Interview with CEO & Co-Founder, Headliner Labs – Caroline Klatt

 

“I am first and foremost a digital marketer, so I understand how important it is that all platforms integrate.”

1. What is it that you found lacking in the bot trends then vs now?

Tell us about your role at Headliner Labs and how you got here?

I’m the co-founder and CEO of Headliner Labs. I founded Headliner after spending my career in digital marketing at e-commerce companies. I saw a huge, untapped opportunity to leverage messaging apps for marketing, and had to seize it!

2. What is it that you found lacking in the bot trends then vs now?

Bots is a tricky term, that means so many different things to different people. What we do is leverage messaging apps (like Facebook Messenger) to send out marketing messages, and then facilitate conversations between brands and their customers. We open up the most relevant, most used channels to brands so that they can meet customers where they’re spending time.

3. Given the changing dynamics in the E-commerce and automation world where do you see Company name fitting in the ecosystem?

Headliner Labs is leading the way in conversational marketing for retail and ecommerce brands. Before now, direct marketing has been pretty limited to one-way channels, like ads and emails. With conversational marketing, we are connecting brands with individual customers, and opening up a conversation between the brand and each customer. Being customer-centric and serving the customer where they want, when they want and how they want is exactly what the leading brands do; the brands that don’t do that will struggle to remain relevant in an increasingly mobile, personalized, and social world.

4. How do you differentiate Headliner labs from other marketing automation companies?

At Headliner Labs, we see the end customer first and foremost. The best way for a brand to connect with their customers is through driving real, actual personalized experiences in the digital universe, and we make that possible.

5. What changes are you majorly concentrating on to enhance and plug-in a more actionable customer interaction and communication model?

We’re super focused on sending actionable communications and then tracking those closely!! We’re constantly building out our intelligence and functionality to make the messaging more and more actionable, interactive, and effective at driving new customers and conversions.

6. How do you manage the dire data complexities that come along with tech integrations?

I am first and foremost a digital marketer, so I understand how important it is that all platforms integrate.

If they don’t, then you don’t pay attention to them, and we never want to be in that bucket. Integrating with the existing marketing stack was a priority for us from the start. I have an incredible development team; they are brilliant technologists that have managed to build our platform to integrate so easily and seamlessly with all other platforms.

7. “Personalized Targeting is the key to recurring customers”. What are your comments on this?

As a customer, I agree. I’ve gotten so used to brands finding me, contacting me and serving me super targeted ads, that if you don’t – if you serve an irrelevant product, or you send me a clearly generic message – I just assume you don’t have what I want or need.

8. Which startups in the martech arena are you keenly following?

I follow startup brands! I’m incredibly excited about the continued growth of D2C brands that are launching with a customer first mindset and building their brands around real customers and their needs. We’re thrilled to help these companies achieve their customer-first goals.

9. Being a company centered around marketing automation in E-commerce and advertising how important do you think scalability is?

Extremely important. Headliner Labs is completely scalable and that’s the key to our rapid growth.

10. What book are you currently reading?

I read a lot of founder biographies and profiles. I just finished the Everything Store about Amazon. It’s a must read!

11. One piece of advice you always follow irrespective of circumstances

Running a business is full of surprises – good ones, and bad ones. No matter what, stay focused and stay positive!