Social Pros Podcast

How Consumer Insights Lead to Trust at the Weather Channel with Randi Stipes

Mar 7, 2025

39:31

How does the weather influence your daily decisions, from your morning routine to your mood? Randi Stipes, CMO of The Weather Company, understands the profound impact of weather on consumer behavior—and how to harness it for deeper connection and trust with their customers. In this episode, we explore how The Weather Company collects and leverages consumer insights to enhance user experience, inform marketing strategies, and shape content creation. From data-driven storytelling to innovative brand collaborations, Randi shares how her team turns weather-driven moments into meaningful connections.

Full Episode Details

Randi joins host Zontee Hou on this episode of Social Pros to discuss how The Weather Channel is using weather data to drive trust with their audience and customers. She explains how weather is the "ultimate contextual accelerant", influencing consumer behavior in unexpected ways (like how a temperature drop in the Ohio Valley can actually boost ice cream sales!)

Randi also shares insights on why B2B businesses need a weather strategy, how The Weather Company is working with content creators to showcase real-life weather impacts, and the brand's partnership with the United Nations on the WeatherKids campaign, a global initiative to inspire climate action through future forecasts.

She also highlights the growing role of social in driving brand authenticity and why every marketer should nurture a strong relationship with their CFO to align strategies and impact -- and gives one of the best answers yet to our "If you could have a video call with any living person, who would it be?" question with a heartwarming story you won't want to miss!

In This Episode:

2:16 - The Weather Company's new brand platform, and the process of rolling it out to achieve their business goals
5:15 - How the brand works with content creators, and how they fit into The Weather Company's ecosystem
7:52 - The different audiences the brand is targeting with their content creator approach
10:38 - How The Weather Channel has changed over the course of its history, and how Randi is preparing her team for the coming evolution of the digital landscape
13:48 - How the brand is thinking about that personalization to give their audience a better expereince
15:52 - Important points for all marketers to keep in mind when building towards registration and ensuring customers see the brand as an ongoing partner in their lives
19:37 - Things that will be really valuable for The Weather Company and all marketers to think about when collecting information about how customers behave so that a better story can be told to them
23:14 - How to think about insights that serve B2B partners, and why every B2B business needs a weather strategy
28:4 - WeatherKids, a joint program with the United Nations Development Program and the World Meteorological Organization.
31:38 - Who Randi would most want a video call with, and the wonderful story explaining why
36:02 - Randi’s advice for aspiring social pros