Episode Details

An integrated agency. A rare edge in the Chinese market. And a deep frustration with brand strategy that lives in a PDF.

Steph built Mulberry Marketing on the belief that brand is a system of belief not a logo set, not a colour palette, and definitely not a document that sits unopened in a Google Drive folder. Her edge is real: one of the only Australian agencies with genuine reach into the Chinese market through WeChat and Little Red Book. Her obsession is making sure strategy actually lives in the businesses she works with, not just in the work she delivers. She's candid about the harder parts of the journey. Growing a team, losing clients, scaling back, and sitting across from people she'd invested in and letting them go. She learned to separate ego from decision-making. She's still curious about everything.

IN THIS EPISODE

How Mulberry works as an integrated agency and the specialist Chinese marketing capability that almost no Australian agencies offer The hardest decision: letting go of her team when the pipeline dried up and learning that success isn't measured by headcount Why curiosity is her core hiring criteria and how it drives fresh thinking across industries she hasn't worked in before Using AI to automate her weekly client update process what used to take 90 minutes now takes minutes The brand strategy failure that shaped her most: a well-resourced client back to clunky messaging within weeks of delivery What she's teaching her kids: empathy and compassion because in a world increasingly shaped by AI, the human skills are the ones that will matter most