Aug 13, 2026 · 20 min · 10 segments
Being the first marketing hire at a company means the strategy, the budget, and the doing all land on you at once. In this episode of Content Amplified, Bronwyn Pope, Vice President of Marketing &…
Bronwyn PopeGuestBenHost
I've really enjoyed what I've done, and I've figured out a way to use my skills that I feel really good about.
I love that.
That's so cool.
Well, Bronwyn, you have this cool experience that you have been in the position where you are the first marcom hire at a business.
And you had the experience of growing and expanding and building the team, going through the changes that naturally occur in that, uh, process.
That's what we're gonna talk about today.
What to do, where to start, how to grow, what that experience looks like for anyone who may take that opportunity on to be that first hire who has to say, "Where do I start? What do I do?" All that kind of fun stuff.
So to kick things off, Bronwyn, tell us about the experience.
Tell us about being that first hire, and then ultimately, let's start with the first 90 days.
You're trying to wrap your head around, "Okay, what in the world do I actually do now?" What did that look like and where did you go, and what do you recommend there?
Once many years ago, got a job at a nonprofit and was the first marcom hire, and more recently now, I've done the same thing at a for-profit, and those experiences have been very different.
At the nonprofit, I was coming right out of having worked on the agency side, so I had a lot of great contacts.
So my position was funded and created, but there wasn't any budget for marketing communications.
So, um, I did the, you know, Midwestern pull yourself up by your bootstraps without any funds, and I contacted a graphic designer and said, "I have $3,000.
If I give it to you, can you make me templates that I can use as not a designer for everything that I want to do in the first year?" So like a template brochure, flyer, sign, banner, ads of different sizes, and that's how I spent the money.
And then I just spent the first year doing everything myself, learning about the organization, um, and figuring out who they were.
It was Special Olympics Minnesota in the state of Minnesota, and at that time, they, uh, many of the Special Olympics statewide branches weren't necessarily using all of the power of the brand of the international organization.
Wow
I've really enjoyed what I've done, and I've figured out a way to use my skills that I feel really good about.
I love that.
That's so cool.
Well, Bronwyn, you have this cool experience that you have been in the position where you are the first marcom hire at a business.
And you had the experience of growing and expanding and building the team, going through the changes that naturally occur in that, uh, process.
That's what we're gonna talk about today.
What to do, where to start, how to grow, what that experience looks like for anyone who may take that opportunity on to be that first hire who has to say, "Where do I start? What do I do?" All that kind of fun stuff.
So to kick things off, Bronwyn, tell us about the experience.
Tell us about being that first hire, and then ultimately, let's start with the first 90 days.
You're trying to wrap your head around, "Okay, what in the world do I actually do now?" What did that look like and where did you go, and what do you recommend there?
Once many years ago, got a job at a nonprofit and was the first marcom hire, and more recently now, I've done the same thing at a for-profit, and those experiences have been very different.
At the nonprofit, I was coming right out of having worked on the agency side, so I had a lot of great contacts.
So my position was funded and created, but there wasn't any budget for marketing communications.
So, um, I did the, you know, Midwestern pull yourself up by your bootstraps without any funds, and I contacted a graphic designer and said, "I have $3,000.
If I give it to you, can you make me templates that I can use as not a designer for everything that I want to do in the first year?" So like a template brochure, flyer, sign, banner, ads of different sizes, and that's how I spent the money.
And then I just spent the first year doing everything myself, learning about the organization, um, and figuring out who they were.
It was Special Olympics Minnesota in the state of Minnesota, and at that time, they, uh, many of the Special Olympics statewide branches weren't necessarily using all of the power of the brand of the international organization.
Wow
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