Category: The 10 Most Influential Leaders to Follow in 2022 Vol2_profile
Kelli Maxwell: Helping Start-ups to Amplify their Brands
Since Kelli Maxwell was little, she knew that she wanted to be her own boss, but she wasn’t sure how. “Defiant” is what the adults that raised Kelli would describe her as. She comes from a Montana ranch family with a strong work ethic and entrepreneurial spirit. She worked for a financial firm for ten years and in that time, she worked her way into the position of marketing director. She also discovered that she had a talent and love for marketing, but insurance is boring and old-school advertising methods like newspaper and local tv were on their way out. Kelli didn’t feel fulfilled. It was during this time that she created her first company, Ever After Events, A Princess Party company, where Kelli Maxwell and her team would dress up as popular princess characters and perform at birthday parties and events. This is where Kelli’s gift for working with people and creating authentic content blossomed. She started taking on several freelance clients and decided to quit her full-time job and make the leap to starting her agency.
So, Kelli Maxwell founded Ember Marketing Group, which specializes in Authentic Brand Amplification. Creating videos and content tailored to each client, the agency handles all aspects of digital marketing from content creation to ads, copy, and PR. In the last year, Kelli Maxwell founded another brand of her business, Ember Marketing the Group. This organization is designed for start-ups and small businesses with no marketing budget. A subscription-based private group, it provides knowledge, tips, and action items to market start-ups as well as one on one monthly strategy sessions with each member.
Helping Clients to Grow
According to Kelli, Ember Marketing Group works with clients from every industry. From custom epoxy floors to home builders to realtors to gyms to pharmacies and coffee companies and more. Kelli Maxwell takes pride in working with PEOPLE. She sees first-hand that so many agencies just offer cookie-cutter marketing packages and create generic industry-related content, without even getting to know their clients. Ember Marketing Group focuses on spending so much time with its clients that Kelli and her team can authentically market them and their company through videos, photos, captions, and copy that is perfectly on brand for them. All of the marketing group’s packages are customized to each client’s specific needs and brand. The agency has continued to grow and expand along with services and platforms such as TikTok. Ember Marketing Group doesn’t believe in locking people into contracts; Kelli prefers to let her work speak for itself as proven by her track record. Once a client signs on with the company, they don’t leave, in fact most of her client base has been with her since the agency’s inception. The agency does an exceptional job going above and beyond for each client and positioning them as THE expert of what they do, through the content it produces for them.
Tackling Challenges
Personally, Kelli’s biggest challenge was learning how to delegate and manage her time to ensure that it is spent doing what she is best at, which includes meeting with people, strategizing, and filming with her clients. She had to fill in the holes on the backend for bookkeeping, social media management, processes, and systems to grow. She currently has two independent contractors on her team and one full-time employee. As an agency, she found her biggest challenge was the huge disconnect between the established businesses that can afford the video production and social media management they need and the start-ups who desperately need it but can’t afford it. Multiple times a week she has conversations with small businesses who have been taken advantage of by a salesman claiming to be a marketer or a cookie-cutter agency who overcharged and under-delivered. Kelli’s solution for serving these people at a price they can afford is Ember Marketing the Group. Along with her business partner Chareese Jorgensen, Kelli Maxwell teaches members of the group basic content creation and marketing principals. She and her team assists them with creating their content, encouraging them through the process and strategizing with them, identifying the best methods to grow their business per their industry, at a small price point that they can afford.
When Going Gets Tough
Shortly after Kelli Maxwell resigned from her previous job and started her agency, she went through a divorce. With suddenly no security net and no backup plan, Kelli burned through her savings and had to sell her house and move in with her best friend to survive. That friend along with her supportive community at the gym were instrumental in getting Kelli through that first year. She refused to give up and look for a job so it was do or die for Kelli. She gave that first year and a half everything she had to make it on her own and she is happy to report that in just three years she has purchased her first investment property, has plans to build a house this year, and has built a six-figure marketing agency that continues to grow. This came from a willingness to celebrate doing the hardest things in life and business and continuing to push forward despite the hardships.
Future Roadmap
Kelli’s company continues to grow rapidly. She is most excited about continuing to expand her client base and team, growing Ember Marketing Group’s subscription group to help start-ups, and continuing to grow her brand as one of the best marketers of her generation. Kelli Maxwell is also working on her first book and she can’t wait to debut that in the coming year.
Suggestions for Young Entrepreneurs
Kelli says, “The hardest part of working with start-ups is when reality sets in. Everyone has brilliant dreams and ideas and when they finally take the leap and launch, they quickly find out it is a steep and gruelling climb just to break even. Make sure your personal relationships are strong, your time management is stronger and you have the fortitude to overcome the discouragement, dips, and hits that come with any start-up. Do your research and make sure your idea is viable for your audience and you have a strong chance of building a brand or company that can survive and generate revenue.”
Roberto Gilardino: Serving Clients with Corporate Advisory Solutions
Meet Roberto Gilardino, the Regional Partner of Horizons Corporate Advisory is a unique advisory Firm with 30 operatives country law firms. The Firm provides international highly specialized legal and tax solutions that allow organizations to thrive in today’s complex transnational corporate environment.
Roberto oversees the organization’s transnational operations from the head office of Horizons situated at the heart of downtown Shanghai. The team’s skillsets rest in corporate issues and property safeguard and liaise day-to-day with Horizons’ regional offices to serve as the advisory’s global gateway.
Roberto’s background and skillsets lie in international business and corporate law with special attention on corporate government, strategy, and shareholder protection. With a deep sense of cross-cultural issues in cross-border transactions and corporate matters, both Roberto and his team provide clients with unique insights and strategies related to the difficult-to-read, often behind-thescenes, nuances in transnational business.
Before joining Horizons, he served professionally in ministries, governmental bodies, and the private sector, primarily in China. Roberto is an Italian national, he is fluent in Italian, English, Mandarin Chinese, Japanese and Korean.
Addressing Corporate Challenges
Roberto and his team at Horizons provide turnkey legal, tax, and financial solutions to comprehensively safeguard cross-border investments. Horizons’ professionals in more than 30 jurisdictions worldwide serve clients by addressing international corporate challenges through a local, national, and international lens. As a result, investments are comprehensively compliant with all the laws that it geographically touches and clients have full control of their cross-border investments, despite geographical distance and cultural differences.
Most of Horizons’ clients are international companies or corporate groups. The Firm’s employees identify themselves as client-centric professionals. Instead of the same traditional listening- executing- invoicing, Roberto and his team engage clients by building long-term trust and identifying their corporate challenges through delving deep into their business operations. Through this approach, the Firm uncovers the intangibles to formulate solutions that fit these unprecedented times.
Equally, Horizons value the unique strength of collaboration. The team brings a broad range of experiences. With such diverse perspectives and know-how, the Firm tackles solutions from multifaced perspectives which are highly attuned to the ever-changing business landscape.
If you greatly desire something, have the guts to stake everything on obtaining it. Come what may, be always a kind spirit!
Tackling Primary Challenges
Roberto believes, the challenge for many corporate advisories is navigating clients through multiple jurisdictions in this evolving world. With the rapid globalization, many businesses not only need to stay abreast of legal, tax, and accounting changes but also need to understand the various cultural and language gaps to thrive in unfamiliar jurisdictions.
As a result, Horizons Corporate Advisory has positioned itself to not simply practice law. Rather the team understands real-world challenges, is committed to conveying legal doctrine with clarity and accessibility and is sensitive to the language and culture of the client.
Through this manner, Horizons’ team opens dialogues, drills down challenging corporate problems and ultimately safeguards the client for the present and future.
Making the Industry Balanced and Equal
According to Roberto, diversity and inclusion are the two hot topics across the industries. While various studies have shown that diverse teams outperform in the fourth quartile by 36% in profitability, the consultancy field, such as legal firms, often remain behind in cultivating diverse teams and inclusive workplaces. Specifically, progression from entry-level roles to seniority in minorities and females remains relatively low in the legal field, resulting in a lack of senior management who understand and address the specific challenges faced by such professionals. Ultimately, lack of diversity at the senior level can lead to inadequate access to mentors and training designated to minority or female professionals.
Horizons ensure career opportunities and mentorships are formulated to match and develop each talent without unconscious bias. In this manner, the Firm strives to go beyond the surface and integrate individuals’ unique strengths to cultivate a multifaced and multidimensional team that can serve clients from all walks of life.
Suggestions for Female Entrepreneurs and Lawyers
Roberto says, “The legal world has advanced from the traditional patriarchal industry. Increased visibility of women in law has spearheaded practises such as work-life balance and transparency in gender pay gaps. For young women entering the legal world today, there are more options to improve work flexibility.”
He also thinks Covid-19 has accelerated agile working practices which align with out-of-work responsibilities including raising families. Aspiring women lawyers should not be intimidated by the specific challenges faced by women in a predominantly male-dominated profession. Rather seek opportunities and firms that support female leadership and work-life balance.
Roberto adds, “At Horizons, we encourage our female professionals to speak at events to increase the visibility of women in the legal field. In this manner, we can play an active role in changing the perception of what lawyers are perceived to be and aspire more females to progress into senior roles.”
Future Roadmap
With a massive experience of more than 40 years in advising both inbound and outbound China investment, the Firm has witnessed the rapid economic growth and changing legal landscape in China. Today, under the leadership of Roberto, the Firm is increasingly assisting consumer goods and high-tech companies to establish entities in China. The growth of technology and the middle-class market around China has generated a huge appetite for foreign companies to seize opportunities. Whilst many manufacturing plants in traditional sectors such as retail are moving operations to South Asian countries or Eastern Europe. Therefore, the foreign direct investments (‘FDI’) in China are swiftly evolving, and China is no longer the low-cost labour and manufacturing country. Rather, FDI in China shall align with national policy, namely the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021- 2025) for National Economic and Social Development Through 2035 published on March 12, 2021.
As a result, Horizons is assisting clients in implementing a new playbook that correlates with national strategy and the domestic market. And excited to play a substantial role in shaping the corporate structure for new clients entering the China market.