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Kerry Bennett is marketing partner at Upfront Ventures, a VC firm based in LA that specializes in technology businesses.
Favorite project you’ve worked on? Every year, our small but mighty team produces one of the largest investor conferences in the world, the Upfront Summit. Three days, 1,500 attendees, highly curated, and our heartfelt contribution to Los Angeles and the wider tech and venture community. It’s also an incredible marathon of production, whether we’re building a tent on the field of the Rose Bowl, flying a hot-air balloon over a party, or facilitating some world-class speakers. I’m always so proud and grateful to be a part of producing it.
What’s your favorite ad campaign? I don’t think traditional advertising is all that interesting anymore—even the concept of a Super Bowl ad feels outdated and bloated. I’m much more compelled by holistic efforts; here in LA, Angel City Football Club has done an incredible job at building a brand with and through its passionate community, not on top of it. Every touchpoint, from social to merch to events to content to comms to mission, feels authentic and fresh.
That said, I think this summer’s Barbie movie blitz is the most delightful old-school campaign, in the best possible way. A real-life Barbie dream house? C’mon! The marketing is so fun, so over-the-top, and so dialed in.
One thing we can’t guess from your LinkedIn profile? I’m a real introvert whose favorite pastime is reading. Last year, I read 147 books, virtually none of which were about business or marketing.
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What marketing trend are you most optimistic about? Least? I’m actually really interested in the trend toward smaller in-house marketing teams with external partners. Unlike almost any other team in the org, great marketing specialists aren’t interchangeable; a full-stack dev can work on most any product, but you can’t swap your editorial lead for your growth lead—at least not successfully.
I have a theory that the most successful marketing teams for all but the largest companies are going to be a handful of in-house marketing athletes who can manage a rotating roster of the very best operational marketing specialists. And probably each marketing team will need at least one person who can leverage AI to help the team scale, whether through content development, message targeting, automation, etc.
What’s one marketing-related podcast/social account/series you’d recommend? My content feed is not heavy on marketing, because I genuinely believe marketers are better off pursuing curiosity about culture and people, whether that’s storytelling, or design, or photography, or psychology, or economics. I think that’s how we bring art, insights, and innovation to the science and the discipline that we practice every day.
But I would 100% suggest David Spinks’s Substack newsletter. Not only is he the guru of community, but his very readable newsletter offers gems and insights that I find applicable to virtually all levers of marketing strategy.