Fractional Hustle

Welcome back to Fractional Hustle. I'm very excited today to welcome my guest, Alex Verdin. Alex, thank you so much for joining me. Alex hails from Baltimore, Maryland. She is a fractional marketing leader with over twelve years of experience driving growth for b two b and b two c companies across many sectors.

She's a dog mom and also sells vintage glass out of her boutique, Twin Thrift Vintage. Alex, thanks so much for coming on today. Yeah. Great to be here. Great to great to meet you.

Yeah. Likewise. Likewise. So just doing a little research on you. Right?

Something I loved on your website that I read was zero eagle all hustle. Right? What is your experience been in encountering some strong personalities in the workplace and, you know, navigating that and, also your own philosophy when you come on to an organization and get hired with zero ego? Yeah. I mean so I've worked in start ups.

I've worked in house. And now being fractional, you come across so many different types of folks, and you work I work in product marketing, so I work with all different teams. And, I believe, you know, there's no I in team. And so when I come across maybe just, ego or egocentric mindsets, I see things like slower go to market, bad silos, bad mouthing other team members. So I really try to take the approach of there's no I in team.

Just get your work done and be a great collaborator. And, that's super important to me, especially in my work as as a fractional product marketing leader, just to smooth things out between go to market teams and and people and and make sure, you know, the work gets done, which is at the end of the day the most important thing. Yeah. Yeah. Talking to experts such as yourself.

This is a theme that I've been running into a lot where a lot of people who are in the fractional space, they're running in they run into this. Right? You know? And maybe that's the reason they left an organization. Maybe that's the reason why they joined the fractional side of things because, you know, when you're in a more maybe corporate environment or, you know, in a larger organization, you run into these sorts of personalities and, you know, things just don't seem to to get done.

Right? And in an efficient way. Do you say that would you resonate with that at all? Do you have you had that experience as well? Yes.

So a lot of the reason that I ended up going into fractional work was I was starting to get interest in just, hey, Alex. Can you come run these projects or support the team? But also because bad bad vibes. You know? Like, that is a momentum killer.

It's a team crusher. Like, it just you know, it's it's business. It's marketing. You know? We're not solving the world's biggest problems.

So, I kinda see it as just immaturity, and that to me is a total turn off when I'm looking for businesses that I wanna work with or work in. And it's taken a long time to get there. I worked with a career coach, two summers ago who really kinda nailed that, in for me that, hey. If it's if it's, egocentric or, like, bullying type of culture, you're not gonna thrive there, and you're gonna be burnt out and miserable. And I was like, you know what?

Finally, time to take some advice about, like, what kind of companies that I'm interested in. So, yeah, I would say forcing function to go fully fractional and something I look out for as I'm, you know, interviewing clients to potentially work with. Yeah. And so, you know, on this journey of this fractional journey, another thing that I've seen with people as well is there's trade offs. Right?

There's pros and cons to this sort of lifestyle where it might be, you know, you're an expert in, you know, messaging and storytelling. I've seen a lot of people have difficulty promoting themselves. Right? Where it's, you know, it's a lot easier to promote a brand or this faceless, you know, organization. Right?

But when it's promoting yourself, you know, people get all sorts of feelings to come up. You know? And so how have you has your experience been with that? It's funny. So my website, I I worked with a woman, Jennifer Yu, who's amazing.

But I got to the point where I was like, I don't know how to talk about myself. I feel really awkward writing about myself. Like, I don't know how to capture my brand. And she worked with me to help me highlight, my story and my value props and all of that kind of stuff. So, you know, some of it is just kind of the imposter syndrome and working through that and faking it till you make it and you start to believe that, hey.

This is the person I I am, and I am totally worthy of getting great deals and great contracts. But some of it, you might need some outside help, and there's nothing wrong with that. So, I mean, I think without Jennifer, I my website would probably still not be done candidly. Yeah. But you're totally right.

It's so much easier to do some messaging or a great campaign for a brand or even someone else. I love to be, you know, behind the camera, like, on the typewriter, building, you know, the messaging or what have you. But talking about myself, I I I was joking with someone the other day. I was like, you know, when I have to be on camera, I feel like I look like I'm in a hostage situation. Like, I'm just totally uncomfortable.

So that's just I think it's a never ending process for me to figure out how to get comfortable with sharing my brand, sharing my story, and, hopefully, helping others do the same. Yeah. Well, shout out to Jennifer. You know, we appreciate her for helping you out. And, so keeping kind of on that vein, right, when it comes to storytelling and and messaging, what is your philosophy when it comes to that?

I love storytelling. You know, I'm I'll you know, I think it's like the cool it's the oldest, knowledge transfer system. You know, humanity has been telling stories around the campfire forever. Right? You know, so it's very powerful for us.

You know? What's your philosophy around that? Yeah. I think in many ways, it's getting back to basics. Like, there's so much over engineering I see on LinkedIn or, like, this, workflow or this chat GBT prompt or what what have you.

And I think it's really simple of just connecting emotion, connecting feeling with what somebody's struggling with. Like, I really when I work with clients, do a lot of research into talking with customers, talking with prospects, talking with churn customers, really trying to hear what their experience was and not just kinda my own assumptions or what's trending in the market around a specific industry or brand. And telling those stories and hearing those stories really helps bring that emotion or that, like, real life presence to the products and companies that I work with. Yeah. Yeah.

And so when it comes to getting the right, wording around that right, I feel like that's super important, you know. And and when it comes to storytelling and finding the right words, the the correct puzzle pieces that kinda resonate, you know, how do you go into that process of just finding the right copy? Yeah. I mean, words really matter. And I was working with a a client recently who had a lot of long time employees, and they were shifting their messaging.

And, we went through the whole exercise of talking to customers, talking to different team members, and putting forth some, in my opinion, like, really great messaging. And we, you know, had to get through the breakup of certain words, certain phrases that they had long held with their brand. And so I think when you're thinking of words and just, you know, how to convey something, it's part, active listening and trying new things to test and experiment and market and kinda share back with audiences, whether that's through communities, customer channels, what have you. And then kinda given trade, like, meeting in the middle to find what resonates inside the brand and and outside. Because, you know, I've seen really great messaging die on the vine because, internally, it couldn't be enabled.

People didn't like it. It didn't make sense. So, you know, thinking both sides of the house, you can have a great external message. But if people aren't buying it internally, gosh, you're gonna struggle in the sales cycle. And and when you're trying to renew customers and when you're trying to make, you know, the internal enablement slides, words matter.

So it's it's both give and take, and I try to take that approach, but also back up with, you know, what I'm choosing and why. Like, having that perspective is super important when you have to come to the table and and put forth, you know, a great message or a new kind of strategy around a campaign or or a sales deck or what have you. Yeah. I feel like you're touching upon belief. Right?

Like, really believing in the product or the service that you're trying to give. Right? And so, you know, people can feel that. Right? You know, if if someone doesn't really believe what they're selling or they really truly believe that you can offer a solution that will help them with their problems, you know, yeah, it kinda falls like you said, you know, dies on the vine.

Right? And so how have you worked with, with teams, right, in terms of just to, like, to get them up to a place where they feel like they they're in a good position and really push this product out to the market? I mean, I think it goes back to two, like, the no ego, all hustle is like bringing the team along as you're building this kind of stuff, working with the founders, working with your head of sales, your head of CS, your VP of marketing. You know, I often come in and maybe there's silos or friction because of this gap that's in marketing storytelling, you know, messaging, what have you. And it's bringing people back together and saying, look.

We all believe in this company. You're here for a reason. I'm here for a reason. And so let's work together to really find what's gonna work for us and, better yet, what's gonna work in market. And so kind of keeping that heads down approach of bringing folks along, being part armchair therapists a lot of the time and hearing people's sides and perspectives, there's nuggets in there.

There's nuggets in what customers are saying. So I think it's just unifying those teams, and not letting egos get in the way, not letting thoughts and feelings. Like, that's a big thing for me is, you know, pushing back on, well, why do you feel that way? Or where did that come from? And trying to uncover what's an opinion and what's a maybe really tough held opinion, and what's something that's malleable and can be changed and and optimized for, you know, what whatever we're going towards, whether that's a new product launch or a new segment in the market or just refreshing what we already have.

Did you anticipate that going into it that you would be, like, kind of this therapist, coach? You know, like, you know, normally you think you're like, okay, I'm just focusing on, you know, the branding, the messaging, but then like there's this whole element of the job that you might've not even thought was going to be a part of it. Right. I've had that experience, you know, kind of been like, you know, holding someone's hand along. Right.

You know, guiding them through, like, what has your experience been with that? Oh, I mean, I think as the oldest daughter, I've been prepared for this my entire life. But when I switched from demand gen into product marketing and that was my focus, what I loved about it was being the central cog of the go to market team and just being able to open conversations between groups of people. I thought that was super powerful and something that seemed, like, so obvious, but it's so hard to do when you're remote or when you're moving fast or, you know, when you have these big, hairy, like, KPIs and OKRs. So I personally love it.

It's one of the aspects of, product marketing that I really enjoy is building that consensus and being able to just be a sounding board and and reflect back maybe some of the frustrations that happen in a team and how we can course correct and do better. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. So something I also wanna touch upon with you was pricing and packaging.

Right? You know, how do you know your value? Right? You know, when you're coming into a space and what to charge people and not to be, you know, scared about it and, like, knowing your value, you know, is kind of what I wanna touch upon. Do you have any thoughts on that?

Whatever you do, do not price hourly. Everybody says that, and I feel like everybody starts out pricing that way and just it creates so much more mess, further down the road. And I I really you know, I I feel like you hear this a lot when you first put that, proposal in front of somebody just really anticipating a no or a reaction. And so, a lot of times, I got maybe too many yeses, and I was like, crap. I think I've underpriced myself or I've given too much value away.

So, like, in the first year of, consulting, just seeing what works, seeing what didn't, and coming back to what kind of projects and how to price that makes sense for me and doesn't stress me out, has been really challenging. It's something I'm still working on. And as more consultants and fractional leaders come into the market, you start to hear new creative ways of doing things or partnering together. I work with a couple different, fractional folks, which, again, creates another layer of complexity. So I'm not quite there yet, but all I can say is don't price yourself by the hour.

Like, that's the that's my number one I tell people. And don't be afraid to charge what, you know, what you feel you're valued, because people always try to back into that hourly number. And so just coming with a clear conviction of your value, what you're offering, and why, you gotta come to the table with that. Otherwise, you'll be like, okay. Whatever you say, and you'll probably be disappointed with that price point or that engagement.

So Yeah. And it's tough when you're a good person too, you know, or because it's like, yeah, you sell yourself short and you sell yourself short and, you know, I've always, my folks are, you know, would give the shirt off your back type of people and, you know, I'm like, and they were too nice. They were too nice to be good business people because they're like, oh, just, you know, pay me back whenever you can. It's like, no. Like, you have to kind of draw some line in the sand and stake that claim and be like, no.

I'm worth this. I put in the work. Like, my knowledge and expertise is helping you. And, you know, I know I I really, really resonate with that. So, you know, I appreciate that.

Kill the people pleaser in me. Like, really trying to stop that. It's good in some instances, but, man, in business, people will just get over on you if you don't hold your ground and set boundaries. So yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. People take advantage if they can. Right? And so, something else I wanna touch upon too was, just going back to, like, the go to market, you know, we kinda touched upon team alignment. But, can we talk strategy and, like, you know, building out a roadmap for an organization, you know, on on whatever scale you think is appropriate, you know, is that is that two months, six months, a year?

You know, what do you usually recommend for people? In terms of building out a roadmap in terms of marketing strategy, product marketing, or Yeah. Marketing strategy. Yeah. I mean, look.

Like, marketing is tough. Like, there is no good way to put it. You know, teams are still really small. Budgets are still really small. Budgets are still, like, in some cases, reporting directly to the CRO.

CFO is managing a marketing team's budget. So I think getting, again, getting back to the basics of what do you need to do, how can you align with those top line business metrics or the things that your board, your founders, your leaders care about, is so important. And being able to do, you know, the demand generation aspect of it, but also the brand building aspect because this market is not getting, like, any easier to stand out. I think the, you know, overrun of AI this and that is making it more complicated for small brands to kind of really get a voice. So balancing that creativity with, more of, like, the quant marketing stuff is so important.

And I think planning at the quarterly level, makes the most sense right now just because there's so much coming at marketers and marketing teams. And, from that, like, maybe higher lens level, building out a team of fractional or consulting folks that you can lean on, whether that's for design, product marketing, demand gen, to, like, plug and play the supercharger team. I'm I'm, like, telling people always be evaluating that. Always be looking for efficiencies there. And then, you know, the yearly plan, like, make a big audacious goal.

Like, try to get to something that's really unique and different, and keep looking ahead because, you know, your board, your founders, that's that's what they're doing. So think in that mindset versus, like, I am a VP of marketing or I'm a director of marketing, and I can only impact this one area of the business. No. Like, you try to take all the all the pieces on the chessboard in my opinion. Like, it's not getting easy any easier to be a marketer right now.

No. No. I I would absolutely agree with you. It's yeah. It just seems like, you know, with the next couple years, like you said, with AI and all this stuff, I don't know what the future holds.

You know, I might be have some educated guesses, you know, but it's really, really tough to articulate what the future might look like, you know, in terms of all this stuff. Right? You know? And so I at least think that with the fractional side of things, it's like, okay. At least I have control over something.

You know? It's like, at least I have a hand on the wheel of my own life. And, you know, I know that I can control my destiny at least when it comes to me. Right? But, you know, with everything else, you know, who knows?

Right? But, so when it comes to branding, right, for an organization, do you have any thoughts on that and, like, name naming. Right? You know what I mean? Just kind of curating that entire picture for a brand if they're maybe, you know, starting out or, you know, how would you advise someone to create something from scratch?

Yeah. I mean, first and foremost, I can't say this enough. Like, find your product market fit. Like, find where your sweet spot is. Find what customers love you, what what prospects you see quicker deal cycles with, like, where you're winning, and start there.

Like, start with a good solid base and then experiment outward when it comes to your brand and try new things. But, I mean, I see a lot of folks maybe try to throw all the spaghetti at the wall when it comes to building out their brand and char targeting too many people, too many personas. So get get really clear on your product market fit, where you play best, and how to excite and delight those people. Like, I don't think it's I don't think it's rocket science. I see these, like, really innovative things of, maybe using video or or interviews.

I think, you know, Novatic and user evidence, and and folks like that are doing a really good job at small teams playing big. And so, you know, I would start there. Like, start with a good product market fit, clarify those stories, and then work outward. And don't try to do too much. Like, stay really focused, on, you know, how to tell a really great story, without burning yourself out.

I mean, brand campaigns are a lot of creativity, a lot of thoughtfulness, and you don't wanna spin your wheels over too many things. And then you kinda do everything that in a average way because, unfortunately, marketers love to talk and love to, like, shit on bad campaigns. So, you know, it's great to have one that knocks it out of the park and then and then take the learnings from there. I'm a big fan of experimentation on that front too, and seeing, you know, what kind of demand capture creation campaigns you can do and how that, again, goes back to impacting your brand and, yeah, and telling a good story, like, foundationally, just telling a good brand story. Absolutely.

And so I noticed too that or, you know, we talked about that kind of at the beginning where, you know, you have a boutique with vintage glass as well. You know, how is that how important has that been for, you know, creating these other avenues in your life where you can, you know, build something, create, you know, just, step outside of work for a second and focus on other things. Yeah. I mean, it's awesome. I run the shop with my sister who's a dentist.

So we come from two different worlds, and we're both glass collectors, so that's kind of what brought us together. And it's just really nice to have something that is not, on the computer. So Yeah. Being able to, you know, tap into my creativity and make displays or figure out kind of what the look's gonna be for each season. And just being in the, like, consumer world of how, you know, buyers want things presented or what they do in the shop.

Like, now I have so much respect. I never worked retail, but, man, people misplacing things or putting them in different parts of the store. I'm like, I have so much respect for people who work retail, and I am so sorry when I picked up that shirt and put it in the wrong, like, section. So it's it's been really great. And outside of that, I play the banjo, and I'm just constantly trying to find other ways to get off of my laptop, get out of the marketing world.

And, like, you know, there's so much more to the world than that. And sometimes it's so easy, especially in, like, startup land, to get really sucked into marketing. And it helps me be a better marketer at the end of the day and a better, like, fractional leader, as I try to just, like, open up what I'm doing in my day to day. Yeah. No.

I think these these things, these endeavors, right, they're beautiful vehicles that allow you to do the rest of your life. Right? You know, whatever that looks like. That's amazing. Banjo too.

I'm a musician as well when I'm not doing, you know, this sort of thing as well, you know, or the piano or singing or whatever. But, you know, I think it's it really is important, you know, like you said, to get to get away from the screen. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Music has been like a total creative avenue.

That's like a totally sidebar discussion, but that's been like stretching my brain in the most, probably the most creative way so far. Yeah. Yeah, no, absolutely. Absolutely. I've, I was talking to, another guest.

And so I spent some time last winter just playing outside of America. Right. So like I was kind of, you know, I was on, I I was in Central America. So, you know, I still have my laptop, still have, like, Wi Fi connection so I could get some work done, and still on, you know, these time zones. Right?

But then, playing music outside, it was really interesting on in a marketing perspective as well just because I noticed attention spans were so different compared to, like, the American attention span is just, you know, people can't hold their attention for for very long, I guess. You know? And so when I'm going to these places and it's just me, a microphone, and a keyboard, and like people would just sit with me for three hours or, you know, for however long I was playing. Just me. You know what I mean?

And their attention span was and was was they were with me. You know what I mean? Like, I had the room for that long. It was really, really interesting you know, just be like, okay. Like, when it when it comes from the worker side, it's like, you know, people are all over the all over the place with their attention span.

You know, have you taken any lessons from like, you know, your your creative endeavors or, you know, the shop and taking that into your work as well? Yeah. I mean, you know, the attention span thing or just, like, being able to delight people with something small, whether that's, like, music or whether that's, like, how the glass is displayed, just slowing down to really think about that and really enjoy the process of, like, building or learning or displaying or whatever the creativity thing is, just slowing down, I think, for me, has been the biggest lesson because, like, I could tell when I was scrolling TikTok, like, I started to get irritated at, you know, three minute videos. I'm like, what is going on with me? This is not, like, normal.

And so it just honestly reminded myself to slow down, and I take that into my work with, like I got, like, so overwhelmed and burned out by trying to do everything and be you know, I feel like with AI, people expect things, like, very quick, and it's like, no. Like, there's a process. Go back to the process. Like, use AI when and where you can, but, like, you need to be creative. You need to have time to think.

And and I think, honestly, that's, like, the biggest thing I'm taking into 2025 from the creative side. It's just slowing down. Yeah. Being present, being present. And, yeah, no, especially I've that's been, yeah.

Something on my mind, of course. Yeah. No. Yeah. Like you said, you know, with, I I've tried to be more of a creator, less of a consumer.

Not that, like, you know, that's everyone's gonna consume, you know, whether, yeah, whether it's TikTok or whether it's, you know, food, whatever, what have you, you know, but we're all consumers in some, in some way shape or form. But, you know, I've trying to focus more on being the creator side of things, you know, like with the glass or with the banjo or, you know, whatever that entails just because it's better for my brain, you know, to be present and to be focusing on that thing for however long before I move on to the next thing. Oh, totally. 100% there with you. Yeah.

Yeah. No. Amazing. So, you know, I really appreciate your time, today. You know, if someone wanted to contact you, if they wanted to learn more about you, what would be the best way to do that?

How can they get in touch if they wanna keep up with what you're doing? Yeah. I mean, LinkedIn. Unfortunately, I'm chronically on LinkedIn. So, that's probably the easiest way.

I have to set up the whole demand gen, like, book a meeting with me side of my website. So that is a good reminder that I need to do Yeah. But LinkedIn for now. Yeah. Awesome.

Awesome. Well, Alex, thank you so much for joining me. I really, really appreciate our conversation. And, yeah, thanks for tuning in, everyone, and we'll see you next time.