The Front Lines
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Jillian Childs.
VP of Marketing · Turntide Technologies
Jillian Childs wakes up at 4 AM every day—not out of obligation, but because she loves staying ahead of the competition. As a mom, two-time business owner, full-time executive, adventurer, traveler, and endurance athlete, she brings discipline, curiosity, creativity, and intentional energy into everything she does. She has led all areas of marketing—from rebranding and content creation to growth, field, event marketing, and social strategy—for both start-ups and established luxury brands. Over the years, she has repositioned brands, led marketing transformations, built high-performing teams (and sometimes operated as a team of one), overseen multimillion-dollar budgets, managed up to 20 vendors at once, executed fully integrated GTM strategies, and partnered with global organizations to design customer engagement programs that improved retention, satisfaction, and referrals. What drives Jillian isn’t just marketing—it’s building brands people love. She believes great brands start with understanding the customer and great companies thrive through connection, creativity, and follow-through. She stays on top of emerging trends and AI tools to maximize efficiency while leading with kindness, empathy, and motivation. To her, inspired people do their best work—and having fun along the way matters just as much.
Guest
Jillian Childs
VP of Marketing
Company:
Turntide Technologies
Location:
Pompano Beach, Florida, United States
Funding:
$491.5M Raised
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In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Jillian Childs, VP of Marketing at Turntide Technologies. Turntide designs, manufactures, and engineers electric motors, power electronics, and battery systems for OEMs across construction, motorsports, marine, and agriculture industries. With a lean marketing team of four targeting multiple industries with complex regulations, Jillian has built a revenue-focused marketing engine that drives results through strategic trade show investments, educational webinar programs, and high-quality content. After operating as a one-person marketing team for 18 months, she assembled her current team and turned on all marketing channels in January 2025, resulting in 400% growth in website traffic and significant pipeline generation.

Topics Discussed

Eight takeaways from this conversation.

Actionable for Industrial Tech marketers

  1. Allocate Half Your Budget to High-ROI Channels, Even If They Seem Old School
    Turntide dedicates 50% of their marketing budget to trade shows because they deliver the highest ROI for lead generation and revenue. They attend 13-15 shows globally per year, targeting tier-one industry events and increasingly niche, industry-specific shows in marine, off-road, and motorsports. Rather than chasing trendy digital channels, Jillian doubles down on what actually drives deals.
  2. Make Webinars Work By Keeping Them Educational, Not Salesy
    Turntide runs monthly webinars that have become their most successful lead generation channel by deliberately avoiding sales pitches. Their engineering team leads deep dives into product specs, cybersecurity, and power electronics—essentially giving engineers peer-to-peer technical education. They intentionally avoid mentioning Turntide and focus on solving real problems their audience faces, which builds trust and generates qualified pipeline.
  3. Standardize Trade Show Logistics to Maximize Budget Efficiency
    Rather than customizing booth sizes for each show, Jillian maintains consistent space dimensions across all 13-15 annual trade shows. This allows them to reuse graphics, ship the same trade kits, and work with the same agencies depending on region. The standardization dramatically reduces costs while maintaining professional presence at every event.
  4. Build a Trade Show Strategy Matrix Around Four Key Variables
    Turntide evaluates trade shows based on: (1) which industries they're trying to penetrate most, (2) what product launches are planned, (3) which channel partners they can leverage for exposure, and (4) what geographic gaps exist in their revenue strategy. This framework helps them choose between tier-one broad shows and tier-two industry-specific events.
  5. Launch Content at Scale to Drive Traffic Growth
    After assembling her team, Jillian launched "Current and Wave" on Turntide's website—a dedicated content hub featuring 75+ articles of thought leadership around electrification, engineering, and industry trends. Combined with their website redesign, this content strategy contributed to 400% growth in website traffic over 15 months by establishing Turntide as a technical authority.
  6. Protect Your Team From Organizational Noise
    As a marketing leader at a startup, Jillian filters out the chaos, shifting priorities, and organizational turbulence so her remote team can focus on executing their quarterly plans. She holds weekly one-on-ones with each team member, weekly team calls, and quarterly on-site strategy sessions with clear actionable plans. This structured approach keeps the team focused on revenue goals despite startup volatility.
  7. Test Digital Channels But Don't Be Afraid to Walk Away
    After extensive testing, Jillian concluded that Google Ads and LinkedIn advertising don't deliver ROI for Turntide—even having a Google rep tell her it wasn't worth the spend. She discovered LinkedIn's targeting is deliberately confusing, with entire budgets getting consumed by unqualified clicks from students when targeting countries like India. Rather than continuing to pour money into underperforming channels, she reallocated budget to proven channels.
  8. Use Press and Communications as a Multiplier for Product Launches
    With a small team unable to deep-dive into specific industries, Turntide uses "air coverage" across multiple sectors through strategic PR. They announce major customer partnerships, new product launches, and company milestones in tier-one media and trade publications, amplifying their reach beyond what their team size would normally allow.

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