Legally Bond
Legally Bond
An Interview with Katie Toomey, Legal Marketing
In this episode of Legally Bond, Kim speaks with Bond's Chief Marketing Officer Katie Toomey. Katie discusses her journey to Bond and provides some insights on how the marketing team works with attorneys on relationship building and communication skills to grow their practices.
Hello and welcome to Legally Bond, a podcast presented by the law firm Bond, shenek and King. I'm your host, kim Wolf Price. Legally Bond is a podcast that focuses on all things law in the legal field and it has law firms or businesses. That often means focusing on the operations side of law firms. So on today's episode of the podcast we're going to do just that and speak with Katie Tumey, the chief marketing officer here at Bond, shenek and King. Hey, katie, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 2:Hi Kim. Thanks so much for the opportunity today.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, we're excited to have you join us. I'm really glad that you're here to talk about marketing, communications, business development, some of the very interesting professional opportunities available at law firms, and for our listeners to have the chance to get to know you a little bit.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Well, again, thanks so much. I'm so happy to be here and this feels like I'm officially official after four months.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think so. Once you're on Legally Bond, I think it's official. Also, as you know, first, as we always do with guests, we ask you to tell us a little bit about your background. So would you mind telling us a little bit about you, where you're from, school, family, whatever you think might be interesting?
Speaker 2:So I am born and raised in Oswego, new York. I have been sort of a central New Yorker at heart my whole life. That said, I did go to SUNY Plattsburgh for undergrad and then ended up at Iona University for my Masters in Public Relations. From there I ended up working at Fujifilm Medical Systems, 1-800-flowerscom, novelis and then, most recently Center State CEO.
Speaker 2:So Novelis kind of brought me back to CNY. I know we want to talk about that in a little bit. I have two boys, george and Patrick. George just turned 10 and Patrick is 9 and they are the funniest, coolest little guys.
Speaker 2:I know, and I'm just like I said, I'm happy to be home. I never thought for a zillion years I would end up back in Central New York and I think that a big part of it has to do with my career and my career choices. So I get to raise my kids around family and friends and just be part of the bigger picture here in Central New.
Speaker 1:York. That's fantastic. I mean, there's something about 315. Yeah, good people, I think I may have actually uttered the words. I'm never moving back to 315 when I was young.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you go away and then you check out a grocery store and someone says, have a nice day to you. And you're like, oh my gosh, nice person. Thanks so much.
Speaker 1:It's been a while, well, and I think there is something about careers and having backup that's kind of helpful too. 100%, 100%. So you mentioned some of the places that you worked before. Do you want to talk a little bit more about that professional background, those types of roles you had before you became our CMO?
Speaker 2:Sure Yep. So primarily I was in public relations and corporate communications for the first three quarters of my career. I started at Fujifilm Medical Systems doing a lot of business to business, public relations, and from there you know, after after a long time doing healthcare PR, medical device PR, it's not, you know, when you're 29 years old that might be, isn't what you want to do for the rest of your life. At least it wasn't for me. I ended up at 1800flowerscom and had a chance to dabble in some consumer public relations, kind of feel out what that world would be like for myself.
Speaker 2:I ended up having the opportunity right after that to be back in a suigo of all places, which is just about 40 miles north of Syracuse, to work at Novellas.
Speaker 2:They reached out to me, said that they would be in need of a public relations and communications manager for the plant. There was a huge expansion going on for their annealing process aluminum annealing process that would mean that the Ford F-150 would be using their aluminum. So I was part of like spreading the message to not only our community but also just sort of oversee the corporate communications and internal communications for that plant. I ended up having two small children and did a little bit of freelance work but then ultimately ended up at the greater suigo Fulton Chamber of Commerce where I was the executive director and eventually went into the role of vice president of member engagement at Center State CEO, which is their parent company. So in all I've sort of either been in a communications role, a relationship building role, a sales-ish role, a customer service role. So so much of my career has had a lot to do with relationship building and just sort of being the messenger one way or another.
Speaker 1:That's fantastic. Should we say that Center State CEO is right across the street from Bonn Syracuse office? You have a short walk.
Speaker 2:A hop skip and a jump, I can leave our office and walk right across the street, so I have a lot of friends over there, that's for sure, and I get to bump into them on the way in the office.
Speaker 1:That's great, and maybe we should invite one of them to the podcast at some point in time. I think that would be a great idea.
Speaker 2:They have a lot of good stuff going on over across the street and I'm proud to have been part of that organization, that's for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so it wasn't something you were looking for. But you know we're always trying to sort of build our careers, so what things were good there. But what drew you to Bonn?
Speaker 2:You know I was prepping for this a little bit and thinking about it and bottom line it's the people I have shared with some of our young associates recently that you really never know what is going to happen when you walk into a room.
Speaker 2:I had the opportunity to attend a happy hour with the bond team when I was in my previous role at Center State and just ended up chatting up a bunch of the attorneys, some of the leadership, and one thing led to another and one of our team leaders mentioned that there was a chief marketing officer position open but it had some traditional PR communications.
Speaker 2:There were needs in that area, but most of it was focused on relationship building, business development and just helping guide our firm and the attorneys and helping them sell themselves the business. And I kind of perked right off but then sat on the information for a little while and about a week later I reached out and two days later I was interviewing and then having lunch with you, kim, I think four days later, and then trapped in a room for seven hours and interviewing with as many people as humanly possible. So I didn't walk into that happy hour ever thinking for a zillion million reasons that I would possibly be walking out of that happy hour with a job opportunity. But it goes to show you that you know, if you position yourself in the right place at the right time and you always see something as sort of an opportunity or an opportunity to grow, good things happen. It's about taking a little leap of faith too, I think sometimes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like being open to that opportunity. Yeah, well, we're glad that you were open to that opportunity and that you know you can help us a lot in all the markets. I mean your experience with Chambers it's huge, right, it's the business development, it's the connecting people and that's a big part. So I guess maybe we should tell people a little bit about that. So lawyers are empress of law. That's what law firms do. Okay, obvious, that's the obvious and pretty straightforward. But so what is the role of a professional services group like marketing and communications teams within?
Speaker 1:a law firm.
Speaker 2:We are in the business of relationship building, knowing our clients internally. Externally we are the messengers, the brand ambassadors, sometimes the cheerleaders for the team, and we really help answer the why right, like why bond, why this specific attorney? We really just want to help always position the firm in the best possible light, right? So there's always going to be the overarching bond brand and then you drill down a little bit and then we have 16 offices, so the messaging for each of those offices might be a little tiny bit different and you drill down even more and it's the practice groups, and then you get all the way down right to the attorneys themselves.
Speaker 2:We have 300 attorneys who always have to have that bond focus, Like they're part of the bond brand. But everyone has a personal brand and how do you sort of navigate as an individual and sort of tackle things based on your interests, your goals, Like what boards would you want to be part of? How do you want to serve your community where you reside? So you always want to keep bond in mind, but you want to be yourself and you want to be authentic and I think our role is to like help coach that and bring the best out of our attorneys here at Bond.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, I think that's a great way to look at it. There's also like the day to day stuff, right, there's RFPs, there's press releases Is that all your team's responsibility? And I don't know, maybe things like podcasts.
Speaker 2:Yes, podcasts. Funny, here we are Some, some blondes on legally bonds. But we are in charge of obviously traditional marketing, social media, communications and PR events, business development and I always make the joke all other duties as assigned, because any communications or marketing team is going to be the sort of catchall for some stuff and we're totally fine with that. Right Like you, don't go into this business if you can't be agile or pivot from one thing to the next, and that's kind of what makes it a fun industry to work in.
Speaker 1:I have to say that's a little bit of what it's like to practice. Law sometimes is having to have the ability to take on 10 different things for 10 different clients and kind of figure it out. So that's good that you see it that way, because that's very similar to how law practice can work.
Speaker 2:And it's actually been. That's actually been a way, kim, where that I've been able to relate with a lot of our attorneys. But first there's a lot of people have mentioned that I don't have a legal background or I haven't done legal PR or marketing in the past, and then I just remind them that I'm responsible for knowing my client, regardless of what it is right Like. Never in a zillion years did I think I'd know about aluminum or radiation dose or the back end of the floral industry or any consumer goods.
Speaker 2:It's just like you pick up little things along the way that make you a more well-rounded person or able to just add something different to the room. So I always look at it as a strength, right Like you walk into a room and it's okay that you're a little different because you have a different background, a different perspective. That's not anything that's going to hinder the situation. It may actually just help people think in a different way than sort of the wash rinse repeat. Maybe I can bring a little flair to our situation and I know my team's already doing that. They're great, they're creative, they're fun and they're great people.
Speaker 1:That's awesome and we say that all the time when we bring in new attorneys. Right, you have to get to know your client's business. So I know a weird amount about dark and lit, fiber and the telecommunications industry from a long time ago, and so it's the same thing You're getting to know your client and that's the lawyers.
Speaker 2:That's what we do here, regardless of what department we are in. Really it's what makes communications and marketing and sales and just sort of that umbrella of interpersonal communications a fun and marketing a good, like a fun job. It's an interesting job, no matter what.
Speaker 1:There's no two days of life, which is good, which is a good thing. Well, so, going off of that, attorneys are always busy, right? Serving clients, that's what we do, that's how we keep the lights on, that's what we service, we provide. How do you get through to them? How do you explain the importance of sort of focusing on marketing and communications to busy people who that's not their field of focus?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's okay.
Speaker 2:Like I said, it's okay that it's not their bread and butter, right? I think one of the things that I was surprised to learn when I joined is that there really isn't a marketing or beauty focus throughout law school. So you have to sort of start from the ground and work your way up in terms of relationship building and amplifying our message and just being thoughtful and positioning yourself with the right people. It's been four months, right, so we're still sort of figuring out the best way to do that, but I've already found the people here at Bond to be beyond welcoming and beyond open to new ideas or sort of thinking outside of the box and, as I shared previously, the New York City market is a lot different than the Buffalo market, which is a lot different than our Naples office, so it's going to be different. The answer is going to be different for all 300 attorneys, all 16 offices, and it's our job just to help make those connections and build those relationships, to figure out the different pieces to the puzzle, to make everything fit together.
Speaker 1:You know what's interesting. I always like to talk to the students who might be listening For someone who might be in a PR or communications or marketing program right now. What makes a role like yours a good choice? Who are people who might be drawn to that kind of work and successful?
Speaker 2:So obviously I think you have to be interested in being the messenger or whether the message is good, bad. You kind of have to be willing to be in the trenches from the beginning of your career. One thing that I think makes being in this role and in this world kind of unique is that you are positioned very closely to the leaders in the organizations that you serve from the beginning. Right, you know the messages, you know the why, probably better than a lot of the other employees, regardless of the industry and the organization. And especially if you're in an in-house position, in-house communications position I just want to add that in there. But I think because you're positioned around the leaders in the organization, you're automatically surrounded by people who are super passionate about the organization. They've probably been there longer, have a lot of industry knowledge and you know that's across any industry, and it has been my perspective that I have always found myself in a room of people that are smarter than me and I always take something away from it. You always learn something. There's always key takeaways and nuggets of information that you never forget.
Speaker 2:I have been blessed in that I have had a number of really good leaders in my life, a lot of really good mentors in my life. I am still remembering things that Courtney Cramer was telling me 15 years ago, probably to the day, at Fujifilm, just in terms of like business etiquette and answering emails and communications or writing press releases and some best practices. Fiona Bell at Novellis was a ray of sunshine and had this really crazy way of finding a positive spin and just approaching things differently. And then, of course, you know, you have the Andrew Fishes and the Rob Simpsons of the world who just were so deeply passionate about their work that it was infectious and it made you want to go to work to every single day and spread the word about our organization and our region, and that was really what made me passionate about coming to bond. The people here really truly care about their communities, they care about their clients, they care about each other, and who would want to pass up an opportunity like that?
Speaker 1:I mean, I agree, I tell people all the time that I never once drove the wrong way to work once I started working here and you know we get like on autopilot, especially like working parents, and as soon as I made the switch, that was it and we were always going every day.
Speaker 2:You. That was one of the first things you shared with me, and there was something about that conversation, kim, that stuck with me Again, like you said, we're working moms, there's a lot of balls in the air all the time, and to show up every day and enjoy yourself is like winning the Jeff pod as far as I'm concerned.
Speaker 1:It really is. And I have to say, you know, thanks to our producer, kate, for always making that part of the good stuff for me here.
Speaker 2:Yep, she does, and I've never been proud or to work with a great team, as I am here at VON, so it's been really fun and learning her, but like the good kind, you don't know what you don't know right.
Speaker 1:Right like a challenge, something that you want to get into and figure out Absolutely Well. We really appreciate you coming on the podcast today. If there is there any last words of something that, like, stands out to you or anything you'd like to point out about your team.
Speaker 2:We have a lot to offer on our team. I think that there's a lot of unsung heroes on our team because, you know, we are the people behind the curtain that make a lot of things happen, and one of the things that I'm committed to is educating our staff and our team about the great things that we do here, because we are a resource right Like we look at ourselves as an internal service for our attorneys and for the organization, and I want people to know just how hardworking and intelligent and creative the people are that I get to work with every single day, and you know again like working for great leaders here at VON makes it even better. It makes us want to work hard for them.
Speaker 1:So I'm happy to do that, absolutely. I mean, I think that there are really great folks leading and new leaders emerging all the time. And I do want to say shout out to Ashley Cahill on your team. I just looked at the invitation for our all attorneys meeting. It looks fantastic.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I agree, ashley, Like it's. I believe I answered that email. It's perfect how?
Speaker 1:often do you get to do?
Speaker 2:that, yeah, exactly Like really great, makes life much easier. I have the benefit. What's that saying? You hire well and manage a little like they keep the shop running, whether I'm running around in a different state or if I'm right down the hall like I know, work is getting done and at the highest possible quality, so I'm very grateful for them, absolutely, absolutely Well, as in line, I get to work with most of them at some point in time, so it's great, all right.
Speaker 1:Well, thanks again. So we're going to have to have you come back. This is for you, all right, we can talk about a project or one of these cool initiatives underway for bond and you can let us all know about the marketing side of it. So please come back. You got it. I'll be back anytime, all right? Thanks so much, thank you. Thank you for tuning into this episode of Legally Bond. If you're listening and have any questions for me, want to hear from someone at the firm or have a suggestion for a future topic, please email us at legallybondbskcom. Also, don't forget to rate, review and subscribe to Legally Bond wherever podcasts are downloaded. Until our next talk, be well.
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