Like I said, I want to like marketing again. Maybe even love it again…
At 5:30am this morning I had a conversation with my dad, a retired radio sales manager known for his humility and creativity.
That conversation reminded me why I went into marketing in the first place.
I (like him) live for big ideas.
Growing up my family (shoutout Butts fam!) would often get on these idea kicks at our dinner table. Before the dishes were even thought about, we’d be throwing out the most ridiculous ideas for businesses and brands we’d (prob never) start.
One time we decided we would open a Butts-themed water park with attractions like bumper butts, butt-putt golf, and a gift shop called “Crap.” My whole family was in tears laughing about this idea.
I remember furiously scribbling all our ideas on a legal pad, because in my sweet little juicy kiddo brain, we were ABSOLUTELY opening this water park and that page would be THE OFFICIAL business plan.
OMG! If I had that piece of paper now, I would frame it in my office.
I miss projects that made me so excited I couldn’t sleep.
I miss writing marketing plans until super late into the night because an idea finally landed and I had to get it all down before it disappeared. I miss presenting that plan to a client. Watching them get super excited about it too. Collectively running with at lightening speed!
I miss the kind of work where a DM turned into a happy hour, and a happy hour turned into a best friendship.
And when one of us had an idea, we’d all pull our resources together to make it happen.
Honestly THAT part we still have! And y’all know exactly who you are because we’ve been in touch lately! ILY! ~*Special shoutout to Dolly Day Colorado for waking that up in me!*~
This was before AI slop. Before ROAS and KPIs ruled every good idea. Before every post had to start with a scroll stopping hook… and so on and so on and so fucking on. But I am tired of hearing about all that. There have always been barriers to creativity and pretenders cosplaying as players.
I get it. It’s SO DAMN easy to talk shit about all the things ruining an industry we love. Much easier than solving for it…
But easy isn’t why I started Bound, and easy isn’t why I do anything.
Lo and I have had some really hard talks about the future of Bound lately. Can we do it? Do we even want to do it anymore? And ultimately we have come to the conclusion that, hell yes, we both still want to do it!
We love the culture we’ve built at Bound, and do not plan to stop talking several times a day any time soon.
SO, I’m not done with marketing, or Bound, or big ideas! But I am thinking about how I can live out the kind of marketing I love in this new world.
We don’t know everything, and we never will, but we do know we’re building again and whatever it is will definitely (probably) involve butt-putt.
XO, Lolo