Have you ever wondered what goes into building a marketing agency people actually remember?
Jessica Scanlon from Hot Dog Marketing didn’t just build a brand. She built a presence.
Bryan Eisenberg sat down with Jessica on the latest episode of the Rock Solid Podcast, and what unfolded was more than just a business chat. It was a real, refreshing look at what it takes to create something bold, local, and lasting.
It started with a name: Hot Dog Marketing. Why that name? Dachshunds. And a bit of stubborn instinct. While everyone else was saying, “Go corporate, be serious,” Jessica was already carving a path that felt more honest. That was 2008. Seventeen years later, her agency is thriving and still proudly carrying the name that once got a skeptical eye.
But don’t get it twisted. Hot Dog Marketing isn’t some quirky sideshow. They’re doing serious work with government contractors, public entities, and professional service providers who need full-stack marketing without hiring full-time teams.
This interview hits you with something else: the quiet force of women in business.
Jessica opened up about being a young woman running a business in a space mostly filled with men. She didn’t rant. She didn’t complain. She just got to work. And over time, things shifted. When she joined the Round Rock Chamber board in 2019, there were only five women. Now the landscape looks very different. Women are helping lead the whole thing, from the CEO down.
If you’re new to Round Rock or thinking of plugging into the business scene, Jessica drops a roadmap. Chamber councils. Ambassadors. Leadership programs. And not just networking. Real collaboration. People showing up for each other. Trips. Boards. Big wins, together.
Jessica also gave a glimpse of what real marketing strategy looks like in the age of AI. No fluff. No gimmicks. Just smart, intentional shifts. From manual content to strategic storytelling. From one-off posts to memory generation, not just lead generation.
Her team isn’t scared of AI. They studied it. They built a roadmap for it. They’re using it to make their clients’ content more human. More thoughtful. More connected.
Oh, and she’s got a favorite project that might surprise you: branding a port. Not a brand most folks think is exciting. But she found the story in it. She pulled the thread. And that’s what great marketers do. They make you care about things you never thought you would.
This episode of Rock Solid isn’t just another business interview. It’s a reminder of what’s possible when you believe in your ideas, invest in your people, and stay plugged into your community.
Go watch the full episode now at www.RockSolidRR.com. And if you’ve got a business here in Round Rock, maybe it’s time you stopped watching from the sidelines and got in the game.
Transcript:
Bryan Eisenberg:
Welcome to Rock Solid. I’m Bryan Eisenberg and I’m here with Jessica Scanlon from Hot Dog Marketing. And I’m just going to dive right into the big question: Hot Dog Marketing — how did you come up with that name?
Jessica Scanlon:
Where did we get the name? That is the number one frequently asked question.
Yeah. I have Dachshunds and that’s where the name came from.
When I had the idea for the company, it was 2008. I was not yet married to my wonderful husband Neil.
We were living in Austin and I was doing some freelance work and I needed to set up a DBA.
I remember walking out of our apartment second bedroom and I was like, “What if I called it Hot Dog Marketing?”
And he looked at me and said, “That’s a really stupid name. It should be something like your last name and Associates or something like that.”
I was like, “I don’t know. I mean, it kind of sounds like the kind of company I’d like to work for someday.”
And that’s what I ended up registering and here we are now.
Bryan:
How many years ago was that?
Jessica:
2008. That was 17 years ago. And I officially left corporate America in 2012 to do this full-time.
Bryan:
That’s awesome. It’s funny because my mentor, who is one of the reasons I’m down here, used to do all the marketing for the wiener dog races down in Buda.
Jessica:
Oh.
Bryan:
So, it’s not so far-stretched for me.
Jessica:
Yeah. That’s a special event.
Bryan:
He did all those funny posters — like Wizard of Ads kind of stuff.
Jessica:
That’s all the stuff that he was doing.
Bryan:
Yeah. Kind of an interesting little twist there.
Jessica:
Familiar. Yeah.
Bryan:
So, tell us a little bit about what your agency focuses on because you’ve got a couple of interesting niches that you really specialize in as well.
Jessica:
Yeah. We’ve helped all sorts of small businesses in the past, but we’re really focused on working with professional service providers, government contractors, and we do public entity work.
So when we go to market, those are the kinds of companies we’re looking to work with.
But we’ve partnered with a variety of different service businesses in the past as well.
Bryan:
And the range of services that you offer as a marketing agency?
Jessica:
Yeah, we do big projects like brand strategy with market research, marketing planning and strategy projects, and website projects.
But then we also do marketing services for companies that don’t have an in-house team.
Most of our clients are in that 100 employee or less category.
So outsourcing makes a lot of sense to them because they don’t want to employ a chief marketing officer, a marketing director, and a team of graphic designers and web developers.
That’s when we can kind of do it fractionally for them.
Bryan:
We just finished recording an episode with Julie Leser, and she mentioned something on the podcast that really struck me. I know you were one of the people she meant. Just the amount of amazing women entrepreneurs in our community. What was it like, especially in the early days of your agency, opening up this woman-owned business here in town?
Jessica:
That’s a great question. So, there aren’t a lot of women-owned businesses like mine, first of all.
And I was pretty young when I started it, so that was also challenging.
But in Round Rock, I think one of the things that I noticed — and it’s no fault of anybody — but this particular community in the chamber and the business community was a handful of kind of just men that have always been in these roles.
And I saw an opportunity for there to be a bigger presence for female-owned businesses in this community and for us to really step up in different business leadership roles.
And to see how it’s changed in the last, you know, 10 years has been pretty remarkable.
I always tell the story that when I first joined the Round Rock Chamber board in 2019, I think it was a board of 40 plus people.
And there were about five women on that chamber board.
If you look at who’s a part of the chamber board now and who’s part of chamber leadership — including Jordan, who’s the CEO — it’s just changed a lot.
And it’s fun to see how many women are in really great influential places now in the community.
Bryan:
And it’s not just that they’re in positions of leadership. It’s the collaboration within the community. Talk about that, because I find that deeply impactful. Coming from a big city, like Brooklyn, New York, you didn’t see as much collaboration as I do here.
Jessica:
And it is the envy of other cities too, I will say, because you talk about it in Austin and you’ll have people reminisce, “Oh, Austin used to be like that.”
We still have that. Everything here is very relationship-driven.
And not in a cliquish kind of way. I think anybody can get involved and start to build those relationships and have influence here.
For the women in particular, we’ve been able to have our own events, collaborate on a wide scale of different city leadership initiatives and chamber initiatives.
And those relationships run deep. They start at places like Leadership Round Rock and Ascend groups — those kinds of programming that the chamber has.
But then the women have gone off and we do trips together and we work on boards together.
And to know that you can call on somebody and have a conversation and come to some sort of solution or initiative in the city is so great.
The flexibility is wonderful. Things get done faster with a lot of passion around here.
Bryan:
Let’s talk about that. Obviously, I’m a male, but I came to the chamber just a little over a year, year and a half ago. The amount of influence it’s had in my life and the relationships have been really powerful. But if there’s a woman in our community and she wants to start tapping in, what are some of these amazing groups that you’ve tapped into that maybe she should learn more about?
Jessica:
Yeah. Well, I would start by coming to chamber events and meeting the different women that are there.
But we have great councils too. So, if you’re a chamber member, you get to be a part of a committee or council because you’re a member.
And that is really where you start to build those deeper relationships, right?
So, you can be an ambassador — that’s a great option.
But there’s the Business Climate Council, the Talent Development Council, the Small Business Opportunity Council, the Entrepreneurship Council.
Bryan:
All of those…
Jessica:
Deep in the heart for Bill here.
Bryan:
Yeah, that’s right.
Jessica:
So those are the councils where relationships meet — where you meet somebody to build those new relationships with.
And a lot of the women, like the ones you’ve had on your podcast, they’re involved in these councils.
That is how you can start to get pulled into more and more things in the community.
Bryan:
What other passion kind of groups are you involved with besides the chamber?
Jessica:
Oh, besides the chamber?
Do we have time to cover them all or…?
Well, I’m very passionate about Leadership Austin, which is a similar group to Leadership Round Rock.
It’s its own separate nonprofit and they do a lot of different civic leadership programming.
I’m on the board of that group.
And then I’m also on the board of the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce and help lead their Small Business Owners Council there, which is just for owners of privately held firms in Austin.
We get together once a month to talk about different city issues and things like that.
Bryan:
What’s the deep passion behind helping all of these smaller businesses?
Jessica:
I think it’s because I can relate to what they’re going through if they’re in an earlier stage.
And if they’re at a more advanced stage than me, then I want to learn from them.
I love running my business.
I had no idea that I was going to be this passionate about owning a business.
The struggles are unique. It can be extremely lonely.
Every year you have to learn something new that you didn’t know before.
And it’s powerful to get together in groups like that and share that information with one another and learn from each other and find mentors — or also be a mentor to somebody else.
It’s a great, great cycle.
Bryan:
What were some of the biggest challenges that you faced, that you figured out how to overcome as a small business owner yourself?
Jessica:
Oh my god, there’s so many.
I mean, you want to talk about this year?
Or… the story that I always tell is I had no idea how to run a business.
I knew how to do marketing and I knew what I wanted to try to do for businesses and how I could help them.
Bryan:
And that is such a common theme among every entrepreneur, right?
Jessica:
Right.
Bryan:
The baker loves to bake but has no idea how to run a bakery.
Jessica:
That’s right.
Bryan:
We see it all the time. That was Michael Gerber’s The E-Myth, the whole principle behind it. I definitely want to hear more about how you…
Jessica:
Somebody suggested I read that book like my second year in business.
And I’m telling you, that was like a page-turner where I just felt like I really related to that story.
I think I was keeping track of all my transactions in an Excel spreadsheet.
And I knew that I should probably move to QuickBooks.
This was back when they were on a CD.
So, I put the CD in my computer and I opened it up and it said, “Start your chart of accounts.”
And I walked away from my computer because I didn’t know what a chart of accounts was.
So I went to — this was through the city of Austin — a free accounting course and had to take that.
Then I took a QuickBooks course.
Then I finally went back to that CD-ROM and set up QuickBooks.
And I have had to teach myself all the business basics along the way.
And I’m still learning how to run a business.
It’s a challenge.
Bryan:
And I imagine in today’s environment in a marketing agency, there are elephants in the room that come after you.
Obviously, the big one I would assume is AI today with a lot of your clients.
How are you looking at that and helping clients navigate this world of AI?
Jessica:
Oh, I think AI is something that we need to embrace.
I will tell you, when it first started rolling out, I was really frustrated with the idea of us having to learn another new thing as a marketing agency — and a million new tools that come with it.
Too many options. And what are we going to do about it?
It could feel overwhelming.
It is a lot.
And as a marketing agency, you’re already having to learn Google and all their changes or the Meta algorithm changes.
There’s always something.
With AI, we didn’t really do anything with it initially.
That year, the year that ChatGPT launched, we went to a marketing conference as a team.
I met someone there and he said, “If your agency can be the first or one of the earlier adopters of this and you figure out the right way to use it, it’ll be a game changer for you guys.”
So last year I took a business strategies with AI course from MIT to try to get myself forced to think about it.
That course forces you to do a roadmap for your business of how you’re going to integrate AI.
If I hadn’t taken the class, I would have just kept putting it off.
And this year what we’re doing is trying to really shift our services from all of this manual content generation work and manual brainstorming work and copy editing and QA work to using the tools the right way.
The staff has to shift into more strategic thinking.
And we’re trying to do more video — very similar to what you guys are doing here, right?
Conversations with the subject matter experts at the companies we service, and then repurposing that content in kind of a multimodal way across different channels using the tools we have.
And I think the shift in focus is going to make for more effective content marketing.
But it’ll make us smarter and it’ll make us more efficient.
Bryan:
I tell this story — I got here to Texas through content marketing.
My mentor started — it was an episode we recorded with Monica Ballard — he started his content on a voicemail system.
Jessica:
Oh yeah.
Bryan:
That eventually migrated to a daily fax.
Jessica:
Okay.
Bryan:
And then eventually went to email, and then became New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling books — the Wizard of Ads trilogy.
Jessica:
Yeah.
Bryan:
He’s been doing it over 30 years, right?
When I first started content marketing online back in the late ’90s, early 2000s, there wasn’t a lot of content.
Jessica:
There’s a lot.
Bryan:
To compete wasn’t that hard. You just had to be saying intelligent things and people would link to you and share it — because there just wasn’t that much.
And today, we’re flooded with the amount of content.
To stand out is really one of the most overwhelming parts of it.
How are you approaching that point of view? Helping your clients understand that part of the strategy — not just pump and dump, but really creating quality content that stands out?
Jessica:
Well, I think a lot of it is we just go back to the basics — good brand, good creative, good messaging.
You’ve got to really think about the value proposition of working with a company like Hot Dog Marketing.
It can’t be around just execution anymore because execution is getting easier.
We are trying to help our clients see the value in really understanding their brand inside and out.
How do you make that come to life?
And then what is the creative and what is the messaging that goes with it so that it is more effective when you start advertising and doing videos and different content pieces?
It is really hard to cut through the noise.
But I want to say that we’re moving into not a lead generation era, but a memory generation era.
Bryan:
I like that phrase.
Jessica:
Yeah.
Bryan:
Let’s talk about some of the projects you work on. Do you have one that’s just absolutely one of your favorite projects?
Jessica:
Oh, we have a lot of great projects to reference, but the one that we are in the final phases of has been really, really fun and super unique.
We’ve been doing brand strategy, brand execution, and a brand new website for a seaport of all places.
So Port Freeport is a port authority and an economic development corporation in Brazoria County.
That one has been really, really fun.
I’ve learned so much about ports and longshoremen and the ins and outs of just getting goods here and out.
I love learning something new — and that is so geeky.
I got to really get in the weeds on that one.
Bryan:
I want to rewind there because most people would think, “Okay, a port — it’s not a very sexy business.”
Jessica:
Oh, it’s so interesting.
Bryan:
And marketing really is about trying to make things sexy.
How are you taking — and I love boring industries — how are you taking that boring and making it interesting for the marketplace?
Jessica:
Well, they have a couple of audiences.
They have the community in which they serve — they are a taxing entity — so there’s some messaging that has to go out to the community.
But primarily, they are trying to attract businesses to set up shop on their port.
They have car brands that use their port, for example.
They are one of the largest importers of bananas.
So they have all the major fruit companies at their port.
They have to attract those businesses.
So a lot of it is about understanding what makes that port special.
And they have the shortest pilot time from the Gulf of Mexico to land, which is a big deal when you are a business that has boats that wait in a channel to deliver goods.
You start learning about all those different interesting things — talk to the people who do business with the port and the employees that work there — and you get to come up with what is sexy messaging and imagery.
And suddenly, this port looks super interesting to people.
Bryan:
Let’s take a different direction. Obviously, you’ve been in Round Rock for quite a while. Worked on a bunch of different projects.
As a marketing agency, I want your critique — positive or negative — on our Round Rock social media team, the City of Round Rock social media team.
Jessica:
Oh, that’s dangerous. You know, my husband works there.
The City of Round Rock has the most exceptional public information team in the country.
They win a lot of awards.
They are on top of it and they have the staff to do it, which is amazing.
So the city has prioritized that public information piece, assigned the budget to a team so they can have people everywhere.
Other cities are envious of this.
Bryan:
And it’s not just putting out content — it’s getting through memory, right?
Jessica:
They’re having fun with a lot of this.
They capitalize on social trends.
They come up with great stuff in advance.
My husband works on their long-form videos.
So when they do their informational budget video of the year, it’s always funny.
It’s always something that people will actually watch so they can understand the budget.
It is amazing what they’re able to do.
Bryan:
Yeah, I definitely want to get them on the podcast at some point.
It’s something to be proud of as part of this community.
“My social media team for the city is way better than any city you live in.”
Jessica:
That’s true.
And a lot of cities don’t prioritize it.
So they’ll have one or two public information officers who can barely keep up with what’s going on.
But this city has someone helping at the library, helping at the sports centers, helping at City Central, at the police department.
All of that information is actually getting out, which is great.
Bryan:
One of my favorites was the use of the Joe Dirt clip on July 4th.
If you don’t know it, you need to go check it out.
Jessica:
That’s right.
Bryan:
They understand their audience.
Jessica:
They definitely understand their audience here.
Bryan:
Talking about our love for Round Rock — what are some of your favorite places around town?
Jessica:
Oh gosh.
You will find me, if I have time, at Salt Traders having a drink and some snacks or Urban Rooftop having a drink and some snacks.
Those places are exceptional.
And then, you know, I’m a mom, so I’m usually out with my daughter.
She’s at a Round Rock ISD middle school, and then she does kung fu here in Round Rock.
So, you’ll find us at those spots more often probably.
Bryan:
If there is a business that needed a little more marketing — maybe a little shout-out — that you love here, what would it be?
Jessica:
Oh, that’s a tough one.
You know, I would say if you haven’t checked out Urban Rooftop, it is a special place.
We have something that nice, with cocktails that nice.
I don’t think people understand how special that place is and how much thought and effort they’ve put into a really nice menu.
They have mixologists there.
I see sometimes on social media people are surprised when they finally go — how nice it is.
And I wish I was spending more time there.
Bryan:
You and Dena probably.
Jessica:
Yeah, I’ll just meet her there.
Bryan:
Yeah, we just have to plan it.
Maybe we need a reunion for all podcast guests and we’ll just have to do it that way.
Jessica:
I think so. I think that sounds like fun.
Bill, that’s on you.
Bryan:
Okay.
Jessica:
Yeah, that would be great.
Bryan:
If people want to learn more about you and get in touch with you, how would they do that?
Jessica:
Oh, it’s really easy to contact us through the Hot Dog Marketing website, which is hotdogmarketing.com, but I’m very active on LinkedIn and love connecting with people there too.
So just find me on LinkedIn.
Bryan:
Awesome. Thank you so much.
Jessica:
Yeah, thank you.
