We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sarah Benoit a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Welcome Sarah, before we ask you to share more specific insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Yes absolutely, I’ve lived in Asheville, NC since 1999 and started my first SEO company in 2003. I’ve worked in the web design, SEO, and social media fields since then and have also been teaching classes on related subjects since 2006. As President of Creative Original, I’ve built a wide variety of small business websites over the years. As Co-founder and Lead Instructor for the JB Media Institute, I leverage my years of experience in the field as a digital marketing strategist to create timely, relevant, and engaging training content. I speak, train, and present on digital marketing topics at conferences and events throughout the year across the country. My focus as an educator is on travel and tourism, the arts and creative professionals, health and wellness, small business development, and community organizing. I also consult with marketing teams of all kinds.

JB Media Institute, LLC is a digital marketing training and consulting company that provides a wide variety of educational services for businesses, individuals, and organizations looking to increase their online marketing skills, stay up to date with trends in the field, and participate in peer and community support. The Institute offers a wide variety of consulting, training, and strategic marketing services for companies and organizations of all sizes. At JB Media I manage an online course called the Content Strategy Roadmap that includes on-demand social media, SEO, and digital advertising classes, office hours with me, and live virtual AI training sessions with a variety of experts. I also help produce the DIY Tourism Marketing Conference held in Asheville every year. This 2 -day, skill-building event brings in destination marketing organizations, convention and visitors bureaus, attractions, shops, restaurants, hotels, and a variety of other businesses that rely on locals and tourists to buy, visit, and tell their friends.

Alright, Sarah first question, what do you think Corporate America gets wrong in your industry?

Have you ever heard someone with a corporate job say, “No one at the office values my skills or work, I’m so over it” or “This job is draining me of my creativity”? Chances are, you have. According to a June 2023 report on Zippia.com, “49% of American workers report being very satisfied with their work, but only 20% are passionate about their jobs. As a seasoned marketing professional, I’ve seen firsthand the negative consequences of prioritizing profit over people. This approach isn’t just harmful to employees, it’s ultimately unsustainable for businesses.

But here’s the good news: change is possible. Small business owners, leaders, changemakers, and entrepreneurs have the power to redefine marketing success within their spheres of influence and are actively doing it, even when Corporate America says that’s not how to win. Leaders in the small business community often have deeper more personal connections to their customers, fans, and supporters and therefore have a clearer understanding of the power of marketing and what is actually effective in the long term. There are three simple steps corporate leaders can take to cultivate a more human-centered and resilient business ecosystem and to shift away from the old paradigm of marketing and sales, which has caused some level of harm to people over the decades:

1. Break Down the Silos
Marketing, sales, customer service, and HR staff members are all on the same team, not separate departments. They all contribute to the same goal: building thriving customer relationships. By fostering regular communication and collaboration between these departments, you can achieve a holistic understanding of your customers and their needs. Imagine the positive impact on your brand reputation when members of your team feel their work is appreciated, creative, and serving a real purpose.

2. Ditch the Megaphone and Start Listening
Gone are the days of one-way communication in marketing. Today’s customers expect real, useful, and beneficial conversations. Instead of pushing generic messages, actively engage with your audience online. Don’t focus on perfection, focus on responsiveness and being present. Data is now more than tracking, it’s paying attention to the core needs and wants of your existing and potential audiences. By demonstrating that you care about their voice, you’ll build trust, loyalty, and long-lasting relationships.

3. Generate Healthy Relationships, not just Transactions.
Remember, customers are people, not just profit margins. Corporate America must truly ditch the manipulative tactics and misleading claims so commonly recommended in marketing. Instead, corporate leaders must focus on building real, emotional connections with employees and customers based on transparency, care, shared values, and mutual benefit. It’s time to move away from control and persuasion and to promote how products and services solve real problems, improve quality of life, and do good in the world.

By embracing these principles and a new approach to marketing Corporate America can help create a future filled with hope and possibility. Let’s imagine and create a business landscape where profitability and human well-being are not mutually exclusive, but rather, complementary forces.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

After 20 years in marketing my creative journey is driven very clearly by one main goal or objective: to make marketing fun. I want to help business leaders fall in love with the practice of marketing, which includes many aspects of communications including sales, customer service, and HR.

As a marketing educator, I’ve learned that many people, especially small business owners and organizational founders do not enjoy, like, or get excited about marketing. Many artists and creative professionals who have been in my classes say they hate marketing. When I hear that it breaks my heart because when you say you hate marketing you are saying that you hate maintaining the most valuable relationships you have with your existing customers AND you hate cultivating relationships with new people who can help you accomplish your goals in the future.

If you hate participating in the relationships that make your company financially stable and give you the chance to grow down the road you are not on the path to success, you are embarking on a lonely road. Let’s make marketing a powerful experience that fuels creativity, vision, loyalty, and community connection. Let’s invest in ourselves and each other.

We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.

My work at the JB Media Institute started when my now business partner of 12 years Justin Belleme asked me to lunch and had a unique proposition to offer me in 2010. It wasn’t the first time we met, but it was an important moment in my life as an entrepreneur. Before this moment we had been competitors and peers often bidding on the same projects and shaking the same hands. I recognized early on when I first met Justin that he was smart and kind. He was also collaborative and driven. No one else in our area was teaching digital marketing when we first met and he was one of the only other marketing experts I knew who was excited to share what they were learning as digital technology radically changed the marketing industry.

I was already aware that to succeed in SEO and digital marketing I needed to be willing to learn continuously and pay attention to the experiences of others in the field. I already knew I could never know everything. I was naturally compelled to attend Justin’s training and classes to get a fresh perspective on various platforms and strategies. His teaching style and approach to marketing really resonated with me. I respected that he taught students relationships were as important to success as a healthy bottom line. Even though we competed for a variety of events, programs, and clients I was always happy to be a part of what he was doing and share my ideas.

In 2010, it had been just over 2 years since the economic crash of 2008. I had parted ways with my previous business partner, rebranded, and kept going despite the challenges. I was accomplishing a lot but I was also tired and there wasn’t enough time in the day to manage marketing contracts, expand my teaching, and grow the brand. I had finally decided I wanted to boutique my company and move more towards marketing education and growing my speaking business.

Enter Justin, someone I already liked and respected, with an unexpected idea. We grabbed lunch at one of the coolest restaurants in Asheville at the time, Tupelo Honey, and he told me his vision for the future. He wanted to open and grow a digital marketing agency, hire staff, and take on larger clients, but he couldn’t do it alone. He needed someone with different but complementary skills to join the team and after discussing with a trusted friend they both thought it could be me. In the future, if I helped him build his agency, he wanted to start an educational arm of the brand and I would get to be lead instructor.

He highlighted that the biggest reason he wanted to bring me on the team was because of my ability to connect with people and build lasting relationships. This was the first time in my career someone had invited me into a professional partnership because of one of the characteristics I like most about myself, the part of me I value most, my love of people. Over a decade later I’m still here growing, changing, succeeding, and loving my work because one of my biggest competitors became one of my biggest clients, and then became my business partner. It’s not your typical story but it’s taught me some of the most powerful lessons and brought me some of the greatest rewards. Collaboration and cooperation can lead to big wins and aligned values are the backbone of accomplishing your goals.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://jbmediainstitute.com
• Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/sarahdbenoit
• Facebook: http://www.Facebook.com/SarahDBenoit
• Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/SarahDBenoit
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWPjgnpXuqEPNbsnKFIUqrg
• Other: https://sarahbenoit.com

Image Credits
These photos were all taken by or belong to me, Sarah Benoit, or belong to the JB Media Institute.