Chris Reimer’s communications career hasn't followed a conventional path.
After spending more than 15 years as a CPA, he leapt into the world of marketing and entrepreneurial ventures.
In this Q+A, Chris shares insights from early Twitter, writing a book, launching his businesses, and championing empathy at work. Whether you’re pivoting careers or looking to elevate your marketing strategy, Chris’s experience offers valuable lessons for anyone seeking connection and impact in a noisy world.
You spent 15+ years as a CPA before jumping into marketing. What pushed you to make that leap?
During the last few years of my accounting career, I started a funny t-shirt ecommerce business called Rizzo Tees. I joined Twitter in late 2008 to jumpstart visibility of my new venture, but instead, I just communicated with people. Then I went to “tweetups” and met those new friends in person. Early Twitter was the best.
I learned social media, video production, and web not via a formal education, but by doing. Then I was ranked the number one Twitter user in St. Louis, which sounds silly today but it opened doors. The accolade got the attention of marketing firms who wanted to add social media as a core competency, and I made the leap from accounting to marketing at age 39. Marketing plays to my strengths and interests in a way accounting never did.
Which skills from accounting still help you today as a marketing and communications leader?
I find that my accounting degree from Marquette University coupled with fifteen years managing finances and running businesses gives me a wider view of business opportunities. Many marketing challenges are actually business and operational challenges, too. Accountants are probably more sensible than marketers, but marketers bring creativity to problem solving. (Accountants should not get too creative or they could end up behind bars).
The reality is accountants and marketers need each other even if they never cross paths at a business. I try to let my right brain take the wheel when building a marketing campaign designed to stop the scroll or drive leads, but my left brain often has a thing or two to say.
At Maryville, you built a digital brand voice from scratch. How do you design a voice that lasts?
Longevity was not the goal. Yes, the next group of marketing employees could replicate the tone, pace, and tenor of the content on current social platforms. Or they could refer to the most robust creative brief the previous marketing employees were nice enough to leave, but that rarely happens and might never work.
Marketing is about the here and now, and then eventually it’s about something new - the future. Now that I’ve been gone from Maryville for a year and a half, they’re doing things completely differently. You can see it clear as day in their social content. The voice has markedly changed and hopefully it’s an accurate reflection of the university. That’s all the digital brand voice should be - the real “you.”
You posted 200,000+ times across channels. What did that scale teach you about breaking through the noise in this environment?
My goal is always to let quantity and quality fight a tug of war that neither side wins. At Maryville University, the goal was to create content that put on full display the pride we had in our community. Our content was as fun as college actually is (very fun!). Show off what’s happening right now, be empathetic and curious and brave, and let prospective students and families feel the real Maryville.
That often resulted in a campus visit, but more importantly, the students who would thrive at Maryville self-selected into the experience. So admissions hits their KPI. Then those students stay because they weren’t sold a false story - they came to the right place. Student Success hits their retention number. Alumni attendance at Homecoming increased - another KPI hit. Sometimes all those posts didn’t look like a strategy, but our content was highly strategic.
You’ve trained senior leaders and faculty on social media. What’s the biggest misconception execs have?
Many saw me simply as “The Twitter Guy.” I had actually branded myself so completely via my Twitter account and my number one ranking that it was hard to shake. Then I decided I had no need to change the way senior leaders saw me. All I needed them to do was grant me permission to do the work and I’d give them even more than they expected.
Also, they underestimated how important our new social media accounts contributed to the current community. Social media is not just lead generation. Most organizations engage in external communication, and most ignore internal communication. I thought of our social media as internal student communication, and it worked.
From Rizzo Tees to Boosa Tech, what did your entrepreneurial ventures teach you that you still use today?
I’m obsessed with customer happiness. Happy customers trump even profits. It’s all I care about, and we’re never going to go out of business because we care too much. That’s the number one lesson, and many businesspeople hesitate here.
Also, my approach during customer service challenges, when I’m taking care of a disgruntled Boosa power bank owner and ultimately showing them what we’re made of, has granted me some experience in turning anger and frustration into appreciation and happiness. Those are skills I can use at work and at home.
What advice do you give to someone breaking into marketing from a non-marketing background?
Don’t let the lack of formal education slow you down. You can’t go to a hospital and start operating on people without the proper degree and credentials, but you can work in marketing. Running a business is probably the best real-world training you can grant yourself, followed by reading the best marketing books.
From your book Happywork, what’s one practice that quickly improves workplace culture?
More leaders, supervisors, and human resources people should lead with empathy for the whole person. I spend 33% of my day at work. What’s happening during the other 67% of the time? Sometimes businesses and supervisors just can’t seem to care, but if KPIs are all that matter, know that you can actually wring greater productivity out of people if you manage the entire human being and not just the employee.
Also, and this one is critical: eliminate toxic people. I don’t recommend trying to train the toxicity out of them. Don’t give them a second chance and a third chance and a fourth chance. Don’t think you can be nice to them until they learn to be nice to everyone else. Have them pack up and go sully someone else’s workplace. Bye bye.
You’ve navigated agency, higher ed, nonprofit, and startups. How do you evaluate if a role or organization is the right fit?
I don’t think I’ve done a great job here. I always think I’m asking the right questions, but subconsciously I’ve already decided to take the job so I’m asking affirming questions instead of probing questions. I got it right with Maryville, as those were the best nine years of my working life. Otherwise, I’ve typically discovered the truth about an organization after a week of working there and no amount of due diligence or evaluation of the role before accepting would have revealed the truth to me. Most people are probably in the same boat here, so I should grant myself some grace.
Looking ahead, what do you see as the most under-told or overlooked opportunity in marketing and storytelling?
Video. Videographers should be in much higher demand as there’s nary a business that can’t use video in marketing, new employee onboarding, sales department showing gratitude, internal communication, and more. Since most businesses aren’t doing it or doing it well, your business will definitely get noticed if you engage in video marketing.
