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AdTechGod Pod
Ep. 124 Bridging the Gap Between AdTech and MarTech, with Alyssa Furth of Credera
00:26:40
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- [00:01]
A
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- [01:03]
A
Welcome to the AdTech Godpod, your window into the world of advertising technology and the people behind it. I'm your host, AdTech God. Welcome to the Attec God Pod, where we speak to those who bridge MadTech and AdTech. Today's guest is Alyssa Firth, the senior manager at Credera, Omnicom's group's transformation consultancy arm. She's worked at Horizon, gojo, healthstream and more. She has an incredible perspective on the industry and the direction it's going in, specifically when it comes to bridging two worlds that usually don't unite Martech and Adtech. So I'm really looking forward to meeting her today. Alyssa, thank you for joining me. Welcome to the pod.
- [01:45]
B
Thank you so much for having me. I'm really thrilled to be here, particularly as a avid listener. So it's exciting to be on this side.
- [01:53]
A
I'm happy you're here, too. Thanks for accepting my invite. I'm definitely been seeing more of you on LinkedIn and I've been seeing your posts on LinkedIn, so I wanted to give you a larger podium to speak your mind and share your thoughts.
- [02:05]
B
I appreciate it. It's very new for me, but really trying to step out of my comfort zone and share some of my thoughts because I think that's what makes this industry so exciting and beautiful. Or, you know, we have really smart, confident, talented people who want to engage in a conversation, so I want to be part of that.
- [02:25]
A
You know, Alyssa, one of the hardest things is getting out of that comfort zone. I don't know what number episode this is in the hundreds at this point. I think I've recorded over 300. And the thing for me is I'm lucky enough to only be audio. Being on video is so intimidating. I know. Jeremy does it. Aries comfortable with it. Amelia, the whole team is totally okay with being on video. You put me on video and I'm like, I want nothing to do with looking at my own face on a screen. Like, I'm okay with just voice. So thanks for your bravery and joining me on video today, and thanks for being my guest.
- [03:01]
B
Of course. Well, you're one step ahead of me because I hate the sound of my own voice.
- [03:04]
A
So what's nice is it's altered so it's not my real voice that I release. So that too, so I don't have to actually hear it, which is like two wins in one podcast. Over here. Alyssa, I wanted to ask you a question. You've worked in the industry for quite some time. You've been at Credera. You know, we spoke briefly prior about how you're. You're bridging MadTech and AdTech as part of this consultancy group within Omnicom. But can we take it back to how you got into the industry and what really sparked that interest in. In adtech and martech overall?
- [03:36]
B
Yeah, definitely. I was very intentional about getting into advertising and marketing. I feel like a lot of people will say, oh, I kind of fell into it. I really didn't fall into it. I've known I wanted to be in marketing probably since I was 18. Kind of a very specific plan to get here, but I never really thought that I would be on the tech and data side like I am now. I studied human and organizational development in school, which people affectionately called the coloring major, really, because it was focused a lot on critical thinking and leadership and teamwork. But I then landed my first job at Horizon Media, and that was such an exciting place to start my career. It was really formative for a number of reasons. I think the people had a lot to do with it. I had some amazing female leaders that I really credit a lot of my success to today. And we can talk about that more later on. But I think what was also really exciting was when I started my career at Horizon, it was at a time where the industry was going through a lot of transition and kind of reinventing itself. So I was learning the fundamentals of media planning and strategy while all that was going on, and getting this peek under the hood of the mechanics of how all of that worked while it was being built. So I was doing, you know, media planning and strategy across linear TV, but then OLV, like, at the time, CTV was FEPs really and just a small part of the media plan. We were just getting into a lot of programmatic display and video. We were doing high impact. I was doing affiliate social search. So I really was planning across all of the channels plus analytics and all of the audience work, et cetera. And I was trying to do that while navigating things like addressability, identity fragmentation. We were starting to talk about signal loss and then definitely more so a couple years into my career, cross channel measurement was another big one. Multi touch attribution versus mmm. A lot of really big conversations that I think set the foundation for where we are now in advertising and it gave me kind of the foundation that I use now in my current role. The pandemic hit 2020 and and all of my media plans got canceled. I was working on a luxury timepiece brand at the time and a QSR. So I like to say no one was buying $30,000 watches and no one was eating at an all you can eat buffet during COVID So I was extremely bored. I had nothing to do other than reconciliation of billing which is just horribly
- [06:40]
A
which is so exciting, so thrilling.
- [06:44]
B
And I was so bored. I taught myself how to run actually. And anyone who knows me knows that's laughable. This episode is brought to you by Indeed. Stop waiting around for the perfect candidate. Instead, use Indeed sponsored Jobs to find the right people with the right skills fast. It's a simple way to make sure your listing is the first candidate. C According to Indeed data, sponsored Jobs have four times more applicants than non sponsored jobs. So go build your dream team today with Indeed. Get a $75 sponsored job credit@ Indeed.com podcast. Terms and conditions apply. So Horizon had just launched their E commerce consultancy Night Market about a month prior. For better or for worse. It was actually a really interesting time for that business and so I moved over there to help them launch it and build that business. I kind of was a jack of all trades there. I worked very closely with the President to help with our go to market, our value proposition, our bd. So I was selling into Horizon accounts, coming up with the messaging and offerings that we could package and sell to them doing website copy. I was writing board updates and forecast projections and BD pipeline. So I got this really interesting mix of skills and projects while I was also learning about retail media networks and shoppable media kind of on my own, teaching myself as I went. And that's really where I got my first exposure to consulting and that kind of methodology and thinking. And I think it completely Changed how I thought about data and signals and the value that it could bring to media. Like how much you could really do when you had such rich audience signals and performance signals and were working at the intersection of media and tech and data. So from there, a couple years later, I went back to my previous role on a different account. I wanted to get some management experience. I then managed a team of eight people, was trying to restructure a bit and turn around performance, so I was leaning really heavily into that. But at the same time, I started to really realize that brands could be doing so much more with their media if they had the right data and tech infrastructure. I was getting extremely frustrated because I was trying to do all of these smart, hard things with the client through media that would really help them to drive better outcomes and really actually just transform their marketing and their businesses. But I kept getting blocked by internal silos, lack of data, not having the right processes, and that was just so extremely frustrating. And so when a friend called me and said, hey, I'm working for this consultancy, they just got acquired by Omnicom and they need someone to come and build their ad tech practice and figure out how to work with the agencies and really be a translator for them, I jumped on it. And that's really what pushed me into the role I'm in today, where I'm not only trying to figure out how to work better with the agencies to, to realize the value or the outcomes that they're trying to drive through data and tech infrastructure, but I'm playing this translator role between it and marketing to actually help marketers have the right data and tech that they need to be successful and make sure that it is actually integrated into the enterprise architecture for longevity, for governance, and to really drive the level of transformation that they're looking for.
- [10:42]
A
You touch up on. On so much in such a short blurp of what you've done. Are you. Would you say like your personality type is the type that could take something that's like overly complicated and simplify it? It's weird because for programmatic for me, and I'll tell you because I felt like I forgot what the movie is called, where he could just, he could visualize what's happening. Like, I'm very good at like looking at something or reading it once or having someone explain it to me once. And I realize how everything connects very clearly. It's almost like I can visualize it in front of me. Do you feel like that's your type of personality where if you look at something overall you're like, oh, I see what's missing here. Like, here are the pipes that lead into this. But if I had this data set, then that would connect to that data set and then wham, we've got what we need here. Like, let's build it. Are you able to visualize it or are you more of like, very good at explaining it to your internal teams?
- [11:34]
B
No, I think you nailed it. That's exactly how I am. I say my superpower, I say I have two. And they're kind of related, but one of them is breaking down complex solutions or complex ideas into really bite sized intangible pieces that then we can go and tackle. The second part of that then is being able to then tell the story of how it actually drives an outcome or value and being able to connect the dots of that larger ecosystem. So it is challenging because I think what you just described is the way that my mind works and it doesn't always come out. So I have to work very hard at taking this mess inside my brain and turning it into something that other people understand. But I can see it in my head.
- [12:22]
A
Yes, it's. It's one of the biggest things that I talk to the team internally about all the time. I go, look, just. I get it. Like, I'm a cluster. I recognize it. I know exactly what I'm doing. I just don't have it on paper. And it's very hard for me to put it on paper. And it's the movie I'm thinking of is A Beautiful Mind, where it's like, it just makes sense to me. Like, I'm able to decode it pretty quickly. I understand it very quickly. I'm able to explain it as thoroughly as I possibly can in a very limited number of words. But if you ask me to document, it's where it's like, oh, my God, I am so bad at this documentation piece. But it is truly, I think, a personality character trait where because of the way my mind works, maybe yours the same way, in order for me to make sense of things that are overly complicated is to simplify it as much as possible. And when you simplify it, it actually becomes a lot easier to slowly bolt on the complicated pieces for it to make more sense. It's truly like a very unique way of looking at things.
- [13:20]
B
Absolutely. One of the ways that I've learned to actually work with people is to give them a caveat. Hey, I'm an external processor. That's one. That one has been really important for me because it lets people know that I'm working through it and I will get there. I'm not just saying a bunch of garbage. And setting that expectation up front has been really successful. Not only for communicating with leadership, to share, hey, I know what I'm doing, but also it's helped me to lead teams because I show up authentically and they're not afraid to ask me questions and they see my thought process and I think that's really comforting for them.
- [14:08]
A
Right. I think the reality is, is that the more, the more transparent you are and the more open you are to feedback. I'm sure you're the type where it's like, well, what do you think? What are your thoughts? What are you really looking for? What are you trying to get out of this? It's really just asking the right questions. It's something that I think people undervalue as a skill. Some people will say don't ask so many questions, but I'm actually the opposite. It's like, no, ask a lot of questions, organize those answers and then you're able to speak the answers out pretty quickly in an organized way. And I think it's like a, it's a very important skill to have and I think it's super valuable for people to have that. You know, we mentioned prior to recording that, you know, you're bridging ad tech and martech together. What does that mean for Omnicom? What's that mean for Credera? Explain that to me just so I know exactly what that means.
- [15:00]
B
Yeah, so I'm going to start with the latter and then move into, to the Omnicom piece. I think that a lot of times people see adtech and Martech as two separate things. And I believe that to be the case because ad tech for so long has been living outside of client ecosystems and has just been this whole ecosystem of craziness that is only related to media. But as first party data becomes more important to media, performance insights and transparency of performance becomes more important. Connecting creative and creative ops into ad tech has been more important. We're seeing it converge to the point where I'd almost call them one thing, ad tech, almost as a subset of. And then if you also think about that, it requires an alignment to even the enterprise architecture. Because for a lot of brands, the only way that they can get the data that they're looking for to drive the precision advertising and to create the models and the performance dashboards and the automated creative pipelines that they're looking for, they need IT support for platform integration for data Accessibility for data governance, privacy, legal, all of that. And so you have to really work as one team, all driven by the same outcomes. And so that's really what I'm focused on when I talk about bridging Martech and ad tech, and even more so, aligning to the enterprise architecture. So what that then means for Omnicom and the agencies is, is that they are actually able to drive more precise advertising and do some of the harder, smarter things with their media plan because they have the infrastructure to support them. And we can make sure that the data is actually flowing through and that we're breaking down those silos that sometimes exist between enterprise and agency.
- [17:13]
A
It's funny, you mentioned the data that you have available to you. Advertising in particular, or ad tech in particular is really focused on getting the ad to the right user and with the right messaging and at the right frequency. And then on the Martech side, it's really, who or what are we doing and how did they purchase or what, what is this profile that's created? What I think is interesting about combining ad tech and Martech is being able to bridge, like how that audience flows out to ads and what they see and then what happens when they come back in from those ads and how did we convince, motivate, or drive a conversion? And if you have these living in two different silos, like, it's really hard to understand the entire process of or value of an ad if you don't know what's happening on both ends. Like, you need to understand who's buying, what they're buying, why they're buying, what ad resonated, how, what was the frequency. But when you silo these into two, it just becomes a very inefficient way of doing things. So I feel like Martech and ad tech combined are actually really important and slowly combining more and more over time.
- [18:27]
B
Absolutely. I also think about a lot of clients right now who are asking for personalization and to better understand the customer journey. Both of those things also require exactly what you just said. Because to really understand the customer journey and all of the touch points, you have to have all that data living in one place to be able to analyze and then to create a consistent customer experience and get to the level of really deep personalization that that brands are asking for right now. And I would say that customers are also asking for right now. You have to be able to understand what message do they already see, how did they respond to it, in what channel, and what is the next best action, the next best message, the Next best channel to actually deliver on that experience.
- [19:19]
A
Where do you think that the Martech ad tech bridge, if you want to call it that, breaks down in practice? Usually. Where do you think that disconnect happens at? What part of the process?
- [19:31]
B
I think it really all starts with data and where it breaks down the most, because a lot of times enterprise, it may have data living in one place, and then marketing has a little bit of data that they have available to them. And marketing is measured on speed, efficiency, and the ability to drive whatever outcome they're working toward, sales, leads, etc. And so they use whatever data they have available to them and they, you know, select tools that help them get there. A lot of times you see this with clean rooms, with CDPs, right? And they make these decisions. But then when they want to go one step further, when they want to integrate with more platforms, when they want to get more data and then they have to work with it, you end up having to kind of untangle that overlap and that mess that was created unintentionally. But I think that's where it breaks down the most because you start making decisions in silos and in order to move forward, you then have to do a lot of rework and reinvestment that slows you down further.
- [20:51]
A
You look back at your career and your success at Credera and Horizon and other over the years. What do you think really brought you to the point today where you are working for such an amazing Holdco and such an amazing division that requires a really good understanding of all aspects of marketing and ad tech, which is truly not common. I think many understand one or the other and usually not too well, to be honest. But what do you think brought you to this point and what drove you or got you to handling this type of workload and responsibility at your work?
- [21:27]
B
I really back to what we were talking about before. I really like taking complex problems and breaking them down into pieces. And I also really love the pace of ad tech. And so for me it's just this constant problem that needs to be solved and figured out. And when you think you know something, you probably don't, or it changes and you have to go find more. And I also love playing this role of storyteller and translator to really keep asking questions, to understand the why behind something and get to the value of what we're trying to deliver. And what I found was as someone who is not rooted in tech, my career and my education has previously not really been in tech or data at all. And I'm not really a technical person. I also have had to challenge myself to go and learn that tech and understand that language and understand the why behind what those technical teams are doing, to then translate and connect the dots and be able to tell a story of here's what the value is and here's how we're going to apply it to marketing. And that challenge for me has just been really fun to try to solve and really rewarding when I can then see how this strategy and this technical architecture that I helped to build actually went and delivered something really successful and valuable in media.
- [23:01]
A
Alyssa, we chatted prior to recording a little bit about being a woman in the space working in tech, and we chatted just off the record about majority of tech roles in particular are predominantly male. A lot of the people highlighted at conferences, thought leadership, social media panels, whatever, are majority male. So I want to ask you, as a woman in the space working at Cordera or at Omnicom, what are some of those challenges? How do you overcome them and how do you lift others to be successful such as yourself?
- [23:38]
B
You know, yes, it is a very male dominated industry and that can be really challenging and overwhelming at times. But I also have really tried to seek out those amazing female leaders and either try to learn from them, emulate them in some way, or even just listen to whatever talks that they're giving to use as inspiration for myself to say there are other people like me and I can build a really successful career as a woman in this space. Because like I said earlier, there are so many people who want to start a conversation publicly, but that can be really overwhelming and feel like everyone knows everything. And so sometimes it's also just remembering that we're all figuring it out as we go. I think what I've really tried to do is be really intentional about the way that I show up and about being confident. And sometimes showing up confident doesn't mean you have, doesn't mean you feel confident. And so there's a lot of work that goes into that that I think a lot of people don't realize. And for me, I've really just tried to work hard on that and remembering that we're all just trying to figure it out. But that doesn't mean I shouldn't speak up or be part of the conversation.
- [25:14]
A
Yeah, I think that's a big part of it. I think the confidence, you know, I hate being on camera. I don't like being on camera. It's a confidence thing. I think that that goes for a lot of things with speaking up or speaking out about the industry or about new suggestions. It does take quite a bit of confidence, I can tell you from this very brief combo and the combo we had before recording. You definitely know your stuff and you definitely understand the industry well. And you should continue to speak up because you, you have a really good understanding of two sides of the industry, which most do not. And so I would say post more, talk more. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised at people's reaction to you doing so well.
- [25:56]
B
I really appreciate that. Thank you. It has been a journey and something I've worked really hard at. I think, by just trying to build my expertise, ask all the questions that I can. I think even if you're worried about asking questions and looking like you don't know the answer, I think what I've learned is that most people have the same question and they're just too afraid to ask. And that the best way to stay relevant and to build your expertise is just to ask all of those questions.
- [26:25]
A
Alyssa, thank you so much for joining me today on the pod. I wish you the best and thank you to Cordera for having you on the pod.
- [26:32]
B
Thank you very much.
- [26:33]
A
Thank you. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the AdTech Godpod, a podcast for the people about the people. Stay connected with me me for more insights, trends and interviews in the realm of adtech. Don't miss out on the latest updates. So follow me on X Instagram and connect with me on LinkedIn. Don't forget ATG Slack community has insights, networking opportunities and jobs. Keep the conversation going and stay at the forefront of adtech innovation.