I always go to the customer service center.

When I start a new role, I want to sit down and hear what are they saying?

What are they asking about?

What's important to them?

Where do we get the majority of our contact with our customers?

I want to see customer survey data.

Um, those are the things that are most important when you're initially starting.

If you don't know your industry and you don't know those customers and what their needs are, you're not going to be able to come up with a resonating value proposition and a strong marketing plan.

Hey everyone and welcome back to Marketing it Raw.

That is the podcast and I am the host Adam Helway.

I'm joined by my lovely teammate Deanna and uh, today we get to dive into somebody's career who exemplifies the fusion of technical expertise and marketing leadership.

Who is it that we're talking to this week?

That's right, Adam.

You guys are gonna love this one.

This week we sat down with Jocelyn Renee Johnson, and we talked about a really interesting path that she has taken in her career.

She started out coding software, and ended up leading marketing for some seriously big names.

I'm talking GE, Girl Scouts of America, American Bar Association.

So it was really interesting hearing about how she brings that tech background into everything she does.

And she was very open about the journey.

We get to see some insights on how she made the leap from tech to marketing.

And then about how staying curious and adaptable are gold for anyone in this field.

So I love.

Some of her personal stories, how she got from A to B, because we know it's never linear.

Uh, and I just, I, I think it's, she has some really interesting points that will be relatable to, of course, marketing, but also anyone in the, the tech field.

I think that they'll find her insights really, really interesting.

And it's awesome because for each of those companies that you're talking about and, and more that we'll, we'll talk through in the interview, she was purposeful about why she chose those challenges, what she loved about working on inside of GE and how she moved around from project to project and department to department.

Uh, within there, but then ultimately again, making the leap to something like Girl Scouts of America and her connection, uh, over there.

And then ultimately right now to, uh, the ABA, the American Bar Association.

So this episode is jam packed with cool stuff.

I love talking to Jocelyn.

Um, she is a breath of fresh air and, um, is always so, uh, full of.

Cool, good energy.

And, um, I just, I just love, uh, riffing off the, having a conversation with her.

So, uh, I want to let you get right into it and experience, uh, the same thing that I did talking to Jocelyn Renee Johnson.

Here you go.

Enjoy.

Jocelyn, it's so wonderful to see you.

I've been looking forward to talking to you for quite some time.

How is 2025 treating you so far?

So far, great.

It's wonderful to be here.

I've been looking forward to this conversation for the last few weeks.

And, and I wanted to congratulate you.

You know, I thought you were going to pop on here with like a scepter and a, and a TR and everything because the CMO Alliance just a couple of months ago, or just maybe even in December, um, folks nominated you and you, and you won for the CMO of the year for the group, right?

Yes, that that is correct.

It was a very humbling experience to be selected amongst such great marketing leadership.

Uh, and I am so appreciative of that honor.

Yeah, again, thank you for being humble and not, you know, wearing all of

No tiara today.

Today.

Well, um, I was also like reminding myself of like your experience and your background and, and, and looking at, you know, a lot of the, the, the organizations and companies that you've worked with, um, over the years.

And I was like, yeah, nobody's ever heard of GE and, and the American Bar Association and Girl Scouts or any of that.

Um, but

pretty obvious that I go for the iconic brands, right?

yeah, for sure.

Well, and, and, you know, so, um, So how did, how did Jocelyn get involved in, in marketing?

Is it, you know, all, all fate or did you kind of fall into it?

Cause you're, you're doing a pretty good job of it so far, apparently.

you.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Um, marketing was not the aerial focus for my undergrad.

I'm actually supposed to be coding software somewhere in a dark room and Yeah, that just didn't work out.

I started at G.

E.

and their information services division and worked on a cross functional team.

G.

E.

is known for its matrix organizations.

And because of that, I got to see this marketer and I was like, oh, wow, I like I like what they're doing.

They get to talk to everybody and they're orchestrating what's going to happen and the decision making in the creative and I want to do that.

And I was young enough in my career that they gave me an entry level marketing specialist position, uh, started off with the global transportation industry and E.

D.

I.

Transactions and just kept growing from there, kept learning and evolving and, uh, fortunately given multiple opportunities in marketing roles.

it looked appealing to you and ultimately it clicked cause you kept with it, even though you had, you were working in that more technical role before.

Right.

yes, yes.

I loved it.

Um, and everything about it.

Um, at G.

E.

I actually worked in four different business units.

So I was able to take my marketing skills and apply them in four different industries.

I worked in, uh, the e commerce business.

I worked in industrial systems with electrical components, all the wires behind the walls.

I also did my consumer piece with appliances and lighting.

That was my first entry to marketing for consumers.

And then I ended my career in the G health care division, which was one of the largest.

Yes.

of the G business units.

Um, and it was a global organization.

So I got to not only take the core marketing skills and just apply them over and over again, learning these new industries because at the base, you know, core marketing applies just about everywhere,

Yeah.

Well, and, and so interesting to me how much of that, of, of your technical expertise, uh, helped with, with, within the roles that you're talking about, because, you know, I, I, I believe the best marketers are Um, and honestly, even the best just business problem solvers are ones that are kind of polyglots.

They can speak different languages related to, you know, the different audiences that they, that they need to speak to, or, um, or just even the, the additional departments within the organization being able to, like you said, they get to talk to all these folks and do all these things.

And so, uh, I agree with that being very, um, attractive for somebody who, you know, I'm like, Kind of all over the place in the way that I'm thinking about that stuff.

So how did that, that, that initial role or the initial background in the, on the technical side, did it impact or help or give you a special power here with

I'd like to think that it helped and that it gave me the ability to understand the processes that have to go on.

Um, it also gave me an interest and desire to continuously learn about new innovations and how do we evolve to that next thing?

Um, we, in my first GE business, we actually had to convince Jack Welch that we needed to create a website.

Because he thought that the internet was evil and that it was a fad and you know, it would be going away.

Fortunately, my executive leadership was able to convince him that no, I, we, we think that we should play some bets here.

And not only did we create our own, uh, website and internet presence, but we hosted for the entire organization.

But that desire to continuously learn and, uh, try new and different, uh, different technologies is definitely something that I think has pushed me throughout my career.

Um, at the appliances and lighting division, I was the digitization leader.

So they said, you know, we saw you over at information service, so we know you got some technical skills.

Can you help us with our marketing?

On the web, uh, and and help us with the whole taxonomy and revamp our website, but do that fun branding stuff that you do as well.

Um, and so that was where 2 worlds kind of came together very well, but there's constantly a need.

You've got to have that marketing technology desire to learn.

Um, that that hunger for more information and what's coming and what's next.

Uh, that's that's definitely something that has helped me, I think throughout my career.

that's awesome.

And you talked about, I think, was it four different business divisions you were, you were talking about?

And so again, being somebody who, cause we're talking about like marketing experience and applying the marketing experience in.

And your, your, the completeness of your marketing knowledge at that point was being thrown into a job that you were like, yes, I'd love to do this.

And then just learning as, as you went, right.

And so how do you, what do you think was the key to success to, to turn that into success in the first place and then ultimately turn it into something where they.

Pulled you to four different, uh, divisions and that you were successful.

I mean, I don't know how different those divisions were from each other, but a mindset that you had for when you first jumped in and then ultimately to kind of like say, this is how I'm going to build off of this or this is why I'm going to say yes to this.

I'm interested to know cause you didn't go off and like Say, Oh, I'm going to go backfill my knowledge with a degree or do it, do something like that.

You just kept moving forward and you were very successful.

You've been very successful at that.

yes.

I think that I always go back to the customer.

So when I was doing the technical support in my initial G.

E.

Job, I was focused on our customers quality.

So that helps with marketing.

Obviously, you've got to know who your target audience is.

You've got to know what your customers needs are, and then you've got to create a value proposition that resonates with them and gives them a reason to believe.

It doesn't matter what industry you're in.

Those first steps have to be taken and you've got to take the time.

And it's it's not always easy to get that information.

But if you go to the right places, I always go to the customer service center.

When I start a new role, I want to sit down and hear what are they saying?

What are they asking about?

What's important to them?

Where do we get the majority of our contact with our customers?

I want to see customer survey data.

Um, those are the things that are most important when you're initially starting.

If you don't know your industry and you don't know those customers and what their needs are, you're not going to be able to come up with a resonating value proposition and a strong marketing plan

So it goes back to, I think what you were describing earlier, where there's these fundamental things that you're going to do across marketing regardless.

And, and you, you, you understood that and you applied that now.

time.

Let's fast forward a little bit more, right?

So I talked about, you know, Girl Scouts and then also, you know, your, your current role.

Um, and, and so tell us about like just sort of as we are quick fast forwarding of the tape and then to where we currently are, uh, in, in, in the role that you have.

So the pandemic was a very pivotal time for me.

I was working for GE Healthcare, one of our largest divisions, a multibillion dollar organization.

Uh, and I had a global team.

I had about 60 people and they were all over the world.

Um, and the pandemic happened.

There was no travel.

Uh, our healthcare customers were a little busy.

And so the time to talk to us and to market to them.

You know, it was, it was a challenging time.

It was time for change.

Um, it was time for reflection and a, uh, good colleague of mine, a former boss, uh, Nick fences, uh, reached out to me and said, you know, uh, Girl Scout CEO.

I was just talking to her because Nick works at the Northwestern University Kellogg Management School.

And has marketing courses.

He invited the CMO for Girl Scouts to come to their course.

The CEO told him, I don't have a CMO.

I've been looking for a CMO for 18 months.

Could you, uh, you know, suggest anybody?

So he contacted me and he said, you know, would you be interested in this?

And I said, well, you know, I was a Girl Scout when I was little.

So I'm a Girl Scout alum.

Of course, I'm going to at least talk to them.

I doubt anything will happen,

buying Girl Scout cookies would not qualify me at all for the job.

Cause I'd have a lot of qualifications

other skills would qualify you for the job.

Okay.

So I, I spoke to the CEO and within 30 days, I was the CMO of Girl Scouts of the USA.

Um, it was a perfect position for the time.

Uh, it was a remote position, uh, because nobody was in an office at the time.

And in, uh, early 21, we actually didn't go to the office the 1st year and.

Maybe 14, 15 months into the job, uh, before we actually started going back to the office and, and, uh, expecting our New York team at least to be in the office.

And so I would go and visit every other week just for a couple of days, but it was a fantastic time.

We were doing a rebrand.

Uh, it was all the things I loved.

I wanted a role where, um, the, the stakeholder at the end of the day was someone that.

to me and girls and young women are very important to me.

So, uh, that piece of the puzzle was, was very much solved with the, with the Girl Scout USA opportunity.

Was, was there something surprising or just sort of, uh, obviously new and different given that you had just come from GE?

To an organization like Girl Scouts.

The, um, impact of the board of directors for Girl Scouts was new and different for me.

We got to meet.

Board members when we were at GE, but it was very light as far as the amount of contact.

Um, the board members and Girl Scouts are extremely engaged.

Uh, the, so that piece of it was a little different for me.

I expected, actually, I was surprised at how much the running of the business was very similar to the running of the business of GE, uh, any business unit that I had worked in, uh, and the consistent theme there is, yeah, you're, you're responsible for connecting, increasing the number of members that you have, that's the revenue that you bring in.

So, yeah, it's very simple.

I saw a lot of similarities with regards to, yeah, I'm expected to bring in revenue.

I am expected to make sure that I have a fantastic value proposition.

I run campaigns just like I ran campaigns at at G.

E.

Maybe I don't have as much money, but I did run campaigns.

And so it was those similarities We're surprised.

I was expecting.

Oh, this is gonna be totally different.

And this is gonna be, you know, it's gonna it was not totally different.

Um, at the end of the day, the stakeholder is a girl or a young woman versus a stockholder, which is, you know, we had used to have the G.

E.

Stop ticker going across our screens all the time.

We were so focused on that being able to say at the end of the day, I'm changing lives of girls.

I'm helping them to build courage, confidence and character that makes you want to get up every morning.

It makes you excited about the work.

You're doing the impact that you're making on their lives.

And related to that, how, I mean, you're, you sort of described this already, but I want to go a little bit deeper.

Like how did the, how did that impact that you were doing given that you were able to look at these.

young women in the face, often probably through the work that you're doing and be aware of these human beings, the ones that you, like you said, you have a connection with you.

You had a passion for, for, for helping.

How did that impact your work as a marketer versus what you were doing before, which obviously you cared about your, your job, but, but this seemed a bit more, even closer to your heart.

It did.

Um, at my end years at, uh, G.

E.

One of the things that I did was I took a passion profiling since you mentioned passion.

Uh, and I learned and was given the vernacular, uh, to say that I am.

I have three passions that are my key archetypes, and that is a transformer, a builder and an altruist.

The way that GE was able to keep me for 28 years was because I was constantly thrown at, Okay, we have this challenge, we want you to fix it, we want you to change it.

We want you to, you know, put this new thing in place.

And so I was constantly having to transform teams or build new teams, build products that we were launching, uh, those types of things.

The way that they got the altruist piece was they had me as a board member for nonprofits.

on a regular basis.

Every state that I lived in, I was on a board representing General Electric.

Uh, and so they were able to keep me for all those years because of that.

In this case, when it came to Girl Scouts, and now with the American Bar Association, I get to fulfill the altruist piece just direct.

It seems more direct.

Um, and I, I just, uh, I'm sorry.

It's a bigger piece of the pie

It is.

It definitely is.

And, and, and so with you, like you said, the ABA, American Bar Association, how long have you been there again?

I am just approaching my fifth month

Your fifth

at the ABA as an official employee.

Now, I did have a fractional period, uh, from March through July, uh, as a fractional CMO at the American Bar Association.

So I was able to do a marketing assessment.

and understand some of the nuances of working with the legal profession.

Um, I was able to make some connections and say, okay, this is similar to the way that it was at Girl Scouts in that they have these separate entities that are also part of the equation.

Um, and they have large boards that are very much involved and engaged in.

The activities and the service offerings that we provide.

on your experience over the last, you know, year, um, what, what do you feel has been the most challenging, challenging thing that you faced as a marketer?

The most challenging thing is the ability to, um, educate, um, at at a level that people can understand what marketing is.

1st of all,

You're talking about

because yes, internally.

And also, I would say with our members, our volunteer members, 1st of all, because yes, internally.

And also, I would say with our members, our volunteer members, In need of understanding, you know, what marketing is, why we're doing certain things, where we're placing our bets, being able to articulate that.

And then at the same time, trying to go full speed with my team on here's what we're going to do.

Uh, is is probably one of the biggest challenges, uh, similar to Girl Scouts.

We had there was I mentioned there was 18 months where there was no CMO and in Girl Scouts and, uh, at the time that I came on board, they had moved that department around so much and as they move the department, if there was a piece that a leader really like, they keep that piece.

So marketing was spread out all over the place.

And similarly here at the ABA, there's several different marketing department, not all of it's the core, uh, marketing organization, uh, that I get to lead and, and have some direction over.

So that piece is, is.

It's different and, and challenging and making sure that we're all looking like the same organization when we go to market is probably one of the biggest challenges and one of the things that I am trying to approach first.

so in both cases, it sounds like for, for Girl Scouts and the a, BA, you know, it's an organization that has a lot of like regional offices or regional organ, you know, bodies, so to speak.

And, and we have a few clients that are like that, where those offices, they, they, there's things they want to do that are very specific to the, to their, that that area and being able to bring some cohesion to it is what you were talking about.

Huh?

Correct.

Correct.

So at Girl Scouts, we had 111 councils and so all across the United States.

And so there are things that are happening in particular regions that may not impact, you know, there might be something going on in the East Coast that the West Coast isn't even thinking about, um, when you're doing different, uh, photo libraries, for example, that you want everybody to have access to.

Well, you need to make sure that there's pictures there where there's people in winter coats, but the people in Florida don't care about the winter coat.

Look.

They want summer, sunny, you know, fun time.

So you've got to make sure that you are providing for the masses.

You're providing for all the different types of scenarios, um, and that you're giving some core messaging that they can then play off of and, you know, they may need to make some specific tweaks here and there that are resonating with their particular audience.

hopefully still aligned to the bigger theme, the bigger message that we are providing,

In regards to Girl Scouts, because of that gap of 18 months, um, did you Did you also sort of had to have to evaluate what you had to kind of pry out of the hands of folks and go, I need, I need to own this, given that there was no owner at all before.

So therefore people would just be like, I won't, I'll take that piece and I'll, and I'll own it regardless of probably whether it was local or not to them.

So was there kind of an exercise of like finding where all of the

There was.

map was spread around the entire organization?

Yes, there was.

Um, we had to identify those that had marketing experience.

Now, the Girl Scout team was a smaller team than what we have here at the American Bar Association.

But, um, we identified individuals that had the titles.

And then there's sometimes when people will create roles, and it's not even a title that sounds like marketing, but that's what they're doing is marketing.

And so you have to kind of peel back the onion and just figure out, Okay, where are these people in?

Let's make sure that marketing folks at least have access to the marketing team if they're not, you know, directly on the team, let's make sure they at least feel as if the information, the guidelines, you know, the branding, any major campaigns that they're able to leverage those and take advantage of those, but also keep that need for consistent branding in play.

Um, uh, is there anything that, um, I had the question in my head here.

It was in regards to, uh, like, so at ABA is, is there anything that, um, Like, you know, you were in technology, you were marketing technology.

Is there anything that, that marketers, marketing leaders, especially trying to make a transition possibly from what you might even consider, at least, at least with, especially with girl Scouts, something that was more aligned with your purpose or, you know, your, where, what would be like the most contrasting difference between B to B or maybe you weren't only B to B, but you know, on the technology side, uh, um, uh, over at GE and then something like ABA, uh, what's the, just the biggest contrast that you can think of?

I want to say it's the, um, willingness.

change.

If you didn't keep up with what the latest technology was and you weren't at least testing it at G.

E.

You were made fun of basically you were, you were lagging and behind and you needed to just go in a corner.

So if you didn't have You know, contacts that you could just text to at Salesforce or, you know, whoever at, uh, Microsoft or Oracle, whoever, uh, the latest technology was, then you were, you were just, you were behind and you were considered unnecessary and archaic.

Um, it's more of a push.

At the nonprofits because there's a cost associated with it.

That's part of the issue.

Uh, is there is a cost associated with it and you have to be much more careful in the bets that you place with the nonprofits.

You don't have, you know, it's not like, oh, well, we'll, we'll spend a couple million here and just see what happens.

No, a couple million is a big deal at a nonprofit.

So, Okay.

Um, I think that that's probably one of the biggest, uh, differences that I see.

And that, that was for B2B and B2C, uh, at GE.

You need to be on the latest and greatest.

And if you weren't, what, what have you done for me lately?

Is what you would get.

and, and, and I don't know what your experience is in this, but, um, sometimes that is really more of like a shiny object syndrome.

I mean, obviously.

technology for the sake of technology or staying on emerging things for the sake of staying on emerging things

Mm hmm.

isn't, it's not 100 percent a hit all the

Correct.

Correct.

um, and I would imagine, though, that because people are in sort of high speed, uh, arguably adjacent to, to, to sort of high tech.

Cause I live in the Silicon Valley and, you know, we've got somebody who's popping up some tool that, you know, three guys that didn't did in a garage.

That could be absolutely incredible and new

Mm hmm.

that the wide majority of people are not.

Adopting.

I remember a number of, you know, even the social networks and things that had come out, they came out of the Silicon Valley and, uh, a lot of my network and the people around me over here were all like on it and using it, you know, four square back in the day or, uh, uh, friend feed, which would, which ultimately was, was purchased by, um, Facebook back in the day.

These were things where people Uh, anybody outside of the valley wasn't using nearly as much.

And we had to like, kind of make sure we weren't getting too enamored with something that ultimately wasn't being used by the customer, uh, outside of, of the, of the Bay area and the Silicon Valley, I would imagine that.

Um, for those nonprofits as well.

Like a lot of people are doing the work because they care about the work in a way, which is quite different than probably what the folks at GE and, and therefore, um, having a mandate to understand the most cutting edge and emerging stuff is not on their docket.

It's, it's a lot of effort to, to do versus at GE.

Would you, you, you think that that's true?

Yes.

And, um, and, and I wouldn't say that we invested in every single thing that came across, but you had to at least be aware of and understand why that particular option makes sense or doesn't make sense.

And you had to have that, that story, that explanation.

Um, and you were rewarded if you at least were aware of what was going on, what was out there, what are others using?

Um, that was a, that was a requirement and that was part of the difference.

Um, but yeah, the, the, the fact that you have that meaningfulness and that fulfilling of any altruism, uh, in your passion wheelhouse at the Girl Scouts or the American Bar Association or other nonprofits, uh, was definitely, uh, it definitely is part of.

the way that we are tight with, you know, we got to be careful with this.

We've got to be very mindful and taking those bets is something that you do after a great number of conversations and collaborations within your team, within the organization, um, definitely with your IT team, um, to ensure that we will be able to fully utilize and see some benefits.

from this.

Um, there's also the need, however, and that's on both sides to set the right expectations.

I think quite often we have very over, uh, over estimating when it comes to short term.

You know what?

You're gonna get short term benefits from different technologies versus the longer term.

I think we underestimate longer term impact of those and and we we sometimes will pivot.

To something else and not give things the opportunity to.

to grow and to be a benefit to the organization and to your end user.

As a marketing leader, um, currently at the ABA, how do you measure success beyond of course the business outcome in the sense of how, what are you, what are you paying attention to to know that you are successful in what you and your team are doing?

Well, for me, the most important things are obviously always revenue and market share.

Um, and you, you do have that as well, even with the nonprofits, you know, how many opportunities are there out there?

Who is a member?

Um, is, is what it comes down to.

Um, the other success metrics are your typical ones for performance marketing.

So how are we doing on our cost per conversion?

How are we doing for our member value?

Lifetime value?

Uh, those types of metrics that you typically would have just as a marketer anywhere.

Um, and then, and then, uh, last, but, but definitely, uh, not least would be your marketing operations.

Um, and, you know, what type of email rates are you getting?

What type of paid media efficiencies are you putting in place?

What are some of your cross channel activation rates?

Um, those types of things would be how.

The team is recognized, but it's always about the numbers at the end of the day.

And even at a nonprofit, if you're not at least breaking even you, you're, you're not winning.

So that's still revenue, you know, and, and making sure that our members feel as if they have a home with the ABA that we are.

Here to assist them, uh, regardless of if it's career development or other deeper connections that they have.

They want to have with the profession that they love.

Is there anything in regards to metrics where You put a new idea in place or you change something that in the last 12 months where you were, it just created results that you were just like, that's incredible, but I also kind of maybe even unexpected at this time.

Could you share what happened?

Um, the last 12 months.

Well, I could go a little bit further than 12 with Girl Scouts since I've only had 4 months here.

Yeah.

with the Girl Scout

Come on.

You don't have any huge exploding wind so far.

I'm actually just getting my team in place.

Um, the at the Girl Scouts, one of the biggest surprises, um, where things just went extremely well was our convention that we had, uh, in 2023, um, I started, it's a triannual convention.

So every three years we have a convention.

And, um, so it was a big deal, to have the 23 because they had to cancel the in person in 2020.

Uh, they had to do it virtually, which was obviously has its, its limitations.

Um, so I came in in 21 and I was given about 18 months to pull together this tri annual convention.

And I was told there was no way that I was going to get eight to 10, 000 registrants.

There's no way I was going to break, even, um, that it was expected that I would, uh, be just the cost.

This whole thing would be a cost, uh, to the organization and, uh, that nobody was going to show up because they didn't feel it was safe.

You know, that we weren't necessarily providing a safe environment.

Um, because of just things that were going on in the world and all the polarization that we have in the United States.

So, um, I was like, okay, so those are what I consider to be my goals.

Thank you for those goals.

So what we did, uh, was we came up with a theme, Phenom by Girl Scouts.

And we, uh, rolled out with that.

We had some fantastic creative work, uh, that was done and really just, just kind of ran with, with that concept.

Um, we made sure that we set up the event so that it was open to all so that everyone felt welcomed.

Uh, and we also made sure that when they had the experience.

That it was one that fed to, uh, the diversity of the girls.

I mean, we have girls from every walk of life as part of the Girl Scouts.

And so we wanted to make sure that when they got there, they saw people that look like them.

And they had experiences that resonated for them and new experiences as well.

Um, we ended up with 9, 600 registrants.

We ended up with a profit of a million, over a million dollars the first time it had ever been profitable for a convention and, uh,

the first time that it ever been profitable.

profitable.

It had never been profitable in the 112 years that Girl Scouts existed.

Um, so that was, uh, definitely a wonderful surprise, especially for somebody that comes from, you know, everything's about profit.

Um, that was, uh, that was key.

And what was most important was the experience, you know, the words that we heard from the girls and from the adult participants about The experience that they had at the event and how, you know, having the girls, I remember at one point I'm sitting in the front of the audience and I can hear all these voices singing one song together and it was all the girls.

They all knew.

And I was like, we did it.

We actually delivered on our promise.

And, you know, that just it was just a fantastic moment.

And It

how does that, how did that make you feel as not just a marketer, but as a former girl scout and somebody who cares

was, it was everything to me and having my, I had my daughter there with me and my niece and her girls and my goddaughter was there as well.

It was wonderful to be able to share that experience with them as well.

That's incredible.

I mean, that is, that's not the story I expected to hear, but it is.

And that's an incredible story, especially like just not only hitting your goals, but being the first profitable, uh, event is.

Yes.

It's something that you'll not have taken away from you, you know, um, so that's, that's incredible.

Um, what are, what is Jocelyn most excited about in 2025 as a marketer?

Well, I'm most excited about our marketing strategy and bringing it together here at the American Bar Association.

As I mentioned, we just aligned our team as far as my direct reports.

I made some restructuring.

Uh, changes, uh, in December so that we could kick off the new year, uh, everyone knowing kind of where they were within the strategy.

Uh, we're having a marketing kickoff meeting.

Of course, that's my old corporate world.

I have to have a kickoff meeting in January.

It's just in my blood.

It's part of my DNA.

Uh, so we're having a kickoff meeting here in Chicago next week.

And I'm really looking forward to that.

Just getting the whole team together and making sure that everyone is hearing my message to them and that I get an opportunity to hear them and what their thoughts are on where we can take the organization with our marketing approaches.

As a Californian, I'm sure everybody's absolutely excited to go to Chicago next week, given the wonderful time of the year and, and weather, right?

Actually, we only have one person flying in.

Everyone else is based here.

So they got

So we have one person flying in from Michigan, so it's not a big deal to him.

No, that, well, there you go.

Um, Jocelyn, I love talking to you.

And from the few times that I've had to, to talk with you, um, I, I, I, I knew, um, that you were someone I wanted to continue to get to know and that you're awesome in what you do.

And, uh, I'd love hearing Um, about the success that you've, that you've had.

Um, and, uh, this is normally the time where I give the guests an opportunity.

If you want to ask the final question to me, uh, before we wrap things up and, and I let you go about your day.

Do you have a question you'd like to ask me?

Yes, I do.

Because I had listened to the other episodes.

and you still showed up.

Awesome.

Thank you.

So besides marketing in the raw, what are your two favorite podcasts?

Yes.

Yes.

That's a good question.

So, you know, it actually shifts and changes because podcasts as an early adopter, I've listened to podcasts for, I swear, it feels like it's been over 20 years now.

And it's also about like, when do I actually have the time?

Cause as a business owner.

Who doesn't have to like commute it's, it's, it's hard finding the time.

Cause the most podcasts that at least that I've consumed are easily 45 minutes to an hour.

And sometimes even multiple hours, depending on what it is that you're listening to you.

So the ones.

them in my long commutes to work.

So,

Well, and what I found is like, honestly, if I'm like, And taking a shower, I'll just throw my phone down and I'll play an episode if I know that I'm, and I'm a bit of a completionist.

So I want to listen to the whole thing.

So what I, what I, the way my brain works, I can actually listen to a podcast at like 1.

5 and it's speed and, and get it done faster.

Um, and, and, uh, and so the ones that I've been listening to, so, uh, because.

I love hearing about technology and I love like also hearing about people and, and, and that sort of thing.

So marketing AI, uh, institutes, I think that really it's just the AI podcast.

Now it's not even specifically marketing, um, even though they talk about it.

So I I've been listening to that religiously every week and we'll do that also at the gym on a treadmill or whatever.

Um, while everybody else is maybe rocking out to something, I'm just listening to, there's that.

Um, honestly, I like, There's like Trevor, no, Trevor Noah's podcast.

What now?

what now?

I love it.

I I like

I love that one too.

I love, I, I read his, his book, uh, born A Crime and it, it gave me a lot of understanding around the diversity.

Um, of languages and people in Africa, South Africa, where he was.

And, uh, I love as somebody who's multicultural, I love the multicultural conversation and his approach to things.

Um, so I enjoy, I enjoy his perspective on stuff and listen to that.

Um, I've been listening to TED AI.

Um, because Ted being Ted being, uh, uh, uh, got some authority.

They're talking with some of the biggest folks at open AI or, or all these other places.

And the other one I'll kind of throw in is I like.

personal conversations with people like, you know, artists, celebrities, that sort of thing that I, that I can, that I respect.

And I've always liked Conan O'Brien.

So I like to hear him shooting the breeze with, with, you know, folks on his show.

It's one of those where I don't have to think, cause I think about work so much.

And as a business owner, I'm in the thick of that so much that it's really nice to like, it's great to hear the AI stuff, but it's great to just also throw something on where it's just.

total mayhem and goofiness and just let people talk and listen to Josh Brolin talk about growing up or listen to this other person talk about the art that they're doing.

Um, and so those are the ones that I, I'm almost always putting in rotation.

love that.

I love that.

I love the AI factor in there as well.

Um,

What about you?

oh, you mentioned a couple of my favorites.

Um, do you ever listen to smart lists?

No, what's that?

Oh, you might want to try that one.

Because if you'd like to hear the conversations with people that are, and it's usually artists.

that they're talking to.

Um, it's, it's quite fascinating.

Um, I also listen to the geeky side of me.

Um, listens to the freakonomics.

I love freakonomics.

Um, uh, I have recently started listening to sisters in law, uh, and that is obviously because of the ABA, the legal profession background.

It's for women,

it's not sisters in law talking, huh?

are lawyers.

Yes.

Sisters in law.

So I love that.

Um, they talk about very UpToDate, uh, things that are going on and their impact on the rule of law and the constitution.

It's, it's wonderful just to hear their perspectives.

Uh, they're very engaging.

Um, so yeah, obviously from a CMO side, I, I listen to marketing in the raw

Thank you.

also.

that beyond this episode, you'll continue listening.

Of course I will.

And, uh, the CMO podcast by Jim Stengel.

I was a guest on that one a couple of years ago.

Um, soul in science is another marketing one that, that I,

S O U L obviously.

yes, soul in science.

So the soul of.

You know, branding and reaching the hearts and minds of your target audience.

But then there's the science piece, all that paid media that we do and different marketing technologies.

So soul and science is what it's called.

And I love that, that, um, that marketing, those are my, like my three top marketing ones, marketing, the raw CMO podcast and soul and science.

And do you listen to the Trevor Noah?

What now at all?

Oh yes, definitely.

Trevor Noah is.

All in on Trevor Noah.

Okay, I'm going to start sending

they're hilarious.

The stuff that it's good because they'll give their points of view and they always say, you know, this is just mine.

I'm not an expert, but I love it.

And I, and I always found him to be hilarious.

And yes, I also read his book.

So, uh, I'm a huge fan of his.

If anybody's not listening to it, like also like Josh Johnson, who is, is usually on the episodes, he doesn't, he doesn't always get to speak very much on the podcast, but I don't know if you're him on, uh, like YouTube or on Tik TOK, but he is one of the smartest, uh, he, he, he has.

He has, he's one of the smartest comedians out there, but you wouldn't, I personally would never have known it just by the way he talks on

I'm going to look that one up.

I, I'm not familiar.

Johnson is, is, it's usually, and I'm sorry, I forgot what her name is, um, his, his, his, you know, partner in crime that was, was with him on the daily show and then himself, uh, cause it's not always those two that are on with him, but then Josh Johnson will join and, um, Josh on his stuff is so, so he is like, if you like comedians that talk about current events, but do so in

Yes.

Okay.

calm, of ways.

Um, he is, is brilliant.

His joke will take, you know, seven minutes to kind of do, but you'll be like, I never thought of that in that way.

Um, so, um, Jocelyn, I appreciate you sticking around with me.

I appreciate having you as a new listener on the podcast and you joining me for this really, um, I've said it before and I'll, and I'll say it again.

You are, uh, somebody that I respect a great deal, uh, in the, in the work that, that you do.

And, you know, I hope folks get a lot from this conversation.

Um, it's always a pleasure to get to know somebody, um, in the way that, you know, you, you shared with us about your passion and your experience and everything.

So, um, thank you again for, for

Well, thank you, Adam.

And thank you for this platform.

Thank you for hosting the way that you do and sharing the information and the wonderful conversations.

I was truly looking forward to this and it was an honor and a pleasure on my side as

I'm gonna walk around with my chest up high for the rest of the week.

Thanks for that.

All right.

We'll catch you later