The Whole Marketer podcast

Episode #133. Strategy is the technical skill explored in this episode, with a lens on simplifying the process to ensure marketers have not only the vision and clarity for where you want to take your brand or business, but also ensuring you have the actionable plan to get you there.

Discussing simplified strategy is Abby's guest, Alice Benham - entrepreneur, business & marketing strategist and fellow podcaster as host of 'Starting the conversation' podcast. Alice works with small businesses to grow their brands online and recently published her book 'The Digital Marketing playbook'.

In this episode Alice shares her definition of strategy, ensuring strategy is actionable, simplifying the process in 3 steps, the buyer's journey, content as value, push and pull, urgency & scarcity and examples of small businesses successfully building their brand online.

Plus Alice shares her career highs and lows and advice for marketers.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Alice Benham | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by House of Performance

Need to up your game in PPC, Paid Social or Display?

House of Performance are a team of passionate marketeers growing ambitious brands through paid media.

For a free mini audit, get in touch with the team at https://houseofperformance.co.uk/wholemarketer

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #132. The focus of this episode is wellness for marketers, and the importance of prioritising your wellbeing not only for your health but to also ensure you have the energy to thrive in our fast-paced and challenging – yet rewarding - profession.

Abby's guest to discuss wellness is EY's Chief Marketing Officer, Rebecca Hirst. Rebecca is an award-winning marketer who has worked on some of the biggest global brands including Samsung, Coca-Cola and Kimberly-Clark. This topic of 'wellness' is a particular passion point for Rebecca as, alongside her marketing career, she has a post grad in Nutrition and historically even set up a health coaching business to help other marketers and highflyers to incorporate wellness into their day-to-day.

In this episode, Rebecca shares her definition of wellness, rest and restore for marketers, her own journey to setting up 'Glorious Wellness' and practical tips for real world wellness and how you can role model this for others.

Plus her career highs and lows and advice for marketers.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Rebecca Hirst | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by House of Performance

Need to up your game in PPC, Paid Social or Display?

House of Performance are a team of passionate marketeers growing ambitious brands through paid media.

For a free mini audit, get in touch with the team at https://houseofperformance.co.uk/wholemarketer

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #131. Today's episode is a personal understanding topic on finding your ideal role; looking beyond the job title for a role that plays to your strengths and values and is fulfilling for you.

Joining Abby to discuss ideal roles and shining a light on hiring practices in the marketing is profession is Lauren Spearman. Lauren is a seasoned marketing professional with over 17 years of experience with brands such as Sky, Benefit Cosmetics and MADE.com. Now thriving as a freelance Brand Consultant, Lauren uses her growing platform on TikTok to champion pay transparency and improved recruitment practices in the marketing industry through her candid insights and advocacy efforts.

In this episode, Lauren shares her definition of an ideal role, green and red flags hiring practices, salary transparency, interview tasks, advice for hiring managers, giving and receiving feedback when job searching. Plus career highs and lows.

Download your free workbook on how to find your ideal role here Resources and free support - The Whole Marketer

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Lauren Spearman | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by House of Performance

Need to up your game in PPC, Paid Social or Display?

House of Performance are a team of passionate marketeers growing ambitious brands through paid media.

For a free mini audit, get in touch with the team at https://houseofperformance.co.uk/wholemarketer

Episode #130. Season 8 begins with a soft skill on being human and the importance of 'humanness' particularly for marketing leaders - being authentic, honest and open in order to build relationships with your team and connect more deeply with your customers and consumers.

Joining Abby is Dom Dwight, former Marketing Director and now Director of strategy, insight, product innovation and diversification for Taylors of Harrogate – best known for Yorkshire Tea, the UK's number one tea brand.

In this episode, Dom shares his marketer's definition of being human, humanness for brands and marketers, the role of AI to free up space for marketers to be more human, vulnerability and imperfections, leadership learnings and psychological safety for marketing teams and agencies. Plus Dom's career highs and lows.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Dom Dwight | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by House of Performance

Need to up your game in PPC, Paid Social or Display?

House of Performance are a team of passionate marketeers growing ambitious brands through paid media.

For a free mini audit, get in touch with the team at https://houseofperformance.co.uk/wholemarketer

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #129. Understanding grief is the topic of this episode, an area of personal understanding to support ourselves but also others in our care that may be experiencing grief.

*Trigger warning: This episode contains discussion around bereavement and loss of a child.

A complex and personal process, grief is the intense feeling of loss of someone or something which can manifest physically, mentally and emotionally.

Abby's guest is Lucy Hudson, Managing Director of McCann Birmingham which is part of McCann Central, the UK's largest marketing communications integrated agency. Lucy is a WACL Talent Award Winner, mentor and founding member of The Margot Collective, McCann World group's first female-led consulting collective.

After losing her daughter Poppy to a brain tumour, Lucy is dedicated to talking and writing about the effects of grief, particularly in the workplace.

In this episode, Lucy shares her definition of grief and how it becomes a part of you, the impact bereavement has in the workplace, companies making admin and return to work easier, 'pre-grief' and understanding all the elements of loss (finance, identity, career, your own health). Plus practical advice for employers to support colleagues.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Lucy Hudson | LinkedIn

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #128. The Burnout Miniseries ep5 – The last episode in our mini-series on burnout shares the story of an agency marketer who, following her experience of extreme burnout, uses the power of breathwork, meditation and wellbeing to help and prevent burnout in others.

Abby's guest is Briony Gunson, mindset coach, wellbeing trainer, meditation teacher and breathworker. Passionate about supporting people in managing stress, anxiety and burnout, some of Briony's corporate clients include NHS, EY, Santander, Lloyds bank, We Work and Freemasons.

In this episode, Briony shares her definition and experience of burnout, listening to your mind and body system, processing trauma, safe spaces, slowing down feeling uncomfortable and power of breathing and techniques.

Plus her advice for marketers of tomorrow.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Briony Gunson | LinkedIn

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #127. The Burnout Miniseries ep4 – We're continuing our focus on burnout and how together, we can raise awareness to prevent it and support each other in our challenging yet rewarding marketing profession.

Abby's guest is Senior Reporter for Marketing Week, Molly Innes. Molly has been researching burnout for the past two years having written many articles about it and is passionate about marketers' careers, ways of working and recruitment.

In this episode, Molly shares how she began highlighting burnout, factors that her research identified can led to burnout, being 'addicted' to high performance and recognition, stories of unhealthy culture and burnout effecting women.

Plus her advice for marketers of tomorrow.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Molly Innes | LinkedIn

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #126. The Burnout Miniseries ep3 – The third episode in our burnout series, raising awareness to the physical, mental and emotional exhaustion that prolonged stress in our profession that cause – and what we can do about it.

This episode highlights burnout from a leadership perspective and the pressure to become other people's version of a leader, not your authentic self.

Sharing their first-hand experience is Abby's guest, Rowan Morrison. An experienced agency-side leader, Rowan is co-founder and co-MD of Rationale, a strategic marketing communications agency. Alongside her role she coaches women in innovation-led businesses.

In this episode, Rowan shares her definition of burnout, her story of burnout accumulating over a year, target-driven stress, the effect of stress on her health, conflict in leadership expectations, boundaries and her processes to empower those in her agency to prevent burnout.

Plus her advice for marketers of tomorrow.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Rowan Morrison | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by Tracksuit

This episode is brought to you by Tracksuit, the beautiful, affordable, and always-on-brand tracking dashboard that helps marketers answer - is what we're doing working?

Making brand tracking accessible and easy to understand, Tracksuit data gives you full visibility on your brand health metrics.

Visit www.gotracksuit.com to start your always-on brand tracking journey.

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #125. The Burnout Miniseries ep2 – Continuing our focus on burnout, this episode discusses the experience of a high-achieving marketer who went through burnout and their reflections on preventing it again - for themselves and others in the future.

Abby's guest is Alan Trice, an experienced and passionate senior marketer, having held Head of and Director-level roles within retail, entertainment, sports, lifestyle and fashion organisations such as Puma, Diesel, Coach, IMG, Screwfix and Clarks. Alan currently holds a NED position at the prestigious Mount Kelly school and is a Marketing Society member.

In this episode, Alan shares his analogy of burnout, his experience of how burnout manifested, the lead up over 18months, spotting the signs and how he looks after his wellbeing to prevent in the future.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Alan Trice | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by Tracksuit

This episode is brought to you by Tracksuit, the beautiful, affordable, and always-on-brand tracking dashboard that helps marketers answer - is what we're doing working?

Making brand tracking accessible and easy to understand, Tracksuit data gives you full visibility on your brand health metrics.

Visit gotracksuit.com to start your always-on brand tracking journey.

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com

Episode #124. The Burnout Miniseries ep1 – Understanding burnout through a scientific lens is the focus of this episode, shining a light on the signs of burnout and how it physically and mentally manifests, as we see a rise in unsustainable stress amongst our profession.

Burnout is a topic that Abby is passionate about addressing and a fundamental part of burnout prevention is linked to the 'personal understanding' pillar or the whole marketer philosophy – the greater we know and understand ourselves, the better we can spot the signs in ourselves and others when we're starting to burnout.

Discussing the science behind burnout is Abby's guest expert Dr Fiona Crichton, VP of behavioural science at Groov, the workplace science platform on a mission to help 100 million people feel and perform better.

In this episode, Dr Fiona shares her definition of true burnout, measuring burnout through cortisol, predictors of burnout, 5 Bs for burnout prevention, burnout vs depression and how leaders can support teams.

Plus her advice for marketers of tomorrow.

Host: Abigail (Abby) Dixon FCIM/ICF | LinkedIn

Guest: Dr Fiona Crichton | LinkedIn

This episode is sponsored by Tracksuit

This episode is brought to you by Tracksuit, the beautiful, affordable, and always-on-brand tracking dashboard that helps marketers answer - is what we're doing working?

Making brand tracking accessible and easy to understand, Tracksuit data gives you full visibility on your brand health metrics.

Visit gotracksuit.com to start your always-on brand tracking journey.

The Whole Marketer podcast is here to support and empower the people behind brands and businesses with the latest technical tools, soft and leadership skills and personal understanding for a fulfilling marketing career and life as a whole. For more info go to www.thewholemarketer.com