Influential Woman · Marketing Tech

Alison Lillie

Head of Commercial Marketing, North America, Seismic

San Diego, CA

Certifications · Degrees · Memberships

Degree University of San Francisco Degree Marketing degree Degree Troy High School

Her Story

About Alison

In college, I had no idea what I wanted to do, though I really enjoyed writing and collaborating with people and thinking creatively. None of my family is in the business world, so I didn't know what the options were. I majored in finance for my first three years just because I heard that's what you do and that's what's going to make you the most successful, but I very quickly learned I wasn't super into it. I took one marketing class where they invited the VP of Marketing from Marriott Hotels to speak, and she talked about all the cool things she was doing to drive people to the brand and run events. I was immediately like, oh wow, this is what I want to do. So I changed my major to marketing. Through professors who had worked high up in ad agencies, I learned the agency pathway sounded really exciting and seemed like a great place to start your career and get a lot of exposure early on to many different companies. I had interned for a golf club that used HubSpot, so I narrowed in on HubSpot agencies and got my first job at one. My day-to-day now at Seismic is really looking at our commercial segment accounts, seeing what are the different verticals that we do the best in, what accounts we can see through our intent data and other website data that are in market right now, and what is the right type of messaging to bring these people in to Seismic and show them that we can help them craft a strategy to turn all of their sales plays into revenue using our sales enablement tool.

Her Interview

Ten minutes with Alison

01What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?

I really am a huge proponent of agencies early in your career because you get exposure to so many different brands and companies quicker than you would if you just went and immediately worked in-house. I definitely think the more you can learn earlier and the wider you can get your exposure, versus narrowing yourself early on, that really helps you longer term. Just try to have as much of a holistic understanding of business as you can, not just marketing, but understand how companies make money, what it means for people to be profitable, and how that works. That way, when you do narrow in on what you want to do, you know how that contributes to a company's growth.

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