Jay Schwedelson: We are back for Do This Not That, and I have an incredible guest here. Who is here? Mary Beech is here. She is the chief, chief growth officer at Thorne. Now, why am I so excited? Because first of all, my wife is a customer. She takes Thorne magnesium like every day or whatever, so I'm getting street cred by having Mary here.

Jay Schwedelson: But Mary is leading this, not just the marketing organization, but the growth of Thorne, which is an incredible... I don't even wanna call it just like a wellness brand or, or some- a company that sells nutritional supplements. They're so much more. They are this modern direct-to-consumer business that's at one of the hardest intersections of modern marketing, where you're trying to drive digital growth in a category, you know, this wellness category where, where trust is m- matters more than just the hype, which is like a lot of the direct-to-consumer category.

Jay Schwedelson: So Mary's leading it all and, and if you don't know Thorne, they are trusted by thousands of healthcare practitioners. Over 100 professional sports team use them. It is bananas. They are the cool kids on the block. Mary's leading it all. We're gonna dig into it. Mary, welcome to the show.

Mary Beech: Thank you so much for having me, Jay. Thrilled to be here, and so glad to hear your wife's a customer.

Jay Schwedelson: There you go. Um, I'm excited. So I feel like I didn't do justice to what Thorne really does. Can you quickly take us through just what does Thorne actually do, and then what is, what is your role there?

Mary Beech: Absolutely. Um, so we are the premium nutritional supplement company. Uh, we were founded 40 years ago, uh, actually, and, um, at that time, and really up until maybe five, six years ago, we only sold through your healthcare practitioner. You had to see your functional medical doctor, a nurse practitioner, acupuncturist, in order to get access to Thorne.

Mary Beech: Um, and that really, you know, kind of set the bar for our quality standards because a doctor has to be satisfied with your quality, with the, um, ingredients that you're putting in, and frankly, with the efficacy. How, how does it work? You know, at the end of the day, um, taking supplements is, uh, it, you know, something you have to do every day.

Mary Beech: It requires compliance, and if you aren't seeing results, you're not gonna do it, and docs know that. So that's really where Thorne set their bar. Um, today we offer close to 170 different supplements. Magnesium is a top, creatine is one. All across, I'd say, the range from prevention to performance. Um, you know, we have everything that you really need.

Mary Beech: Um, we're also a wellness company, so we're very keen on getting people... I think one of the things that's so important to know always is that the right supplements for me aren't the right supplements for Jay, and so we really are there to help people learn about supplements, learn about lifestyle changes they can make, and learn about what's right for them and their biology, their lifestyle, their genetics.

Jay Schwedelson: love that. And, and, you know, I wanna-- we're gonna get into Gen Z marketing, influence marketing, all this stuff. But before we do, something about you I think that is really interesting for all the listeners out there, because a lot of listeners are in marketing roles that are listening. And you, you used to be, in your past life, you were chief marketing officer at Scholastic, right?

Jay Schwedelson: Chief marketing officer. Now, you are chief growth officer, okay, at Thorne, and I love that because I love seeing people in marketing roles kind of move up the corporate food chain, if you will. And so, i- uh, is that something you did intentionally? Is this like, is, is, is growth the elevation point for a marketer?

Mary Beech: I think, you know, I've been a CMO, uh, at Kate Spade, at Scholastic, and, um, I won't, I won't go backwards. I'm gonna stay in, in the CGO lane. Um, and, and this is really why I think that, um, you know, if you think of marketing 20 years ago, um, and the tools that were available to us to, to where we are today, really from a growth and performance perspective, we are able to drive the business.

Mary Beech: And I think when we both are, uh, responsible for driving it through the marketing actions that we take, but also accountable to the numbers 'cause we run those businesses, that marriage is, is really what should be in the modern marketing organization. I run, you know, 80% of our, our business directly. I'm accountable to those numbers.

Mary Beech: And so that, when I wake up in the morning and I'm talking to my, you know, performance marketing team, my brand marketing team, um, our public relations team, that's what's on my mind, is how are we performing and doing right by the brand? 'Cause I am a brand marketer at heart, that's what I love, but at the end of the day, also by the business.

Mary Beech: And I think that connectivity serves both the marketing world and the business, um, to have that. You know, I also, having the brand hat, I'm not gonna make a short-term decision that's harmful to the long-term brand without really thinking about it. Whereas if I was just over the business, that might be an easier path to make the numbers.

Mary Beech: So I, I do think combining the two things is, is the wave of the future, and with performance marketing and the strength of that arena, I think it's, it's a smart way to go for companies as well.

Jay Schwedelson: you know, I, I, I love the way that you positioned that 'cause I think it's such a crime when you see like memes on the internet that the sales and marketing, they, they don't get along or they don't talk to each other or all that nonsense, uh, which by the way, I put on the internet, so who am I to talk?

Jay Schwedelson: But, uh, uh, but I do believe what you're saying is true, that the path of the future is that marketing and sales are, are, are units because how do you do one without the other? It doesn't

Mary Beech: You don't. And I mean, I agree with you. I think marketing and sales are usually at odds from one another. I will tell you that- My head of sales is my closest peer and partner at Thorne. Like, we sort of both walked in and said, "We don't wanna do what every other organization has done. We wanna be aligned."

Mary Beech: Um, and you know, at the end of the day, the way that, you know, we're rewarded, like, if my businesses are rising and, you know, we all rise. If his businesses are rising, we all rise. So I do think that alignment is, is far, far improved from, from the, uh, the infighting of the past.

Jay Schwedelson: Well, let's see if everyone will start jumping on that train. All right, speaking about jumping on a train, one of the markets that you all go after is Gen Z. Now, I have a 18-year-old daughter and a 19-year-old son, which is in the Gen Z, uh, world. Gen Z people are 14 to 29, right? I always get confused by it, but that's the age range.

Jay Schwedelson: That has to be a very hard market to get any attention because I see them on TikTok. I see their brains doing brain rot. So what is the secret sauce? How do you, how do you crack the Gen Z code?

Mary Beech: I think what was so interesting to me about, about Gen Z and Millennial frankly, um, and Millennials are always a lot older than I think they are. They go up to, like, 44. Um, but they're incredibly interested in wellness in a way that, you know, Gen X and Boomers really didn't get interested in wellness until much later in their journey.

Mary Beech: Um, I would say it was more about prevention, so it's something I need to do when things start going south, versus today, well- wellness is a way of being. Mental wellness, physical wellness, feeling good, feeling at the height of your performance. So there's so much interest in it from that generation at a, at a very young age, and I have, I have, uh, 18 and 20-year-old kids as well, and so I see their interest in it far more than, than again, I was at their age.

Mary Beech: Um, but what we've learned is that there's a huge amount of confusion. Like, here's this topic that you're so engaged in, you're really curious about and motivated around, but there's so much inters- information that you're just overwhelmed, um, about what to do. We did a wellness confidence report earlier this year where 65% of Americans said they, they were less confused by doing their taxes than they were by choosing a supplement.

Mary Beech: Um, and that just said to me, like, wow, because doing taxes with, even with the advent of AI, is still confusing and complicated, um, particularly if you earn, you know, if you have more than one W-2 or something. Um, and so people find it so confusing, and so we really view our job to help remove that confusion.

Mary Beech: Um, you know, one of our core pillars in our, in our marketing arena is guidance. So I spend a lot of time and money putting out information about our quality, our standards, what different ingredients do. Um- That actually isn't selling anything. It's just for, uh, providing education and transparency into what is a rather, like, you know, can be a rather hype, as you said, industry where it's like, "Oh, am I only going by the headlines?"

Mary Beech: And what we've found is that Gen Z will engage with that. Like, I'm surprised. Yes, they love a six-second ad more than a 30-second ad, for sure. Um, but they'll also come to an hour-long Reddit AMA and be super engaged, ask a ton of questions, or watch a YouTube video that is more 10, 15 minutes long about a specific topic or ingredient that they're interested in.

Mary Beech: So I think it's all about creating the right content at the right moment, um, and not just going down the one lane, like it is with any generation. But I think Gen Z in particular, um, really does have a lot of curiosity. Um, and I think AI can actually... You know, the chat, the chat tools are also helping there.

Mary Beech: The AEO tools are helping as well, helping them discern information.

Jay Schwedelson: one of the things that marketers... I, I always struggle with this, is what you all are doing is you're going out and you're providing a lot of education, right? It's not, "Hey, buy this stuff from Thorne, we're the best." It's, "This is what magnesium could do for you if you took it, you know, however often." And then, and by the way, at the end, you know, Thorne's awesome, or maybe it has your branding on it or whatever.

Jay Schwedelson: And I, I think a lot of marketers, whatever category you're in, business, consumer, nonprofit, doesn't matter Would love to do that, but then they go into their meetings and they go, "Well, what's the attribution if we are just trying to provide thought leadership in our category? How do we say we did this and it drove that?"

Jay Schwedelson: So how-- I mean, you're winning the battle with yourself 'cause you yourself are the chief growth officer, but how do you win that battle internally? 'Cause that's a hard thing to assign value to.

Mary Beech: It-- I think what's really important is it, it is about... I mean, I hate to use the term the marketing funnel, but it is about a funnel of content that's gonna serve you at various moments. I, I think it's always good to remember most people go on a journey before purchasing something. Yes, sometimes we click through immediately, but most people, there's multiple steps before they hit buy, and they need to take in different types of information.

Mary Beech: I certainly found that true in the handbag space where you were selling something that was a considil- considerable purchase size, like a lot of money for most people. Um, there was a lengthy, um, purchase phase for people. But even in something like supplementations, the price point's high for something that is not a basic need.

Mary Beech: Um, and it's like you have to know I'm gonna use it, it's gonna work for me, all of those things. So we really look at our content and say, you know, "How can we hit at various points on the funnel?" So we'll have upper funnel that's really about, you know, anthem- anthemic, um, you know, often with an influencer or celebrity to get your attention.

Mary Beech: We'll have mid-funnel pieces where a lot of times we're using, you know, doctors or trainers to really talk more about the specifics, not even about Thorne, um, just about, you know, berberine or magnesium or creatine and, and what's in it and how it helps you and how it helps your li- life. Um, and then we'll have lower funnel that's just delivering on our proof points around, you know, efficacy, around certification, around, you know, manufacturing processes.

Mary Beech: And then in terms of the attribution, we're really looking at that full funnel and saying, "What's working for us?" I think, you know, we've had to work hard to say metrics for lower funnel are easy, you know, click-through rate, you know, purchase rate, um, conversion. Um, when you get to upper funnel, we obviously look at engagement, but we're also doing things like brand lift studies where we can see, you know, if we run an ad alone versus, you know, have three ads in conjunction that work together, what is the change in consideration for the brand?

Mary Beech: What is the change in likelihood to visit the website, um, and, and tool around? What is the change in likelihood to consider for the next purchase? Um, and that's helping tell the story. Like, I may be the chief growth officer, but I still have a CFO. Um, so I'm still in that position of having to convince someone to continue to give me money.

Mary Beech: Um, and so th- that type of brand lift study, you know, um, awareness, g- you know, brand awareness, customer acquisition numbers, all of those things you... we're looking at. But I always present it as a full funnel, not as, like, the one piece that we're doing. It's like these are all the various ways we're going to be touching consumers along their purchase journey.

Jay Schwedelson: Yeah, I used, you know, if I rewind like two or three years ago, I used to tell people, "Hey, be great on, in one platform. Like, be great on Instagram or, or LinkedIn or whatever." I just think because, you know, website traffic is different now 'cause of AI and everything else, you kinda need to be all over the place.

Jay Schwedelson: Is that kind of the playbook? Like, are you trying to, like, be like, "We gotta cover a lot of, lot of places"?

Mary Beech: We do. I think that, um, still to this day I, I will experiment with the channel, see if there's resonance there, and then I think the hardest thing to do is pull back if it's not working. Um, you know, like, like anyone, like, you can put your effort towards something that's working and make it better a lot easier than you can towards something that's not working and trying to get it to work a little bit, and that's hard because we often, as people, wanna make something work.

Mary Beech: So if we hear a brand has been... You know, a lot of brands in our space are really successful on TikTok, for example. Um, we haven't found that be, to be the place to reach Gen Z. They're there for sure, but for a clinical supplement brand, um, we haven't yet found the right combination of elements to work on TikTok, whereas Reddit, fantastic for us.

Mary Beech: YouTube, fantastic channel for being able to provide more information and get things out there. Um, so we're always, you know, kind of experimenting. We... AEO is Definitely a big focus for us. Thankfully, we've had a blog for, like, 10 years, so the amount of content that I have is incredible, and it's, you know, often written by doctors in the field, not directly by Thorne.

Mary Beech: So it's very validated and credible information on our blog, um, that we didn't generate specifically for the purpose of AEO. We generated it for our consumers and our healthcare practitioners. So that's been very helpful. Um, but I do think it's about that, like, fail fast mentality, um, and then narrowing in on what works for you.

Mary Beech: I always wanna add new channels. I love it. Um, but we try to do it in a resource-light way, and then see what... Fail fast or succeed, and then, you know, double down.

Jay Schwedelson: love it. Double down. Totally agree on all fronts. So you mentioned something earlier on about, uh, influencers. I don't know why that word crushes me. I just, I just despise that word, but okay. It's probably the best form of marketing on the planet that exists in terms of performance, and I know that you all, you, you partner with all sorts of different influencers.

Jay Schwedelson: So, um, and, and I've seen influencer programs in two different ways. I'm curious about how you do it. Some are like, "Hey, will you post something for us a couple times? Great." And then other ones are, like, hyper-organized, you know, with all sorts of deliverables and backend performance and metrics and tracking and UTMs and all this stuff.

Jay Schwedelson: So where do you live and, and how do you scale a program like this, and are you on board with the influencer world? Cool

Mary Beech: signed a sponsorship with Unrivaled, the women's basketball league.

Mary Beech: Um, so we're looking at how can we show up in places where consumers already are. Um, the- we then utilize paid, a, a limited number of paid partnerships. Um, so we have, you know, a very strong and authentic partnership with, um, Madison Keys, a tennis player, with Ben Shelton, who's a tennis player, Jrue Holiday, who's a basketball player.

Mary Beech: These peop- are people who already used Thorne because we are one of the only supplement brands that's NSF Certified for Sport, which means they can take it without any worries about any, you know, problems in, in all of the testing that they go through in order to be able to perform, and it works, so they need to know that.

Mary Beech: Um- And so they were authentic users of Thorne before they came, um, you know, to the brand. So that's really key to us in those partnerships. And then we did launch just last year actually an ambassador program. And I would say there, again, quality over quantity. Um, and we do very tight briefs so that we can really take the time to educate people.

Mary Beech: We have one right now on our new plant protein. Um, and we did a lot of education about why is plant protein good, you know, how it does provide, you know, 22 grams of protein. And while it may not be the same as a whey-based protein, which is a little, sometimes a little higher, it's still a really good source of protein for people who can't handle, you know, dairy or, or are vegan and vegetarian.

Mary Beech: Um, I use plant protein myself and love it. Um, so it's, you know, it's providing all of that education and then finding the right influencers for whom talking about plant protein is natural because that's the protein source they seek. Um, so I think we have a... I, I'm really proud of that program, which again, has launched.

Mary Beech: And we do look at the metrics pretty carefully, both how the influencer performs themselves, but then how also it performs in terms of delivering on our reasons to believe and our proof points. Um, so it's, the storytelling is as important as, like, the revenue metric, for lack of a better phrase.

Jay Schwedelson: Yeah, I love the idea, and I think everybody, if you're considering doing influencer marketing, influencer marketing is for all size companies, all brands, all categories, to really look and go to your customer base and see who is a user. 'Cause frankly, I've done programs where I'm not the customer of the thing, and I'm out there jumping around saying, "Do this thing," and it's contrived and it's embarrassing and it doesn't feel authentic, and it's so much better.

Jay Schwedelson: So I, I love the idea of looking at your users and seeing who's in there that has some influence. So you're about to have influence on me. I wanna, I wanna... I, this is totally off topic. I didn't even tell you I'd bring this up, but I read that you've run 13 marathons,

Mary Beech: Yes.

Jay Schwedelson: And something, in some article I read that what you do is the second half of the marathon, you do this thing where you, uh, uh, I, uh, basically the second half you're gonna run it faster than the first half, and that's how you kind of like live your professional life, your work life.

Jay Schwedelson: I need to now, I need to get all involved with this 'cause I'm about to get inspired. What is going on here?

Mary Beech: Okay, so the concept is called the negative split. I didn't invent it. It's out there in the running world. I came to running late in life. Um, also came to supplementation later in life. Um, I had a, a heart incident when I was in my early 30s, combination of stress and just lifestyle factors that I wouldn't have necessarily known.

Mary Beech: Like, I generally look physically to be a healthy person, but you can have underlying issues based on diet that don't manifest physically. Um, and so I had issues, and I came to both supplementation, health in general, but running. And running was just a way for me to man- manage my stress. Um, and to be frank, I can't do anything and not try to do it the best, so it led me to, led me to marathons.

Mary Beech: But the concept of negative split is the idea of running the second half of a race faster than the first, which is really hard, um, because you tend to go out strong, um, you feel great, and then, you know, mentally and physically, things break down in the second half. Um, I don't always do it. I've only done it a handful of times.

Mary Beech: It's very, very hard. Um, and but and I loved the idea of also applying that to your professional and personal life. Like, it, it is wonderful every day to wake up and think, "Today is gonna be better than yesterday," or, "I can-- I have the opportunity to make it better than yesterday," um, versus the, the attitude that maybe all the good is, is behind you.

Mary Beech: Um, and so I do love that sort of every day waking up knowing that I have the power to, to make today and, and the future better, even as I, in my case, get older and more tired and all the issues that occur. Um, it, it is this-- I find it quite motivating, um, personally, professionally, and, and in my running career as well. So I-- Happy to have you adapt it.

Jay Schwedelson: I, I am, you know, I'm turning 50 in a few weeks, and I'm like, you know, and I, I, you have all these thoughts, whatever, and when I read that, I'm like, "You know what? I wanna have a negative split for the rest of my career." I'm not winding down. I wanna, I wanna crush it with what I got, you know, the runway I have left.

Jay Schwedelson: So you made an impression on me. I appreciate that.

Mary Beech: I'm glad. I think it's a great-- I think great mentality for any age, but yes, I'm on, I'm on the same side of the life curve as you, and I think it has been incredibly motivating for me in my 50s just to know that I'm not done. I'm not done with any of it.

Jay Schwedelson: Amazing. Well, and everybody out there who doesn't wanna be done with their life, they need to go check out Thorne. We're gonna put it all in the show notes. That's T-H-O-R-N-E. And Mary Beech, you can find her all on social. Uh, it's B-E-E-C-H. Mary, anything else you wanna mention to the universe? You are fantastic.

Mary Beech: No, thank you. I enjoyed the conversation, and it was great to meet you guys.

Jay Schwedelson: Yes. Awesome. All right. We'll see you soon. Thanks