Meet Ayokay’s newest team member, Chad Pollitt! Chad joined the Ayokay team recently as the new Director of Growth to help take Ayokay to the next level as an agency. We chatted with him about his goals in the new position and how his previous experience in the military informs his sales strategy.

Q&A with Chad

Q: What is your position at Ayokay and what does that entail?

A: I am the director of growth/account executive. And the fancy thing that I do (in air quotes) is marketing and sales, but as of right now, it’s mostly sales. Probably an 80/20 split at this point, but that will adjust over time.

 

Q: Do you have one that you prefer – marketing or sales?

A: In my opinion, marketing and sales are two peas in a pod. They work together closely – or they should in any successful organization. So I bucket them together because at the end of the day it’s all about the funnel. You have your marketing funnel that goes into the sales funnel and then if you flip that upside down and add it to the bottom of the sales funnel you actually have a retention funnel. Which is hard to describe verbally, but I could white-board that out all day.

 

Q: What brought you to Ayokay?

A: Well, I’ve lived the agency life since 2006 and I had one stint outside of an agency but it was very similar to an agency in that it was an ad tech company. I’ve known agency life for a long, long time and Indianapolis only has so many agencies. And I had known Jack for a while and his company has so many positive reviews. So, when I decided to jump back into agency life, Ayokay really, really stood out to me because of the good work that you all do.

 

Q: What’s one thing that you wish people knew about your job?

A: Well, I’m going to say this and then I’m going to put an asterisk next to it. But for people that aren’t exposed to professional marketing – which the asterisk is, everyone is exposed to marketing. But the big misconception for some of my friends that have never been exposed to professional marketing from my side of the table think that all I do is sit around and play on social media all day. Which is definitely not the case.

Also there’s a generalization about sales people, especially successful sales people, being hardcore and cut-throat. I think Hollywood has a lot to do with that. And some sales people are, but I don’t think that’s a requirement to be successful.

 

Q: What are some areas you’d like to learn more about while at Ayokay?

A: Ayokay is really honed in on nonprofits, especially public health. And in my career, I’ve been fortunate enough to be able to work with over 200 brands from SMBs to enterprise type customers. But I’ve never had a chance to work with a public health nonprofit. And I’m really excited to learn that industry from a marketing and sales perspective. I’m interested in understanding the marketing challenges that they face and the best way to overcome them.

Also, I am a lifelong learner. I get up between 5 and 6am every day and I spend the first hour of my day reading marketing and sales materials and publications online.

 

Q: I know that you spent time serving in Iraq. How do you think that experience informs your work life?

So there are a couple concepts that originated in the military. And some of them have creeped out into the citizen’s vernacular. The first one, KISS: Keep it simple, stupid. I live by that motto. And here’s the reason why: I’ve been around hundreds of marketers throughout my career, working with them, being competitors with them, going to conferences. And what I notice is – especially in SEO by the way – the amount of jargon. And the amount of complications that they communicate with when it comes to some simple tactic or a simple strategy that’s unwarranted and unneeded when you can just keep it simple, stupid. And like I said, SEO is notorious for this. 

Two is a concept called “embrace the suck.” So what is “embrace the suck?” I wrote a giant article on LinkedIn about it that blew up, but essentially what “embrace the suck” means is that no matter how terrible and how horrible a certain situation is that you find yourself in, if you use your mind and take it as a chance to learn and improve yourself, it is a valuable experience. If you don’t do that and you whine and cry and cower and fear the suck, rather than embracing it, then it’s not going to be the opportunity for you to learn from that particular situation or scenario.

 

Q: What do you like to do for fun?

A: As an undergrad in college, while I did graduate with a BS, I graduated also with a masters in foosball. In 2002, I ended up placing second in the foosball championships in Las Vegas. It’s like the Super Bowl of foosball. I play it all the time. Not so much anymore because I have kids and other responsibilities, but anytime I get a chance, I love to play a game of foosball.

 

Q: Do you have a table at home?

A: I did. But I sold it, actually, because it was just sitting out in my garage and I wasn’t playing it. So I sold it to  a family that would use it regularly.

 

Q: Any other things you do for fun? 

A: I’ve been so lucky in that I’ve been able to have a career and have fun at the same time by traveling. I’ve been able to go to South America. I’ve been all over Europe. I got to go to Moscow, Russia. Of course I’ve been all over the United States for work.

When it comes to traveling, I spend a lot of time in the Dominican Republic. I’ve got a small network down there and I’ve learned a little bit of Spanish along the way.

 

Q: How did you first wind up in the DR?

A: Long story short, I had a girlfriend that was from there years ago. And we went for a couple of weeks and I met her family and met some other people. We ended up splitting up, but I had an opportunity to do some charity work down there, build some cinder block houses and things like that.

 

Q: Anything else you think is important to share about your life?

A: Well, I have 14 year old twin daughters. And they’re awesome. They kind of take after their father in that they’re both into content creation, but they’re more on the journalism/media side. So they participate in all those clubs at school. And they’re talented in that they do show choir and musicals and things like that. And one of them always gets the lead, which is awesome. So I’m very proud of my daughters and love to spend time with them.