#17. An Update On My Latest
I Made Another Move!
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Hey there!
First, if you're new, welcome! And if you're not, I still love you for being here.
If you haven't noticed (and I really hope you have), I went a little quiet for a few weeks on the newsletter front.
But as a great orator once said, real Gs move in silence like lasagna.
(Although apparently the G in lasagna is not silent, it actually impacts the pronunciation and -- sorry, never mind.)
Anyway, here's a quick update on where I've been and what to expect moving forward.
You ever just feel totally uninspired at work?
Like you’re not growing. You’re just getting chipped away at by tedious work, office politics, and the inability to really have your voice heard and appreciated?
A few years ago I had a bad manager. A really bad manager.
Like the kinda bad that tells you you’re not qualified to do anything other than admin work, throws their team under the bus to make themselves look good, and calls you while you’re in the hospital to ask why you didn’t properly submit PTO.
But that bad manager was just a symptom of the overall disease.
A nightmarish company culture that blatantly valued profit over people and was so dedicated to the status quo that some days felt like working on the set of Mad Men (but with a lot less of the marketing & advertising creativity -- so none of the good stuff).
Recovering from that bad experience took a while.
(Actually I just whined about it to my therapist the other week, so probably still working through it.)
But it really made me step back and ask myself: What do I want?
When it comes to my career, where do I see myself in 5 or 10 years, and what’s the best way to get there?
Watching so many stories about how brave, creative people took a leap into the unknown and started their own venture made me want to become more active in writing my own story.
I’ve always known that I wanted to start something of my own, to test my hand at entrepreneurship.
And the pandemic has created a great opportunity for such ventures.
This is a moment of reinvention. A lot of people are having to rethink everything they’ve ever held true.
Entire industries are adjusting the way they’ve traditionally worked to embrace a new reality. New Normal, whatever you want to call it, there are going to be a lot of long-term changes to business models around the world.
Thinking this through really lit a fire under me.
Reminds me of the song from Hamilton, Non-Stop.
(Sorry, I have to take any chance I get to tie something back to Hamilton.)
Why do you write like you're running out of time?
Write day and night like you're running out of time?
Every day you fight, like you're running out of time.
Our most precious commodity is time. We all only have a finite amount of it. And by sitting back on my dreams and ambitions for so long, I'm wasting opportunity.
So a few months ago, I connected with someone named Steve on Twitter.
Steve told me he had started something new, PromoPrep, and was looking to quit his job and focus on it full time.
As someone who’s project managed a team before (with in-office and remote team members, across different time zones), I thought, “Wow, this would’ve been so useful.”
And I told him I was itching to start a new venture -- to grow something from the start. To have the freedom and flexibility you often lack in a 9-5.
But also to have more of a voice at the strategic leadership level.
And we realized there was a real opportunity for us to partner up and combine our strengths.
So I’ve joined PromoPrep as Head of Growth.
It’s still a side hustle for me right now, but I’m so incredibly excited about the possibilities.
We’ll be sharing more updates really soon. We’ve got some really cool things in the works.
If you want to follow our journey together and watch how this unfolds, . Most of what we’re sharing will be interviews with marketing leaders. (The first interview will be with the Head of Marketing at stock photo resource Pexels.)
Or just follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn since we’ll be sharing plenty in both places.
As for this newsletter, you bet I'm going to keep this going.
I've got some REALLY awesome content planned out, which is another reason you haven't heard from me here in a few weeks.
There will be a really exciting interview series I plan to release shortly with incredible business people and marketers. I don't want to reveal anything yet, but I think you'll be very excited to see some of the names.
Other Stuff I’ve Been Doing:
I was featured in this article about how journalists make great marketers. i know a lot of you share a similar background, so it was really cool to get to speak about this topic.
Don't forget about that YouTube channel I recently launched. I'm about to start releasing the interview series here, so if you're interested, would love for you to subscribe and let me know what you think!
Unlayer featured me in a post about how to build a better landing page. My basic thoughts are that we need to really start innovating the template most of us have been trained to follow.
Can't wait to be back with some great content for you to read! In the meantime, feel free to give me a shout if you have any recommendations for something you'd like to see in the future.
<3
Chantelle
Still some great content on my site if you missed it, including my lists of the best free marketing tools, best free stock image sites, and best free digital marketing resources. Click the button below to check them out!
Bonus: Stuff That Caught My Eye This Week
Talkwalker published a great article about conversational intelligence analysis from 50+ experts, including Marketing Twitter Queen and HubSpot community manager Christina Garnett. Get her expertise here.
The broader marketing industry has just discovered the concept of 'Community,' so brace yourselves for all the community content that's going to come out over the next few months. This article looks at whether Chief Community Officer will be the next big executive title.
On a roll with the community theme, so let's keep it going. Here's a look at how to harness community-led growth for your brand.
Here's a really fascinating article I came across about the ethics of using AI for job interviews and hiring. Apparently artificial intelligence can develop some of the same biases of its creators or programmers, which could have pretty devastating results in the future for creating equitable opportunities for all. (Also beautifully designed page!)
Lastly, I know Gorilla Glue isn't a thing anymore right now. But take a look at the bump in search interest around the brand created by the social media fiasco of the Gorilla Glue story about the woman who glued her hair in place.
If you found this useful or entertaining at all, I'd really appreciate your help in getting the word out to others by clicking the share icons below or just forwarding it to others!