Christina Del Villar is a Silicon Valley marketing executive, consultant, and author who geeks out on helping companies transform, grow and scale, leveraging technology with 25 years of experience at Fortune 100 companies and more than 10 startups. Christina has developed go-to-market and marketing strategies for exponential growth, new product launches, acquisitions, and IPOs, particularly for high-growth companies where she leverages her experience and industry perspective to take them to the next level.
Christina’s GRIT Marketing Method focuses on helping marketing professionals to build smarter programs, be more efficient, and exponentially grow revenue to improve overall company performance. She is the author of Sway: Implement the GRIT Marketing Method to Gain Influence & Drive Corporate Strategy.
Tell us a little bit about your background and how you ended up writing a book?
I have spent the past 30 years in Silicon Valley as a marketing executive, working with both F500 as well as start ups, including Elon Musk’s first company, Zip2. What I realized early on is that I was not the “big idea” person. Rather I was the strategist that was going to make sure the products and solutions got to market, essentially developing the go-to-market as well as marketing strategies.
I noticed a disturbing trend of marketing budgets being cut, along with marketing personnel, the tenure of CMOs being reduced to less than a year, and company executives not understanding the true value and impact of marketing. Along the way, I developed my own set of processes to ensure the success not only of my team, but of the entire company. I wanted to share these with other marketing professionals and go-to-market strategy teams, to help them become more efficient and ultimately able to show their true value.
What do you hope your readers take away from this book?
Sway provides a framework called the G.R.I.T. Marketing Method to help marketing professionals gain trust and influence the corporate strategy. It also guides them through the steps of developing what I call a Map of Influence, that helps them identify key touch points along the customer journey to better align with the overall corporate goals and collaborate more cohesively with the rest of the organization.
Readers should come away from this book with specific steps they need to take to implement the G.R.I.T. Marketing Method, build their own Map of Influence, gain trust and internal influence, and articulate their impact and value, thereby creating a more secure, fulfilling, long-term career.
What were the top three mistakes you made publishing your book? What did you learn from them?
My biggest mistake was not truly understanding everything that goes into writing, publishing, marketing, and selling a book. The writing part I had down as well as the marketing. But early on, I hit pause and read up on what it would take to get published. Who knew if you wanted your book in an airport bookstore, it had to be a minimum of 50,000 words!?!? While it can be overwhelming, I recommend taking the time to learn about the publishing process.
Another lesson learned was to make sure I set aside the time to write and to do so in a consistent manner. I blocked off 6-8 a.m. every day and kept that cadence until I was done. By blocking the time, and at the same time every day, it became a habit. I hear so many authors say they are struggling to “find time to write,” especially if they have a “day job.”
The other lesson I learned was that no matter which publishing method you go with, you need to invest time, money, and resources. The amount will be different for everyone. Ultimately, I treated my entire journey like a marketing program, with a budget, forecasted results, timeline, milestones, and more. I feel like there are three major components to being a successful author – a compelling topic, the resources to make it happen, and the headspace. If you have the latter, the first two will come naturally.
When will you consider your book a success?
My goal in writing this book was two-fold. First, to help other marketing professionals gain trust and internal influence, so that they would become more embedded in the go-to-market strategy and overall corporate strategy.
The second was to leverage the book to help amplify me as a thought leader, do more contributed articles, and book more paid speaking engagements. Even before the book has officially come out, I have already achieved both of these goals and successes.
The feedback I have received so far has been amazing. It has already changed people’s lives and careers for the better. The rest is just icing on the cake and a kickass ride.
It is up to marketing professionals, mavens, and gurus to help sway the rest of the organization—executives, our managers, our manager’s manager, the board, heck, even our own parents—into understanding the value we bring to a company and its overall performance. We need to show the significance of our roles, our programs, and our organizations, as well as our impact.
What is the one thing you wish you knew before publishing your book?
The key thing I wish I had understood about this journey is that it is much more than just writing a book. There is so much that goes into publishing a book—from research to cover art that will pop in an airport bookstore to engaging influencers early on. Don’t even get me started on the weight of paper, quality of ink, and where the heck you can store your books. (I’ll give you a hint, in your garage is NOT a good option!)
My book is all about go-to-market strategy, so I focused a lot on this from the start. Having a clear understanding of your goals (number of books you want to sell, ebook vs printed, breakeven, revenue from books, etc.), and how you can get there is key. Writing and publishing are only half the battle. One thing that was particularly important for me was getting influencers to review and endorse my book, being a guest on top marketing podcasts, and being a speaker at certain events.
Early on I started to engage with influencers, asking them for advice, sharing interesting articles, and building meaningful relationships with them. Once I had my ARCs, I asked if I could send it to them, which they all agreed to. My book is called Sway, so I sent a hammock along with the book and told them to enjoy Sway while swaying. I then went to Cameo and had other celebrities thank them on my behalf for reading the book. After all that, I followed up with them to make sure they had received the book and if they had any questions. All of my top influencers have since read the book, given me quotes to use, and have agreed to do reviews and social media endorsements once the book goes live. It’s an investment in time and money, but worth it in the end.
If you had the chance to start your career over again what would you do differently?
First, I would accept Elon Musk’s offer to be one of the first marketing people at PayPal. Doh! After that, I would look to build trust and gain internal influence, working and collaborating with everyone involved along the entire customer journey – from product to customer success. Next, I would step up and own the go-to-market strategy, revenue and all. It’s essentially what marketing is responsible for anyway, I would just want to be clear as to who owns it.
What’s a productivity tip you swear by?
I don’t allow myself to look at email until I am done with my writing for the day. This can be applied to whatever you have on your plate. Don’t read your email before you complete your top 2 tasks for the day, or before you have read some articles or listened to podcasts. Email can be a time suck and lead you down a rabbit hole the size of a crater. Set aside time first thing in the morning to accomplish your most critical tasks, uninterrupted.
Book – The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse is a beautifully written and illustrated book by Charlie Mackesy. Reading this book calms me down and puts things in perspective.
Podcast – So many to choose from, but I really love Rockstar CMO. Ian does a great job of bringing on guests that give amazing advice to help propel marketing professionals in their career.
Course – Stacy Ennis is a bestselling author that has focused her career on editing and book writing. She was instrumental in helping me get my book developed, written and published. She is now offering a course to help other aspiring authors. I will definitely go through her process for my next book as well. Her course is called Nonfiction Book School, which she offers several times a year.
Know your audience, and it better not be yourself. Who are you writing the book for? This should always be in the back (or front) of your mind. I recommend literally printing out a picture of the person that emulates your persona and sticking it somewhere where you can always see it.
And outline, outline outline. I would rather rewrite my outline 5 times than my book even once.
What is your definition of success?
When someone I respect tells me that they learned something from my book and applied some of the techniques and methodology—like building their own Map of Influence—and can share outcomes. Also, on a larger scale, when marketing professionals finally have more of a voice, are seen for the value they bring and have a seat at the table, and have more control over their career trajectory. Then I will know my book was successful,
How can readers get in touch with you?
I would love to connect with you. Whether you need some advice on your career or information on how to create your own Map of Influence, feel free to reach out to me. You can find more information on my book Sway: Implement the G.R.I.T. Marketing Method to Gain Influence and Drive Corporate Strategy at swaythebook.com, follow me on LinkedIn @christinadelvillar or email me at sway@christinadelvillar.com.
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