI work that are like, wait, I'm unfamiliar with that. So therefore it becomes a little bit scary. Right. And so understanding that the client needs to feel comfortable and confident with what I'm, um, bringing to the table, as well as actually understand the solution and feel like it's meaningful to them. From the marketing side of things, I think that means refining the narrative for clarity. You want to eliminate any kind of confusion or miscategorization of yourselves. We tend to have, you know, frames of mind where, uh, as a marketer or a buyer, even on the customer side, you have to bucket your partners. And when you don't fit into one of those buckets from the vendor side, you need to really continuously refine your narrative and to meet the customer where they need to be to understand it, um, and constantly kind of evolve that message. Because sometimes, you know, you're the founders, create a product that feels really, really important to them and is super cool to them and they're generally really brilliant people. Um, but sometimes details are missed about like what is the market actually craving from this product? Like sometimes, uh, 20% of what we actually can do is what everybody needs. And the other 80% are super nice to haves. But we need to figure out like, when do we even bring those up to not create way too much complexity. Um, so all of that about just like refining and continuously changing the narrative, that's all okay in the beginning. So those are kind of the things that I focused on in my first six months here talking to net new customers and brands that have definitely never heard of SWIM before.

Speaker B: Yes, that process sounds very familiar to me. It sounds like you wore a product marketing hat for those, uh, first six months. I'm curious, um, just to follow up on what you talked about with essentially putting together the customer Personas. Did you do a lot of customer interviewing or how did you come to understand straight from the clients where those gaps were and how you could fill them?

Speaker A: Yeah, I think it's not necessarily interviewing. Right. You've got a founding team here with a lot of really deep rooted relationships. Um, they took a great strategy of hiring sort of senior level folks who are connected first. So it's just an organic conversation with our industry peers, whether that's going to agency or brand leadership and saying, this is what we have. How does that fit in? How does this benefit what your goals are and hearing what's important to them and what feels easy to them in those actual sales conversations. Right. It's not even like pre gaming, it's just like I'm hitting the road, talking about something new and what am I hearing? And I'm bringing that back to my team constantly and having everyone else on the team also bring back all of the customer feedback. And you know, we have a daily stand up meeting, for example. Right. Leadership team meeting every morning. And those are some of the key things that I want everyone to talk about. What feedback did you get, what didn't work, how did you fix it? And that kind of fits into changing those little bits of narrative or setup or process that we need to do at this stage.

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. The kind of test and learn, building the plane while it's in the air. So you've led revenue for companies at, uh, very different stages. You know, in your intro I mentioned Open Slate, Captify, Genuine, which was very early stage. What's one go to market move that you've seen across, uh, these companies that consistently works? Um, and then on the other side, what's something that really doesn't translate from bigger company playbook to earlier stage?

Speaker A: Yeah, I mean I think there's definitely more than one move that works, but consistent across all experience. Relationships are key, right across all stages. Trust is your number one asset in a founding role, in a bring something new, in a commercial role. So you know, at earlier stages it's a little bit different because having that trust means you can be honest, you can be vulnerable with your clients. You can say, I'm building something, I want you to be part of this. Um, and that actually really helps because people like to help their friends. It's shocking, but we do, um, I love to help other small companies. Right. But that's something that's just consistent across the board. Um, when I think about something that's more like tactical and that other people can kind of take and use. One of the key building blocks to every new brand that I've been on a team helping to bring to market has been really like partnering with other usually small and growing companies, but sometimes ones that have like a little bit more share of voice in market to do things, whether it's co selling strategically and they already have a somewhat established client base similar to who you're going after. Um, it could be an immediate multiplier of a small salesforce if you have a complimentary product that enhances what a very similar company already does. You know, one plus one equals three at that point. And instead of having one seller, I could have 12 on the ground all of a sudden. And it's really just a game of m enablement at that point. For like an example of that when we were building open slate and it was ratings and quality scoring for YouTube channels, it was kind of the first approach to automated whitelisting in a uh, brand safety context. For YouTube, we partnered with Maker Studios and this was pre Disney acquisition. So Maker was still a startup in itself, but a much bigger startup than we were. But what we brought to the table for all of their content, all their content creator led YouTube channels was a way for clients to understand which ones are best for them and where their ad should be and how to approach Maker in a smarter way. And for me I at the time I had like two salespeople and they had like 12 and it was great because they had been around for a few more years. We now had access to this wealth of clients that were already buying on YouTube and like just the, the multiplier of our business by doing that. And you know, over time we built and didn't sort of need that anymore. And then you can kind of transition people onto your owned and Operated products, um, while still providing value for those early partners. Right. You're not sort of taking anything away. Um, you know, at Captify as well, we partnered really closely. We were a very early curation company and so we decided to partner with a lot of the SSPs directly and enable their own demand teams and train them on why our data made what they sell more exciting for their clients. And all of a sudden, you know, the combination of the two offerings was just better and had more people on the ground talking about why they should add that data. Um, even kind of toot our own horn. We just partnered, for example, like our technology is an automation for supply decisioning. Um, sounds really nerdy and ad techie and we can go direct to a bunch of clients and get that in there. But we partnered with ah, a dsp, a media buying platform, Altara Media. And it's great because again, it's not a trade desk, it's not the biggest guy out there. But what we do is meaningful for their clients. And now their clients have the opportunity to get more value. Right. They've got something extra in their arsenal that we're powering and we get access right. To that sort of whole world.

Speaker B: That makes a lot of sense. When I was at Yahoo, we would call that the chocolate and peanut butter approach.

Speaker A: Like it made it better.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly,

Speaker A: exactly.

Speaker B: Um, but it works. It absolutely works.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, it works. I mean, um, something else that I think is really important when you're growing a smaller company, especially in media. Right. We're in advertising media. There's a lot of schmoozing that happens and stuff just to stay top of mind. Small companies don't have the budgets that Yahoo or whatever has. And so I've actually found that helping our commercial teams be more creative and more scrappy when it comes to things like client entertaining. And just, you know, getting in front of your clients in meaningful ways actually creates better memories than some of these like super luxury things that the big companies do. Um, people like I. One of my teams would throw like beach parties for entire agencies in Santa Monica on like a shoestring budget and just set up like volleyball courts and some towels that we got brand named on and like order pizza and beer. It was like years ago and people still talk about it. Yeah, that was the best event. You know, like now I'm giving away all the secrets right now. Everybody's gonna do that. But you know, you have to think about things that way. You have to hire other people to think about things that way. And for the clients, like it's, you know, you don't always need to go and be a big company when you're in that GTM kind of stage. Like, you can impress people by being a good person, by being fun to be with, by being, you know, and by being creative. Um, so that was just, you know, something else that, that wouldn't kind of work in a big company because what they expect but has been really successful.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's all about the relationship building, particularly when nowadays people are more kind of working from home or a little bit more separate. People, I think, are looking for those kind of opportunities to build relationships. So sometimes I hear from startups that I work with, uh, that lead gen isn't their core issue yet, that they feel that they do have good lead flow, but they want to be more recognizable and relevant. So from what, where you stand, what are some of the more underrated levers for becoming top of mind? We just obviously talked about building relationships and you were saying how, you know, at smaller startups you can still make memorable experiences. Um, but beyond having like an event, uh, like that, what are some of the more tactical things that you do to stay top of mind?

Speaker A: Yeah, um, I think really understanding and having everybody on board with the fact that leads are great, but your best customer right now is your current customer. What else, you know, driving revenue that's going to support growth in the next like six to 12 months. Like, what else can we get out of our current customers? The ones who already love working with us that we're already driving results for? How do we maximize that? Um, and how do we stay in front of those people and everything? So it's like almost like leads from existing before net new and can talk about all day long strategies for net new. Because I believe that there's always need to keep your pipeline fresh. Right. But when you have limited bandwidth or limited resources, that understanding that you're, you know, your best customer really is that current one. Um, you know, I get at swim. Um, today we're doing great things for our initial client partners and it's getting noticed. We've got these partners who have massively expanded our technology across their entire agencies, buying investment for, you know, to power everything that they're doing, really focused on just what is that service level that's needed, what is the solution that's needed and how do we maximize what we're doing with those really tight partners and become part of their fabric? Um, really before we go wide and try and sort of spray and pray out there for New leads and things like that.

Speaker B: Yeah, retention is key, I think, particularly in such a noisy market. If you do get a client that was hard won, it's pretty much the day after you sign, you're put them in a retention program. Right. You're constantly defending, I think, uh, the

Speaker A: discount or just being good. Right. Like servicing them. Well, like making sure what you're doing is right. Making sure they feel like a partner and not just a customer. Right. Those, those kind of things really drive long term growth with clients.

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. So when I work with founders, which lately is pretty often, they have usually created the first version of their sales deck and their website. So this is almost a, uh, kind of a personal question, um, how you're doing it. Um, kind of a self or a self. This is kind of a self serving question. Um, as someone who has to get in front of customers with those kinds of materials, what are some of the telltale signs that it's time to level up the story? I know that sometimes I look at what has been created and I immediately want to go in and level it up. So, so my question really is how, uh, do you have that conversation without making them defensive? Because I get it, the founders, they did not get to be a founder by making nice looking sales decks. Like, that's just not their area. Um, but at the same time they have a lot of ownership around it, so it can be a little touchy.

Speaker A: Yeah, uh, someone can tell me that answer too because I always mess up and call somebody's baby ugly. I'm like, this is boring. And then somebody's like, I made that. And I'm like, oh my God, I'm sorry. Um, so yeah, please, like, tell me when you find out too. Uh, because honestly I, from a commercial standpoint, look, making Google Slides and PowerPoints and Pretty Things is not how I got here in the industry either. Right. But I'm also the one that's facing clients and the experience that's showing on the screen behind me is a preview of the experience that that customer probably is thinking in their head they're going to have working with me. And so if it's not sexy, uh, you know, if it doesn't have a little bit of an essence of cool, it's just like an extra thing that I have to get over. Right. Because they might think like, oh, that's going to be a boring platform to work in because her slides are boring. So I've, I just am trying to figure out how to, you know, prove business value from vibes and That's a really, really hard thing to do early on because a lot of times those early materials, they're simple and it's straightforward. It makes sense and it tells the story. But having to get into the room and say, well it tells the story but sometimes people want to work with our competitor because it felt better. Like that's a really hard thing to say and it can be like kind of offensive. Um, so I've tried a couple of things. I tried, I've tried collaborating with, you know, I've been in the agency and media space for a long time. I've got friends who own killer um, creative shops. So I've leaned on them as a resource and said like, let me collaborate with like a friend who owns a great design firm and help like gather outside advice or proposals on like how they've impacted this with other similar stage clients and try and like this is how we make it more of a priority that we need to not necessarily update our like entire story but like our vibe a little bit, like to stand out a little more. Um, including the founder or, or if it's ah, a CMO or like whoever, including the person who might be pushing back on updating those type of things and updating the look and feel, um, for the brand message, including them on client meetings, especially in person ones, is really important. Um, I think it's not that you're going to get a bad reaction to it, but sometimes they don't realize just how many other competitors or just other options are coming through that door every day. You know, sometimes just that experiential is like, oh, um, you know, it gives a bit more of a real life preview because they're in that, in that moment and people are getting hit up with many, many partner options every day. And sometimes you know, that gets passed around to people who you have not spoken to. So it has to feel smart, but it also has to feel cool. It's almost like it's a preview of what Rachel's going to be like to work with, honestly. Like not just what Swim's going to be like to work with, but like what Rachel's going to be like to work with. Um, so that's. Yeah. Again, please tell me if you, you know, hit the magic bullet there.

Speaker B: One thing I don't know is, uh, similar to what you're saying, I'll go and do a uh, kind of audit of the top competitors and do kind of a little bit of a uh, like a light competitive analysis from a narrative and visual standpoint and Try to show, you know, this is what other people are doing and this is what we're doing to make it a little bit less emotional. And a lot of times, you know, that's. That's met with, uh, you know, maybe a little bit of probably embarrassment that they don't want to show in the moment. And I probably don't get results directly after that kind of a meeting. But I'll notice over time that you. I see it seeping in. So it's a way to kind of plant a seed, um, and let it grow.

Speaker A: More voices. Right? Like, the more people that say something, it becomes more real.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. So that's. It's certainly not like a secret, but that's kind of what I've been trying. But like you mentioned, it's an ongoing struggle.

Speaker A: Yeah. And look, you another thing with those kind of things, the people sometimes behind the product are very technical or product focused. And it's just like the things that are important in that space and in their headspace are different. The color scheme and the vibrancy of a slide deck is not as important as, like, the workflow that's detailed on it. And we realize that it's, you know, it is both, um, because of who you're talking to. It's just, It's. It's your bubble.

Speaker B: Well, it's communication. And I think that words are certainly important communication, but the visual and the words together can be more powerful, is what I try to remind clients. I also try to diffuse their fear of change by saying, look, we could try this and we could always change it, and we could iterate and we should be evolving over time. And I feel like they get a feeling sometimes when you suggest changes that things are going to change. And it's on stone tablets. This is what we're going with because it's on a website. Um, and it doesn't have to be that way. Right. Like, we could try different things. We could test and learn nothing set in stone with. With marketing. So you've had a lot of different roles. Um, you've led big commercial teams, and you've even been fractional. Um, and now you're back to, like a scrappier build phase at Swim. So do you adjust your go to market and leadership depending on what stage the company is at and where you're.

Speaker A: Where you're. I mean, personally, some people might. I don't really. Um, some people probably don't like that. But I really like. In terms of leadership style, it could be 20 people, it could be 2,000 people. I could have a team of two. I could be on the street selling, or I could have a team of 35 sellers. Like, I still just care about my team. I want them all to succeed. You know, I want to support the team as best as I can. Um, you know, when I was at a bigger company, I was still like, the CRO or the SVP who wanted to come out on every client dinner or who, like, couldn't say no, which is another issue. I need to work. But, you know, I was. I wanted to be in five cities at a time because all of my reps wanted me there on their client things. Because I love. I actually, like, love that part of the job. And, you know, being a leader but still being out in the trenches, I think is really important. You're leading by example. You're being, um. You know, I, I would never want to be kind of one of those managers that just sits behind a screen and analyzes data to make decisions for the board all day. That's. That's not fun. Um, I've had bigger jobs that, like, kind of as companies grew to a certain point or got bought by private equity and stuff, like, it kind of became that and it became boring to me. I, um, just want to stay true to, like, my own authenticity and leadership and my own values. And, like, I feel that I can always learn as much from an intern as I can from the CEO. Uh, I'll always be like that. And I've definitely gotten comments. Um, also, just the thing as like, a female in leadership about, like, executive presence and, you know, stuff like that, and I'm like, okay, but I'd rather be real. And I think that actually has more of a lasting effect, um, making people feel good on the team because people that feel good do good work.

Speaker B: I love that. Yeah. Um, be your authentic self. Life's too short to be any other way.

Speaker A: It's too fake, so it feels weird. Being fake feels weird. I don't care who I'm talking to.

Speaker B: A lot of energy for what? Right. So what has the kind of back to the startup scrappy experience been like from being in a little bit more of enterprise environment? There, I mean, there is a difference. And maybe, you know, you're not adjusting your personal personality, but there's, you know, we all bring different flavors to the office, I think.

Speaker A: Yeah. Um, I don't know if it's like, adjusting, but it's just, it's a change in what I'm doing dayto day.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: Like, you do what you got to do. Um, it's like, it's humbling sometimes. You know, I've definitely had, um, some, like, now that, you know, I'm on a small team, I'm out there selling. We all are. My founders are out there selling, like, and everyone, by the way, everyone loves it. Like, it's energizing and it's exciting. Um, but, you know, I'm a little bit older now, and I'm going into these rooms sometimes with much younger media, teams planners, traders. Uh, I'm not as cool as I think I am or that I used to be, but I've tried to, like, kind of flip that and use it to my advantage. And so sometimes I walk into these rooms and I find things like, everyone in the room is under 30 and people are, like, scared to speak up or ask questions or don't feel empowered to, um, do whatever I'm selling to implement this solution, but they just stay quiet about it. And I've kind of made a decision in those situations to, instead of continuing to throw slides down the throats of people who can't even make a decision in front of the wrong audience, to be like, hold on, let me, like, let me share some career confidence advice. Like, let me, like, help this room advance. Like, uh, and I'll say something like, nobody's speaking up. Like, raise your hand. Like, I. There's no stupid questions. Like, those kind of things, actually, I've brought into meetings. And then you're just, you're not a salesperson, you're a guide for them. You're a help. You know, you're someone that's supporting the client team too. And eventually, you know what they're going to do. They're going to connect you to their boss who is empowered to make that decision. Um, there's also benefits, right, to losing that big team. I used to have, like, I don't know, 18 hours a week taken up by one on ones internally, you know, and I have now, like, two hours a week taken up by one on ones internally. So, like, that's massive. And you sometimes, like, don't think about that. Like, okay, I have to book my own flights, great. But, like, I'm not in internal meetings for three quarters of the day and starting my own stuff at 5:00pm um, so, yeah, so just making those little adjustments to my own sort of workflow and time management have been great.

Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, having something to offer, I think rather than just tell people what is what is always a better way to go about building a relationship with people. Um, of Any age really. So along those same lines, I like to ask people, as we, uh, wrap up the, the end of, of our session, a couple of questions about how they integrate their work life and their personal life. So because you were talking about advice, what's the worst piece of advice you've gotten in your career? And then conversely, I'm going to ask you what's the best piece of advice that you kind of still come back to? Um, frequently.

Speaker A: Um, I mean, the worst. I don't know if it's advice or feedback, but the worst piece of advice I've gotten anytime recently was like, don't talk in meetings. Or like, basically things that say, like, my opinion doesn't matter, be less direct, like the typical, like be less difficult kind of. Um, but I had some advice that like my confidence was going to hinder my career progression from one executive role to another. I'm sure. Amazing. I'm like, I'm sure all the men in the room got that same advice too. Sorry, but just exactly, you know.

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, what that person was saying was, your confidence makes me really uncomfortable because I'm not confident.

Speaker A: So that was bad advice. Never, never hide your confidence. Never. If you have something to say, say it politely. Don't be mean to people. But like, say what you're thinking because you can make a big change and it might be important. Like, don't hold back. Um, and don't let someone tell you that not holding back is going to hinder your ability to get promoted by them. Um, if that happens, go somewhere else. That's what I would say.

Speaker B: Yeah, find, find better people that are more aligned with your goals, personality, life.

Speaker A: You know what, the people who deal, the people who have dealt with it, they've won really big. So. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker B: Well, I'm sorry that you got that, but, uh, but right. At least, at least they say it's a good, uh, way, it's a good guidepost to be like, I gotta get outta here.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: If you were on the fence, what's some good advice you've gotten?

Speaker A: So I'll give you two on the good advice. Cause I like positive things way better than negative things. Um, the first one was early in my career from a boss who was my boss for, and partner for 10 plus years who I'm still very close friends with. And he, and this may be like we served by ChatGPT these days a little bit more, but he said if you get an email or something that pisses you off, do not respond to it for 24 hours. Like, don't shoot back a, uh, response. Sit on it. You can write the response. Don't send it. However, after 24 hours, if you're still mad about what's in that email, send the email. 80% of the time you're going to have, like, it's. It's reactionary, right? And you are going to calm down or you're going to answer in a much more appropriate manner, something more productive. Like, you're not going to yell at the person. Um, 20% of the time you're still mad, and, like, go ahead and do it. So I thought that was really good advice. I've always followed that advice. I have imparted that on all of the teams that I have worked with, you know, that have reported to me and everything over, over the years. Um, the other one I would say is, like, in regards to culture, um, also from an early company that I helped build and was at for a very long time. And when I was leaving there, I asked one of my partners, like, it was just such a great time. And, you know, I. People hate when you call, like, your work people a family, but, like, it was really a family. Like, they are still, like, near and. Or like every single one of these people that. That was at that. That company with me. And I was like, how. How did we make something so great, right? Uh, like, how did we. How do I even know how to, like, look for this kind of fantastic culture somewhere else? And one of my original bosses just said, like, you don't. You have to create it. And that was like a st. It stuck with me. Like, that was like a sticking moment. And it kind of ties back into, like, always being yourself and always being authentic. And if I want to bring fun to the table, somewhere that feels overly professional, I'm going to bring fun to the table. Um, so, you know, hopefully throughout my career and different companies in progression, I've made him proud with that piece, uh, of advice because I think that I've, you know, I've created a lot of teams that people enjoy working on and have been successful working on because they enjoy the culture, um, that we've built. So, um, that was. That would be like, the. Probably the best. The best one.

Speaker B: That's great. And it goes back to your confidence point. It takes confidence to want to take the initiative to create the workplace that you want to work in. Don't sit around and wait for it to come to you. I think that's great. One of my. I'll just offer one of my positive pieces. Pieces of advice I got. I'm someone that definitely likes to really get in there and fix things. Like, when there's a problem, I'll come in and just no matter what, like, be like, I can fix this, you know, which, you know, has its positives, but also has some negatives because maybe it's not the time for. No one asked you to fix it or et cetera. So some advice I got once that I think about frequently when I face, you know, things that need to be fixed is look at the problem, realize it's not your problem. Like, really what they meant was assess, uh, if this is really your problem, like, is this your. Like, what's it gonna do for you on the positive and negative? And I come back to that a lot. Not just at, uh, at work, but, like, even in personal instances. Like, is this a battle that you want to fight or. Or not as someone that's always willing to go into battle, you know, you don't always have to go into battle. You don't have to.

Speaker A: You could just.

Speaker B: You could just go for a walk around block.

Speaker A: That's. That's really good advice. It is like the pick your. Pick your battles. Right? Like, not.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.

Speaker A: Not everything's life or death.

Speaker B: Exactly. Yeah. Um, so just keeping with our theme upon a. Bringing maybe work, work, life, balance outside of work. What's something that you do that has absolutely nothing to do with your job but you think does help you do your job better?

Speaker A: I think it's not necessarily something I do now, but it's something in my background. Um, so, you know, I was a theater kid. I grew up in music and film and theater and doing all those things and being off Broadway shows and, uh, it was my major in college. And I think that that's really helped. Just in a commercial role, like, look, some. Some good improv experience and comedy experience is great for pivoting a meeting on the fly. Like, listening to what the room is saying and adjusting to understand right away what to say. That's a unique skill, and it comes pretty naturally. And I don't. I don't need the, like, prep time, um, for meetings and pitches. And I, I can riff a little bit better because of that. And I think it's. It's helpful in. In my current role, which is. Which is very communication, um, based. Right. Like customizing things for the now. Um, yeah.

Speaker B: Sales is a bit of a performance. Right. You have to be on. Yeah.

Speaker A: So you have to be on. You have to be also, like, look, especially as you move up and are in more executive roles. Like, I do, like, panels and speak at conferences. And, like, I think I don't have that, like, element of being nervous or screwing up or forgetting your line because I spent years growing up, like, memorizing lines and knowing, you know, what if it skips your mind and you're in the middle of a performance? Like, you just say something else and someone else rips off of you and it's fine. And by the way, no one in the audience knows, like, if you say, I've had some, you know, people in sales or teammates who are like, literally, if you say one wrong thing against the slide, they're like, like, it breaks their world, you know? And I'm like, you know, the people on the other side of this conversation have no idea what it was supposed to say. Like, yeah, uh, it goes back to

Speaker B: everything is not so dire.

Speaker A: Right?

Speaker B: That's great. So, Rachel, thank you so much for being a guest on the Last Word on product marketing. This has been a lot of fun. What is the best way that people can get a hold of you? Should they reach out to you on LinkedIn?

Speaker A: Yeah, sure. I mean, yeah, I'm, I'm on LinkedIn. Um, uh, you can email RachelWim. AI super easy email address. You get those when you're early stage at companies. Yeah, I think either of those work fine. I'm, I'm happy to hear from anyone. I try and respond to everything. Perfect.

Speaker B: Okay. Be sure to to subscribe to the podcast on all the major platforms and check out the YouTube channel for our videos. Thanks so much for listening.