The Marketing Mascot

When I was younger and sitting in section 224 at UD Arena for that year’s Gem City Jam between the Dayton Flyers and the Wright State Raiders (a cross-town ‘rivalry’ of a bygone era), I didn’t know what was going to happen when the team’s mascots marched over to one another, hands on their hips, with fingers wagging as if to say “you do not belong here and you have angered me beyond all repair... here... in MY HOME!”

(Rudy Flyer likely got the best of Rowdy Raider that night, then was back at it the next game.)

I was a kid, but don’t get me wrong. Rudy and Rowdy weren’t real… insomuch as they weren’t these anthropomorphic mutations of airplane pilots and wolves wreaking havoc on the sidelines as student athletes battled home or away student sections in equal measure. They were mascots, and they made a younger version of me smile and feel pretty invested in the outcome of their quarrel.

We’ve all met a marketing mascot, too, even if we haven’t coined it as such: That beloved marketing figurehead who’s great on Teams calls, keeps the presentation templates update, and reports out on the volume of activities that are still in progress (but seemingly never quite done).

These are smart people! Likeable. Often the face of the team, even. And in the right context, that matters.

Morale matters. Voice matters. Presence? That definitely matters.

(Rudy Flyer forever, for the record.)

The challenge in this role-player as a marketing leader is that many companies often stop there. Vision gets confused by energy, and strategy fades in the light of all that visibility. The mascot becomes the ceiling, not the spark. The sideline entertainment, not the out-of-conference win in mid-December.

What marketing really needs these days, especially at senior levels like the ones this site is so fervently advocating, is more than a hot costume with a stuck zipper mascot. It needs someone who:

• Aligns marketing to the go-to-market team, the finance department, product, and all manner of sellers… not just runs campaigns and cheers on vanity results.

• Translates abstract and occasionally left-field-unexpected market shifts into sharp, actionable positioning before the pipeline gets soft.

• Knows how to build systems that generate, measure, and repeat impact… not just vibe with it.

 Because while every single organization needs and benefits from a strong voice… that voice better be connected to the business engine. Otherwise, it’s just brand sideline theater.

The work I do isn’t about looking like a fancy CMO, it’s about operating like one with or without the badge and in no need of furry mask. I make strategy move and pipeline measurable. I make marketing leadership feel felt far beyond the rows of the marketing team.

By all means, let’s have a mascot (dibs on mine being a pug). But! If you want marketing to drive business, and not just represent it? That’s when you call someone already leading.