VGTM_Brad Gillum_Full Audio Interview_Edited_V1
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[00:00:00] Corey Quinn: Welcome to the Vertical Go To Market Podcast, where you'll discover new opportunities to grow your business from seven figures to eight from the world's most successful agency and B2B SaaS executives. I'm your host, Corey Quinn. Let's jump into the show. Today, I'm joined by the CEO and Chief Cheerleader at Willow Marketing, Brad Gillum.
[00:00:24] Corey Quinn: Welcome, Brad.
[00:00:25] Brad Gillum: Thanks for having me. I
[00:00:26] Corey Quinn: appreciate it. Absolutely. I'm super excited for our conversation. [00:00:30] Could you just share a little bit about yourself and your background for those who may not be familiar? Yeah,
[00:00:35] Brad Gillum: sure, I'm happy to. So, I am Brad Gillum, based in Indianapolis, Indiana. I've been here all my life.
[00:00:41] Brad Gillum: Graduated from Butler University. Go Dawgs! Big, big, big East team. Nice. I have been here since graduating from Butler. Started working in the agency world. I've worked for a couple of different agencies before starting Willow. At the rip old [00:01:00] age of 27 and uh, we celebrated, uh, we'll celebrate 32 years in March of 24.
[00:01:07] Brad Gillum: So we've been
[00:01:08] Corey Quinn: around a little while. Wow. Congratulations. Yeah. 32 years. Thank you. My goodness. Could you tell us about, a little bit about Willow marketing and what you guys do? Who do you serve?
[00:01:17] Brad Gillum: Yeah, so today is very different from the day we started a little over, uh, 31 years ago. Today, our focus is really on associations and member based organizations.
[00:01:28] Brad Gillum: That's the niche that we [00:01:30] service. So, if you think about, um, there's an association for everything. So, we really focus on those member based organizations. Typically, they're professional organizations, uh, not necessarily trade or, uh, organizations, but there are a few, and we help them with, uh, just about everything, anything from their overall strategy and branding, repositioning work, uh, we work with them on member recruitment, member [00:02:00] engagement, attrition issues, uh, Many, many of those organizations also have foundations.
[00:02:06] Brad Gillum: They've formed over the years some sort of a foundational element, so they have a non profit side to what they do as well. Many of them use those foundations for scholarships or to help their industries in one way, shape, or another. So, We do a lot of work with those foundational elements or foundational businesses or entities of those non profit, [00:02:30] non profit entities of those associations as well.
[00:02:33] Brad Gillum: I would say about 60 percent of our business today It is made up of those associations and member based organizations. And then we have some non profits, if you will, that we work with, and then some traditional based businesses that are more B2B based businesses that we work with too.
[00:02:52] Corey Quinn: Tanner Iskra Beautiful.
[00:02:52] Corey Quinn: And What's your role there as a CEO and chief cheerleader? Yeah, well,
[00:02:58] Brad Gillum: you know, I try to figure that out every day. [00:03:00] Today I was, uh, cleaning out sink drains and, uh, making sure they installed the new water heater properly. So, you know, as a, as a, uh, small business owner and an entrepreneur, you do a little bit of everything, but my role, my role today has evolved more to, uh, that higher level strategy and consulting.
[00:03:20] Brad Gillum: I manage the majority of financial operations, so any fiscal responsibility here at the business. I've stepped out of a lot of the day to day [00:03:30] business operations, so I don't have any account responsibilities per se, unless we have a client that has some issues or some problems or some troubles. Then I'll step in or might get involved with them or if they've got some planning needs or strategy needs or brainstorming sessions I'll participate.
[00:03:50] Brad Gillum: I do a lot of thought leadership work So I lead a lot of the business development and thought leadership work that we do here at willow as well.
[00:03:57] Corey Quinn: Beautiful I'd love to dig into that in a little [00:04:00] bit here and just for For context, how, how big is Willow Marketing? Is it a number of employees or clients, whatever you're comfortable sharing?
[00:04:08] Corey Quinn: Yeah, sure.
[00:04:08] Brad Gillum: We have 20 employees currently. We are full service, so we're soup to nuts. We try to provide our, try to provide our clients a one stop shop, if you will, as much as we possibly can. So we provide that depth as far as marketing services are for them. We have, uh, four developers. So from a digital, [00:04:30] digital side, we've got four developers and analytic guys on, on staff, guys and gals, actually on staff that, uh, we can work with clients on those needs, account services, staff, content developers, art, creative director, as well as art directors.
[00:04:45] Brad Gillum: So. You know, we cover the gamut. We have a small video studio in the basement, so we do a lot of video, a lot of, a lot of video production for our clients as well. That's great.
[00:04:56] Corey Quinn: So if you, if you wouldn't mind, Brad taking us back, you [00:05:00] mentioned you're almost 32 year old agency didn't necessarily start out in the associations or member groups area, where, where did you start?
[00:05:08] Corey Quinn: What was the, what was the, so the Genesis for the, uh, the agency itself and how did you go to market and how that changed over the years?
[00:05:16] Brad Gillum: Yeah, we went to market to make money. So, you know, we hung a shing, we hung a shingle out and tried to sell whatever we could. So we'd do just about anything that we possibly could to make a dollar in those first days.
[00:05:28] Brad Gillum: Our first big client was [00:05:30] Phillips Consumer Electronics. They were based in Knoxville, Tennessee. At that time, we had some previous relationships with a few clients that we had worked with over the years. There were two partners that I had at that time. There were three partners when we started the firm.
[00:05:45] Brad Gillum: We were really focused on Philips as our, our, our main client at that point in time. We started working with them doing sales and product training because that's who our contact was. Uh, we were working with them. That's where the need [00:06:00] was and that's where we could do work. So we became sales and product training specialists.
[00:06:06] Brad Gillum: We worked with them as we started the agency and at that time. There's a bit of a dip and a downturn in, um, the economy and typically marketing and communications people are some of those firsts that are cut. So when they cut their staff, we thought, gosh, you know, maybe this is an opportunity for us to really become those contract marketing managers for them.
[00:06:29] Brad Gillum: So we did [00:06:30] exactly that. They loved that because they could hire us and fire us whenever they needed to, without putting us on payroll. So we stepped in and become. Became marketing managers for them and helped run projects. So, you know, Phillips had, uh, I think two big photo and video studios and, uh, Knoxville, they reached out to us and said, Hey, can you guys do these training programs and these sales and product training videos for us?
[00:06:56] Brad Gillum: We've got. You know, this product line coming up or this product launch [00:07:00] coming up, you can use our facilities. You can use our equipment. We just need somebody to get this stuff done for us because we don't have the staff. So we stepped down and we went down and we stepped in and we did that work for them.
[00:07:11] Brad Gillum: So it was a great relationship and that continued for a couple of years. The way we got into marketing is that we'd literally come out of the basement, which literally we would come out of the basement where all the engineers were at Philips and carrying boxes of products and spec [00:07:30] sheets and engineering documentation and remotes and all sorts of other things that we'd carry home with this to try to decipher and distill into, uh, Language that a consumer could understand the marketing guys would trip us and say, Hey, we saw you down there working on XYZ project.
[00:07:49] Brad Gillum: We're going to have to do some marketing materials on that too. Could you guys help us out with that? And we're like, yeah, sure. Absolutely. So it was a win win situation for us. We do [00:08:00] the sales and product training materials and as well. We can very easily adapt and we help them do all the marketing materials that they might need too.
[00:08:08] Brad Gillum: So that kind of moved us into a very interesting direction where we were doing both the sales and product training, as well as the marketing. That relationship was really nice and it grew our business because we had clients at Phillips that would leave and move to other companies. We used to say that most people hated it when their clients left.[00:08:30]
[00:08:30] Brad Gillum: the organization because they didn't know if they were going to get work or not. We were excited because typically 90 to 120 days later, we'd get a phone call. And that was the case. Yeah. So we had a client leave Phillips and go to Hunter Fan Company in Memphis and picked up the phone and called and said, Hey, we need you guys.
[00:08:48] Brad Gillum: Can you come help us? We had one leave and go to, um, Motorola and, uh, to the wireless data communication group in Schaumburg in Chicago. We started [00:09:00] working with them there. Hunter fan ended up buying Casablanca fan in Pasadena, California. We started working with them. So it just kind of grew and we were busy, you know, we were, we were hopping.
[00:09:12] Brad Gillum: We grew from three people to four to six to eight people. And we were just doing tons of work. Every time we get a project, we'd go back and we'd put our heads down and we'd work feverishly to get the work done. We were very fortunate because we'd lift our heads up and there was more [00:09:30] work there. So we were happy as clams, just tons of work there for us and having a good
[00:09:34] Corey Quinn: time.
[00:09:35] Corey Quinn: I mean, at that moment in time, that sounds like a full on business, growing great clients, good brands, all everything's on the up and up. Yeah. It was good. It sounds like it. That's wonderful. And about, about how far into the business, how many years into the business was about this moment? What'd you
[00:09:53] Brad Gillum: say?
[00:09:53] Brad Gillum: Well, I would say that, uh, roads got rocky somewhere around, uh, 94, [00:10:00] 95, when, uh, the economy took a little bit of a turn and we had to tighten our belts. Okay. And that was a difficult period of time. We lost a partner. He came to the table and said, Hey guys, look, I, I got to have a paycheck. I can't do this. So there's no more belt for me to tighten here.
[00:10:18] Brad Gillum: I've got to go get a real job. So he left us. We actually bought him out. We had to retool and refocus what we were doing and, um, that meant, uh, knocking on some doors and [00:10:30] trying to, uh, generate more business a little bit more locally here in the Indianapolis market. And we were pretty successful doing that.
[00:10:38] Brad Gillum: So we, uh, started competing with more of the local firms, if you will, more of the local ad agencies and played that game and landed some nice work with other B2B firms here, started doing some work with them. You know, the airport and doing some annual reports and nice brochures and we had some nice steady growth in doing that.
[00:10:59] Corey Quinn: Okay. [00:11:00] So then it sounds like the focus was start local in the Indianapolis area. Again a great strategy. A lot of successful agencies, you know. Do something in that type of that type of approach. How did that bridge to Focusing in on associations and member groups. What what happened or what were the series of steps that got you there?
[00:11:22] Corey Quinn: I'm curious
[00:11:24] Brad Gillum: great question so in about 2000 my remaining partner [00:11:30] came to me and shared with me that she wasn't having any fun because what we were doing is literally Our attrition was horrible. We do a project and have to go get another client. So it was project based. It was that ra It was, it was that rabbit race.
[00:11:43] Brad Gillum: Yep. You know, we'd do a work and have to go find more work and have to, it was, we were just churning churn and burn and, uh, she wasn't having fun and said she wanted out. So I ended up, uh, going through the process of buying her out and all of a sudden I was the, I was the [00:12:00] man left standing . And, and to be honest, um, I was tired too.
[00:12:04] Brad Gillum: You know, it was, it was a lot of work, right? It was a lot of fun in, in those early years and pretty exciting. And we did some really cool projects. But, you know, I now had a, a, a daughter and she was young and I wanted to spend some time here and couldn't, couldn't burn the candle at both ends the way we once were and needed to bring some sanity to life.
[00:12:25] Brad Gillum: So the first thing that, uh, I did is to start asking some, some people about. [00:12:30] And how I could build a little bit more sustainability into the business. And that led me to Vistage. I don't know if you're familiar with
[00:12:36] Corey Quinn: Vistage or not. I'm no longer a member of it. I was a member for six years here in Los Angeles.
[00:12:40] Corey Quinn: So, yep.
[00:12:42] Brad Gillum: So I, I joined Vistage and, um, found some answers there, found some comfort and dealing with some other business leaders that, uh, weren't in my business, but very smart. Very, very shrewd business people, business leaders who I learned an awful lot [00:13:00] from and, and decided that, you know, there was. There were some things that I needed to do with what we were doing at Willow that, uh, would help build a bit more value to our business and one of those was niching, niching down.
[00:13:12] Brad Gillum: I mean, as we're looking at, uh, creating value in this organization, you know, we couldn't be a mile wide. We really needed to focus. And when we focused, that's where we were creating value as an organization, but I was necessarily looking at selling it in five years, but... [00:13:30] You know, we needed to be able to position this thing, have, have a strong balance sheet, have a strong niche that we were serving, some nice long term clients and some contracts in place that were sustainable that would create value for the business.
[00:13:45] Brad Gillum: So, in learning All sorts of things from them. We kind of, uh, retooled what we were doing. We took a hard look at our client list and who we were working with. And lo and behold, there were some synergies there, you know, there [00:14:00] were some interesting clients that we had, uh, developed some. Experience with some, I wouldn't call it necessarily an expertise at that point, but we had some interesting experience with and, um, sat at, uh, sat in a conference room and figured out why we liked doing work with those clients.
[00:14:20] Brad Gillum: And out of that came associations and member based organizations for several different reasons.
[00:14:27] Corey Quinn: So backing up just a sec here, you, [00:14:30] you, um, you were making the point that as a result of working, uh, being a member of Vistage and getting access to some really, some great business leaders who brought some perspective and ideas to you, you mentioned that niching down would help you to create value.
[00:14:45] Corey Quinn: In what way? Does niching down help? How does it help you to create value? I remember
[00:14:51] Brad Gillum: a conversation with one of my mentors specifically who, well, there were actually two, one that was a healthcare, software healthcare [00:15:00] company. And as I was talking to him, you know, he was building a 650 million organization.
[00:15:06] Brad Gillum: And, you know, sitting and talking with him, I was asking him, you know, what, Why this track? What were you trying to do? What, what's your goal here? And he said, look, I'm, I'm trying to build an organization that's going to have a high multiple so that when I sell this thing, it's got a high multiple. And it's not something that I'm just dreaming up.
[00:15:26] Brad Gillum: I really spent some time going back and studying, you know, [00:15:30] M& A and what's happened within the market in the last five years and in the last 10 years. You know, what are those businesses that are getting? The higher multiples when they are selling. So, you know, I thought, gosh, that that's pretty smart. Well, I'm going to go back and figure out what are those agencies that have been sold in the last five or 10 years and see.
[00:15:55] Brad Gillum: Which ones have been sold for the higher multiples? So I did that. [00:16:00] Getting access to that information was the first challenge, and I tapped on my banker and asked him if he might be able to help find some of that information, and he said absolutely. We've got tons of resources. I got some people in a research desk that's up in Chicago.
[00:16:16] Brad Gillum: I could probably get on it. So They, they found all sorts of stuff for me. I mean, I, I thought it was awesome. Sent all this stuff to me. I start sorting through it and realized very quickly that, you know, healthcare is going to get a [00:16:30] big multiple in agency worlds. The more specific and the more focused that you are as an agency, you're going to see a higher return as far as a multiple is concerned.
[00:16:41] Brad Gillum: Those generalists, those, you know, simple, straight, full service firms that are doing anything like we used to do, they're not getting the returns. They're not getting those higher multiples. So that immediately told me, Hey, I'm going to be on this end. I don't want to be on that end.
[00:16:58] Corey Quinn: And did you make a shift in your product [00:17:00] strategy as well, where did you shift away from project based?
[00:17:03] Corey Quinn: Engagements to more of a recurring revenue
[00:17:05] Brad Gillum: model. Yeah, we wanted to mix, you know, quite honestly, we're more profitable on a project basis when we really look at it. But, um, we knew that we needed to have a mix of both. So we tried to position ourselves so that we had a nice mix of those retained base retained service agreements, as well as that project based work that we were doing.
[00:17:27] Brad Gillum: Sure.
[00:17:27] Corey Quinn: Absolutely. So it sounds like you were in the, in [00:17:30] that process, you looked at your book of business sounds like you. You asked yourselves that, uh, you know, what, who do we like working with, who are we getting sort of maybe results with, and if we were going to focus in an area where, where do we want to focus?
[00:17:43] Corey Quinn: And then the, so the associations came up. You mentioned something earlier in the, in the intro around that the, that the associations and member groups are not really focused on like the trades, but more sort of professional groups. What is the difference between the two? I'm curious [00:18:00] your thoughts on that.
[00:18:01] Brad Gillum: Well, yeah, those trades are, you know, like, you know, the, uh, electricians and, you know, HVAC, more of the blue collar type of trades, yeah, yeah, those types of things, you know, we're working with, um, certification bodies, so the Board of Certification for Emergency Nursing is one of our clients, the NAMIC, National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies, so you know, we're working for more of those, uh, professional service organizations,
[00:18:28] Corey Quinn: more of those.
[00:18:29] Corey Quinn: That's curious, [00:18:30] that makes sense. Yep. That was unclear because I'm fascinated by associations, like the, where do you, where you focus your, your agency and, and, and, uh, your client specialization like that, that whole world is very, very interesting. So when you decided to focus in on members, member based associations, what did you, what'd you do next?
[00:18:49] Corey Quinn: Like, how did you begin to grow that part of your business? Yeah,
[00:18:52] Brad Gillum: well, you know, I think the whole process. Picking that niche was interesting all in itself. And there were a [00:19:00] couple of things that went into that. One of them was, um, really looking for the clients that we enjoyed working with. There was a certain type of client that we found in associations.
[00:19:10] Brad Gillum: One, you know, associations aren't competitive. I mean, they aren't really out there. You know, they aren't really out there competing with each other. If nothing else, they're, they're collaborative because, you know, the, the accountants and the accountants and the dentist associations aren't, aren't competing for members, but [00:19:30] they're collaborating together.
[00:19:31] Brad Gillum: You know, those. Those C level executives in those organizations, those association professionals, they're meeting on a regular basis and they're talking about, hey, here are some member retention ideas that we put in place and some things that you might want to consider. And we loved that idea of collaboration and how this community was Very unique in the sense that they did that level of collaboration.
[00:19:56] Corey Quinn: My mind is blown right now. I'm like, my mind is blown, right? This is, this is so [00:20:00] cool. Like that, this happens. I mean, it makes sense when you say it, but I would never have come up with that. Okay. I'm sorry to interrupt, but go ahead, please go ahead.
[00:20:07] Brad Gillum: The other thing we really liked is that they're, they're all mission driven.
[00:20:11] Brad Gillum: You know, it wasn't, it wasn't necessarily about shareholder value and, uh, making the numbers at the end of the month. Um, You know, how many units did you sell and what kind of profit did you make? But, you know, they're, they were all about taking care of their members. They were all about making sure that they're [00:20:30] advancing their industry, advancing their profession.
[00:20:33] Brad Gillum: So that whole concept of being mission driven to us was extremely appealing. So we, we loved that. So there were all sorts of things that created a certain allure for us that we thought, Hey, we. We really want to try to chase this a little bit and, uh, go down the path. So that, that was one of the reasons, if you will, or several of the reasons that we carved, carved that out.
[00:20:59] Brad Gillum: Uh, [00:21:00] once we did, we had a couple of clients already that were in that segment or that were in that niche. Um, one of them was in our, our first, first ever was the National FFA, the Future Farmers of America. They're actually based in Indianapolis. They have, um. They're the single largest student based organization in the country, and we started working with them.
[00:21:23] Brad Gillum: They moved their corporate office to Indianapolis, and in doing so, they were moving their national convention at [00:21:30] that time from Kansas City to Louisville, Kentucky. So that was our first project. How do we, how do we convince, you know, these kids all across the country? I think at that time it was, you know, 50, 000 student membership.
[00:21:44] Brad Gillum: How do we convince them that? Louisville, Kentucky is going to be just as cool, if not more cool than, than, than Kansas City. So, you know, we put together the road to Louisville, as we called it and did a fun little campaign there. And they launched us [00:22:00] into all sorts of other work. You know, we started working with our marketing department.
[00:22:04] Brad Gillum: We started working with their membership department. We started working with their curriculum department, doing curriculum development, their merchandising department, designing t shirts and sweatshirts and helping them. Sell more product to students as non dues revenue. We started working with them in their foundation, helping them with alumni giving programs.
[00:22:26] Brad Gillum: We helped them with the sponsorship development [00:22:30] and how they can find sponsors that might be interested in giving philanthropic dollars and, or. Helping them do marketing activation around giving gifts to the National FFA to have access to some of these kids and some of the programs that they were doing.
[00:22:44] Brad Gillum: So we loved what we were doing. There are tons of opportunities there and that then led us to some other organizations. Indianapolis has quite a few national headquarters for fraternities and sororities which are member based organizations. [00:23:00] I for one am a fraternity member. I'm a member of Phi Kappa Psi fraternity.
[00:23:06] Brad Gillum: And, um, that was one of our first clients. It wasn't by any other opportunity than me seeing somebody on the street downtown outside of our foundation's national headquarters who had Greek letters on one day. And I said something to him and he happened to be assistant director for the foundation. We had coffee and before I knew it, we were doing work for them.
[00:23:28] Brad Gillum: That led [00:23:30] to about 30 other. National fraternities and sororities over the course of the next five or six years that we started doing work for. That was a fun gig. We enjoyed that, but we wanted to move a little bit more into larger associations. And that, that was through ASAE, which is really the Association of Associations, the American Society of Association Executives.
[00:23:56] Brad Gillum: So I told you there was an association for [00:24:00] everything. Believe it or not, there's an association for associations. It is the go to for anyone who is a member of an association, whether that be a marketing person, whether that be a C level executive leader, whoever it is, and ASAE is a tremendous resource.
[00:24:21] Brad Gillum: For anyone who is a leader within a member based organization or association. And through them, we started doing some thought [00:24:30] leader work and attending conferences and other things, which, um, gave us access to all of those associations that are out there.
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[00:25:27] Corey Quinn: You could sign up and get the first secret right [00:25:30] now by going to getoutboundroy. com That's getoutboundroy. com. Now back to the show. So, okay, that's, that's super smart and interesting. So they, they were sort of the hub, they were the association for the associations. And so you align with them and you begin to add value there.
[00:25:51] Corey Quinn: And then as a result of that, it helps you to more easily, you know, find these other associations that may need your help. Yeah, was [00:26:00] there ever a moment as you were going down this road and as you were exploring this direction where you felt like, well, you know, that's not a big enough vertical for if we're going to focus, you know, that's just that, you know, there's not big enough, like where there's not enough opportunity or how did you think about that?
[00:26:22] Corey Quinn: I know a lot of generalist agencies struggle with. This idea of niching down or focusing in on a specific vertical [00:26:30] market, like how did you ever have those thoughts and how did you address those?
[00:26:35] Brad Gillum: Yeah, absolutely. We do probably at least once a year, to be honest. You know, the leadership team and I, we, we, we all sit down and we do our planning for the next year.
[00:26:45] Brad Gillum: And the topic comes up. I mean, everybody has a different interest. Everybody has different things that they want to do. Everybody wants to produce that Super Bowl commercial, right? So, you know, the creative director says, man, you know, can't we, can't we [00:27:00] do something other than associations? What else is there out there?
[00:27:03] Brad Gillum: So we, we, we have an open, open and candid conversation about, okay, great. What are, what are the other niches that there are that we might want to go out and service and how long is it going to take to do that? We spent an awful long time and invested a lot of money in really targeting this niche and are well situated there.
[00:27:22] Brad Gillum: I don't mind. Us looking for a secondary niche that we might want to do some work in. But I think as I've [00:27:30] shared with, with them, it's going to take time and it's going to take an investment for us to really make that happen. It's not going to go out. It's not going to be something that we can just say, we want to work with, you know.
[00:27:42] Brad Gillum: Orchards, every apple orchard in America and, and target them. And tomorrow we're going to go out and work with them. It's going to take three to five years for us to do enough thought leadership and establish ourselves there to be able to go out and become the apple orchard marketing [00:28:00] experts in America.
[00:28:01] Corey Quinn: Just as a thought experiment, if you were going to do that over that three to five year period, what are the, some of the, the things that you would. Particularly want to focus on as a way to kind of establish your credibility in that space Like how would you open up a new vertical market at this point?
[00:28:17] Brad Gillum: I'd want to do some analysis on the front end first to see what the potential is for us, you know so that that can be a little difficult, but you know do the [00:28:30] Do the clients in that niche have, have the marketing budgets that will sustain at the levels that we, we need, that we want to help us grow? Are they sophisticated marketers?
[00:28:43] Brad Gillum: You know, we're to the point in who we are as an agency that, you know, no offense to anyone, but we, we don't want to, um, Teach someone how to market. We'd rather have somebody who has a pretty good strategic head on their shoulders that are helping, looking for somebody who can help [00:29:00] them execute. So I'd really want to put some time in upfront to understand a little bit more about what those niches might be and how we can get into them, having experience with associations.
[00:29:12] Brad Gillum: I will tell you that there's an association for whatever that niche is that we might be targeting. So I would, I would look for any and every opportunity to try to target and become aligned to their association. [00:29:30] As a thought leader, as a sponsor, attended their conferences, network with those people. To me, that just, that, you know, you got a, you got a bushel basket of people all in one place at one time.
[00:29:43] Brad Gillum: That's where you want to be. So anything that you can do to, to be a thought leader for them and share expertise and share information, you know, look, look for those opportunities of an association that will bring them all together. [00:30:00]
[00:30:00] Corey Quinn: I love all that. Let me ask a different type of question. Do you employ, do you employ salespeople today or over, over the years?
[00:30:08] Corey Quinn: Have you had full time salespeople at the agency? Yeah,
[00:30:11] Brad Gillum: we've had, uh, business development people probably, you know, three or four over the course of the 30 years that we've been here, you know, trying different models, finding somebody that's out there knocking on doors and beating the streets. They have lasted anywhere from Six months to two years [00:30:30] before we somehow figured out that that really didn't work well.
[00:30:34] Brad Gillum: You and I both know a gentleman by the name of Drew McClellan at the Agency Management Institute, who we are members of, and Drew will tell you that the owner and those senior level. C level executives in an agency need to be the one selling. So we've kind of really bought into that philosophy and have in the last probably, um, [00:31:00] 10 years really focused there where myself and my president, Kim Jones, are the ones leading the majority of those business development efforts.
[00:31:09] Brad Gillum: And
[00:31:09] Corey Quinn: has there ever been a moment? So, so. That's interesting. I think, do you ever experience a time where that is more, has that prevented you from achieving the growth that you want? In other words, As the primary, I'll call it closer. It may not be it, but the person who comes in to [00:31:30] help close the deal or maybe to nurture the nurture, the deal, has that ever gotten in the way of your ability to grow?
[00:31:35] Brad Gillum: Yeah, that's a great question. I don't know if it's ability to grow, but I think it's certainly hampered business development efforts. I, I have, um, well, I'll be very candid. I have, um, I've had some, um, family members with some mental health issues specifically in the last year and a half that have, um, directed my energies elsewhere and my time elsewhere.
[00:31:58] Brad Gillum: So. You know, [00:32:00] that has taken my time away and my eye off the ball a little bit with respect to doing some of that business development. And we felt that we have certainly felt that personally, that's where I need to be. My family comes first and I have no regrets whatsoever for being able to do that.
[00:32:16] Brad Gillum: We've been very fortunate that fiscally the business is sound and I've been able to spend the time doing it. And I've got, um, got a great team here that's given me the grace to be able to allow me to make that happen. So I feel very, very [00:32:30] fortunate to be where I am today to be able to make that happen.
[00:32:32] Brad Gillum: But yeah, any, any time you take off the, take your eye off the ball or aren't focused on it, um, you're not feeling it. And I would say that it's, it's more than just. Kim and I, they're doing the work. We've got a great team, our leadership team. They're always out looking for a new business. They have, as an experienced leadership team, they have agency experience, so they have relationships that they have developed.
[00:32:59] Brad Gillum: [00:33:00] We have, uh, A couple of a great account managers that are spectacular with doing new business, you know, they're great having conversations and bringing people in and talking with them and making them comfortable and learning about them to establish rapport so that, you know, there are some opportunities that we can dig a little bit deeper to see if there are some possible opportunities for us.
[00:33:22] Brad Gillum: So, you know, it's, it's not just. Kim and I doing it, but I think from a, from a thought leadership perspective, you know, there are a [00:33:30] couple of us that are really leading those efforts. It
[00:33:32] Corey Quinn: is the primary focus of that thought leadership. Directed towards the association or the member based type of businesses.
[00:33:39] Brad Gillum: Yeah, definitely. In the last four years, we've done a lot of research. So we've done quite a bit of a member based research, attitudinal member based research. It's kind of, there's been a gap in the industry as far as some of those attitudinal research as to what members are thinking and that's benefited as well.
[00:33:57] Brad Gillum: So we've compiled quite a bit of data that [00:34:00] is interesting to. Interesting, I think, to associations coming out of COVID and where we are today with this new, new style of working, this new workforce, people wanting to spend more time at home, working from home, working remote. So, you know, there hasn't been an attitudinal shift in, not just association members, but, you know, all of us.
[00:34:21] Brad Gillum: And I think we've, we've been able to track and have some really interesting data that we've collected. On association members [00:34:30] over the course of the last three or four years that we're using that for quite a bit of, um, our thought leadership work that we're doing and writing as well as speaking.
[00:34:38] Corey Quinn: Great.
[00:34:39] Corey Quinn: That's super valuable. Taking kind of a big step back here with regard to. The listening audience, a lot of folks who listen to this podcast are generalists. They're trying to figure out how to verticalize, maybe on this path of verticalization. And having, having been down this road now, and you know, a 30, almost 32 year veteran of the [00:35:00] agency world, any sort of mistakes or negatives that, uh, or negative experiences that happened along the way when, when it comes to verticalizing, any lessons learned that you could share specifically as it relates to.
[00:35:14] Corey Quinn: You're taking a vertical market approach.
[00:35:16] Brad Gillum: Well, one, not doing it soon enough. I think that, uh, that's one. I mean, I think that that's a lesson I had to learn along the way. Yeah. I think studying the, studying the [00:35:30] vertical that you're, you're moving into and making sure that based upon what your business plans are and where you want to go and where you want to grow.
[00:35:40] Brad Gillum: Yeah. Is that, is that niche one, is that vertical one that. is large enough where the clients there have the budgets that are appropriate to be able to get you where you want to go. Right. You know, there's, there's some places that, you know, you might be able to, some places that you might go [00:36:00] that may not be able to sustain the level of growth that you're anticipating or the level of growth that you want to target.
[00:36:08] Brad Gillum: So I think doing that upfront research to make sure that You know, the business that you're going to reap from them is the type of work that you want and is the, the, the financially enough that's going to sustain you over the period of time that you're looking to continue growing.
[00:36:25] Corey Quinn: Beautiful. I just have one last question for you as we [00:36:30] wrap it up here.
[00:36:31] Corey Quinn: What's your
[00:36:31] Brad Gillum: motivation? Oh, gosh, you know, it's interesting. We just went through a values exercise with, uh, everybody here as, uh, we were doing some planning for 24. And as we did that, my why is pretty much what it was when we started the business. And, you know, it's a, it's a. That's a toss to Simon Sinek.
[00:36:53] Brad Gillum: We're big Simon Sinek fans. And you know, my, my why is really still focused on the people. [00:37:00] And, you know, I, I didn't, didn't want to do this really to go out and be rich, didn't do it to, for ego. I mean, if I did it for ego, my name would be on the side of the building and it would be Gillum marketing. It wouldn't be Willow marketing.
[00:37:14] Brad Gillum: It's really about the people that are here. It's the team. It's the individuals that are, are a part of who we are. Cash, I wish I had a business card, one of my business cards to show you, but even when we started the business, our business cards, everyone, the first thing you do is you, you pick [00:37:30] an icon that represents yourself.
[00:37:32] Brad Gillum: And that icon is supposed to be a conversation starter. And the icon is something about you. Both personally to give some insights as to who you are, but it also represents you professionally. And then on the backside of the card is our logo and our contact information. But the front side of the card is all about you.
[00:37:51] Brad Gillum: And that came out of where we came and where we moved from, another agency, that there was really a loss for the [00:38:00] individuals as a part of the team. We had, I'll just say that we had a leader that really enjoyed being king of the hill and didn't really think too much about seeing thanks to the folks that were on the front line doing the work.
[00:38:13] Brad Gillum: And we didn't appreciate or didn't enjoy that environment at all. So we wanted to make sure that, you know, the individuals were recognized as a part of the team because I couldn't do anything that I've done without them. And that's still a big piece, a big part of what [00:38:30] my why is, is the people that are around me.
[00:38:33] Brad Gillum: And, uh, making sure that, you know, even, even though someone may come and be with us for two years, three years, five years, you know, I know that they're going to spread their wings and they're going to go somewhere else, but I still hope that they look back and remember their time here at Willow and think, Wow.
[00:38:48] Brad Gillum: I really learned something while I was there. I really enjoyed that. It gave me a slingshot into my career to where I am today. And I hope they look back fondly on their time here. [00:39:00] All about the people.
[00:39:01] Corey Quinn: It is about the people. That's it. That's beautiful. Well, thank you so much. Where could people reach out to you if they want to learn more about.
[00:39:08] Corey Quinn: You, your services over at Willow, maybe it's a member, member driven association who may be listening to this. Uh, what's a good way to get in touch?
[00:39:16] Brad Gillum: Yeah. I'm brad at willowmarketing. com. Pretty easy. So you can toss me an email, brad at willowmarketing. com, uh, visit our website, take a look at it as well. If you'd like to, it's, uh, it's got some fun Easter eggs in it as [00:39:30] well.
[00:39:30] Brad Gillum: So you can go around on it, learn a little bit more about us and all of our people and some of our clients.
[00:39:35] Corey Quinn: So. Wonderful. And we'll make sure we add that to the show notes as well. So thank you so much for joining Brad. Appreciate it.
[00:39:42] Brad Gillum: Corey, thank you. I certainly enjoyed it. I appreciate your time.
[00:39:46] Corey Quinn: All right, folks, that's it for today.
[00:39:48] Corey Quinn: I'm Corey Quinn, and I hope you join me again next time for the Vertical Go To Market Podcast. If you receive value from the show, I would love a five star rating and review on Apple Podcasts. [00:40:00] Thanks, and we'll see you soon.
