leen Voboril, the martech singer: Salary and career

We interviewed people to learn about their marketing experiences as part of the Salary and Career Survey. Kathleen Voboril, a former top-level marketing executive who has been a consultant for many years, is our guest today. Kathleen Voboril has also found a way to combine her love of musical theater with martech. )

Q. How did you start in marketing?

I went to musical theater school and dreamed of becoming an actress on Broadway. For my first few years after college, I spent in New York City, trying to become an actress on Broadway. I was temping, and the best side jobs in financial services were those that involved me working with money.

I ended up working for a private equity company because they gave me health insurance. One thing led to another, and they offered me full-time employment as a marketing assistant. After a few years, I decided to get my MBA from the University of Texas.

Q : What is the role of marketing in

A: I didn’t focus on marketing. Marketing was not my passion. I didn’t love the classes or coursework. I focused on entrepreneurship. I was going to do the VC entrepreneur program, but I had an opportunity to attend GE’s experience commercial leadership program. It was two years long and I thought it was a vocational MBA. Three eight-month rotations are required in different GE businesses. It was an amazing job.

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At GE I caught the digital bug pretty early. My mentors and sponsors thought it was just a fad, something for interns. They also thought that it wasn’t very strategic. I said, “Well we’re supposed be the future sales and marketing leaders of the organization. All the data indicates that B2B and B2C users are increasingly spending more time online. Are we going to understand this and be relevant?”

Q: You called. You must have been very well positioned.

A: Yes, I became known as a digital expert within GE. When it came time to graduate, GE had been one of the very first brands to invest more in digital advertising than traditional advertising. Jeff Immelt had ordered that each business unit has a digital leader at a senior-mid level. I got to pick which unit I wanted to work for, and I chose GE Transportation. It was a $5 Billion business but GE’s smallest Division.

Q. What made you leave the company?

A: I did a great job in transportation and it was well-received throughout the company. However, I could not get more budget. The business had no CMO and I was only one of three marketing managers for the division. I was approached by larger business divisions to work on digital projects for them. However, at GE, at the time, they were unwilling to sell me.

Q. Where did you go after that?

I knew a friend who worked for a consumer goods company named Central Garden and Pet. They were looking for a digital leader and the location was Atlanta. I was living in Atlanta and did not want to leave. I was excited to learn that it was a CPG, and that marketing would be the driving force. There was a large number of CPG marketing leaders with a traditional background and a big vision for the digital world. I was very excited to manage a digital marketing agency with big budgets and build a team.

The entire senior management team was laid off in my second week. I went from having a digital ad spend of millions to $100,000 and I got to fire my agency. So we did content marketing, we did social. I replaced my agency with software firms. We replatformed our 50-60 websites, as well as a lot more training, to Sitecore.

Q. How did you get from Atlanta to Oregon

A: I moved back to Portland, where I was raised. I got a job offer at Oregon Tool. At the time, it was Blunt International. Up until then, I had only worked in digital marketing. I hadn’t really done much with ecommerce. Oregon Tool offered a 50/50 mix of digital marketing and online commerce. This was very interesting.

Q. But there were problems?

When I arrive, I hear, “We spent all this time and money to hire all these people.” I think, “Oh, my god, they bought the wrong technology.” There are some diamonds here and I can make this team work together. But this isn’t what they want to achieve. So I spent the first two years cleaning things up and re-evaluating the situation.

Most senior leaders, particularly those over a certain age range, are reluctant to admit they do not understand these things. They think, “Oh by now, I should have a good idea of how important the Internet is.” But they aren’t willing to admit that they don’t know.

I worked there for four and a half years, and built an ecommerce global business. Revenue grew from $2.5 to $30 million. We developed a direct fulfillment capability for consumers and started to do some really cool things like replatforming websites. It was purchased by private equity investors. They took on a large amount of debt, and I was part a mass dismissal. It’s only a question of time before it becomes a shell.

Q. What is your favorite thing about marketing?

A: I like how it’s multidisciplinary. I love the way the art and science meet, how everything is just one ecosystem. It’s a perfect blend of structure and creativity, technology and art, data and feelings. It’s so cross-functional, and I especially love digital marketing.

Q. Is there a Broadway Musical hiding in Digital Marketing?

You’re a funny person. I started a side project I call corporate karaoke. I take musicals and pop songs, and I re-perform them in a corporate context. The latest song I’ve done is Joni Mitchel’s “A Case of You,” which is about SAP, and how SAP has become the invasive vine that is destroying your tech stack.

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( You may listen to Kathleen’s other funny tunes on her YouTube channel @Corporate Karaoke.

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