Interview with Katrina McCarter Founder of Marketing to Mums

Women control 80% of household purchasing decisions, they are also one of the hardest audiences to market to because there is so much competition for their attention. 

In episode 10 of Mumbition The Podcast by Mums & Co, Carrie and Lucy chat with Katrina McCarter. Katrina is a marketing strategist and author, who specialises in helping businesses sell more effectively to the world's most powerful consumer -  mums. Katrina shares her decades of marketing knowledge and range of experience working with small startups to corporates …

Tell us more about Marketing to Mums and what you do?

“I'm the founder of Marketing to Mums and that's a marketing and research consultancy. I call myself a marketing strategist and I specialise in helping businesses from small startups, right through to corporates. I help them sell more effectively to the world's most powerful consumer who are mums. And I'm a really prolific researcher of mother's behaviours. I share a lot of my insights through two books that I've published called Marketing to Mums and the Mother Of All Opportunities. I love speaking both at conferences and virtual events, and I regularly contribute to business media throughout Australia and also in the US.”

What do you love most about your business right now?

“For me, there's a couple of things. Flexibility is massive. I've got three teenagers. One's in year 12. So the opportunity to fly out, drop them off at school, and pick them up. For me, flexibility is really, really precious. The other thing that I would say is I love the diversity and the meaningful work that I do. I absolutely love being the voice of women all around the world and sharing their views with businesses, with brands, with employers, to change how we value and represent women.”

What have you had to stop doing in your life to enable all of these wheels to keep turning in your business?

“I've stopped doing it all myself. I have been in business for 10 years, and over that time, I've experienced burnout. I've done the 3:00 AM mornings on a consistent basis, building a startup. And whilst I love being a one-woman show I do like to collaborate with others and I've really had to build my team of trusted freelancers. So I have one or two people in my pocket that I've worked with over a long-term basis and I've added some more. This year because I've now got two businesses that I'm managing, so I've learned that I can't do it all by myself and I have to have some good team members around me.”

What do you think are the most important transferable skills between being a mum and being a business owner?

“Problem solving. Without question, no one can solve a problem and get things done like a mum can. And being able to transfer that into business, there is a really strong can-do approach by mothers in business. I just think that they really know they will solve a problem quite quickly because that's what they do all day long. That's what we do. We're constantly solving problems. So that's an easy question.”

What do you think is the most important tip for anyone starting their business journey to grow?

“Something that I would really recommend is niche. I know that a lot of new business owners are really frightened about niching in terms of the market they want to go after, and this is one of the biggest mistakes that I see people make when they market to mums, is for instance, they'll try and be all things to all mothers and you just can't be, we all know how diverse we are. So I really encourage business owners to niche and really understand that niche very, very deeply. They are the two biggest issues that I see business owners make as a mistake that really cost them dearly.”

Want to know more about Katrina's insights into the world’s most powerful consumer?

How do you get the attention of the mum target market? Why is being brave and bold essential to your business? And are collaborations the key to success?

Listen to the episode now to find out.

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