Laurie and Sandie Giacobi, Co-Founders My Marketing Manager

ML: What’s it like to be born and raised in Monaco?
LG: We went to school in Monaco up to the Baccalauréat and then we studied in Nice for five years. We never had the impression of living somewhere incredible or different when we were young. Looking back, I can say we had the chance to be raised in a secure and international environment. Monaco is a very comfortable place to live and we feel privileged to have the chance to have our life here. However, we also thought that instead of just taking advantage of this situation, we had to prove that we deserved this chance.

ML: What do you dream of becoming as children?
SG: When we were younger, like all kids, we were interested in many things. However, we made our first steps into marketing when we were teenagers: in high school, we used to work for the F1 Grand Prix each year. I remember asking the pilots to sign cans of Coke to “launch a limited edition” of our cans. Later in college, we started to sell our stuff on eBay, to make some money. We enjoyed it very much and always tested new strategies to sell better by adapting the message and description, choosing the right picture and starting price, and even the time to put the bid online. It was really fun.

ML: So the eBay experience was a segue into launching your own business – My Marketing Manager?
LG: After college, we worked separately for different companies for about seven years, always in Marketing departments. Sandie worked in business tourism, automotive and telecommunications while I was more into luxury industries like hotels, jewellery and cosmetics.

However, we were very often asked for marketing help outside our jobs. At a certain point, we realised that there was something to be done for companies who did not have the time or skills to take care of their marketing needs nor the money to hire someone. That is how we came up with My Marketing Manager – we offer outsourced marketing services to companies. We work on their strategy, we bring our expertise to help them build their campaign and we can take charge of their marketing “department” and implement all the actions all year long.

We are not an online service, we are just using digital tools to communicate and offer a better experience to our customers. We, of course, meet with our clients when geography permits. They chose My Marketing Manager to be able to focus on running their company. And as their time is very precious, we chose to communicate as much as we can by email, video calls, SMS and by phone.

ML: What was your business plan?
SG: Our goals were very simple: to run a profitable business while having fun. We are both very curious by nature and My Marketing Manager enables us to meet different people, work on various types of missions in all types of industries, which is very rewarding. Without saying that we are free to work whenever we want (which we sometimes hear, but is completely wrong), it gives us some freedom in the way we want to organise our working days.

We both quit comfortable jobs to create My Marketing Manager without knowing if it was going to work. Failure scared us but we were very confident.

ML: How important is social media to your business?
LG: Social media has always been important for our business, as it’s the channel we chose to promote My Marketing Manager when we launched our business in 2010. It was a successful strategy because many companies contacted us to implement the same course of action that we used for them. Today, every business wants to be present on social media but a lot spend an incredible amount of time being everywhere, without knowing exactly how to use social networks or what to say. Social media can be a powerful tool in a marketing strategy but it really has to be part of a global thinking to achieve the goals of a business.

ML: What’s the hardest part of running your own business?
SG: The hardest part may be the fact that you never completely disconnect: a company is like your baby, you think about it almost all the time. We have the chance to work together so we can really rely on each other when one of us is away.

ML: What is the one app or tool you cannot live without?
LG: Hum, so many … actually, I can live without technology. It’s just that some tools and apps make my life and my work easier. We have implemented an organisation and tools that allow us to work from absolutely anywhere, from any device.

ML: What is something you’ve always wanted to try or do?
SG: Probably write a book. Or create another company ☺

ML: Best place to hang out after-work?
LG: After work, we hang out … at home with our families! We both have young children. But the best place for a business lunch is Maya Bay, Valentin or Le Quai des Artistes.

ML: Best piece of advice a woman gave you?
SG: Our mother always told us “Il n’y a que ceux qui ne font rien qui ne se trompent jamais” – The only ones who are never wrong are those who don’t do anything – which is absolutely right!

Article first published November 9, 2016.

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