January 13, 2015
Influencer Marketing & Beauty Brands by BBR11 Thought Leader, Conor Begley of Tribe Dynamics
January 13, 2015
Influencer Marketing & Beauty Brands by BBR11 Thought Leader, Conor Begley of Tribe Dynamics
According to a McKinsey study, marketing-inspired word-of-mouth generates more than twice the sales of paid advertising, and these customers have a 37% higher retention rate. Given the importance of peer recommendations and their amplification through social media, influencer marketing has become a widely discussed topic among marketers.
That’s why we were so pleased to have Conor Begley, the Co-Founder, People, at Tribe Dynamics as one of our Beauty Biz Roundtable 11 Thought Leaders!
Conor is the co-founder and president of Tribe Dynamics. Conor and co-founder Jon Namnath founded Tribe Dynamics in April 2012, after Conor discovered the power and potential of influencer marketing while working in Australia. With extensive experience in search marketing, reputation management and CRM systems, Conor and Jon decided that influencer marketers needed their own analytical systems and enterprise-class technology. What began as an intuitive theory shared by two long-time friends, the Silicon Valley based startup in just over two years has become a leading authority in technical marketing and social analytics within the beauty, fashion, and lifestyle industries. Under Conor’s direction, Tribe has developed close relationships with some of the beauty industry’s top brands and publications, including WWD/Beauty Inc. and The CEW’s Beauty Insider, who both feature the startup’s analytics and expertise on an ongoing basis.
Conor’s BBR11 Roundtable topic was “Connecting Dots Between Digital Marketing, Earned Media, and Offline Revenue.”
Who/what are your biggest career influences?
My biggest career influences fall into three categories – family, career, and authors. Family is an obvious one, but I cannot be thankful enough for the good luck and fortune I had with winding up with the parents that I did. Career wise, I had amazing mentors at my first company Reputation.com in Brent Franson and Owen Tripp that have continued to have an impact on my career despite no longer working for them. In terms of authors, I’ve always been a much bigger believer in books than articles. When you think about a book, it’s typically written by somebody who is a subject matter expert and has gone through a rigorous editorial process, and whose topic has something to do with their life’s work. With all of those factors in mind, the knowledge you can attain there is infinitely more valuable than most blog articles. Some of my top authors would include Seth Godin, Jim Collins, Clayton Christensen, as well as many others.
What do you see as the latest trends in your industry?
Within my particular industry, digital marketing, the big trend has been moving towards higher fidelity visual content and away from many of the traditional pay-per-click advertising models that have proven to often be ineffective in building a brand.
What kinds of qualities do you look for when hiring a candidate to join your team?
We look for someone who is going to be the absolute best in a particular field that we don’t currently have a specialty in. Every person has their own strengths and weaknesses, so what I’ve found to be most effective organizationally is to put people in a position that emphasizes their true strengths while putting shock absorbers in place to protect against any potential weaknesses.
Want more BBR? Stay tuned for our BBR12 event coming up in April 2015!
Brows, Beauty & Business: BBR11 Thought Leader Q&A: Chris Kolodziejski, CEO – Chella Brow