Pipeline Visionaries

Connect with Phyllis on LinkedIn

Learn more about Transcend

Learn more about Caspian Studios

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The New Marketing Role You Should Be Hiring For

Emily Kramer, Ian Faison — Tue, 6 Jan 2026 10:00:00 +0000

Emily Kramer, founder of MKT1 and a longtime voice in modern B2B marketing, joins Ian Faison to unpack how AI is reshaping marketing teams, roles, and expectations.

They explore Emily’s concept of the “gen marketer”, and why traditional silos and specialist-heavy teams struggle in today’s high-velocity environment.

Key Takeaways

Marketing teams need more generalists who can connect strategy, creativity, and distribution.
Speed to execution matters more than perfect alignment across functions.
Big marketing wins come from coordinated campaigns, not isolated tactics.
AI increases the value of orchestration and taste, not specialization alone.
Marketing leaders should think in portfolios of bets, not incremental activities.

Quote

“Every big initiative needs to have a chance to really win — not just deliver incremental results.”

Episode Timestamps

(03:51) What the “Gen Marketer” role actually means

(10:04) Why speed matters more than perfect alignment

(16:42) Escaping random acts of marketing with big bets

(24:58) How CMOs should think like producers or VCs

(31:37) When founder-led marketing works (and when it doesn’t)

Sponsor

Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com — the pipeline generation platform for revenue teams.
Turn your website into a pipeline machine with PipelineAI. Engage and convert your most valuable visitors with live chat, chatbots, meeting scheduling, and intent data.
Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Emily Kramer on LinkedIn

Dear Marketers Podcast

MKT1 Unboxing
Learn more about MKT1
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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4 CMOs, 1 Question: What Marketing Spend Is Truly Uncuttable?

Shannon Sullivan Duffy, Melton Littlepage, Jill Wiltfong, Chris Bontempo — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Hear from Jill Wiltfong, CMO, Korn Ferry, Chris Bontempo, CMO, Johnson Controls, Shannon Sullivan Duffy, CMO, Asana, and Melton Littlepage, CMO, 1Password on their uncuttable budget items.

Timestamps:
(01:19) Jill Wiltfong, CMO, Korn Ferry,
(08:03) Chris Bontempo, CMO, Johnson Controls
(23:12) Shannon Sullivan Duffy, CMO, Asana
(28:10) Melton Littlepage, CMO, 1Password

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A CMO’s Guide to Working with the Board

Stacey Epstein, Ian Faison — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Ian sits down with Stacey Epstein, CEO of Magnetic, where she helps brands create clear positioning and go-to-market strategies that drive lasting demand. She talks about how to succeed in interacting with the board, outlining do’s and don’ts, and providing advice around defensiveness and preparation.

Key Takeaways:

The board is there to help you succeed. Treat them like advisors and go to them with questions and issues that you are trying to solve. Don’t try to hide problems, do demonstrate your wins.
There is an art to defending yourself without being defensive. Defensiveness often results in a board member feeling unheard and pushing harder. Take the note, even if you can’t take the proposed solution.
Ditch the slide decks and excel spreadsheets, and tell the story for board members. A unified board letter from the leadership team is a great way to do this and increases alignment before a meeting.

Quote:

“ We're all on the same team. We all wanna win. Like we're here together in this board meeting because we want the company to be successful and we want to win. And, . There should be no hiding of issues. In fact, that's what the board is there for. The board is there to help you get through the challenging times.”

Episode Timestamps:

00:53 The Role of the Board in Marketing

02:20 Navigating Board Interactions

03:06 Performance and Authenticity in Board Meetings

04:29 The Complexity of Marketing Roles

08:51 Aligning Marketing and Sales

16:56 The Importance of SDR Feedback

19:13 AI and Marketing Technology Decisions

21:44 Navigating Board Dynamics as a CMO

21:59 Building Relationships and Credibility

23:11 The Importance of Authenticity in Marketing

24:22 Handling Investor Feedback Tactfully

29:16 Defending Your Marketing Strategy

36:03 Effective Board Communication Strategies

39:10 The Value of Board Letters

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Stacey on LinkedIn
Learn more about Magnetic
Learn more about Caspian Studios
AI’ve Got Questions Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2497617/episodes

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Are Websites Dying?

Ian Faison, Shafqat Islam — Tue, 9 Dec 2025 18:18:44 +0000

Ian sits down with Shafqat Islam, President, Optimizely. They dive into AI, GEO, and the future role of websites. They also talk about how experimentation and creativity give companies the competitive edge in the current marketing landscape.

Key Takeaways:

Your content needs to provide scarcity value to stand out. People and LLMs want original ideas.
Most CMOs are not experimenting enough, and are not being creative enough. Experimentation is key.
Many SEO tactics will work for GEO, and the harsh truth is that a lot of SEO content did not move the needle anyway.

Quote:

“ Everyone should be testing. Testing allows you to be more creative.Take bigger bets, be bolder. If your bet is huge, and the return and the result is huge, it's totally disproportionate, upside uncapped. Frankly, most marketers are afraid.”

Episode Timestamps:

01:56 The Role of Product and Marketing

03:09 Origins and Evolution of Opal

10:51 Creativity in Marketing and Software

13:44 The Importance of Experimentation

19:40 Storytelling and Risk-Taking in Marketing

23:21 The Rise of AI and Podcasting

28:03 Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)

29:31 Websites' New Dual Role

32:34 The Studio Head Approach to Marketing

38:12 The Impact of AI on Creativity

40:09 The Future of Search and Marketing

Sponsor:

Links:

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How To Win in AI Search

Alex Halliday, Ian Faison — Tue, 2 Dec 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Alex Halliday, the CEO at AirOps, an end-to-end content engineering platform that gives marketing teams the systems they need to win visibility across AI search and SEO with quality content. Alex gives the marketing masterclass on AI search, laying out the framework for what marketers need to be doing.

Key Takeaways:

Understand your current State of the Union: Audit how you are currently showing up across the AI models and what is driving those results.
Pick a strategy based on what truly matters to you as a brand and ruthlessly prioritize.
Execute through content engineering, a combination of brand taste, technical skills and strategy.

Quote:

The future of, we think, content and AI search is this new role that we're pushing and championing. It's called content engineering. And content engineering is a blend of three things. It's brand taste, which you absolutely need. It's enough technical skills to use this technology well. It's strategy. It's like really a really good strategic mind of the kinds of plays that you want to put out into the world.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:26) The Trust Tree: Education- and Evidence-led go-to-market

*(10:19) The Influence of YouTube on AI Search Results

*(18:10) The Masterclass on AI Search: Step-by-step

*(25:35) What do LLMs actually like?

*(40:04) How should marketers be investing in content?

Sponsor:

Links:

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Navigating GEO and the New Search Landscape

Kady Srinivasan, Ian Faison — Tue, 25 Nov 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kady Srinivasan, Chief Marketing Officer at You.com, the enterprise AI productivity platform redefining knowledge work with trusted, customizable AI agents. She breaks down GEO, storytelling in an infinite-content world, and why content now must serve both humans and LLMs.

Key Takeaways

Demand generation has changed: Google Ads don’t work, while newsletters, advertorials, and events perform better.
Marketing teams must operate as multithreaded groups built around outcomes rather than traditional functional silos.
Imperfection and speed are essential to stay competitive in fast-moving AI markets.

Quote

“I just want everything to be on time and running properly… And so, particularly in AI and to your point in 2025, that is, you could just get killed if you're like that. So you need to know when to be fine with imperfection and when to, and in some cases you have to double down and really take your time.”

Episode Timestamps

03:23 Demand Generation Changes

04:56 Google Ads and New Marketing Channels

05:51 Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)

07:44 Importance of Original Content

25:12 Exploring the Future of Marketing Roles

28:10 Balancing Speed and Perfection in Marketing

Sponsor

Links

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison/
Connect with Kady on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kadysrinivasan/
Learn more about You.com
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://caspianstudios.com

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Selling What Buyers Don’t Know to Search For

Ian Faison, Dario Ambrosini — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 08:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dario Ambrosini, CMO at Propel Software, a product value management platform that connects commercial and product teams to help product companies grow revenue and increase business value.

Dario talks about merging three categories into one, selling to very different buying committees and leveraging changes in your competitors to get new business.

Key Takeaways:

When buyers still search old categories, your job as CMO is to clarify the bigger story and guide them from familiar entry points into a new, more valuable category.
In a world where LLMs now shape discovery, your content and ABM strategy must shift from chasing clicks to shaping the algorithms your future buyers trust.
Competitor shifts—like an end-of-life announcement—can become high-intent pipeline moments when paired with precise ABM and deep understanding of the displaced product’s shortcomings.

Quote:

“We’re doing a category creation because we’re rolling up three different categories and saying it’s an entirely new thing… Most of the people searching are still looking at those individual categories that make up a portion of the new thing that we’re creating.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:37) The Trust Tree: Merging categories to create something new

*(12:18) The Playbook: Selling to many different buying committees

*(45:08) Quick Hits: Dario’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Building Pipeline Through AI and Zero-Click Content

Tami Cannizzaro, Ian Faison — Tue, 11 Nov 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features Tami Cannizzaro, Chief Marketing Officer at Thryv, a software company helping small business owners run and grow their businesses with AI-powered tools. Tami shares how her team focuses on revenue first and builds marketing strategies around what drives impact for SMBs.She discusses the shift from traditional SEO to AEO and why speed and originality now define effective marketing.

Key Takeaways

AEO and AI are redefining how customers find brands online: Learn how to optimize for AI-driven discovery so your brand appears in conversational search and LLM-generated results.
Fresh, original content outperforms repurposed AI blogs: The fastest way to lose visibility is to sound like everyone else. Originality and recency are now ranking factors in AI search.
First-mover advantage in AI tools can create outsized revenue impact: Early adopters capture learnings and market share before competitors adapt.

Quote

“Anytime there’s something new in marketing, if you can be a first mover and jump on it before everyone else figures it out, there’s a real opportunity to drive revenue from that.”

Episode Timestamps

(02:28) The Trust Tree: Supporting SMBs
(17:12) The Playbook: ABM, AEO, and social ads
(37:34) Quick Hits: Tami’s Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

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The End of Manual Marketing and What Comes Next

Gil Allouche, Ian Faison — Tue, 4 Nov 2025 10:00:00 +0000

In this episode of Pipeline Visionaries, Ian Faison sits down with Gil Allouche, CEO of Metadata, to explore how AI is reshaping the way B2B marketers work.

Gil explains why marketers should stop fearing AI and start using it to eliminate repetitive work, freeing teams to focus on creativity and strategy. Gil also dives into how AI-driven optimization can save companies time and money, enabling bold experiments that cut through the noise.

Key Takeaways:

Speed beats consensus. The future of marketing belongs to fast-moving, experiment-driven teams.
Reinvest efficiency into innovation. Use time and budget saved through automation to fund bold creative ideas.
When something works — double down. Don’t move on too quickly from success; scale what performs.

Quote:

“You don’t have to wait for someone technical anymore. There’s no barrier between idea and execution. You can get everything to the finish line yourself — and see if it was a good idea or not.”

Episode Timestamps

03:10 AI's Role in Modern Marketing

07:30 The Future of Marketing Teams

30:20 Experimentation in Marketing

33:01 Encouraging Innovation

44:31 Embracing AI in Everyday Tasks

Sponsor:
Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com — the pipeline generation platform for revenue teams.
Turn your website into a pipeline machine with PipelineAI. Engage and convert your most valuable visitors with live chat, chatbots, meeting scheduling, and intent data.
Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links:
Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Gil on LinkedIn
Learn more about Metadata
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Thinking of Founder-Led Marketing? Do This First

Lindsay Tjepkema, Ian Faison — Tue, 28 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

In this special episode, we bring you an episode of Caspian Studios’ new B2B Snapshot webinar series. Ian Faison and Lindsay Tjepkema break down why founder-led marketing still matters, why it never truly ends and how to make it work at any stage of growth. Drawing from LinkedIn’s latest report, they share how to turn executive voices into authentic content that builds trust, cuts through AI noise, and drives real pipeline.

Key Takeaways:

Founder-led marketing never ends. Even as companies scale, founders remain the most powerful storytellers for their brand.
Separate founder-led sales from marketing. Let executives focus on perspective and narrative—not just deals.
LinkedIn wants this. The platform’s algorithm rewards executive-led thought leadership, so lean in and boost what works.
Start with better questions. Ditch the scripts. Ask founders about paradigm shifts, mistakes, or their “aha” moments to spark genuine insight.

Episode Timestamps:

(00:32) Introducing the Snapshot Series: Bite-size B2B Marketing Conversations
(02:00) Founder-Led Marketing vs. Founder-Led Sales
(06:20) Why Authenticity Wins on LinkedIn
(09:12) The 21 Questions Every Marketer Should Ask Their Founder
(16:00) The Grandma Test: Simplify Your Story
(17:40) Making Founder Marketing Fun Again

Sponsor:

Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com.
Qualified helps you turn your website into a pipeline generation machine with PipelineAI. Engage and convert your most valuable website visitors with live chat, chatbots, meeting scheduling, intent data, and Piper—your AI SDR.

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Lindsay on LinkedIn

Learn more about Caspian Studios
Tune in to B2B Snapshot Live

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The Future Belongs to the Marketers Who Move Fast

Ian Faison, Lauren Vaccarello — Tue, 21 Oct 2025 16:12:02 +0000

This episode of Pipeline Visionaries features an interview with Lauren Vaccarello, CMO of WEKA, a company building the foundation for enterprise and agentic AI. Lauren discusses her marketing philosophy: align every initiative with business goals, empower teams to experiment freely, and build category leadership through creativity and thought leadership. From the company’s breakthrough collaboration with U2 at the Sphere to its irreverent “Introducing Neural Mesh” launch video, Lauren shows why modern marketing demands bold storytelling and a studio-like mindset.

Key Takeaways:

Creativity and speed are non-negotiable. Empower teams to ship ideas quickly and learn fast, don’t get bogged down in creation by committee.
Smart teams sell. Put your smartest people front and center to define the future of your industry.
Tell stories that feel human. From rock-concert customer videos to funny launch trailers, authentic content creates the biggest impact.
Anchor every idea to impact. If it doesn’t tie back to the company’s biggest goals, it’s just noise.

Quote:

“ This amazing thing with being earlier in your career is, you don't know what you don't know. You think you can do everything and because you don't know this is how things are done, you just figure it out in a different way. And I see some of these earlier in career marketers and what they are able to accomplish because they don't have the hangups of the rest of us. The, well, this is hard and this takes a long time and you need approvals. Here they are using AI to just pump out really incredible work. They are thinking in ways that I just, I wish I was 22 and was like thinking like that. It's so inspiring and I think a challenge for many marketers who have more tenure and more experience.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:29) The Trust Tree: Serving as a tech partner at the Sphere

*(32:56) The Playbook: Kill Creation by Committee

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Lauren on LinkedIn
Learn more about WEKA
Learn more about Caspian Studios
NeuralMesh™ by WEKA®: Storage Rewired for the AI Era: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23cVbsAIwSY

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Why Share of Attention Beats Share of Voice

Rodrigo Maroni, Ian Faison — Tue, 14 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode of Pipeline Visionaries features an interview with Rodrigo Maroni, Head of U.S. at Winnin, the cultural intelligence platform that reveals actionable insights to grow your brand’s cultural relevance exponentially. Rodrigo shares why culture is the invisible hand guiding B2B consumer decisions, why chasing trends won’t make brands relevant, and how predictive cultural data uncovers unexpected audience opportunities.

Quotes

We don't track things like share of voice. Really I believe that this is an outdated metric. You are only measuring your intent, not your outcome. So we use a metric we develop called share of attention. Share of attention is really a metric that takes into account, the output in there, the effect, the impact that you make in your audience.We are measuring the end game, not the starting game, so you get a real pulse on what's working.

Key Takeaways

Culture drives growth. Every purchase decision is culturally influenced, even in B2B.
Don’t chase trends. Predict cultural moments and map “cultural categories” to get ahead.
Hidden audiences = growth. Insights from behavioral data can reveal unexpected segments like sneakerheads for cleaning products.
Measure what matters. Share of attention captures true cultural impact, unlike outdated share of voice metrics.

Episode Timestamps

(05:49) The Trust Tree: Collecting behavioral data

(21:38) The Playbook: Developing cultural intelligence reports
(30:19) Dust up: Navigating gaps in metrics
(31:05) Quick hits: Rodrigo’s Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Rodrigo on LinkedIn
Learn more about Winnin
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Cutting Through Complexity with Clear Value

John Gaines, Ian Faison — Tue, 7 Oct 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with John Gaines, VP Marketing, Zyter|TruCare, a healthcare technology company supporting 45 health plans and more than 44 million covered lives

John emphasizes the importance of establishing thought leadership to build credibility before focusing on amplification and talks about effective tactics such as leveraging PR agencies and using effective lead generation platforms.

Key Takeaways:

Lead with thought leadership to cut through the AI clutter. Position your brand as a credible voice first, then layer in activation.
Non-negotiable marketing levers: PR, demand gen infrastructure, and product clarity. These are foundations you can’t compromise.
Evaluate the ROI of events. In many cases, digital channels and content may outperform costly in-person events.

Quote:

“ So you have to have, somewhere in the mix, the capability to cut through that density and get to an understanding of what does this stuff do that solves a compelling problem in a unique way that somebody will pay money for versus other alternatives that are out there? And that is a combination of talent and skill that you just have to have in the mix. It doesn't usually come from outside. It's something you have to have internally.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:51) The Trust Tree: Position your brand as a credible voice first, then layer in activation

*(11:10) The Playbook: The value of a PR agency

*(30:36) The Dust Up: Operating in a startup up within a large company

*(33:19) Quick Hits: John’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Cutting Through the Noise with Personalization

Ian Faison — Tue, 23 Sep 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode of Pipeline Visionaries features an interview with Tamir Sigal, the CMO of Trintech, a company that helps finance and accounting teams simplify and automate the entire financial close process, from reconciliations to reporting. Tamir explans his marketing philosophy of focusing on the customer journey, driving alignment across the organization, and evolving tactics around personalization, in-person experiences, and AI. He also reflects on rebranding challenges, innovative campaigns, and why he encourages his team to experiment—even if it means making mistakes along the way.

Quote:

“We just get so much information into our lives—whether it’s through email, social media, our devices, and how do you differentiate? How do you cut through the noise? So one of our tactics is making sure that we’re personalizing the message to the right audience. One of my pet peeves is saying the right message at the right time at the right channel. That’s so cliché to say, but it’s at the heart of what we want to do—making sure that the message is personalized to the industry, to the persona, and to the topic.”

Key Takeaways:

Personalization cuts through noise. Tailoring messages by industry, persona, and timing is key to standing out in a crowded digital landscape.
CMOs are responsible for creating alignment. Success depends on aligning marketing with sales, finance, partners, and leadership.
Encourage experimentation. Tamir fosters innovation by rewarding his team for trying new ideas and learning from mistakes.

Episode Timestamps:
(04:00) The Trust Tree: Why time is the most valuable currency
(10:44) The Playbook: Top uncuttable tactics—personalization, events, and AI
(29:06) Dust Up: Rebranding a 100-year-old company against the odds
(31:15) Quick Hits: Tamir’s quick hits

Links:
Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison
Connect with Tamir on LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamirsigal/
Learn more about Trintech: https://www.trintech.com
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://www.caspianstudios.com

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Lead With Buyers Instead of Product

Bruno Bertini, Ian Faison — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Bruno Bertini, the CMO of 8x8, a CX platform that brings together business communications and interaction data in one place.

Bruno discusses 8x8’s innovative marketing campaigns, particularly 'The Power of You,' which creatively leverages AI to feature customers in engaging ways. Bruno shares insights into their marketing strategy, the role of AI in scaling their efforts, and the challenges and rewards of pushing creative boundaries in B2B marketing.

Guest Quote:

"In B2B, the only way to cut through the noise is by doing something creative. Imagine you're a buyer. You wake up like, oh my God, I'm gonna read a white paper this morning. I'm so excited. Anyways, jokes aside for us as we are repositioning the company, the idea was I don't have the biggest budget. You know, I'm one of the smallest players in a very big market, that's moving at quantum speed. So instead of burning all the money we had just in paid, trying to push more of the usual, the idea was can we do something really different leveraging our internal AI culture."

Episode Timestamps:

*(06:42) The Trust Tree: Economies of scale from AI content

*(10:05) The Playbook: The Power of You Campaign

*(44:48) Quick Hits: Bruno’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Bruno on LinkedIn
Learn more about 8x8
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Bringing Brand Mantras to B2B

Jill Wiltfong, Ian Faison — Tue, 9 Sep 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jill Wiltfong, Chief Marketing Officer at global consulting firm Korn Ferry.

Jill shares her unique path from TV news anchor to marketing, emphasizing the crucial skills of storytelling, communication, and adaptability. She discusses why their thought leadership team is all journalists and discusses their transformative sponsorship of the PGA Korn Ferry Tour.

Key Takeaways:

Empower employees to promote your brand by giving them clear guardrails instead of slowing them down with heavy approval processes.
Wait for the big brand opportunities that authentically tell your company story, like Korn Ferry’s PGA development tour sponsorship, rather than chasing generic opportunities.
If you’re not the biggest player in your market, the only way to get a seat at the table is to do something different, at scale.

Quote:

"The other thing that was really transformative for us was deciding we were not going to be a boring B2B company. We needed to act and think and behave like a B2C firm. So we came up with this brand mantra: Be more than. Nike had just do it. Apple had think different. We are all about Be More Than. And this is our rallying cry. It tells people exactly who we are. It tells you what we're gonna do for you, for employees. It gives you a sense that Korn Ferry is rough, man, it's pretty relentless because we are always gonna push you to be more than you were yesterday."

Episode Timestamps:

*(19:09) The Trust Tree: Marketing is best suited to lead and drive innovation

*(22:23) The Playbook: Get the right people, the rest falls into place

*(44:40) Quick Hits: Jill’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Will AI Finally Kill Spray and Pray?

Thea Hayden, Ian Faison — Tue, 2 Sep 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Thea Hayden, CMO at Cognizant, a leading professional services company that brings deep technology and industry expertise together to help our clients transform and stay ahead.

Thea discusses the importance of a strong partnership with IT, and the significance of multi-channel tactics. She also shares insights into experiential marketing tactics and her commitment to fostering a culture of experimentation and fun within her marketing team.

Key Takeaways:

We often discuss building strong relationships with the CFO, but investing in your relationship with your CIO is essential too, since the martech stack is so crucial to success.
Overindexing on any strength will make it your weakness; nothing works in isolation and a multichannel approach is necessary.
AI may be the death of spray and pray tactics and broad reach marketing, since personalization will be so much easier and more successful.

Quote:

”The tactic that may finally die because of AI is spray and pray, right? Because everything's going to be so personalized and so easy to personalize, and so much more effective because of that. And so I think even the days of just super broad reach maybe are dead altogether.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:00) The Trust Tree: Start with the end in mind

*(16:48) The Playbook: Overindexing on strengths, makes them weaknesses

*(33:30) The Dust Up: Build a strong relationship with IT

*(34:26) Quick Hits: Thea’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Thea on LinkedIn
Learn more about Cognizant
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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AI Video Generation: Practical Uses and How it Enhances Marketing

Gaurav Misra, Ian Faison — Tue, 26 Aug 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Gaurav Misra, CEO, Captions, an AI video-generation company that allows you to create and edit talking videos with AI.

Gaurav dives into the practical applications and future implications of AI in video, and how these tools can enhance marketing efforts for businesses of all sizes.

Key Takeaways:

Video capabilities are improving rapidly, and are now at the point where spinning up an AI-generated version of you speaking, is likely better quality than anything you could deliver to camera.
These capabilities allow marketers to spin-up and test content very quickly with far less expense than in the past.
How people will react to content moving forward, when it will become less and less clear what is real, remains to be seen.

Quote:

“ Spun up a video and it's like me wearing like a suit… I'm delivering this emotional message, but I'm delivering it so fluently with all these words that I would probably never use actually… and I'm looking at this like, shit, I couldn't be like this on camera. This is such a good delivery, such a good presentation.. It just isn't actually physically possible. And I think we are at that point where I can look at that and be like, wow, I just couldn't do this. It's better than what I could do.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:13) Challenges and Opportunities in Video Content

*(08:01) The Future of AI Tools in Creative Work

*(24:11) Innovations in Video Generation

*(28:28) Real-World Applications and Feedback

*(35:27) The Future of Deep Fakes and Content Authenticity

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Social Proof and Unintended Signaling

Casey Hill, Ian Faison — Tue, 19 Aug 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Casey Hill, CMO at DoWhatWorks, a company that removes the guesswork from website optimization, tracking millions of websites daily to find winning A/B tests from major brands.

Casey provides actionable advice on effective thought leadership, influencer marketing, and various ways to optimize your website.

Key Takeaways:

Promoting customer’s posts about your company can be a great way to spread an outside vantage point, and customers are typically happy to have you pay to promote their pages.
Test all your assumptions and learn what makes sense for your business. Try to test components of your website that you may not have initially thought to look into.
Be cautious when it comes to social proof and unintended signalling with third party reviews. A lot of marketers do this poorly.

Quote:

Most people do social proof really poorly. The way now, and this is across the board, so we talked about logos, but it also applies to G2 reviews or third party reviews. I think people don't pay attention enough to unintended signaling. Like someone puts 4.4 stars with 300 plus reviews and someone sees that, and that might actually might be a negative signal, right? And so like they look at that, they're like, 'oh, I thought you were much bigger. You only have 300 reviews.' Or in our world today is 4.4 good or bad, right? Like some people might see 4.4, like if I see it on a restaurant or I'm like, eh it's okay. Like it's kind of a neutral one to me, right? So I think you wanna be really careful about unintended signaling.

Episode Timestamps:

*(07:32) The Trust Tree: Create content that will be shared by other outlets

*(20:30) The Playbook: Convert faster, talk about your capabilities instead of benefits

*(49:53) Quick Hits: Casey’s quick hits

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Distinction vs. Differentiation: Win on Both Fronts

Brenton Williamson, Ian Faison — Tue, 12 Aug 2025 16:42:04 +0000

This episode features an interview with Brenton Williamson, VP of Marketing at Bamboo HR, a company that empowers HR pros, employees, and organizations everywhere to simplify complicated processes and streamline time-consuming tasks.

Brenton discusses how he thinks about creating distinction in the market, the diversification of marketing channels, and the value of digital engagement.

Key Takeaways:

Distinction is different from differentiation. Differentiation is product focused, while distinction has more to do with brand identity and feel. You need both.
As organic search continues to take a hit, in-person events become an increasingly important tactic to get in front of customers.
We’re coming out of the inbound era and sales may need to get used to interacting with people who aren’t actively in a buying motion, and building relationships over time.

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:29) The Trust Tree: Distinction, differentiation, diversification

*(09:04) The Playbook: The end of the inbound era

*(36:24) Quick Hits: Brenton’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Brenton on LinkedIn
Learn more about BambooHR
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Building Memory Structures That Stick

Andrew Thomas, Ian Faison — Tue, 5 Aug 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Andrew Thomas, VP of Marketing at Archer Meat Snacks, a company that makes jerky, sticks and sausages, from real ingredients. Andrew has over 15 years of experience in the CPG food and beverage industry, with brands like Chicken of the Sea, Wilde Chips, and PepsiCo.

He discusses Archer’s recent rebrand, their go-to-market strategies, and the importance of social and influencer marketing.

Key Takeaways:

Awareness and creating memory structures for customers helps build a moat around your brand.
Don’t underestimate the power of a strong PR flywheel. Once it gets going, it has an outsized impact.
Long-term partnerships are the way to go with influencers. Fewer, bigger, better is a more strategic and authentic approach.

Quote:

We're the fourth largest meat snack brand in the nation. Our awareness is not the fourth largest. It's lagging quite a bit behind. And so what I'm trying to do is really build that mental availability, build a big ownable, distinctive brand that creates those memory structures in our consumer's mind so that when they go to the store, when they go to Costco, they go to Sam's, they go to Target, they go to Walmart, they recognize and see us because we have a pretty successful business today, but people are buying the grass fed beef mini sticks. They haven't necessarily been buying the Country Archer or the Archer grass fed beef mini sticks. And we want to create a moat around our brand. We want to generate a lot of that stickiness.

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:46) The Trust Tree: Being scrappy with social and influencer

*(23:09) The Playbook: Leading a strategic rebrand

*(45:43) Quick Hits: Andrew’s quick hits

Sponsor:

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How Do We Restructure Our Websites?

Robin Emiliani, Ian Faison — Tue, 29 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Robin Emiliani, Co-founder and Chief Growth Officer at Catalyst Marketing, an AI-enhanced growth marketing company that leverages AI to build smarter growth marketing strategies, faster.

Ian and Robin cover the fears marketers face with AI and how becoming an expert in tech tools can make marketing leaders indispensable.

Key Takeaways:

Expectations around websites are changing. People want answers at their fingertips, not to search for them on secondary and tertiary pages. Marketers will need to rethink inbound.
Surround sound and reaching your prospects through many different channels, is especially critical right now.

Quote:

How are websites going to change over time when the expectation is, I don't wanna go to a secondary page, I don't wanna go to a tertiary page anymore. I just wanna be able to type in my question, get my answer. Like that I think is on the new forefront of how this is gonna help evolve things. But how do we restructure our websites completely? Because the expectation is I'm going to be able to get my answer at my fingertips.

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:38) The Trust Tree: How AI is changing websites

*(19:50) The Playbook: It’s a race to create strong content at scale

*(29:47) The Dust Up: Messaging needs to be clear and concise

*(32:15) Quick Hits: Robin’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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To Invest or Not to Invest: Headcount

Kevin Cochrane, Ian Faison — Tue, 22 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kevin Cochrane, an experienced CMO who is currently CMO at Vultr, a company on a mission to make high-performance cloud computing easy to use, affordable, and locally accessible.

Kevin dives into the art of being discoverable, the monetary value of brand equity and the importance of using all data available to build a real model of your marketing efforts. He also discusses headcount, and how he is thinking about investing in it.

Key Takeaways:

Avoid focusing too much on tactics to get customer attention, like tweaking the subject line or the format of the email. Focus on the art of being discoverable, on making it easy for customers to find and fall in love with you.
Don’t be simplistic about data analysis. Simple metrics can you lead you astray, you need to leverage all the data available to you to build a holistic model.
Brand equity directly impacts the value of a business, take a company like Nvidia or Apple. Marketers who investing in their brand well, will see the productivity of their demand gen dollars skyrocket.

Quote:

“ I would not invest heavily in headcount. I have seen too many marketing organizations rapidly scale headcount. And you can have a company that's 200 million in revenue and there'll be 80 people in marketing, right? You can have an organization that's 50 million in revenue and they'll have 40 people in marketing and they'll hire field marketers in this region and that region. They'll build out their whole PR team. They'll build the whole AR team. We operate super, super lean here at Vultr. Number one is we empower everyone with a lot of, you know, AI tools and a lot of ability to make decisions, and they all have access to a massive treasure trove of data in our data warehouse, right? We just drive employee productivity as much as possible. Secondly, we leverage as much as possible external third parties that have specific expertise.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(06:59) The Trust Tree: Fostering an open ecosystem, the antithesis to a walled garden

*(25:22) The Playbook: Brand experience drives demand gen productivity

*(43:42) The Dust Up: Tension over events

*(46:05) Quick Hits: Kevin’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Moving With Agility as a Fortune 500

Caspian Studios — Tue, 15 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Rebecca Stone, SVP of Revenue Marketing at Cisco, the worldwide technology leader that is revolutionizing the way organizations connect and protect in the AI era.

Rebecca shares how she stays agile inside a Fortune 500 giant and why she approaches AI with thoughtful skepticism. She also reveals her evolving take on content strategy – arguing that soon how you present your content could matter more than the content itself.

Key Takeaways:

You can prioritize agility to drastically reduce time to market, even at a large Fortune 500.
Always think critically about answers from AI, and ask the models where they pulled their data from. Otherwise, risk sharing misinformation.
The way your content is distributed and presented is just as important as the content itself.

Quote:

I think it's a matter of meeting the market and meeting the moment, as well as just the sheer breadth of things that we have to do from an internal perspective. As with most organizations, there's not an unlimited amount of headcount and budget to go around. And so when you start to think about how do I approach things in a way that allows us to make progress. In a way that we were super slow, to your point, historically, that agile methodology is really helping us. And I think as an example of that, if you look over the course of the last six months, as we've moved more and more into the team operating fully agilely, we've cut down time to market for some of our most successful tactics from months, even potentially a quarter or more, to weeks.

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:42) The Trust Tree: Serving mom-and-pops up to the world’s largest governments

*(10:22) The Playbook: Agile operations in very large marketing team

*(37:50) The Dust Up: Marketing and sales, and marketing and product

*(40:27) Quick Hits: Rebecca’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Rebecca on LinkedIn
Learn more about Cisco
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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No More Mass Marketing: Precision Wins

Ian Faison, Suzanne Behrens — Tue, 8 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Suzanne Behrens, CMO at Granicus, a software company that helps better engage governments and the people they serve.

Suzanne discusses how Granicus is transforming engagement through AI-driven marketing, investing in digital channels over booths, and ensuring tight sales alignment.

Key Takeaways:

While procurement processes differ, public sector buyers still seek personalized, digital-first experiences. Meeting them with the right message at the right time is just as critical as in traditional B2B marketing.
New tools allow a new level of precision, and marketers needs to stop with mass marketing effort and focus on higher prospects.
While events are crucial for many CMOs we speak to, they can also be high cost and it may make more sense to overinvest in digital channels to meet customers where they are.

Quote:

“ We've got a tech stack with some tools that are AI-enabled, that we've adopted and hosted, that have really helped us more effectively understand buyer's behavior and intent to help us target opportunities more effectively, versus in the past, it used to be mass marketing. You'd sort of throw it out there and hope someone will, you know, call you. It's really now about looking at their behavior and intent to help us target more effectively and personalize the experience and customize from a super ABM perspective of reaching prospects and customers. So, leveraging different tools to help us do that. We're reaching them when they're ready. They're much higher prospect than just sort of casting a wide net.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:36) The Trust Tree: Selling globally to many personas

*(05:04) The Playbook: Overinvesting in digital and web

*(21:37) The Dust Up: Meeting in the middle

*(22:47) Quick Hits: Suzanne’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Suzanne on LinkedIn
Learn more about Granicus
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Search: Don’t Throw The Baby Out With The Bath Water

Putney Cloos, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison — Tue, 1 Jul 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Putney Cloos, CMO at Bombora, a B2B data pioneer that connects the B2B ecosystem in a one-of-a-kind Data Co-op of leading publishers, brand websites, and premium data providers.

Putney dives into the criticality of intent data in building your go-to-market motions, the importance of measuring ROI across a long sales cycles and playing the long game in PR.

Key Takeaways:

While we all need to be rethinking search and paying attention to how the world is changing, we shouldn’t abandon traditional search entirely, or too quickly. It still has a significant role.
While some see PR as an old-school tactic, it’s a very high return tactic. Marketers should leverage the fact that journalists are under pressure to find stories and should be reaching out before there is a deadline to they are top of mind.
An AI thought-partner doesn’t care when you throw out the entire brainstorm or trash an hour of work, making AI a great thought partner.

Quote:

“One thing that we're all struggling with, or thinking about at least, is traditional search. I think we all need to learn and think about, how does the world change? But the reality is in aggregate, traditional search still plays a pretty significant role. We're not going to throw the baby out with the bath water. We have to think about how we position ourselves as the world changes, but continue to do sort of old school investment and test and learn in the traditional search channels.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:16) The Trust Tree: Selling to publishers

*(19:43) The Playbook: Invest in high quality intent data

*(41:36) The Dust Up: Conflict during the interview process

*(45:06) Quick Hits: Putney’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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How to Build Your B2B Content Strategy in 2025

Ian Faison — Tue, 24 Jun 2025 09:00:00 +0000

In this special episode of Pipeline Visionaries, Ian Faison, CEO of Caspian Studios, breaks down the future of B2B content creation for 2025. He dives into frameworks and strategies, outlining the five methods of consumption and aiming for high quality that makes virality possible. He also dives into the difference between feeds, shows, and networks, giving case studies and examples and highlights the shift towards platform-specific content and the role of marketers as 'gardeners' in navigating walled gardens like YouTube and LinkedIn.

Key Takeaways:

There are five methods of consumption that marketers need to be thinking about: shorts, shows, medium form video, live entertainment and fiction. The format matches consumption. Shorts for scrollers, shows for subscribers, limited series for binges, live events for live learners, fiction for edutainment.
A feed and a show and a network are three different things. Creating a network allows audiences to self-select into the content that they like.
The optimal strategy for creating content to deliver it to your audiences, is for creators to create it and put it on the platform. Individuals, not brands.

Quote:

“ That's what we have to figure out - how do we maximize coverage for our target audience? And if you ignore methods of consumption or you ignore format, or you ignore hosts, you're inherently ignoring a subset of your population."

Episode Timestamps:

*(00:06) The future of B2B content in 2025

*(01:42) Five methods of consumption

*(07:52) Framework: feeds, shows, and networks

*(16:38) We’re all gardeners: accessing walled gardens

*(17:38) The shift to creator-first content

*(24:41) The importance of distribution and creativity

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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AI is Now Part of Your Team

Chris Bontempo, Ian Faison — Tue, 17 Jun 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Chris Bontempo, CMO, Johnson Controls, a 140 year old company that is a global leader in smart, healthy and sustainable buildings.

Chris spent nearly 19 years at IBM, eventually serving as CMO of IBM Americas before moving to Johnson Controls. He shares his perspective on website content being scraped by LLMs, how they’re using AI to reduce ad spend, and which types of content are resonating most with prospects.

Key Takeaways:

Websites need to be designed to be scraped by LLMs. All CMOs are trying to figure this out right now.
CMOs need to consider AI part of their teams “to supplement the labor that [they] have and give people superpowers to do their jobs better”.
CMOs need to be hands-on-keys, using, learning and leveraging new tools themselves, in order to be able to lead well.

Quote:

"As a CMO, you need to consider AI as part of your team, right? So the tools that we're using that all have AI baked into them, the how AI is going to streamline your process. AI is part of your team to supplement the labor that you have and give people superpowers to do their jobs better and at huge scale without taking on a huge amount of expense."

Episode Timestamps:

*(06:02) The Trust Tree: No daylight between sales and marketing

*(15:04) The Playbook: Designing the website to be scraped by AI

*(42:12) The Dust Up : There’s always a kernel of truth to both sides

*(46:08) Quick Hits: Chris’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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From Bait-and-Switch to Human-Centric

Ian Faison, Ashley Faus — Tue, 10 Jun 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Ashley Faus, Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Portfolio, Atlassian and author of the book Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI.

Ashley dives into the pitfalls of both active spamming and the bait-and-switch tactics that are commonplace today. She also explains why marketers should ditch the funnel framework and embrace playgrounds as the model for the customer journey, and shares her insights into what it means to make marketing truly human-centric.

Key Takeaways:

Misleading CTAs and bait-and-switch tactics erode trust. Marketers should not be trying to trick prospects into buying. It is expensive to acquire a customer that is a bad fit, and they should be prioritizing the relationship.
The funnel is outdated; marketers should adopt “the playground” where they allow customers to move through a self-directed customer journey however they want to.
The language that we use to talk about our audience, “is so adversarial. It's like I'm gonna hunt for a prospect and I'm gonna capture a lead, and I'm gonna lock down a deal.” Remember there is a person behind the screen.

Quote:

“ My job as a marketer, I always say, I never want to sell anything to anybody. My job is to match problems with solutions. And if I harass you or convince you to buy something that doesn't actually solve your problem, that's going to be very expensive for me to fix, either from a reputation standpoint, from a support or implementation cost standpoint. Like, it's not free for me to acquire a customer that's a bad fit. It's not just not serving them. It does not serve the business either. And I think that's the other piece that like sometimes people think when I talk about this, that I'm trying to be altruistic or that like it's a nice thing to do for the audience. I mean, yes, we should be decent humans, but it's bad for business to behave this way and to do the bait and switch or to force somebody into a bad fit. It's gonna be very expensive for you to force fit that, or to try to, you know, win and re-win that customer or to serve that customer If they go nuclear and they start posting on social media, or they file a lawsuit, right? It's very expensive to get out of a bad deal or to turn a bad deal into a good deal.”

Segment Timestamps:

*(02:55) Human-centered marketing frameworks
*(08:56) The pitfalls of bait-and-switch tactics
*(27:13) The playground over the funnel
*(35:33) The Playbook: Uncuttable budget items

Sponsor:

Links:

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Using Small Bets to Win Big with AI

Ian Faison, Avi Bhagtani — Tue, 3 Jun 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Avi Bhagtani, CMO at Digitate, a company that leverages machine learning and AI to intelligently manage IT and business operations.

Avi discusses their success with regional, curated events and how they are investing in AI experiments. He also shares insights into how they are leveraging AI to optimize the website.

Key Takeaways:

Many successful events are curated, smaller and regional. Marketers who can meet their customer expectations and create networking opportunities with peers will pull ahead.
The world of the traditional funnel is gone. The buyer journey is much more user dependent. Buyers have more agency and the journey has become very fast.
The speed that generative AI can move when it comes to updating the website and launching ABM campaigns is already astonishing, and will only get better. Marketers should be leveraging these tools to move faster.

Quote:

“In the last one year, we have experimented with at least 12 to 15 new tools, either for finding our prospects or distilling our signals or increasing productivity with AI, right? Some of them have worked. Some of them have failed miserably, just the nature of the business today. But fortunately, we are doing this going in all eyes wide open, right? We know that some of these things are just gonna work. Some of these things have, you know, they have a little bit of a longer runway that they need to give you the results you want. Some of these just don't work, right? So that's where the majority of the investments are focused on today.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:07) The Trust Tree: Finding every avenue to intercept prospects

*(09:06) The Playbook: Consistency of messaging over time

*(31:31) The Dust Up: Answer what marketing will do for other functions

*(33:48) Quick Hits: Avi quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Category Design and Surviving as a Startup

Ian Faison, Bruce Cleveland — Tue, 27 May 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Bruce Cleveland, author of the best-seller “Traversing the Traction Gap" and CEO of Traction Gap Partners, a Market Engineering advisory firm.

Bruce outlines why most startups fail and explains market engineering, a term he coined to represent the ideas around category design. He shares insights into creating a category and what goes into startup success.

Key Takeaways:

Market engineering involves the ideas around category design or redefinition thought leadership to create a category.
There are distinct advantages to being a category leader; the category leader generates about 76% of all the profits from a category. While there is a first-mover advantage, there are also some associated challenges.
Thought leadership is an essential component of creating a category. People want to be around peers they admire, so gathering the right people together leads to an eventual tipping point that makes it easier for a company to sell.

Quote:

One of the reasons that you need to actively be involved in the thought leadership part of category creation is people wanna hang out with other people who they think are smart, who have some cool ideas. And that I think happens with companies as well. So eventually some companies kind of climb out of the morass, the cacophony of, fighting the marketing battle and begin to emerge as the thought leaders in those. And then they collectively gather more people and more people. And finally there's a tipping point where that company is perceived as the category leader. And so it becomes really easy for those companies to then sell more.

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:26) The Trust Tree: Traversing the Traction Gap

*(07:31) The importance of category design

*(26:05) Thought Leadership in category creation

*(35:39) How to evaluate startups

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Bruce on LinkedIn
Learn more about Traction Gap Partners or Traversing the Traction Gap
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Not Taking Risks is Risky

Ian Faison, Armen Najarian — Tue, 20 May 2025 14:39:02 +0000

This episode features an interview with Armen Najarian, CMO at Sift, an AI-powered fraud platform delivering identity trust for leading global businesses.

Armen has 10 years of experience as a CMO across a variety of fraud prevention, digital identity, and cybersecurity organizations. He discusses how word of mouth and a strong brand has allowed them to become a leader in their space and also gives insight into Sift’s top source for demand generation.

Key Takeaways:

It is riskier not to take risks. Marketers need to be willing to try something unconventional. If it fails, the world goes on.
Giving your customers access to your data, if it answers important questions for them, can be a key driver of demand.
Understand what your customers are curious about and what questions they are asking. If you can find a way to provide answers, the ROI will be significant.

Quote:

”Those that aren't taking risks are the ones taking risks, is the way I would look at this. Like we have to take risks -you know, it's gotten so noisy and some of the tried and true tactics like organic search, right, which is completely flipped on its head right now. Every CMO has a responsibility, anyone in marketing really, has a responsibility to really rethink the logic for what they're doing and take some risks.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:29) The Trust Tree: 10 years of CMO experience

*(09:19) The Playbook: Answering your customers biggest questions

*(38:24) The Dust Up: To create a category or not

*(42:32) Quick Hits: Armen’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Get Off the Treadmill: Make Space for Creativity

Ian Faison, Alison Lange Engel — Tue, 13 May 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Alison Lange Engel, CEO of Ceros, a company that provides tools and services that empower companies to create interactive content with unparalleled ease and efficiency, driving customer engagement.

In this episode, Alison discusses the power of interactive content and how to differentiate your brand amidst increasing noise. She and Ian dive into the importance of being unique and how creativity is a competitive advantage.

Key Takeaways:

Creativity is a competitive advantage, even more so as copying assets gets easier with AI. CMOs need to get their teams off the treadmill and make space for creativity, inspiration and ideation.
The sea of sameness is real, especially in B2B, and the world continues to get noisier. You have to disrupt and have conviction behind your big bets; check box marketing won’t cut it anymore.
Originality is as important as ever, but teams have to find ways to do more with less and won’t succeed if they are only trying to differentiate themselves through words, tone, or processes.

Quote:

You're going to miss the opportunity to differentiate and tell a unique story, right, if you have your team on a treadmill constantly. And that's how most people feel. But, as a leader, you've got to create space for it and find inspiration. Encourage your team to bring ideas. We would bring magazine clips in. People would bring in their pets. People brought in old, you know, pictures, family mementos, what matters to them. You've gotta get to the heart and soul of what you're trying to do to kind of unlock your team and have your company, you know, feel fresh, feel modern, and have people take risks, right? Great companies take risks and you have to kind of create that environment to do that. The brands that don't, are in trouble and the brands that do are the ones that win.

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:50) The Trust Tree: Experiences over static content

*(25:36) The ROI of creativity

*(36:29) Advice for CMOs on creativity and boldness

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Alison on LinkedIn
Learn more about Ceros
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Driving Qualified Pipeline Through Meta

Ian Faison, Jen Rapp — Tue, 6 May 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jen Rapp, CMO at Superside, an AI-powered creative service, trusted by 500+ top brands. Jen has over 20 years of experience developing and executing marketing strategies for high-growth companies, with a particular focus on working alongside entrepreneurial leaders to scale.

She discusses selling the vision and how doing good impacts marketing, sharing her lessons from her time at Patagonia and DoorDash. She also discusses winning on meta through quality creative and driving qualified leads through virtual summits.

Key Takeaways:

Don’t sleep on meta ads. If your ICP is on Instagram, those ads can be some of the cleanest and most effective ads to drive pipeline, especially if you have quality creative.
Virtual Summits, or essentially a stack of webinars, are a great way to get emails and drive pipeline if you are truly offering great content.
Sell the vision, not the product. A focus on features, instead of stories, is rarely the way to go.

Quote:

“ I would not have said this a year ago, when I first joined the company - number one is our meta, paid meta spend. I came to this company and I saw how much we were spending on Meta, and I was like, whoa, what the hell are these people doing? They're making mistakes left and right. Nope. We drive a majority, or a lot, I shouldn't say a majority, a lot of our qualified pipeline through our Meta spend. Our Meta spend also acts as our top of funnel awareness driver. When we turn off meta, we basically turn off the ability of our SDRs and our BDRs to convert people to SQLs. It is invaluable. So number one, my marketing team is like rallied around creating incredible creative for Meta.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:51) The Trust Tree: Making sure customers have confidence in you

*(12:12) The Playbook: The power of Meta ads

*(33:10) The Dust Up: Standing up to brilliant founders

*(41:01) Quick Hits: Jen’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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People Churn From Products, Not From Brands

Ian Faison, Steve Rotter — Tue, 29 Apr 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Steve Rotter, CMO at DeepL, a global communications platform powered by Language AI.

In this episode, Steve shares with us the power of a small uplift to your website when you see large scale website traffic, and the importance of pushing your point of view over your product features. He also dives into the value of brand in avoiding churn.

Key Takeaways:

Small changes to the website can have a small uplift, and when you are dealing with large-scale website traffic, that can have a big impact on the business. For large enterprises, don’t underestimate the value of small optimizations on the website.
People churn products, they don’t churn from valued brands and communities. Make sure to invest in your brand accordingly.
Explaining your POV over pushing your features, allows you to demonstrate the outsized impact of your product more effectively.

Quote:

Brand is critical. My general sense is, people churn from products, they don't churn from communities, they don't churn from brands with personalities that they enjoy. So, we spend a lot of time looking at that in terms of, you know, what is the voice, what is the language, what is the identity of the brand?

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:11) The Trust Tree: People churn from products, not brands and communities

*(24:13) The Playbook: Explain your point of view, over pushing all your features

*(39:22) Quick Hits: Scott’s Quick Hits

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Being Led Astray: First- and Last-Touch Attribution

Ian Faison, Bill Macaitis — Tue, 22 Apr 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Bill Macaitis, Founder & CEO, SaaS CMO Pro, where he shares growth strategies for SaaS and AI companies. His past roles include CMO positions at Slack and Zendesk, and SVP of Marketing at Salesforce.

Bill joins the podcast to discuss findings from a recent survey of over 300 B2B marketers that gives insights into marketing strategies and budgets. He shares what they learned about marketing versus sales budgets, the most common attribution model, and more.

Key Takeaways:

Companies that are growing the fastest, invest the most in marketing. While cause and effect of that correlation is unclear, it’s an interesting finding.
Pipeline generation was one of the most tracked metrics for CMOs, which is a nice move away from only looking at MQLs or leads. Unfortunately, awareness was rarely tracked, making it hard for marketing teams to invest in long-term initiatives.
A lot of companies, 65 percent, continue to use first or last touch attribution models.

Quote:

So, what we learned is a lot of companies, I think especially in their earlier stages - percent still use first- or last- touch. It's kind of crazy. I'm still shocked by it. I remember my time at Salesforce, I was running the marketing ops team at that point, along with a couple other teams, and I just did a deep dive into attribution. Like I really wanted to understand like, hey, how many touches are people having with us before they became a lead? And then how many touches before they became a customer? What we would see is people would have 10, 20, 30 interactions or touches with us before they became a lead, and then they'd have like another 20 or 30 before they became a customer. And just imagine giving all the credit to the very first or last thing. And by the way, it's one of the reasons Google got so big was because a very common last touch thing is they will search on your company name. Branded search, right? And it's like, oh, like the SEM guys are like, this is amazing, right? We need to spend more on Google because they're producing these massive deals. And it's like, well wait, what about all the stuff in the middle?

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:48) Marketing Strategies and Budgeting

*(22:31) Attribution Models in Marketing

*(26:44) Top Metrics for B2B SaaS and AI Companies

*(31:06) Marketing's Role in Revenue and Expansion

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Automating Inbound to Maximize MQLs

Ian Faison, Jenny Force — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jenny Force, VP of Global Demand Generation at Meltwater, a company with a suite of solutions that spans media, social, consumer, and sales intelligence. Jenny discusses her experience launching the company’s first big summit, as well as the work they have done to automate their inbound process to maximize each MQL.

Key Takeaways:

Launching a new big initiative and then proving ROI to the executive team requires careful positioning and careful measurement against KPIs.
Automating the process for inbound leads through tech removes manual human intervention and puts the sellers into positions where they can do their job at a more impactful level.
Imbuing campaigns with humor, while a little scary, can cause a big lift in engagement.

Quote:

We've been really investing and not just spending more money to get more MQLs. It's making, not to sound cliche, but every MQL count. It's about automating the process. Here at Meltwater, we're a 20-year-old company, we're very sales-centric and there's a lot of energy that used to be put behind outbound. So, it was changing the narrative around inbound. Until we totally make this change as a business where everyone in the business is shouting to get an inbound lead and are super excited about it, it's how can I get every single lead responded to in under an hour without any delays? And it's been a bit of a journey to put the right tech in place to automate those processes that we can, take out that manual human intervention and then put the sellers into the business so they can actually sell. So, I've got some tech around instant meeting scheduling, self-serve demos, a conversational email that we've put in. And honestly, I feel like that has already had such an impact on our conversion rates. I wouldn't get rid of it.

Episode Timestamps:

*(06:03) The Trust Tree: Improving inbound efficiency and increasing deal velocity

*(14:32) The Playbook: Launching a summit and investing in automation

*(45:53) The Dust Up: Changing inbound KPIs to get a seat at the table

*(49:30) Quick Hits: Jenny’s quick hits

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Making Sales an Advisor to Prospects

Ian Faison, Luke Arno — Tue, 8 Apr 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Luke Arno, CRO at Transcend, a privacy platform that empowers brands to enhance regulatory stances and improve customer relationships through data transparency, consent, and control.

Luke shares his thoughts on strategy that prioritizes data privacy and limits engagement to prospects who opt in. He also discusses making the sales function an advisor and consultant to potential customers.

Key Takeaways:

One size fits all messaging is not successful and does more damage than good. It needs to go.
Marketing while prioritizing data privacy is a different ball game and requires a series of calculated investments based on the target market.
Empowering your sales leaders as thought leaders, and asking them to act as advisors, makes them very valuable at events.

Quote:

“ How do we most effectively deliver thought leadership or ask the right questions from our customers about the problems they're solving? And we invest deeply in enabling our sales force to be subject matter experts, and then therefore we rely on them to help scale, to meet our customers and open up the conversation in a trusted environment. Hence the name of the segment, the trust tree. But that whole process requires sales rep to put their sales position down and, effectively, ship the paradigm for how they think about engaging customers as more of a consultant or an advisor. So, we try and delight our customers with a sales free experience, but we do rely deeply on the employees we hire at every function to effectively manage the conversation as a trusted advisor.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(07:47) The Trust Tree: Thoughts on marketing strategy from a CRO

*(21:52) The Playbook: The psychology of prospecting

*(37:03) The Dust Up: Show up prepared to articulate your position

*(40:45) Quick Hits: Luke’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Luke on LinkedIn
Learn more about Transcend
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Standing Out in a Crowded Market

Ian Faison, Kamal Thakarsey — Tue, 1 Apr 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kamal Thakarsey, CMO at Smartling, an AI Translation Platform that helps companies grow globally, faster. Kamal shares his strategy to stand out in a crowded market. He also dives into understanding trends, educating your customer, and testing even your smallest hypothesis.

Key Takeaways:

Fight complacency in your messaging. Companies may be comfortable with what they are doing, and comfortable sticking with the status quo, so you need to demonstrate the value of changing their approach.
Test everything, from button colors to CTAs and beyond. Testing often surprises you and proves your hypotheses wrong.
If you’re in a crowded market, focus on truly understanding your market and customers. Investing in that research can support your efforts to differentiate.

Quote:

Being an established market, there's lot of kind of noise that's happening and every company kind of raising your hand and saying, we do this, we do this.I think for us also a big part of our strategy is like standing out really like trying to show the market that like we are kind of being industry leaders and helping the space move forward. , I think it's also really about for us, also about how we really highlight kind of the value we bring to an organization and a team. Not just like, tactically, here's some solutions, we help you kind of of do better, but like, what do we actually bring the table and how are we going to help you be successful? I think to me, that's really just like foundational to them, like how we kind of run our programs and campaigns and how more effective they can be, rather than just kind of de facto doing things because we should be doing them. So, you know, one thing I really stress is just really continue to do like market research and understanding, you know, what are their priorities? What are the business initiatives? What are their executives and leaders asking them on an ongoing basis?How can we then understand those trends and that feedback and really put together, you know, smart, timely, relevant campaigns that are going to reach them? Because, like I said, we're in a crowded market with a lot of different vendors, both in the software and the services side, and we have to stand out.

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:35) The Trust Tree: Capturing the marketing and targeting accounts

*(12:24) The Playbook: Driving intent through search

*(36:59) The Dust Up: Advocating for self-service

*(41:50) Quick Hits: Kamal’s quick hits

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Rigorous Testing to Go Viral

Ian Faison, Gaurav Agarwal — Tue, 25 Mar 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Gaurav Agarwal, COO and Revenue Leader at ClickUp, an all-in-one productivity platform that replaces all individual workplace productivity tools with a single, unified platform.

Gaurav shares his thoughts on keeping your content strategy relevant and the iteration and testing needed to go viral. He also discusses maintaining a blend of B2B and B2C tactics to achieve scalable success.

Key Takeaways:

Content strategy and going viral is much more about consistency and iteration than it is about the spark of one amazing ideas. Rigorous and experimentation leads to long-term ROI.
To stay relevant in marketing, you have to keep up to date on generational trends and new formats of reaching people. You can’t get comfortable being a great marketer in an outdate channel.
You have to keep bets in your portfolio that have an asymmetric upside, which you can only do if you are willing to take on a certain amount of risk. Don’t get too excited about immediate ROI.

Quote:

A huge part of perfecting craft is you want to stay relevant. I know amazing marketers who are gods of Facebook and building viral content on Facebook. And they fought the short form vertical video format with TikTok so much. They looked down upon it because they thought that this is cringy, this is shot on an iPhone. And I'm like, why are you doing this to yourself? Like, do you not want to be culturally relevant in the next decade? So, a huge part of a great team is staying hungry and not thinking that you've arrived because content, media, consumer preferences, even software is a generational business. You have to stay on with the formats of what the future is and keep moving towards that direction versus be so happy that I'm this amazing marketer on Facebook. Dude, like your time is up. Facebook pages don't get any distribution anymore.

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:29) The Trust Tree: Size of audience and LTV should drive your marketing strategy

*(11:18) The Playbook: Strategic iteration to go viral on social

*(38:03) The Dust Up: Adapt content to different channels and stay true to your brand ethos

*(43:52) Quick Hits: Gaurav’s quick hits

Sponsor:

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Understanding Digital Body Language

Ian Faison, Ural Cebeci — Tue, 18 Mar 2025 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Ural Cebeci, SVP Marketing, Global Demand Generation at Braze, a customer engagement platform that allows any marketer to collect and take action on data from any source, so they can creatively engage with customers in real time, across channels.

Ural shares his perspective on the challenges and hesitations surrounding personalization, and his thoughts on how to move forward. He also dives into understanding digital body language and customer signals.

Key Takeaways:

A good demand strategy requires two things: GTM alignment and having the infrastructure to understand the business through data.
To have a strong brand, you need healthy, long-term customer relationships, which requires understanding digital body language and customer signals.
Marketers have valid hesitations around personalization, due to compliance and data privacy issues, and fear of eroding customer trust. As a result, using channels to continually get consent from customers and actually delivering value is key.

Quote:

”In the end, in order to have a strong brand, you need to have healthy and long-term customer relationships. And we all acquire customers, users, through campaigns, but then retaining them really means connecting with the human behind that anonymous user or anonymous visitor. And that brings back the whole digital body language. Like we understand what that user is signaling, like what is at the surface versus what they are saying with their engagement, like what they say and collect that data and then like use that to drive better and more meaningful customer relationships.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:55) The Trust Tree: Understanding the business through data

*(11:46) The Playbook: Any channel is cuttable, you need to understand your marketing mix

*(25:59) The Dust Up: Alignment and committing to the same idea

*(27:43) Quick Hits: Ural’s quick hits

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Stay Ahead in Search with Quality Content

Ian Faison, Emma Robinson — Tue, 25 Feb 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Emma Robinson, B2B Marketing Lead at Canva, a global online visual communications platform on a mission to empower the world to design.

In this episode, Emma dives into Canva's shift from individual to enterprise functionality, sharing her thoughts on the inherent value of investing in brand at any stage. She also dives into the increasing importance of word-of-mouth and avoiding the sea of sameness in B2B marketing.

Key Takeaways:

Brand and creative help you to get potential buyers thinking and feeling, and help you differentiate among a sea of sameness in B2B marketing, and pushes buyers towards action.
While analyst relations are still important, word-of-mouth and peer-driven buying are increasingly important, potentially reducing some of the importance of analyst reports.
Traditional SEO is changing, and having high-quality, insight rich content with an authentic point of view will be important.

Quote:

Traditional SEO is probably changing somewhat. I mean, most of us who have searched something in recent times will not necessarily be searching just in Google. So, finding ways to make sure that our content will be trained by an LLM in the right ways, you know, people still need answers, but they're getting them in a very different way now. Image search and, you know, tech search and all these different things that will inevitably change what we know as traditional SEO. So, I think for that, it's again, back to the point about being grounded in really good quality content, like colored content that has a point of view that does feel less AI oriented and more really rich in insights insights, for example, like primary research, those types of things, but that's still going to stay. And then I think influencer marketing and things like podcasts and so forth, like all of those sort of authentic moments are going to matter in kind of the new world. So, we're definitely rethinking our search strategy there, and so more to come on that.

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:33) The Trust Tree: Changing perceptions and moving into enterprise

*(23:16) The Playbook: Thinking and feeling to action

*(39:53) The Dust Up: Do you invest in brand equity for the long term?

*(43:53) Quick Hits: Emma’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison/
Connect with Emma on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-robinson-mtkg/
Learn more about Canva: https://www.linkedin.com/company/canva/
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://www.linkedin.com/company/canva/

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Merging Brands and Minimizing Negative Impact

Ian Faison, Jean-Christophe Pitié — Tue, 18 Feb 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jean-Christophe Pitié, CMO and Chief Partner Officer at Contentsquare, an experience intelligence platform that helps you gain a deep understanding of your customers’ whole online journey.

In this episode, Jean-Christophe shares his approach to merging brands while minimizing friction and negative impact. He also discusses the future of SEO and how they are experimenting with influencing LLMs.

Key Takeaways:

The future of SEO may shift to thinking about how to influence LLMs, and what they say about your brand. While it’s currently unclear how to do this, it will likely become increasingly important in the coming years.
When merging multiple brands, move slowly and very carefully monitor your work to look for friction and negative impacts.
Investing in the martech stack is uncuttable since data is essential to the modern marketer.

Quote:

We did two major acquisitions in the last two years, and we had three websites under three brands. So we are going through this major rebranding, combining and merging the three brands and phasing out two of the three brands. And so I would say that's a massive project and experiment too. It's like, how do you merge these brands and which have followers, minimizing the business impact, minimizing customer friction? Break things along the journey, so you have to take things. So this, you can identify what you bring to customer journeys or customer flow you're breaking. And as you shift the traffic, for example, SEO, as you start to rebuild SEO, it takes time. Paid search, you cannot do it all. So we said the main learnings are, we knew that would be things breaking and it's happening. So take it slowly, monitor, monitor, monitor very quickly. And we have a weekly committee where we monitor how it's going and the transition is happening. So yes, be slow and patient. Don't break things, or as little as possible.

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:04) The Trust Tree: Useful organizational design structures

*(08:57) The Playbook: Influencing LLMs

*(31:51) The Dust Up The challenge of monetization

*(33:54) Quick Hits: JCP’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Jean-Christophe on LinkedIn
Learn more about Contentsquare
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Don’t Waste Time on Buyers Who Aren’t Ready to Engage

Ian Faison, Drew Chapin — Tue, 11 Feb 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Drew Chapin, CMO at Certinia, a platform that connects all aspects of services operations, from services estimation and delivery to customer success management and financial planning and accounting.

In this episode, Drew discusses monitoring buying signals and generating the right traffic to your website. He also dives into inheriting a rebrand and some of the nuances of marketing in a private equity owned company.

Key Takeaways:

Cold calls, cold emails and the days of expecting someone to fill out a form to get content are over. B2B marketers need to stop making friction or blockers.
Nothing fails like success. If you just continue to execute what has worked in the past, you're going to miss innovation opportunities.
Aspire for a champagne flute funnel over a martini glass funnel. Maybe not as many leads are coming in at the top, but they are higher quality and converting and much higher rates through the funnel.

Quote:

“85 percent of the time the buyer will go with the first vendor that they contact. So, building that trust with the buyer over time is critically important. And so, you know, in the old days, you put a form in front of every piece of content and we would optimize around the contact information. And then you'd pass that along to some BDR and they would just be banging their head against the wall, calling people who weren't on the buying committee. They weren't ready to talk to a salesperson, you know, and it just was waste so much waste. And so what we're trying to do now is we're trying to monitor the activity at the target account level and look for buying signals”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:51) The Trust Tree: Stretching the dollar in a PE-owned company

*(06:28) The Playbook: Generating quality traffic to the website

*(24:28) The Dust Up: Proving ROI to the board

*(26:59) Quick Hits: Drew’s quit hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison/
Connect with Drew on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chapindrew/
Learn more about Certinia: https://www.linkedin.com/company/certinia/
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://caspianstudios.com/

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The Exciting Potential of AI SDRs

Ian Faison, Niloy Sanyal — Tue, 4 Feb 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Niloy Sanyal, CMO at LeanTaaS, a growth-stage company that creates software solutions combining lean principles, predictive and prescriptive analytics, and machine learning to transform hospital and infusion center operations.

In this conversation, Niloy and Ian debate the merits of last touch versus multitouch attribution models. They also dive into the potential of AI SDRs and the benefits of ungating the content on your website.

Key Takeaways:

While reporting last touch attribution may help CMOs establish credibility, there are benefits to thinking in terms of multitouch and how to best determine the next best touch.
B2B still has a way to go to fully leverage the capacity of our current LLMs, not to mention the new versions coming out. There is immense opportunity in AI SDRs and BDRs.
If you may the CEO fill out a form on your website, you’ve lost them. Ungating content allows high level prospects to consume the information they need.

Quote:

I am absolutely bullish on the impact of generative AI in the tactic of, to start with BDR and AE sales motions as part of our broader ABM execution. But very soon our comms execution, and every part of the marketing execution. But right now, early days, so I don't want to oversell it. But, the promise of what this can do without any improvement on the LLM. Like we were having this debate last night with another thought leader and I don't need chat GPT 5 to come out. I think 4. 0 or 4 is good enough and it's actually great. We just haven't caught up in a B2B environment to take advantage of it. And what I'm seeing from our early experiments, we've been at it now for three, four months, is absolutely astounding in what it can do. It's not going to replace BDRs. Let's be clear, you're in the Bay Area. If you drive from, you know, Peninsula to the city, I almost feel half the billboards these days are on like AI-automated SDR, BDR type of a thing. Not in my space. It's not going to automate that any, replace rather, but it can supercharge. Those individuals and it can supercharge. So I'm very excited about where we are.

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:00) The Trust Tree: Last Touch Versus Multi-Touch

*(30:07) The Playbook: The Potential of Gen AI SDRs and BDRs

*(44:05) Quick Hits: Niloy’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison/
Connect with Niloy on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/niloysanyal/
Learn more about LeanTaaS: https://www.linkedin.com/company/leantaas/
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://caspianstudios.com/

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Lightning Strikes - Pulling Yourself Above the “Visible Line” with a Small Budget

Melton Littlepage, Ian Faison — Tue, 28 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Melton Littlepage, the CMO at 1Password, a password manager trusted by businesses and consumers alike.

In this episode, Melton shares his thoughts on building big bets into your budget and how the lightning strike strategy can increase awareness, even on a limited budget. He also talks about how he’s structured his team to create harmony with sales and the importance of focusing on expansion marketing.

Key Takeaways:

The lightning strike strategy, spending a large portion of your marketing budget on a message over a number of weeks, can increase awareness better than spreading your budget evenly across the year.
CMOs can be very focused on acquisition, but they should not forget to focus on expansion marketing and the value they can generate there.
One-on-one sales and marketing partnerships can help ensure both teams are on the same page and operating in harmony.

Quote:

I'm a huge believer in lightning strikes. Lightning strikes are so important to us. If you're not familiar with the lightning strike concept in marketing, it's when you align the entire business, everything about the business where you could possibly project the message into the market, the website, all digital marketing, organic, social, paid social, the sales behavior, your presence at an event, everything in this tiny period of time says one thing. And you say it in deafeningly loud. You deploy 25 or 30 or 40 percent of your marketing budget into a window of time that could be just one or two weeks. And you absolutely blast your way into awareness inside your target buyer audience. This goes against the nature of the CMO, right? The CMO, like we all have these spreadsheets of targets where I need to deliver exactly this many MQLs consistently month in and month out with a little bit of seasonality built in and I can't afford variability. Like I definitely can't miss a month. And I don't know if a lightning strike is going to move the needle and so I peanut butter spread my budget evenly. But the problem is unless you have a massive budget, and most of us don't have a massive budget, then you're constantly below the visible line. You're just relegating yourself to being below the visible line.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(06:52) The Trust Tree: Leveraging solution marketing as you move to enterprise selling

*(23:05) The Playbook: Lightning strikes and increasing awareness

*47:00) The Dust Up: Navigating CEO-decisions

*(49:00) Quick Hits: Melton’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Melton on LinkedIn
Learn more about 1password
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Becoming a Leader in Analyst Reports

Ian Faison, Alex Saric — Tue, 21 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Alex Saric, CMO at Ivalua, a company that empowers businesses to effectively manage all categories of spend and all suppliers, increasing profitability, improving ESG performance, lowering risk, and improving employee productivity.

In this conversation, Alex shares his insights into pitching to and engaging with analysts, and how Ivalua has lead in reports since he joined the organization. He also dives into the ways he supports his team in building a dynamic website and when events with significant impact aren’t measurable in terms of ROI.

Key Takeaways:

There is a strategy to sharing your value with analysts in order to lead in their reports. Sharing strategically chosen customer stories and assessing what influences each analyst can go a long way.
In addition to the basics of creating a great website and tracking traffic, you need to create a dynamic website. Empowering your team to make minor changes and request major changes can allow you to adjust quickly and improve your website strategy.
There is a tendency to focus on fixing problems, but don’t forget to also assess how to improve and scale what is working well.

Quote:

Yes, I'll say when I joined, we at the time were not a leader in almost any of these reports that were out there. I think we had broken into one. In the 7 years, and knock on wood, I don't want to jinx myself, we've been the leader in every single report from Gartner and Forrester since then. And I'd say, you know, what I really did, it was probably one of my first priorities, given how important it is in our industry, I reached out to the analysts, started meeting one-on-one with the key analysts there. And of course, you know, I'm going to tell them my pitch, but they're smart enough to know take it with a grain of salt. I think the important thing is to start introducing them to customers because that's where you get a lot of credibility, if the customers back up what you're saying. And you can be very strategic. So, you know, I was very careful in, the competitor that was kind of the top competitor at the time, making sure I introduced the analyst to customers that had switched from that competitor, which would privately both talk about us, but also kind of badmouth, their past vendor and that really helped kind of flip the switch and start building credibility what I was saying was actually true. And also improving the rankings. And besides the rankings, they're also influencing a lot of deals behind the scenes and I think they start recommending us a lot more after that.

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:27) The Trust Tree: Structuring the team to tap into regional expertise

*(09:27) The Playbook: Engaging with analysts and leading in reports

*(33:34) The Dust Up: Healthy tension with other functions

*(34:42) Quick Hits: Alex’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison/
Connect with Alex on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexsaric/
Learn more about Ivalua: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ivalua/about/
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://caspianstudios.com/

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How to Experiment on a Tight Budget

Ian Faison, Liz Carter — Tue, 14 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Liz Carter, CMO at Reputation, a company helping brands understand and improve their reputations. In this conversation, Liz discusses the differences between brand and reputation and the current challenges of building trust with today’s consumers. She also shares her thoughts on experimentation within tight budgets.

Key Takeaways:

Brand is not synonymous with reputation, Your brand is who you aspire to be, while your reputation reflects how consumers perceive you based on their experiences. Bridging the gap is essential for success.
When budgets are tight, think about how you can do small experiments and how you can best leverage them, but keep experimenting.
With AI and misinformation, it is a challenging time to to build consumer trust in the marketplace, and brands should be paying special attention to how they are perceived by target audiences.

Quote:

In an environment where budgets are getting cut and things are being tightened or whatever, you know, you have to think about like, is now a time for experimenting with big dollars or is it time for little experiments and what can you get out of that? And so, I mean, again, it's a balancing act of knowing sort of what's happening in the market or in your business specifically at a given time and how and when to sort of look for those opportunities.

Episode Timestamps:

*(08:17) The Trust Tree: The difference between brand and reputation

*(14:07) The Playbook: Bringing crazy ideas to your CFO

*(34:41) The Dust Up: Alignment and clear expectations

*(35:57) Quick Hits: Liz’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ianfaison/
Connect with Liz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liz-carter-a9842a2/
Learn more about Reputation: https://www.linkedin.com/company/reputation-com/about/
Learn more about Caspian Studios: https://caspianstudios.com/

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Let Them Binge! Why Ungating Content is a No-Brainer

Ian Faison, Calen Holbrooks — Tue, 7 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Calen Holbrooks, VP of Demand Gen at Airtable, the no-code app platform that empowers people closest to the work to accelerate their most critical business processes.

In this episode, Calen shares with us how she thinks about “big C and little c community” and why it is important to invest in, even when it is harder to measure. She also dives into her approach to accessible content and how they increased their conversion rates through a homepage refresh.

Key Takeaways:

We know that people are consuming content in a binge-like format; we should let them binge! While sales’ desire to gate content is understandable, ungating is a no-brainer, especially given all of the data we have now.
Investing in community pays dividends and drives intent. While some community investments are more measurable than others, it doesn’t mean you should not invest in those less-measurable communities.
The homepage is crucial, and refreshing it to tweak the way Airtable told their story resulted in a 25 percent conversion increase.

Quote:

“ I'm surprised at how slow organizations have been to adopt some of this, ungate 80 percent of what you're doing strategy. Maybe I shouldn't be surprised, like, I get it. The processes with marketing to BDR to sales handoffs require a lot of this sort of traditional lead flow of things. Not to point fingers, but I do blame a little bit on the sales side and sort of what they need to be why we can't do that. But it seems like a no-brainer when we have the amount of data that we have today… When we know everybody is scrolling and consuming content in a binge-like format, like, let them binge!”

Episode Timestamps:
*(03:53) The Trust Tree: The evolution to enterprise selling

*(21:26) The Playbook: Investing in community and tracking account propensity

*(34:23) The Dust Up: Demand gen versus brand araguments

*(41:42) Quick Hits: Calen’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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The Changing Paid Search Game

Ian Faison, Lyndsey Rojas — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Lyndsey Rojas, CMO at IFS Ultimo, a SaaS enterprise asset management solution, focused on maintenance & safety and well known for a rapid deployment, ease of use and an unparalleled time to value.

In this episode, Lyndsey dives into leveraging partner marketing to move from a regional to a global player and making sure communication is transparent to maintain 98 percent customer retention.

Key Takeaways:

Investing in your team, particularly with all the rapid changes in tech and AI, is uncuttable. It’s essential to equip your team to use new technologies and to be strong storytellers.
Transparency through the full buyer's journey helps reduce friction in the customer experience by setting accurate expectations, ultimately resulting in high customer retention.
Partnerships are especially valuable during times of budget constraints because it allows you to do more with less and helps companies move from regional players to global brands.

Quote:

Search, paid search and social, they keep changing the game on us. The algorithm changes, cookie lists, all these things keep changing. It keeps us on our toes, and it is like a game you play. You know, you think, oh, I'll pull this lever, and maybe the cost-per-click will go down. And, it's not something that you can figure out one time and be okay with it. But, for us, like most B2B tech companies I think, it is the number one traffic generator for our website. It is the top two lead generator for us. So, it is something that we absolutely have to stay on top

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:35) The Trust Tree: Authentic communications and creating efficiency for customers
*(12:55) The Playbook: Doing more with less through partnerships
*(32:40) The Dust Up: Setting objectives with sales

*(33:45) Quick Hits: Lyndsey’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Don’t Obsess Over Attribution

Ian Faison, Louise Clements — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Louise Clements, CMO at WorkJam, the world leader in the digital frontline workplace, revolutionizing how HQs and their frontline workforces work together.

In this episode, Louise discusses why she is no longer looking at attribution and is instead focusing on intent. She also dives into how she is using AI to automate and improve their marketing efforts and managing joint ownership of the funnel with sales.

Key Takeaways:

AI makes marketing better by giving the team more time to reflect and think. CMOs should be investing in automation.
Marketing is increasingly owning go-to-market and jointly owning the funnel with sales. This is a bit of an evolution, and it allows you to focus on influence over attribution.
Obsessing over first and last touch attribution is not useful. CMOs should focus on driving intent.

Quote:

“One thing that we've done is we've sort of stopped worrying about first touch and last touch attribution. I don't care. Is it ultimately working? You can drive yourself insane, worrying about specifics. Instead, it's looking at how all of those channels connect. And I think one of the greatest things in the last couple of years is, we’ve got these fabulous new tools. As B2B marketers, whether you use Sixth Sense or Demandbase or whatever, you can go in and understand intent in a way that we never could. So ,what I'm looking at is, are we driving intent? And then, let's time box that campaign and everybody who came in or who we touched. I want to understand what's the time lag? Are they going to come back? And I'm looking at things like that way more.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:41) The Trust Tree: The power of investing in PR

*(15:28) The Playbook: Focus on driving intent

*(41:05) The Dust Up: Agencies and fighting over scope

*(42:30) Quick Hits: Louise’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Louise on LinkedIn
Learn more about WorkJam
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Get More Mileage from Your Tech Stack

Ian Faison, Millie Hogue — Tue, 3 Dec 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Millie Hogue, VP of Marketing at Hakkōda, a modern data consultancy that helps companies harness cloud platforms and AI capabilities.

In this episode, Millie discusses the power of co-marketing with major partners like Snowflake, personalized one-to-one advertising strategies and optimizing tech stacks to maximize ROI.

Key Takeaways:

Marketers are wasting an extraordinary amount of budget on unused tech spend. Part of a CMO’s strategy should include making sure they are optimizing on their investments in tech.
If you want to partner with big organizations like Amazon and Snowflake, building a reputation for quality and reliability can help you compete for their attention and become a go-to partner for execution.
Shift from the mindset of optimizing for productivity, and optimize for impact.

Quote:

“I was reading an article the other day about marketing budgets and where everyone's allocating and how all of that is shifting. And marketing technology was the big thing that kind of kept coming up. And the takeaway from that was that right now, if you ask CMOs, they had a whole survey for 2024 Q1, about 50 percent of our tech stack is actually being utilized right now. So, of our technology investments, half, and that was so striking to me as someone who works in a data and technology space and knowing where this kind of industry is headed. There is no way that marketing is going to continue to exist if we have that much inefficiency in our technology spend. So, I think when I'm looking at strategy, not just for my next two quarters, but for my next three years, that's a huge piece of it. How do you invest in the right tooling and make sure that it's actually being adopted by your team? Because it looks a lot like we're kind of failing as an industry at that right now.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:53) The Trust Tree: The power of comarketing

*(21:39) The Playbook: Deanonimizing website traffic, intent data and personalized marketing

*(41:38) The Dust Up: Marketing and sales should not be fighting over attribution

*(43:40) Quick Hits: Millie’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Millie on LinkedIn
Learn more about Hakkōda
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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The Future of Paid Search and Authentic Forums

Ian Faison, Susanne Rodriguez — Tue, 26 Nov 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Susanne Rodriguez, CMO at Auvik, a cloud-based IT management platform that reduces friction and increases agility.

In this episode, Susanne talks about how they think about growing market share by getting customers to switch to Auvik and their big investments in community. She also discusses the future of paid search and why they are focused on authentic forums like Reddit.

Key Takeaways:

Despite the “paid search is dying” narrative, paid search remains a high ROI channel. Continue leveraging search but prepare for shifts by building a presence in other forums like Reddit and focusing on authentic community building.
Campaigns focused on switching customers over from competitors can be part of a strategy to gain market share. Categorizing potential customers into "easy switchers," "difficult switchers," and "non-switchers” can help target campaigns.
Auvik saw success with their rapid response campaigns, partially because they so specifically catered the reward to their target customer, which attracted qualified prospects and encouraged meaningful product engagement.

Quote:

“ I mentioned Reddit as part of a, one of our three paid channels that are uncuttable, but we also have a really large effort to build awareness and conversation and community in Reddit more organically. And that's just because, as we talk about the future of search and search disappearing, if we think about where Google could potentially drive people, it's to these forums like Reddit. And so we're working hard to build our presence there organically, too. Reddit's tricky, though. You have to be authentic on Reddit in a way that you don't have to be on any other platform. They will call you up.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:26) The Trust Tree: Getting customers to switch from competitors

*(10:14) The Playbook: Paid search and authentic forums

*(27:34) The Dust Up: Get aligned and come armed with data

*(29:38) Quick Hits: Susanne’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Susanne on LinkedIn
Learn more about Auvik
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Experiments as Investments in Future-Proofing

Ian Faison, Emily Campbell — Tue, 19 Nov 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Emily Campbell, CMO at Blackline, a leading provider of cloud software that automates and controls critical accounting processes.

In this episode, Emily discusses their shift to lifecycle marketing and her focus on doing fewer things better to drive efficiency. She also dives into her approach to experimentation, and how she’s allocating 50% of her budget to experiments as a way to future proof their organization.

Key Takeaways:

It’s important to understand how the customer behaves at each stage of the buying journey and to build lifecycle campaigns accordingly.
A connected content strategy that builds on itself is an important component of lifecycle campaigns and streamlines retargeting efforts.
Experiments are a way to future-proof the marketing organization, and pushes the team to try new ideas and to take calculated risks.

Quote:

“It's probably more like 50 percent of our budget is for experiments this year. I really think about that as an investment in future-proofing our marketing organization. And I want to make sure that the team doesn't get super comfortable in what they're doing. So, I think that innovation really helps push them outside of their comfort zones. But I think we need to be testing new ideas. We need to be taking the, I'll say, calculated risks. We don't want to be throwing money away, but we need to learn what works and what doesn't. And, you know, one of the things that I'm trying to bring to the team is a sense of, we're going to celebrate successes and failures because those failures provide as much learning as the successes, if not more. And so we are very focused on fail fast, learn fast, try more. And, again, still fewer things better, but try new things that we haven't had a lot of experience with in the past.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:27) The Trust Tree: Lifecycle campaigns and understanding customer behavior
*(12:11) The Playbook: Relevant content at the top of the funnel
*(33:43 ) The Dust Up: Competitors that advertise on your key terms
*(35:35) Quick Hits: Emily’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for pipeline pros. The world's leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Emily on LinkedIn
Learn more about Blackline
Learn more about Caspian Studios
Blackline Customer Look Book

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Marketing is Chess, Not Checkers

Ian Faison, John Schneider — Tue, 12 Nov 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with John Schneider, CMO at Betterworks, a performance management solution HR professionals rely on for increasing employee engagement, manager efficiency, and business impact.

In this episode, John shares insights into how he transformed Betterworks' content strategy to cut lead costs by 65% and why establishing a trusted sub-brand has been crucial to their success. He also talks about the importance of strategic experimentation and understanding the multidimensional levers in marketing.

Key Takeaways:

By focusing on a content-first approach rather than paid-only channels, you can significantly reduce lead acquisition costs. BetterWorks achieved a 65% reduction in cost per lead over John’s time as CMO for the company.
There are benefits to building a sub-brand to house content that resonates with your audience. It can help differentiate the company and attract significantly higher engagement.
Strong content can engage the full buying committee across personas. Making quality, accessible thought leadership content engages a company at multiple touchpoints, resulting in an easier sales process.

Quote:

“You have to realize in marketing, you are absolutely not playing checkers. You're playing chess and you're probably playing some multidimensional version of chess. And you can't expect immediate results from everything you do. If it was easy to do what you're going to go do, they would not have hired you because the former person would still be there. And all those things have probably been tried in different capacities. And what is really important is to balance the tension between taking action but also doing it in a quality way and with some strategic foresight. And that's where the experimentation really comes in, understanding the scenarios and the outcomes. It's good to experiment and it's okay not to know what the outcome will be, but you need to know which lever you're pulling or you're not going to have a result that you can then fix against.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:12) The Trust Tree: Auditing when you step into a new role

*(23:23) The Playbook: Content as the lifeblood, shared through a sub-brand

*(35:37) The Dust-Up: Having a say in pricing and packaging

*(38:37) Quick Hits: John’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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The Data Can’t Tell You Everything

Ian Faison, Shannon Duffy — Tue, 5 Nov 2024 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Shannon Duffy, CMO at Asana, the enterprise work management platform that connects company-wide goals, strategic initiatives, and the execution of work in one place.

In this episode, Shannon discusses their evolution from product-led growth to targeting enterprise clients, and the challenges and successes of expanding up market. She also shares her thoughts on thinking beyond the data.

Key Takeaways:

While data-driven decisions are critical, marketers should trust their intuition when the data isn’t conclusive or when exploring new market directions. This flexibility allows for creativity and risk-taking, especially when data lags behind rapid market changes or emerging client needs.
Moving from product-led growth to targeting enterprise clients isn’t just about scaling product features; it demands a shift in how marketing teams understand customer pain points. It’s essential to align messaging to resonate with decision-makers who prioritize company-wide impact and long-term strategic value.
Personalized outreach can make a significant difference, but it can be a challenge to create campaigns that feel personalized yet can scale across multiple accounts. Achieving this balance helps each client feel uniquely addressed without overloading marketing resources.

Quote:

“I do think a lot of PLG companies have a lot of data and so that's good in a lot of ways because the data can help guide you. Everyone's like, yeah, no kidding, Shannon. The flip side of that though is, sometimes the data can't tell you everything. And that's when, if you've been doing enterprise marketing for a long time, or you have a background there, there is some pattern matching that needs to be layered over the data, if that makes sense. Like there are certain things that work, and so how do you take the data to guide you, but you don't wait for the data to tell you everything when you know there are tried and true things that work? For example, Asana now has a live in person event. Asana had never done that before, and there was no data I could point to that says, yes, this event will be successful. There just wasn't. So a little bit of it was like a trust fall of pattern matching of enterprise software selling, enterprise software marketing, being like, this will work. It will start small and we will build. And we did. And so last year we did our first event ever, had 150 people. This year we're doing it in New York. We're going to have a thousand, right? Like those are the things that like the data can't help you, so you need to be mindful of what the data will, but also trust sort of the enterprise marketing playbook for things that will make a big difference.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:43) The Trust Tree: Cultivating relationships with different personas

*(29:44) The Playbook: Brand is the only thing that helps with both PLG and enterprise markets

*(41:23) The Dust Up: Challenge your long-held assumptions
*(43:45) Quick Hits: Shannon’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Shannon on LinkedIn
Learn more about Asana
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Fewer, Bigger, Better

Ian Faison, Mary Wells — Tue, 29 Oct 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Mary Wells, CMO at Cloudera, a software company that empowers organizations to transform complex data into clear and actionable insights.

In this episode, Mary discusses her maniacal focus on strong foundations and operational efficiency, and how it allows her to experiment and take calculated risks. She also dives into her focus on simplified, consistent messaging and why CMOs need to tap into their inner CIO.

Key Takeaways:

Ruthlessly prioritizing foundations and operational excellence, especially with budgets, allows you to optimize, experiment, and take calculated risks.
CMOs need to tap into the inner CIO. CMOs have a tech stack and their organization is an expensive line item for a company. Scaling back and leaning into data and reporting gives the CMO a seat at the table and insights into what their customers need.
Mix matters to your audience. Do fewer things, but do them bigger and better, aligning behind one marketing strategy to find your customers where they are in the buyers’ journey.

Quote:

”The other strategy is what we're not doing and cutting down on the quantity. What we want to do are fewer things, but bigger and better. By breaking down these silos, we're able to do that, so that when I wake up on a Wednesday, like today, I don't have 50 marketing things happening today. Everybody in marketing now has one playbook and together we're making it happen. And with the strategy though, again, it's not just events, it's not just hands-on labs. Mix matters, and knowing where a prospect or a customer is in the buyer's journey lots of times helps me and the team gauge where we need to dial up and down. Sometimes it's video, sometimes it's a deep dive technical presentation, sometimes it's an event, digital, et cetera. And the idea is that mix matters based on the audience.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:37) The Trust Tree: Prioritizing operational excellence

*(18:21) The Playbook: The value of comms

*(35:10) The Dust Up: Practice the pause – different day, different person

*(38:27): Quick Hits: Mary’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Customer Focused Over Functionally Focused

Ian Faison, Mika Yamamoto — Tue, 22 Oct 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Mika Yamamoto, Chief Customer and Marketing Officer at Freshworks, a company that provides powerful, easy to use Customer service, IT, and CRM software.

In this episode, Mika discusses surgically blending the physical and digital world, to create a campaign experience that sticks with prospects. She also talks about encouraging innovation from her team, tying marketing victory to sales’ success and focusing on customer over function.

Key Takeaways:

Blending the physical and digital world when creating campaigns can create more lasting impact and better returns.
Allowing your team to divide and conquer different markets and functions allows people to specialize and be the best at what they do, an impossibility if they are doing too many things.
Incorporating humanity and a recognition of the human on the other side, not only differentiates your marketing in a B2B space, it makes the whole job more enjoyable

Quote:

”In terms of signals, what helps is that we have one operations function that works across all functions. There's traditionally been, marketing comes up and celebrates and says, “Woohoo, we did all this work, we’re green!” And then sales is saying, “Well, what the heck you can't claim victory because we haven't met our numbers. So how can you declare victory if we haven't met our numbers?” And so again, the construct that we have is we have one operations group in our organization, Freshworks. So, we have one dashboard that essentially ties together and we're still working on making those ties, but that ties together, marketing doesn't declare victory if sales can't. So, it's driving shared metrics in one dashboard versus this view of the world that is a marketing view, then a sales view then a product view. We want to drive one view, which is more customer focused versus functionally focused.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(08:24) The Trust Tree: Divide and conquer different markets

*(24:12) The Playbook: Focus on demand capture

*(39:20) The Dust Up: Assumptions about sellers and marketers

*(42:49) Quick Hits: Mika’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Mika on LinkedIn
Learn more about FreshworksLearn more about Caspian Studios

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Pilot, Prove, Scale

Ian Faison, Niki Hall — Tue, 15 Oct 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Niki Hall, CMO at Five9, a company that provides cloud contact center solutions, facilitating billions of customer engagements annually for 2,500+ customers.

In this episode, Niki discusses the role of a CMO as a business professional first, and how important it is for them to bring customer insights into the overall company strategy. She also dives into her approach to experimentation and enhancing authentic marketing with the customer voice.

Key Takeaways:

CMOs should see themselves as business professionals first, and marketing professionals second. As a business professional, they need to be honest about what is not going well, so while you need to highlight wins, you can’t focus too heavily on what is going well.
CMO's need to bring out insights to inform strategy, anticipating future issues that could arise. It’s essential to use customer insights to inform overall business strategy.
Experiments are important, and you can pilot and prove new ideas at a small scale for proof of concept. Leaders should invest in and encourage experimentation.

Quote:

“ Pilot, prove, scale. So, I always ask my team to try new things, pilot it, prove it at a smaller scale. Once we've proven it out, then let's scale it globally. So, I've always set aside money for experiments and encourage my leaders to do that.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:09) The Trust Tree: Having the right ingredients as a company

*(14:02) The Playbook: Having a clear, differentiated message

*(37:12) The Dust Up: Grounding in common understanding

*(39:25) Quick Hits: Niki’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Create Content People Will Love or Hate

Ian Faison, Karl Van den Bergh — Tue, 8 Oct 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Karl Van den Bergh, CMO at Gigamon, a company that helps IT organizations better secure and manage their hybrid cloud infrastructure.

In this episode, Karl talks about shifting from a lead-based model to a demand unit model, the impact of investing in brand when budgets are tight, and balancing awareness with demand. He also talks about his approach to content, creating something that stands out and that people either love or hate.

Key Takeaways:

Transitioning from a lead-based model to a demand unit model can better align with complex B2B buying processes because it allows for more accurate targeting of entire buying committees.
Maintaining brand investments during economic downturns is a way to seize opportunity to win market share. Companies that continue to invest in brand awareness during tight budgets will emerge stronger when the market recovers.
Leveraging humor in campaigns, and embracing that some people will love it and some will hate it, is more memorable and can have better results than content that blends in.

Quote:

“We said, look, I'd rather put something out there that people either love or hate, as long as it's done, again, it can't be offensive, but people love or hate. I'd rather have something that stands out than something that's bland that no one would object to. And sure enough, as I said, it way outperformed benchmark.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:30) The Trust Tree: Shifting from a lead-based model to a demand unit model

*(20:26): The Playbook: Put out content people will love or hate

*(38:06) The Dust-Up: Authentic Dialogue

*(39:47) Quick Hits: Karl’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Pushing the Envelope in Marketing

Allison Breeding, Ian Faison — Tue, 1 Oct 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Allison Breeding, CMO, Apptio, an IBM Company that provides data insights that empower leaders to make smarter financial and operational decisions.

In this episode, Allison talks about shifts that have stuck around post-covid, getting really clear on personas, and pushing the envelope through experimentation.

Key Takeaways:

It’s worth pushing the envelope and trying out-of-the-box approaches. If you’re not pushing the boundaries a little bit, you’re not trying hard enough.
When the market is turbulent and shifting, you have to be able to adjust your value prop and positioning to endure. Apptio made a big shift into digital marketing during COVID. Then, when the market plunged after hitting a high, they were able to shift to allow for continued success.
Focus groups, and feedback from partners, prospects and employees, can inform the direction that you need to go in and support your efforts to understand your value proposition.

Quote:

“We've been doing a lot of really fun kind of guerrilla, out of home concepts, outside of events. Getting our hands slapped every now and then, but that's okay. If we're not getting in trouble, we're not pushing the envelope enough. But yeah, we're kind of trying to own the spaces that people are kind of in the mindset of thinking about our product in. And so whether that's airports or outside of event venues, on taxi cabs, on trains, that sort of thing around the events that we're participating in.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:45) The Trust Tree: A bottom-up and top-down approach

*(17:35) The Playbook: Spending money fast and utilizing events
*(32:31): The Dust Up: Navigating the founders’ mentality

*(34:58) Quick Hits: Allison’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Anti-Checklist Marketing

Ian Faison, Dorian Kendal — Tue, 24 Sep 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dorian Kendal, a former CMO and a multi-time marketing leader. Most recently, Dorian served as CMO at Netlify, a platform for developers to build highly-performant and dynamic websites, e-commerce stores and applications.

In this episode, Dorian discusses his non-traditional path to the CMO role, his experience restructuring teams for an enterprise focus, and the value of partner programs. He shares his thoughts on why you should avoid checklist marketing.

Key Takeaways:

Moving from product-led growth to an enterprise focus requires more targeted, “surgical” campaigns.
Evangelist and influencer programs can drive long-term pipeline growth more effectively than short-term, paid media strategies.
Over-reliance on SEM (Search Engine Marketing) can stifle creativity and drain budgets without delivering proportional returns. Redirecting resources to SEO, community engagement, and innovative campaigns like events can offer better long-term ROI.

Quote:

“I'm very anti-checklist marketing, I call it, where you just have, every campaign you're like, here's the eight things we need to do, and you just check them off. Because it just sucks creativity out of the process. And I think that we oftentimes, instead of finding really unique ways to attract audiences and engage them, we sometimes just fall back on stuff. And search engine marketing, I've always felt it's been like the easiest thing for people to be like, you know, we're gonna do a campaign. Well, of course, what's our SEM budget? So I think sometimes just sucks creativity out of the process.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:59) The Trust Tree: Restructuring to target enterprise customers

*(13:23) The Playbook: Investing in search optimization over search engine marketing

*(35:45) Quick Hits: Dorian’s Quick Hits

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Win Customers with Binge-Worthy Content

Caspian Studios — Tue, 17 Sep 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jason Ing, CMO at Gusto, a company that automates and simplifies payroll, benefits, and HR, while providing expert support. Jason was early on the ground at Xbox and Prime Video, playing pivotal roles in revolutionizing online gaming and digital media.

Jason offers a behind-the-scenes look at marketing major shifts in entertainment consumption, like launching Netflix on Xbox and his role in getting Amazon fire sticks into our homes. He also dives into his current marketing strategy at Gusto.

Key Takeaways:

Everyone loves good content, and creative, entertaining content attracts and retains customers.
Commitment and excitement about a long term vision can lead to groundbreaking success, even if others are skeptical initially.
There is value in trying out unexpected or unconventional strategies, such as direct mail for Amazon Prime Video.

Quote:

“As it relates to Netflix, and streaming overall, this was during the years in which people were still getting Netflix by mail. That was what they were known as. But the technology was being built and the amount of Xboxes we had in living rooms in the U.S. households and across the world was at a point where these streaming providers could create a viable business by getting into all those living room spaces. And this was before TVs were all smart-TV-enabled. So, it was really cool to see a vision for the future. And there was a bit of belief that you had to have around knowing that there was a better way. When you're fortunate enough to work for a company that is as successful as Microsoft was, and it's even more successful today, the company was willing to think long term. And I think that was really the first time in my career where I was exposed to this idea that you had to manage things on a day-to-day level and for the short term, but you had to have long-term vision and commitment to it. And I think all of us who were there, we were just very much bought into that idea, that there was just a future that was around the corner.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(29:09) The Trust Tree: Bringing elements from B2C to B2B

*(34:58): The Playbook: Controlling the narrative through brand

*(45:39): The Dust Up: Tension around partnership deals

*(47:42): Quick Hits: Jason’s Quick Hits

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Invest in the Full Marketing Bow Tie

Ian Faison, Karen Budell — Tue, 10 Sep 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Karen Budell, CMO, Totango + Catalyst. Totango and Catalyst recently joined forces to build a leading customer growth platform that helps businesses protect and grow revenue, providing businesses with a united platform that drives recurring revenue success and measurable growth.

In this episode, Karen talks about leading a marketing team through a merge. She talks about the importance of customer success and investing in the full marketing “bowtie” to focus on retaining customers.

Key Takeaways:

Post-merger, marketing teams need to harmonize the brand and messaging, the product, the tech stacks and more. While this is a challenging process, it allows you to take the best from each company and present a unified brand that fosters trust.
Start with outcome-based conversations when talking to prospects to make sure you understand their objectives before you complete the sale. Your customers’ success is your success.
Don’t just invest in the marketing funnel. Invest in the full marketing “bowtie”. Retaining and growing current customers is very important.

Quote:

“We stood up a sales enablement and go-to-market enablement role and function within the marketing org. So reporting up to me, but a dotted line to the CRO’s organization. And part of the reason that I thought that that was a great fit and was so successful was because you really want to make sure that your frontline team understands who your target audience is and what your galvanizing story and narrative is all about. So, being close to the marketing team that was working on that messaging and positioning and the programs and events really helped create a nice bridge and reinforce the partnership that we had with our sales team.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(4:18) The Trust Tree: Outcome-based conversations with customers

*(16:02) The Playbook: Updating the website post-merger

*(33:24) The Dust-Up: CMOs that come from a brand focus

*(39:59) Quick Hits: Karen’s quick hits

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Capitalizing on AI Through SEO Content

Ian Faison, Laura Beussman — Tue, 3 Sep 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Laura Beussman, Senior Vice President of Marketing at CallRail, an intelligence platform that helps businesses track and attribute each lead to their marketing journey and use real-time insights to optimize their marketing.

In this episode, Laura discusses their marketing strategy as a pure-play PLG where marketing generates all the leads, and how they reach prospects through a sub-verticalized approach. She also shares how they are leveraging AI for better SEO results.

Key Takeaways:

A sub-verticalized approach can improve efficiency and return on investment, helping to ensure that you are accurately speaking to customer needs. Learn about the sub-verticals in your market.
Leveraging AI in your content efforts can really improve your SEO results, by allowing you to create more content that is specifically catered to sub-verticals in the market.
When marketing takes full responsibility for generating all leads, it eliminates the tension with sales by offering clarity, improving operational efficiency and allowing sales to focus on closing deals.

Quote:

“ One of the ways that the team is really capitalizing on AI is on SEO content. Again, as a PLG, SEO is very important for us. And with those verticalized go-to-market strategies, we needed to create a high volume of content to support not just the verticals, but the sub verticals. So, we have developed a strategy on creating that SEO content that leverages AI. Now, it's not that the AI writes the content from top to bottom with no human assistance, but what we do is we educate the AI tools on our content guidelines. We create a robust draft of an outline. AI then converts that into an article. Our content team edits, and makes sure it's reflective of our brand and our voice before we publish. What we've been able to do with that, though, is triple the amount of SEO content we're able to produce. And what that means is that we're able to be really hyper targeted, really hyper verticalized, and we're actually ranking better. And it's not that we're ranking better because the articles are significantly better. It's because they are able to be more specific, because they are able to be more targeted and sub verticalized. That allows them to rank better as well.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:34) The Trust Tree: Operating in a marketing-led lead generation model

*(17:25) The Playbook: Using hyper-targeted content to boost visibility and conversion rates

*(36:14) The Dust-Up: Making sure sales feels supported by marketing

*(39:08) Quick Hits: Laura’s Quick Hits

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Betting on Brand Campaigns

Ian Faison, Prachi Gore — Tue, 27 Aug 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Prachi Gore, SVP of Marketing, Checkr, Inc., a company that makes background checks faster, easier, and more compliant.

In this episode, Prachi shares how they balance marketing to both the SMB and enterprise markets, and discusses her approach to reach each group of prospects. She also emphasizes the importance of investing in brand, and talks about how her revenue team is focused on “push marketing”.

Key Takeaways:

Be strategic about how you target different customers. Prachi has distinct approaches for SMB and enterprise markets, —focusing on brand advertising for SMBs while leveraging thought leadership and compliance content for enterprises.
It is worth investing in customer lifecycle and partner marketing to improve customer retention and expand market reach. Customer lifecycle marketing is especially crucial in businesses with a transactional model.
A robust inbound marketing strategy, supported by comprehensive brand awareness efforts, is vital for capturing latent demand and nurturing leads, even when brand investment feels like a riskier bet.

Quote:

“I think brand campaigns are always a bet. You're taking a risk of placing a bet on something that may or may not work. It's not measurable. It's hard, really, really hard to measure. And so it's kind of like, you’ve got to jump in with two feet and you'll float. But I think that that makes it hard for us as marketers to say like, hey, you're just like two million or five or whatever is your number, I'm going to put this towards a test and let's see what works, what doesn't work. Versus anything else, even we talked a lot about content syndication, but anything else like search, demand, events, campaigns, everything can be tied back to, it produces so much pipeline, exactly how much, you know. So, it just makes taking those bets, experiments, faster, easier, and at lower risk. Brand is hard, and then it also needs a philosophical alignment with your CFO, with your CEO your board, like everyone needs to be on board to help place those bets with you.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:10) The Trust Tree: Marketing to SMB and enterprise markets

*(12:19) The Playbook: Hitting both parts of the business through search

*(33:13) The Dust Up: Turning the BDR program around

*(35:15) Quick Hits: Prach’s Quick Hits

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If You Build It, They Will Not Come

Michael Freeman, Ian Faison — Tue, 20 Aug 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Michael Freeman, VP of Marketing, Airbase, a procure-to-pay solution that simplifies purchasing.

In this episode, Michael discusses smart SEO strategy and the importance of investing in the distribution of your content. He also talks about how, while marketers are incentivized to demonstrate that they are generating pipeline, they still have to pursue the high ROI tactics that are difficult to measure and predict.

Key Takeaways:

If you create content, customers will not just come; they may never even find it. SEO is a core ingredient from the start, not an afterthought, and you need to find people with the language they use, understanding their intent.
Marketers are charged with generating pipeline and proving it, but they need to avoid neglecting high ROI tactics that may be difficult to quantify or predict.
Don’t just feed the content beast; make sure you are creating quality content purpose that has a genuine impact on your audiences.

Quote:

“I've been at a lot of companies where there was just a mentality of feed the beast on the blog. And we don't do that here. Every post has a specific objective and purpose that we're trying to meet. Sometimes there's just some corporate brand stuff we need sales to be able to point to or use for other purposes, but 95, 96 percent of what we publish has a specific objective and purpose from a traffic or leads perspective. And we've done the research upfront to say, yes, we have a reasonable chance to achieve that objective before we commit the resources on that piece of content.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:14) The Trust Tree: Be smart about paid search
*(18:59) The Playbook: SEO and good content strategy
*(48:43) The Dust Up: Inheriting a bad website
*(51:11) Quick Hits: Michael’s Quick Hits

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The New World of Content Repurposing

Lisa Bennett, Ian Faison — Tue, 13 Aug 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Lisa Bennett, CMO at Kaltura, a company that provides live and on-demand video SaaS solutions to thousands of organizations around the world, engaging hundreds of millions of viewers.

In this episode, Lisa talks about the new world of repurposing your content and how marketers can improve their content strategy and outcome measurement. She also talks about how she thinks about “brandformance” and ensuring that you are walking the walk, as a marketer.

Key Takeaways:

It’s easier than ever to repurpose your content across channels, maximizing its impact. Marketers should be thinking about this, instead of just constantly generating new content without thinking critically about its delivery and impact.
You can focus on “brandformance”, brand and performance marketing, even without a huge budget. To do so, you need to collaborate with the c-suite to determine the best go-to-market strategy.
Marketing is constantly changing and the new norms are not set. It’s a new world, in a lot of ways, and we will have to find these new ways of marketing.

Quote:

“It feels as if, to a degree, we're generating content and not necessarily measuring it well enough. And then moving on to the next piece of content, and the next piece of content, and the next webinar, and the next event, and the next thing. And there's so much that actually can be repurposed, which is definitely becoming a trend now with AI because it's so easy to do. So, maybe before people didn't repurpose content as much, and video especially, because it was complex. It wasn't so easy to do. But now, you take a tool like Kaltura, not only have your event or your webinar, and then repurpose it, put it into social, put it into blog posts, put it into whatever you need and get all the data on it. So, that's an example of kind of this new world that we're looking at.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:22) The Trust Tree: Brandformance and strategizing with the executive team
*(18:05) The Playbook: Maximizing the impact of events by repurposing content
*(29:35) The Dust Up: Communicating and having a partner in crime
*(32:09) Quick Hits: Lisa’s quick hits

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Marketers Shouldn't Be Order-Takers

Ian Faison, Heidi Bullock — Tue, 6 Aug 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Heidi Bullock, CMO at Tealium, a customer data platform that connects customer data across web, mobile, offline, and IoT so businesses can better connect with their customers.

In this episode, Heidi highlights the essential role of brand in B2B marketing and the effectiveness of the pod structure in marketing organizations. She also dives into the need for marketers to be proactive and come to the table with a point of view.

Key Takeaways:

In a competitive market, it is all about creating preference, and you do that through your brand. B2B marketers need to invest in the brand.
Marketing needs to come into conversations with sales with a point of view and they need to do their homework. They can’t just wait to be told what to do.
Everything runs more smoothly if you consolidate signals and create summaries of intent.

Quote:

Marketing can't be the order taker. It really has to be the salesperson that's the quarterback, but marketing has to come in with a point of view. Like, hey, you're talking to a lot of people in the pharma space, let's make sure that we're doing X, Y, and Z. We've got this amazing workshop. We have this great piece of content. Come in with a viewpoint versus like, hey, just wait and have somebody tell me what to do. Everything goes better if you can consolidate signals, and then the marketer has a strong point of view and does their homework.

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:50) The Trust Tree: The benefits of a pod structure
*(18:00) The Playbook: Reducing the friction
*(38:30) The Dust Up: Working with product teams, focusing on the user
*(41:22) Quick Hits: Heidi’s Quick Hits

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If You’re Not Working with Influencers, You’re Left Behind

Ian Faison, Cristy Garcia — Tue, 30 Jul 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Cristy Garcia, CMO, impact.com, a partnership management platform that automates business partnerships, at scale.

In this episode, Cristy shares the do’s and don'ts of marketing, and the primary reason for failed partnerships. She also discusses the evolution and importance of using influencers in marketing, and what it's like marketing to marketers.

Key Takeaways:

Influencers have been around for awhile, but they became even more important during the pandemic. If you aren’t working with influencers as a marketer, you’re being left behind.
When partnerships fail, it is most often due to lack of communication. Make sure to be very clear about payments, expectations, and what you are promoting.
You can generate significant revenue through partnerships, for some companies, as high as 28 percent of their total revenue.

Quote:

“If you're not working with influencers right now as a marketer, you're left behind. This is happening now. The rise of influencers, they've been around for a long time, I spoke at mommy blogger conferences back in 2012, so it's not new. But what is new is sort of the heightened awareness and demand for influencer content. And I think it all happened around the pandemic when people were at home with their phones, creating social interaction, buying things online, and the influencers really took off.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(3:06) The Trust Tree: The rise of commerce content
*(14:20) The Playbook: THe dos and don’ts of partnerships
*(35:55) The Dust Up: Knowing your worth
*(37:28) Quick Hits: Cristy’s quick hits

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The Proverbial Question of ROI

Ian Faison, Stephen Gold — Tue, 23 Jul 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Stephen Gold, Chief Sales and Marketing Officer at SparkCognition (Previous), a company providing AI solutions that allow organizations to predict future outcomes, prescribe next actions, empower people, and protect assets.

In this episode, Stephen discusses experimenting to find the best combination of elements to engage prospects through a long sales cycle. He also dives into the healthy tension between marketing and sales, and how he is thinking about using AI tools in his marketing.

Key Takeaways:

Experiment to find the right mix of tactics to engage with prospects and customers. Continue to test and tweak to find the right combination for your prospects and sales cycle.
Use AI and other tools with a specific objective in mind; don’t get distracted by shiny new toys with little pragmatic use.
Marketers will always be challenged to demonstrate their value to their organization. Even in smaller organizations, this takes a concerted effort and CMOs would be remiss to forget the importance of internal marketing.

Quote:

“There's always a question, the proverbial question that hangs over marketers heads, that says, am I really getting a return on my investment? Maybe we can cut the budget and we're not going to feel the effect. And marketing, unlike other areas of the business, it's probably harder to quantify the impact because it touches so many parts of the business. Marketers are constantly, or should constantly be thinking about, how do I demonstrate to my organization, qualitatively and quantitatively, the value we bring? We work really hard to produce content internally for consumption by other executive members, by the rank and file. Who doesn't want to work at a business where the brand matters? Who doesn't want to work at a business where they're doing social good? We're a small company, approaching 400, but it's still important that you get the word out. And it's not easy. You have to put a concerted effort to do that.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(6:20) The Trust Tree: The importance of education

*(16:35) The Playbook: Finding the combination of tactics that work

*(37:08) The Dust Up: Inviting friction between sales and marketing

*(39:14) Quick Hits: Stephen’s Quick Hits

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Stop Using Someone Else’s Playbook

Ian Faison, Tom Wentworth — Tue, 16 Jul 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Tom Wentworth, CMO at Recorded Future, the world’s largest threat intelligence company, working with over 1,600 businesses and government organizations across more than 74 countries.

In this episode, Tom talks about building Recorded Future News, a separate P&L that has become one of the largest cyber intelligence news sites, and a trusted media entity that breaks important news in the cybersecurity/intelligence world.

Key Takeaways:

Brand building is not just about creating awareness, it is about building trust and building relationships.
Sometimes, the only information you need to determine ROI is whether your clients and prospects feel your initiative provides them with value.
A quick way to fail as a CMO is to run someone else’s playbook. Make sure that you understand the current company and context; create a bespoke plan.

Quote: “If you think about brand building, what most people do in cyber security, when they get to be Recorded Future size, we're about over 300 million in ARR, which makes us a pretty good sized company. What most companies our size do, is they go buy an F1 sponsorship, or they go put their logo on some sports team's jersey. And that's cool. That's a cool way to get in front of people, but I don't think it builds trust. Like, why would I trust this vendor just because their logo is on a jersey or their logo is on a car? That just tells me they’ve got a lot of money to spend. So we said, instead of going to do that, the way that we're going to build awareness for Recorded Future and build a relationship with our audience is through news and then through a podcast, which I'll talk about a little bit too. So that's our brand awareness investment. We feel very confident that people who fall in love with our news are also going to like our product. I don't have to prove it, in the sense that I don't have to have this super complicated attribution scheme. We just ask our clients and our prospects, ‘Hey, do you like Recorded Future News?’ And they love it. That's just about enough for us.”

Episode Timestamps:
*(04:22) The Trust Tree: Becoming a fan of account-based marketing

*(25:34) The Playbook: Building Recorded Future News

*(43:45) Quick Hits: Tom’s quick Hits

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Stop Fighting with Your Collateral and Make Better Content

Caspian Studios — Tue, 9 Jul 2024 09:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Eric shares with us how to effectively tailor marketing messaging, why it’s important to push the boundaries of content design, and leveraging tools like ChatGPT for brainstorming ideas. Eric also talks about why fighting pieces of collateral to get to the point is often done in vain and his approach to creating better content.

Key Takeaways:

Balance products and personas: You need to adeptly balance different products, verticals, and personas to create a cohesive marketing strategy. Segmenting your audience based on their product install base allows you to tailor your messaging and approach more effectively, fostering stronger connections and driving better results.
Be innovative with design: Emphasize innovative and boundary-pushing design in your content. Think of new ways to deliver your message and make your content stand out from the competition. Creativity in design can significantly enhance your brand's appeal and memorability.
AI is a tool - use it: Use tools like Chat GPT for brainstorming ideas. AI can help you generate creative concepts and refine your strategies, making your campaigns more dynamic and innovative.

Quote:

“I think the design is so important, and as someone who, I run the marketing team here, I'm personally probably on a lot of sales lists and distributions. I get hit up constantly by SDRs who are sending me things. If it doesn't look good, I'm not going to open it. I don't really care what it is. Like I'm so busy drifting between emails and Slacks and meetings. And then, my personal life as well, that if it's not designed in a compelling, intuitive way, I'm not going to fight with a piece of collateral to get to the point. And so I think we have really tripled down on brand, visual identity, how the different pieces of our story come together…But when you're getting into thought leadership, I think the era of attaching a PDF or a static white paper, one pager, like those are so long gone. And I think in an industry that is a bit old school as well, I think standing out as a more dynamic marketing function where we're putting out pieces of collateral that not only does the user want to read the insight because the data we have is so unique to us, no one else is putting out content that looks like ours does.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:57) - Trust Tree: It’s all about balance

*(16:20) - The Playbook: The data is the hook

*(41:56) - The Dust Up: Approaching product launches thoughtfully

*(44:02) - Eric’s Quick Hits

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Leveraging AI to Forecast Meaningful Project Plans

Caspian Studios, Qualified, Chris Mills, Wrike, Ian Faison — Tue, 2 Jul 2024 09:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Chris dives into his go-to-market strategy at Wrike, and discusses how they are leveraging AI internally to become more efficient. He also discusses how their marketing strategy allows them to go after different types of companies within a very large market.

Key Takeaways:

Efficiency in Performance Marketing: There is no time wasted on optimizing marketing budgets to ensure each dollar spent yields a satisfactory ROI.
ABM: Your ABM tactics are increasingly important for targeting enterprise clients. Start by focusing on refining your org’s ICP and leveraging existing customer advocates to engage potential buyers effectively.
Metrics and Measurement: It often comes down to data. Continuously monitoring key funnel metrics like lead quality, conversion rates, and cost per lead, to quickly identify and address issues and improve overall performance for your customers.

Quote:

“From a product perspective, we're looking at how do we leverage AI to take, in some cases, a massive amount of data that sits in our system around work and tasks and projects and things that are happening and how to use AI to help people summarize a big thread of communication and collaboration that's happened over a period of time. And using AI to use natural language to create project plans rather than creating a project plan from scratch saying, hey, I have a project to do to launch this new product in this type of market. And here's what the product consists of. Build me a project plan and it can leverage data that exists both publicly for similar types of projects, as well as within that customer's, set of historical projects. Like, how do you generate content that way, and then how do you use AI to predict risks on a project or how do you use AI to identify resources to staff on a project. So it's interesting: both our internal workers are using AI that's available to us to help us internally. And then we're also looking at our AI strategy from a product and innovation perspective and figuring out how do we make our system more powerful, more intelligent to automate some things, to help people, focus on more creative, human-centric work.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:28) - The Trust Tree: Land and expand

*(12:47) - The Playbook: Chris’ uncuttables

*(35:51) - The Dust Up: Defining your ICP company-wide

*(39:06) - Chris' Quick Hits

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Why You Can Never Spend Too Much Time with Your Customers

Ian Faison, Alison Lindland — Tue, 25 Jun 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Alison Lindland, CMO at Movable Ink, a SaaS MarTech platform that empowers marketers with scalable, omni-channel personalization through data activation and AI decisioning.

In this episode, Alison discusses the importance of a customer advisory board and of personally spending time with your customers. She also talks about the flywheel they have built through their unique strategy team and how they incorporate customer insights back into their content.

Key Takeaways:

It is worth investing in a customer advisory board and building a community there. The insights and feedback that you gain can be fed back into the company to improve the product and create authentic marketing.
Movable Ink has built a unique strategy team, made up of former clients that interact closely with their senior clients and bring back insights to their teams. This team has become one of the most sought after resources in the company.
Having the outbound function sit under the CMO bring them closer to other marketing functions and creates alignment.

Quote:

”I think you really can never spend too much time with your customers. So making sure that you are out there personally talking to your clients. I'd say is really just the number one piece and, I onboard every new member to our cab and it's a considerable investment of time, but it's my absolute favorite thing to do. And in every single conversation that I have, there's always some light bulb moment opportunity that comes out of it. Some piece of feedback that goes back to the account team. Some personal connection we didn't know we had. It's just always something great or an opportunity for them to speak at Think Summit, just something terrific comes from it. So I'd say making sure that you're investing in building those relationships and just laying those tracks.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(09:16) The Trust Tree: ABM playbook as a team sport

*(16: 53) The Playbook: THe value of a customer advisory board

*(29:27) The Dust Up: Turning disappointment into a big opportunity

*(32:14) Quick Hits: Alison’s Quick hits

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

How CMOs Should Think About Building a Strategic Narrative

Ian Faison, Andy Raskin — Tue, 18 Jun 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Andy Raskin, Strategic Narrative Consultant, who aligns CEOs and their teams around a strategic narrative — to power success in sales, marketing, fundraising, product and recruiting.

In this episode, Andy shares what a strategic narrative is, how CMOs should think about it, and how to get CEO-buy-in.

Key Takeaways:

Clarifying and developing your strategic narrative is a leadership level task that requires buy-in from the full executive team, and buy-in from the CEO is crucial.
A successful strategic narrative transforms the act of buying into that of joining a movement.
The process of developing a strategic narrative often reveals misalignment within leadership teams, even amongst teams who think they are on the same page.

Quote:

“I always start asking, okay, what are the pieces of this story? I’d say there's always, there's like a little bit of alignment, but almost every time there's, people are going in different directions, and very often I'll get, oh yeah, the CEO will say, yeah, me and the CMO or me and the CFO we're totally on the same page, like talking to the same person. And then I'll ask and it turns out quite different about how they want to talk about the company and build this narrative. So it's a very common thing, yes. When I send out a proposal, I used to say like strategic narrative creation or something like that, and I changed it to strategic narrative alignment. Because I really do think that, at the end of the day, that's the work.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:26) What is a strategic narrative?

*(08:10) How should CMOs think about strategic narrative?

*(16:52 ) How to get CEO buy-in

*(40:15 ) Quick Hits: Andy’s Quick Hits

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The Buyer’s Journey is the New Brand

Ian Faison, Kelly Hopping — Tue, 11 Jun 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kelly Hopping, CMO at Demandbase, a go-to-market company for B2B brands. They help marketing and sales teams overcome the disruptive data and technology fragmentation that inhibits insight and forces them to spam prospects.

In this episode, Kelly talks about her strategy to make sales love the marketing team and to collaborate with sales on their ABM strategy. She also discusses the ROI on retaining a customer, versus getting a new customer, and how the brand is really the full customer journey.

Key Takeaways:

Account based marketing only works as a collaborative effort between sales and marketing. It’s marketing’s job to make the sales team love them, providing them with a brand they are proud to represent and high intent leads.
The ROI on retaining a customer is much better than on getting a new customer. Taking great care of the customers is not just a sales or customer experience responsibility.
Part of retaining customers is building brand loyalty by making sure customers love the product and building community.

Quote:

“ I have a general belief, I tell my team, my number one goal is to make sales love us. And that doesn't mean that we do all bottom of the funnel, like pipe create, but it means we're going to give them a brand that they're proud to represent. We're going to give them great air cover at events and through social. We're going to give them high-quality pipeline that has good intent. We're going to focus, so we're not going to try to boil the ocean. We're going to be laser-focused on an ICP and we're going to work together on conquering them. We're going to give them content that's usable versus like a thousand pieces and they have to sort through it. We're going to give them five pieces and a really clean bill of materials that they need to close the deal. And we're just gonna be really, really, really focused on those things. So, to me, that's ultimately the strategy is if sales is successful, then we've done our job right.”

Episode Timestamps:
*(3:53) The Trust Tree: Building sales and marketing alignment

*(23:26) The Playbook: Your brand is the full customer journey

*(34:41) The Dust Up: Tensions with sales and ensuring you send them good opportunities

*(37:33) Quick Hits: Kelly’s Quick hits

Sponsor:

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Creating a Total Social Strategy to Hype New Products

Ian Faison, Katie Berg — Tue, 4 Jun 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Katie Berg, VP of Marketing at Klue, an AI-powered Competitive Enablement platform designed to help product marketers collect, curate, and deliver actionable competitor insights to empower revenue teams to win more business.

In this episode, Katie dives into all things content, discussing building high quality content for your core audience and avoiding the trap of trying to reach all audiences right away. She talks about the meaning of community and building authentic relationships.

Key Takeaways:

You can’t reach every audience authentically through your content, at first. Trying to include too many personas at once results in general content that is not of interest to any of them.
It’s difficult to create entertaining content and you don’t need to have a perfect launch. The discipline of constant iteration and learning is the path to excellence.
Identity is a core component of community. Build a community that people want to identify with.

Quote: “I agree with you on the point that you don't have to have a perfect launch. And actually that's like a great, nice-to-have that comes from a bunch of different cycles and learnings of running shows. But the most important thing I think we ever did with our flagship podcast was we started it. If you went back and listened to those first episodes, I'm sure they were trash, but every single time we would listen to them. And we take down notes on what do we need to improve for next time? How do you ask better questions? How do we cut this better? How do we create better social clips? And literally just the pure discipline of constant iteration and constant learning, it is like the surest thing to getting to excellence. It just requires the discipline of being open to learning and trying to improve a single inch every time.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(16:54) The Trust Tree: Strategy founded on content and education

*(41:01) The Playbook: Media driving organic and direct pipeline

*(46:06) Quick Hits: Katie’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Getting Crafty as a Lean, Mean Team

Clare Dorrian, Ian Faison — Tue, 28 May 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Clare Dorrian, CMO at SugarCRM, a CRM that helps marketing, sales, and service teams finally get a clear picture of each customer’s journey.

In this episode, Clare talks about gaining clarity on your strategy and ensuring that it is not based on conjecture, advising marketing leaders not to sacrifice data-backed decisions for speed. She also discusses the importance of investing in reputation management and her approach to content.

Key Takeaways:

You need to focus on profitable growth, and remaining both efficient and effective, especially as a lean marketing team.
People buy from people, investing in events is very important, as is investing in reputation management.
Don’t drive strategy based on conjecture; keep your team honest about goals and what needs to be done.

Quote:

“I think that this comes back to getting crafty when you are a lean, mean team. We think about big rock pieces of content…the way that we approach content is to break down those insights and map themes, topics that those insights have and will uncover, and we're in the middle of this right now, by the way this piece of research, into social media soundbites, webinars, into short form, long form, and multiple formats, and with a perspective that will resonate to each of our core buying groups. So that we get the most out of the research that we're doing. We're approaching content in a way where we're trying to uncover insights that we can then package in many, multiple ways to educate. When people are at the top of the funnel to reinforce that the challenge that they're having, or that we're expressing to us when they become a prospect is shared by many others and they are not alone, but also into door openers for our sales team to give them reason to reach out, to give them reason to connect as well.”

Episode Timestamps:
*(06:53) The Trust Tree: Focusing on profitable growth as a private-equity-backed company
*(15:25 ) The Playbook: The importance of investing in reputation management
*(34:39) The Dust Up: Rebrand tensions and using your community to validate the right choice

*(38:15) Quick Hits: Clare’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Where to Play and How to Win

Kady Srinivasan, Ian Faison — Tue, 21 May 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kady Srinivasan, CMO at Lightspeed Commerce, a commerce platform that helps merchants innovate to simplify, scale and provide exceptional customer experiences.

In this episode, Kady discusses the importance of understanding your segments so you can talk about the value proposition for each segment appropriately. She also dives into the process of determining where to play and how to win at Lightspeed Commerce.

Key Takeaways:

You need to understand your segments in order to ensure that you are talking appropriately about the value proposition for each segment.
Go through the exercise of determining where to play in the market and how you can win there. Gain clarity regarding the choices that you are making and where you should say no.
Position yourselves as a partner, instead of the provider of a product or service, when you are building your brand.

Quote:

“The short-term focus on the short-term ROI is a big problem. And then the second thing is like the unattributable spend and how to make the right business case for it. I'll say as a tee up to our budget masterclass, when we do it, there are three segments of metrics that I've realized, uh, CFOs care about: there's volume, which is usually your MQL, SQL, closed one, you know, whatever that is, right? Then there is the velocity bucket, which is time to close, or time to first transaction, time to XYZ, whatever that is, time to first touch. And then the third one is efficiency. So it could be ROAS, it could be sales and marketing as a spend, as a percentage of spend. If you can convincingly present these three buckets or the right kind of information in these three buckets, you get a lot of mileage out of your conversations.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:49) The Trust Tree: Leading the shift towards prioritizing higher value ICPs

*(23:45) The Playbook: Managing brand building as CMO at different companies

*(36:08) The Dust Up: The translation problem

*(38:50) Quit Hits: Kady’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Kady on LinkedIn
Learn more about Lightspeed Commerce

Learn more about

Caspian Studios

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Showing Up for Customers Through Your Product

Ian Faison, Smita Wadhawan — Tue, 14 May 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Smita Wadhawan, CMO at SimplePractice, a leading practice management software company for health and wellness professionals.

In this episode, Smita discusses the importance of keeping your customers at the center and incorporating their voice. She also dives into educating the customer about the value of your product and then showing up for them through that product.

Key Takeaways:

Customer feedback should be taken very seriously and it is worth creating a formal process to give customers a chance to share their thoughts.
It’s important to arm yourself with data and examples when trying to sell your ideas internally, or you won’t be able to push them through.
The website can serve as your sales function and you should experiment with how the website can “work harder for you”.

Quote:

“So I would literally think of the marketing strategy as the full funnel from building the right product to getting the product in the hands of our customers, to making sure they use the product and get the most value out of it. And then last but not the least using our communications and our creative to tell the stories which put our customers front and center. We don't use models. We don't use actors. All our creative is telling authentic stories and they are all our customers. That is something that's really key to our brand, always honing in on our customer and having them do the storytelling for us.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(4:43) The Trust Tree: Fulfilling your obligation to your customers, who rely on your product

*(15:42) The Playbook: Customer referrals as the largest source of acquisition

*(34:45) The Dust Up: Advocating for staff to support conversion rates on the website

*(38:03) Quick Hits: Smita’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Smita on LinkedIn
Learn more about SimplePractice
Learn more about Caspian Studios

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Strategically Organizing Your Own Customers

Ian Faison, Kristin Russel — Tue, 7 May 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kristin Russel, CMO at symplr, a company that offers healthcare operations solutions, anchored in governance, risk management, and compliance.

In this episode, Kristin talks about not only creating a category, but also creating roles for the people who work in that category, in an effort to organize their customers. She also discusses going to market with the human in mind and authentic marketing.

Key Takeaways:

Creating a category involves driving brand recognition, but it also requires educating your customers and thinking about creating jobs within the category you are building.
If you have a smaller budget, “brandquisition”, focusing on brand acquisition efforts with a very recognizable brand, can be a useful strategy.
Prioritize featuring real people on your website. Focus on creating content and going to market authentically with real people in mind.

Quote:

“When you think about creating a category, we're also thinking about how do we create people who work in that category? How do I create a healthcare operations director or the manager of healthcare operations for workforce? And so, crazily enough, thinking about not just our content, but also working with our training team, working with the ways that we're reaching out and organizing our own customers.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(5:56) The Trust Tree: Going to market with the human in mind
*(20:58) The Playbook: “Brandquisition” and SEO

*(38:13) The Dust-up: Using the “Lencioni approach” to work through disagreements

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Kristin on LinkedIn
Learn more about symplr
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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The Niche Media Approach

Ian Faison, Shane Murphy-Reuter — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Shane Murphy-Reuter, CMO at Webflow, a company that offers non-coders the ability to design, build, and launch powerful websites.

Shane discusses the importance of the website and the value of being able to build quickly without coding knowledge and without making sacrifices in quality. He also dives into the efficacy of paid and organic search investments and the niche media approach.

Key Takeaways:

You should align your content strategy with how people consume content, which is in a more niche way.
Invest in the conversion rate on your website. Can you support the people who come to your website? How much are you spending on traffic generation versus conversion rate optimization?
Across marketing and sales, pace is important. Think about how to organize your team and empower them to go from concept to execution quickly.

Quote:
“This concept of niche media is to align our media buying strategy with how people consume content, which is a much more niche way. So right now we've just done, I think, five different podcast sponsorship deals with podcasts that are consumed by CMOs, which is our new target market. Marketing events, right? Talk about Forrester, Gartner. Where are CMOs? Where are they consuming content? Where are they listening to things? Go be there.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(14:05) The Trust Tree: Creating a bifurcated marketing team

*(31:49) The Playbook: The efficacy of paid and organic search

*(40:48) Quick Hits: Shane’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Bringing Value at Every Stage of the Customer’s Journey

Ian Faison, Narine Galstian — Tue, 23 Apr 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Narine Galstian, CMO at SADA, an IT Services and Consulting company that helps customers move to the cloud and then innovate and explore what is possible on the cloud.

In this episode, Narine discusses fostering ongoing conversations with customers and focusing on getting customers for life. She also dives into the importance of providing value at each stage of the customer journey and meeting customers where they are.

Key Takeaways:

It’s important to ensure that you are providing value to your customers at every stage of their journey and having ongoing conversations with them.
You need to meet your customers where they are and be very mindful of their time. Customers may no longer be near their company headquarters, so you need to know where your decision makers are really sitting.
Going to your customers allows you to create a more intimate experience and have a more captive audience.

Quote:

“ I think you have to kind of go where the customer is. While travel budgets are being cut everywhere right now, right? Everybody's very budget-conscious. You have to be mindful of everyone's time and make sure that you're bringing value to them. When we go on these roadshows, we're really investing time into putting these together and making sure that when the customer is coming to sit with us for 2, 3, 4 hours, that we're bringing value to them at every stage. And they appreciate that. They appreciate the fact that we're coming to them and they're not having to take time out of their schedule to fly across the country to sit in sessions that may not be relevant for them because they're too general at some of the big conferences, right?”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:38) The Trust Tree: Ensure the marketing strategy is in sync with sales

*(10:24) The Playbook: Investing in events and digital tools

*(25:23) The Dust-Up: Being accountable and taking ownership of failures

*(26:48) Quick Hits: Narine’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Future of Gifting is AI Enhanced

Ian Faison, Kris Rudeegraap — Tue, 16 Apr 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kris Rudeegraap, Co-CEO, Sendoso, the leading gift sending platform that helps companies stand out by giving them new ways to engage with customers throughout the buyer’s journey.

Kris talks about the value and the future of gifting, diving into how AI will enhance gifting efforts and creative ways companies use gifting to build trust with their customers.

Key Takeaways:

Gifting allows companies to engage with their customers in creative ways throughout the buying journey, helping them stand out from the competition.
Utilizing data allows companies to send the right gift to the right person, and to be thoughtful with timing, messaging and the location it is sent to.
The future of gifting will be enhanced by AI and will be automated.

Quote:

“How AI can affect, what is the right gift to send? So, I think the plethora of data that we're sitting on from tens of millions of sends and what we're having access to through a lot of really interesting data that we've built from AI, but also through data that's available through third party enrichments. We'll be able to say, hey, does Kris like golfing? Or does Kris like tennis? And so there's interest graphs that we've built that will really help decide, okay, Kris gets this, it's going to resonate with him more. Then it's like, okay, where's the best place to send it?

Is it his house? Is it an office? So, we can use data for that. We can say the timing, is it good to send it today for this prospect, or do we think that timing when they just went to your website, looked at your pricing page, and we want to trigger that. So, there's different reasons why you want to have timing be important.

The message. So, we launched last year, a gift message rider, either the e-gift message or the handwritten note message. And so now we can craft a better message than, say, an SDR can write, by using AI. And I think writing is a key area there. So all that will make it easier to get the right gift to the right person and drive better results.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(37:26) Quick Hits: Kris’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Defining the Enemy When Rebranding

Ian Faison, April Moh — Tue, 9 Apr 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with April Moh, CMO at Kyriba, leader in cloud treasury and finance solutions, delivering mission-critical capabilities for cash and risk management, payments and working capital solutions.

In this episode, April shares her expertise on managing perceptions through PR and building a demand creation arm from scratch. She also dives into the process of rebranding, and the framework they used when crafting their strategic narrative.

Key Takeaways:

To maximize your PR efforts, make sure you have a clear idea of the perceptions that you want to drive and how you are currently perceived among your audiences.
When rebranding and recrafting your strategic narrative, define who the enemy is, and who the hero is.
Find ways to quantify your demand creation arm beyond just direct ties to short-term revenue and be prepared to see results from that engine two years down the line.

Quote:

“A rebrand is more than just look and feel. A lot of it is also about what is that story and what is that strategic narrative? And for us, we worked through a very simple framework, which is to define what the enemy is. So the enemy represents the current way of work that is not productive for CFOs or treasurers. And then what the hero is. So how do we position ourselves as being able to really add value in solving that problem?”

Episode Timestamps:

*(12:21) The Trust Tree: Creating a scalable, repeatable marketing engine

*(19:02) The Playbook: Paid media, PR and events

*(34:18) The Dust Up: Changing a beloved mascot

*(37:41) Quick Hits: April’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Brand as the Hub of Your Go-To-Market Approach

Ian Faison, John Solomon — Tue, 2 Apr 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with John Solomon, CMO at Therabody, the wellness tech pioneer that brought us the Theragun, among other products that optimize human performance and unlock the body's natural ability to achieve health and well-being.

In this episode, John shares his strategy to overcome the “Kleenex problem”and dives into how they prioritize the entry point to their brand. He also talks about how he structures his team with the brand at the center to avoid silos and strengthen their go-to market strategy.

Key Takeaways:

Focus on the product that serves as the entry to your brand to get customers into your ecosystem.
Distinctive brand assets are essential and need to be protected, especially for companies facing the “Kleenex problem”, when their product name becomes synonymous with the product and less associated with the company brand.
Structuring your brand team at the center of the marketing function helps avoid siloes and strengthens your go-to-market strategy.

Quote:

I'm a big believer that your kind of brand team has to sit in the middle. It's the hub of your going to market approach, right? And so I have the brand team really thinking about it in those three areas that I talked to you about before, the performance, wellness, and beauty. And then we have specific brand managers that really think about specific audiences. But that's who's driving the integrated process. That’s who is bringing the functions together, saying, hey, we're launching this product, or, hey, we got Mother's Day, or, hey, this week we have sleep week. And then bringing together what's influencer, what's PR, what's the site, what's email, what's media, what all of those teams are doing to drive that integrated process.

So that's what I'm a really big believer in and how you structure things. Or else it becomes really siloed. It becomes fragmented. You have one team going over there shooting that content. Another team going over there doing that and it oesn't hang together. It's not bigger. It's not like 1 plus 1 equals 4 or 5.

Episode Timestamps:

*(13:19) The Trust Tree: Addressing the “Kleenex problem”

*(34:27) The Playbook: Capturing attention through television

*(45:03) Quick Hits: John’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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The Customer Journey Isn’t a Funnel - It’s a Spiral

Ian Faison, Sun Lee — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Sun Lee, CMO at BigPanda, a software company that enables organizations to organize and mobilize the world’s DevOps and ITOps data.

In this episode, Sun shares why she no longer thinks about the customer journey as a traditional funnel, why it's important to "go big or go home on events", and the importance of face-to face human interaction.

Key Takeaways:

The traditional funnel may not be the best way to think about the customer journey; it is more like a spiral.
It’s better to invest heavily in a few meaningful events, than to do many events each year.
As a new CMO, don’t be afraid to be vocal on what could be better across functions.

Quote:

“One thing that I always tell people is the traditional funnel is dead. When you interview with a startup CEO, they will tell you, we have a pipeline problem, we have a sales funnel problem, or we have a product marketing problem. They have a lot of problems, they're trying to classify that into a certain org or function.

And the one thing that I say is, it's actually all of the above. Because how people buy these days, it's not like you become a stage one prospect, you become two or three, four, and then you're down to, and then one activity will move you through the funnel. Like the concept actually doesn't exist. So if you look at the customer journey that we have from a BigPanda perspective, it's like a giant spiral.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:41) The Trust Tree: Structuring the team to match the customer journey
*(13:17) The Playbook: PMM budget as a priority
*(32:54) The Dust Up: Brand tensions moving into new markets
*(36:00) Quick Hits: Sun’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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The Venn Diagram of Content Marketing

Ian Faison, Gerardo A Dada — Tue, 19 Mar 2024 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Gerardo A Dada, CMO at Catchpoint, a company that increases retailers' internet resilience by catching issues in the internet stack before they impact business.

In this episode, Gerardo discusses his ungated content strategy and the venn diagram of content marketing. He also shares his thoughts on sticking to your ICP and his strategy to only go after high intent marketing leads.

Key Takeaways:

When thinking about your content marketing, you should find content that fits within three concentric circles.
It’s important to stick to your defined ICP and Gerardo has chosen to only go after high intent marketing leads.
Marketers should stay disciplined and should avoid artificially inflating demand. While there is a role for bribery in marketing, it can be easily misused.

Quote:

I believe that the best content marketing strategy, especially if you're in a position where you're trying to educate the market, you're trying to establish thought leadership, is finding that space in the center of three concentric circles.

One is what your audience cares about. The other one is what you know more than anybody else. And the third one is what the technology or the point of views that will predispose your prospects to buy, or increase the likelihood of them to buy.

Episode Timestamps:

*(6:44) The Trust Tree: Defining and sticking to your ICP

*(28:25) The Playbook: ABM strategy, content and intent

*(50:03) Quick Hits: Gerardo’s quick hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Learn more about

Caspian Studios

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Part 10: Top Marketing Leaders Share Their Most Uncuttable Budget Items

Tue, 12 Mar 2024 12:00:00 +0000

Every week on Pipeline Visionaries, we sit down with amazing marketing leaders to uncover the pipeline strategies that have been fundamental to their success. In each episode, we ask these guests which three areas of investment are most important to their marketing strategies. Tune into this special series to hear the budget items our CMO guests can’t live without!

Find parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and nine

Episode Timestamps:
*(01:37): Grant Johnson, CMO at Billtrust

*(04:22): Jessica Gilmartin, CMO at Calendly

*(06:11): Megan McDonagh, CMO at Amperity

*(07:17): Shafqat Islam, CMO at Optimizely

*(08:42:) Efrat Ravid, CMO at Quantum Metric

*(10:59): Orlando Baeza, CMO & CRO at Flock Freight

*(13:32): Jenny Victor, CMO at Epicor

*(16:18): Jessica Shapiro, CMO at LiveRamp

*(19:09): Jacqueline Woods, CMO at Teradata

*(21:24): Brad Rinklin, CMO at Infoblox

*(24:33): Celia Fleischaker, CMO at isolved

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Brand as a Competitive Advantage

Ian Faison, Mark Viden — Tue, 5 Mar 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Mark Viden, SVP of Brand at CommonSpirit Health, a non-profit that operates 140 hospitals and more than 2,200 care centers serving sites across 24 states.

In this episode, Mark discusses building an emotional connection with the consumer, using your brand promise as an operating principle and his focus on sharing the amazing stories in the healthcare industry.

Key Takeaways:

When brand promises are guiding principles for company operations, it creates a competitive advantage.
When building a brand, focus on the people in your ecosystem and on creating an emotional connection with the consumer.

Quote:
“What I see and have seen all the time is the competitors will start to nibble at what we do. They'll start to come in and borrow some of our themes. But they never stay with it because, again, I think kind of the flavor of the day and then the shiny object over there captures their attention and they're on to something else. Where we have this anchoring principle, “Hello humankindness” that, again, is seeded through so many areas of the organization.It is our brand promise.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:19) The Trust Tree: Building an emotional connection with the consumer

*(16:12) The Playbook: Creating value alignment

*(30:44) Quick Hits: Mark’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Strengthening Your Sales Relationship

Ian Faison, Leslie Henthorn — Tue, 27 Feb 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Leslie Henthorn, CMO at Ironclad, a contract lifecycle management software that provides a secure way to create and collaborate on contracts.

In Leslie’s return to the podcast, she discusses navigating the shifts in AI, Ironclad’s influencer strategy, and getting into the psyche of your target persona. She also talks about strengthening your relationship with sales and prioritizing alignment even when you have a strong inbound funnel.

Key Takeaways:

It’s important to get into the psyche of your target persona and to think about their frame of mind day-to-day.
You need to nurture your sales relationship, even when you have a strong inbound pipeline.
When working with influencers, it is important to find people that truly believe in the work that the company is doing and are genuine fans of the product.

Quote:

“We have tried to grow closer to sales and really support outbound in a way that marketing hasn't before. I think when you have a strong inbound funnel, sometimes your sales relationship isn't as strong as it should be. Yeah, you might be watching conversion and you might be watching how things are moving forward to pipeline, but it's easy to go like this after that. And when you start to understand that new business shouldn't drive your entire company strategy, that customer adoption, cross sell, understanding the logos you want to go after. This is something we've really been working on.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(11:02) The Playbook: Changing tactics over the last year

Sponsor:

Links:

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Using Incentives to Drive Impact

Ian Faison, Dana Barrett — Tue, 20 Feb 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dana Barrett, VP of Marketing at Tremendous, a company that offers a simple way to send rewards and payouts around the world.

In this episode, Dana discusses the ways that incentivizing your ideal customer provides impact across use cases, whether you are looking to build pipeline, drive sales, get participants in studies, etc. She also talks about carefully identifying your target persona and focusing on a small number of priorities.

Key Takeaways:

Incentives are a great way to drive impact, regardless of your use case (generate pipeline, sales, gaining study participants, etc.)
It’s important to find the sweet spot when incentivizing. Don’t offer a discount so high that people take the offer without any interest in the product; make it just low enough that it attracts people who genuinely have an interest.
Define your ideal customer persona and stay focused on a few key items to go after them.

Quote:

“ Incentives, regardless of your use case, are a great way to drive impact. Whether you're trying to grow pipeline. Whether you're trying to drive sales. Whether you want to make sure people participate in your studies, and you can recruit people in global markets that you're trying to figure out how to get people to just respond or participate. And so based on what we do, we're starting to see some best practices or things that can actually position you better to reach your ultimate goal, which is sales, pipeline, et cetera.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:52) The Trust Tree: Building awareness of brand and category

*(14:11) The Playbook: Investing in content

*(28:17) The Dust Up: Diffusing tension between product and sales

*(30:07) Dana’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Accountability in Experimentation

Ian Faison, Riikka Söderlund — Tue, 13 Feb 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Riikka Söderlund, CMO at Katana Cloud Inventory, a company that provides SMBs with easy-to-use inventory management software, to get them the real-time data that they need.

In this episode, Riika discusses staying accountable for intentional experimentation, how she invests in talent and why she dislikes the term “marketing strategy”.

Key Takeaways:

Experiments should improve results and should fit within goals. Including experiments in your overall budget, instead of pulling them into a separate, “experimental budget” keeps you accountable.
Talent development is an uncuttable item and marketing leaders should align individual growth aspirations with company goals.
Being right isn’t always enough. Marketing leaders need to be strong internal communicators and influence opinions to get the right results.

Quote:

“ I have a gazillion other marketing KPIs, of course, but at the end of the day, if we're not driving revenue, then it doesn't matter. I am not a fan of measuring leads or MQLs. Honestly, revenue is the only metric that tells you, did you generate pipeline? Did you reach the right audience? Is your value proposition correct? And is your brand resonating with that target audience? It's the only one that combines all the aspects of marketing.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:42) The Trust Tree: Why Riikka doesn’t believe in the term “marketing strategy”

*(12:53) The Playbook: The importance of content and intentional experimentation

*(31:54) The Dust Up: Becoming a strong internal influencer

*(33:45) Riikka’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Riika on LinkedIn
Learn more about Katana
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Be the Easiest Company to Buy From

William Tyree, Ian Faison — Tue, 6 Feb 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with William Tyree, CMO at IntelligenceBank, a platform that helps marketing teams get brand and legal approved content out the door faster.

In this episode, William discusses his focus on being the easiest company to buy from, the importance of empathizing with buyers, and how customer buying behavior has changed over time.

Key Takeaways:

Buyers have a hard job and marketers need to prioritize making their company easy to buy from.
Product marketing needs to be about empathizing with buyers, not just pitching the good things about your product.

Quote:

“My goal is to make IntelligenceBank the easiest company in our space to actually buy from. Buyers have a hard job. It's really hard to lasso all those different people on your buying committee and get them to agree on you as a vendor. So, to be the easiest, we have to assume that buyers are going to conduct at least three quarters of their research before they even talk to a seller.”

Episode Timestamps:
*(05:17) - The Trust Tree: The complex roles for people in charge of brand

*(16:15) - The Playbook: Becoming easy to buy from

Sponsor:

Links:

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Investing in Community and Relationships

Ian Faison, Celia Fleischaker — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Celia Fleischaker, CMO at isolved, a trusted HCM leader that provides software and services to meet the needs of HR professionals. Through their partner network, they reach more than 5 million employees and 145,000 employers across all 50 states.

In this episode, Celia shares with us how they are investing in and amplifying their engaged community as well as how their focus on relationships and primary research supports their marketing efforts.

Key Takeaways:

Coming into a company with an engaged customer base is a welcome challenge for a CMO, and amplifying that engagement is imperative.
It’s worth investing in primary research, to better connect with customers in ways that are actually of interest to them.
There is a continued convergence between customer experience and marketing. Leveraging data and information from customer service and blending that with marketing helps clarify what customers need.

Quote:

I think there's such a cool convergence between customer experience and marketing. And I think they are just continuing to get closer and closer. At Verint, where I was before, I worked in the CX space and we saw it there a lot, a lot of our customers realizing the power of taking customer experience, customer service information, blending that from a marketing perspective. And the amount of data that you get that really points to what you need to be doing for your customers, where they are at a relationship point with you.

And that's what I think with the CXO role, the customer experience role here, taking that, looking at that from customer service perspective, from a marketing perspective and pulling things together to look holistically at what is it that we can do both internally and externally to drive a better experience and how is that going to benefit, yes, our customers and the satisfaction that they have, but from a marketing perspective, there's so much opportunity to better understand what your customers are going through and it just puts you in this better position.

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:36) - The Trust Tree: Creating demand within community

*(08:15) - The Playbook: Investing in primary research

*(33:49) - Quick Hits: Celia’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Being the “Voice of” and “Voice to” the Market

Ian Faison, Kimberly Storin, Caspian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 23 Jan 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kimberly Storin, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at Zayo Group, a leading telecommunications company with a network that stretches over 16.8 million fiber miles and spans 141,000 route miles across North America and Europe.

In this episode, Kimberly shares with us how she built an end-to-end marketing organization within Zayo and demonstrated the value of the marketing function, diving into expanding their buying committee and creating a “Shark Tank'' mindset where people share their best ideas.

Key Takeaways

Marketing can be undervalued as a function and collaborating with C-suite peers is essential to a CMO’s ability to demonstrate their impact on revenue for the organization.
At the end of the day, marketing needs to be the “voice of” and the “voice to” the market, and needs to avoid short-term, quarter-by-quarter thinking.
There is value in shifting to a “Shark Tank mindset” and having people bring their ideas, then funding great ideas.

Quote:

“At the end of the day, we really just need to be the voice of and the voice to the market. If we're thinking about in-quarter revenue, we're not doing our job. Our job is to be thinking about the next quarter, next year, next five years, and how do we position the brand for the maximum growth efficiency. And yet so often I talk to CMOs who are stuck in this, well, what did you do for me this quarter? And if that's where marketing is focused, then marketing will never be successful.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:43 ) - The Trust Tree: Expanding your buying committee

*(15:19) - The Playbook: Investing in the top of the funnel

*(35:37) - The Dust-Up: Learning to have constructive conflict

*(39:01) - Quick Hits: Kim’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Using Neuroscience to Understand Your Customer

Tue, 16 Jan 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Esther-Mireya Tejeda, CMO at Anywhere Real Estate Inc., a leader of integrated residential real estate services, whose portfolio includes some of the most recognized brands in real estate. 

In this episode, Esther-Mireya discusses how marketers should consider themselves “business psychologists” and shares how she is incorporating neuroscience research when creating customer personas.

Key Takeaways:

Buying decisions for customers often have more to do with subconscious, emotional drivers that cannot be articulated in surveys or focus groups.
Marketers should think about themselves as “business psychologists”, and can use neuroscience to better understand subconscious drivers for their customers.
Marketers need to maintain connectivity to business objectives and avoid the trap of short-term thinking.

Quote:

“We have been really trying to get to the unconscious emotional makeup of consumers that set up their predisposition to like or dislike and to behave or not behave in particular ways. I call that the layer below the things that we are already measuring. And it's based on this premise that over 95 percent of our human behavior. is actually rooted and driven by unconscious emotions that we're not even aware of. So it's not stuff that I, as a consumer, would be able to articulate in a focus group.

It's not things that I would be able to, as a consumer, articulate in a survey. And so it is our job as marketers, if we think about ourselves as business psychologists, to get further down and deeper into that mindset, to get to the heart set to understand those things. And that's really what this is about.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(08:24) - The Trust Tree: Buying decisions are largely unconscious

*(26:13) - The Playbook: Research and insights are essential to success

*(37:23) - The Dust Up: Leaving what isn’t right for you

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with on Esther-Mireya LinkedIn
Learn more about Anywhere Real Estate Inc.
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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Creating Demand Starts with a Story

Ian Faison, Ben Slater, Beamery, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 9 Jan 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Ben Slater, SVP of Marketing at Beamery, a Talent Lifecycle Management platform that empowers companies to understand the skills and capabilities they have, build more agile workforce plans, and attract, retain, upskill, and redeploy their workforce.

In this episode, Ben encourages companies to think about the future of their workforce, shares why internal marketing efforts are often overlooked but shouldn’t be, and why leadership should have their hands in choosing talent. Ben also talks about how creating demand starts with a story and how they go about just that at Beamery.

Key Takeaways:

HR is an increasingly strategic part of the organization. How companies think about the future of their workforce impacts how they can achieve their business objectives.
The internal role of marketing is one of its most overlooked functions. Marketing has an amazing opportunity to be the internal communications engine that brings people back to the “why” of the organization.
Creating demand starts with a story. Specifically, demand starts with a story that is not just about your product, but about a fundamental shift in the market that is accelerating your category.

Quote:

“ For us, if we think about the demand process, what we are really focused on is not just demand capture, but also demand creation. I'm a huge believer that creating demand, it all starts with the story. So it's a story that's not just about your product, but about a fundamental shift in the market. Something that is either creating your category or accelerating it. Something that's fundamentally impacting your buyer and the way they go about their role on a day-to-day basis. What's the big story that we think is most relevant to our audience and that's in line with our point of view on the market? How do we ensure that there's internal alignment around that story? Because I think if you get the storytelling right and if you're able to tie the different channels and programs together in a way that is consistent, clear, not just for the external audience, but also for internal teams, it can really be a force multiplier for demand.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:28) - The Trust Tree: Addressing talent gaps accelerates transformation

*(17:24) - The Playbook: Investing in community

*(33:52) - Quick Hits: Ben’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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What Makes a Great Marketer? Right Thing, Right Place, Right Time

Ian Faison, Qualified, Brad Rinklin, Infoblox, Caspian Studios\ — Tue, 2 Jan 2024 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Brad Rinklin, CMO at Infoblox, a Computer and Network Security company that unites networking and security to deliver unmatched performance and protection for a world that never stops.

In this episode, Brad shares with us how Infoblox is expanding its buyer persona reach, what a modern marketing team looks like, and the importance of adapting to whatever your data tells you. Brad also talks about what makes a great marketer better than the average marketer - creating the right thing, in the right place, at the right time.

Key Takeaways:

Bringing in new buyers through education. When you’re looking at personas outside of your normal reach, be sure you’re providing educational resources so they can better understand who you are and what you offer.
Partner marketing acts as a force multiplier for your brand. Good partner relationships provide credibility in spaces you’re not currently in and can potentially cut marketing efforts and costs in half.
A lesson in marketing from fly fishing. Whether it’s the buyer journey, the “bait” or content you create, remember your efforts should be focused on one buyer at a time. So, how can you be a better marketer? Provide the right thing, at the right place, at the right time.

Quote:

“What makes a great marketer better than an average marketer? Two fishermen go on the lake, they both have the exact same rod, the same reel. You might even have the same bait. What makes the one just ripping fish out left and right? And the other one doesn't catch anything at all? It's the same concept. You've gotta understand the behaviors of the buyers that you're selling to and the market that's out there and what else is out there trying to steal their attention.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:09) - The Trust Tree: Passive decisions have big implications

*(25:11) - The Playbook: Partners as as force multiplier for your brand

*(32:46) - Quick Hits: Brad’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Mixing Up Traditional Marketing Models for Next-Gen Buyers

Stephanie McCarty, Taylor Morrison, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison — Tue, 19 Dec 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Stephanie McCarty, CMO at Taylor Morrison, the 5th largest homebuilder in the U.S. made up of the nation's leading homebuilders and developers.

In this episode, Stephanie shares with us why your website should be a selling tool not a seduction tool, how the role of sales is changing, and the unique ways Taylor Morrison has created partnerships to boost brand awareness and demand. Stephanie also talks about how companies should be approaching the next generation of buyers by mixing up traditional marketing models.

Key Takeaways:

Fitting your products/services to the various life stages of consumers. When you’re able to meet the customers where they are at any place in their lives and lifestyles, you’ll create repeat buyers naturally.
Mix up your marketing game. There are marketing models a lot of us use that simply don’t fit the next generation of buyers. These outdated systems can act as unintentional traps for consumers who will probably decide the process isn’t worth their time or money. Make sure your company is removing as many buyer traps as possible by mixing up marketing models.
Thinking of the customer journey after they buy. Once a customer buys from you, do you have strategies in place that benefit them and keep you top of mind? Innovative, engaging content is a great way to create a win-win for you and your buyers.

Quote:

“Remember a time when, before Zappos, before Amazon, when you had to actually go into a department store to buy shoes, or before Uber, and Airlines, or you didn't have your boarding pass on your phone, you had a physical one. So it's just taking our executive team through kind of reminding them that things that they're used to today haven't always been, and that's the space that homebuilding needs to enter. We need to enter that chat room and talk about here's what has always worked, here's that model, but there's a lot of that model that doesn't fit the next generation of homebuyers.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:28) - The Trust Tree: Managing a family of brands

*(24:39) - The Playbook: Creating innovative content your consumers (and beyond!) can benefit from

*(41:30) - Quick Hits: Stephanie’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Mobilizing Your Customer Base to Drive Sales

Jordan Schenck, Flashfood, Qualified, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios — Tue, 12 Dec 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jordan Schenck, Chief Brand Officer at Flashfood, a technology company working to eliminate retail food waste by connecting consumers with discounted food nearing its best-by date.

In this episode, Jordan shares with us how to push through the zeitgeist around what you do to change consumer perception, and she talks about some unique strategies for mobilizing your fan base to boost sales and brand awareness even without Coca-Cola dollars.

Key Takeaways:

Your biggest fans are your biggest drivers of sales. Empower and motivate your customer base to go to bat for you and market your products. How do you do it? Make and sell good products that people use and have them share their experiences.
Changing the zeitgeist around you and your product. Just because consumers have used similar products to yours doesn’t mean anything. When you make superior products that people love, and when you market those products in unique ways, you get people's attention, which builds greater brand awareness.
Organic brand awareness can be worth more than big dollars. Most companies don’t have the kind of cash big dogs like Coca-Cola do. But if you create fandom around your products, you do a lot with a little.

Quote:

“So there's something really interesting in that tension for me to like, how do we actually change behavior or you can like create a really cool movement around doing something totally novel. And I'm like, how can we make this idea of food that's near its best by the same as like how cool it is to shop for vintage clothes? Like what Depop did for Gen Z is really cool, right? And we've got that same sort of thing going where, like, how do we sort of create that sort of spirit and moment around the perfect window of this food? Truly, it's the perfect window. It's food ready to eat and the cheapest. Like, boom. Go. It shouldn't be that much more complicated than that.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:57) - The Trust Tree: Selling to a double-sided market

*(22:07) - The Playbook: Healthy level of commitment to owned and earned

*(36:20) - Quick Hits: Jordan’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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How to Run a ‘Pipe Council’: Approach Pipeline as a Team Sport

Ed McDonnell, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Asana, Ian Faison — Tue, 5 Dec 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Ed McDonnell, CRO at Asana, a software company that helps teams orchestrate their work, from small projects to strategic initiatives.

In this episode, Ed shares with us Asana’s vision for tackling work automation, insight into their Work Innovation Lab, and why attribution for attribution's sake is meaningless. Ed also talks about the importance of treating pipeline like a team sport and how to effectively run a “Pipe Council”.

Key Takeaways:

Get focused on your ICP. Partner with your product teams to develop your ICP so you can define use cases and show the productivity you can gain from those use cases.
Tell your story through the lens of your customers. Your customers are the inside players of how your product works and what it’s doing in a real way on a daily basis out in the world.
Pipeline is a team sport. All of your business channels should be involved when it comes to pipeline generation. Pipeline is not one person or function, and in order to succeed, it has to be the highest-performing team in your organization at cross-functional scale.

Quote:

“Pipeline to me is a team sport. It is not one person. It is not one function. It is such a, it is, it, it has to be. The highest performing team in your organization at cross functional scale, because nobody works for each other. Everybody's in their own worlds, but they have to come together as a team and solve the, you know, a problem that every B2B enterprise software company faces. Which is, do we have enough pipeline to go into the market to be successful? Because every organization is a little bit different as to how much they want each of those. stakeholders to develop into their pipeline. If you're not producing at the right scale or the right coverage model, Why? Like, interrogating the why is equally as important as getting all hopped up as to why not. And too many companies and too many people I have found spend time on, well, why isn't something happening? Like, versus going in and saying, okay, it's not happening. What can we do differently to actually produce a different result? Because you get caught up on poking on sales leaders and saying, hey, you're not hitting your pipeline metrics, like, why, what's wrong, and that friction, while good and has to happen, you also have to be really open to interrogating so to me the interrogation of it in a healthy way with everybody having a seat at the table and being a team sport is Is the way that I, I have found to be very successful running a Pipe Council.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:44) - The Trust Tree: Go to market strategy when you solve lots of problems for lots of people

*(15:32) - The Playbook: Running a Pipe Council

*(37:53) - Quick Hits: Ed’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Ed on LinkedIn
Learn more about Asana
Learn more about Caspian Studios
From zero to ten podcasts: How Caspian Studios produces B2B podcasts with Asana

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Unlocking Greater Marketing Potential: Operationalizing Your ICP

Caspian Studios, Qualified, Justin Anovick, Ian Faison — Tue, 28 Nov 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Justin Anovick, Former CPO/CMO at Syndigo.

In this episode, Justin gives us a masterclass in operationalizing ICPs (Ideal Customer Profiles) by providing us with tangible strategies for defining ICPs, tips for how to approach fringe use cases, and the reason why it’s so important to have alignment with the executive level.

Key Takeaways:

How to define your ICP: 1. Accounts 2. Size 3. Region 4. Market
Alignment with the executive team is essential. When the board asks “Who is our customer?” “Where are we seeing success?” you better have answers. Beyond marketing, teams need to work together cross-functionally so everyone is in the know and leadership understands where the company is at any given moment.
The entire organization needs to own the ICP. When product, marketing, finance, and leadership teams understand the ICP and do their jobs well, company success is inevitable.

Quote:

“So I think that a lot of organizations I see they just haven't put the time, effort, money, manpower behind it in order to actually define and understand the ICP. And so certainly each of those three times, one of the hardest things to operationalize it was to explain to the organization, starting with marketing, what actually ICP meant, what target adjustable market meant, but what service obtainable market meant and what you needed to do, and it was eye opening to realize how, to your point, most even marketers didn't really… they understood the concept, but they hadn't actually operationalized it or used it before.”

Sponsor:

Links:

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Goodbye Traditional Outbound, Hello Hyper-Personalized Content

Bluecore, Sarah Cascone, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 21 Nov 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Sarah Cascone, VP of Marketing at Bluecore, a retail marketing platform that enables marketers to turn data into revenue-generating campaigns, in minutes.

In this episode, Sarah educates us on what her team calls the Relationship Demand Gen Chain, how to foster a meaningful customer community, and how ruthless prioritization is a super power. Sarah also shares with us why she believes traditional outbound is fading away and that now, marketing is all about curating hyper-personalized content.

Key Takeaways:

Building out the Relationship Demand Gen Chain: Turning overall demand generation into pipeline. Sarah’s four points of focus are: points of view - educating the market on your points of view; points of entry - how you’re engaging with your target audience; points of leverage, where you can organically access your personas; and points of conversion - where your prospects have meetings with your sales team.
People buy from people, not companies. When you build a community around what you stand for, it’s a lot harder for prospects to walk away from that community anchored with your service or product offering.
Always have something to drive your target market to. When your prospects are ready to buy, they’ll enter into that conversation with your sales team. So before that point, it’s imperative to be connecting with your prospects and community at large organically and often.

Quote:

“ I think traditional outbound is fading away. That is why we've kind of pivoted our entire SDR team into this ABX account based experiences role. This goes back to in enterprise, where tech solutions are oversaturated, most prospects are not buying from just like a cold call or a cold email. So, the way we kind of integrate the SDRs and the ABX team, really is what they are, into that relationship demand gen chain totally elevates their value because we're becoming known and respected in all of the activities we're doing between thought leadership, events, and community, which gives them the ability and the time to curate their outreach based on the very specific research they're doing on the specific company so that they can speak to exactly what the person that they're going to email is feeling the pain that they're feeling, who, if we're doing our job right, has heard our point of view all along, has been part of our community, now they want to take a call with us…So goodbye, like cold calling and blast emails from the SDR. Hello, hyper-personalized curated that's built right into the marketing engine.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:25) - The Trust Tree: The Relationship Demand Gen Chain

*(09:06) - The Playbook: Building a community around what you stand for

*(36:14) - The Dust Up: You can take the girl out of NY but you can’t take NY out of the girl

*(40:33) - Quick Hits: Sarah’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Creating the Ultimate Unified Digital Experience for Customers

Teradata, Jacqueline Woods, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jacqueline Woods, CMO at Teradata, the connected multi-cloud data platform for enterprise analytics, solving data challenges from start to scale.

In this episode, Jacqueline talks about the new age of personalization, why AI should not be held accountable, and reminds us that data in technology is only as good as the data put into it. Jacqueline also shares how data is like water and paints a picture of her vision for a unified, frictionless customer experience.

Key Takeaways:

Personalization is key. One size does not fit all, so dimensional personalization has become so much more important in recent years. There are greater expectations amongst customers when it comes to their digital experiences and how they engage with companies, and it’s important to be aware of these changes and leverage them in marketing strategies.
AI isn’t responsible. When we talk about “responsible AI” we have to remember that it cannot be responsible - it’s a technology. So, AI can be trusted, but people need to be responsible. And when people are responsible, they can begin to create an environment of trust for users.
Prepare for the AI driven enterprise. Teradata’s estimate is that AI will drive most of our experiences by 2030 and a lot of companies feel disorganized in this area. Data is currently extremely siloed, so the first step is to cultivate a connected enterprise.

Quote:

“How do you know you're moving the needle? I mean, when we started this conversation with Forbes, it literally was around the same time last year, and my pitch to them was the following: There are a lot of people that say data is the new oil, data is gold, data is this, and I said, you know, my own belief is that data is like water is because this planet is over 72% water. That is what the earth is comprised of. The usable water that you can use on this planet is 2.5%. Most of that is in glaciers, which means that the real usable fresh water is 3 tenths of 1%. And so when you think about data, and all the data that's out there in the world, about 90% of the data is like data that's duplicated or replicated and how much of the core data is new data and information that you can use? And when you distill it down, it probably is very similar to water where the usable data that you can use, once you filtered it, cleaned it, harmonized it, associated it with the right things is probably less than 2 or 3% and that takes a lot of work. And at the end of the day, our thematic or our core belief is that we believe that people thrive when empowered with the right information. People don't always necessarily use the right information when they get it. But if they had it, and they were able to use it, they would actually be better off.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:06) - The Trust Tree: The cloud has changed marketing forever

*(30:05) - The Playbook: AI needs to be trusted and people need to be responsible

*(46:57) - The Dust Up:

*(49:54) - Quick Hits: Jacqueline’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Jacqueline on LinkedIn
Read: Enterprise 2030: Building the AI-powered company of the future
Learn more about Teradata
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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The End of Marketing Stagnation: Simple Content and a Strong Brand Strategy

Caspian Studios, Ian Faison, Jessica Shapiro, LiveRamp, Qualified — Tue, 7 Nov 2023 13:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jessica Shapiro, CMO at LiveRamp, the data collaboration platform for the world’s most innovative companies.

In this episode, Jessica shares with us how brand and demand go hand in hand, why everything you do should be measured, and the importance of avoiding building up silos within your marketing team. Jessica also talks about how she and her team are combating stagnation through producing simple content and fostering a strong brand strategy.

Key Takeaways:

Everything has to be measured. Even the “unmeasurable” aspects of your business needs proxies that can be measured by effectiveness, but everything you do needs to be monitored and appraised in some way to better understand effectiveness.
A strong brand strategy is not stagnant. If you’re looking to run a differentiated brand, which you should be, you need a strong brand strategy. Your brand cannot live in PowerPoint; it needs to have room to breathe and grow, and teams need to be constantly evaluating alignment cross-functionally within the company.
Interdependencies are key. Making sure you don’t build up silos within your marketing team leads to the best marketing. We all have the same goals. The way relationships become strong isn’t simply through human nature, it’s data driven, so when any and all information is shared across teams, success abounds.

Quote:

“I started with a differentiated brand and understanding that buyer's journey. It's not a channel or a tactic, but it is everything. If you do not get the whole company singing off the same page, it's very hard to make a difference. So, for me coming in, it was taking that time to do the rigorous research, talk to customers, get alignment with our leadership, get a strong brand story, train our marketing, build the marketing materials, and then train our sellers to use those same stories as they are talking to their customers. So having the whole organization moving together, we revealed our brand platform at our major customer event, Ramp Up…and it was this incredible organizing principle around data collaboration and so my “not cut” is strong brand strategy and I believe a strong brand strategy is not stagnant. It has to live and breathe and grow and everyone has to continue to be aligned.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(06:07) - The Trust Tree: Bringing companies together to exchange first-party data in a privacy-safe way

*(22:29) - The Playbook: Your whole company should be singing off of the same page

*(35:30) - The Dust Up: The most effective marketing is through layering your messaging in every channel

*(37:40) - Quick Hits: Jessica’s Quick Hits

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Scaling Success: Breaking Down Organizational Silos

Caspian Studios, Qualified, Andy Nester, Firstup, Ian Faison — Tue, 31 Oct 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Andy Nester, CMO at Firstup, the world’s first intelligent communication platform.

In this episode, Andy gives us the scoop on why Firstup is the best in the business at delivering information to individual workers, how he and his team help large organizations personalize experiences for their workers, and his approach to in-depth problem solving for customers. Andy also shares about his work breaking down organizational silos and how that helps scale success for businesses.

Key Takeaways

Build communities based on who you’re specifically trying to serve. The more you attempt to attract and engage a community of multiple roles and various functions, you inadvertently water down the value you offer. Identify your persona’s shared purpose and get laser focused on how they are collectively marching toward the same objective.
Large companies need a platform where they can communicate with every single worker. Utilizing a platform that automates communication at scale with individual employees is key in successfully understanding your workforce and making data driven decisions.
If you want to scale, you need to identify and break down organizational silos. Whether it’s sales, marketing, or otherwise, when teams work individually, they risk losing knowledge and insights that could help the company grow as a whole.

Quote:

“Most companies when they think about communicating to the workforce, it's a lot of knowledge workers, desk workers, people who sit behind a laptop like this. But in reality, 70% of the world's workforce doesn't have an email address. They don't sit behind a desk. So being able to communicate with them and understand how those employees are either engaged or disengaged is really, really difficult if you don't have a platform that can automate this type of communication at scale and in a personalized way to capture all those insights that can exist. When you keep that connection with the workforce and use those insights to really identify where there is potential challenges with retention, where there are productivity issues, where there are opportunities for advancement for people, where you should deliver more L&D, for example, there's lots and lots of great things that come out of really understanding the workforce down to an individual level.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:27) - The Trust Tree: Being the best in the market at delivering information at the right time, in the right place to every individual worker.

*(22:57) - The Playbook: Nothing is uncuttable.

*(41:14) - The Dust Up: Stay calm and approach tension thoughtfully

*(42:26) - Quick Hits: Andy’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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The Modern CMO: A Cornerstone of Services and Success

Caspian Studios, Ian Faison, Jenny Victor, Epicor, Qualified — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jenny Victor, CMO at Epicor, a company focused on solutions that help their customers with big-picture inventory management, forecasting, and timely delivery.

In this episode, Jenny shares with us how compelling content should be at the center of all that you do, how consumability is key when reaching prospective customers, and the unique strategies Epicor is employing to stand out in a crowded marketing landscape. Jenny also shares a new vision for what it means to be a CMO in our modern world and what that looks like when it comes to services and customer success.

Key Takeaways:

The role of CMO is evolving. Being a CMO isn’t just about the demand side of things anymore; it’s about impact and driving the business. CMOs are now blending more with the services and success side of the house, which gives marketers a more strategic role in a business.
Content is king. Content is at the center of everything you do, so it’s something that needs to be constantly invested in. It also needs to be eye catching, compelling, and consumable above anything else.
Create space for peer to peer experiences. Marketing and sales go hand in hand, so marketers working directly with sales helps to accelerate the sales part of the funnel. Acceleration events, where prospects are brought together with SMEs so everyone can learn more about each other, what everyone does, as well as use cases for products, provides a space for everyone to get on the same page and visualize the same goals.

Quote:

“ I think one of my final thoughts for all the marketers that are listening to this, see if you can find the cool stuff and make it work for you. I think we all want the big hype and we all want the cool stuff. We are fortunate enough to sponsor an F1 car, Alpha Tauri. That is so fun with Drive to Survive. We've done a lot of cool, fun things with it, but we've made it meaningful in the story because Alpha Tauri uses our product to make sure that car's ready for every race. Those 14,000 parts are where they need them to be. And I think it's being able to find that cool stuff and make it work for you.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:39) - The Trust Tree: The most essential ERP partner to the most essential businesses

*(10:53) - The Playbook: Content is king

*(37:02) - Quick Hits: Jenny’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for pipeline pros. The world's leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links:

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How Your Narrative Fuels Brand and Demand

NetApp, Gabie Boko, Gabrielle Boko, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 17 Oct 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Gabie Boko, CMO at NetApp, a hybrid cloud data services and data management company, offering cloud data services for management of applications and data both online and physically.

In this episode, Gabie shares with us why you can’t have brand without demand, her desire for partnerships vs handoffs, and the beauty of marketing agility. Gabie also helps us unpack why running a brand of commas isn’t the goal, but rather how companies can work toward stabilizing the functions and innovations they offer customers through their brand narratives.

Key Takeaways:

Leverage thought leadership as a market accelerator. Especially with conversations today about AI and cloud, thought leadership gets lost in the mix. If you’re not in the market and seeding the conversation, you’re reactive vs proactive.
Stabilize a “brand of commas” through the narrative. Companies are so much more than what’s written on paper. Showcase what you do for your customers and how you’ve made them successful by stabilizing your brand narrative.
Sometimes content is less about what you make and more about where you put it. Be strategic in making your content accessible and available anywhere a prospect might consume it.

Quote:

“We're putting the dollars in on the narrative, not putting the dollars in on a branding campaign. It's taking the strategic dollars and saying, let's go get the basics right and then not spend money over on this so we can go spend money on some other things until we get some of this other stuff right. You don't need to plant the flag and then defend the flag all in the same year, maybe you just spend some time to getting it right and planting it and getting everybody engaged versus, you know, saying, okay, now we're done! Let's go, let's go out into the market! So, you know, I think it's strategic choices like those two that are the important part of our budget this year, but it's also kind of the like goes back to what I said. I love the agility of marketing to be able to say that's not relevant for me right now. I gotta do this. And I think it's really important to have a good team around you to say, yep. You're right. We support that. You don't have to go do everything.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:36) - The Trust Tree: Brand and demand go hand in hand

*(16:28) - The Playbook: Fixing the “brand of commas”

*(37:27) - The Dust Up: You can’t do your job well without going head to head with others

*(39:00) - Quick Hits: Gabie’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for Demand Gen pros. The world's leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links:

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The CRO to CMO Advantage: Reimagining Go to Market

Ian Faison, Orlando Baeza, Flock Freight, Caspian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Orlando Baeza, CRO & CMO at Flock Freight, fixing freight’s biggest weakness by offering a smarter alternative — shared truckload — that moves goods more reliably and with fewer emissions.

In this episode, Orlando shares with us his tips for innovating decades old marketing strategies, the benefit of working under dynamic leadership, and why you should always keep your prospects laughing and learning. Orlando also talks about his journey of becoming the active CRO and CMO at a company like Flock Freight and what it takes to reimagine go to market from org structure and design.

Key Takeaways:

Shared truckload is the key to a cost-saving, efficient trucking future. Most of the trucks you see on the road are half empty, so when we think of the next step forward for cutting costs and getting more commodities to more customers at a faster rate, shared truckload is the answer.
Utilizing humor to educate the market. Leveraging humor and wit to grab attention and create care so customers want to engage and learn more about the company 's mission.
Reimagine go to market top to bottom. From org structure to design, go to market materials, sales enablement, messaging, inbound vs outbound, and beyond. An organizational shift is necessary at some point in a company's lifecycle for scaling into the future.

Quote:

“ So one of the big things, we've done is really reimagined our go to market top to bottom from org structure and design, all the way through go to market materials and sales enablement to messaging, right? To even thinking about the inbound versus outbound dynamic and how we prospect. So we've done a lot of organizational shifting to create what we believe is a much more dynamic, much more efficient organization that will set us for scale into the future.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(05:05) - The Trust Tree: A shared truckload future

*(14:53) - The Playbook: Build bespoke to reimagine the existing company playbook

*(38:46) - Quick Hits: Orlando’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Orlando on LinkedIn
Learn more about Flock Freight
Steve Burns Solves a New Mystery for Flock Freight: 'How Much Is a F**kload?'
Learn more about Caspian Studios

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The AI Conversation: What Marketers Should Be Thinking About

Ian Faison, Andrea Tarrell, Caspian Studios, Salesforce, Sercante — Tue, 3 Oct 2023 12:20:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Andrea Tarrell, CEO of Sercante, making marketing and sales teams wildly successful on the Salesforce platform.

In this episode, Andrea shares what organizations should be thinking about in their marketing when it comes to AI, how companies have overused marketing automation, and why the focus of AI should be on process, content, and technology.

Key Takeaways:

The role of Generative AI: process, content, and technology. AI isn’t going to solve all of our problems or do all of our work for us and it shouldn’t. The human element will always be needed, so marketers should look at how AI can step in to help with the non-value parts of our jobs.
Personalization is a frontier we haven’t conquered yet. We see use cases pop up all of the time, and yet we’re still struggling with basic use cases, let alone more sophisticated ones. There’s a lot of untapped potential when it comes to serving up content, offering next best action for prospects as well as related products provides us with lots of room to work with.
Marketing automation is overused and sloppy. Be thoughtful about why and how you create content, always be authentic, and think through the natural sequence of information your customers need.

Quote:

“ I think one continued challenge is training and enablement and getting your teams ready to embrace new technology. And part of the reason why that's top of mind is with all this talk of AI. There's going to be a whole new sector of jobs that are created as a result of that, and getting people comfortable and adopting things that are new is a muscle that I feel like all organizations need to start working out.”

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Reduce Revenue Leak with Purpose-Driven Marketing

Clari, Kyle Coleman, Devin Reed, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison — Tue, 3 Oct 2023 12:15:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kyle Coleman, CMO at Clari & Devin Reed, Head of Content at Clari. Clari’s Revenue Platform improves efficiency, predictability, and growth across the entire revenue process.

In this episode, Kyle and Devin give us the inside scoop on how to reduce revenue leak with purpose-driven Marketing, share their thoughts on operational thought leadership, and how revenue is not just an event it’s an outcome.

Key Takeaways:

Revenue is not just an event, it’s a business process. And a process can be planned, modified, and provide more predictability.
Map out your buying personas across the entire buying group. This has to be done so marketers can have more of a seat at the table for deal acceleration. The buyer’s journey has changed so much and we need to be aware of those changes and make strategic decisions through a more updated, effective playbook.
Sell and evangelize the problem you solve. You should always be talking about the value you bring to the marketplace and make sure you put the hero cape on your customer so they feel empowered to leverage what you offer and solve their problems.

Quote(s):

Kyle:

“ You need to be selling and evangelizing the problem that you solve, and you need to be putting the hero cape on the buyer so that they feel empowered to go solve that problem, leveraging your technology. And that's the move that we're trying to make. So a lot of what we do in the RunRevenue campaign, and the way that we're showing up, and certainly, hopefully, the vibe that you get when you engage with any Clary properties, whether that's RunRevenue pro or Clary. com or us on social. Hopefully, you get more of a B2C feel from us. We want you leaving any Clari experience and feeling like, that was, that felt like Nike. That felt like Apple. Not, that felt like IBM. Like, that's not the way we want to go. So that's what we're trying to invest more in.”

Devin:

“You need to win mind share before you can win market share. So all that like people like, oh, it's brand content, like that's not converting. It's like, but most people aren't buying anyway. So you need to start to get, uh, get them to know, like, and trust you, like you're doing with your ad. And then later, when the meeting comes, when it comes up that I need your services, you'll be the first one. And you'll get more inbound.”

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Mastering Event Engagement Through Customer Stories

Okta, Karin Flores, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 3 Oct 2023 12:10:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Karin Flores, VP of Strategic Events at Okta, a software development company enabling organizations to securely connect the right people to the right technologies at the right time.

In this episode, Karin talks about how Okta is augmenting its portfolio to meet the needs of their customers, how customer stories are always the greatest asset in any marketing campaign, and what it means for brand personas to be more connected than ever before.

Key Takeaways:

Know the true identity of your customers. After Covid, we learned we didn't’ know our customers as well as we thought we did, yet all we do is centered around our customers. So, it’s an important time to utilize technology and augment marketing portfolios to truly meet the needs of your customers and give them an outlet to share their stories.
You always have to be in change motion. You can’t build your portfolio or event after it’s been created: you have to constantly poke at it and make necessary changes. Otherwise, you’re behind.
As a marketer, you need to ask yourself: what am I trying to accomplish? Everything about your program is built from understanding your end goal.

Quote:

“So we've really started to augment our portfolio to meet the needs of our customers. So I think you always have to be in this change motion, change motion. I think you can't build your portfolio anymore, build your event, leave it and be like, this works and then just let it go. You can't, you constantly, constantly have to be poking at it and have to be making changes… You have to be willing to make changes. You have to look at what you're doing. And I say like, look at what you're doing. Change 50%. You know, listen, the times are changing, we change, the way we do business is changing, our priorities are changing, and if you're not making those changes, you're behind.”

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The Future of Pipeline Generation

Sarah McConnell, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 3 Oct 2023 12:05:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Sarah McConnell, VP of Demand Generation at Qualified, the pipeline generation platform for revenue teams that use Salesforce.

In this episode, Sarah shares the benefits she’s seen of nesting owned events into broader marketing goals, hiring varied skill sets in house as an invaluable ROI, and how everything you do should be about pipeline. Sarah also talks about pipeline as a personalized journey for prospects and the opportunity in giving potential buyers as many avenues as possible to convert.

Key Takeaways:

Being more diligent about spend. We need to be referring to our data often to be sure the ROI we expect and work towards is something that’s actually happening. It’s important to never stray too far from is this tactic or strategy really working?
Owned events should play a multi-functional role for your business. Every event you host should be nested within a broader goal that works for multiple aspects of your business operations.
It’s all about pipeline and the customer journey. Every customer’s journey is different. Let’s be sure we’re giving them as many avenues to convert as possible.

Quote:

“It's business. It's pipeline. Like, that's all we care about. At the end of the day, everyone needs pipeline. If they need revenue, which is every single company. So, I think you make such a good point of, I hate to say it, but like, who cares? It's great to have. It's good to know. It, it helps us directionally. But at the end of the day, we're all working together to drive pipeline. And that's all that matters.”

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Championing Owned Media Experiences for Brands

AudiencePlus, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison, Anthony Kennada, Qualified — Tue, 3 Oct 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Anthony Kennada, Co-Founder & CEO at AudiencePlus. In this episode, Anthony shares the many benefits of companies distributing content on their own domains, the idea of a more efficient content feedback loop, and how owned media is the way forward.

Key Takeaways:

The old marketing playbook no longer works. Marketers need to be asking: How can we tell more and better stories about our brand and our customers? How can we entertain and educate our prospects? The marketing industry is hungry for authenticity, so let’s create compelling content and utilize more marketing automation strategies.
Unearth peer-driven insights. If we can learn from what we’re all doing in real time, we can fundamentally change how we think about how we’re serving the right information to the right people by utilizing our peers through their expertise and insights.
Owned media is the way forward. AudiencePlus is going all in on content production and events to champion brands to own their media channels.

Quote:

”When you have someone that is... Opted in to your content, where we see if they're coming back, what they're watching, what topics they're interested in. And so, you know, I think part of the value proposition of what we're trying to offer is, you could get a pretty close, a pretty fast feedback loop on content you're producing today, if you're able to have the data to prove the connection to, to something else.”

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Crafting Brand Intent for Greater Customer Impact

Caspian Studios, Qualified, Rachel Konrad, Ian Faison, The Production Board — Tue, 26 Sep 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Rachel Konrad, Chief Brand Officer at The Production Board, a holding company established to solve the most fundamental problems that affect our planet, by reimagining global systems of production across food, agriculture, biomanufacturing, human health and the broader life sciences.

In this episode, Rachel shares with us her take on conventional marketing, why the most disruptive companies are the ones who think from a tech and marketing perspective, and the need to throw out the incumbent’s chess board and play your own game. Rachel also shares her mission for crafting brand intent first and foremost in order to make greater customer impact.

Key Takeaways:

Conventional marketing doesn’t always cut it. It’s hard to be disruptive in a busy marketing space with your brand if you aren’t willing to throw out the way everyone has done the same thing in the past.
You can cut anything in your budget. Especially in startups, hire people who are swiss army knives to keep costs low and who give you the ability to internally support your company better.
Craft brand intent first. If you don’t know who you are and what your purpose is, you cannot create effective campaigns that reach your target audience(s) well.

Quote:

“It's actually a lot easier than you think if you break it down into these, what does the consumer want? What does the consumer care about? And everything else is just not even something you should over, overly worry about. You just have to be in the same zone of the incumbents on those, but you have to dominate the few things that really profoundly matter to the customer. The goal is not for us to be thumping our chests, telling our story, in our own words, using a lot of marketing jingo. The goal is users. The goal is having user generated content, having your true believers, your advocates, and... Convincing and converting the non-believers, right? That is the goal.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(07:17) - The Trust Tree: Disruptive companies throw out the incumbent’s chess board

*(38:04) - The Playbook: Don’t get too precious about any of your uncuttables

*(48:29) - Quick Hits: Rachel’s Quick Hits

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Enabling Your Marketing Team to Be Bold

Analisa Dominic, Opengear, Qualified, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios — Tue, 19 Sep 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Analisa Dominic, CMO at Opengear, a company that delivers secure, resilient access and automation to critical IT infrastructure, even when the network is down.

In this episode, Analisa shares with us how marketing and sales work as one team at Opengear, the importance of getting clear on your buying persona before setting strategy, and why she put Darth Vader in a photo booth. Analisa also shares her experience being a disruptor in the marketing space and how she enables her team and encourages new CMOs to be bold and different.

Key Takeaways:

Be bold. In order to stand out in the marketing landscape, you have to unabashedly embrace new and unique marketing methods to connect with your customers. Creativity is free.
Get to a place where your customers love you. When your customers truly love you, they're your best advocates for quality referrals and so much more.
Remember why you were hired in your marketing role. If you were hired to disrupt the space, then disrupt.

Quote:

“It's really being able to understand the buying persona then creating the strategy. Because if you think you understand the buying persona and you create a strategy, it doesn't matter how good the strategy is, if you're not speaking to them in the right way, in the right times and pulling all those levers, you're never gonna be successful. So, I think there, when you set strategy, it's also important to have that alignment with the sales organization. What's important to you? What are you trying to hit? What are your target customers? Who are gonna be making those decisions, et cetera, et cetera. So it's not just a marketing strategy, it's a business strategy.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:47) - The Trust Tree: Opengear is the silent ninja for all engineers

*(14:46) - The Playbook: Darth Vader in a photo booth

*(33:51) - The Dust Up: Bring all the stories you can

*(37:09) - Quick Hits: Analisa’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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The Benefits of Refreshing Brand for Demand

Caspian Studios, 1WorldSync, TJ Waldorf, Ian Faison, Qualified — Tue, 12 Sep 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with TJ Waldorf, CMO at 1WorldSync, the leader in Product Content Orchestration.

In this episode, TJ shares the true value in customer case studies and what that can do for the sales team, why brand and demand aren’t mutually exclusive, and the importance of understanding what your business is trying to accomplish. TJ also talks about why alignment across teams is critical to marketing success.

Key Takeaways:

Brands should refresh and reposition to be sure they’re resonating with their buying groups. Buyer needs and wants change over time, and brands need to be flexible and evolve to meet those changing demands. Brand and demand go together.
Build up a backlog of customers who are willing to help your brand. Customer case studies provide endless value and opportunity for businesses to market their brand. An investigative approach will lend more answers to the questions brands really want to know from their customers.
Teams must be aligned to experience the greatest success. Get as granular as possible cross-functionally so everyone sees the same vision and is on the same page.

Quote:

“ I mean, it goes back to, is that asset distinctive? Right? Like if you want them to think about a certain series, like for us, if we wanted to think about or have marketers think about a certain series different than the IT team or the master data team, you know, how do we make that distinctive so when a marketer sees it's not kind of blending in with some of the other stuff that we might be doing that speaks to a different audience.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:30) - The Trust Tree: Refreshing brand to reevaluate persona needs

*(15:38) - The Playbook: Brand and demand go together

*(30:36) - The Dust Up: Quick responses aren’t always best

*(31:34) - Quick Hits: TJ’s Quick Hits

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Leaning into the Art of Continuous Product Design

Quantum Metric, Efrat Ravid, Qualified, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison — Tue, 5 Sep 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Efrat Ravid, CMO at Quantum Metric, a pioneer in Continuous Product Design, helping business and technology teams align faster on customer needs and prioritize the opportunities that will drive the most value.

In this episode, Efrat takes us on a deep dive into Quantum Metric’s continuous product design approach, the endless benefits of hearing directly from your customers, and the importance of data accessibility across entire teams. Efrat also shares with us how Quantum Metric provides opportunities for their customers to release with confidence and warns all CMOs to stay away from marketing campaigns that do not work for your customers.

Key Takeaways:

Modern marketing is all about customer relationships. If you don’t know your customers and ask for (and accept) their honest feedback, you are leaving a lot of untapped potential on the table. Encourage customers to share feedback in their own words.
Embrace industry dynamics and lean into continuous product design. The purpose of new initiatives isn’t always about selling more products; it’s about continuous improvement to our products for the benefit of our customers.
Feedback in your customers’ own words creates marketing magic. The more companies try to force language out of their customers, the less useful customer feedback truly is.

Quote:

“And then we ask them a different question, and they ask them, what's the value the product actually brings you? Like, forget about what we tell you, what you and the word they use were completely different. They were talking about releasing with confidence. So every time you have an update on your website, you need to release and think about your airline, like United Airlines and you need to release, you can break so many things, right? Or think about [if] you are a bank like US Bank and people can stop, withdraw money because of a mistake you make and it can have a real impact. So releasing with confidence was an amazing value. Another thing they mentioned is being able to test and try again and again and not be afraid of that.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:08) - The Trust Tree: All marketing efforts are focused on the customer: their journey and their feedback

*(22:58) - The Playbook: Why Efrat’s not married to any particular tactic; anything can be cut if it needs to be

*(31:44) - The Dust Up: There’s an ongoing healthy tension between sales and marketing

*(34:29) - Quick Hits: Efrat’s Quick Hits

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Creating Content That Meets Your Customers Where They Are

Caspian Studios, LinkSquares, Juliette Kopecky, Ian Faison, Qualified — Tue, 29 Aug 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Juliette Kopecky, CMO at Link Squares, the company behind the AI-powered contract management platform of choice for legal teams aiming to move their business forward faster.

In this episode, Juliette shares with us her strategies for defining and creating good content and how to meet customers where they are, her focus on creating stronger customer connections, and the importance of bringing varied skill sets in house in order to match the change of pace within the marketing industry.

Key Takeaways:

It’s crucial to understand how your customers interact with your content and why. Not only does this help your team to better understand your target personas, but it also helps create better connections with prospects and customers.
Now more than ever, bringing skill sets in-house is key to marketing success. A skilled and diverse team allows for resilience against the pace of change within the marketing industry.
Eliminate what doesn’t perform well for you. Create meaningful results, not just leads, and when you do this over time there’s less to cut in your business.

Quote:

“And I think for us, that's what we always think about is what is that piece of content or topic area that we wanna build upon that our audience cares about and what is going to be like that best medium for it. And sometimes it can be the same topic area and different pieces of it, like a bite-sized piece of content might work well in an audio podcast, whereas a detailed sort of step-by-step here's how you use the product goes really nicely with, with doing maybe a video tutorial or a written out piece of document. And I think, and I think that's so much about, like marketing is thinking about like that content and what is the vehicle, and then really matching it to your buyers and your prospects. What their needs and how they prefer to consume that content.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:56) - The Trust Tree: Making the backend processes easier for legal teams and increasing ROI by 352%

*(24:17) - The Playbook: Eliminating what’s not performing so you don't have to cut anything else

*(29:20) - The Dust Up: How you approach conflict is key

*(30:24) - Quick Hits: Juliette’s Quick Hits

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Scrappy, Out of Home Marketing Strategies for CMOs

Caspian Studios, Ian Faison, Qualified, Optimizely, Shafqat Islam — Tue, 22 Aug 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Shafqat Islam, CMO at Optimizely, a leading digital experience platform (DXP) that equips teams with the tools and insights they need to create and optimize in new ways.

In this episode, Shafqat shares his core company beliefs around marketing, the journey of cutting Optimizely’s budget to zero and starting over, and how he and his team are getting scrappy and going back to the drawing board to start afresh with their marketing strategies. Shafqat also gets transparent about what it’s been like to be a first time CMO and the advantages that presents him in his new role.

Key Takeaways:

For long term business success, you have to have a solid digital presence, create awesome content that keep your customers coming back for me, and utilize creativity and science to provide unparalleled customer experiences.
Sometimes, you have to scratch it all and start over. By cutting their company budget to zero and starting afresh, Shafqat and his team now run a leaner and more scrappy marketing organization.
Anything measurable is uncuttable, anything unmeasurable is cuttable. Be ruthless about what your output is and how it affects your input.

Quote:

“We wanted to get a lot scrappier, a lot more entrepreneurial, a lot cheaper, like spend a lot less money, even though we have big budgets and it just requires a different type of person, right? And so, as I mentioned, sometimes some people opted out. Some were encouraged to find a better fit somewhere else. And the entire leadership team in our marketing org turned over very quickly…So they all left and all the people who were doing the job one level below got promoted into the new marketing leadership team, and they've absolutely crushed it. Like I'm so proud of them because they were just waiting in the wings to take on more responsibility. Get shit done, prove that we can run a very different type of scrappy marketing organization.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:43) - The Trust Tree: Cutting the budget to zero and starting over

*(23:37) - The Playbook: Getting scrappy and redefining the marketing game

*(33:39) - Quick Hits: Shafqat’s Quick Hits

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Investing in Brand Awareness for Long-term Business Evolution and Growth

Todd Wells, Acumatica, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 15 Aug 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Todd Wells, CMO at Acumatica, a leading innovator in cloud ERP.

In this episode, Todd provides insights into the marketing team’s responsibilities within Acumatica, how people want to be sold to, and what major sports sponsorships have done for brand awareness and helping his team break through to new audiences. Todd dives deep into his vision and work in brand awareness for Acumatica and how those efforts directly work with and alongside demand generation.

Key Takeaways:

It’s imperative to focus on brand awareness alongside demand generation.
Explore innovative ways to market your brand to break into new audiences, whether it’s major sports sponsorship, airport ads, connected TV, etc.
No matter how you market, always think of your individual personas: their wins, wants, and pain points. People want to see themselves in your marketing.

Quote:

“We've progressively been dipping our toes into just brand awareness as well, and so whether that's airport advertising, whether that's connected TV, whether that's sports, sponsorships, but all of those are really something that we've understood from the marketplace that there's, you know, especially from partners and in speaking to partners, what do they value? What do they want?...In our scenario, I think it happens interestingly very far down the funnel, and so where it's really critical and where the partners are asking for is really that conversion to win.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:45) - The Trust Tree: Acumatica’s criticality of awareness

*(11:49) - The Playbook: How Acumatica reconciles their spend with partner spend

*(28:01) - The Dust Up: Dust ups are a productive outcome of pushing the execution and strategies of business models

*(29:47) - Quick Hits: Todd’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Generating Pipeline Through Authentic Partner Relationships

Acrolinx, Christopher Willis, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 8 Aug 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Christopher Willis, CMO and self-proclaimed Chief Pipeline Officer at Acrolinx, an AI platform that uses a unique linguistic analytics engine to “read” content and provide immediate guidance to improve it, transforming how the world’s biggest brands create high-performing content.

In this episode, Christopher shares about why he and his team are focused on 1 to 1 equals 3 partner relationships and what that’s meant for the business, building trust between the sales, marketing and BDR teams, and how awareness and authenticity set up organizations for greater wins with prospective buyers. Christopher also talks about the partner ecosystem and why partner relationships are critical in making Acrolinx as successful as it is today.

Key Takeaways:

Zeroing in on 1 in 1 equals 3 strategic relationships with partners by crafting a product, an offering, and point of view in order to be able to identify as a content impact platform.
Pushing a compensation model where everyone wins or loses together builds greater trust between sales, marketing and the BDR teams.
The best results come out of hyper-personalization to prospective buyers, which enables teams to get granular with prospects through research and relationships.

Quote:

“The difference between then and now is the focus on the one in one equals three relationship that we're having with the businesses that we work with now. Businesses like MHP, which is a services organization owned by Porsche or Hitachi in Japan, or RWS where there's real value in the two companies working together that goes well beyond small technical and marketing relationships.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(14:31) - The Trust Tree: How Acrolinx is the TSA checkpoint for content inside of big business

*(24:58) - The Playbook: Investing in relationships with partners matter

*(41:41) - Quick Hits: Christopher’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn
Connect with Chris on LinkedIn
Learn more about Acrolinx
Learn more about Caspian Studios
WordBirds Podcast: How HPE Is Revolutionizing Customer Experience With Content

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Unleashing the Power of a Video First Marketing Strategy

Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Brightcove, Theo Hildyard — Tue, 1 Aug 2023 12:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Theo shares Brightcove’s holistic go to market strategy, how and why to create a Netflix style experience, and the importance of collecting and harnessing the power of first-party data when it comes to video content. Theo also talks about how thinking and acting like a media company is the way forward for all marketers.

Key Takeaways:

Different personas need to be sold to differently. Be sure all messaging directly reflects the needs of a particular persona and that it’s not written for every potential buyer.
A go to market strategy that’s worked for Brightcove: Treat buyers as individuals, personalize content, and since video is king - make good use of it.
Create a Netflix style experience for your customers. Thinking and acting like a media company is the way forward.

Quote:

"It's ubiquitous. Now research shows that 90%, 97% in fact of recent video viewers would be more receptive to sales communications from a business after consuming their video content, so it's incredibly important that enterprises get on board with video as well.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(4:20) - The Trust Tree: Brightcove’s focus on “streaming” content strategies

*(25:09) - The Playbook: Marketing to customers as customers and not simply as prospects

*(38:53) - The Dust Up: Overcoming tension between marketing and sales

*(42:56) - Quick Hits: Theo’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Systematically Approaching Your Win-Loss Strategy

Caspian Studios, Qualified, Spencer Dent, Ian Faison, Clozd — Tue, 25 Jul 2023 12:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Spencer Dent, Founder of Clozd, provides insights for running effective win-loss programs that help companies see the bigger picture when it comes to product marketing and roadmapping. Spencer also shares Clozd’s three tiered approach to the buyer’s journey, the importance of getting feedback directly from clients, good or brutal, and how to make sure companies are visible to the right people at the right time.

Key Takeaways:

Continued education for the customer is paramount in showcasing your product’s or service’s value.
An effective win-loss strategy is essential for product marketing and product road-mapping.
Choosing to focus on nurturing your pipeline and thought leadership efforts not only helps to educate potential buyers on what you do but it also allows for more streamlined content creation and brand messaging.

Quote(s):

“ I think what you've seen in the last 10 years in terms of the evolution of rev ops, going from being like there's a marketing ops team and a sales ops team and whatever, and a customer success ops team, to a lot of companies are moving to a unified, there's one team that runs the whole customer journey that's responsible for reporting on the whole thing. Making sure all the systems and everything are tied together. We see that right across our clients. And the cool part about win loss is it's the companies that do well with win-loss and actually get the most value out of it, it has very little to do with who owns it, whether it's sales or marketing. It has everything to do with, do they have a culture that can accept feedback?”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:17) - The Trust Tree: Why pulling buyer data is key to understanding why a deal happened or not

*(24:17) - The Playbook: Clozd’s tactical approach to win-loss

*(34:25) - Quick Hits: Spencer’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Embracing an Outside-In Marketing Perspective

Emburse, Johann Wrede, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios — Tue, 18 Jul 2023 12:00:00 +0000

Episode Summary:

In this episode, Johann shares how he and his team are approaching spend management in a holistic way, the beauty of championing your clients, and how all marketing comes down to adding value. Johann also talks about strategies for shifting budget spend to incorporate additional high-converting formats and channels and the importance of focusing on strong content and adding value outside of demand gen interactions.

Key Takeaways:

Incorporating customer success into the buyer lifecycle journey helps to avoid internal breakdown through departmental silos.
Learning how your potential customers interact with your brand before your sales team gets involved allows for deeper insights into the kind of content a business should be investing in and creating.
The effectiveness of ads is diminishing and that ad spend should transition away from single use assets to resussable assets that can be repackaged in multiple ways.

Quote(s):

“What are the business processes that our buyers go through? What are their jobs like? What is their working environment? What does their day look like? Right? And then how do we give the salesperson the education on the topics that are relevant to those buyers that we can address so they can start asking questions and start sort of engaging in an open-ended way and that's kind of the problem, right? You can do all this automation on the website and you can create beautiful content, but if you're not thinking about how do I enable my sellers to understand that content journey and how to leverage the insights that are attached to that content to create dialogue, then it will fall short.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(8:40) - The Trust Tree: How and why Johann and his team are starting to “solution sell”

*(29:44) - The Playbook: Engaging potential buyers before the sales team gets involved

*(47:11) - Johann’s Quick Hits

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Leveraging Connections and Emotion for Marketing Campaign Success

Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, DocuWare, Thomas Grohl — Tue, 11 Jul 2023 12:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Thomas Gröhl, VP of Marketing at DocuWare, shares the three methods DocuWare focuses on for marketing campaigns, why engagement is key to everything they do, and how DocuWare is leveraging a more emotional approach to connect with their customers. He also provides insights into how marketing can have a better relationship with sales, the importance of keeping buyers in mind when creating campaigns, and how to be a trusted advisor.

Key Takeaways

Providing value in a digital world begins with engagement and being a trusted advisor.
Have a local mindset. Step outside of normal marketing tactics and strategize language, tone, and value propositions in a way that can be adapted to a local market.
Utilize emotion to tell your buyers a story and connect with them as human beings.

Quote(s):

“I would like demand gen marketers out there to have their buyers more in mind when they create their campaigns, their content, the messaging. Think about how relevant is it for my audience? What's the value proposition? There are no shortcuts that last long, and your customers will value that in the long run.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:24) - The Trust Tree: How DocuWare uses the channel for 80% of their business

*(06:40) - The Playbook: Thomas’s uncuttable budget items

*(29:44) - The Dust Up: How Thomas utilizes facts and numbers to bust through company tension

*(30:33) - Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links:

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Staying on Top of Industry Dynamics Through Innovation & Efficiency

Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Stevie Case, Vanta — Wed, 5 Jul 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Stevie Case, CRO at Vanta. Vanta is the leading trust management platform that helps simplify and centralize security for organizations of all sizes. At Vanta, Stevie oversees and helps expand Vanta’s go-to-market team to support the company’s rapid growth. She brings over 15 years of sales and business experience, most recently serving as Vice President of Mid-Market Sales at Twilio, a market-leading cloud communications platform.You might also know Stevie as "KillCreek" -- the world's first female professional gamer.

In this episode, Stevie shares her experience and expertise with not forcing prospects into a one size fits all experience, how Vanta stays on top of industry dynamics, as well as how and why her team is moving into an always-on approach.

Key Takeaways:

Buyers today are much more educated than they have been historically, and companies need to take into account the end-to-end buyer journey.
Moving away from one-off activities and into always-on programs that are scalable and repeatable.
Everyone on the team is responsible for pipeline generation.

Quote(s):

“It is an all hands on deck effort. You gotta do it in a way that's scalable and thoughtful and evolves and it's gonna be different for everybody. You know, there are, all of the best practices in the world are great, but unless you figure out how to personalize them to your company, your brand and your target personas, it won't work.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(07:27) - The Trust Tree: How Vanta organizes activities around their ICPs

*(34:49) - The Playbook: Stevie’s uncuttable budget items

*(42:43) - The Dust Up: Vanta’s inward focus on execution and speed to drown out the noise of market competition

*(47:27) - Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Harnessing the Power of First-Party Data

Amperity, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison, Megan McDonagh — Tue, 27 Jun 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Megan McDonagh, CMO at Amperity. Amperity is a customer data platform company that helps B2C brands unify and stitch together their fist party customer data for effectiveness and efficiency in order to help companies attain and acquire customers. Megan is a seasoned marketing executive with over two decades of experience leading marketing teams in the high tech space.

In this episode, Megan dives deep into the world of first-party data. What it is, how you collect it, and how you can harness its power to create effective marketing strategies.

Key Takeaways

Unless your first-party data is stitched together, it’s almost impossible to understand your customer persona and create effective marketing strategies.
Education is necessary for defining personas, their problems, and the solutions to help them.
Approaching ABM strategies as a pyramid: who are the big players to go deep with? Who are the one to few? Who are the one to many?

Quote(s):

“How do you understand that and know that if you don't truly know who your customers are? You have data coming in from offline sources…but how do you know if that data is not all unified and stitched together? Unless that's done, it's really hard to understand how to build really effective marketing programs.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(04:07) - The Trust Tree: Why Amperity pushes for the unification of first-party customer data

*(22:35) - The Playbook: Megan’s uncuttable budget items

*(37:42) - Quick Hits: Understand your customer journey and what’s needed throughout the funnel

Sponsor:

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The Evolutionary Marketing Advantage

Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Carmen Williams, Zuper — Tue, 20 Jun 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Carmen Williams, Co-CMO and Head of Product Marketing at Zuper. Zuper builds digital solutions to help businesses provide exceptional customer experience. Their mission is to create the world’s most comprehensive tool for field workforce management. Carmen is an evolutionary marketing executive, with experience accelerating innovation and growth for fast-growing companies. She is skilled at driving marketing strategy and plans for fast-growing organizations, and is a forward-thinking, collaborative leader who advocates an evolutionary mindset and empowers teams to optimize performance.

In this episode, Carmen shares about her work with inbound ABM strategies for growing field service operations by streamlining their processes, delivering better customer service, and helping them to be more efficient to scale and grow.

Key Takeaways

In order to help fast-growing businesses streamline their efforts, working with a team who strategically uses AI and automation for better customer service and efficiency is key to scaling.
Deep collaboration and discussion amongst leadership is one of the secrets to ongoing success.
Having an evolutionary, adaptive mindset and culture around testing can prove to be one of the greatest marketing advantages in business.

Quote(s):

“We're very lucky that the culture and the mindset is around testing sort of the agile, evolutionary adaptive mindset. So we're always thinking kind of like the 80% core that we keep that's working and constantly be testing the 20%. So both my counterpart and I are very much focused with that mindset.”

“As every company I've ever been with, I'm sure every company that exists, there's always that tension between subjective, anecdotal, and data, right? Because there's never enough of the exact data you need. Uh, so I think it's just always trying to get everybody on the same page about, um, let the data speak, you know, let the evidence speak whatever it is, rather than, you know, opinions. And I think that's always the dance.”

Episode Timestamps:
*(02:56) - The Trust Tree: Zuper’s evolutionary mindset

*(07:10) - The Playbook: Carmen’s uncuttable budget items

* (22:21) - The Dust Up: Carmen’s experience with company culture fit

*(23:45) - Quick Hits

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The Power of Segmentation and Experimentation in Saturated Markets

talroo, Martha Aviles, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 13 Jun 2023 14:14:19 +0000

Martha Aviles, formerly VP of Marketing at Talroo, shares how the company leverages dynamic market segmentation to meet customers precisely where they are in their buying journey. In this episode, Martha gives insight into Talroo's innovative demand generation strategies and describes why they are founded on a test-and-learn approach.

Key Takeaways

Growth lies in the ability to connect with customers on their own terms, espeically in a market defined by segmentation and intense competition.
Growth in a segmented and competitive market necessitates the adoption of a test-and-learn mindset, coupled with a proactive pursuit of cutting-edge tools and methodologies.
Strategic employment of data should be utilized to customize content that resonates with distinct buying personas.

Quote:

“Customers are getting much more sophisticated. They want to know the differentiators about your platform. How is it better? How are you matching me with better candidates? How are you filling my pipeline?”

Episode Timestamps:

* (03:02) - The Trust Tree: How Talroo uses segmentation & experimentation

* (12:11) - The Playbook: Martha’s uncuttable budget items

* (23:32) - The Dust-Up: How to improve rapport with the finance department

* (24:53) - Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Demand Gen Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for Demand Gen pros. The world's leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links:

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Utilizing Data Insights for Product Marketing Success

Ian Faison, Priya Gill, momentive.ai, caspian studios, qualified — Tue, 6 Jun 2023 12:00:00 +0000

Priya Gill, VP of Product Marketing, shares how Momentive.ai utilizes data-driven insights to captivate its target audience amidst a sea of competitors. Plus, Priya dives deep into her relationship-building strategies with cross-functional teams in order to ensure ongoing success for product marketing.

Key Takeaways:

For any product marketer, market insights, customer insights, and competitive insights are indispensable tactics that cannot be overlooked.
In order to achieve product marketing success, it is imperative to build robust strategic relationships with a diverse range of teams, including sales, customer service, demand generation, and paid marketing.
Effectively communicating differentiation on a company's website and during sales discussions is an essential component for distinguishing oneself in an oversaturated market.

Quote:

“If you are not in tune with what's happening in the market, why your target buyers care, what they care about, and what their pain points are—then you have no idea how to effectively speak to them in such a way that resonates. That’s what really helps you differentiate yourselves in a crowded market.”

Episode Timestamps:

* (03:53) - The Trust Tree: Momentive’s utilization of data-driven insights

* (16:15) - The Playbook: Priya’s insights into cross-functional team building

* (26:28) - The Dust-Up: Finding Alignment between Management and Marketing

* (29:06) - Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links

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Elevating Your Value Story at a PLG Company

jessica gilmartin, ian faison — Tue, 4 Apr 2023 12:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Jessica Gilmartin, the CMO of Calendly, talks about the company's shift in marketing strategy from PLG approaches to partnering with large enterprises and shares her thoughts on CMOs who successfully implement a hybrid approach of both PLG and SLG strategies. She also provides valuable tips on how to approach large enterprise accounts, communicate value propositions, and strengthen the relationship between sales and marketing teams.

Key Takeaways

Advice for prioritizing tensions between PLG and SLG teams with a customer-centric approach.
Tips for approaching large enterprise accounts with different personas by telling a value story with examples highlighting how using Calendly benefits the entire organization.
Calendly's latest product launch designed to enhance the relationship between sales and marketing teams.

Quotes:

“The only way that you can help your sales team prioritize is to give them really good data about who are the teams that are using [your product].”

“Two of the most important things you need to be a successful PLG + SLG hybrid is data… Once you understand those customers that are most right for expansion, how do you provide that value story?”

Episode Timestamps:
* (00:00) - Meet Jessica Gilmartin, CMO of Calendly
* (03:00) - Jessica’s experience with PLG + SLG hybrid approaches
* (05:30) - Transitioning from a PLG-focused company to partnering with enterprises
* (10:30) - What CMOs need to be a successful PLG + SLG hybrid
* (10:30) - Jessica’s uncuttable budget items
* (24:00) - How to approach large accounts with different personas
* (26:00) - Defining success for each channel
* (31:00) - Calendly’s new product announcement
* (37:30) - Quick Hits

Sponsor:

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Optimizing ROI with the Right Marketing Mix

Ian Faison, Grant Johnson — Tue, 28 Mar 2023 18:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Grant Johnson, CMO at Billtrust, shares insights on prioritizing ROI and tailoring your marketing mix. Additionally, the episode explores Grant's marketing strategy and how he incorporates investing in new and untested tools and strategies into his overall approach. It is a valuable listen for anyone looking to improve their marketing strategy and gain insight into how to maximize ROI.

Key Takeaways

Model out your marketing investments by considering factors such as audience demographics, personas, and methodology.
It is critical to have a projected ROI of at least 3 to 1, and ideally, 10 to 1, to ensure the success of any marketing effort.
It's essential to regularly evaluate your marketing tech stack and tools to ensure that they remain effective and relevant in the constantly evolving marketing landscape.

Quote:

“You have to commit. You can't declare [a tool or strategy] unsuccessful if you haven't given it a chance and tried a few tweaks and after a certain period of time, you don't hit your head against the wall – you let it go.”

Episode Timestamps:

* (02:00) - Meet Grant Johnson, CMO of Billtrust

* (014:00) - The Playbook: Grant’s marketing strategies

* (21:00) - Why your website is essential

* (32:00) - Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Links

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Building Brand Awareness in Shifting Markets

Kevin Tate, Ian Faison — Tue, 21 Mar 2023 12:00:00 +0000

This episode features a conversation with Kevin Tate, the CMO at Clearbit. With extensive experience in enterprise SaaS, eCommerce, digital marketing, and social media, Kevin offers valuable insights on the shifting economics of demand generation driven by changes in the market. He also emphasizes the significance of timing in brand awareness building, highlighting its pivotal role in today's business landscape.

Key Takeaways:

Optimizing inbound motion has become a big focus area in the new economy for CMOs.
The economics of demand generation is changing, with more tire kicking and fewer direct leads due to the market shift, but building awareness is still important.
Mid-funnel content–content designed to nurture potential customers who may have interest but not the budget–is an uncuttable budget item for Kevin.

Quote:

“When things were really frothy, you could be more sure that someone who came across your content ad on Facebook or Instagram might be in the market. Now, it's less likely that they're ready to buy but it's just as important as a brand to be building awareness so that you're top of mind when the time is right.”

Episode Timestamps:

* (01:30) - Meet Kevin Tate, CMO of Clearbit

* (04:00) - Navigating changes in shifting markets

* (15:00) - Kevin’s uncuttable budget items

* (33:00) - How do you show ROI from mid-funnel content?

Sponsor:

Links

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Marketing Strategies to Navigate Risk, Governance, and Compliance

Gina Hortasos, Ian Faison — Tue, 14 Mar 2023 12:00:00 +0000

In this episode, Gina Hortatsos, the CMO of LogicGate, discusses the importance of risk management as a strategic necessity and shares valuable insights into governance, risk, and compliance. She also offers expert advice on creating effective campaign maps that meet the needs and buying jobs of customers and prospects. Tune in to learn how to enhance your marketing strategy and navigate the ever-changing landscape of risk management.

Key Takeaways

Although governance, risk, and compliance is not a new concept, there is a need for disruptive and cost-effective solutions for old problems.
To compete with bigger and more established companies in the market, companies’ efforts need to be focused on creating integrated campaigns that provide prospects with content that serves their buying job.
Companies need a platform that can help them automate, enhance and manage risk efficiently.

Quote:

"Category creation has been a very popular trend, but the reality is governance risk and compliance has been around for decades and it will continue in perpetuity because everybody needs to strategically manage risk.”

Episode Timestamps:

* (01:30) - Meet Gina Hortasos, CMO of LogicGate

* (08:15) - The Trust Tree: Gina’s demand gen secrets

* (26:50) - Gina’s uncuttable budget items

* (34:45) - Gina’s cuttable budget items

* (37:00) - The Dust-Up: How Gina handles healthy tension

* (40:00) - Quick Hits

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Part 9: Top Marketing Leaders Share Their Most Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items

Caspian Studios — Tue, 7 Mar 2023 13:00:00 +0000

Every week on Demand Gen Visionaries we sit down with marketing leaders from some of the world’s largest and fastest-growing companies to uncover the demand gen strategies that have been fundamental to their skyrocketing success. In each episode, we ask our marketing-leader guests which three areas of investment are most important to their demand gen initiatives. Tune into this special mini-series to hear the budget items our CMO guests can’t live without!

Find parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, & eight

Episode Timestamps:

*(02:00) Kevin Sellers, CMO, Ping Identity

*(04:00) Melissa Sargeant, CMO, AlphaSense

*(04:30) Esther Flammer, CMO, Wrike

*(06:30) Liam Barnes, Head of Demand Gen, Bionic

*(08:00) Eric Quanstrom, CMO, CIENCE Technologies

*(11:50) Don Schuerman, CTO & VP of Product Marketing, Pegasystems

*(14:00) Michelle Huff, CMO, UserTesting

*(16:00) Mandy McEwen, Founder, Mod Girl Marketing

*(17:50) Madhukar Kumar, CMO, SingleStore

Key Takeaways

Simplification and focus on a single message or platform is a priority for many CMOs in 2023.
Several CMOs say they believe in-person events can be a valuable way to connect clients and a crucial element of their marketing strategy.
CMOs cited the web channel as a significant contributor to the pipeline over the years.

Quotes

“Rather than having multiple go-to-market kinds of motions, we're going to be singular-focused which will give us the ability to invest at the level we need to, but also keeps us simplified and focused on a single message or single platform.” - Kevin Sellers, CMO, Ping Identity

“The website, the content team, and paid… those three key areas are what we're developing and focusing in on 2023 to bring new people into the pipeline.” - Melissa Sargeant, CMO, AlphaSense

“Our constant need to optimize channels and to look at every single message and keyword—optimizations that we can potentially do within those inbound digital channels is a huge focus for us." - Esther Flammer, CMO, Wrike

"Our field budget which is working with vendors… are the lowest volume but the highest converting for us because it's basically just ABM and sales." - Liam Barnes, Head of Demand Gen, Bionic

“Some uncuttables are a lot of the positions that we've achieved on directories where our own clients are reviewing us and relating their firsthand experience of doing business with us to the rest of the world." - Eric Quanstrom, CMO, CIENCE Technologies

“I think one of the best things I can do as a marketer is connecting one client with another client so that they can inform each other… some of that can only happen at a big in-person event where we can sit down in a tech pavilion or an expo and see the technology, but also talk to each other about how it can be used." - Don Schuerman, CTO & VP of Product Marketing, Pegasystems

“Our web channel is definitely a huge contributor to pipeline over the years." - Michelle Huff, CMO, UserTesting

“If you are in B2B, your target market is on LinkedIn and it's only getting bigger and bigger...if you're not on LinkedIn and you're in B2B, you're missing out on a massive opportunity." - Mandy McEwen, Founder, Mod Girl Marketing

“Our first unctuabble item is events and hybrid events too–webinars and such. There are ways to do that in a very economic fashion." - Madhukar Kumar, CMO, SingleStore

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Unlocking the Power of Product Led Growth Marketing

madhukar kumar, ian faison — Tue, 28 Feb 2023 13:00:00 +0000

Madhukar Kumar, the CMO of Singlestore and a PLG expert, shares his insights on the world of product led growth in this episode. With over 15 years of experience leading global product marketing and product management teams, Madhukar explains how PLG can transform businesses, dispels common misconceptions, and highlights upcoming trends in the field.

Key Takeaways:

To implement a successful PLG strategy, companies should focus on creating a product that is easy to try, adopt, and use. They should also measure product usage and customer behavior to identify areas for improvement and opportunities for growth.
Common misconceptions about PLG include thinking that it only works for certain types of products or industries, or that it requires a freemium pricing model.
In the future, PLG is likely to become even more important as companies continue to move to the cloud and as customers demand products that are easy to use and deliver value quickly.

Quote:

“It’s not as if you either do PLG or you do PLS, it's a combination of both. You talk to your users through the premium product and the trial, but at the same time, there has to be a gradation of experience.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(1:47) - Madhukar’s journey to CMO of Singlestore

*(10:11) - The Trust Tree: Madhukar’s best marketing secrets.

*(29:05) - The Playbook: Singlestore’s marketing strategies

*(39:15) - The Dust Up: How Madhukar’s handled tension

*(40:44) - Quick Hits

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LinkedIn Strategies for Generating New Leads

Mandy McEwen, Ian faison — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 13:00:00 +0000

Mandy McEwen, CEO and Founder of Mod Girl Marketing and Luminetics, shares valuable insights on how to optimize your LinkedIn profile and leverage the platform for generating new business leads. Her tips and strategies focus on creating a polished and professional profile, regularly engaging with your network, showcasing your expertise through content creation, and much more.

Key Takeaways

The biggest mistake 99% of LinkedIn users make is not optimizing their profile.
Use Sales Navigator to find people who are actively using LinkedIn and engage with them.
Cold outreach should be personalized and tailored to the exact type of person you're reaching out to.

Quote

“The number one mistake that 99% of LinkedIn users are making is their profile. Your profile needs to be optimized and amazing–it shouldn't be a glorified resume.”

Episode Timestamps

* (01:43) - Meet Mandy McEwen, CEO and Founder of Mod Girl Marketing & Luminetics
* (04:26) - The Trust Tree: Structure at UserTesting
* (08:07) - The Playbook: LinkedIn strategies for companies and individuals
* (37:48) - The Dust Up: Healthy tension and how Michelle overcomes it
* (38:50) - Quick Hits

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Digital Demand Gen Success in a Sales-Driven Organization

Michelle Huff, Ian Faison — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 13:00:00 +0000

In this episode, find out how an organization fundamentally driven by enterprise sales, rather than product growth, is achieving sustained digital demand gen success. Michelle Huff, CMO of UserTesting, explains how she organizes her sales development and business development teams, how they capture data on their website, and much more so that you can land more qualified leads in your pipeline.

Key Takeaways

The success of demand generation and building pipelines requires close collaboration between the sales and marketing teams, especially in the SaaS industry.
Relying on qualitative measures can lead to incorrect assumptions about data—however, as data becomes available and the market and solutions mature, a more accurate understanding of the situation can be gained.
CMO is often perceived as one who needs to have all the answers, but the reality is that they are responsible for owning the decisions and driving the strategy, even if the ideas come from others.

Quote

“The website we call a digital-first demand center because I wanted to make sure that everything is being brought together—our demand gen function along with content, SEO, and our digital web experience teams.” - Michelle Huff, CMO, UserTesting

Episode Timestamps

* (01:31) - Meet Michelle Huff, CMO at UserTesting
* (04:36) - The Trust Tree: Structure at UserTesting
* (12:49) - The Playbook: Demand gen strategies for a sales-driven company
* (30:33) - The Dust Up: Healthy tension and how Michelle overcomes it
* (31:43) - Quick Hits

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Activation-Based Strategies for the Digital Marketer

don schuerman, ian faison — Tue, 7 Feb 2023 16:00:00 +0000

In a competitive digital world where attention spans are short and businesses are looking to build relationships with their customers, high-touch strategies have been shown to increase loyalty and lifetime value. In this episode, we talk with Don Schuerman, the CTO & VP of Product Marketing at Pegasystems—an organization that has built relationships with the world’s leading brands—so that you can learn tips from the experts and apply it to your strategy too. Plus, you’ll hear insights into digital marketing strategies that activate vs. generate excess content, and much more.

Key Takeaways

True customer intimacy is hugely important and can only be achieved through frequent interactions.
Events are back but people are no longer focused on entertaining experiences. Instead, they’re looking for effective outcomes in the form of learning, training, or collaboration.
Measuring engagement with a holistic lens reminds marketers that it's not about getting clicks on the website—it's getting converts.

Quotes:

“That [high] level of customer intimacy and understanding is essential, especially from marketers in technology and enterprise technology where it's not enough to have a strong message and vision. You also have to continuously make that relevant to your customer and audience.”

“Measuring engagement across a holistic lens helps me as a marketer remind our broader team that it's not just our job to get a bunch of people clicking on the website—it's actually getting that website to convert.”

“Most organizations generate plenty of content—probably too much content. Really, what you really have is an activation problem. Can you effectively activate the content?”

Episode Timestamps:

* (01:41) - Don’s unique role as CTO & VP of Product Marketing at Pegasystems
* (06:50) - Segment: The Trust Tree
* (12:09) - Looking at engagement holistically
* (19:40) - Segment: The Playbook
* (28:24) - Segment: The Dust Up
* (31:23) - Segment: Quick Hits

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How CMOs Can Leverage Analyst Relations To Drive Growth

Joely Urton, Lauren Vaccarello, Ian Faison — Tue, 31 Jan 2023 16:00:00 +0000

We’re diving into the topic of Analyst Relations and why it's a critical aspect of modern marketing. In this episode, Joely Urton, Senior Director of Analyst Relations at Splunk & Lauren Vaccarello, CMO at Salesloft, pull from their own experience to describe how the AR and CMO relationship can impact your company's reputation and how you can leverage it to your advantage. Whether you're new to the field or a marketing veteran, Joely and Lauren will help you better understand the role of analyst relations in marketing.

Key Takeaways

The analyst relations function is an important strategic function for the B2B marketer.
Analyst relations allow CMOs to differentiate their portfolio by raising awareness and providing knowledge.
Having a relationship with the right analysts can help executives to get the information they need or to get urgent critical questions answered quickly.

Quotes:

“Analyst relations allow you to differentiate your portfolio. How do you value that for your end user, customers, and clients? Through analysts – their whole job is to write about technology and evolution of technology, and why it matters for the customer.” - Joely Urton

“If you are a B2B marketer with a technology solution, analyst relations is one of the most important and one of the most strategic functions that you'll have.” - Lauren Vaccarello

Episode Timestamps:

* (01:41) - Meet AR and marketing experts, Joely & Lauren

* (14:35) - How big does a category need to be to get considered by analysts?

* (25:16) - How AR can help predict ROI

* (33:16) - Tips for building relationships with analysts

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Top Marketing Priorities for 2023

Ian Faison — Tue, 24 Jan 2023 13:00:00 +0000

Get ready for some exciting changes coming your way in February! Host and Caspian Studios CEO, Ian Faison, teases what’s to come and shares his top marketing priorities for 2023.

Key Takeaways

The show’s focus will remain pipeline generation, but will have a new look - stay tuned!
Ian’s 2023 marketing priorities include fighting harder to win deals and supporting sales.
Another focus for Ian is having a clever first touch, and why that’s important in 2023.

Quote:

“We want to continue our focus, which is getting a deep dive look at how CMOs and marketing leaders think about pipeline, demand, technology, and how they spend their marketing dollars. There's going to be new branding, so stay tuned for that on February 1st.” - Ian Faison, Host and CEO at Caspian Studios

Episode Timestamps:

*(00:32) - Sneak peek at new changes coming in February

*(03:08) - Ian’s top marketing priorities for 2023

*(08:52) - Wrap and goodbye

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Outbound Marketing Still Works with Eric Quanstrom, CMO at CIENCE

Ian Faison, Eric Quanstrom, CIENCE, Qualified, Caspain Studios — Tue, 10 Jan 2023 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Eric Quanstrom, CMO of CIENCE Technologies. CIENCE offers the quickest, most-targeted path to market using their Orchestrated Outbound program to deliver qualified sales opportunities directly to your business. Eric is a startup executive with an entrepreneurial mindset, and spends his time preparing overall plans to increase revenue, reduce costs, mitigate risks, and develop programs to measure results.

On this episode, Eric shares his insights into why outbound marketing still works, the critical role that your website plays, and why relevance is king in all cold outreach.

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“One of the things we’ve been positioning in the market lately is the critical role that the website plays, especially in outbound outreach, especially in helping capitalize on the people you’re bringing to your website on a daily basis.” - Eric Quanstrom

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:37) - Eric’s role at CIENCE Technologies

*(05:22) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(07:36) - Why outbound marketing still works

*(11:35) - Segment: The Playbook

*(13:06) - The critical role that your website plays

*(27:08) - Why relevance is king in all cold outreach

*(33:02) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(34:19) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Why it Pays to Listen with Liam Barnes, Head of Demand Generation at Bionic

Ian Faison, Liam Barnes, Bionic, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 3 Jan 2023 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Liam Barnes, Head of Demand Generation at Bionic. Bionic is an Application Security Posture Management (ASPM) platform that can proactively reduce and mitigate security, data privacy, and operational risks by continuously analyzing an entire application architecture and all its dependencies that run in production. Liam is a technically trained SEO turned Demand Generation leader with a focus on taking on complex marketing issues and building successful campaigns.

On this episode Liam shares his insights into why it pays to listen, how to use content mapping to resonate with your buyer, and why it's important to showcase the value of your platform.

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“People just wanna be treated like humans instead of treated like another step in the sequence.” - Liam Barnes, Bionic

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:37) - Liam’s role at Bionic

*(03:11) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:42) - Why it pays to listen

*(11:01) - Segment: The Playbook

*(13:24) - How to use content mapping to resonate with your buyer

*(27:08) - Showcase the the value of your platform.

*(29:07) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(31:44) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Better Manage Your Budget This Year with Esther Flammer, CMO at Wrike

Ian Faison, Esther Flammer, Wrike, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 20 Dec 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Esther Flammer, CMO at Wrike. Wrike brings all work into a single place to remove complexity, increase productivity, and free people up to focus on their most purposeful work. Esther is a senior executive with 20 years of marketing experience in high-growth B2B tech and non-profit sectors.

On this episode Esther shares her insights on how to better manage your budget this year, ways to be smarter with your resources, and how to boost your marketing efficiency.

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“If you're not able to showcase the ROI or build a good business case on why every dollar that you're spending is producing ROI or is helping move the business forward, it's going to be cut.” - Esther Flammer, CMO, Wrike

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:49) - Esther’s role at Wrike

*(03:51) - Reduce spending, reduce resources and deliver more

*(07:42) - Showcasing the ROI on every dollar that you're spending

*(12:45) - Leveraging data to make better marketing decisions

*(14:47) - The role of experimentation in marketing

*(20:57) - Being smarter about your resources

*(30:16) - Ways to understand what's working and what's not

*(35:24) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Help Your Customers Where It Hurts with Melissa Sargeant, CMO at AlphaSense

Ian Faison, Melissa Sargeant, Qualified, Caspian Studios, AlphaSense — Tue, 13 Dec 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Melissa Sargeant, CMO at AlphaSense. AlphaSense is a market intelligence platform used by the world’s leading companies and financial institutions. Melissa runs worldwide marketing initiatives including corporate and product branding, demand generation, product marketing, public relations, inbound sales development, and more.

On this episode Melissa shares her insights into customer pain points and how to solve them, utilizing macro-themed marketing, and why SEO is important for your website.

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“You can't show value for what you're providing, if you can't make a connection between the pain and what they're trying to achieve in their roles, particularly on a market intelligence platform.” - Melissa Sargeant, CMO, AlphaSense

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:49) - Melissa’s role at AlphaSense

*(05:11) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(10:35) - Utilizing marco-themed marketing

*(15:24) - Segment: The Playbook

*(16:17) - Why SEO is important for your website

*(17:22) - Customer pain points and how to solve them

*(26:33) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(29:46) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Prioritizing the Digital Customer experience With Kevin Sellers, CMO at Ping Identity

Ian Faison, Kevin Sellers, Ping Identity, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 6 Dec 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kevin Sellers, CMO at Ping Identity. Ping Identity helps you protect your users and every digital interaction they have while making experiences frictionless. Kevin is a modern marketer with extensive digital expertise to drive growth and relevance for world-class brands.

On this episode, Kevin shares his insights into prioritizing the digital customer experience, maintaining a singular focus to maximize your productivity, and the power of the accurate brand ambassador.

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“We’ve invested heavily and will continue to do so to ensure that our digital journey is exceptional.” - Kevin Sellers, CMO, Ping Identity

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:14) - Kevin’s role at Ironclad

*(04:24) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(10:59) - The power of leveraging data

*(13:51) - Segment: The Playbook

*(14:21) - Prioritizing the digital customer experience

*(18:34) - Choosing the accurate brand ambassador

*(25:21) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(28:58) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Part 8: Top Marketing Leaders Share Their Most Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items

Ian Faison, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 29 Nov 2022 10:00:00 +0000

In each episode, we ask our marketing-leader guests which three areas of investment are most important to their demand gen initiatives. Tune into this special mini-series to hear the budget items our CMO guests can’t live without!

Find parts: one, two, three, four, five six & seven

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Episode Timestamps:

Part seven of this special mini-series features 10 CMOs and marketing leaders from some of the world's fastest-growing companies, including:

*(02:07) Dylan Steel, CMO of Coalition

*(03:56) Chris Lynch, CMO of MindTickle

*(04:47) Marie Hillion, Head of marketing at Livestorm

*(06:25) Dan Verley, SVP of Sales Workplace Technologies at Canon Solutions America

*(10:18) Cindy Knezevich, SVP of Brand and Communications at SalesLoft

*(12:48) Micheline Nijmeh, CMO at JFrog

*(14:53) Ryan Bonnici, CMO at Gympass

*(16:37) Palmer Houchins, VP of Brand Marketing & Communications at G2

*(17:55) Rich Donahue, CMO of IBotta

*(20:38) Maria Pergolino, CMO of ActiveCampaign

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Quotes:

“Data can get you really helpful insights and tell you if you’re way off base, but sometimes magic is figuring out the combination of what your customer says they want and what’s aligned to their value, how much you have to shift their perception and change their mindset of what your product can be and can do and then find the sweet spot.” - Dylan Steele, CMO of Coalition Inc.

People respond well to strong storytelling, no matter if you’re in a consumer context or you’re in a B2B context because even in B2B, there are people making decisions.” - Chris Lynch, CMO of Mindtickle

“Adapt and try to not have the same approach, not only the language but also try to adapt to the mindsets of the region, the countries that you’re going to enter in and you’re going to target.” - Marie Hillion, Head of Marketing, Livestorm

"Marketing is an invaluable tool and partner. When done well and when paired well, and we all consider the needs of the organization and what role we each play, it’s really a powerful tandem when you go to market if things are aligned." - Dan Verley, SVP of Sales, Canon Solutions America

"Brand is who you are, product marketing and demand gen is what you do. And so those two things work really well together when they’re aligned, when they’re not aligned, it can be pretty painful." - Cindy Knezevich, SVP of Brand and Communications, Salesloft

There's an old saying, the content is king and there's a reason for it. Organic search is all about content, same with paid search, but organic much more so, and the nurture you’re building to get them to engage with you. - Micheline Nijmeh, CMO, JFrog

“I think at the end of the day, the most important thing with your content investments is to invest in creating really good content.” - Ryan Bonnici CMO, Gympass

“We’re going to go to market with both a seller and buyer campaign, and this is where the brand becomes sort of a glue, we make sure that the way that we’re presenting ourselves is cohesive.” -Palmer Houchins, VP of Brand Marketing & Communications at G2

“You have to trust that you're hitting the audience the right way and you're getting your message there the right way. We want to be the right message, we want to be with the right partners and that's true of any influencer, right? As long as you have the right partner it's probably going to be a really good partnership”. - Rich Donahue, CMO of IBotta

“ It has to be a mission that you stand behind and it has to be something you can differentiate. There are many products out there in the world that like you can’t tell the difference between two of them, and if you can’t, it’s then really hard to differentiate. It’s really hard to do great marketing, you have to choose an opportunity where you feel like you can do something with your skill, with that marketing.” - Maria Pergolino, CMO of ActiveCampaign

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Mastering Brand Momentum with Leslie Henthorn, CMO at Ironclad

Ian Faison, Leslie Henthorn, Ironclad, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 22 Nov 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Leslie Henthorn, CMO at Ironclad. Ironclad is the world’s #1 Contract Lifecycle Management platform and provides a simple, secure way to create and collaborate on contracts. Leslie has over 16 years of experience and has held multiple leadership roles in marketing, partnerships, and go-to-market program management.

On this episode Leslie shares her insights into mastering brand momentum, the role of your website in guiding the customer journey, and why marketing needs to be data-driven.

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“When it comes to brand don’t just think about what you’re super close to. Think about the rest of the world, and where are you there.” - Leslie Henthorn, CMO, Ironclad

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:43) -Leslie’’s role at Ironclad

*(07:24) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(14:46) - Mastering brand momentum

*(20:59) - Segment: The Playbook

*(23:59) - Why marketing needs to be data driven

*(27:33) - The role of your website in guding the customer journey

*(33:17) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(33:49) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Building Opportunity with Partner Marketing with Genelle Kunst, VP of Global Marketing at Bloomreach

Ian Faison, Genelle Kunst, Bloomreach, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Genelle Kunst, VP of Global Marketing at Bloomreach. Bloomreach is the world’s #1 Commerce Experience Cloud, that combines the power of unified customer and product data, with the speed and scale of AI-optimization.

On this episode Genelle share her insights into building opportunity with partner marketing, optimizing your website to personalize the customer journey, and creating a brand community.

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“If you truly wan to drive value out of your partner ecosystem, you’ve gotta have some sort of like better together story or some sort of value prop for them to be working with.” - Genelle Kunst, VP of Global Marketing, Bloomreach

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:32) - Genelle’s role at MarginEdge

*(03:04) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(08:59) - Segment: The Playbook

*(10:38) - Building opportunity with partner marketing

*(22:46) - Creating a brand community

*(26:14) - Optimizing your website to personalize the customer journey

*(27:35) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(33:49) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Building Brand-to-Human Relationships in a Digital World with Emily Wolfe, Senior Director Growth Marketing & Analytics at Collective Health

Emily Wolfe, Collective Healt, Capsian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 8 Nov 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Emily Wolfe, Senior Director Growth Marketing & Analytics at Collective Health. Collective Health simplifies employee healthcare with an integrated technology solution that makes health insurance work for everyone. Emily is a Digital marketing leader with an eye for analytics and a passion for developing stop-in-your-tracks creative campaigns.

On this episode Emily shares her insights into building brand to human relationships in a digital world, personalizing your marketing to boost your brand value, and developing a 360 degree marketing plan.

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“It's so critical to build that brand relationship with prospects. In B2B, we like to think about them as committees or we think about them as faceless organizations, but it’s just people and people want to work with funny people.” - Emily Wolfe, Collective Health

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:34) -Emily's role at Collective Health

*(03:03) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:50) - Developing a 360 degree marketing plan

*(12:38) - Segment: The Playbook

*(13:24) - Building a brand relationship with prospects

*(17:22) - Personalizing your marketing to boost your brand value

*(24:34) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(28:19) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Evoking Customer Emotion with Tara Clever, VP of Marketing at MarginEdge

Ian Faison, Tara Clever, MarginEdge, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 1 Nov 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Tara Clever, VP of Marketing at MarginEdge. MarginEdge delivers real-time data to restaurants to make timely, critical decisions. Tara has a diverse background in sales, operations, and marketing with a history of engineering significant growth.

On this episode Tara shares her insights into evoking customer emotion, why content has to be responsive to your customers, and why video marketing is vital for business growth.

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“When you’re thinking about messaging, about capturing their attention and providing a solution, that emotional resonance that’s so common that you see on the kind of the D to C side. It's absolutely the way that we think about things here. It's a big change and a lot of time, a lot of times for restaurants, and so it's a big piece of how we think about telling the story.” - Tara Clever, VP of Marketing, Margin Edge

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:22) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(03:33) - Tara’s role at MarginEdge

*(05:41) - Capturing attention and evoking customer emotion

*(12:54) - Segment: The Playbook

*(13:50) - Why content has to be responsive to your customers

*(17:22) - Why video marketing is vital for business growth

*(29:19) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(32:37) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Customer Satisfaction That Drives Word-of-Mouth with Sarah McAuley, CMO at Paperless Parts

Ian Faison, Sarah McAuley, Paperless Parts, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 25 Oct 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Sarah McAuley, CMO at Paperless Parts. Paperless Parts is leading the digital transformation for custom part manufacturers. Their patented technology and proprietary geometry engine unlock insights that enable job shop manufacturers to modernize and grow their business. Sarah has 20 years of experience building and managing world-class marketing organizations, accelerating ARR growth, and shaping and defining new software categories.

On this episode Sarah shares her insights into how customer satisfaction drives word-of-mouth, improving customer loyalty with impactful engagement, and creating customer champions.

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“Our customers are way better salespeople for us, than we are. They come to the table with so much credibility and real-world experience around what it’s like to change the way you’ve been operating. So I look for different ways to incentivize that behavior.” - Sarah McAuley, CMO, Paperless Parts

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:55) - Sarah’s role at Paperless Parts

*(03:32) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(11:50) - Understanding your customer personas and their pain points

*(17:56) - Segment: The Playbook

*(19:14) - Identifying how your customers are consuming information

*(23:34) - How customer satisfaction drives word-of-mouth

*(31:01) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(34:44) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Maintaining Human Connections in a Digital-First World with Dillon Nugent, CMO at Khoros

Ian Faison, Dillion Nugent, Khoros, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 18 Oct 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dillon Nugent, CMO at Khoros. Khoros connects every facet of customer engagement, including digital contact centers, messaging, chat, online brand communities, CX analytics, and social media management. Dillion is innovating the tech industry with both programmatic and account-based strategies.

On this episode Dillon shares her insights into maintaining human connections in a digital-first world, the importance of speaking your customers language, and diversifying your portfolio to reduce market risks.

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“We've gotten used to the ability to find human connection through digital, it has enabled how we're living and how were purchasing, how we're interacting with brands and also in our personal lives with each other.” - Dillon Nugent, CMO, Khoros

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:49) - Dillon’s role at Khoros

*(03:31) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:16) - Maintaining human connections in a digital-first world

*(10:35) - Segment: The Playbook

*(14:38) - Diversifying your portfolio to reduce market risks

*(19:39) - The importance of speaking your customers language

*(26:32) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(29:12) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Links

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Demand Gen Visionaries Live 2022

Tue, 11 Oct 2022 09:00:00 +0000

Every week on Demand Gen Visionaries we sit down with marketing leaders from some of the world’s largest and fastest-growing companies to uncover the demand gen strategies that have been fundamental to their skyrocketing success. For the first time ever we have a special edition of Demand Gen Visionaries Live. We sat down with the marketing legends that built Dreamforce and world-class speakers who were excited to share their insights, inspire you, and to make you think.

This episode features a live interview with featured panel speakers, Lauren Vaccarello, CMO at SalesLoft, Julie Liegl, CMO at Slack, Karin Flores, Vice President, Strategic Events, Customer Experience Center and Programs at Okta, and your host Ian Faison, CEO of Caspian Studios.

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Think of part of your budget as an innovation fund. What are the big bets that you and your team have come up with and, and those could vary. If you can architect it right, with the right customer experiences, and the right amplification across press and social, doing something kind of crazy and stunt like can actually make sense. - Lauren Vaccarello, CMO, SalesLoft

It’s about differentiating, if you can do an event in a way that is going to be special, whether it's going to an event or throwing an event, how do you make it different? It can't just be status quo, you have. Give people a reason that it's exciting, and that it matters.- Julie Liegl, CMO at Slack

I think we are working in a world now where we really need to think about convincing people, and so I think you need to entertain them, motivate them, and inspire them beyond product, and what's going on in the world. - Karin Flores, Vice President, Strategic Events, Customer Experience Center and Programs at Okta

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Episode Timestamps:

*(04:46) Marketing in uncertain times

*(07:13) Thinking of your budget as an innovation fund

*(08:40) Investing in like big name events this year

*(09:18) Differentiating you events from competitors

*(13:51) Curating an experience that's personalized

*(15:50) Human marketing and bringing humans together

*(20:08) Inspiring people beyond product

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Sponsor

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Links

Connect with Lauren on LinkedIn

Connect with Julie on LinkedIn

Connect with Karen on LinkedIn

Learn more about Qualified

Learn More about Caspian Studios

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Building High Impact Partner Ecosystems with Suresh Sathyamurthy, CMO of SingleStore

Ian Faison, Suresh Sathyamurthy, SingleStore, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 4 Oct 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Suresh Sathyamurthy, CMO of SingleStore. SingleStore helps businesses adapt more quickly, embrace diverse data and accelerate digital innovation by operationalizing all data through one platform. Prior to SingleStore Suresh held various product and marketing leadership roles with industry leaders like Microsoft, Palo Alto Networks, and Dell EMC helping build and grow emerging businesses in areas of Security, Data Platforms, and Cloud Services.

On this episode Suresh shares his insights into building high-impact partner ecosystems, ways to demonstrate value to your customers, and secrets to non-intrusive marketing.

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“You have to focus on fewer, bigger partners at scale, so you can dedicate the time and energy with them. And then over time you’re creating proof points and value that other partners are going to look at and say, I want to be a part of that story. Create the energy and evidence that you need for partners to want to be a part of your ecosystem.” - Suresh Sathyamurthy, CMO, SingleStore

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:18) - Suresh’s role at SingleStore

*(02:49) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(08:05) - Targeting developers to try your product

*(12:05) - Segment: The Playbook

*(14:04) - Providing value to users of your product

*(20:22) - The value of non-intrusive marketing

*(17:35) - Building high impact partner ecosyetems

*(37:32) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Building Consumer Trust with Education-Based Marketing with Kate Adams, SVP of Marketing at Validity

Ian Faison, Kate Adams, Validity, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 27 Sep 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kate Adams, SVP of Marketing at Validity. Organizations across the world have relied on Validity solutions to target, contact, engage, and keep customers, using trustworthy data as a key advantage.

On this episode Kate Adams shares her insights into building consumer trust with education-based marketing, how to generate leads with webinars, and providing customer engagement tools to attract consumers.

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“I generate revenue by providing valuable education and making people better email marketers at the end of the day, and as a result, they trust and rely on our products.” - Kate Adams, SVP of Marketing, Validity

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:32) - Kate’s role at Validity

*(02:58) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(10:14) - Segment: The Playbook

*(14:04) - How to generate leads with webinars

*(17:35) - Generating revenue by providing valuable education

*(22:27) - Providing customer engagement tools to attract consumers

*(26:35) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(29:17) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Links

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Creating Champions of Your Brand with Melissa Rosenthal, Chief Creative Officer of ClickUp

Melissa Rosenthal, Click Up, Qualified, Caspian Studios, Ian Faison — Tue, 20 Sep 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Melissa Rosenthal, Chief Creative Officer at ClickUp. ClickUp is an all-in-one productivity platform, that brings teams, tasks, and tools together in one place. Melissa is an award-winning marketing executive focused on making the world more productive through best-in-class software as a service marketing.

On this episode Melissa Rosenthal shares her insights into creating champions of your brand, the importance of taking bets in marketing, and ways to differentiate your brand from competitors.

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“I believe in building people as media channels. It was just a huge growth lever for us because there’s a lot of value in building people, versus brands.” - Melissa Rosenthal, Chief Creative Officer, ClickUp

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:51) - Melissa’s role at ClickUp

*(03:12) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:10) - Segment: The Playbook

*(09:37) - Why its trivial to take big bets

*(13:24) - Building people as media channels

*(15:33) - Leveraging people as funnels

*(26:21) - Empowering you teams to have a creative mindset

*(28:07) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(32:53) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Strategic Story Arcs That Shape B2B Narratives with Allyson Havener, VP of Marketing at TrustRadius

Ian Faison, Allyson Havener, Qualified, TrustRadius, Caspian Studios — Tue, 13 Sep 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Allyson Havener VP of Marketing at TrustRadius. TrustRadius is the most trusted review site for business technology, serving both buyers and vendors. Allyson leads the marketing strategy across all functions including demand gen, PR, product, and partner marketing.

On this episode Allyson shares her insights into strategic story arcs that shape B2B narratives, ways to use data to analyze your market, and the benefits of an integrated marketing approach.

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“When you think about content and what you’re going to say, you have to have strong messaging. Think about what you’re trying to say and the point that you want to drive home with your audience.” - Allyson Havener, VP of Marketing, TrustRadius

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:37) - Allyson’s role at TrustRadius

*(03:53) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(10:48) - Benefits of an integrated marketing approach

*(12:11) - Segment: The Playbook

*(16:55) - Shaping strategic story arcs

*(18:03) - Using data to analyze your market

*(25:56) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(27:13) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Making your Website Feel Like a Virtual Concierge with Kristi Melani, CMO at TeleSign

Ian Faison, Kristi Melani, Qualified, TeleSign — Tue, 6 Sep 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kristi Melani, CMO at Telesign. Telesign provides continuous trust to leading global enterprises by connecting, protecting, and defending their digital identities. Kristi brings with her over 27 years of cross functional marketing experience, leading global marketing teams across demand generation, campaign creation, events, web, digital transformation and more.

On this episode Kristi shares her insights into why it's important to make your website feel like a virtual concierge, why successful marketing is people-based, and the way empathy enhances marketing.

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“What are the high-value tasks that you can embed in the website? So that when you do make it there, it's useful and it's helping. I've called it the virtual concierge.” - Krisiti Melani, CMO at TeleSign

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:16) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(04:56) - Kristi’s role at TeleSign

*(10:04) - The power of people based marketing

*(13:43) - Segment: The Playbook

*(16:02) - Creating thought leadership

*(20:24) - Making your website feel like a virtual concierge

*(33:12) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(36:34) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Banding Together, Branding Together with Patti Boyle, CMO at Dstillery

Ian Faison, Qualified, Dstillery, Patti Boyle, Caspian Studios — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Patti Boyle, CMO at Dstillery. Dstillery is the leading custom audience solutions company, empowering brands and their agencies to maximize the value of customer data and transform the way they connect with their audiences. Patti is a strategic marketing leader responsible for planning and driving results through growth plan development, team collaboration, client and partner relationships, and oversight of integrated marketing programs.

On this episode Patti shares her insights into why banding together is essential for success, how to build your relationship currency, and the innovation of data science in marketing.

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“The banding together is essential for success, because if everybody’s not marching in the same direction, you don’t have alignment, and you don’t have a shared vision for innovation for constant continuous learning, you have a very average company.” - Patti Boyle, CMO at Dstillery

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:48) - Pattis role at Dstillery

*(03:47) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(12:21) - The innovation of data science in marketing

*(16:55) - Why banding together is essential for success

*(17:37) - Segment: The Playbook

*(19:16) - Why relationship currency matters

*(28:29) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(29:54) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Preparing for the Future of Content with Jason Widup, VP of Marketing at Metadata.io

Ian Faison, CaspianStudios, Metadata.io, Jason Widup, Qualified — Tue, 23 Aug 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jason Widup, VP of Marketing at Metadata.io. Metadata.io provides a closed-loop account-based marketing solution that amplifies marketing campaigns with opt-in leads. Jason is an experienced and talented Marketing Operations and Technology leader with a focus on developing high-performing teams through empowerment, challenging experiences, and trust.

On this episode Jason shares his insights on preparing for the future of content, the benefits of long-term thinking in marketing, and having intention behind the content you create

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“Let’s create almost a media entity that can stand on its own and that people would actually, want to participate in it, get value from, and read. The strategic thinking was if we do that well, people will come to our content and they’ll think, this is smart, this is actually helping me do my job.” - Jason Widup, VP of Marketing, Metadata.io

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:47) - Jason’s role at Metadata.io

*(04:05) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(08:52) - Creating a media entity

*(16:45) - What product demos can do for brands

*(21:06) - Segment: The Playbook

*(24:53) - The benefits of long-term marketing

*(31:35) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(34:15) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Aligning Brand Awareness and Demand Generation with Mario Paganini, VP of Marketing at Stord

Ian Faison, Mario Paganini, Stord, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 16 Aug 2022 18:27:45 +0000

This episode features an interview with Mario Paganini, VP of Marketing at Stord. Stord is pioneering cloud supply chain, a new category of logistics solutions, by combining both the digital and physical pieces that growing brands need for best in class supply chain operations in a plug and play, utility-like solution. Mario is a 3-time head of marketing, leading 2 startups to unicorn status and 1 through exit, before the age of 30.

On this episode Mario shares his insights into aligning brand awareness and demand generation, creating and converting demand, and qualitative versus quantitative marketing.

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“The one piece of advice that I give to every single person on my team and every single person that I ever talk to about marketing is so unbelievably simple, whatever you do whenever you put something out there in the ether, whether it's an ad, a blog, a video, LinkedIn post, an Instagram post, a TikTok, ask yourself, what about this is going to blow someone away. What about the thing that I'm publishing is genuinely going to excite people lost in the shuffle? ” - Mario Paganini, Stord

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:18) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(04:14) - Mario’s role at Stord

*(12:31) - Creating and converting demand

*(16:45) - How to excite your customers

*(18:39) - Creating Stord's innovative website

*(24:31) - Segment: The Playbook

*(28:17) - Why talent is essential for success

*(35:51) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Strategies to Drive Brand Differentiation with Maria Pergolino, CMO of ActiveCampaign

Ian Faison, Maria Pergolino, Active Campaign, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 9 Aug 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Maria Pergolino, CMO of ActiveCampaign. ActiveCampaign gives businesses of all sizes access to over 500 pre-built automations that combine transactional email, email marketing, marketing automation and CRM for powerful segmentation and personalization across social, email, messaging, chat and text. Maria has served as a senior marketing leader for global B2B technology organizations for almost two decades. She’s known for building world-class go-to-market teams that drive growth, differentiation, and category leadership.

On this episode Maria shares her strategies to drive brand differentiation, the importance of setting goals for customer success, and the power of automation.

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:16) - Maria’s role at ActiveCampaign

*(05:26) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(10:18) - Diversity in marketing

*(14:20) - Segment: The Playbook

*(15:04) - Marketing Success Through Differentiation

*(31:53) - The power of automation

*(35:51) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor:

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Links:

Learn more about ActiveCampaign

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Understanding Influencer Marketing with Rich Donahue, CMO at Ibotta

Rich Donahue, Ibotta, Caspian Studios, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 2 Aug 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Rich Donahue, CMO of Ibotta, Ibotta is a cash back rewards platform that has delivered more than $1.1 billion in cumulative rewards to its users, It offers cash back on purchases on more than 2,700 leading brands and retail partners. Rich leads all marketing initiatives to welcome advertisers, publishers, and retail partners into the Ibotta Performance Network. He’s a natural storyteller, relationship builder, and digital strategist.

On this episode Rich shares his insights into influencer marketing, why it's important to partner with the right people to get your key message across, and why creating opportunities for customers to save money is beneficial for your business.

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:42) - Rich’s role at Ibotta

*(03:56) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(06:57) - The benefits of customers savings

*(09:07) - Segment: The Playbook

*(18:22) - Reasons influencers impact your business growth

*(29:44) - Amplifying your website

*(34:48) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Why Brand is your Organizational Glue with Palmer Houchins, VP of Brand Marketing & Communications at G2

Ian Faison, Palmer Houchins, G2, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 26 Jul 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Palmer Houchins VP of Brand Marketing and Communications at G2, the largest and most trusted software marketplace, helping 60 million people every year make smarter software decisions based on authentic peer reviews. Palmer previously served as a senior marketing leader, and G2 customer at Mailchimp. He was also the VP of Marketing at CallRail, where he lead demand generation, brand, communications, content, and customer marketing teams.

On this episode Palmer shares his insights into why your brand is your organizational glue, the consumerization of B2B marketing, and how transparency gains consumer trust.

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“We’re going to go to market with both a seller and buyer campaign, and this is where the brand becomes sort of a glue, we make sure that the way that we’re presenting ourselves is cohesive.”

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:13 - Palmer’s role at G2

*(03:58) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(14:49) - The consumerization of B2B marketing

*(26:01) - Segment: The Playbook

*(25:50) - How transparency gains consumer trust

*(28:38) - Why brand is your organizational glue

*(30:36) - The Dust Up

*(32:09) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Content Marketing Essentials with Ryan Bonnici, CMO at Gympass

Ian Faison, Gympass, Qualified, Ryan Bonnici, Caspian Studios — Tue, 19 Jul 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Ryan Bonnici, CMO at Gympass. Gympass is a complete corporate wellbeing platform that ignites every journey to feel good. Gympass is reinventing wellbeing, making it engaging and accessible. Ryan is a globally renowned marketing leader and has twice been included in Forbes’ ‘World’s Most Influential CMOs’.

On this episode Ryan shares his insights into why investing in content is essential, ways to drive revenue and demand, and the importance of your distribution strategy.

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“I think at the end of the day, the most important thing with your content investments is to invest in creating really good content.” - Ryan Bonnici CMO, Gympass

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:57) - Ryan’s role at Gympass

*(05:54) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(15:15) - Segment: The Playbook

*(16:38) - Ways to do paid marketing right

*(19:25) - The importance of your distribution strategy

*(21:50) - What content you should invest in

*(24:42) - Building roads that lead back to your website

*(30:18) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Organic Marketing for Long Lasting Results with Micheline Nijmeh, CMO at JFrog

Ian Faison, Micheline Nijmeh, Jfrog, Caspian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 12 Jul 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Micheline Nijmeh, CMO at JFrog. JFrog is redefining the way developers are building, securing, managing, and distributing software updates. Micheline brings over 20 years of technology marketing experience - leading and implementing successful global marketing strategies at high-growth software companies.

On this episode Micheline shares her insights into why organic marketing pulls in better quality leads, the importance of educating your customer, and why your website is the face your company.

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:01) - Micheline’s role at JFrog

*(03:24) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(10:16) - Segment: The Playbook

*(10:43) - Balancing organic over paid

*(15:03) - Why organic draws in better quality leads

*(25:23) - Why your website is the face of your company

*(28:16) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(30:15) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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The Brand Strategy Roadmap with Cindy Knezevich, SVP of Brand and Communications at Salesloft

salesloft, Ian Faison, Salesloft, Qualified, Caspian Studios, Cindy Knezevich — Tue, 5 Jul 2022 19:02:21 +0000

This episode features an interview with Cindy Knezevich, Senior Vice President of Brand and Communications at Salesloft, the leading sales engagement platform that helps sellers and sales teams drive more revenue. Cindy has spent the majority of her career in marketing leadership roles growing and transforming Sales-as-a-Service companies. She’s overseen Salesloft’s rebrand in 2021, as well as the highly successful relaunch of the company’s website in 2020.

On this episode Cindy shares her insights into the power of brand and demand gen alignment, why customers are the most significant constituency, and the importance of brand consistency.

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Brand is who you are, product marketing and demand gen is what you do. And so those two things work really well together when they’re aligned, when they’re not aligned, it can be pretty painful. - Cindy Knezevich, SVP of Brand and Communications, Salesloft

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:12) - Cindy’s role at Salesloft

*(02:59) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(06:08) - Creating a successful brand campaign

*(15:03) - The importance of brand consitency

*(16:10) - Segment: The Playbook

*(23:20) - The role community plays with your brand

*(26:28) - Making big bets as it relates to brand

*(29:26) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Smart Marketing with a Sales Perspective with Dan Verley, SVP of Sales at Canon Solutions America

Tue, 28 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dan Verley, SVP of Sales, Workplace Technologies and Services at Canon Solutions America. Canon provides integrated systems technology that comprise one of the strongest solutions portfolios in the document management industry. Dan has a highly diverse skillset with more than 34 years of proven experience successfully leading both sales and operations.

On this episode Dan shares his insights into achieving sales and marketing alignment, why having curated content that is easily digestible is important, and why marketing is an invaluable tool when paired with the needs of the organization.

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"Marketing is an invaluable tool and partner. When done well and when paired well, and we all consider the needs of the organization and what role we each play, it’s really a powerful tandem when you go to market if things are aligned."- Dan Verley, SVP of Sales, Canon Solutions America

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:13) - Dan’s role at Canon

*(02:55) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(08:21) - Why marketing is invaluable

*(10:27) - Segment: The Playbook

*(12:37) - Reasons to have curtated content

*(18:58) - The significance of your website

*(21:19) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(23:49) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Boosting your Video Engagement Score with Marie Hillion, Head of Marketing at Livestorm

Ian Faison, Marie Hillion, Qualified, Livestorm, Caspian Studios — Tue, 21 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Marie Hillion, Head of Marketing at Livestorm. Livestorm is an end-to-end video engagement platform enabling organizations to create on-demand, live, or pre-recorded events at scale from your browser. Marie joined Livestorm in 2020, where her team developed Livestorm’s content strategy and visibility across Europe and North America.

On this episode, Marie shares her insights into boosting your video engagement score, adapting your marketing strategy to the mindsets of the region you’re targeting, and why it's important to keep your recurring audience engaged.

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:12) - Marie’s role at Livestorm

*(04:40) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:27) - Segment: The Playbook

*(11:51) - Translating your content

*(15:18) - Boosting your video engagement score

*(18:27) - Keeping your recurring audience engaged

*(21:08) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(23:45) - Segment: Quick Hits

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How Emotions Drive Purchasing Decisions with Chris Lynch, CMO of Mindtickle

Ian Faison, Chris Lynch, Qualified, Caspian Studios, Mindtickle — Tue, 14 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Chris Lynch, CMO of Mindtickle, the market-leading sales readiness platform, helping revenue leaders at world-class companies. Chris has a proven track record leading and growing both direct-to-consumer and B2B marketing organizations.

On this episode, Chris shares his insights into how emotions drive purchasing decisions, why customers respond well to strong storytelling, and why it's important to understand the consumer from a data standpoint.

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“People respond well to strong storytelling, no matter if you’re in a consumer context or you’re in a B2B context because even in B2B, there are people making decisions.” - Chris Lynch, CMO of Mindtickle

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:49) - Chris’s role at Mindtickle

*(07:11) - Why emotions drive purchasing decisions

*(08:13) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(14:03) - Segment: The Playbook

*(25:42) - Figuring out your brand story

*(31:36) - Rebranding your website

*(37:15) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(38:45) - Segment: Quick Hits

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The Benefits of Data-Driven B2B with Dylan Steele, CMO of Coalition

Ian Faison, Dylan Steele, Qualified, Coalition — Tue, 7 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dylan Steele, CMO of Coalition, the leading provider of cyber insurance and security, combining comprehensive insurance and proactive cybersecurity tools to help businesses manage and mitigate cyber risk. Dylan is an accomplished marketing executive with experience leading marketing efforts for high-growth technology companies.

On this episode Dylan shares his insights into the benefits of data-driven B2B, why sales enablement matters, and why mapping the customer journey is important.

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:04) - Dylan’s role at Coalition

*(03:08) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(08:28) - The cybersecurity landscape in marketing

*(17:29) - Segment: The Playbook

*(24:30) - The sales enablement playbook

*(29:57) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(34:03) - Data insights into your customer

*(34:03) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Part 7: Top Marketing Leaders Share Their Most Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items

Ian Faison, Qualified, caspian studios — Tue, 31 May 2022 09:00:00 +0000

Find parts one, two, three, four, five & six

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Part seven of this special mini-series features 9 CMOs and marketing leaders from some of the world's fastest-growing companies, including:

*(03:51) Suzanne Konkle - CMO, Deloitte

*(05:14) Randy Frisch - Chief Evangelist Content Experience, Uberflip

*(10:50) Daniel Incandela - CMO, Reachdesk

*(14:18) Maura McCormick Rivera - CMO, Qualified

*(18:02) Meagen Eisenberg - CMO, TripActions

*(21:36) Jamie Gier - CMO, Ceros

*(24:16) Daniel Rodriguez - CMO, Simplr

*(26:24) Anna Kostroun - CMO, NewRocket

*(29:31) Micha Hershman - VP of Marketing, Envoy

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Caspian Studios

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The Building Blocks of the Modern Data Platform with Micha Hershman, VP of Marketing at Envoy

Micha Hershman, Envoy, Ian Faison, Capsian Studios, Qualified — Tue, 24 May 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Micha Hershman, VP of marketing at Envoy. Envoy is transforming modern workplaces with products that make office life easier and work more meaningful. Micha is a marketing leader with a twenty-year history of integrating inbound and outbound demand generation strategies to drive growth and revenue at B2B SaaS and B2C organizations.

On this episode, Micha shares his insights into the building blocks of the modern data platform, why your website is the single most important conversion tool that B2B organizations have, and why the bottom line of marketing is about customer experience.

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“I think platform data is something that everyone needs to leverage. And if you’re a marketer thinking like, “Hey I’m considering joining this new company,” the questions you need to ask yourself, and there are lots of them, is do they have platform data that helps me tell a story, and can I access it?” - Micha Hershman, VP of marketing at Envoy

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:18) - Micha’s role at Envoy

*(03:28) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:40) - How to structure your go to market strategy

*(11:15) - The highest point of leverage in your sales and marketing funnel

*(21:20) - Segment: The Playbook

*(32:57) - Why you website is the most important conversion tool you have

*(37:23) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(40:14) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Activate an Emotional Connection with Your Customer with Anna Kostroun, CMO at NewRocket

Ian Faison, Anna Kostroun, Qualified, Caspian Studios, New Rocket — Tue, 17 May 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Anna Kostroun, CMO of NewRocket. NewRocket delivers meaningful experiences and extraordinary results with ServiceNow and has delivered over 4000 successful projects through world-class implementations and integrated solutions across the entire ServiceNow platform. Anna brings more than 20 years of marketing experience, with deep expertise in demand generation, brand building, experiential marketing, and sales engagement.

On this episode, Anna shares her insights on activating an emotional connection with your customer, why workflow is important for your business, and why it’s important to have empathy for the end-to-end customer experience.

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“You can do all of the email marketing, you can do all the events, you can do all of the things, all of the various marketing tactics that everybody knows how to do, but if you’re not emotionally connecting with your prospects and customers in a way that’s meaningful to them, you’re not getting anywhere, and you’re not doing anything different than anybody else.” - Anna Kostroun, CMO of NewRocket

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:13) - Anna’s role at NewRocket

*(05:46) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:27) - Best practices for building workflows

*(11:43) - Emotionally connecting with your prospects

*(17:18) - Segment: The Playbook

*(19:41) - Driving traffic to your website through content syndication

*(29:26) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(36:05) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Building a Successful Brand Community with Daniel Rodriguez, CMO of Simplr

Ian Faison, Qualified, Caspian Studios, Daniel Rodriguez, Simplr — Tue, 10 May 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Daniel Rodriguez, CMO of Simplr, a human-first, machine-enabled customer experience solution that meets the demands of the NOW Customer across all digital channels. Daniel is leading a team that is redefining the way brands deliver customer service.

On this episode Daniel shares his insights into building a successful brand community, creating a halo effect by having the right investments, and ways to get your target audience to think positively about your brand.

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“Community is an organic process. You can try to do things to encourage people to engage, but I think it's understanding. You really have to understand what is it that people are looking to learn, and one of the things that we've realized is that, there's a lot around career definition.”

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:19) - Daniel’s role at Ceros

*(06:13) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:12) - How demand gen fits into Simplr’s marketing strategy

*(12:12) - Segment: The Playbook

*(17:05) - Creating a movement with community

*(24:46) - Getting you target audience to think positively about your brand

*(30:46) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(34:04) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Stop Selling and Start Educating with Jamie Gier, CMO of Ceros

Ian Faison, Jamie Gier, Ceros, caspian studios, Qualified — Tue, 3 May 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jamie Gier, CMO of Ceros, a cloud-based platform encompassing a collaborative, real-time digital canvas, upon which designers create animated, interactive content without the need for a developer. Jamie has worked with leading tech companies from healthcare to education to grow and scale by creating impactful brands, designing revenue-gathering go-to-market strategies, and leading high-performance teams.

On this episode Jamie shares her insights into the power of educating your buyers, how to create valuable connections with inspiration, and why it’s important to put customers at the core of your business.

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“You break through the noise by offering a value exchange with your customers. You need to be relevant in what you’re providing them. And I think sometimes where we go wrong with content is we sell our product, we don’t educate our buyers, and oftentimes we’re looking to be educated on best practices.” - Jamie Gier, CMO of Ceros

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:28) - Jamie’s role at Ceros

*(04:55) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(09:27) - Segment: The Playbook

*(12:46) - Offering a value exchange with your customers

*(17:37) - The first rule of marketing

*(19:39) - Inspiring customers with your website

*(21:23) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(25:56) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Increasing Revenue with Sales and Marketing Alignment with Meagen Eisenberg, CMO of TripActions

Ian Fasion, Meagen Eisenberg, Qualified, TripActions, Caspian Studios — Tue, 12 Apr 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Meagen Eisenberg, CMO of TripActions. TripActions is the only modern, all-in-one travel, corporate card, and expense solution. Meagen is a transformational leader, advisor and marketer, managing global businesses ranging from startups to mid-market and Fortune 500 companies. She was recently named Top 50 most retweeted by mid-sized marketers according to AdWeek and Top 25 for B2B Marketing Influencers.

In this episode, Meagen shares her insights on how to increase revenue with sales and marketing alignment, the power of the sales marketing road warrior, and how to shift from reactive to proactive marketing.

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“I see demand as aligning with sales teams. What are the goals? What do we have to hit? How does that break down? What are we going to be sourcing? Managing the SDR team, a large part of their pipeline and funnel is going to be coming from the demand, go-to-market organization of marketing, and sales development. Really that’s a key part of success, sales alignment.” - Meagen Eisenberg, CMO of TripActions

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:48) - Meagen’s Role at TripActions

*(03:28) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(07:32) - Why sales alignment is a key part of success

*(08:06) - Segment: The Playbook

*(14:38) - Building rapport for future business success

*(21:43) - Getting your marketing team close to the customer

*(26:31) - Investing in your website

*(34:11) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(37:48) - Segment: Quick Hits

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The Pipeline Revolution with Maura McCormick Rivera, CMO at Qualified

Maura McCormick Rivera, Capsian Studios, Ian Faison, Qualified — Tue, 5 Apr 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Maura McCormick Rivera, CMO at Qualified. Qualified is the #1 conversational sales and marketing platform for revenue teams that use Salesforce. Maura leads the growth and expansion of the business’s marketing and demand generation efforts. Since joining in 2019, Maura launched three major products, led the development of their brand, and created the Demand Gen Visionaries Podcast. Under her leadership, Qualified has seen record levels of web traffic, follower growth, and pipeline generation.

In this episode, Maura shares her insights into Qualified’s pipeline revolution, creating thought leadership content to build awareness, and how to keep a pulse on conversations to engage buyers.

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“Everybody wants to interact with one click, chat, voice, video. As companies, we need to shift how we meet with buyers and shift how we generate pipeline." -Maura McCormick Rivera, CMO at Qualified

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Episode Timestamps:

*(04:36) - Maura’s Role at Qualified

*(06:25) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(11:49) - What drives Qualified’s Pipeline

*(15:35) - Segment: The Playbook

*(17:05) - Why content is king

*(21:23) - How to keep the pulse on conversations to engage buyers

*(27:56) - The Pipeline Cloud Campaign

*(35:15) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(37:10) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Moments that Matter at Scale with Daniel Incandela, CMO at Reachdesk

Qualified, Ian Faison, Daniel Incadela, Reachdesk — Tue, 29 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Daniel Incandela, CMO at Reachdesk. Reachdesk enables companies to deliver moments that matter at scale, globally, throughout the entire customer lifecycle. Incandela is a creative, strategic thinker, who has more than 20 years of digital and marketing industry leadership experience.

In this episode, Daniel shares his insights on the role of authenticity in marketing, moments that matter at scale, and how company values tie into marketing.

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“Ultimately B2B is about connecting with humans, and so it works. It works on the prospecting side, it works on the customer side. We want people associated with us to feel special and gifting does that." -Daniel Icandela, CMO, Reachdesk

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Episode Timestamps:

*(02:15) - Daniel’s Role at Reachdesk

*(03:23) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(07:28) - Segment: The Playbook

*(12:06) - Driving traffic to the key parts of your website

*(17:59) - Gifting with personalization to gain customer loyalty

*(20:39) - Bringing human connection to prospects

*(27:22) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(33:22) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Minor Personalization for Major Results? With Randy Frisch, Chief Evangelist for Content Experience at Uberflip

Ian Faison, Randy Frisch, Qualified, Uberflip, CaspianStudios — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Randy Frisch, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist for Content Experience at Uberflip, a content experience platform & software that enables marketers to create digital experiences with content for every stage of the buyer journey. Randy has led the content experience movement, prompting marketers to think beyond content creation and focus on the overall destination, The Content Experience. In this episode, Randy shares his insights into why demand gen marketers are leading content curation, how personalization is being used to drive business and gain customer trust, and the power of marketing content to reflect what people care about.

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“What we need to be thinking more about in marketing is what do people actually care about? That’s the content we should create. That’s the content you should package.” - Randy Frisch, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist for Content Experience, Uberflip

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:12) - Randy’s Role at Uberflip

*(03:19) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(11:31) - Personalization and putting the right content in front of people

*(16:39) - Uberflips overall marketing strategy

*(20:39) - Organizing and updating assets for maximum value

*(25:26) - Gathering data and gaining customer trust

*(29:56) - Why demand gen marketers are content curators

*(31:48) - Segment: The Playbook

*(40:23) - Segment: Quick Hits

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It’s Time to Rethink the Mechanics of Customer Loyalty with Suzanne Kounkel, CMO of Deloitte

Ian Fasion, Caspian Studios, Suzanne Kounkel, Deloitte, Qualified — Tue, 15 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Suzanne Kounkel, CMO of Deloitte, an industry leader in audit, consulting, tax, and advisory services to many of the world's most admired brands. Suzanne’s trifecta of business, technology, and marketing experience provides the essential foundation for spearheading marketing and sales in an era of rapid change and ground-breaking innovation.

In this episode Suzanne discusses the mechanics of engendering customer loyalty, innovating marketing within long standing companies and elevating the human experience within B2B marketing.

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“It’s really about thinking through the lens of your business strategy. Which are the channels that you should be investing in? At what levels? We should be constantly evolving.“ -Suzanne Kounkel

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Episode Timestamps:

*(03:50) - Suzanne's role at Deloitte

*(04:55) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(06:59) - Balancing the market set of activities and the marketing portfilio

*(09:20) - Deloitte's overall marketing strategy

*(13:20) - Segment: The Playbook,

*(14:34) - What channels you should be investing in

*(22:05) - Investing into the functionality of your website

*(31:18) - Campaigns that drive customer engagement

*(35:41) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(39:08) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Part 6: Top CMOs Share Their Most Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items

Ian Faison, Qualified, Caspian Studios — Tue, 1 Mar 2022 11:00:00 +0000

Part Six of this special mini-series features 10 CMOs and marketing leaders from some of the world’s fastest-growing companies, including:

*(3:17) - Anthony Kennada, CMO, Hopin

*(7:30) - Nikhil Behl, CMO, FICO

*(9:50) - Heidi Bullock, CMO, Tealium

*(11:41) - Alon Alroy, CMO, Bizzabo

*(14:02) - Tyler Lessard, VP of Marketing, Vidyard

*(15:50) - Kevin Tate, CMO, Clearbit

*(17:53) - Karen Steele, SVP of Marketing, Near

*(20:31) - Ritu Kapoor & Julie Ginn, CMO, Lob

*(21:35) - Mark Josephson, Co-Founder and CEO, Castiron

*(23:32) - Eugene Levin, Chief Strategy and Corporate Development Officer, Semrush

Sponsor

Demand Gen Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for Demand Gen pros. The world’s leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links

Follow Ian on Twitter
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www.caspianstudios.com

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The Ultimate Playbook to SEO with Eugene Levin, Chief Strategy and Corporate Development Officer at Semrush

Eugene Levin, Semrush, Qualified, Ian Faison — Tue, 22 Feb 2022 11:00:00 +0000

This episode features Eugene Levin, the Chief Strategy and Corporate Development Officer at Semrush, an online visibility management and content marketing SaaS platform. Previously, Eugene was the Investment Director and a partner at Target Global, and before that - co-founded one of Europe’s leading game development and outsourcing studios.

In this episode, Eugene discusses tailoring your marketing approach for small business owners, his GTM strategy (and why it doesn’t involve looking at channels), and shares valuable SEO best practices to help your content get more clicks.

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“Sometimes [ranking higher] requires you to go deeper. Sometimes it means you have to use more authoritative sources and work with materials that may be not as easy to analyze as a blog post. And then once you publish content, it's important to work on the distribution.”

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Episode Timestamps:

*(0:30) - Eugene’s role at Semrush

*(5:00) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(7:51) - Tailoring your marketing approach for small businesses

*(8:50) - Semrush’s overall marketing strategy

*(10:00) - Semrush’s GTM Strategy

*(10:38) - Segment: The Playbook

*(12:56) - Best practices for writing articles and blog posts

*(20:32) - Avoiding over-optimization

*(21:56) - Uncuttable budget items

*(26:29) - Investing in content creation for your website

*(30:58) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(33:04) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Stop Selling, Begin Solving, and Start Scaling with Mark Josephson, Co-Founder and CEO of Castiron

Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Mark Joesphson, Castiron, Qualified — Tue, 15 Feb 2022 11:00:00 +0000

This episode features Mark Josephson, a Co-Founder and CEO of Castiron, an e-commerce company that caters to kitchen-based entrepreneurs. Mark brings to the table an impressive track record of successfully building and growing software and tech companies. Mark came to Castiron from Bitly, where he was CEO from 2013 to 2020. Prior to Bitly, Mark held various positions at AOL’s Patch, Outside.in., and About.com.

In this episode, Mark discusses using storytelling techniques in demand gen marketing, how to engage with harder-to-reach audiences, and shares advice to CEOs and Founders figuring out their Demand Gen strategy. The interview wraps up Mark’s insights on investing in digital infrastructure with scaling in mind.

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“Wouldn't it be great if we were obsessed with solving problems for our customers, instead of just trying to sell them something? Wouldn't it be great if our success was aligned with the success of our customers? … That means freemium, that means SAS, that means consumption-based pricing. A lot of truisms about great businesses have roots in the kind of relationship you want to have with your customers and that, to me, is all marketing.” - Mark Josesphson

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Episode Timestamps:

*(0:30) - Mark’s vision for Castiron

*(3:03) - How Mark views the role of CMO and Demand Gen as CEO

*(5:00) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(7:51) - Getting in front of harder to reach audiences

*(10:38) - Segment: The Playbook

*(12:56) - Biggest surprises Mark’s encounter in marketing

*(17:42) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(23:56) - Mark’s favorite campaigns

*(29:57) - How Mark views his website

*(33:04) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Why a Personal Touch Matters More Than Ever with Ritu Kapoor and Julie Ginn, CMO and VP of Demand Gen at Lob

Ritu Kapoor, Julie Ginn, Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Lob, Qualified — Tue, 8 Feb 2022 11:00:00 +0000

This episode features a special double-feature conversation with Lobs’s Chief Marketing Officer, Ritu Kapoor, and Vice President of Demand Generation, Julie Ginn. Ritu is Lob’s first CMO but is no stranger to leadership roles, having worked in higher levels at several SaaS automation leaders. Julie has more than 20 years of experience in the technology industry, with a specialization in demand generation and marketing operations.

On this episode, they discuss the latest research in direct mail marketing, share their favorite experiential marketing campaigns, and talk about what makes a campaign and website outdated.

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“[Personalization] is like going back to experiential marketing. Being able to have these small events and really immerse the customer in your brand by giving them an experience that they want to talk about with their friends and want to talk about on social, because these large events at this point are going out.” - Ritu

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:00) - Ritu and Julie’s Roles at Lob

*(5:00) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(9:18) - Lob’s Go-To Market Structure

*(15:46) - Segment: The Playbook

*(25:10) - Using Experiential Campaigns for Engagement

*(26:49) - Outdated & Oversaturated Campaign Techniques

*(33:04) - What Makes Personalization Work

*(34:43) - Stop Thinking of Your Website as Static

*(36:30) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(38:10) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Spend Smart by Investing in Your Website with Karen Steele, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Near

Ian Faison, Karen Steele, Caspian Studios, Near — Tue, 1 Feb 2022 11:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Karen Steele, the Senior Vice President of Marketing at Near, a global leader in data intelligence for businesses. Karen has an impressive track record as an enterprise Cloud Marketing Executive with extensive experience in scaling fast growth companie. Some of her past roles include Marketo, VMware, Saba Software, Cloud9 Analytics, Xactly Corporation, Informatica, Currenex, and more.

On this episode, Karen discusses building demand gen teams on a global scale, why customer marketing is part of her DNA, and shares examples from her favorite campaigns. The interview wraps up with advice from Karen to Marketing Leaders about investing into their online presence, and explains how it’s a critical decision for growth.

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“Your website is your front door [to your brand]. Everybody communicates online these days. Everybody is going to look at your website first and do their own online research before they ever probably reach out and have a conversation with one of your sales reps. So, your website needs to have great content. It needs to be personalized... It needs to have great opportunities for people to engage with you and learn more. It is probably the most important thing you have to invest in.” - Karen Steele

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Episode Timestamps:

*(0:34) - Karen’s first job in demand gen

*(1:52) - Karen’s role at Near

*(3:08) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(6:22) - How to build a marketing team

*(9:53) - Building trust in the B2B world

*(14:37) - What makes a good leadership team

*(22:44) - Segment: The Playbook

*(31:47) - Potential future investments for Near

*(33:44) - Over-hyped marketing trends

*(35:03) - Karen’s favorite campaigns over the years

*(42:07) - Segment: The Dustup

*(46:12) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Discovering Your Ideal Customer Profile with Kevin Tate, CMO at Clearbit

Ian Faison, Caspian Studios, Kevin Tate, Clearbit, Qualified — Tue, 25 Jan 2022 11:01:57 +0000

This episode features an interview with Kevin Tate, Chief Marketing Officer at Clearbit, a marketing data engine for customer interactions that helps businesses grow. Kevin has more than 24 years of sales and marketing experience as a 2-time CRO and 3-time CMO, and has held many other senior leadership roles throughout his career.

On this episode, Kevin discusses the importance of speed when it comes to capturing customer intent, marketing’s role in creating a compelling promise for a company’s product, and why websites need to look to mobile-first experiences as inspiration sooner rather than later.

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"...the idea of the ideal customer profile is maybe a sort of 101-level content, right? It is really foundational to how companies think about, understand, and act on their ideal customers. But, as we look at sort of the 201 and 301 levels, it's about how to actually focus my funnel on my ICP and then, how do I do it in a way that's consistent through acquisition, conversion, and operations so that I can actually measure and optimize? ... So, again, thinking about how [the ICP] goes from foundational to the edge of where people are pushing the boundaries is what keeps it fun." - Kevin Tate

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:00) - Kevin’s role at Clearbit

*(3:12) - Kevin’s first job in demand gen

*(5:00) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(9:18) - Clearbit’s buying committee and personas

*(15:46) - Segment: The Playbook

*(25:10) - Clearbit’s event strategy

*(26:49) - How Kevin views Clearbit’s website

*(33:04) - Kevin’s favorite campaign

*(34:43) - Kevin’s most cuttable budget items

*(36:30) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(38:10) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Links

Connect with Kevin on LinkedIn

Follow Kevin on Twitter

Connect with Tyler Lessard on LinkedIn

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The Power of Video to Generate Demand with Tyler Lessard, VP of Marketing & Chief Video Strategist of Vidyard

Ian Faison, Tyler Lessard — Tue, 18 Jan 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Tyler Lessard, VP of Marketing & Chief Video Strategist of Vidyard, a video platform for marketing and sales video hosting. Tyler has over 15 years of experience in B2B marketing, sales enablement, content marketing, brand and video. He’s also the distinguished author of The Visual Sale.

On this episode, Tyler breaks down how to effectively use video to generate demand, why video chops need to be in every marketer's toolkit, and how to be cost-effective and make videos at greater scale.

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“...up until the last few years it was costly and complex to do a lot of video. That’s where it was really a barrier and people will go, ‘oh, we just do it over there because if we do it everywhere else, I don’t even know how I would afford that or manage it.’ But the reality is today, there are very approachable ways, very cost-effective ways to do video at a greater scale. And so that’s what we’re starting to see is this scaling the use of video across these different programs, having more teams, demand teams, social teams, content teams, thinking about where does video content fit into what we’re delivering. How can it help us better tell this story or answer this question?” — Tyler Lessard

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Episode Timestamps:

*(1:57) - Tyler’s first job in demand

*(2:55) - Tyler’s role at Vidyard

*(3:51) - Segment: Trust Tree

*(7:17) - How Tyler’s marketing team is structured

*(9:03) - Tyler demand gen strategy

*(16:56) - The future of video in every marketers toolkit

*(33:08) - Where should listeners put their videos?

*(36:10) - Segment: The Playbook

*(40:35) - Segment: Quick Hits

*(42:49) - Advice for a first time VP of marketing

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Sponsor

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Links

Follow Tyler on Twitter

Check out Tyler’s book: “The Visual Sale”

Connect with Alon on LinkedIn

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How Marketers Should Think About Events in 2022 with Alon Alroy, Co-founder, CMO & CCO of Bizzabo

Ian Faison, Alon Alroy — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Alon Alroy, Co-founder, CMO & CCO of Bizzabo, a hybrid events platform that has raised $195M and has acquired several companies to date. Alon is a distinguished marketing executive shaping the future of the martech industry.

On this episode, Alon provides a crystal ball into the future of events, why he believes experiences play a vital role in this future, and why everything as a marketer leads back to delighting your customers.

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“When you think about the future, the future is really not about event management software anymore. It’s really about event experiences. People can consume content anywhere. People can get a Netflix like experience in terms of, on demand almost anywhere. So those who want to stay relevant, we need to evolve their offering to be focused on experiences, the attendee experience, the sponsor experience, the speaker experience, and the other experiences. So the future is really about experiences and this is what we have been experiencing as well. And this is what we have been demonstrating. To provide this immersive experience in which people feel connected, the rich transforming from attendees to participants.” — Alon Alroy

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:00) - Alon’s first job in marketing

*(2:35) - What it means to be CMO of Bizzabo

*(4:02) - The latest happenings at Bizzabo

*(6:54) - How marketers should think about events for 2022

*(8:24) - Segment: The Trust Tree

*(11:00) - How Alon structures his marketing team

*(12:16) - Alon’s marketing strategy

*(16:26) - Segment: The Playbook

*(18:10) - The future of events

*(26:13) - Making experiences memorable

*(29:46) - How Alon views content, Bizzabo’s website, & event lifecycle

*(33:31) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(35:36) - What’s going away in marketing

*(36:26) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Links

Follow Alon on Twitter

Connect with Heidi on LinkedIn

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The Rise of Data Driven Marketers with Heidi Bullock, CMO of Tealium

Ian Faison, Heidi Bullock — Tue, 4 Jan 2022 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Heidi Bullock, CMO of Tealium, a company that connects data from all different sources so brands can better connect to their customers. Prior to Tealium, Heidi was the CMO of Engagio and Global VP of Marketing at Marketo.

On this episode, Heidi talks about what it means to be CMO of Tealium, why the rise of data driven marketers is so important, and her top do’s and don’t for customer event marketing during a pandemic.

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“...know where your audience is. And I know that seems obvious, but I think even in social, you often see people saying, ‘oh, we've got to do LinkedIn, Facebook, Tiktok', you name it. But if your audience isn't there, maybe that doesn't make sense. So I think before you even think about channels and tactics, make sure you know who you're marketing to. Who you're trying to engage with and where they are and then how they prefer to be communicated to.” — Heidi Bullock

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Episode Timestamps:

*(1:52) - Heidi’s first job in demand

*(2:17) - What being CMO means at Tealium

*(3:44) - Segment: The Trust Tree

*(4:49) - Who Tealium’s customers are

*(8:45) - The rise of date driven marketers

*(11:00) - How Heidi structures her marketing organization

*(14:26) - Segment: The Playbook

*(16:34) - Tips on customer events

*(20:20) - Heidi’s marketing don’ts

*(31:49) - Heidi’s all-time favorite campaign she’s ran

*(32:14) - Segment: The Dust-Up

*(35:50) - How Heidi views Tealium’s website

*(37:14) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Links

Follow Heidi on Twitter

Connect with Nikhil on LinkedIn

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Everything Starts & Ends with Great People with Nikhil Behl, CMO of FICO

Ian Faison, Nikhil Behl — Tue, 30 Nov 2021 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Nikhil Behl, CMO of FICO, a leading analytics software company helping businesses in over 85 countries. Nikhil has over 25 years of technology, software and e-commerce experience. Prior to FICO, he was COO of Mercantila and spent 12 years in a number of executive-level positions at Hewlett-Packard. Nikhil is best known for being a part of the founding team that built H-P-Shopping.com and turned it into one of the top-five I-R 500 retailers in just seven years.

On this episode, Nikhil uncovers the main ingredient for crafting the perfect customer testimonial, why the people you work with are the main driver for creativity, and his strategic tips for creating curated events that perform.

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“You have to be able to tell these stories just in time with the right medium and not taking up too much of that, person’s either time or ability to digest something. And so taking a story and starting to break it up into either multiple components or segments, putting it into multiple mediums, whether it’s a video or audio or through social or long form and helping these things actually build on each other is really important.” — Nikhil Behl

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:15) - Nikhil’s first role in marketing

*(3:31) - Nikhil’s current role as CMO at FICO

*(4:10) - Segment: The Trust Tree

*(5:52) - What the buying committee looks like for FICO

*(9:19) - Nikhil’s marketing strategy

*(10:37) - The way Nikhil organizes his marketing team

*(12:26) - Segment: The Playbook

*(17:38) - How Nikhil craft’s his customer testimonials

*(21:38) - How Nikhil thinks about FICO’s website

*(26:48) - Tips on creating curated events

*(29:07) - What it’s like being a serial entrepreneur and CMO

*(31:50) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(34:00) - Segment: Quick Hits

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Sponsor

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Links

Follow Nikhil on Twitter

Connect with Anthony on LinkedIn

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Redefining Shared Experiences with 3-time CMO Anthony Kennada, CMO of Hopin

Ian Faison, Anthony Kennada — Tue, 23 Nov 2021 10:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Anthony Kennada, CMO of Hopin, an event technology platform that recently garnered a $7.75B valuation.

On this episode, Anthony takes us behind the scenes on Hopin’s explosive growth, how he and his team are trying to redefine webinars, and why he believes every company needs to start acting like a media company.

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“Every company needs to start acting like a media company or risk going out of business, pure, plain and simple. And when the cookie-less future that we're all staring down comes to light, the companies that survive are the ones that caught this early and were able to start investing in building their own content moat around the business.” — Anthony Kennada

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:05) - Anthony’s first job in marketing

*(2:45) - More about Anthony’s role at Hopin as CMO

*(4:05) - Segment: The Trust Tree

*(6:41) - Who’s the buying committee for Hopin

*(8:37) - How Anthony’s marketing team is organized

*(14:23) - How events have changed over the last 18 months

*(25:15) - Segment: The Playbook

*(29:45) - The investments Anthony makes into brand

*(31:54) - How to think about investing in content

*(35:30) - Segment: The Dust Up

*(38:45) - Segment: Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Anthony on Twitter

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Part 5: Top CMOs Share Their Most Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items

Tue, 16 Nov 2021 21:10:23 +0000

Find parts one, two, three & four

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Episode Timestamps:

Part five of this special mini-series features 12 CMOs and marketing leaders from some of the world's fastest-growing companies, including:

*(4:00) - Amanda Malko, CMO, G2

*(7:40) - Raj Khera, Head of Growth, SalesIntel.io

*(9:05) - Katrina Wong, VP Product Marketing and Demand Gen, Segment

*(11:11) - Morgan Norman, CMO, Dialpad

*(12:30) - Kady Srinivasan, SVP Global Head of Marketing, Klaviyo

*(13:55) - Joy Corso, CMO, Vonage

*(15:05) - Justin Shriber, CMO, People.ai

*(18:40) - Susan Beermann, CMO, NAVEX Global

*(20:21) - Keith Messick, SVP Marketing, LaunchDarkly

*(22:20) - Kyle Lacy, VP Marketing, Seismic

*(23:45) - William Tyree, CMO, Revenue.io

*(25:30) - Jon Miller, CMO, Demandbase

Sponsor

Links

Connect with Jon on LinkedIn

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The Evolution of ABM with Jon Miller, CMO & CPO of Demandbase

Ian Faison, Jon Miller — Tue, 9 Nov 2021 10:00:00 +0000

“The thread that runs through these best practices is this concept of account based experience. And it's a concept of really understanding where the account is in its journey and applying all that account intelligence that you have to not treat every account the same, but to really interact with them in a way that's going to be relevant and appropriate for where they are in their journey. So that's absolutely a key theme to how the best companies are doing this.” — Jon Miller

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:05) - How Jon got started in demand gen

*(2:40) - Jon’s current role at Demandbase

*(4:10) - How COVID-19 changed demand gen

*(5:35) - The Trust Tree

*(7:20) - The different personas Demandbase is selling to

*(11:45) - Where the industry is at with ABM

*(14:05) - What the future of ABM looks like

*(18:50) - The biggest trends in demand gen

*(25:25) - The Playbook

*(28:43) - The Dust-Up

*(30:54) - Jon’s favorite past campaign he’s ever run

*(31:48) - Biggest learning experience over the years

*(33:30) - Quick hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Jon on Twitter

Check out Demandbase’s guides

The Sales Enablement Podcast with Andy Paul

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The Marketing Return on Investment You Never Knew You Needed with William Tyree, CMO of Revenue.io

Ian Faison, William Tyree — Tue, 2 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“Make a really good case for having your most experienced SDRs handling your inbound leads. That's going to make the biggest difference ever in terms of the return on your marketing investment.” — William Tyree

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:30) - How William first got into demand gen

*(3:00) - William’s current role as CMO of revenue.io

*(4:10) - The Trust Tree

*(8:35) - How William’s marketing team is structured

*(15:30) - William’s 3 most uncuttable budget items

*(17:25) - How Revenue.io’s podcast became to be and how they think about rich media

*(26:27) - Why LinkedIn marketing is a game changer

*(28:40) - Rebranding from ringDNA to Revenue.io

*(32:22) - William’s favorite campaign

*(33:40) - William’s biggest learning experience from a past campaign

*(32:27) - How William views Revenue.io’s website

*(36:15) - The Dust-Up

*(38:10) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Connect with William on LinkedIn

Follow William on Twitter

Connect with Kyle on LinkedIn

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The ABM Stack That Wins with Kyle Lacy, SVP of Marketing at Seismic

Kyle Lacy, Ian Faison — Tue, 26 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“A very important part of demand gen is the alignment between marketing, product, sales, and customer service.” — Kyle Lacy

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:00) - How Kyle got started in demand gen

*(2:55) - Kyle’s current role at Seismic as SVP of Marketing

*(3:53) - The Trust Tree

*(6:10) - Selling to sales teams

*(7:50) - What getting acquired is like and what changed from Lessonly to Seismic

*(13:20) - Playbook - Kyle’s most uncuttable budget items

*(15:10) - Digging into SEO strategies Kyle uses

*(18:40) - The ABM stack that wins

*(22:50) - How Kyle views the company website

*(24:55) - Kyle’s favorite campaign

*(26:15) - A strategy or tactics Kyle is not trying again

*(28:55) - The Dust Up

*(31:30) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Kyle on Twitter

Connect with Keith on LinkedIn

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Your Website is an Always-On Billboard with 3-time CMO Keith Messick, SVP of Marketing at LaunchDarkly

Caspian Studios — Tue, 19 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“[Our website does] both education and conversion and is the way we think about it, but it actually plays all of the classic roles. It plays as our billboard. It's our always-on asset. We have complete control over it, so we want it to be great.” - Keith Messick

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Episode Timestamps:

*(3:03) - Keith’s first job in demand gen

*(4:25) - LaunchDarkly explained

*(6:14) - The Trust Tree

*(7:36) - Keith’s main marketing strategy

*(9:45) - How Keith thinks about spreading marketing resources

*(13:00) - Justifying ROI for building community

*(15:40) - Rebrands and avoiding the nightmare

*(21:46) - The Playbook and Keith’s uncuttable budget items

*(32:42) - How Keith thinks about his website

*(36:16) - Customer marketing strategy and perspectives

*(39:00) - A tactic that is fading away to be aware of

*(42:25) - The Dust-up

*(44:16) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Keith on Twitter

LaunchDarkly is hiring!

Connect with Susan on LinkedIn

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Taking Risks to be a Signal in the Noise with Susan Beermann, CMO of NAVEX Global

Ian Faison, Susan Beermann — Tue, 12 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“It's noisy out there and creativity can be the difference between people paying attention to you and not paying attention to you. So I think we have to take some risks as marketers to stand out and be a little bit different and not all look the same and play it safe.” — Susan Beermann

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Episode Timestamps:

*(1:54) - How Susan first got into marketing

*(2:45) - Susan’s current role at NAVEX Global

*(3:14) - What NAVEX Global is

*(5:00) - The Trust Tree

*(9:40) - How Susan’s marketing team is organized

*(12:24) - The Playbook - Susan’s most uncuttable budget items

*(14:25) - Digging deeper into NAVEX Global’s website

*(18:45) - Susan’s conversion tips

*(22:05) - Tactics/channels that are fading away in Susan’s eyes

*(26:10) - Susan’s favorite campaign she worked on

*(32:43) - The Dust Up

*(38:17) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Susan on Twitter

NAVEX Global is hiring!

Connect with Justin on LinkedIn

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An SEO Masterclass with Justin Shriber, CMO of People.ai

Justin Shriber, Ian Faison — Tue, 5 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“The danger of the website is that you can attempt to make it all things to all people. We're very focused on two priorities for our website: First and foremost, it is a lead gen tool for us. And secondly, it is a platform for our thought leadership.” — Justin Shriber

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:20) - How Justin got into demand gen

*(3:30) - What People.ai does

*(4:30) - The Trust Tree

*(17:20) The Playbook - Justin’s most uncuttable budget items

*(19:00) - A deeper conversation on SEO

*(28:35) - A marketing tactic that Justin thinks is fading away

*(29:30) - Justin’s favorite marketing campaign

*(34:00) - Justin’s least favorite campaign and why it didn’t work

*(37:40) - How Justin views his website

*(41:15) - Advice on marketing on LinkedIn

*(43:20) - The Dust-up

*(46:40) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Justin on Twitter

Check out the Legends of Sales and Marketing podcast

Connect with Joy on LinkedIn

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The $4B Demand Gen Formula with Joy Corso, CMO of Vonage

Ian Faison, Joy Corso — Tue, 28 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“Make content personal for consumers. That’s what folks are really interested in. They want to be educated and engaged. We really want to try to serve up that blockbuster content that we think is going to be compelling for folks to help them make good decisions.” — Joy Corso

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:00) - How Joy got started in Demand Gen

*(3:30) - What Vonage is and what it means to be CMO

*(5:30) - The Trust Tree & Joy’s demand gen strategy

*(8:30) - Who Vonage is selling to

*(9:45) - Org structure for Joy’s marketing team

*(12:25) - The Playbook - Joy’s most uncuttable budget items

*(17:00) - Joys non-digital channels for marketing (day-to-day)

*(18:30) - How to market to developers

*(21:40) - What Joy is most likely to cut in the coming years

*(23:35) - Joy’s favorite campaign

*(26:40) - How Joy views Vonage’s website

*(30:00) - Joy’s favorite/most convertible aspect of Vonage’s website

*(35:20) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Joy on Twitter

Connect with Colin on LinkedIn

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Dreamforce Mini-series Part 3: The Origins of Salesforce+ with Colin Fleming, SVP of Global Brand, Events, Product, Content, & Customer Marketing at Salesforce

Ian Faison, Colin Fleming — Tue, 21 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“The content we're putting out is not transactional. It's not behind a gate. It's essentially there to help people be better at their jobs as salespeople or marketers or commerce individuals or admins or devs. It's really to help people be better. And we think organically that will help grow the business.” — Colin Fleming

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:15) - Colin’s first job at Salesforce

*(2:40) - Life as driver for Red Bull racing

*(4:11) - The origins of Salesforce+

*(9:07) - Why marketers have underinvested in content

*(12:50) - Community building and long term investments

*(15:10) - Planning the rollout of Salesforce+

*(17:06) - How to think about educational + entertaining content

*(23:34) - The scale of Dreamforce and Salesforce+

*(29:20) - How Salesforce+ will organize its content

*(32:00) - How Salesforce+ thinks about advertising + partner relationships

*(37:00) - What surprised Colin about the Salesforce+ process

*(41:07) - What Colin would do differently about the Salesforce+ rollout

Sponsor

Links

Follow Colin on Twitter

Salesforce+

Dreamforce 2021

Connect with Dan on LinkedIn

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Dreamforce Mini-series Part 2: Reimagining B2B Events in a Digital-First World with with Kraig Swensrud, Linda Dunlap, & Dan Darcy

Ian Faison, Dan Darcy, Kraig Swensrud, Linda Dunlap — Tue, 14 Sep 2021 09:05:00 +0000

“My hires this year have not come from the event world. They've all come from the broadcast production world so that we can understand how to keep curating products that are going to be engaging to our viewers. We take that concept of ‘we've come here to tell a story.’ So we have to take advantage of all the tools and best practices out there in storytelling. And that means that we're not borrowing from the events world, we're borrowing from a completely different industry.” — Linda

Episode Timestamps:

*(1:47) Dreamforce’s inspiration going into a hybrid world

*(10:42) Hiring from different industries is a cheat code

*(20:38) Dreamforce’s secret unstoppable sauce

*(21:42) What to expect for the upcoming Dreamforce

Sponsor

Links

Follow Dan on Twitter

Connect with Linda on LinkedIn

Follow Linda on Twitter

Connect with Kraig on LinkedIn

Follow Kraig on Twitter

Connect with Dan on LinkedIn

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Dreamforce Mini-series Part 1: The Legends that Built Dreamforce with Kraig Swensrud, Linda Dunlap, & Dan Darcy

Kraig Swensrud, Ian Faison, Linda Dunlap, Dan Darcy — Tue, 14 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“There's something about the culture where you just take things on. There's not a lot of time to be overwhelmed or have fear. You go into a room and you're like, ‘all right, let's bring out all the ideas that would make this bigger.’ And then you just turn each one over to see what's possible and how it can work. There's not that space of, ‘oh my goodness, how are we going to do this?’ It's just like, ‘all right, you guys, let's just take this on. Let's go.’” — Linda Dunlap

Episode Timestamps:

*(6:40) Create the bar that others will want to try and raise

*(18:27) Having a vision and being intentional

*(19:10) It matters where you’re getting your inspiration from

*(29:38) The importance of having a backup plan

*(35:00) The epicenter of the keynote

*(44:16) Cultivating a fearless mindset

Sponsor

Links

Follow Dan on Twitter

Connect with Linda on LinkedIn

Follow Linda on Twitter

Connect with Kraig on LinkedIn

Follow Kraig on Twitter

The Art of the Impossible book

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Scaling the $9.5B Rocketship with Kady Srinivasan, SVP Global Head of Marketing at Klaviyo

Ian Faison, Kady Srinivasan — Tue, 7 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“Be confident. There are so many people who are going to make you want to second guess your intuition about things that you have to do, but just stay strong and focus on what you think is right.” — Kady Srinivasan

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Episode Timestamps:

*(0:30) - How Kady got into demand gen

*(3:05) - What a Global Head of Marketing does

*(6:00) - The Trust Tree

*(7:00) - Klaviyo’s marketing strategy

*(8:38) - The organization of the Klaviyo marketing team

*(9:20) - Who goes into the e-commerce buying committee

*(10:27) - How Kady thinks about market segmentation

*(12:22) - The Playbook - 3 Uncuttable Budget items

*(14:12) - Kady’s main marketing philosophy after 20 years in the space

*(17:00) - Hotjar analysis tool

*(24:09) - How to help your customers achieve their goals

*(25:20) - What Kady’s team won’t be spending money on this year

*(27:08) - How Kady views Klaviyo’s website

*(28:30) - The Dust Up

*(32:32) - Marketing at EA and Ubisoft

*(34:50) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Hotjar website tool

Klaviyo is hiring

Connect with Kady on LinkedIn

Follow Kady on Twitter

Connect with Morgan on LinkedIn

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How to Borrow Ideas Like a Marketer with Morgan Norman, CMO of Dialpad

Ian Faison, Morgan Norman — Tue, 31 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Key Takeaways

As a marketer, you’re here to borrow, remix, and be unique — not to steal.
Demand gen is more than numbers and metrics. Without engaging storytelling, you’re destined to fail.
All CMOs should have open dialogue with their CEOs. If you’re not willing/able to share your rawest ideas, you’re both in trouble.

Quote

“As a marketer, we're always borrowing, cheating, stealing from everyone out there in the market. And I think that's good and bad. You can use the pattern from someone else, but the bad part is you're also not always coming up with your own unique ideas. And if you're a marketer, you're a pretty bad-ass creative person. In general, that's why you're here. That's why the world puts you there.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(4:15) - The Trust Tree - Morgan’s demand gen strategy

*(6:20) - How marketing and demand fit into sales

*(8:06) - The Playbook - Morgan’s Uncuttable Budget Items

*(9:40) - Paid Google spend

*(12:50) - Why great marketers are always borrowing

*(15:50) - Planting the seed in consumers' minds

*(18:10) - What Morgan’s investing in from a creative standpoint

*(23:48) - Taking cues from B2C to implement to B2B

*(28:17) - How to think about personalization

*(34:00) - The Dust Up

*(37:05) - Morgan’s favorite campaign

*(38:40) - The challenge of marketing A.I.

*(43:25) - How to view your website

*(44: 25) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Morgan on Twitter

David Goggins book

Checkout Dialpad

Twilio’s Signal Conference

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Leading a $3.2B Twilio Acquisition with Marketing MVP Katrina Wong, VP of Product Marketing & Demand Generation at Segment

Ian Faison, Katrina Wong — Tue, 24 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“I think most outbound prospecting these days is being warmed up in some way, shape or form by marketing and all the content we put out there. And each marketing engagement becomes a signal. It's a clue and it gives us insight on the intent of the prospect. And so I don't know if true cold calling exists in the same way as it did years ago.” — Katrina Wong

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:08) - Katrina’s first job in demand gen

*(3:00) - What marketing at Segment looks like

*(4:20) - The Trust Tree

*(6:50) - What Segment is and who their customers are

*(10:00) - Technical vs. functional leaders

*(13:08) - How Katrina views Segment’s website

*(14:10) - The Playbook & the Most Uncuttable Budget Items

*(15:30) - SEM/paid social tricks

*(18:00) - Product demos in person vs. over Zoom

*(19:15) - What legacy marketing tactic is fading away

*(22:50) - Katrina’s favorite campaign over her career

*(26:30) - Insights around personalization

*(29:30) - Katrina’s most memorable dust-up

*(30:44) - What it was like getting acquired by Twilio

*(33:08) - Quick Hits

Sponsor

Links

Segment’s blog

Follow Katrina on Twitter

Connect with Katrina on LinkedIn

Connect with Raj on LinkedIn

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The Power of Intent with 3-time CMO/CEO Raj Khera, Head of Growth at SalesIntel

Raj Khera, Ian Faison — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“Don't hold back your knowledge. One of my recent posts was about sharing your expertise. Nobody's going to believe you're an expert if all you do is talk about what you know. You actually have to show people what you know. So write articles, write a book, do a webinar on your specific area of expertise and let it all out. Just share that knowledge.” — Raj Khera

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:07) Raj’s first job in demand gen

*(3:00) SalesIntel explained

*(4:00) What Raj’s role is and what he does as head of growth

*(4:40) The Trust Tree - Raj’s demand gen strategy

*(6:20) SalesIntel’s Org Structure

*(8:00) Who SalesIntel sells too

*(10:45) The demand for SalesIntel

*(13:20) How Marketing departments use SalesIntel

*(16:50) The Playbook - Raj’s Uncuttable Budget Items

*(18:35) Raj’s favorite tools for keyword research

*(20:20) PPC strategies for SalesIntel and Raj

*(23:40) Setting up sponsorships and sponsorships in general

*(31:20) Dust-ups

*(36:40) Raj’s favorite campaign

*(38:10) Bad campaigns are due to not testing enough

*(39:45) Quick hits

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Sponsor

Links

Follow Raj on Twitter

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Power Questions - Build Relationships, Win New Business and Influence Others

SalesIntel is hiring!

Connect with Amanda on LinkedIn

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The Secrets to Success Using G2 with 3-time CMO Amanda Malko, CMO of G2

Amanda Malko, Ian Faison — Tue, 10 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“Retention is the foundation for growth. And I think it's one that's easy to overlook as you're focused on pipe gen and getting more customers. But if you invest in customer success advocacy and building a community, then you're going to continue to have a very successful business because you're going to retain and grow the customers that you already have.” — Amanda Malko

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Episode Timestamps:

*(2:25) Amanda’s first job in demand gen

*(2:50) Amanda’s role at G2

*(6:50) Digital transformation wasn’t the only thing COVID accelerated

*(7:20) The Trust Tree

*(9:30) How different people are using G2 successfully

*(11:15) G2’s overall go to market motion and strategy

*(20:05) Amanda’s marketing philosophy and how she treats her first 90 days as CMO

*(22:00) The Playbook — Amanda’s Uncuttable Budget Items

*(25:25) Amanda’s views on customer marketing

*(28:30) How B2B enterprise tech companies can leverage ABM/email marketing

*(33:00) Measuring campaign success and the framework G2 uses

*(35:15) Amanda’s advice for someone figuring out their G2 strategy

*(39:00) How Amanda views G2’s website, chatbots, and conversational marketing

*(41:30) Amanda’s most memorable dust-ups and advice

*(43:15) Quick hits

Sponsor

Links

Follow Amanda on Twitter

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Part 4: Top CMOs Share Their Most Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items

Tue, 3 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Episode Timestamps:

*(3:54) Christelle Flahaux, Head of Marketing, FortressIQ

*(6:02) Jamie Domenici, CMO, LogMeIn

*(6:47) Susan Ganeshan, CMO, Granicus

*(9:20) Dave Kellogg, Principal, Dave Kellogg Consulting

*(13:18) Norman Guadagno, CMO, Acoustic

*(16:14) Alex Rosemblat, CMO, Datadog

*(18:22) Jay Lee, CMO, Avalara

*(20:50) Jim Sinai, SVP Marketing, Procore Technologies

*(22:42) Josh Todd, CMO, Mindbody

*(25:33) Erica Chan, Head of Brand and Marketing, North America B2B, Alibaba

*(29:00) Sydney Sloan, CMO, SalesLoft

*(31:10) Brian Kardon, CMO, InVision

Sponsor

Links

Find parts one, two, and three

The Qualified Sales Leader: Proven Lessons from a Five Time CRO by John McMahon

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Marketing for 100% of the Fortune 100 with 5-time CMO Brian Kardon, CMO of InVision

Ian Faison, Brian Kardon — Tue, 27 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0000

“The part of the playbook is to go slow to go fast. So I see a lot of people going really fast, but if you don't have the foundation of analytics, you're really flying blind. And so as marketers jump into a new job and they want to really show value right away. But if you don't have a good foundation of understanding, what's working, what isn't, you don't have a really good marketing automation platform that's configured the right way and the right MarTech stack and the right data stack, it's going to slow you down later. It's like engineers who have technical debt. Like you can never develop a new product if the foundation is cracked, you just can't build up. And so for marketing organizations, you've got to go slow to go fast.”

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*(2:24) How Brian got into marketing

*(2:53) Everything you need to know about InVision

*(5:26) Brian’s main marketing/demand-gen strategy

*(7:30) How Brian thinks about InVision’s website

*(8:31) Bots are better than humans at demand gen

*(13:10) Study SDRs and direct mail like an anthropologist

*(17:37) The theme of Brian’s marketing playbook is to go slow to go fast

*(36:50) Brian’s favorite campaign of all time

*(39:45) How Brian thinks about marketing a new product

*(44:50) Brian remicises on a memorable dust up and advice on avoiding them

*(46:20) Quick hits

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Sponsor

--------

Links

Invision’s podcast

Freehand by Invision

Follow Brian on Twitter

Connect with Brian on LinkedIn

Dare To Lead by Brené Brown book

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The Clearing Model: A Framework for Having Difficult Conversations with Sydney Sloan, CMO of SalesLoft

Ian Faison, Sydney Sloan — Tue, 20 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Sydney Sloan, CMO of Salesloft, a leading sales engagement platform whose most recent funding round valued the company at over a billion dollars.

Sydney is a two-time CMO and seasoned marketer with more than 25 years of experience as an advisor, investor, and marketing leader for numerous companies, most notably Adobe, where she spent 15 years in product marketing, customer marketing, and demand generation.

On this episode, Sydney delves into the inner workings of SalesLoft’s website, explains how to personalize your marketing team’s communications, and shares the framework she uses for having difficult conversations at work.

Key Takeaways

All marketing teams must use the communications holy-quad-fecta: email, phone calls, social touches, and direct mail.
Your website is a direct reflection of your brand. Treat it that way.
CMOs who are trying to rethink or figure out their demand gen strategy: don't try and fix it all at once. Find one part that you can focus the team on, fix that first, and then go to the next one.

Quotes

“You have to personalize your communications. Email is the primary channel, but you have to use more than email….When you're doing email, phone call, a social touch and a direct mail, that is the holy-quad-fecta. You'll get a 4.7 X higher lift than sending email alone.”

“Everybody in SaaS knows that you have to continue to work really hard to maintain a customer, especially in a competitive marketplace. So having those programs where customers can come and learn about what we're up to and learn from others is important.”

“I love my website. First of all, I believe the website is the first door, the reflection of your brand. It should speak like a human and we've worked really hard to make it sound like a ‘Lofter’ and even our chatbot’s called Lofty. Just having that ability to communicate in the way that sellers want to be communicated to– that’s so important.”

“My one piece of advice to give to a CMO who's trying to rethink or figure out their demand gen strategy would be to don't try and fix it all at once. Try and find one part that you can focus the team on and fix that first and then go to the second one. Trying to do it all at once can be overwhelming and take too long. Get quick wins.”

Sponsor

Links

Future Female CRO series

Hey Sales People podcast

How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie

Dare to Lead podcast by Brené Brown

Follow Sydney on Twitter

Connect with Sydney on LinkedIn

Alibaba's B2B Today Daily Series

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Globalizing & Localizing Your Brand with Alibaba’s Head of North America B2B Brand and Marketing, Erica Chan

Ian Faison, Erica Chan — Tue, 13 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Erica Chan. Erica leads Alibaba’s Brand and Customer Insights Team in North America, where she works with over 20,000 sellers and 26 million buyers worldwide.

On this episode, Erica talks about the challenges and misconceptions a Chinese company faces when breaking into the North American market. She also shares her insights on building customer trust, trade-show and content strategy, and much more.

Key Takeaways

You’re only as successful as your customers' success.
There are over 30M U.S. businesses, but only around 1% do international sales. Think about how your marketing efforts can increase international sales.
If you have a brand or company that you’re trying to globalize, don’t forget about the localization aspect of globalization. Local communities make up the global community.

Quotes

“At the end of the day, B2B is a very human business. What we’ve found is that having an on-the-ground customer success team to pick up the phone or meet face-to-face with our customers to help them through this digital journey has been tremendous. For us, this is a gold mine for customer insights.”

“We rely a lot on our ecosystem of partners to help us with content ideas and also content creation...we love creating the content with our customers. We feel very strongly that our customer's success is our success. We're only successful if our customers are successful and we love featuring customer success stories.”

“We actually have a competition within our office...We want to encourage folks to talk and get in front of as many customers as possible. It's like a competition amongst teams... like a fun way for us to incentivize getting front and center and really listening to our customers.”

Sponsor

Links

Connect with Erica on LinkedIn

Connect with Josh on LinkedIn

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Inception, Flow, & Interruption: Three Pillars of Marketing Glory with Josh Todd, CMO of Mindbody

Ian Faison, Josh Todd — Tue, 6 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Josh Todd, CMO of Mindbody, the leading technology platform for the wellness industry.

Josh is a two-time CMO with 20 years of strategic and tactical experience in key marketing leadership positions, including eight years at Constant Contact, where he led an aggressive customer-acquisition strategy that propelled the company from 50,000 to more than 600,000 customers.

On this episode, Josh discusses how he’s structured his marketing organization to serve the unique blend of Mindbody’s B2B and B2C product offerings, and the challenge of building a website that serves both sides of the market.

Key Takeaways

Less is more with your website copy. It’s more difficult to nail it, but if done correctly, the influence is huge.
By making your marketing more simplistic internally, you’ll get more ideas from people who aren’t typically in marketing.
The saying, “Everybody thinks they’re a marketer,” doesn’t always have to be a bad thing. The more ideas the better.

Quotes

“What we've really focused on is hiring marketers who truly understand what the one-to-one personal touch looks like. And I mean, they are just great at going in and understanding, ‘what do they care about? What do they like? How do I find a creative way to break through that's aligned with our vision, our messaging for how we can support them, and then having that directly connected to the sales team so that they are talking the same language.’”

“There are three ways for us to [market] everything we do. There's inception marketing, where we're laying that groundwork. It's thought leadership — we're showing up in your trusted publications, and we're incepting this idea of Mindbody and what we can do. There’s flow, where we’re showing up where you are, whether it's answering a question in search or showing up to an event that you're already at. And then finally there's interruption, where you weren't really looking for us. Some of our advertising falls into that area, but what we're trying to do with these strategic accounts is just get in flow with them. Go where they are. Remove any barriers and any resistance. And then we can have a conversation about how we can help their business.”

“We try to keep things as simple as possible. We look at that buyer's journey: Awareness, interest, desire, and action. It may feel old. It may feel too simplistic, but what it does is it creates a common language for the marketing org and the rest of the org. If we orient it to the customer journey, if we keep what we're trying to do simple and straightforward, we can actually stay out of our own way. We can bring the org in and now you start getting ideas from all other places, because you've made a kind of marketing theory, if you want to call that, accessible.”

“There are a lot of hard parts in marketing, but one is: everybody feels like they’re a marketer. But like anything, the closer you get to it, the more you understand. This is a science, this is an art. Every little part of it is super complex. So the more we can simplify that and broaden the conversation, we feel like the more smart people we can get engaging and coming up with great ideas.”

Sponsor

Links

Hidden Brain Podcast

Mindbody’s website

Follow Josh on Twitter

World of Concrete Conference

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How an $11B Powerhouse Tackled Pre and Post IPO Marketing with Jim Sinai, SVP of Marketing at Procore

Jim Sinai, Ian Faison — Tue, 29 Jun 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jim Sinai, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Procore Technologies, a global cloud-based construction software company that recently went public at an approximate valuation of $9B.

Prior to Procore, Jim held numerous senior leadership roles across 8 years at Salesforce, including leading the launch for major product rollouts of Salesforce Platform and Salesforce Einstein.

On this episode, Jim unpacks the intersection between product marketing and demand gen, the hardest challenge facing modern marketers, the future of webinars, and much more.

Key Takeaways

Every product marketer must think like a CMO. Messaging is important, but messaging for an entire audience is more important.
Whenever you have a disagreement, the answer is not going to be found inside the four walls of the building, it's outside with the customer.
If you're a CMO and you're not willing to learn how the demand gen systems work, you're not going to be CMO for very long.

Quotes

“The best demand gen leaders out there can do product marketing. I've seen them do product marketing, and they all have the same attributes in common, which are stakeholder management and alignment. At the end of the day, what makes for great campaigns and great demand gen is when you have the sales team and the marketing team focusing on trying to say the right message to the right people.”

“All good campaigns are really just about trying to get eyeballs back to your website where you're trying to convert things. We have this mantra at Procore in our marketing team that the website is our most important asset. And we put all of our attention to make sure that we have all of our merchandising on the website.”

“Just think about how your buyers are humans and they want a really delightful experience on the website. [Maybe] that's integrating a chatbot...One of the things that I think is fantastic is when you don't have to talk to a salesperson to book a meeting with the salesperson. I want to talk to sales and I want to talk to them either now via chat or I want to pick up the phone. Giving the shopper that channel is really important.”

“Whenever you have a disagreement, the answer is not inside the four walls of the building, it's out with the customer. So the person who has tested it the most is the person who will likely have the winning argument in a dust-up.”

“If you're a CMO and you're not willing to learn how the demand systems work, you're not going to be CMO for long, unless you have a phenomenal demand gen visionary as your right hand..”

Sponsor

Links

Procore is hiring!

Follow Jim on Twitter

Connect with Jim on LinkedIn

Avalara Crush Virtual Event

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Metrics: A CMO's Best & Worst Friend with Jay Lee, CMO of Avalara

Ian Faison, Jay Lee — Tue, 22 Jun 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jay Lee, CMO at Avalara, a leading provider of tax compliance automation software valued at $13B.

Jay is a two-time CMO with more than 20 years of experience developing high-performing marketing teams, and previously held leadership roles at GE, American Express, and PayPal.

In this episode, Jay walks us through the ins and outs of partner marketing, growing site traffic, content strategy, and the key learnings that he and the marketing team at Avalara are reflecting on post-pandemic.

Key Takeaways

If your company is in a rapidly changing industry, treat your website as an online newspaper. Keep your users up-to-date on what’s changing in your industry so your site is the go-to site.
Always have backup marketing channels at the ready. You never know when the next curveball will be thrown your way.
CMOs that don’t have the numbers on their side are in deep trouble. Metrics are your best and worst enemy.

Quotes

“We are always trying to get a sense of what the spend is and then what the return is. In B2B, it's all about what kind of leads you are creating and all the different programs that you have and what kind of pipeline you're generating for sales.”

“A recommendation from a partner, ‘hey, you should use Avalara to manage your tax compliance in our system,’ that's enormous. We do a lot of direct marketing ourselves. But it's always better to have that trusted advisor or a system that you're already using to endorse us because you know that it's going to work and that’s what really matters.”

“COVID happened in March and immediately the whole events industry shut down. That was a whole channel for us. It just went dark. If you're thinking about a multichannel approach to go to market and one of the main ones to your target audience gets shut off — what are you going to do? What we did was we leaned into all the other channels. We put up a bunch of webinars and started to get ourselves into the virtual world.”

“What's so great about marketing versus any other part of the company is it's where you're actually supposed to test a ton of stuff. So there really isn't any bad marketing campaign. Just as long as it doesn't cause any reputational issues or do anything that’s too strange.”

“Marketing should never say this: ‘We tried that and it didn't work.’ Because the world is always different today than it was yesterday. And circumstances have changed. Testing is always a part of the budget that people should make sure that they have.”

Sponsor

Links

Hidden Brain podcast

Jay's Linkedin

Jay’s Twitter

Follow Alex on Twitter

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From Employee 11 to $600M in Revenue with Alex Rosemblat, CMO of Datadog

Ian Faison, Alex Rosemblat — Tue, 15 Jun 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Key Takeaways

Don’t sweat the numbers, sweat the quality.
All B2B marketing teams should consider hiring a great demand gen person that knows Google ad words as an early hire.
To make an event that drives pipeline, you must define your audience as narrowly as possible.

Quotes

“To make an event that drives pipeline, I think the most important thing is to define your audience as narrowly as possible. If you were to say ‘this is going to be an event tailored for X kind of person,’ that's probably not enough. It's got to be X kind of person that works on Y kind of systems that is really concerned about Z kind of things. You really need to get as tailored as you can.”

“Getting a great demand gen person that knows Google ad words like the back of their hand should be an early hire for any marketing team that’s doing B2B marketing.”

“Something that we’ve done really well at Datadog: once we find a formula that works—even if it’s at a very small scale—then the challenge on us as a marketing team is to figure out how to keep repeating it or doing it in a bigger way until we hit a ceiling where you can’t do any more of it.”

“I think if you were to take a look under the covers, we really do marketing by a thousand cuts. We have a lot of campaigns that do really small numbers, but they’re good numbers or the quality on them is good. So we keep on layering more small campaigns...and that’s how we end up delivering a very good set of leads for our sales team.”

“The worst thing you can do is keep on trying to push something that's just not working up the hill and expending effort on it. Because there might be a lot of other campaigns that actually will work. And the effort that you're putting on this thing that you can't ever seem to get to work might be better spent in other places.”

Sponsor

Links

Follow Alex on LinkedIn

Datadog is hiring!

Follow Ian on Twitter

Connect with Ian on LinkedIn

www.caspianstudios.com

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Cutting Through the Noise: The Challenge of Marketing to Marketers with Norman Guadagno, CMO of Acoustic

Caspian Studios — Tue, 8 Jun 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Key Takeaways

SEM and SEO have to work together.
You can’t just appeal to the rational side of your audience. You have to also appeal to the emotional side as well.
People forget how video humanizes marketing through the “show” aspect of the “show don’t tell” side of marketing.

Quotes

“Nobody sees through BS faster than another marketer. There's a level of transparency, honesty, and integrity that I think marketers need to bring to the table when they're marketing to their peers.”

“I have been and will continue to be–and the numbers prove it–a believer in search. SEM works no matter how you slice it. SEM is not a one and done. You have to water and trim the plants every single day because it really requires attention. You have to understand the market. You have to be thoughtful about what you’re investing in and continue to iterate.”

“Our website is conceptually the center of our demand creation universe. No matter what else we're going to do, we're trying to bring people back to the website to spend time there or to download content or complete a ‘contact us’ form. I look at the website as a living, breathing, entity and the second you take your eye off it and say, ‘it's good,’ you're wrong. You have to cultivate it and think about the experience that you're delivering and be willing to change things.”

“For a first time CMO, I’d give the following advice: You are going to make mistakes. That's part of the deal. Don't forget that in the making of these mistakes, that’s how you start to learn what's actually going to resonate with your audience and you can't be afraid of that.”

Sponsor

Connect with Norman on LinkedIn

Follow Norman on Twitter

Subscribe to Norman’s Substack

Acoustic is hiring!

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Season 2 Trailer

Ian Faison — Wed, 2 Jun 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Season 1 of Demand Gen Visionaries featured luminaries at some of the world’s most innovative companies like Salesforce, Slack, and Google who shared strategies, insights, and ideas for maximizing sales pipeline amidst a shift to an all-digital world. And we’re just getting started.

Tune in to the premiere of Demand Gen Visionaries Season 2 on June 8th. We’ve got some heavy-hitters and master marketers like our friends at G2, Datadog, InVision, and Procore joining the show. We’ll dive deep into post-pandemic trends and how industry pioneers are returning to the new normal. If you thought Season 1 was good, you won’t want to miss a moment of Season 2.

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Make Sales Easier: The Blueprints of a Marketing Titan with Dave Kellogg, fmr 3x CMO and SVP/GM at Salesforce

Caspian Studios — Tue, 11 May 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Key Takeaways

Most boards don’t have marketing leaders, but all boards have operators (GMs, CEOs, etc.) and successful ones have an understanding of marketing.
If trends continue, more and more CMOs will become CEOs
CMOs and CROs should be locked at the elbows

Quotes

“I believe what separates the sales leaders from those who stay as CROs, to those who go on to become general managers or CEOs is actually an understanding of marketing.”

“A key skill for any CMO is the ability to say no. Just don't say it too often. I believe both parts of that. You have to be able to say no, but you don’t want to become Dr. No, that doesn't work. So, you should have yes, no, and let's do an experiment.

“The CMO should be locked at the elbow with the CRO. They should answer each other's phones on the first ring. They should have a good personal relationship. They should be aligned in meetings. One should take a bullet for the other. If one's getting shot at in the board meeting, the CMO should dive in front of the VP of sales or vice versa.”

“Market vision while selling product. We market a vision to the customer that gets them excited about where we're going. Because when [customers] buy these apps, [they’re] not just buying what's on the truck today. We sell what's on the truck, but they buy into this broader vision.”

“My credo has been ‘make sales easier’… I’ve built my career on it. And ironically, some of the biggest arguments I've had about that little phrase have been with sales leaders. They’ll say, ‘No, that's not what marketing's about,’ and I'm like, ‘Yeah, it is. That's why we're here.’ That's my philosophy and I’ve practiced it to the extent that it even surprises people sometimes.”

“Marketing is the entire business scene from the point of view of the customer.” — Theodore Levitt, Former HBS Marketing professor

Sponsor

Connect with Dave on LinkedIn

Follow Dave on Twitter

Dave’s blog

Dave’s podcast

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Part 3: Top CMOs Share Their Uncuttable Demand Gen Budget Items for 2021

Tue, 4 May 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Find parts one and two here

Part three of this special mini-series features 12 CMOs and marketing leaders from some of the world's fastest-growing companies, including:

Vidya Peters, CMO, Marqeta

Leela Srinivasan, CMO, SurveyMonkey

Grant Johnson, CMO, Emburse

Robin Daniels, CMO, Matterport

Joanie Wang, Director of Marketing, Expensify

Rachel Thornton, SVP Marketing, Amazon Web Services

Esther Flammer, VP Demand Gen, Conga

Marie Gassée, VP Growth, Confluent

Lynne Capozzi, CMO, Acquia

Len Fischer, SVP Demand Gen, Okta

Dave Dabbah, CMO, CleverTap

Naman Khan, CMO, Zeplin

Key Takeaways

Paid digital became even more important as a result of the pandemic
Invest in a robust MarTech stack
Events are still going strong, they just look different

Sponsor

Links

Find parts one and two here

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No Silver Bullet: A 3-time CMO’s Approach to Demand Gen with Susan Ganeshan, CMO of Granicus

Susan Ganeshan, Ian Faison — Tue, 27 Apr 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Susan Ganeshan, CMO of Granicus.

Susan is a multiple-time CMO with an impressive 25-year marketing career that includes leadership roles at Clarabridge, newBrandAnalytics, and Deloitte Consulting.

On this episode, Susan discusses the unique challenges and opportunities that come with selling exclusively to government entities. She also expands on her career-long objective to convert leads faster, why she says there is no silver bullet in demand gen, and her philosophy that you have to do everything right.

Key Takeaways

There is no silver bullet in demand gen, which is why every component of the funnel must be done right.
If you don't have a highly functioning BDR team, you might as well take your leads and throw them into a lead graveyard.
Beware of treadmill marketing. Get off the treadmill of constantly producing one small thing at a time, and create a strategy.

Quotes

“I have a philosophy on demand gen and my catchphrase is ‘there is no silver bullet.’ There's no one thing you can do that will make an amazing demand gen cycle, so you have to do everything right. You have to think of the entire funnel from top to bottom…and everything in that cycle has to be pristine. If there's even a little bit of fray on that thread, it will break. There’s no silver bullet, you have to do it all right.”

“When you don't have a highly functioning BDR team–and I've talked to hundreds of CMOs about this–you might as well take your leads and throw them into a lead graveyard. Because salespeople don't have the diligence or the time to follow up in the way a BDR team does, and have a multi-touch cadence and that practice of continuing to go after those hot leads. So I would say that the people-spend that is probably most important to me is that BDR function.”

“When you have a hot lead, it has a half-life, and you have to catch them while they're hot. That's been my objective as a CMO for a long time is to really focus on the speed at which we're talking to these people, catching them while they're thinking of us. The cool thing about Qualified is that when someone visits our website, we can use the Qualified workflow and logic to understand what pages they landed on...Qualified routes that person to a live conversation and my BDRs can start the conversation with them instantly.”

“What we've found is that when someone requests a demo, about 10% of those are going to turn into opportunities. When someone comes through Qualified, it's 25%. It's remarkable.”

“Memories are short. Catching someone in real time while the information is fresh and top of mind can make a dramatic difference in the overall conversion metrics."

“You’ve got to do everything right, but don't let that overwhelm you. Start tackling one thing at a time, but make sure it's all strung together. There is no silver bullet. Don't let sales tell you that if only they had a single one-pager that they could get the deal done because they will keep telling you that.”

“I call it treadmill marketing, when you are constantly producing one little small thing for sales, but it's not being reused or scalable in any way in the organization. And you're on the treadmill, you're running, running, running, but you're going nowhere. Get off the treadmill, create a strategy, and make sure it goes all the way through the funnel and pulls the string tight. Make sure it's consistent.”

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Owning the SMB Market: $1.3B in ARR with a New Demand Gen Playbook with Jamie Domenici, CMO of LogMeIn

Jamie Domenici, Ian Faison — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Jamie Domenici, CMO of LogMeIn, a pioneer in remote work technology that has become one of the world’s largest SaaS companies.

Prior to LogMeIn, Jamie spent ten years at Salesforce, serving in various marketing leadership positions including Global Senior Vice President of Customer Adoption, Marketing and Business Development.

On this episode, Jamie shares her secrets on how to dominate the SMB market, why product-led growth is the key to the future of SaaS, the complexities of marketing a large portfolio of digital products, and where B2B marketing is headed in the future.

Key Takeaways

Write down these words: Simplicity through efficiency to drive growth
PLG is key to the future of where SaaS is going
Simplicity matters. What would the T-Shirt say?

Quotes

“You’ve got to go where the customer is, especially in this current digital environment. And if they're in your product, it's so much easier to upsell and cross-sell there versus email or webinar or an area where you have to pull in. Having post-sale experience helped me to understand PLG because I think you have to look at that full funnel, and you’ve got to go where the customers are to really drive efficiencies within your marketing org.”

“Back in the nineties, marketing was all about leads and MQLs, and many companies are still there, but the modern marketer is responsible for a heck of a lot more. The world is digital, and I think B2C has driven a lot of B2B behaviors and the consumer is so key. So for me, the digital experience is the most efficient way to spend and it's critical to building your brand and driving traffic.”

“One of my most important measures now is actually website traffic as a key driver, because if I can fill this funnel, then all of the things I'm putting in place between e-com, PLG, sales optimization–that funnel is going to work, I just need to bring people in. I find driving awareness and building your organic website traffic is key to that long-term growth for a high-transactional company.”

“Simplicity matters. Whenever I start at a new company or a new role or a new team or a new campaign, I always do this exercise which is ‘what would the t-shirt say?’ I give everybody a t-shirt and try and synthesize the message of the campaign down to what would be on a t-shirt…and I use that as the basis to drive this thematic approach to the campaign that you'll steel thread through every tactic. It helps your team to not over-complicate…if you just really narrow it down to what you want to say to your buyer in the simplest form, I think it really helps you build a cohesive strategy around it.”

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Five Seconds to Wow Somebody: Two Decades of Demand Gen Secrets with Christelle Flahaux, VP of Marketing at FortressIQ

Christelle Flahaux, Ian Faison — Tue, 6 Apr 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Christelle Flahaux, Vice President of Marketing at FortressIQ, a pioneer in the burgeoning field of process intelligence.

Christelle is a seasoned professional drawing on two decades of experience in marketing, including senior leadership roles at some of the tech industry’s most recognized and fastest-growing B2B companies. Prior to joining FortressIQ, she served as CMO of Planful, formerly known as Host Analytics.

On this episode, Christelle lays out her approach to category creation and why content and analyst relations play key roles in marketing an emerging category. She also discusses why the CMO’s job is to be a listener, the content value of podcasting, and how to do ABM with food trucks.

Key Takeaways

Category creation means spending time with analysts and making it seem like it was their idea.
Use analyst relations as a demand gen engine and treat it like a budget item.
Repurpose your content.

Quotes

“Growing up in demand gen, I never realized how important analysts were…But what I've realized is that the relationship that you have with the analysts, being on their radar, always being in front of them, being a customer of some sort–I think that to me is uncuttable now. Six or seven years ago I would not have even brought up analysts, but I think analysts are very important.”

“I'm a huge fan of repurposing content. Do one thing and create six or seven pieces of content…I think that's what a lot of marketing teams get wrong is they always start with a fresh piece of paper…But it's not always about creating something from scratch.”

“The website's the front door to any company. You think about someone's first interaction with you as a potential vendor, and it's the website…You've got five seconds to wow somebody.”

“80% of people have probably already done their homework…And if they want to talk to you, they're going to reach out, which is why conversational marketing and chat is so hot right now, because it is such a low barrier to entry for me [as a prospective customer] to have a conversation with somebody and set up a demo. I just want to see the product. Period, end of story. Don't pitch me, don't ask me what my problems are, I already know what my problems are.”

“[My advice to a first-time CMO is] just listen. Do what you can to listen to the salespeople and to your customers. Before you do anything, make sure you understand your current state, what is actually happening, where you need to focus. And the only way you can do that is to be a listener. I say my first 30 days are usually spent as resident therapist for a lot of people because they always want to tell the new person what's wrong and how they would fix it. It's your job to understand the lowest common denominator and work your way through that list.”

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www.fortressiq.com

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Journey to CMO: What I Learned From the World's Greatest SaaS Companies with Naman Khan, CMO of Zeplin

Naman Khan, Ian Faison — Tue, 30 Mar 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Naman Khan, CMO of Zeplin.

Naman is an accomplished marketing leader with experience across B2B and B2C marketing and sales at some of the largest companies in the world. Before joining Zeplin, he served as VP of Marketing at Dropbox, VP of Product Marketing at Salesforce, and held marketing leadership roles at Microsoft and Autodesk.

On this episode, Naman discusses his journey from some of the world’s most recognizable brands to being a first-time CMO and standing up a new marketing organization. He also shares how he learned to harden messaging frameworks from Marc Benioff and more of the fascinating insights and most successful campaigns from his time at Salesforce and Dropbox.

Key Takeaways

How to harden messaging frameworks. It takes prioritization and curation.
Content is an investment, it doesn’t happen on its own.
Succeeding is great, but learning is way better.

Quotes

“I've been through messaging frameworks many times over my many years. There's only a handful of messaging that I've seen done well…When people like Marc Benioff review a messaging framework, they know what good looks like, so you learn how to harden messaging frameworks. You learn how to create really simple content that optimizes for simplicity instead of completeness or accuracy…What you really want to do is think about your user…You'll be lucky if they remember two or three things, so optimize for two or three things. This sounds so simple, but unless you've done it the hard way, it's very easy to keep making those mistakes.”

“We all want that very simple, elegant, pithy ‘A thousand songs in your pocket’ that kind of says it all. I don't think it's always going to happen, but that's the goal–to get to where you curate a message that people totally get…but that comes from curating and prioritizing. You really have to invest in it. Otherwise, you just end up with kind of flat, generic sounding messaging that you can just take your logo off and put a competitor's logo on.”

“When people think of tactics, they may not always think of website. But because we're a hybrid self-service and sales-assist model, our website is super, super critical. So making sure that the website is optimized for top of funnel, middle, and purchase is important. And again, that doesn't just happen. You have to be very thoughtful about when you update your website with different features, when you want to run a promo, when you want to spin up a landing page, and how that will affect the overall kind of revenue footprint for your company.”

“Growth experiments and our MarTech stack–I put those together because you just can't have one without the other. For us to drive revenue and drive demand, it's all about running experiments through the high volume of visitors and the high volume of freemium traffic that we get.”

“Succeeding is great, but learning is way better. The reason is marketing isn't just rinse and repeat. You can't have done growth optimization at one company, come do the exact same thing at another company, and think that anything will ever look the same. There are just too many variables.”

“You can glean a lot of insight if you invest in data science. You can actually build a pretty complete picture of what the user is doing. You see that in other industries like social media–they know what I'm going to have for lunch right now, it's kind of bananas. So if you invest in really learning about your customer–quant, qual, take a look at how they use your app, and you iterate on it and become really good at it, it makes for much more sophisticated, targeted, high-ROI marketing.”

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https://zeplin.io/

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Make It Memorable: Secrets from a 20 Year Tech Veteran on Tackling Global Expansion with Dave Dabbah, CMO of CleverTap

Dave Dabbah, Ian Faison — Tue, 23 Mar 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Dave Dabbah, CMO of CleverTap, the leading AI-powered customer engagement and retention platform.

Dave has been leading high growth marketing teams in Silicon Valley for the past 20 years. Prior to joining CleverTap, he led marketing at Agora, and he currently serves as an advisor and board member for several Silicon Valley startups.

On this episode, Dave details his strategy for building a growth brand in the B2B space, the unique challenges of being a global company and evaluating international markets, and why it’s your job as a marketer to always make things memorable.

Key Takeaways

It all starts with the most basic principle: Know who you’re trying to sell to. What exact problem are you solving for them?
You probably need to be doing 10X as much ABM as you’re currently doing if you’re trying to grow at scale
Whether it’s in product naming, branding, re-designing, re-branding, coming up with taglines, etc. it’s your job to make it memorable

Quotes

“Targeting lighthouse and strategic accounts is different than targeting the mid-market. [I’m a] big fan of ABM, but my take on ABM is there are different levels of ABM…If you're trying to build your business rapidly, and you're also trying to grab some portion of market share in a specific market, you need to do 10 times as much ABM as you're currently doing in order to really grow at scale.”

“In a B2B business, it becomes important that every potential brand, whether or not they're a potential customer today–they could be a potential customer tomorrow or a potential customer 36 months from now–is aware of [your] brand. And the only way to really do that is to make sure that the brand is getting in front of as many people as often as possible without annoying them along the way.”

“One of our biggest challenges globally is how do we keep the brand fresh? I’m a big fan of having large PR teams that are able to help a company expand pretty rapidly in a specific market…My experience has always been that the best way to grow a global brand is to grow it with leaders on the ground in those spaces and in those markets.”

“My take on PPC is different than a lot of other marketers in the B2B space. A lot of other marketers in the B2B space would simply say to you, ‘what's the return on investment for the amount of money we spend on our pay per click ads?’ The truth is if you just look at stuff like that, then you would probably stop spending money on PPC ads. What it really comes down to is brand recognition. You want people to see your brand and think about your brand…a large portion of our PPC budget is really just billboarding. It's providing us a significant amount of brand recognition, which you need to do time and time and time again in order to really build a growth brand in the B2B space in a lot of the markets that we're in.”

“My personal thing is to always try to make things memorable. If you don't try to make things memorable, then you’re not doing your job as a marketer. And when you look at a bunch of the B2B brands in the marketplace, how many of those would you consider to be memorable?”

Sponsor

Links

Leukemia and Lymphoma Society

Follow Dave on Twitter

https://clevertap.com/

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Stay Agile, Stand Out: Accelerating Pipeline to Achieve a $30B Market Cap with Len Fischer, SVP of Demand Gen at Okta

Len Fischer, Ian Faison — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 09:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Len Fischer, Senior Vice President of Demand Generation at Okta.

Len leads the team responsible for creating and accelerating Okta’s pipeline through campaign management, field marketing, partner marketing, and digital marketing efforts. Prior to Okta, Len was Executive VP of Marketing at BDNA, and held key leadership roles in marketing and sales at Informatica. He holds an MBA from Pepperdine University.

On this episode, Len shares how he and his team at Okta strive to be different, how his demand gen strategy changes over time, the person who he says can get him fired the quickest, and some of the most clever and interesting demand gen initiatives he’s seen.

Key Takeaways

Push the envelope on innovation with campaigns and demand gen initiatives
In SAAS, if you’re not focusing on customer marketing, customer success, and customer programs, you’re not going to be in business for long
Remember that sales is marketing’s customer, and in demand gen, the Head of Sales can probably get you fired faster than anyone else can

Quotes

“There's a big portion of my demand strategy that will change over time as the company evolves and changes. You have to be able to partner with not only sales, but the other functions within marketing in order to be effective. Think about demand over personalization, digitalization, and integration, and if those three themes carry through, you'll have a successful demand motion.”

“The person that can get me fired the quickest is the Head of Sales. So if the Head of Sales does not think I'm doing the job, regardless of if [the CMO] thinks I'm doing the job, that's the quickest way for me to get fired.”

“Not everything in marketing will work. That's the other thing that I've learned over the years. And what doesn't work typically will teach you more lessons than what does work. So as long as you're willing to think about why it didn't work and what kind of changes you would do next time, I think there's value in it, regardless of how much pipeline you get.”

“I'm a big believer that these experiential things really work, but I would rather do a few of them and go to the big events–go to the Final Four, go to The Masters…We want to be different, so if everybody has access to a Laker game or a Warriors game or a Giants game, then what difference is it? But if we're going to the World Series, then sure, let's talk about it.”

“Fight for your team because they'll fight for you…Bring the right people in and set them up for success. This is a very collaborative position and you have to work with a lot of different people, but ultimately I think if you bring the right people in and you set them up properly, [and] you fight for them with the rest of the organization on what we can do and what we can't do, it typically will work in your favor.”

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Links

Top 24 CMOs Share Their Uncuttable Budget Items

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A 4-time Tech CMO’s Secrets to Integrated Demand Gen with Lynne Capozzi, CMO of Acquia

Lynne Capozzi, Ian Faison — Tue, 9 Mar 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Lynne Capozzi, CMO of Acquia, the leading cloud platform for building, delivering, and optimizing digital experiences.

Lynne is a multiple-time tech CMO who first served as Acquia’s CMO in 2008, before leaving in 2011 to pursue nonprofit work full-time. She returned to Acquia in late 2016 to lead the marketing organization into its next stage of growth.

On this episode, Lynne explains why demand gen always needs to be an integrated strategy, how to create a great website experience, why it’s so hard to do personalization well, and why the next phase of the industry is moving from marketing operations to revenue operations.

Key Takeaways

Integrated campaigns always work the best for demand gen
You should be evaluating and re-platforming your website every 18 months
Intent data is the next opportunity for marketers

Quotes

“What we do for demand gen is all about integrated campaigns. The one thing I know about demand gen is that it's never a one-and-done type of task. Demand gen is very much an integrated strategy…it’s everything that falls under that roof to generate demand–it's multitouch, it's nurturing campaigns, it’s all about using the right tools…and so much of it is based on data and data analytics.”

“I re-platform every 18 months or so. That's the recommendation that I give to people. If you haven't [done] an evaluation of your website in the past two years, it's time to do it…A lot now is based on design. Do you have a modern, sleek design on your site? That's really important because that level of Netflix and Apple–that's kind of the experience that everybody is expecting now. So you need to make sure that your site is reflective of your brand, reflective of your messaging, and really have it be a great experience for customers.”

“I think there's a lot more to be done using intent data and using AI and machine learning…As marketers, I think we’ve got a lot of opportunity if we can look at intent data--looking at intent data and not waiting, but seeing where people are raising their hands and where the interest already is…to help you figure out what's the next action to take or the next market to go after.”

“We’ve spent the past couple of years in our industry in marketing gathering the data–now what? I want people that can help make the determination of what happens next and how do you use that data. And now I'm finding some really great marketing folks who are geared towards that. So we're moving from marketing operations to revenue operations, which is really the bottom line.”

“I think conversational marketing is critical. We're using it a lot right now…we use it to really drive our leads. And I expect that to continue even more in the future.”

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Achieving a $4.5B Valuation Through Product-Led Growth with Marie Gassée, VP of Growth at Confluent

Marie Gassée, Ian Faison — Tue, 2 Mar 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Marie Gassée, Vice President of Growth at Confluent, the enterprise event streaming platform provider that garnered a $4.5B valuation last year.

Prior to Confluent, Marie served as Senior Director and General Manager of the Online Sales Business Unit at Box, and she holds an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

On this episode, Marie discusses the heavily data-driven nature of her role, the product-led growth model that she embraces to maximize revenue and ROI, and the leadership philosophies she uses to trust and empower her teams.

Key Takeaways

SEO and SEM can be some of the lowest hanging fruit and some of the highest leverage tactics in your arsenal. Even small changes can make a meaningful impact on your business
Data data data. If you’re a data-driven organization, partner closely with your analytics folks or your data science team, and you can also see additional benefit from hiring marketers with a level of analytics proficiency
Hire great people that you trust, then open the purse strings and advocate for them

Quotes

“I'm really into the product led growth model...we focus on acquiring folks into the product, getting them onboarded, getting them active…Really trying to view it as kind of a pipeline mechanism. If I do my job well, I have a bunch of small teams active in the product, not spending a ton of money, but getting value from the product. And then we focus on handing that off to sales in a thoughtful way where they can add value and they can think about having a longer term relationship with Confluent.”

“The way I approach things is really to build a super strong partnership with our analytics folks, and then do everything in my power to unblock them--to give them budget, to help them hire, to give them head count…Ultimately I'm just going to sign the check for whatever my team says is good. That's my mentality: hire great people that you trust, and then if they say they need something, my job is to open the purse strings and advocate.”

“I think a lot of marketers maybe aren't as close to their data scientists or their analytics partners. For me, the quantitative part of marketing is what my job is, and so we certainly can't do that without our data science counterparts. The other thing I'll say is just a level of analytics proficiency for everyone on my team. That's another way to partner really well, is just making sure we hire folks who can self-serve a lot of their data, who can do high-level analyses, who value our data scientists and who love partnering with them. That's a big part of how we structure our team.”

“On the web optimization side, I enjoy it because it's like a puzzle…It's such a fun tactic, but also crazy impactful. You can make changes to your CTA or to the look and feel of a page and have meaningful downstream impact on your business. Not just in B2C, very much in B2B as well. I find that to be such an impactful, but also a satisfying tactic. You can do an AB test and meaningfully change the direction of your company. That's so insane and should be fully exploited.”

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How to Fuel Multi-Segment Demand with Esther Flammer, VP of Demand Generation at Conga

Ian Faison, Esther Flammer — Tue, 16 Feb 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Esther Flammer, Vice President of Demand Generation and acting CMO of Conga.

Esther is a senior marketing executive with nearly 20 years of B2B and agency experience in SaaS, high-tech, and non-profit sectors. Her dynamic leadership has driven success at high-growth B2B technology companies like Conga, Convercent, and Return Path.

On this episode, Esther discusses the balance between the art and science of marketing, what B2B can learn from B2C, and the different motions that fuel high-transaction, high-volume inbound pipeline versus the targeted ABM strategies that drive complex, enterprise-level deals.

Key Takeaways

Marketing is a delicate balance of art and science, but in demand gen, you’re going to need a lot of data to back up the strategies you employ for generating the pipeline needed to meet the company’s goals.
If you sell to SMB and Enterprise, high-velocity, high-transaction deals are going to be very different than complex, enterprise-level deals. Make sure you have distinct go-to-market strategies for each segment and that you’re fueling both engines, but that you also understand the overlap between the two.
In-person events are on hold, but virtual events are still a strong tactic. The reach is much larger but you have to be much more focused, purposeful, and intentional about the content to keep audiences engaged.

Quotes

“We see so much ROI and a lot of the bigger deals and true qualified pipeline coming from [our ABM efforts]. It’s a very multichannel, targeted effort, starting with the technology that provides propensity to buy data…really defining what those target accounts look like, adding in targeted advertising so that we can warm them up and truly personalize…then ensuring that we're delivering the right message to the right person at the right time, that it's personal, that it's relevant and it’s aligned with where they are in their buyer's journey.”

“We were invited to be on a pilot to try out Qualified.com on Salesforce AppExchange…and it's been a game changer completely. We've always had high volumes from AppExchange and from each of our product listings, but we were able to see much higher conversions, more qualified conversations and true pipeline come from that. So we’re huge fans.”

“Because of the fact that we don't really have live events where you would typically see conversations happening at a booth, [conversational marketing] has been a great addition to our full demand gen strategy and the tactics and channels that we're utilizing.”

“I think there's a lot that B2B can learn from B2C–tech and data analysis and neuromarketing and things like that. B2B tech is, I feel like, just starting to do that in a sense, but there's a lot that we can do to actually provide really relevant content to people who are looking to purchase.”

“I feel like when you're in demand generation, there's kind of always a target on your back just because you are accountable for the pipeline that the business needs to close in order to hit the bookings goals. Demand generation in most cases is front and center: What are you doing? What is your strategy? How are you producing more pipeline? ...Everything is very much kind of that art and science of marketing…So we use a lot of data and science to figure out how much pipeline we need, and for me, our goal of the demand gen team is predictable pipeline. We put a lot of effort into trying to figure out how much pipeline do we need to create in this quarter in order to hit our goals, both this quarter as well as next quarter and beyond.”

Sponsor

Links

Check out Conga's Agents of Change Podcast

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Marrying Creativity and Data to Become a $51B Business with Rachel Thornton, VP of Global Marketing for Amazon Web Services

Ian Faison, Rachel Thornton — Tue, 9 Feb 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Rachel Thornton, Vice President of Worldwide Marketing for Amazon Web Services, the comprehensive cloud computing platform that powers hundreds of thousands of businesses in 190 countries around the world, and is on track to surpass $51B in revenue in 2021.

Rachel is a true Demand Gen Rockstar, having been hailed in the press as “Captain of the B2B Marketing Dream Team.” She joined Amazon in 2013, serving as Head of Amazon Student and then Vice President of Global Field and Partner Marketing for AWS before her promotion to her current role in January 2020. Prior to Amazon, she served as VP of Marketing for the US, Canada, and Latin America at Salesforce.

On this episode, Rachel details the demand gen strategy that powers the dominant player in the cloud computing space, and shares the intricacies of the most important leadership principles that fuel successful marketing teams, from customer obsession, to diving deep, to thinking big, and much more.

Key Takeaways

Be customer-obsessed. Start from the customer’s point of view and work backwards. What is your customer trying to do from a business outcome perspective? What are they trying to achieve? Knowing that helps you write a great marketing / demand gen plan
Think Big. In marketing, it’s critically important to give teams the freedom to really use their imaginations and get creative with new ideas
Disagree and commit. For any new service, product, marketing idea, campaign, demand gen strategy, etc., it's critical to have an in-depth discussion and encourage disagreement. But at the end of the meeting, if the decision is made to go forward, then everyone must commit to making it work.

Quotes

“From a demand gen perspective, one of the most important leadership principles is customer obsession…When we think about our demand gen strategy and any new program or new campaign that we want to put together, we start from the customer and work backwards. I think that's probably what really helps us develop great demand gen and marketing programs.”

“The best way to figure out how you're doing from a measurement perspective is go into the campaign or the demand gen program with a clear set of objectives and outputs that you're looking to get…When we're developing campaigns, we always set up what do we want the impact of this to be? How do we want to define that? And How do we want to measure it?”

“Marketing is the beautiful marriage of not only creativity, but understanding data and doing a lot of data analysis. Because you want to make sure that whatever big idea you come up with–how do you test it? How do you refine it? And then how do you understand its impact? So that if you really love it, you can replicate it.”

“[My advice would be to] ask a lot of questions. Sometimes I think people don't want to ask questions. They're afraid, like ‘oh, I should know this.’ I'm a big believer: Ask the questions because there are probably other people sitting there thinking of the same question you are. Ask a lot of questions, really dive deep…I just think it helps you be so much more effective and efficient.”

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The Uncommon Art of Creating B2B Brand Champions and Super Bowl Ads with Joanie Wang, Director of Marketing at Expensify

Ian Faison, Joanie Wang — Tue, 2 Feb 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Joanie Wang, Director of Marketing at Expensify

Since joining in 2014, Joanie has helped grow Expensify into the most recognizable expense management platform in the space, spearheading the launch of some of the company’s biggest marketing initiatives. She has been named one of the Top Women Leaders in SaaS and one of the accounting industry’s Top 20 Influencers under 40.

On this episode, Joanie discusses how Expensify’s relentless focus on end-user experience turns customers into devoted champions of the product, how they work to cultivate a positive brand experience in every consumer interaction, and the process of launching their massively successful Super Bowl ad campaign.

Key Takeaways

In the enterprise space, focusing on the experience of the end-user of your product–not just the buyer or the administrator–is key to creating true brand champions.
Successful word of mouth marketing comes from cultivating brand champions and curating a positive experience in every interaction you have with current and potential customers. It’s not just the product you’re selling, but the community, the experience and the environment.
Marketers need to understand the shift that’s occurring as Millennials and Gen Z become a larger component of the workforce. They’re savvy consumers and they will be the ones to possibly make or break your business in the long term.

Quotes

“We've been very end-user centric in how we build out our product and who our ultimate consumers are. There are a lot of similar apps out there that focus on the person buying the software, not necessarily the person using it. What we realized is that when you focus on the end-user experience…they really become huge champions of your product.”

“At the heart of it, demand gen at Expensify is essentially a partnership between marketing, business development, and sales. We focus our efforts on entering and growing new markets by accelerating our word of mouth business model. It's been the heart and soul of our business since day one, and it's something that's been really effective for us in terms of how we've grown.”

“We focus a lot on creating experiences–whether that's at trade shows, in product, etc–creating experiences that are memorable and everlasting so that people not only believe in your product and love it, but become champions of it.”

“I recognize that brand is sometimes the opposite of demand gen, but I do think that it is a very important factor–at least from a top of funnel perspective–to stir interest and to create that initial awareness about our product…This idea of creating experience…is really setting the foundation for a lot of the demand gen work that we'll do later on. Anytime you come across Expensify, we focus on making sure…that everything that you come across is a positive experience.”

“We picked the Super Bowl because we knew that it was a moment in culture that everyone is paying attention to. In terms of meeting the audience where they are, that was kind of our moment. Everyone's paying attention. In fact, people are always on the lookout for commercials…We wanted a super large audience who is receptive to this kind of brand play, this sort of this messaging, and we wanted to meet them where they are.”

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All In: A Year of Rocketship Growth with Matterport CMO Robin Daniels

Robin Daniels, Ian Faison — Tue, 26 Jan 2021 11:00:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Robin Daniels, CMO of Matterport. Robin has built an impressive two-decade career at industry-defining tech companies across the US and Europe, previously serving as CMO of WeWork and in leadership positions at LinkedIn, Salesforce, and Box. He joined Matterport in early 2020 to lead worldwide marketing strategy at a time of rapid growth for the company.

On this episode, Robin shares how his “go all in or don’t go at all” mindset helped lead Matterport to rocketship growth in 2020 and which strategies, channels, and tactics he’s doubling down on for 2021.

Key Takeaways

When it comes to campaigns and launches, go all in or don’t go at all. Going halfway is a recipe for regret
Nobody can tell the story of what’s possible with a product better than your customers. Invest in figuring out the right stories and promoting them across the right channels
Remember that a marketing career is supposed to be fun! It’s not always going to be easy, but it should always be an adventure.

Quotes

“I'm very much of the mindset that if you're going to do something, you go all in or you don't go at all. I'm not a big fan of half-assing campaigns or launches. I've done a few in my career, and I always regret it.”

“Customer stories is something I've been trying to invest in heavily…Nobody tells a story of what's possible with Matterport better than our customers. Investing in figuring out the right customer stories, promoting them across all our different channels, getting them into the press, getting them into media is really, really important for us, but it takes investment.”

“The website for us is so key, and we've put a lot of effort into it…To me, the website is where it all starts. This is the first impression that anybody's going to get. Especially with something like Matterport, the first thing you see has to be so appealing that you want to know more”

“One of my pieces of advice to people who want to come into a new role or want to be a CMO: Don’t reuse the old playbook. You’ve got to try new things…Experiment like crazy. It’s great if you have some learnings and some ideas of what you want to do. But if you have a playbook, honestly, it’s probably outdated already. Try new platforms, try new messaging. Test, measure, learn, improve, that’s the way forward.”

“I have an opportunity here to really change the storytelling game and the demand game, because we can show up in ways on these platforms–through our visual storytelling–that no other platform can. In other companies, it’s always ‘imagine this.’ I don't have to imagine with Matterport, I just show. I always want to show the product.”

Sponsor

Links

Check out this open Demand Gen Leadership role at SurveyMonkey!

Follow Robin on Twitter

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ROI of Everything: The Playbook of a 4-time Tech CMO with Grant Johnson, CMO of Emburse

Ian Faison, Grant Johnson — Tue, 19 Jan 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Grant Johnson, CMO of Emburse. Grant is a four-time tech CMO with 20+ years of success in scaling marketing operations and building profitable global businesses. He was brought in last year to lead the group of six travel and expense management software vendors that came together as Emburse to challenge the industry incumbent.

On this episode, Grant discusses his holistic view of marketing, encompassing the four key levers and how they work together in an integrated marketing framework, as well as why the best strategies are customer-focused, how to be adaptable in applying your playbook, and much more.

Key Takeaways

Templates, tools, and playbooks are great frameworks to start from, but they’re not the actual roadmap. Keep an open mind and be willing to adapt your playbook as circumstances change.
Closed-won is the key metric. Marketing’s mindset has to be that volume of leads and MQLs don’t matter if sales doesn’t make the quarter.
The best practices and strategies are customer-focused. You’re more likely to be successful if you understand the pain points and personas and align content and communications to the buyer's journey.

Quotes

"My philosophy is the ROI of everything. If you can't project what a return is, I'm not spending that dollar…Pre-COVID, I cut between a half million and a million dollars out of events because they were harder to measure and they didn't prove to deliver the ROI. When COVID hit and I put the brakes on in-person events, it took me about five seconds to redeploy those dollars into digital channels."
"I tend to look at marketing very holistically. I don't think I can talk about demand gen without talking about what I consider the four primary levers, all working together to help demand gen work optimally. The levers are brand, communications, product marketing, and demand gen, and they really should ideally be part of an integrated marketing framework…those are the levers that really drive a company's positioning, opportunity, and ultimately its success."
"For me, the best practices and strategies start with a customer focus…As a head of marketing, that's where I've had the most success. What I consider the foundational work is if we understand the pain points, the buyer personas, and we align our content and our communications to the buyer's journey, we're more likely to engage successfully, create opportunities, nurture and progress those opportunities, and win that business."
"We have a high level of complexity because of our tailored solutions; my team is not creating holistic demand, we're creating specific demand…so we really have to understand a day in their life, what their watering holes are, what they're going to respond to…Is the value proposition resonating? Is the messaging resonating? By taking that very customer-centric, persona-specific approach, we’ve found that our demand gen tactics have worked better."

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Scaling Audience Engagement for the Fortune 500 with Leela Srinivasan, CMO of SurveyMonkey

Leela Srinivasan, Ian Faison — Tue, 12 Jan 2021 10:30:00 +0000

This episode features an interview with Leela Srinivasan, CMO of SurveyMonkey. Leela joined SurveyMonkey in April 2018 to lead all marketing functions including brand strategy, growth marketing, product marketing, and communications. Previously, she served as Chief Marketing Officer at Lever, VP of Marketing at OpenTable, and Director of Marketing at LinkedIn.

On this episode, Leela dives deep into the key components of her strategy, including how to truly understand and add value for your prospects, put your customers at the forefront of your marketing, optimize your channels and tactics, build community, and much more.

Key Takeaways

Know your prospect as well as you possibly can, and focus on how you can add value for them
Nothing can convince your future customers as well as the success stories of your current customers. Identify the customers you have who can best influence your prospects, and find ways to put them in the spotlight.
Experiment, optimize, and measure. You have to be experimenting with different channels and approaches all the time. Double down on the things that are working, while still trying to find the next set of channels or tactics that are going to take you to the next level.

Key Quotes

“We live in such a noisy world, and your prospects are being pinged left and right with messages and offers and opportunities from all of your competitors. So to have the right strategy, you have to understand what you can uniquely bring in terms of value to that prospect conversation.”
“Something that has been a mainstay of my demand gen strategy across companies is identifying the customers that you have who will influence your next customers, and then finding ways to put them in the spotlight, because nothing will convince the next set of customers like your current customers and the success that they are seeing with your solutions.”
“Experiment, optimize, and measure. I think about demand gen as a portfolio of approaches or tactics, and they're often at different stages of maturation. For the most mature ones, you are scaling and optimizing those, but in the interest of having value to add to your customer and reaching them in different ways, you have to be experimenting with different channels and different approaches at all times. You're constantly doubling down on things that are working while trying to find the next set of channels or tactics that are going to take you to the next level.”
“How do you add value to your prospect? What can you share with them that will be of insight to them? have that be the central meat of your campaign, and then figure out how to leverage that across as many viable channels as possible.”
“On NPS, I see a lot of companies that are measuring it, but the question is, what do you do with that? And do you understand the why? That's the big gap that I see sometimes is the failure to really understand the root causes of an NPS score and then put an action plan in place and charge after it, because it’s not a vanity metric. We shouldn't be navel gazing, we should be acting on what we learn.”

Sponsor

Links

Open Demand Gen Leadership Role at SurveyMonkey