Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Full Episode Transcript

Hello everyone. Welcome to Question Everything, a podcast all about learning from the successes and the failures of those who dared to well question everything. This podcast is part interview, part therapy, and a little Price is Right. We even have our own game board stacked with questions that'll make the most successful CMOs totally sweat. I'm your host, Ashley Walters, chief Marketing Officer and partner at Curiosity. On today's episode, I sat down with Grace Whitman, senior brand director on Secret at P&G. Grace has worked on household brands like Old Spice and Secret and Challenger D to C brands like Native. On today's episode, she shares best practices for agencies and brands, like why the brief is the most important document you'll create. We need to think about it like a contract: what legacy brands can learn from D to C Challenger brands and vice versa. And then how providing business context to your agencies can be the secret to breakthrough work and relationships. Let's get started.

Explore and learn more about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships by reading this article: Lessons from Leadership: A Young Professional’s Guide to Agency Life

The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships: Grace Whitman’s Introduction

All right. Welcome to the Question Everything podcast. Today, I'm joined by Grace Whitman. She's a senior brand director at Procter and Gamble, working right now on Secret. Although she's touched other notable brands like Native and Old Spice, she has experience in both current business and innovation development, retail, and direct-to-consumer on new-to-the-world challenger brands and legacy brands. Her career spans from r and d to marketing, and she's passionate about answering a brand's most difficult questions simply and quickly to enable growth. I cannot wait to dig into that. Welcome to the podcast, Grace. Thank you very much for having me. You're welcome. So how are you? What's going on in your world? What's Phyllis in? 

Yeah, Well, it is the day before Thanksgiving. Oh my gosh. So most of the things going through my head are what I'm gonna eat tomorrow and how I'm gonna enjoy myself. But outside of that, yeah, I'm about a hundred days into my role on On Secret, which, of course, is the largest household penetration brand of deodorant. Very different from what you mentioned, Native. I'm sure we'll talk a little bit about that. But I've loved it. It's nice to get back to being a big category leader and the different challenges you face in that setting. And then personally, my husband owns a boxed wine business that's mostly direct to consumers. So, Black Friday is upon us. He's been doing a lot of work to make sure that that's successful. That's why we're having a quiet Thanksgiving at home, which I'm very excited about. Outside of work, I just picked up my holiday choir cycle.

Tell me more about that.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Exploring Cincinnati's Young Professional Choir Collective & Startup Scene

I don't know if you're familiar with the young professional Choir Collective of Cincinnati.

Somebody did tell me. You're a very good singer.

I  would not say that. I am a choir singer who stands in the back row and can read the melody because I sing Soprano. But I love, love, love this choir in town. It's young, professional people from all around, the nicest people you'll ever meet. I love to socialize. We sing maybe six or seven cycles a year, and I've never gotten into the holiday one because I'm always gone for it. So, who doesn't like Christmas carols?

Oh, have fun. Okay, well, we're gonna dig into all of that today. I'm super excited to unpack the Secret Heritage brand versus the native D2C Challenger brand. Yep. We have a ton of fun questions prepared, but what I really love about this episode is that I get to sit across from a client. So, you have worked with curiosity in the curiosity team on the native account. Yep. And so I'm excited just to get to know you more and like what makes you tick. Absolutely. Alright. You wanna, you wanna go to the game board? Let's do it. All right, let's go to the board. Favorite number? Alright.

Favorite number two.

Number two. Okay. Number two. Okay. Well, you just mentioned the Boxed wine company. So you and your husband recently moved from San Francisco. Two, Cincinnati, the startup. You were in the startup capital of the world. Now you're in Cincinnati. Talk a little bit about what life is like launching a startup here in Cincinnati. And I want to know about really good boxed wine.

Yeah, absolutely. So, and just to be clear, really good boxed wine is definitely Jake's business versus mine. I get the joy of being able to give feedback, in my opinion, and then having nothing to do with the results or having to carry out any of the execution of anything, which is actually quite enjoyable.

I love that for you. 

But basically, it's super premium wine in a box. And so he puts things that are like the quality of a 30 or $40 bottle of wine. He puts four of them into a box for about $65, and all of them have vintages and varietals, and most of them right now are from the West Coast of the United States. It has a winery in Healdsburg, which, if you're a wino, you are probably familiar with that area. But yeah, it's really been taking off in the last couple of months. The talk about the transition from San Francisco back to Cincinnati, not only was we moving from the startup capital of the world to Cincinnati, but also we were moving away from wine. The wine capital, Yeah. Some people would consider California to be the wine capital of the world. But, you know, I think it surprised even him how easy it was to handle the business virtually, or, you know, separated from where the winery is and where his winemaker is.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Tight-Knit Community, Big Impact Opportunities

Grace Whitman’s insights about Cincinnati business opportunities:

The benefits of Cincinnati are that the startup community here is extremely tight knit. It's much smaller, and with the benefits also come the downsides, right? Like it's much smaller, there's less money to go around, et cetera. But part of the reason we moved back to Cincinnati is it's a city where, you know, I felt this way. Definitely. Like, I felt like we could make an impact here. Yeah. And I felt like we were connected and people were always seeking out connections with each other. San Francisco is great, but you know, you're a small fish in a big pond. Mm-Hmm. And so, while we loved our time there and enjoyed the outdoors and enjoyed being there, it was a no-brainer for us to move back here. 

I like that. So, would you give any advice to other brands trying to start up a business here in Cincinnati versus one of those, you know, traditional startup cities?

Grace Whitman: “I mean, it depends on the kind of business you're trying to build, too. You know, Cincinnati, there's a lot of CPG companies and product focused companies. He happens to have a CPG product that he's working to sell.”

And a CPG marketer living in his house.

Exactly. And I mean, he has some past experience in that space, too, which definitely helps him. At the same time, if you're trying to build a SaaS business or something AI-focused or really tech-enabled, I can see how one of the coastal cities might make more sense to you. But the reality is, like in the world we live in, it doesn't really matter where you live as long as you're able to find the right people and find the right product fit. And if you're good at what you do and you're onto something, people will find you to support you.

Yeah. The great debate right now is like in the office, not in office virtual, not virtual. Like, what is your take on that? Is it the same? Like, do you feel like you can do great work from anywhere? Yeah, it's a good question.

I spent most of my time on Native, which seems kind of hard to believe because I felt so close to that team. Basically, I started, and then a month later, Covid hit. And so I kind of forget that two years of that role was spent virtually. And I would say I feel like I learned and probably accomplished more in that role than at any other time in my career, which is great. At the same time, like I'm a social creature. I don't, as soon as I'm in the office, like I'm loving it and enjoying myself minus the hunt for places to meet with people. Yes. I think we're all going through that. So I see the benefits of both sides, and sometimes you do catch someone in a conversation, and like magic happens, right? When you're in an office setting. I, so basically what I'm saying is like, there's no wrong way. I think hybrid's probably the right way. And I can see how folks that are in different functions too, like research and development, you gotta be in the lab if you really wanna get things done. Or performance marketer, like, let's be real. You're staring at a screen. So it's okay.

I feel the same way. I think I really appreciate the flexibility. Yeah, depending on who, how you're showing up that day, and what your needs are that day. Put yourself in the best possible environment. Yeah, to be successful. Definitely.

Good advice.

All right, let's go back to the game board.

All right. Fantastic. Let's try seven next.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – CMO Tips for Effective Client-Agency Collaboration

Number seven. So, giving feedback as a client is a learned skill. I love being on this side of this question. So, what advice would you give to other CMOs or brand managers on how to work with agencies and give feedback to make sure you're getting to the best possible work? Yeah.

Okay. When you say feedback, I think about it in two different ways. One is, you know, client-agency relationship feedback. Mm-hmm. And the other is sort of, creative feedback.

Let's do both. Okay. Awesome.

Grace Whitman provides CMO Tips for Effective Client-Agency Collaboration:

Yep. When it comes to the work, I mean, sometimes this is boring, but it's back to the basics in a lot of ways. We often forget that, like the brief acting as a contract with your agency. So, like, if you don't get the brief right and everyone's not clear on the brief and set up to succeed, you're gonna have problems later on with the feedback. And sometimes it goes back to those tried and tested ways of being like, does this meet the brief? Like does it build brand equity? Is it accomplishing the benefit we sought out to do? If it's doing all the things that good creative does and it's meeting the brief, then you should have very little feedback. Yes. To give to the agency. And, in fact, you wanna keep their creative spectrum as wide as you possibly can.

Grace’s continuation tips: I, as a client, tend to give creative agencies more context, political context sometimes than, than most would, you know, I think a lot of folks wanna hand over the pink brief and say like, this is your box. Play in it. It would be great if that were the world we lived in. Mm-Hmm. But the reality is like, I want you to know the VP's opinion on this. I want you to know where we've struggled in the past in accomplishing this. Some people would say that's not the right way to go about things, but I personally find it to be helpful. Yeah.

I think it's really helpful to have all of that context and then it's not as limiting either. Like you can bring your full self and all of the full ideas to the table knowing you, but you have to know that context. Yeah. Or you could swing and miss. Right? Yep. I love the notion of the brief in the contract because I feel like sometimes we don't put enough emphasis on the brief Yeah. On both sides, the client side and the agency side. Yep. You know, it's like, oh, it's just something we have to do to get to work. And it's like, no, no, it's equally as important because if it's not locked tight and you guys are really good at writing briefs and like giving us a good kickstart.

You're being kind. 

But it's true. The better the brief, the better the work will be. Yeah, I love it being a contract. I feel like we should all sign it, and you just like going back to it. Maybe we'll do that. Yeah, put a little signature at the bottom.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Giving Feedback and Building Relationships with Your Agency

I love it. It's absolutely the way we should think about it. And then I guess the other piece of creative feedback, and this is so many people are guilty of this, I don't care what level you are, you're trying to give exceptional feedback on like, oh, how might, might you solve this challenge? Versus saying like, Hey, this makes me feel uncomfortable, and here's why. Or, like, here's what makes me feel uncomfortable and why I don't know that it met the brief versus being like, well, if you could just move that over there and add some more words over here and like pump up the music that way. This sounds like a no-brainer, but like I have seen people who I really love and respect give hyper-executive feedback. Yeah. When it's like, not the time or place for it. And frankly, it's not our job. That's why we hire an agency.

Great. What about the relationship side?

Grace Whitman gives feedback on building relationship with her agency:

So I think there's a reality of, you know, any working relationship is gonna have ups and downs. And I'll just caveat that with like, some of the folks or agencies or groups that, you know, you sometimes struggle with the most with. It's an absolutely good thing overall. It means you guys both have a strong point of view and that you're not just kind of like letting one of you walk all over the other one. Yeah. Which is a good thing. I really appreciate an agency that is willing to push back if they're unclear or if they're getting feedback that doesn't match up with what's in the brief. And also recognition of, like, that's also going to happen. Like it happens. How can we move on to the next step? So, I definitely like constructive feedback and taking time out on a regular basis just to say, how are things going?

I found Peyton, I found curiosity to be excellent at this and just explaining like, Hey, it's feeling a little rough going on, you know, our six-second assets, and here's what I think's happening. We've had too many rounds of feedback, now we're getting off brief, blah, blah, blah. Just like saying it out loud is sometimes half the battle. I'm not a conflict-averse person, and so I sometimes have to watch myself because people have varying degrees of comfort with that kind of direct communication. So, no matter how you get there, you still need to have the conversation.

Is that part of your vetting when you're thinking through my agency partner? How are you at conflict management and taking feedback? Yeah, that's important to you.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Nurturing Long-Term Client-Agency Relationships

Absolutely. I think an agency likes being willing to stand up for itself and being knowledgeable. Like why would I hire you if you have all the same thoughts and skills that I have? Is one thing. And I think the other piece of it, and this gets challenging, especially with longer-term relationships, is just like, is there a level of interest and intrigue and like, can you get as excited about my brand and my brand's challenges as I am. Do you really want to understand the consumer insights? Can you give me the time? And sometimes that's kind of a logistical problem. Mm-Hmm.  where it's like, oh, we don't have enough time or hours or billable, what, whatever that is. And sometimes it's like, it's a lack of interest. If I could sense that there's just a lack of interest in solving a brand's problems. That's the biggest red flag.

Yeah. And how do you keep that interest alive, year after year? Yeah. Because when you build a good relationship, you don't want them to die. Yep. I don't know what the average client-agency relationship is right now, but I imagine it's not more than a couple of years.

It's a great point.

You gotta keep that flame alive.

Grace Whitman’s response on how she keeps that interest alive year after year: 

Yeah. It's a great question. You know, people come on and off of brands Mm-Hmm. Which I think is a good thing. I feel like the best thing you can do, too, is every brand kind of has learning cycles it goes through, sometimes, we bring in agencies at the end of our, like, we've done our learning and now, like here is the insight, like go, be free. Like creating the content. It's much easier and much better and people feel more involved if they like, kind of come along for the journey. Yeah. Now, that's within reason, right? Like we have a process and can't bring you along on every, you know, just work with us then at that point, you know? Yeah. But I think that's the best way to keep people interested. And just like going back to, again, if you write a good brief and you're seeing creative and you're like, this isn't meeting the insight, like going back to like where you found this insight and who said it out loud and how, you know it's real Mm-Hmm.  to keep people feeling they're actually solving a problem for someone.

Yeah, that's why we're in this bus business, right? I love that. All right, let's go back to the game board.

All right, let's do 11.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Tales from the Towers and Company Culture

Okay. So P&G is the world's largest advertiser inquiring minds. Want to know what it is really like to work in those iconic towers? Give us the juicy scoop. Is there anything we don't know?

Grace Whitman: Hmm. That's so fun. This is so funny. So I have to caveat this with like, I did not start working at P&G in the lovely Towers. I started at Wynton Hill working in a lab, looking at literally what goes inside baby diapers. So I can remember a time when I thought the folks who worked in the towers were like the fanciest of people. Like never did I go down. I think in my first year and a half of work, never did I come within a mile of the P&G downtown. You know, it is what you'd expect. But having left P&G and coming back to P&G, I think Amy, the perspective like it is, it's very full of excellent people. Mm-Hmm. And it is a big enough company that you can find someone who is truly an expert in anything.

Yes. It's a giant company. Yes. That comes with downsides. Yes. It moves slowly. Sometimes, people get frustrated, et cetera. But like, in my opinion, if you've been there for as many years as I have now, you have to accept that. You have to accept the challenges and be willing to take them on Mm-Hmm.  yourself to solve them. Or how do you work within those challenges to still do great and interesting work? I mean, the building itself shouts out to the lovely women who work at the front desk. I think they're the best in the world at receiving people and being helpful so that they know who they are. Outside of that, it's an office building. Let's be real.

What's your favorite perk about working at P&G?

Favorite perk of P&G?

Like, do you guys still have yago?

No, I've never heard of this perk. What? Tell me more.

We used to get yago in your lobby.

What? Yeah. See, this is before my time working in the fancy towers. You know, I mean, PG is great for a number of reasons. Like I think one of the biggest benefits is if you live in Cincinnati, especially, and work for P&G, you have a thousand other people to ask questions. Yeah. About like, oh, well, how did you handle the paperwork for this, the healthcare for this? Oh, what doctor do you go to for this? It does, like, create an ease of living. Yeah. that after living in California and kind of having none of that and getting feeling like, oh, I'm a fish outta water a little bit here. You, you realize, is like a huge help to just your lifestyle.

Sense of community. Absolutely. Even when people retire or leave or move, I feel like it's still like this badge of honor, and you can call me anytime. Yes, because I've been there, done that. Yep.

Absolutely. That's, and I've, you know, my husband when he left P&G, I think he still feels very closely tied to the company and the good things it did for him. And even I never left P&G because I didn't like it. I left P&G because I had a different opportunity, and I was moving across the country. But it still gave me a nice perspective of the benefits that come. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Good. All right. Next number.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Advice for Brand Managers and Agencies

Let's do number nine.

Number 9. So you and your team are really good at writing briefs. We've talked a little bit about this. I can still recite the native brief so that you know. Wow. Way back when. So it makes me feel very good. Thank you.

Yes. What advice would you give to other brand managers in your position to help their agencies crush this critical stage of the project?

Grace Whitman’s take:

First of all, thank you for saying that. Yes. I feel like it's so funny, the brief writing process in every single brand role I've been in P&G, the expectations are actually quite different. And I know that that's not what they should be. Like. There's meant to be this streamlined process for how we come up with briefs Yeah. To meet the needs. But that's just, it's not always the case. The advice I would give people, honestly, is to put yourselves in the shoes of the agency. What questions might they have? What context might they want? What is a more interesting way of asking for the output than you would normally say? So for example, like we're working on something with a secret right now. Like, we know the fragrances of our sticks win in blind scent testing. We know it like they win versus many other deodorant brands, but people don't have the perception that it smells good.

So, you know, we could put in the brief, like tell people that secret smells good or show people that. But instead, it's like getting people to pick up secrets and giving them a snippet shelf. Like that's really like, so it's just a slight reframing of the way people would think about what you're asking for. And then, I kind of go back to the fact that I think agencies deserve the additional context and background that we don't always give them. Again, this is a topic. Others would disagree. There's another reality that there is, there are experts who do like, just focus on commercialization and brief writing and like to use those people. It is more important that you spend five months getting a brief write than spending one month getting a brief write and then spending 18 months having to adjust it back and forth with your agency and getting contact that you don't want.

Yeah. so take the time even though it feels like, oh, well, this is just putting words on the paper. Yes. As a starting point. It's not a starting point. I think there's a brief I've been working on for like four and a half months with my team now. And it's funny, like the more we learn about the business, the more we're like, oh, actually this is a separate brief. And just be willing to kind of go with the flow of your needs might change. You might realize there's a bigger opportunity. And then chase it.

The fact that you said you would spend five months on a brief, like, it makes my heart so happy because I feel like we're in this era right now of like, hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry. Yeah. Not fast enough. I wanna be on air in January. And I'm like, how are we gonna make that possible? Yeah. And then it's like the brief writing gets truncated down to like two weeks. Yeah. And have you been in a position like that where, like, gosh, I don't have time to do it the full way we'd wanna do it? We're gonna have to make some sacrifices, some shortcuts.

I mean, and it's kind of funny because, like, getting an insight 30% off and then having creativity that's 30% off if you're lucky. Yeah. This means your ROI and your creativity. Was it really worth it not to take the extra time? That is the question I have there. And I say this now: we're talking about briefs for big campaigns.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Navigating the Creative-Media Partnership for Big Brand Success

Grace Whitman: Big campaigns, big challenges. It's funny, I was literally lurking in Facebook Ads manager this morning at competitors. And I'm thinking to myself like, these are not ads that require five months of work. This is iteration and performance marketing and big brand advertising. It couldn't be more different in that way. But just like you guys did for native, Yeah. Like, sometimes you need a campaign that does the full gamut. Yeah. Of performance all through, like awareness driving and marketing. Right.

Okay. So we're not alone in thinking that sometimes we have to hurry up. But when you're launching a big brand campaign, Yeah. Give it the time that it deserves because you'll be 30% better. Yeah. Who doesn't want 30% more sales?

Yep. Exactly. And I think there's been this belief that copy wears out so quickly and like, we're always gonna have to have the new best thing, and the answer's like, no. Like, if you get something so right. To build your brand or the category, you can still stay in that space for like 3, 5, 10 years to come and get more out of it. So again, just warrants the time and the upfront.

Great advice. All right. Let's go back to the game board.

Perfect. Okay, let's go with number eight.

Number eight. Okay. So, you've experienced firsthand the synergy of creativity in media working together. Mm-Hmm. And I'd love to know, like, do you like it when that happens when you have creative and media under one roof? Like you're Yeah. Does one agency represent both? Or is it okay when it doesn't happen? Which one's better? And, if it is separate, is there any advice you could give to other brand managers to get your agencies just to integrate and talk to each other?

Grace Whitman’s take on that question:

Man, this is, this is a million dollar question, and I think it's one that, you know, you've seen P&G. I know Clorox went back and forth on everyone, kind of, everybody goes, goes back on the thinking here. You know, the creative you make is like what you're gonna show consumers, and then the media you choose and how you target and what channels you use is like how you get it to the consumers. Mm-Hmm. So, the two things really should be linked, but there's a reality of efficiencies and costs that comes into play as well. Yeah. You know, the dream is that everyone's one big team and is singularly focused on one brand and one campaign, and everyone's along for the ride. And here's the nice thing: the bigger the brand you work on, the more of that feeling you can get.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Managing External Agencies for Small Brands

Yeah. When you're a small brand, when you're a challenger brand, if you're a majority D2C brand and you have to use resources outside of, you know, maybe prototypical agencies or in-house, folks like that can fall apart really quickly. The best thing you can do, and I remember when I first moved into the brand management function, someone described it as like you're the hub of the wheel, and your job is to connect all of the functions and agencies and keep everyone kind of like moving to the beat of the same drum. And it's easier to do that if you're all like P&G folks all on the same team, et cetera. It gets a lot more challenging when you're thinking about external agencies. Yep. Or maybe there is a media team. We have an awesome media team in-house, you know, now that I work with, that works for Seeker but also works for a number of other brands.

So I think it's trying to figure out what the most helpful information to share is and then what the best times to share that information are. Like how sure you need to be, I think the biggest outage you can have is waiting too long till you're ready to be like, okay, here's our plans for 2025. We've got three tracks of this. And they're like, what? This is completely different from what we're doing today. Mm-Hmm.  like, are you sure? Can you tell me how? So that the more you can bring people along for the ride, the better it is, I guess I'd say? Mm-Hmm. But the dream is like everyone focused on one big consumer challenge to solve. Everyone's excited about it. Everyone's marching to the beat of the same drum.

Do you have any secrets or tips on how you do that? Let's say you have a separate creative agency, a separate media agency, a separate PR agency, and maybe a separate social agency. Yeah, you have all of these great agencies at your fingertips. Do you have any advice on how to get them talking integrated? Do you follow a process?

Grace Whitman’s take on that question:

Yeah, it's a great question, and I think it's different strokes for different folks. Yeah. Some people are like, no, just tell me what you want when we get to this date. And I'll be there for you, and we'll get it done. I like the better personal relationships that I have with members of agencies or media teams or whatever, whoever it is. And I specifically asked them when I joined a new role, like, Hey, what are the things that went really well in the last two years on the brand? And like, what are the things that went not so great and y and more often than not, one of the things that went not so great and y is, well, we really just got like thrown overboard when, you know, x, y, z changed, or, well, when this innovation popped up like everything got thrown out the window, et cetera, but I didn't know till five months afterward. So you kind of pick up on things like when maybe things have slipped from a communication point of view before you, and then sure enough like things are gonna slip when you're in the role too, and you just have to be okay with it and deal with it and build trust with people as time goes on.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – From Biology to Business

Well, I love that you're even asking. The fact that you're doing a survey or having those real serious check-ins with your agencies kind of goes back to what we were talking about before. How do you have a great client-agency relationship? Yeah, that's one of 'em. Yeah, test it, survey it, get the pulse on how it's going.

For sure. And some people feel more or less comfortable in giving you the, the really real, but yeah, I mean, with time, and if I always say this, it's tough because like I, I feel like I'm a trustworthy individual. Mm-Hmm. But the reality is that people need to work with you. Yeah. For a number of days, even years before. Like they've, they can watch you, stand up for them, and have their backs consistently. And so, you know, that's the benefit of also sticking around on a brand for a while.

Yeah. Good. All right. Let's go back to the board.

All right. Let's go number one.

Okay. So this is super interesting. People might not know this about you, but you got your bachelor's degree in human biology from IU. Yeah. Not psychology, biology. How in the heck did you go from biology to marketing?

Grace Whitman’s take: 

Oh man, this is kind of my career journey. So, I will try and keep it pithy. I'll say this like science and math, like I love it. Like, I could read books about science and math all day long. It was like my passion, right? Like, I knew I wanted to do something in the sciences. When I went to school, I thought maybe medical school, I thought maybe I'd wanna work at a hospital administration. So, business and biology balance. And then I learned about healthcare in America and I decided I wanted to stay as far away from that as I possibly could. But the major was interesting because you took all the basic science courses, which, you know, are, are, are challenging and more challenging for me. But they also did some really interesting intersections, like social sciences and hard science.

So, I can remember one of my classes was about death and dying. And basically, there's like only seven ways people, people die, like inside your body. But, like then, how does that come to life socially, and how does that come to life? Literally, scientifically? Anyways, it's a fascinating major. Wow. Wouldn't go back and change it for the world. Loved it very much. But what's funny is I was also in a business program, and the business stuff just always kind of came naturally. Mm-Hmm. Like, it just made sense. It was easy, honestly. Science courses are hard.

Did you get into a business program? What was it like when you were like, okay, I'm not going to go to med school?

Yeah, yeah. It's business. When I went to Indiana, there was a program called Lamp. Okay, we were always such cool lamps.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – A Curious Career Journey

It was all the base kind of business classes up to where you'd start to specialize. Okay. Frankly, I'm not this overachiever, but a lot of folks who went to medical school wanted to have a background in business, especially if they wanted to start their own practice, etc. Okay. Again, that's not the route I went down. Yeah. but those were my friends, you know? Yeah. So, that's kind of how I found the program and ended up there and loved it. So, but anyways, after school, of course, then as I was applying for jobs, you know, I was applying as a biologist. And so that's how I came into P&G through the r and d track. Again, I love science, but my whole first year of work, I was working really far upstream, meaning stuff that didn't come out for a long time.

And I kept being like, how does this grow the business? What are these metrics for a goal of 1 0 5? Like, what does that even mean? And how is what I'm doing affecting this? And so I was constantly searching for answers to that. And kind of through searching for answers to that, I found other functions that I felt maybe like, made more sense for me. So I eventually moved to what was then consumer market knowledge, which is like analytics and insights, consumer insights, and deep consumer work. In the longer term, of course, I found my way to marketing. But I feel confident marketing is my home. Clearly. I feel very settled here.

I feel like this is, I finally found my place, but I encourage people like, oh yeah, there's so many different career paths you can take. Like, what's it gonna hurt? Yeah. Like, do a year. I don't know, but being an astronaut is not really feasible. If it were, I feel like so much is applicable to marketing. Yeah. Like, I've talked to so many people who come from such a variety of backgrounds Yeah. And they find their way to marketing. 'cause At the end of the day, it's like, how do you motivate consumers? Like how do you get into a consumer's head and mindset? And you can do that through so many different paths. Yeah. I love that you said, you know, I just kept asking more questions. That's like literally at the core of who we are and what we do out of curiosity. And we say like, the more questions you ask, the more interesting questions you ask, the better the solution you can become. Yeah. The more interesting a human you ultimately become. Yeah. So I love that that was kind of part of your career.

Yeah. I mean, it doesn't come naturally. And when you're 22 and you kind of are just trying to figure out what it is to do a job well, but then you start seeing other people really succeed. And they're the ones in the meetings that like, aren't afraid to be like, well, why are we doing this? Yeah. and whenever I see young people in P&G ask questions like that, I always walk up to them afterward and be like, don't stop doing that. Ugh. Because I guarantee half the people in the room had the same question. And they, a lot of this is on, for example, just like knowledge on, on media and media buying and, and how this works. Let's be realistic. Like, there's not that many people who are experts in this space. So when we're doing training, like ask, ask what every single acronym means if you have to. Yes. and other people will thank you for it.

I remember asking what p and l meant when I was like 23 years old.

I would've had no idea.

You keep talking about this p and l, who are they?

Who is the p and l? What is the p and l?

Oh, man. Do you remember the kids who always asked why we hired them? Yeah, we love those people.

Yes. You guys have a lot of those people, which is great. We do. Which is great. Do you have to have an inherent? Yes. Curiosity. And honestly, why not? Like, what you would do is quite boring if you're not seeking for some reason.

I couldn't agree more. Yeah, all right. I think we have time, maybe for two more. Cool. Are you game? 

Sounds good. Okay. Now I feel like I have to pick carefully.

Alright, let's do it. Here we go.

Let's try number four. Okay.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Insights from Agency and Brand Perspectives

Number four.

Okay. So you've worked with some of the best agencies in the world. Yeah. I'm kidding. I know you're so lucky you've worked with Widen, right? Mm-Hmm. And you've also worked on some of America's most beloved brands. My question to you is, what do you admire about the agency side that maybe you don't get when you're on the brand side? And then, is there anything that agencies are missing? For example, when you work on the agency side, you're missing this, and is it some benefit that you're getting on the brand side? Yeah. There's this constant debate of agency versus brand. Yeah. Which side do you wanna be on? Yeah. I've only ever been on the agency side. Yeah. And I love it. And there are so many benefits, but I'm sure there are things that, you know, I would also love about the brand side.

Grace Whitman’s take on that question:

Yeah, absolutely. Oh, that's a great question. I mean, I'll start with what I sometimes feel like we, as brands, don't give enough to agencies. You know, for better or worse, think of creatives, like creative agencies as just like kids on a playground of life and just coming up with creative ideas and thinking outside the box. And, like, that's where they thrive. And like, don't put, you know, don't teach them too much. Yeah. And I guess I question that. Like, I feel like people at agencies are very intelligent. Mm-Hmm. And I think that they like having a little bit more business context. Mm-Hmm.  for why we're doing the things we do. I can remember the first one of my first agency meetings with Wyden. I literally just put up every single SKU that we had on a board, and we put down what the dollar sales were for each SKU.

And they were like, no one's ever done this. We had no idea that this entire collection doesn't sell anything. Yeah. Now I understand why we wanna focus on X, Y, Z. So I think that that's something that we could do better. Mm-Hmm.  I like to give folks a little bit more insight. And it just helps you understand decision making. Totally. easier as well, on the other side. The antithesis of what agencies get that brands don't get is so much more variety, not only in the brands that you serve but also in the challenges that you have to solve. Which I transparently think would be so challenging. Yeah. Like, I think it would be, you're both trying to work like in, in a box outside of the box at the same time. Take into account people's personalities and experiences you've had with that team in the past.

In the future, it's a lot more, I guess there's a lot more interpersonal Mm-Hmm.  bits and pieces to it, I think. Yeah. Because you're working with so many different kinds of people all the time. And the one similarity I've ever found between, like, I feel like on an agency team, there's always the person that's doing like a little bit of the translation to the, the creative leaders on the team. Mm-Hmm. And back to the brand. And it reminds me of when I was in research and development, I had a role called product research. Okay. And often, what you are doing is going to be like genius level PhDs.

So it's like all that's in Tide, you know, and then you're trying to translate what they're saying into something that a brand team can use to go sell a product or explain why they should use this product to a consumer. So you're like this interesting, like in-between translator. Mm-Hmm. And I feel like that's, I feel like I connect the most with, with folks on agency teams where, like, that's the role is like you have to do the translating between the business, need the objectives of the business but then also like a making amazing creative that moves people and changes people's minds.

Good. I've always said that on the agency side, I've always felt like, you know, like in one hour you're working on deodorant, and then the next hour you're working on like, you name it, telecom, and then the next hour you're working on baked beans. Yeah. And like, I always loved the variety of it, so we're, you know, we're like those T-shaped employees kind of at the top. Yeah. Versus, you guys get to go really deep. Yeah. Like, you know, the ins and outs, the sense of everything for that brand and all of the skews. Yeah. Which I think we often miss out on. So your advice today, like if I could just summarize it all about just giving that context, it helps us so much because, you know, we're kind of in and out of the category Yep. Often. So when you can provide us with that, I think it's a game changer, really.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Diving into D2C Marketing Across All Industries

Grace Whitman talks about D2C: 

I'm amazed. Like, I don't know how your brain can do it, bouncing from category to category. Brand to brand, even just like the company you're working with in general. Yeah. And if you think about it, like even GMs of business units who have maybe 10, 15 brands to support. And I'm always like, good heavens. Like how are they bouncing back and forth between secret and ivory and safeguard and all the things? You have to do it even more so. Right. Because like you're working across categories. Sometimes, it's not even a product. Yeah. It's literally a ServiceNow or it's a cruise chain. Yeah. So yeah. I mean, it's a great skill to have, though. And the nice thing is, too, you get innovation there. You do. 'cause You can see like, oh, this, this worked in a service industry. I have no idea if it worked in CPG. Well, let's try it. Yeah. And see if it works out.

It is crazy to me. How many different categories look to D2C as inspiration? Like I don't care if you are a cruise line, a grocery store, or a CPG brand. Yeah. I get more phone calls like, what did you learn in the D2C world that you can apply to our business? Because even though they're massive and big, they want to operate and think more like, yeah. The D2C marketers,

It's D2C, the entry cost to D2C is so low. So low.

It's funny. Just before I walked over here, I was having a conversation with one of my colleagues, and I was lurking in Facebook Ads Manager.

By the way, I love that you do that. Of course. Don't you have people who do that for you?

No. It's like literally no part of my job description to be lurking in Facebook Ads Manager at other brands. But it's interesting because, like, you're seeing what folks are testing and putting out there, and it's, it's, it's fascinating because it's kind of the complete antithesis to our way of doing big brand building. Mm-Hmm. , which is like, get the insight Right. Get the consumer right. Understand what's gonna move people the most and, like, build very few, very simple things to push people in that direction. Yeah. D2C is the opposite. It's like, build 1000 things that might work. Throw 'em out there, see what works, and then go from there. Yeah. And it's, I mean, it's literally an opposite way of coming at the problem.

But it does enable people to, you know, like you said, there's D2C, and you can get out there. I could put an ad up today for anything we want, whether I have it made or not.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – From D2C to Mainstream Retail

And it's not also precious. Yeah. So there's like a test and learn mentality. Yes. It is so alive and active. Yes. What do, so what do you prefer? Have you been on both?

Man, that's tough. I mean, okay. Here, that's a very tough question. I think we could be using D2C to learn in a data-backed way that could help us fuel Yeah. Bigger brand campaigns. Like maybe that's part of the insights or learning we should be doing. Mm-Hmm.  At the same time, there are some things that come from great creativity that I don't see how D2C could have ever gotten there. Mm-Hmm.  For example, I was just thinking about taglines the other day. I don't know why. And I was thinking about the Nike tagline of, like, just do it. Mm-Hmm. I'm like, there are two things that are funny about this tagline. Number one, if an agency, if I was Nike and an agency had come back to me with this tagline, be like, it doesn't mention the brand, it doesn't build us, like how does this connect to the equity?

Grace Whitman’s take: 

But obviously, it worked, and obviously, it was good. I don't know how you would've ever gotten there with D2C Mm-Hmm. Like, you're always talking about a product or a feature. You're lower in the funnel with consumers. Yeah. So, and I guess, you know, if I wanna have something to be known for in my career, I wanna be known for big, big insights that drive big category growth. Like, forget my brand. Yeah. Like my brand aside. If I can do something that helps consumers find a product or a category or something that they like, really get out a lot of value from that they hadn't seen in this light before. Like that's what I'm more interested in.

When you look back on your work on Native, do you feel like you did that?

Oh man. 'cause You entered native at just such an interesting time when, you know, they were predominantly D2C, right? Yep. And you kind of saw them through the transition into retail. Yep. This is what every D2C brand dreams of having that scale. Yes. Which P&G allowed them to have that kind of scale. Yes. You got to do a big brand awareness campaign the first ever. And I look at Native now, and I'm like, you walk into Target, and it is a full-fledged beauty care business. It's like the haircare is unbelievable. You've got oral, you've got all the lotions. Yeah. We got everything.

Its insane. 11 categories I think it's in now.

Skincare.

You were a part of that team.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – From D2C Success to Mass Market Expansion

I loved my time on Native, and I agree. Like the time I got to join the brand as it was transitioning from more of a pure D2C to also being retail. It also could have failed, though. Like it didn't, it wasn't necessarily gonna be a huge success.

No, not at all. And we, and we did have to do things differently Yeah. Then if the brand had continued just to be a D2C business. You know, Noah's our woe, Yes. The campaign was probably the work I'm the most proud of as a marketer I did with you guys. What we realized when we were talking to the masses was that your insights and your barriers to using a natural product were very different from the consumers that natives were currently talking to online. Mm-Hmm. And you know, this is true in the innovation space, too. If you were focused on innovating just for the native consumers in D2C, you are serving people who are searching out natural solutions, right? You are serving people who are searching for sustainable solutions. Mm-Hmm.  the second you're in a Walmart, you're not just serving those people.

And so you have to account for an appeal to the representative public as well, and how can native still be a product or proposition that they can feel better about using, but it's still fun. Yeah. And I think where natives have gone with their fun since seasonals, et cetera, has made it more accessible to people. But like no is our woe in using the free aspect of the product to talk about still how amazing it can be on a performance level. I think it was really right. Insight. Yeah. And maybe we got lucky. I don't know, who knows? Like maybe, maybe the brief was all just lucky. No. But I was, yeah. I'm very, very proud of that, that work with you guys. Oh, good. We are, too. I mean, the brief, it did hit it right on the nose, and I love that it brought like the beauty of D2C, which you're talking about, like the performance of it, but then also what you need to build a brand, which is more of that emotional pull Yep. And building some intrigue into the business. Into the brand, which you guys did beautifully. 

Yeah, we all did. Thank you. I mean also, really. Thank you.

Yes. All right, last question. All right, last question. What do you think? Okay, let's pick the number.

Let's do 10.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Balancing Tradition and Innovation

Okay. Number 10.

Okay. Well, it's funny because we were just talking about this. So, in your career, you've done some really cool stuff like native, right? New to the world D2C Challenger brand. Yep. And then now add a secret to the mix, right? Like I feel like there has to be a secret deodorant in every household, almost like, I don't know what the brand awareness level is, one in four, one in four households, one in four, like an incredible heritage brand, right? Yeah. So what can heritage brands do you think? Yeah. Like, do you ever look to Native people and say, oh, we should take this from them or, "What do you think D2C brands can learn from heritage brands? I'm just curious: is there any of that like a cross-pollination of learning? For sure, when you're sitting on a beautiful, amazing brand that everybody already loves?

Grace Whitman’s take: 

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think one of the conundrums of folks who work for big heritage brands that have been around for a long time is like, you're always getting pummeled with, well look at this challenger brand, look at this D2C brand, look at what they're doing. Which is great and it keeps you on your toes. Honestly like, I'm happy D2C brands exist because they make you think differently about your product and proposition. But I think it's funny, like if you think about deodorant when people think about deodorant, and they like to think about odor and sweat control. Yeah. Literally, the secret is the brand that comes to mind. Yes. Like us, we forget that sometimes, when working on the secret team, we have had 70 years of trying to explain to people that the secret really works and that it works for sweat odor control.

Grace Whitman: By the way, no one would use a deodorant if they didn't have those problems. So, like, we sometimes forget about the joy that it is Mm-Hmm. to like own the category prototypical benefits. Yeah. and then how do you use that? Like you own the category benefits, how do you strengthen that and make sure you secure that while also trying to change or affect other aspects of the brand that need to tilt in a new direction? Yeah. And it's a constant tug of war, of like, you know, oh, should I try and do the new cool thing, or do I try to do this a different way? I was just talking with somebody today about, you know, what is really, really the barrier to the secret we could list off like, oh, I don't think it works well. And all the functional barriers to people not wanting to use secrets.

Here are some quick insights from Grace Whitman about the secret to excellent client-agency relationships

Grace Whitman: The Secret to Excellent Client-Agency Relationships – Balancing Tradition and Innovation

Oh, I don't know if it smells good, but there might be something deeper and more emotional or like, it's the brand I used when I was a kid. Mm-Hmm. And I feel like I've grown up, so I feel like my deodorant has to grow up, too. Mm-Hmm. Like, we have to get it. Really, really, what's stopping people from using the brand? Then it's a game of how do we solve that? One way to solve it is trying to act like all the small challenger brands and do all the things that they do and put up all the same ads, but that doesn't feel right. Right. Yeah. Like it doesn't, it feels like it might be a little cringe to see a brand try and be something that it's not. Yeah. So there, you know, there's lots of routes forward.

One of them would be like, should we triple down on the fact that we're a heritage brand? And the fact that we're trusted and that's great. Try whatever deodorant you want when you're ready for one that works. We'll still be here. Mm-Hmm.  like 75 years later. That's one route. Like, but we have a lot to learn in that space. But again, it's a huge brand challenge, and it's a big enough brand. If you can solve that challenge, like, oh my gosh, you're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars of growth. Yeah. so I don't know if that actually answered your question or not. It does. Yeah. At the same time, you know, natives are always learning from big brands and seeing what was successful from them in the past and what they need to do more or less of. Oh, what kind of retail tips and tricks did they use when they were first starting? So it definitely goes both ways. 

Have you been in secret long enough to have a favorite piece of work or campaign, or are you in the middle of working on it right now? We're

Grace Whitman’s plans: 

In the middle of working on it right now. That's the brief that's kind of taken us several months to come up with, and like shout out to the team of people behind that as well. You know, I am a little excited. I think we're gonna have some more focus on the scented space for the brand, which will be new and different, where we're usually very hard-hitting and sweat and odor performance. And there'll be some cool stuff that comes to life, like how we bring that to life. But yeah, nothing, nothing I can speak to just yet.

Okay. Well, maybe you'll come back. Yeah. When the campaign runs, we can talk all about it. Yep. Absolutely would love that. Awesome. Okay, so we are gonna try something new today. Let's do it. You're the little Guinea pig for today, so we'll see how it goes. But we have one last question for you. We're calling it the fun question. Fun is in our URL. It's one of our values. We like to say that, you know, if you're not having fun, you're doing something wrong. And so we're gonna do a little lightning round with you. Okay. The first thing that comes to mind, you just spit it off. Oh boy. Are you ready for this? I feel like this is desperate for me to say something inappropriate, but like, let's go for it. I'm here for that. Here we go. West Coast or Midwest. Midwest. Wine or beer? Beer. Native or Old Spice. Oh, that's tough. Native Walmart or Target. Oh gosh. I'm gonna get punished for the target. Yoga or Pilates? Pilates, Widener. Curiosity. Oh, man. I mean, curiosity.  this. Hopefully, no one's listening. This was so much fun. Thank you so much. Absolutely. Thank you guys for having me. This was awesome. Yeah. Okay. Appreciate it. Thanks.