Acceleration Partners CEO On Building A Global Brand And Why It’s Time For Companies to Make Decisions About Office

Marketing plans can vary from product to product, but some things always stay the same. Marketers always need a strong strategy, a competent team behind them and clients who are interested in building their brand.

Few people have a better understanding than Robert Glazer of what it takes to not only execute a successful marketing plan but also run a successful global marketing company. Glazer is the founder and CEO of Acceleration Partners, an international marketing agency. He is also the author of Friday Forward, a weekly email update that he turned into a bestselling book. 

Glazer was the guest on this week’s Walker Webcast, during which he spoke to Walker & Dunlop CEO Willy Walker about marketing across the globe, the key to maintaining his version of a successful work-life balance and why now is the time for companies to make a hard decision about when and where their employees will work for the rest of 2021 and beyond. 

Glazer started by explaining that at its simplest, affiliate marketing, which is what Acceleration specializes in, is paying for an outcome — for impressions, clicks, traffic and more. He used the example of someone who is a part of Amazon’s affiliate program writing something on their blog and linking to a particular book on Amazon. If that blog post drives people to that book and causes them to purchase it, that person could get a commission. 

His team creates value by being experts in software platforms and how to set up successful campaigns on them, he said, and by acting as a client service team to recruit affiliate partners for his clients. 

“I think what makes these programs scalable is the digital aspect of being able to track, measure and pay using technology,” Glazer said. “However, there are still humans and businesses behind these programs who have needs and want to work out a campaign with you, and our team just knows how to find them, engage them and get the best out of them.” 

Acceleration has offices around the world, and Walker asked Glazer what some of the challenges are that come with operating abroad. Glazer said that when companies are building globally, they often make one of two mistakes: They either hire a local team that has no connection to the company or they send out expats who understand marketing but have no connection to the local culture. The key, he said, is to find a combination of local team members and leaders who understand the company but have a shared vision globally. 

Friday Forward, Glazer’s weekly newsletter with more than 200,000 readers, was previously just an update he sent to 30 people. It has been successful, Glazer said, thanks to the fact that he focuses on how he can bring value to his readers, not how he can get value out of them. 

“The key is to not have an ulterior motive,” Glazer said. “I started doing it because it was part of my morning routine and I wanted to share things with my team that were not about work. It wasn’t until weeks later I realized people were sharing it with others and it could have value outside of the company.”

The conversation shifted to time management, and Glazer said that he thinks the term “work-life balance” is a flawed one because it puts too much pressure on people to strike a perfect balance. He said he prefers to focus on how he can have positive work and personal experiences and figure out how to fit them all in his life.

One way he does this is by focusing on a stop-doing list, where he cuts out the people and tasks in his life that don't bring him value. Some examples he gave were energy vampires — people who drain energy out of him without giving anything in return, or even clients who have become too difficult to work with, the ones who are unhappy and whose business relationship with Acceleration may have just run its course. 

Walker moved on to talk about the modern workplace and how to thrive in a virtual environment. Glazer said that on the employee side, people need the right tools — a microphone, light, a professional background for calls. Employees also need to set normal work hours and find ways to incorporate the things they used to do before coming into the office — wind down during their commute, exercise, eat breakfast — into their new routine. 

As for employers, Glazer says it is time for them to make a call on where they want their employees to work in the coming months. He said he respects the businesses that have told their employees they have to come back into the office in September simply because they are at least being clear with their workers. This is compared to the 40% of companies that haven't declared their post-pandemic strategy and another 30% that have been so ambiguous that the employees don't understand what it means. On top of that, many companies have different definitions of what hybrid work means or they simply can’t decide what days employees should come into the office. 

He said that while it may mean possibly coming up with a strategy that some employees won’t like or even losing some workers, companies need to stop wavering and come up with a clear plan for everyone’s sake. 

“We're past that point. You need to pick a strategy, you need to start reinforcing it,” Glazer said. 

On Sept. 1, Walker will host John Kotter, co-founder and executive chairman of  Kotter International. Register here for the event. 

This article was produced in collaboration between Walker & Dunlop and Studio B. Bisnow news staff was not involved in the production of this content.

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