You do not need to do everything on your own. As innovators, we see the gaps in our industry and we want to fix it. But it doesn’t mean we need to do it all, what potential referral partners can you connect to make the final result even better? For example, I am a marketing strategist and in order to run a full marketing wheel, I would need to grow a mid-sized agency. For me, that sounds like my personal logistical nightmare. Instead, I organize exactly what my clients need and connect them with agencies that align with their values and communication style.
As part of my series about young people who are making an important social impact”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Ruoyun Xu Killian.
With over 10 years in the Digital Marketing industry, Ruoyun Xu Killian works with changemakers to continue amplifying the impact they’re making by implementing Human-Centered marketing and business systems.
As a Digital Marketing Strategist, she has supported clients such as BigCommerce, Slow North, Serenity Kids, University of Texas Center for Sports Communication and Media & others to build an online experience that reflects the trusting relationship they’re cultivating with their community.
Her mission to put the human experience back into marketing and business has given Ruoyun a platform to speak at a variety of organizations and events including Bumble Bizz, St Edward’s University, Concordia University, ACC Fashion Incubator, Creative Meets Business Conference, Texas Women in Business Conference, to name a few.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit how you grew up?
I grew up in a world of polar opposites and had to learn how to navigate my own path at a young age. I was born in China and immigrated to Houston, TX when I was 4 years old with my parents. Growing up Asian American and navigating the waters of finding my own identity coming from two drastically different cultures has been a rollercoaster. I mainly grew up in Austin, TX but have lived all over the world from Houston to Chicago to France. My experience living in all of these different countries has allowed me to stay grounded and see the context of the world as a whole. My parents were entrepreneurs who built a trades company where they sold US manufactured medical equipment to Chinese hospitals. It wasn’t a shocker in my family when I decided to start my second business, C3nami, as my parents already paved the way for it to be acceptable for me to stray away from the typical 9–5.
Is there a particular book or organization that made a significant impact on you growing up? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?
(Note to the editor: I don’t have per say a specific book or an organization but I do have a movie if this counts.)
Growing up, I didn’t have a role model that looked like me in the US. While I had plenty of Asian dramas I can binge, the life lessons taught in those dramas didn’t reflect my coming-of-age story.
But there was one, My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It was astounding how much I related to the cultural conflicts that the main character, Toula, had to go through. From going to Greek and in my case, Chinese school instead of Brownies, to getting teased about the food that I brought to school.
Those moments where she faced adversity by both sides of her culture allowed me to feel finally seen. That this isolating experience wasn’t only exclusive to the Asian American narrative but happened to many other minorities.
Through watching this movie, I was able to see that it wasn’t my inner narrative of “I’m not American or Asian enough”. It was just how people reacted to something that they deemed as not normal.
I was being isolated because I stood out in both cultures.
In this moment of clarity I was able to have a choice. To choose to assimilate more into a culture or choose to be on my own.
I chose to be my own and I wore my uniqueness like a badge of honor.
Bullying or being shamed is never easy. But that clarity allowed me to step out of my personal narrative and realized the reality and that I still had a choice. It’s one of my favorite movies to watch and be reminded that in our own uniqueness, we are enough.
How do you define “Making A Difference”? Can you explain what you mean or give an example?
To make a difference is to know that we each have the power to make change and have the bravery to take that first step. It’s not the size of the impact that matters but the fact that each individual believes that they can make a difference to better their world. Many of us often feel like we don’t have the power to change our current reality, when in fact we do. We may be aware that there are improvements that need to be done. Yet it is until we own our power that we can be a part of change in our own unique way that is when we have the courage to stand up.
Ok super. Let’s now jump to the main part of our interview. You are currently leading an organization that aims to make a social impact. Can you tell us a bit about what you and your organization are trying to change in our world today?
We are shifting the expectation of how business and marketing operates from a transactional approach to a human-centered approach. Many of my clients are changemakers who are part of businesses that are actively making a change in the world but they get frustrated with the transactional expectations, the “hustling” or “hunting” that it took to be successful.
I’ve helped my clients adjust their systems to be designed with an emphasis on the human relationship and impact the business is making. Rather than getting lost in the need to get more people, we get back to the core of why they created their businesses in the first place. It’s about continuing to deepen the relationships with our customers AND our team members. In doing so, we’re able to humanize the two drivers of innovation in our world — business and marketing so that we can humanize the rest of our world.
Through my work I am setting standards in the marketing industry by giving marketers a space to speak up and be seen. I am a speaker at universities where the next generation of marketers are being cultivated and at conferences designed for businesses and marketers. My articles act as resources for marketers and business owners to navigate the online realm. I love setting real expectations on hard topics like Advertising, Diversity and Inclusion, Communications with fellow industry experts on my Real Talk with Ruoyun vidcast.
Can you tell us the backstory about what inspired you to originally feel passionate about this cause?
When I started my social media marketing agency, C3nami, 5 years ago, I noticed that it was like the wild wild west for business owners to take control of their digital marketing efforts. They felt like marketing online was ingenuine, like it was all about numbers and not about the relationships that they’re so passionate about building with their audiences. They didn’t have many options: either invest in a really good agency, work with an SEO company who “said” they did social media, or look around the room and say “You’re a millennial you should know how to do social media marketing right?”
There wasn’t a space for business owners to be able to ask vulnerable questions about what success looks like in marketing or become confident in handling everything on their own. I’ve had so many clients come to me partially traumatized by working with a bad marketer because they just didn’t know how to ask the right questions.There wasn’t a safe space for them to try, learn, and refine their marketing as the algorithm changes and evolves.
That’s why I created C3nami and why I work individually now with scaling businesses to build their internal systems. We wanted to take away the smoke screen of marketing and focus on designing the system that they can use. We wanted them to know what expectation to set to achieve their goals. We wanted business owners and marketers be confident and excited about the online presence that they’re creating instead of having it be another task.
Many of us have ideas, dreams, and passions, but never manifest it. They don’t get up and just do it. But you did. Was there an “Aha Moment” that made you decide that you were actually going to step up and do it? What was that final trigger?
For me, this has been an evolution. C3nami, my agency, allowed me to prove that using Human-Centered marketing created the results by doing the work but I knew that there was so much more that I wanted to do. I wanted the industry to refocus on the human connections that make business come alive. Most importantly, I wanted some standards set so marketers can stop being burnt out and business owners aren’t traumatized by a bad actor.
The moment that I realized it was a new era was when I knew we had successfully created a humanistic way to do marketing through my agency. But we need this to be a standard and the best way to do that is to present my personal brand as a thought leader in our industry.
That was my moment of clarity but the courage to sunset my agency, my “baby”, and start this third business in the middle of the pandemic has been in reserve since I was 16 years old when I became a suicide survivor.
There is a saying that I live by to this day, “If I stopped existing in the next moment would I ever regret anything?”
Daunting, I know. I had a moment at the age of 16 where I could have chosen not to exist but I chose to live on because I realized. No one will live for me or save me except me.
So I will live for myself in my second chance at life and this question has been a grounding question for me ever since. As I work through the many different milestones of my life, I use this question to help me reground back to my why, the reason why I do all the things that I do, my passion and my mission.
Many young people don’t know the steps to take to start a new organization. But you did. What are some of the things or steps you took to get your project started?
I was very lucky to have a Bachelor in Marketing so the foundational skills of accounting and business law has saved me many times in running my businesses.
My first business was built under the guidance of Vector Marketing and Cutco. I was able to successfully run a sales recruiting and training branch under the brand with everything set up for me ahead of time. I was able to have a space that allowed me to thrive and teach me all of the hard lessons with mentors who have gone before me. So by the time I started my second business, C3nami, where I had to build everything from scratch, I had already gone through the trials and tribulation of being a new business owner.
The best place to start is to find your community. If you’re starting a business, put yourself in the local entrepreneur community and find good mentors who can be in your corner. Start knowing where your weaknesses are, like I am a great creative but finances were a weakness so the first thing I I did when I could afford it was a fantastic CPA who helped me build my system and guided me on the growth of my business. Then I hired a fractional CFO who taught me how to plan for the future with financials in mind so I can fund my dreams.
Remember, you are not alone in this journey, there are other changemakers who are all on a mission to make our world for the better, you just have to put yourself in the right community and your project will take flight.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began leading your company or organization?
Oh where do I begin? Entrepreneurship is one of the biggest personal growth experiences that anyone can go through and it’s definitely not for the faint of heart. The freedom to be myself fully as a multi-talented being and defining my own success in my own way is definitely the reason why I choose to be an entrepreneur. This freedom did not come easily, I’ve had to let go of a lot of old foundational stories I told myself that no longer served me.
But I’ve found that in this freedom, I’m able to not only be happy but inspire others to do the same and that has honestly been the most rewarding.
This past year with this third company, I have been able to allow my creative side to shine in tandem with my strategic side. I was able to have the freedom to fully share my story as an Asian American, Bi-sexual suicide survivor, that are sides of me that are not usually shown in the business world. In my courage to share my story, I’ve had more people come to me sharing how they’ve been inspired to be themselves.
That’s honestly what our world needs, more people to be comfortable to be themselves so that we’re open to collaborating with each other instead of this feeling that only one person can win.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson or take away you learned from that?
Saying yes to everything. When I started my business, like many before me, I said yes to everything cause I just wanted to try it all. On top of saying yes to everything I undercharged and that quickly resulted in overwork and burnout.
I would work late at night because I was young, 23, and still a night owl. But I failed to use the schedule send function so my emails would be time marked for midnight rather than my normal business hours. I ended up getting mothered by some of my earlier clients asking, “Why are you staying up so late?!” My only response was, “I’m a night owl.” Which some people are, their creative juices are the best at night and they can create a lifestyle to match that and get 8 hours of sleep.
Nowadays, I am most definitely not a night owl and will become a pumpkin before midnight. I’ve learned to use the schedule function and I set the expectations of when my business hours are so that I don’t overwork myself.
None of us can be successful without some help along the way. Did you have mentors or cheerleaders who helped you to succeed? Can you tell us a story about their influence?
My professors at my university were my first mentors. When I first started my agency, I went to them asking, does this process and system sound effective? They were fondly surprised that I have built a large agency process into a small business because that meant my agency could scale. Their consistent curiosity helped me expand my view point and it’s an approach that I love to share with my clients.
Without saying specific names, can you tell us a story about a particular individual who was impacted or helped by your cause?
One of my favorite people in my network, when I shared with her my vision of helping to humanize the world starting in the innovation sector of business and marketing. She was like “Yes and?!”, she invited me to dig deeper into explaining how this showed up and what’s next in store. Her ability to just get it was reaffirming for me because it showed that I was on the right track. In her invitation to dig deeper, I was able to help formulate the language of explaining what Human-Centered marketing and business is and how I empower changemakers to take ownership of their systems.
Are there three things the community/society/politicians can do to help you address the root of the problem you are trying to solve?
- We need to understand that in order for there to be progress, there needs to be structure. But the intention behind how the structure and system is designed is what drives the results.
- People are recognizing that life is more about materialistic gains because that does not matter when you may not exist in a matter of days, that’s how quickly COVID can spread. What matters is, what is the legacy and impact we are making in our world?
- We are currently in a world where structure is designed based on number and growth and transactions. The next question we need to answer together is what is our structure? How can we focus back on the human relationship? How can we redefine success not by how much money is in our bank account but by the impact we’ve been able to create to make our world better for everyone around us?
Fantastic. Here is the main question of the interview. What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why? (Please share a story or example for each).
- You do not need to do everything on your own. As innovators, we see the gaps in our industry and we want to fix it. But it doesn’t mean we need to do it all, what potential referral partners can you connect to make the final result even better? For example, I am a marketing strategist and in order to run a full marketing wheel, I would need to grow a mid-sized agency. For me, that sounds like my personal logistical nightmare. Instead, I organize exactly what my clients need and connect them with agencies that align with their values and communication style.
- Be unafraid to go after your goal and be excited with failure. Failure is such an intense word but it’s part of the process. The key is about being open to trying and learning from our mistakes so we can do better next time. When I was in sales, what we’ve found is actually that the more Nos we get, the closer we are to a Yes. It’s about going beyond thinking it’s all or nothing but adjusting as we go based on what we’ve learned.
- It’s OK to be vulnerable and humble. We are human, we honestly do not know what we don’t know. It’s about being able to own up to our mistakes and be comfortable with saying “I don’t know but let me take a look and get back to you”. One of the most freeing lessons I learned is that I didn’t have to be perfect and know all of the answers. Instead, in the gap of my knowledge is an opportunity for collaborating with others and creating an even better answer.
- You are never behind. No really, you’re not. As changemakers and innovators, we are creating a new way to do business that people have never done before. We are going into the unknown and there isn’t really a paved path ahead of us. In fact, you are moving at the pace that you should be. I always felt like I needed to hustle to get ahead but I realized the only competition that I had was to myself and no one else. When I feel like I’m not hitting my goal, instead of hustling harder, I take time to step back and reassess “Was my goal actually what I needed? If so, what can I adjust to get there smarter?”
- We are human. We are not machines, we are imperfect and that’s what makes us powerful. As human beings, we’re able to innovate for the better that machines cannot do. Humans are naturally messy, but that’s what it means to be alive. We are like onions, we can be super strong when we’re raw but we bring recipes to life. If we give ourselves a chance to honor our humanness, then we can truly set ourselves up for success.
If you could tell other young people one thing about why they should consider making a positive impact on our environment or society, like you, what would you tell them?
You are reading this article because you want change to happen in your community. Here’s a secret, you already have the power to make change. It doesn’t have to be a big idea. It’s about simply recognizing what is the problem that you’re passionate about, look around you to see what is being done and then you decide your role in this movement.
Do you have something that has never been done before? Start an organization and welcome to the entrepreneur journey.
Do you see opportunities for growth within existing organizations? Start there. We can move our world for the better by building on what has already been done that can work towards a whole new innovation.
Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂
Brene Brown, her work in vulnerability is amazing and I love that she has the ability to inspire many change seekers to start becoming changemakers by allowing us to own our own stories first.
How can our readers follow you online?
Follow me on:
Instagram: Imperfectlyren
Youtube: Ruoyun Xu Killian — https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfhmTGNgiDvGCxGf51Pi78g
Linkedin: Ruoyun Xu Killian
Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/7ea527863f2d/humanize-our-narrative
This was very meaningful, thank you so much. We wish you only continued success on your great work!
Young Change Makers: Why and How Ruoyun Xu Killian Is Helping To Change Our World was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.