Author: Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Suzi McNicholas at Johnson Controls

Suzi McNicholas, Director of Marketing for Residential & Light Commercial HVAC at Johnson Controls, discusses her career in B2B technology marketing. She talks about how marketing in the industrial sector has changed, the challenges of getting stakeholders to understand what marketing really is, and what B2B companies can learn from consumer marketing.

• Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
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• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Johnson Controls

Johnson Controls transforms the environments where people live, work, learn and play. As a global leader in smart, healthy and sustainable buildings, Johnson Controls’ mission is to reimagine the performance of buildings to serve people, places and the planet.

Building on a history of nearly 140 years of innovation, Johnson Controls deliver the blueprint of the future for industries such as healthcare, schools, data centers, airports, stadiums, manufacturing and beyond through OpenBlue, a comprehensive digital offering.

About Suzi McNicholas

Suzi McNicholas is Director of Marketing for Residential & Light Commercial HVAC at Johnson Controls. She leads the marketing team to support new product introductions and integrated marketing campaigns.

She has a 25+ year career in progressive B2B marketing roles including digital marketing campaigns, lead generation, branding, public relations, new product introductions, content creation, events, communications, and budget management.  Prior to joining Johnson Controls, McNicholas built an integrated marketing team at Honeywell in the Industrial Safety Products division.

McNicholas holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from Presbyterian College in Clinton, SC and a Post-Graduate degree in English and American Literature from the University of Hull in England.  She currently resides in Charlotte, NC.

Time Stamps

[00:47.5] – Suzi discusses her 25+ year career in marketing.

[05:32.7] – What are the differences to marketing to a channel partner versus an end user?

[08:55.3] – How do you manage short term and long term goals? Suzi discusses.

[13:28.2] – Suzi discusses how audiences reliance on sales is shifting.

[15:31:9] – Suzi talks about what she sees being the biggest changes in marketing over the next five years.

[18:50.8] – Suzi shares some advice to those looking to get into marketing.

[19:58.8] – Suzi’s contact details.

Quotes

“Don’t get emotionally attached to the outcome because your budget’s going to get cut… maybe your campaign isn’t going the way you’d want it to… that’s ok, you’re going to learn from what’s happening… you’re going to spend a whole lot of time frustrated and upset if you’re emotionally attached to these outcomes.” Suzi McNicholas, Director of Marketing for Residential & Light Commercial HVAC at Johnson Controls.

“People aren’t going to buy until they’re ready, and that 70% of the time that they’re spending before reaching out is research.” Suzi McNicholas, Director of Marketing for Residential & Light Commercial HVAC at Johnson Controls.

Follow Suzi:

Suzi McNicholas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suzimcnicholas/

Johnson Controls website: https://www.johnsoncontrols.com/

Johnson Controls on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/johnson-controls/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Suzi McNicholas at Johnson Controls

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Suzi McNicholas

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today.

Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier today, I'm joined by Suzi McNicholas. Suzi's the marketing director of Ducted Systems, Residential Light and Commercial at Johnson Controls. Welcome to the podcast, Suzi.

Suzi: Thanks very much for having me.

Mike: It's great to have you on the podcast. What we like to do is get all guests to you know, give us a bit of an introduction and really tell us about themselves. So can you give us a little bit of background about your career and how you've got your current role?

Suzi: Sure. So I've been a B2B marketer for 28 years. The vast majority of them have been in industrial manufacturing.

Mike: What is it you like about industrial manufacturing that's got you to stay there because you've been in some other industries as well.

Suzi: Yeah, I like industrial manufacturing because I find it interesting to try to make things that may not be super exciting, really exciting. And it's also been unchallenging in that if you say the word industrial from a marketing perspective, it can sometimes imply, you know, this sort of old style thinking, you know, sort of like, oh, we have a new product. Let's make a brochure and go to a trade show. And it's very different now. And so bringing these environments into, you know, what you and I would consider modern marketing, is actually a lot of fun for me, and it's a great challenge.

Mike: And so tell us a little bit about this. You know, maybe not so exciting area working at the moment, ducted system. So is that HVAC type equipment?

Suzi: It is, yes, for residential, ultimately, our products go into people's homes and and also some light commercial up to, we call it up to 150 tons, so a variety of buildings might use our rooftop units.

Mike: And, you know, having moved into industrial systems, you mentioned that industrial as a category is seen maybe as being perhaps a little bit behind the times when it comes to marketing. I mean, do you think having experience in other sectors has really helped you move forward when you've moved into industrial.

Suzi: Yes, and in fact, I use consumer examples all the time when I'm educating my stakeholders and others in the business about what marketing really is. That's an ongoing challenge. I think for all marketers. I saw a meme once that said all marketing job descriptions should come with a bullet point that says, must be willing to spend at least 50% of your time explaining what marketing is to non marketers. So it's an ongoing conversation. You know, I'm constantly educating people on what marketing really is.

Mike: I mean, I couldn't agree more. I think it's super important, particularly within the organization, to explain what you're trying to do and what you're trying to achieve. I mean, one of the things you mentioned, and I think some of the listeners on the podcast who are very much B2B would have definitely picked up, was the fact that, you know, a lot of your products get sold to consumers. So I mean, presumably that's through a sales channel. So are you actually doing elements of consumer marketing, or is it really a pure B2B play?

Suzi: Well, we are not targeting the consumer ourselves directly, because we don't have the money or the resources to try to do that. So typically, we're two levels away from the actual consumer. We sell our equipment to distributors, and then the distributors then sell to the installers or dealers or contractors. Those are we use those words interchangeably. What we will do is provide assets that speak to the consumer and give those assets to the contractors so that then they can take that information and use it to market to their audience, which is the consumer, so we're sort of three layers away from the actual homeowner, but that's what we do, to try to empower the contractors to be more effective in their markets.

Mike: That's interesting. I mean, is the product? You know, perhaps the brand is more important to those installers, those contractors, because they're the guy's going to get a call if it breaks down, then maybe it is to consumers who don't feel able to differentiate. Is that a reasonable summary the market, or is it somewhat different?

Suzi: Yeah, that is a reasonable summary in general, and there are always exceptions, but I would say in general, consumers aren't researching the actual brand of the air conditioning unit that you're going to install. The consumer's primary concern is, is my contractor certified? Do they know what they're doing? You know, really, the consumer is just thinking, please make me comfortable in my home, right? That's really all they want. Just make sure it works and that my contractor knows what they're doing, and then I can go back to my contractor if I ever have. Issues or problems. We do get some homeowner inquiries directly on our website, but in in general, those are folks looking for support, not necessarily, you know, looking to speak to a salesperson about the actual unit. They use their contractors for that.

Mike: That makes a lot of sense. And so that's why, you know, in your role, it's very much B2Be but it's marketing to a channel, rather necessary marketing to an end user. Is that really different? You know, trying to persuade a channel partner to take a product rather than an end user? Or do you see it as being very similar?

Suzi: It's different because, particularly with the contractor, they want to know that they can install this product and it's going to work, right? They don't want to be called out to make repairs or change things. They want to sort of set it and forget it, right? So it's important to them that the quality is there, but also the serviceability. So how can they access if there is need for a repair? How easy is it to get into the unit? Things like that. These are the things that we think about when we're engineering the products themselves.

Mike: That makes a lot of sense. But looking at what you do, I mean, you're obviously somebody who's looked at integrated marketers across the whole of marketing, in many of your roles, what do you think the key is to creating campaigns that really work across, you know, multiple channels and multiple tactics?

Suzi: Well, first and foremost, you know, I think the mark of any great marketer is the ability to put yourself in the shoes of your target audience. So the message is critical, and I'm sure that's no surprise to anybody who is listening, from a marketing standpoint, right? The very essence of marketing is to try to create an emotional connection to the person doing the buying, but an integrated marketing campaign, once you get the message down and it's the right message for your target audience, in my mind, includes a mix of tactics, and you have to reach people in multiple ways. And for me, you know where they live is majority online these days, so it has to you have to hit them from every direction that you can. It has to be email, it has to be social, it has to be some digital advertising on the websites that your target audience may spend time on, even in our case, radio ads. If you think about those contractors who are out in their trucks all day long, right? They're they're listening to the radio. Radio works great for us, and to some extent, in person events, to kind of supplement those digital tactics. So I'd say marketing is more complex than it's ever been before. I mean, when I started, marketing was really advertising and nothing more, but that's when the internet was a baby. So to me, it's a mix of tactics. And then the other piece that's so critical is the technology. If you don't have the right tech stack, you can reach your audience, but measuring becomes very, very difficult, so it's important that you've got the right marketing automation platforms, that your website and landing pages have the right technology, so that you can kind of watch the user, you know, click on an ad from social and go to the landing page, and then what do they do next? And so on. So it's a it's the message, it's the mix of tactics, and it's having the right technology.

Mike: In my mind, that's fascinating. I mean, I love the example of, you know, radio advertising reaching your audience really well, because I think a lot of people wouldn't. They normally assume radio advertising is really pure consumer, but you've clearly got a market there that, as you say, is listening to radio a lot.

Suzi: Absolutely and even sometimes billboards, you know, we will provide the the asset, you know, needed the graphics and the design needed if somebody wants to put up a billboard in in their market. So, yeah, you know, every audience is, is different, and some tactics work with some audiences and others, not necessarily, but in our world, it's an interesting mix, for sure.

Mike: And does that mean you're continually experimenting and trying new tactics? I mean someone at some point must have said, Hey, we could try the radio. And I guess there was some pushback there. Is there always experimentation.

Suzi: Absolutely. And in fact, the most recent campaign that we ran was the first time that we actually added radio in, and it worked. And so it's it's great when you introduce these new sort of tactics and find out what works, but also important is what doesn't work. You know, there if a campaign isn't going the way that you want, that's okay, because you're still learning from it. Now you know kind of what not to do. So yes, we're always testing. We're always trying different things. It's important that you do that. And you know, with the way that technology is changing, I'm sure we'll be doing things in the next five years that we haven't even thought of yet.

Mike: That sounds really exciting. I mean, one, one question, you know, as a marketing leader, how do you balance this requirement for, you know, short term returns through lead generation, for example, and then this longer goal of building brand and establishing reputation. I mean, do you have an approach that lets you balance your activities and your budget?

Suzi: That's a great question. You know, all marketers go through this, right? We are to. Day more than ever before, forced to do more with less. And so, yes, it's an interesting balance. You know, leads are very, very important, and generating those leads are very important for us as marketers to be able to justify, you know, the work that we're doing. But we do also pepper in thought leadership and other types of, you know, content creation that we know will live for, you know, a year or more, let's say, on our website or somewhere on the internet that people can access. And those are the activities that I think help build the brand over time. Because when you when you focus on thought leadership, you're positioning yourself as an expert in your field, which we absolutely are, in our industry in particular, but it's a balance, particularly when you're trying to convince those who hold the purse strings to invest in something that may not be seen as direct lead generation, but more of a strategy for the Long Haul.

Mike: I mean, you're obviously not afraid to try things. I mean, you've mentioned radio. Are there any other sort of innovative campaigns you've run recently that have been, you know, particularly successful, or, you know, maybe leverage something new?

Suzi: So what I will say is, you know, we are doing what today, what I think you would define as, you know, standard integrating marketing campaigns. But I have been looking, I look all the time at the competition and see who's doing what out there that's different or new. And I will say that, while it's somewhat controversial, Tiktok is a very interesting marketing platform in my mind. Now, most people think of Tiktok as, you know, the fun dances, or, you know, whatever it may be. That's why I joined, right? Just to watch my kids do cute things. But I have done a little research, and there's a competitor that has a branch in Austria. I won't name them by name, but they they did a campaign over the holidays where they featured cartoon characters interacting with their products. And it was basically like Santa Claus and all the elves were interacting with their products, you know, around the holidays. So it was set with, you know, snow and there's a fireplace and there's a Christmas tree. And it was just an, a real interesting way to promote themselves, you know, in a seasonal type of campaign that people may not necessarily associate with HVAC or comfort, but if you think about it, you know, if you think about Christmas and the fireplace and the tree, you know this is kind of warm, cozy, very comfortable type of feel. So I just thought it was a very interesting way to engage with their target audience, you know, around the holidays in this kind of feel good way.

Mike: I love that. I think that's a great idea. And, you know, I think it's been really interesting, Suzi, because you've talked about a lot of things that I suspect other marketers in between would be quite afraid to try. So, you know, I really hope you've encouraged marketers to try something new, try something different. In terms of talking to you on the podcast, I'd really like to talk a little bit about some of the things that are changing in marketing and some of the trends. And in particular, we're seeing a lot of research that suggests that customers are spending less time talking to salespeople and more time interacting with marketing content with your industry, is that the case are you seeing the same thing? Are your contractors and your distributors spending less time with sales?

Suzi: Yes. And interestingly enough, I just recently saw a statistic that's relevant to this question, from a study in 2023 called the B2B buyer experience report that was published by a company called six cents. The statistic is that 70% of the buyer journey happens before the very first conversation, and it's 83% of the time that the first contact is initiated by the buyer. So what that tells me is people aren't going to buy until they're ready, and that 70% of the time that they're spending before they reach out is research, right? Think about it. As consumers, we behave in the very same way. Let's say you're going to buy a, you know, pick anything, you're going to buy a new camera. You're probably going to spend some time online, you know, researching and and looking at recommendations and referrals and things of that nature, it's exactly the same way in B2B, those, those lines between B2B and B to C are starting to blur a little bit. So, yes, that 70% is all marketing. It's the content that marketers put out on the web. You know, it's the trying to get, you know, our content in front of people on social or digital advertising or email, you know, that kind of thing. So, yes, that initial part is very, very important, because, again, they're 70% of the way through their buyers decision before they ever reach out to a salesperson. Yeah.

Mike: I think that's a great stat. And, you know, I wish a lot of people in charge of allocating budgets would recognize how important marketing was. You know, it's been a big trend, and I think covid has really impacted how much people want to talk with salespeople.

Suzi: Don't you absolutely, totally agree with you?

Mike: I mean, I think looking forward, I'm interested to know. You know, there's a lot of technology out there. Ai probably is the thing people talk about most, or I'm not sure it's the biggest thing. What do you think is going to be the biggest thing changing marketing in the next five years?

Suzi: I do think it's going to be AI, but I don't necessarily think that AI is going to take anybody's jobs away. I think that it will become a wonderful productivity tool for marketers to pull information down and help develop business cases for what it is that we are trying to do. So I see it as a I see it as a positive, even though I will tell you, personally, I'm still kicking the tires, and I'm not exactly sure how it's going to work, but we're looking into some of those platforms now as a company to determine, you know, which is the right one for us to start down this, you know, AI journey, if you will.

Mike: I mean, it is fascinating, and AI certainly is going to be a factor. It's gonna be interesting to see, I think, how it changes. I think we're all looking to try and wear that out at the moment. I mean, with this amount of change, how do you think the role of marketing leaders, and maybe your role particularly, is going to move over the you know, next few years?

Suzi: Well, I'm coming, I'm going to come back to my education piece. Because if you and I as marketers are kind of looking at this like not exactly sure how this is all going to play out, then I can assure you that anybody outside of marketing doesn't know. So it's going to be again that continuing education helping you know our stakeholders and leadership understand the benefits of it and how we will apply it. And there are some concerns around security when it comes to AI, you know, and making sure that whatever we upload that might be proprietary company information, you know, how does all of that work? These are some of the things that we are trying to work out now. So as a marketer, how this is going to impact me and my role is going to be twofold. It's going to be, you know, continuing that education and just adding one more topic to the level of marketing education that we have to give but also, how exactly are we going to use it? How will AI be kind of a helper or an assistant to me, these are the questions that I don't necessarily have answers to, but those are the two things that pop into my mind when you ask that question.

Mike: That's fascinating. I mean, it's been really interesting talking to you, and I'm aware you're very busy. So before you go, there's a couple of standard questions we'd like to ask everyone. So one of the things I'd like to say, you've given us lots of advice. But Suzi, what's the best marketing advice you've ever been given?

Suzi: Don't get emotionally attached to the outcome, because that you know your budget's going to get cut, right? And that's frustrating, right? And maybe your campaign isn't going the way that you want it to. And like I mentioned earlier, that's okay, too. You're going to learn from what's happening. And even with things like budget cuts, you know, it gets frustrating, and a project that you really want to do gets, you know, put on the back burner because of budget cuts, you're going to spend a whole lot of time frustrated and upset if you're emotionally attached to these outcomes. So in my mind, it's you got to roll with it. Things are changing all the time. Disappointments happen, so try to stay as objective as possible and do your job to the best of your ability.

Mike: I love it. That's great. The other question I want to ask you is, if you were talking to a young person about to embark on a career in marketing, what advice would you give them?

Suzi: The first thing I would say is, go for it. I love what I do. I think marketing is a fantastic career, and you have to be able to balance your sort of right part of your brain and your left part of your brain. So it gives you an opportunity to be really creative, which is the fun stuff, but then you also have to be able to look at the numbers and start to put that together in a way that can continually educate and convince your stakeholders that what you're doing works and that you are positively impacting revenue. So it's a balance between the creative side and the analytical side. So if you think you can do that, jump on in the water's warm.

Mike: That's awesome and a really positive way to end. I love that. I've really enjoyed our conversation, Suzi, I think particularly, I've loved the way you've talked about some very different tactics and had the courage to try those, and also talked about the importance of educating people about what you're trying to do in marketing, it's been really enjoyable getting to know you. So thank you very much. If people have any questions, you know what's the easiest way for them to contact you?

Suzi: Well, you can find me on. LinkedIn, it's Suzi, S, U, Z, I, and the last name is Mick, Nicholas, and that's m, c, and then the name Nicholas, N, I, C, H, O, L, A, S, and you'll find me. I'm currently employed at Johnson Controls, but we did just get sold. My business unit just got sold to Bosch, so we're in a transition period, but I'll be with Johnson Controls here for the next 10 to 12 months.

Mike: I think sounds like there's a whole new set of challenges for you to face over the next couple of years. I wish you the very best for that. Maybe we should have you on once you've made that transition to talk about it, that could be a great discussion. Suzi, thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Suzi: Thank you delighted to be here, and thanks again for your time. I appreciate it.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode, and if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at napierb2b.com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with John Harrison - Schaffner

John Harrison, UK Managing Director and Global VP of Marketing at Schaffner, a global company specialising in providing solutions for EMC and power quality, joins the latest episode of the Marketing B2B Technology podcast.

In the episode, John discusses the challenges and benefits of balancing two job roles and emphasises the importance of aligning sales and marketing to strengthen the brand and drive sales. He believes in leading with a forward thinking approach, understanding customer needs, and staying ahead of industry trends, particularly in the niche area of EMC.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
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• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Schaffner

Schaffner plays a vital role in building a sustainable future in the new era of electrification. Headquartered in Switzerland and with subsidiaries around the world, Schaffner is a global leader in electromagnetic solutions that ensure the efficient and reliable operation of electronic systems. The Schaffner Group are experts in EMC filter solutions, harmonic filters, electromagnetic components and electromagnetic solutions. Our passionate and knowledgeable employees empower our customers to develop reliable electronic devices and systems that meet compliance standards and deliver increased energy efficiency.

This is how we deliver…

MORE POWER TO YOU.

About John Harrison

John Harrison joined Schaffner in April 2022.  He is the UK MD and Global VP Marketing.  He has spent 25 years in the electronics industry primarily within the connector space for Molex.  John has extensive international experience having lived and worked across Europe and the US, covering a range of markets from Industrial to transportation.  His most recent experience prior to Schaffner was within the IOT space for Ramtech heading up their Global Marketing and Sales activities. John is passionate about EV and increasing speed of adoption across the globe.

Time Stamps

[00:43:0] – John provides some background to his career.

[03:30.8] – John discusses how he manages the demands of both the UK Managing Director role and Global VP of Marketing role.

[05:04:7] – John shares his views on whether he thinks marketing and sales should be closer together or not.

[06:05:2] – John talks about what he’s looking for from marketing to make the role of MD more successful.

[13:38:9] – John shares his approach of trying to get salespeople, marketing people and engineers working more closely.

[19:31:0] – John talks about how he sees his role changing with technology over the next five years.

[20:49:1] – John shares some advice to those looking to get into marketing.

Quotes

“Marketing and sales need to be closer together. The ultimate aim for both is to drive more customers and value for the brand. We need to focus on the customer’s needs, whether it’s through direct interaction or brand messaging.” John Harrison, UK Managing Director and Global VP of Marketing at Schaffner.

“From a sales perspective, it’s not just about leads. It’s about ensuring the brand is seen as a partner and thought leader, especially in specialised areas like EMC.” John Harrison, UK Managing Director and Global VP of Marketing at Schaffner.

“It’s crucial to put yourself in the customer’s shoes. If a piece of marketing material doesn’t resonate with the customer, it’s not effective. Marketing should be about creating content that truly addresses the customer’s needs.” John Harrison, UK Managing Director and Global VP of Marketing at Schaffner

Follow John:

John Harrison on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-harrison-3552ba14/

Schaffner website: https://www.schaffner.com/

Schaffner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/schaffner-gruppe/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with John Harrison - Schaffner

Speakers: Mike Maynard, John Harrison

Mike: Thanks for listening to marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing.

Today, welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. Today I'm joined by John Harrison. John is the UK Managing Director and the global VP of Marketing for Schaffner. Welcome to podcast, John.

John: Thanks, Mike. It's great to be here.

Mike: It's great to have you on. And as always, you know, what we'd like to do is let you tell us a bit about your career and how you've got into the role that you're currently holding?

John: Yeah, well, it's a little bit of a long story, really, mate. I spent, you know, sort of early part of my career in sales at a connected company called Molex. I'm sure many of your listeners will be well aware of covering a number of customers across the UK. And you know, as we've been through the various sales cycles, you move from customer to customer or Market to Market, and so it's given me a really good, broad overview of what's happening in the marketplace, where the technologies are moving. And after, you know, around 10 years or so in those sorts of roles, I moved at the Netherlands for my first overseas role, where I was had my first sort of glimpses into marketing, more Industry Marketing, as opposed to corporate and brand marketing. And that was a military area, really quite a short term assignment before I moved up to Sweden, where I moved into more sales management and general management. Now there was really my first opportunity to run international teams, and that was something that I really enjoyed, being able to travel having a multicultural team. And it was really those, I guess, first couple of years, or first three, four years in those roles that really pointed me in the direction I wanted to sort of continue in my career. So I moved back to the UK to take on a larger European role at Molex, and before then going over to the US for a role within the industrial space. So that was a really interesting time of of not just my life, but my family's life, moving over there again, experiencing something different. And I think that's really the key to an interesting career. And to sort of build your experience is to try different things. Certainly not everything's going to go to plan, but it gives you the opportunity to try something different. I then moved back to Europe and left the industry briefly to work in a construction wireless company, and that's where I moved into a sales and marketing director role, and again, that gave me sort of the first insights into marketing agencies. We started to talk to them about, how could we promote our products, how could we build our brand across the industry? And that gave me really good experience in working with agencies, particularly in trying to find the right agency. I think that, you know, that's key, and that's been really good for our work with Napier. And next I moved to Schaffner, where I am now in my UK MD role, and I've taken on the global VP role.

Mike: So that's interesting. I mean, obviously, from an outsider, it sounds a bit like they had two jobs, and they gave them both to you, rather than necessarily having a single job that combined UK Managing Director and global VP. I mean, how do you manage to balance demands those two really quite different roles?

John: Yeah, well, interestingly, the original role I applied for was the UK MD role and chatter had been through a big rebranding exercise. Just as I started, I saw there was a huge opportunity for us to do more with the brand, and I'd sort of given some ideas and made my sort of voice heard. And the CEO at the time said, yeah, that's all that's that's great, John. So if you want to do something, then you go and do it. So the role for the VP role came sort of by accident, really, and it's something that I've, you know, I've really enjoyed, but to balance the two roles, it's really about priority. Of course, I have customers in my UK role, and I need to focus on those. First of all, they're paying the bills, but the VP of marketing role gives me an opportunity to really look a little bit more longer term. I'm also fortunate that I have a really good team in both areas that enables me to sort of have the time to focus on on both. And whereas they're doing the day to day activities. We also work, obviously, with our various partners and agencies, that enables me to have the time to think about what we're doing on a more strategic basis.

Mike: And presumably, if you do a good job in that VP of marketing role, it's actually going to make that UK MD role easier, because it will drive more sales.

John: Yes, exactly, and it gives me an opportunity to really see whether the things that we're doing in the marketing side are actually having an impact on the sales side.

Mike: I mean, that's interesting, because people talk a lot about this, this separation between marketing and sales. Is it your belief that marketing sales should be closer together, or do you think it's better running them separately?

John: I think that. To be closer together. And you know, if you think about what the ultimate aim for both activities, it's about customers. Maybe you know they're talking to customers in little different way. But ultimately, we need to drive, you know, more customers, more value for shasner and for any brand that in that matter, towards us. And that's about saying the right things, understanding the value that we bring, understanding problems, understanding the solutions, and whether that's in front of the customer, over a desk or over a design, or whether it's electronically, or thinking about the brand as a whole, the customer has to be the focus of all of that activity.

Mike: That's interesting, because I wonder what in your sales role, your more sales focused role, as MD, you're expecting from marketing? I mean, is it the classic, we want good leads? Is it we want the market to be interested in the products and be aware of them? I mean, what are you looking for from marketing to make that MD role more successful?

John: Well, the easy answer to that is, is leads. Everybody wants good leads. But that's not quite as simple as it seems. And often, if you put too much focus on lead activity, you can really potentially damage the brand. And over the long term, you know, if you're not putting out good, good assets, good content, then the leads won't come. So it's a careful balance. What I really want, as my UK MD hat on, is for customers to see the brand as a partner, as a thought leader, someone who really understands, in our case, EMC. So if our customers are thinking anything to do with EMC, we come to someone who knows about it, and that Schaffner, then I've done a good job with my other hat on my my VP of marketing hat. I mean,

Mike: it sounds like to summarize it, you want to be seen as a leader. You want people to to have you at the top of their list when they're thinking about a supplier for in schaffner's case, EMC,

John: yes, definitely. And if you think about EMC, it's quite a narrow field within electronics, and there aren't that many people who really understand EMC. So you know, our job is to really understand EMC to the highest level of detail and allow our customers to focus on what they do well, which is creating innovative new products and solutions for their customers. When it comes to EMC, we want them to say, I'm not so sure about EMC, let's go to Schaffner. They know what they're doing. We've seen the white papers. We've seen the articles. We know they understand EMC, let's bring them in to start to talk to them about solutions for our products and our solutions.

Mike: I love that. I think that's a really clear vision for marketing. So on the other side, you know, when you see problems, what do you think from a sales point of view, marketers tend to get wrong.

John: Sometimes it can sort of be over exaggerating. You know, where your expertise is. I think we need to be really, really careful. And we're lucky in some respects, because we're quite narrow in terms of our, you know, our market reach and the technology that we focus on. But if you're a larger organization, the challenge for me is, how do you, how do you really cover all of that without becoming just too sort of broad, then you lose that level of knowledge that you're trying to portray to the customer? I think that's one of the key, the key challenges. And I think the other one is around, around leads. You know, trying to focus too much on on leads, because, of course, that's what sales always wants. That's what I always want with my UK MD hat. But that's not always possible depending on the assets and the you know what you're working towards.

Mike: That's interesting. One of the things you know, we've seen with some other clients is people are talking about this research that they're showing. In general, customers are spending more time engaging with marketing materials and less time talking to sales. They talk to sales people later in that sales process. I mean, is that something you've seen at shafner, where people are relying more on content and less on talking to salespeople? And then how do you change that balance between marketing and sales to accommodate it?

John: Well, I think we've definitely seen that. I think we've spoken in the past. Mike, it's moved on in my early days. And as a salesperson, I was, I don't know like to use the font of all knowledge, but I had information. So customers would call me for information, for drawings, for specs, all of that is available now. So for salespeople, they don't have that advantage that that I had 20 years ago that people needed me. So I think from a marketing perspective, now, the challenge is to get people to view that content, and that's drawing people into the right places, whether that's through white papers or articles to pull them towards shafter.com in our state, or whether it's getting them to go to our distributors pages to look for parts, to understand what we're providing. So I think that's a different way of talking to customers now than we did 1520, years ago, even 10 years ago to that matter.

Mike: I mean, that's fascinating. I remember, you know, and some people know that I actually started engineer, then moved into sales. At one point, we had a line of displays, and there were literally less than 100 data books. For the whole of the UK, and working in technical sales, it was easy to get a meeting if someone's interested in the product, because that was the only way they're going to get the data to design it in. So I totally agree with you. I think, I think things have changed. It's interesting. You say it's now not a case of scarcity of data. There's there's just so much information out there. Getting attention is important. I mean, one of the things we see some clients doing is trying to apply, you know, perhaps more tactics associated with consumer marketing rather than B2B marketing. Do you see that happening and trying to get engagement that way with some products?

John: Yes, I think so. And that's definitely, definitely evolved when you think of B to C, it's as the name suggested the consumer, and as B2B, we're really now trying to think about the consumer within the within the B within the business. And so it's about, you know, for us, trying to build up and profiles or personas within those businesses so that we can start to talk them in the right way, just as you see in the B to C arena, where is very much a much more targeted approach, and that's you know what we're doing. So a good example would be, when we're looking at content that we're developing, we're going to do that for a design engineer, or maybe we're doing it for a for a purchasing manager. And those two things may be very different, clearly, if we're talking to a design engineer or a compliance engineer, but the level of technical content needs to be higher, whereas, from a procurement perspective, we're talking to a persona there, then maybe we look at, perhaps more, some of the commercial aspects about service support. You know how easy it is to get the parts, for example. So I think, you know, we're being much more focused and considerate around how we target those personas, just as the consumer companies do an excellent job, and we in the in the B2B space, need to really think about that. Now, that's really interesting.

Mike: It sounds like you're saying that it's not necessarily a case of just stealing ideas from the consumer sector, it's much more about rather than thinking you're talking to a business in the marketing, realizing that your marketing should be talking to a person. Is that, is that what you're saying?

John: Yes, yeah, exactly. But you know, behind every business, it's about people. And if you're in procurement, then the way that you're measured, rewarded, satisfied, is very different to someone who is within the engineering disciplines. So if you don't get that content right, you could get it very wrong. And perhaps back to your one of your earlier questions around, what can marketing get wrong is if you speak to that person in the wrong way, you could really damage that relationship, potentially, by giving them something that they certainly don't want, but also wasting a lot of time. And so we're really careful about the type of content that we put out there, where we're pushing it, and making sure that we, you know, we put ourselves in our audience's shoes, really, and provide them with something that brings real value to them.

Mike: That's great. I think that's excellent advice to anyone thinking about building campaigns, is think about the people you're talking to a little bit earlier. You talked about the need to get marketing and sales closer together, and you've also talked about the challenge of creating this highly technical content, which clearly is an engineering input. So do you have a way or an approach of trying to get these three groups, very different groups of salespeople, marketing people and engineers together and working, you know more closely

John: well, we don't really have a formal approach. It's almost, you could say it's almost like start of a joke, actually, isn't it that you've got sales people, technical people and marketers, you know, together in a room, and what happens? But for me, it's, it's about communication and and making sure that we understand what each of those stakeholders is is looking for. You know, clearly our more technical team are looking to provide high quality content. Our salespeople are looking for leads and for development of the brand. So how do we pull that together? So? So what we do within Schaffner and I've done in in other businesses, is before we start to talk about what we're going to do, we pull everyone together and to make sure we're all on the same page. So we're getting that feedback. It's also as we go through the process, communicating what's what's happening, so that sales aren't surprised that a content is going out, or where that content is being sent, and for our technical teams that they're involved, and that if we get questions and feedback from that content, that they're ready and able to answer that. So we try and provide the right people to the right point within those campaigns, but they all need to be talking together. I'm sure there are more formal ways of doing that, but within a business like ours, we go back to a much more simple route, which is that we just need to communicate and do that well, such a great solution for so many problems.

Mike: Just get people to talk together. I think that's a great solution. I mean, I guess as well. You know, we talked about the three groups that are marketing, sales and engineering, but there's almost like a fourth person coming in now, which is AI. What do you see the impact of AI being at the moment? And. Do you think it's going to just keep going and eating different functions, or do you think there's some pitfalls we need to be worried about?

John: Well, I think think about the positives are, you know, we talked about all of this data that's available. The ability of AI to be able to go through that data and pick out the best parts of that data and give you access to all of that data is huge. It's incredible that that's possible, and no human is able to do that on their own. That, you know, the concern, or the the challenge is it, it could become quite one dimensional. And then, potentially, if everyone has the same data and they're using the same AI algorithms, you essentially come up the same thing. So potentially, from a competitive standpoint, you know, we could all be talking roughly the same thing without a real difference in tone. And I think that's the key. And when I think back to what we're doing at Schaffner, we talked earlier about our leadership in EMC, that comes down to the people. So we want that to be more than one dimensional. We want it to be real people who really understand the subject in in depth, and it's about the nuances. And we also need that, not just from our technical people, also from our marketeers, so that when we create that content, it is a far more nuanced approach. You know, we've had conversations might before about AI and could AI, you know, write an article? Of course, it can, but it doesn't have that nuanced approach. And can become a little say me, and that's, you know, that's not good enough. It might be good enough for some, but it's not good enough for us, and we want to make sure that we're really stepping forward, that we're leading those conversations. And for me, AI, isn't that level yet, and maybe never will do, because there is that nuanced approach from from journalists or from our technical people that we need to get out there to our customers.

Mike: It's really interesting. I mean, one of the themes I've heard from you through this interview, John, is that it seems like you have this really clear vision that you have to be seen as the leader in the market, and that's where you'll be successful by having that leadership, not by seeing as being seen as being good, but by being seen as being seen as being the best and the most innovative and the most thoughtful, is that a fair reflection of your vision?

John: Yes, yeah. And that comes down to very much how, you know, Schaffner has been built up over the years, and that has been to be the leader in EMC. And I think if you talk to most EMC say, experts or EMC engineers, Schaffner is extremely well known. And if is there as the leader. So, you know, we take that very seriously. So we're, we're always working to try and find out what's what's coming next, and we've, we've done that over the last number of years, particularly when we look at campaigns, you know, looking at what's happening in the market, where are regulations going? And that's a different conversation around what products do we have? It's about where the regulations going and how does that impact our customers and our market. And that's really where we can add value as we move forward.

Mike: That's very insightful, and I've certainly seen it working with Schaffner, where we've had conversations about topics. And the question has obviously from us as agency, been what does this mean to customers today? And the answer quite often is, well, really today doesn't mean very much, but if customers aren't thinking about it, then it's going to be a big problem tomorrow. I love that, that forward thinking approach you've taken,

John: yeah, and I think that that's absolutely key. There's, you know, there's lots of people making similar products to us, but what they don't have is that real, in depth understanding of EMC, not working on the committees, understanding where those regulations are going because those regulations, you know, may seem a little way off, but they'll soon come up. And design cycles are quite long in in our industry, particularly in industrial and it needs to be right. So, you know, the question we ask ourselves is, how can we help our customers navigate through those regulations? Be that sort of level of expertise to help them, support them through that. We may not know all the answers all of the time, but we can start that conversation. We can start to work through that, and that's what we do with our key customers, and how we start to get that information out of the market. Also provides a lot of really good feedback, you know, our customers hearing about this, and in many cases, they're not. And then we can start to tailor the content to support the questions that we get back from customers.

Mike: That's fascinating, and it's certainly been a, I think, a great approach for Schaffner, talking about looking towards the future. I'm interested. How do you see the role of CMOs and VPs of marketing, and perhaps even your role changing with technology over the next five years?

John: Well, I think it's going back to our AI discussion, actually, that sort of cmo VP market, to anyone in marketing for that matter, it's going to be about understanding more about the technology. What does that bring us, in terms of the benefits, but also not falling into those pitfalls where you just take everything into into an AI bot and it create everything for you, because that's not the answer. So I think it's about understanding that technology and working with people that understand the technology so that you can use it for the benefit of what you want to achieve. You know, we know that it can take huge amounts of data and collate that and give you access to the answers within in that data, it doesn't mean everything. Has to be done that way. And you know, the challenge for for us, and I think for everyone in marketing, is, where does it fit? It's not about replacing everybody, you know, with a with an AI tool. It's about using it in the best way so that that valuable skills of marketeers can be focused on in the areas where they bring the most value.

Mike: I think that's that's a really positive view for marketing in general and the opportunities there. I mean, one of the questions we always like to ask guests is about people starting in marketing, and what would be your advice to someone who's just starting a career in marketing?

John: I guess good luck would be the first, the first thing. But ultimately, for me, I think it's about, you know, starting to get a broader, broad understanding of what marketing is, and putting yourselves in in the customer's shoe. Because when, when you start to sort of look in the mirror a little bit and and start to think about what you're creating, what you're doing, and why you're doing it, and the value that the customer will have, I think then you'll become a better marketeer. There's plenty of opportunities to create really fancy content, but if you're if your customer, you know your consumer is not interested in that, doesn't matter how good it is, you know they're not going to engage with that. So I think it's really sitting down and talking to customers about what they want. So you can then develop that content. And I think the opportunities in marketing are huge, and there's also that ability to be a little bit more creative than some roles and and for me, marketing should be exciting. It shouldn't be just all about process. Of course, we need good processes, but if you can't, if there isn't a little bit of edge or a little bit of excitement, then marketing's not really working. I think, you know, within the within the company, you want at least one department to be really enthusiastic about what's going on in the business, you know, really banging the drum. And that's what I see marketing, you know, should be doing that's not just external that's internal marketing, getting everyone on the same page, enthused about what we're doing as an organization, and having a bit of excitement. So I think, I think it's a great career path for anyone. I think it also leads into other areas, potentially, if you're good at marketing, then there's a likelihood that you've got good communication skills. So that lends itself to, you know, to management and many other areas, you know, within business, so, and, of course, sales itself. So I think a great opportunity for anyone and marketing is only going one way. I think I think up, even though we talk about AI that's just one element of it that's great.

Mike: And obviously, potentially the opportunity to end up with two job titles in one?

John: Yes, you know, two, two job titles and just one salary.

Mike: That's the last question I've got for you. You know, you've obviously had a long career in marketing. You've worked with with a lot of different people. I'm interested to know, from your point of view, what's the best piece of marketing advice that's ever been given to you?

John: Well, I think I sort of mentioned it earlier, and that's about putting yourself in your customers shoes. When you sit, you know, in your home office or the office and you see a piece of material coming through, and if your immediate reaction is I'm going to delete that, that's where you need to be. Thinking as a marketeer, can I get someone to open that that email? How can I get someone to click on that page, on the website, or that news story? That's what you need to be thinking about. And it doesn't matter how good it looks, but it needs to be right for the audience. And we talked about personas, we talked about knowing who your customers are, and if your customers are all technical, then you need to create more technical content. There's no point. It being very, sort of fluffy, I suppose, commercially based. And the same is true the other way. So I think, I think that's really key, perhaps for any you know, you go back to the last question about someone starting out in marketing, you know, I'd recommend anyone who's starting out in marketing is to get out and talk to their own customers. What are they interested in? Because if you understand that you've got a better chance that what you're doing is going to hit the mark, and that's absolutely key for me,

Mike: John, this has been a fascinating interview. I feel like I could ask you another 100 questions here. It's been been really enjoyable. But I'd just like to say, you know, thank you so much for being so generous with your time and with your knowledge, and thanks for being a guest on the podcast. No thanks, Mike.

John: It's always good to talk

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode, and if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at napierb2b.com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Thomas Lewis – Semiconductor Marketing Leader

Thomas Lewis, an experienced semiconductor marketing leader explores the challenges of building integrated marketing campaigns in technical industries and shares his advice on building strong working relationships with engineers.

Thomas also explores the industry's current focus on sustainability and the potential pitfalls of greenwashing, what B2B and B2C marketers can learn from each other, and offers his insights on the changing role of CMOs.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Thomas Lewis

Thomas Lewis is a seasoned marketing leader with over 28 years working in the semiconductor industry. He has a unique background which has afforded him first-hand experience in sales, business unit leadership, and marketing. Thomas believes in the power of data-directed marketing with a proven track record to support his “ALL IN” approach to creating, developing, and sustaining highly successful campaigns and teams.

His background includes impactful roles at Texas Instruments and Analog Devices and career opportunities such as launching a global pricing process, living abroad as an expatriate, leading engineering teams and directing multi-channel marketing campaigns.

Time Stamps

[00:45:2] – Thomas discusses his career in the semiconductor industry and why he chose that specialism.

[02:50:3] – How can not being an engineer actually be a benefit in technical roles?

[04:41:0] – Advice for building better integrated campaigns.

[09:22:8] – How can data break down silos between different teams?

[15:02:3] – Does B2B marketing lag behind B2C? How can we fix this?

[18:56:9] – The dangers of greenwashing.

[22:43.3] – The changing role of the CMO

[27:13.6] – Thomas shares some marketing advice.

[31:35.6] - Andrus's contact details.

Quotes

“Keep an open mind, ask more questions than you make statements. That's great advice for dealing with engineers.” Mike Maynard, Managing Director at Napier

“Data can really be used to drive our marketing decisions. It's not just gut feel of what could work. You can do something, you can measure it and you can adapt to the situation.” Thomas Lewis, Semiconductor Marketing Leader

“So, I do believe that adjectives have become the enemy of a really good marketer in the B2B space. To get precise in what you’re talking about has become incredibly important.” Thomas Lewis, Semiconductor Marketing Leader

Follow Thomas:

Thomas Lewis on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomas-lewis-nhpoe/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Thomas Lewis – Semiconductor Marketing Leader

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Thomas Lewis

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today.

Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. I'm Mike Maynard, and today I'm joined by Thomas Lewis. Thomas is a semiconductor marketing professional, who's been in the industry for about 28 years. Welcome to the podcast. Thomas.

Thomas: Thank you for having me, Mike.

Mike: It's great to have you on. So what we'd like to do on the podcast is to let you really describe your background, give us a bio of what you've done. So do you want to tell me a little bit about your career? Sure.

Thomas: Every time someone introduces me or mentions 28 plus years, I always smile because it really truly has gone by in a blink. It's been a really wonderful experience, filled with so many different roles and nuances. I spent 26 years at Texas Instruments, and had the luxury of enjoying different roles that cover all four P's of marketing. And then the last few years I spent with analog devices and an integrated marketing role.

Mike: So you obviously like the semiconductor industry? I mean, what is it about semiconductors that you know, has made you stick there for your career?

Thomas: That's a really good question. The first thing I would say is coming out of school, I researched what different industries I wanted to potentially look at. Different than a lot of my colleagues, I didn't look at roles. I looked at companies and industries. I was very fortunate, I picked a hot one, I got lucky. And during that time, what I've come to appreciate about the industry. It's a little cliche, Mike, but I've learned to love working with engineers. There's a very famous cartoon strip that most people know Dilbert. And it depicts that tension between engineers, and sales, and marketing. Typically, marketing is poked fun at a lot in this industry. For good reason. Engineers love data. And I've always had a love for data myself. So I guess in one sentence, what I love about the industry so much is how data centric, it actually is. And that just appeals to who I am as a person. And I just have always really enjoyed working with engineers.

Mike: And that's interesting, because you're not actually an engineer yourself. Are you, Thomas?

Thomas: I am not. No.

Mike: Yeah, I find that amazing. We talked to a lot of people on the podcast, who are marketing professionals in engineering industries. And it does seem to be that not being an engineer can sometimes be an advantage. I mean, do you find that? Or do you find this real challenge understanding the technology,

Thomas: In certain ways, it can be an advantage, and in certain ways, it could be a disadvantage, and it really depends on the role. And honestly hope and you are helping your own mind is, so in my experience, being different, has been a benefit. It has really helped me to come into a room, one of the jokes on a team I worked at at TI was, well, if Thomas understands it, and can repeat it back, we know we've explained it well. Just to say that they had to really boil it down to something very simple for me without a W degree to get. And it really allowed us I believe, to make really good marketing collateral, because we we never assumed anything because I was in the room, it was always make sure we really explained the values, the benefits translated into into equipment benefits. And that's always been a good thing for us to your the second part of your question. It can be unless you ask a lot of questions. So I've also learned that you don't want to get into a data fight with an engineer, you're likely going to lose. Instead, go in slow, patient, ask a lot of questions, take breaks and say, Hey, let me get back to you. I understand you want to see the data of the return on this potential marketing investment? I need some time. So yes, as long as you keep an open mind and ask more questions than you make statements, you're probably going to be alright. If I keep an open mind, ask more questions, then he makes statements.

Mike: So that's great advice, I think for dealing with engineers. Moving towards your roles, I mean, your most recent role at analog was running integrated marketing. I'm really interested because a lot of companies struggle to integrate campaigns. Why do you think that is? Why do you think it's so difficult to build these integrated campaigns?

Thomas: I think there's probably about 20 different ways I can answer your question. There are a lot of challenges. I think first and foremost. How you organize I have come to appreciate is very important. Trying to have the owner of the budget and the owner of deciding what you do. Be together, I think that's really important. And with that said, you have to take your time and be very patient to get everyone on the same starting block on. Okay, we're going to do this campaign, what will success look like defining and getting everyone to agree that the purpose of doing this campaign is x, number of contacts, y number of impressions, z amount of backlog, whatever those things are that you want as a company, and being really patient and establishing alignment on that before you start running. And on top of all of that, I think, again, back to how you organize, do you have this integrated marketing function outside of the business units? Or does each business unit who typically owes the profit and loss do they have this role. And that's a really critical decision. There's pros and cons to each. If you don't have the two aligned, though, the issue quickly becomes, while you're asking me to pay for something that I don't fully control, right, that's the rub at the end of the day. And so when you find yourself in that situation, it's really difficult, because everyone's kind of jockeying for the relatively low percentage of budget and low percentage of chances of being selected for one of these major corporate campaigns. So taking the time to get everyone as close to as aligned as you can, I think is the key up front says

Mike: Interesting. So it sounds like what you're saying is, it's much more a matter of culture than it is of structure and process.

Thomas: Yes, I mean, the process, I don't want to brush over that when you said the word process, you've got my attention, because that is really important. These integrated campaigns, as you know, could be incredibly complex. If you're really using all the different channels at your disposal, the timing of when you do this, compared to that and having, having that customer journey thought out before you start have it all, while the corticospinal is integrated, having an all managed well, that the processes are incredibly important. As soon as you said that, I'd have to say it's 60%, the former and 40% process, because if you don't have a good process, then it falls apart as well.

Mike: Great point, I love that. I mean, when you're building integrated campaigns as well, you tend to generate a lot more data than single channel campaigns. So do you have an approach to, you know, really building an understanding the data that you can then use to either optimize or analyze those campaigns.

Thomas: I think the really successful companies that running integrated marketing campaigns, or really even more simplistic product launches, is access to that data. And it's been surprising to me in my career. So I finished up at Notre Dame just to back up a little bit, I finished with my MBA at Notre Dame concentration and database marketing. And when I came into TI, I fully expected a row. I mean, it's an engineering company, right? I just expected there to be data at my fingertips and dashboards and things that do exist today, but didn't exist that and seeing that develop over time and get more and more robust and seeing companies invest in that. I like to say to any body I'm talking to my fields, are not saying question, what data do you have? What things do you learn, these are linked my friends and colleagues in different industries, and maybe same industry different company, because I really liked to see how the data capture and analysis is evolving over time, and to make sure that I'm not losing touch on some new way of looking at things? And to answer your question, I do believe it always comes back to did you define upfront what success looks like and create your, your dashboard, whatever you want to call it upfront and say this is the data we're going to track. This is the source. We know we believe in the source. We've done our homework, we're sure that this data is accurate. And it is measuring what we want. So I hope I answered your question. Their data gets me excited to ramble sometimes.

Mike: I think you did I love the discussion about making data available. I mean, do you think the emergence of having a lot more data actually is one of the ways that marketers can break down silos between different channels and maybe even between marketing and sales?

Thomas: Those listening can't see how hard I was shaking my head, Mike, but it's honestly the number one way to connect the three teams that can get siloed engineering, sales and marketing. And it's been interesting to me to see sometimes how people will fight really hard to not share their data. and it goes both ways. I've seen salespeople be like no way you're not getting access to, you know, who my top customers might be, or where my pipeline might already sit. And you'll also see the marketers be like, No, I'm not gonna let you see how many new contacts we got at this trade show. It's an interesting and I, for life of me, I don't understand where it really comes from, we're all wearing the same badge of the company we're working for. But there's this natural inclination to be siloed, to protect your own data. And when they merge, that's when magic happens. Because it allows you to follow the customer journey from the beginning to the end, they didn't even know we existed as a company. And now they're buying product, what was their journey? And can we replicate that over and over and over again. And the only way that's possible, is if everyone's open to sharing all of their data to one another. And to your point, it results in putting the all those people in a room and giving them something to really focus and talk about, like, look at that. That's interesting. That's

Mike: 

fascinating. And you talked about, you know, being able to see that entire customer journey. I think one of the things a lot of marketers in B2B struggle with is, you know, balancing the need to generate leads, short term new business, versus building a strong brand. And particularly when data comes in, it's much easier to measure the bottom of the funnel activities, and it is in terms of the brand building. So how do you balance those two things when you're running campaigns?

Thomas: One of the things that is really starting to, I believe, take off and be looked at to this brand question, and it is a really good one is measuring your net promoter score your NPS. And there's a colleague of mine, that analog, I'll give him a free shout out Peter busy, he's, he's a leader in his field. And he really opened my eyes to the ability to actually measure, I guess I sought to put it in air quotes to measure your brand effectiveness in the way that you are actually going about it right is this the simplest question is, would you promote our solutions to a colleague at a different company? Now who work at Company A, would you tell some a company B, you should really go work with analog, they're great. That's the best kind of marketing there is. Right? That's a genuine customer to customer promotion. And it's a it's incredibly valuable. So it's starting to change, we're starting to as at least inside of semiconductor, I believe some industries have been doing this for a while. And so semiconductor is a little bit late to this game. But starting to capture that is as good a proxy, I believe, as we can grab on, what is our our brand equity, what is our brand ROI? So it's starting to change? But it's still a good question. And it's always a balance, you have to have an easy brand. It's identifiable at a corporate level, you need to say Texas Instruments and whatever 10 words come to mind. And at the same point, you've got to sell widget. 12378, you know, so it is this constant balance and fight. Because if you don't have one, you really can't do the other they it's a handshake.

Mike: Yeah, I think yes. Is a an interesting scoring. One of the big problems is is MPs varies quite widely from industry to industry. So how did you deal with, you know, setting a target for MPs? Or did you look more at the trend of whether it was improving or getting worse?

Thomas: Yeah, it's more than directionally correct. And the real nuggets, though, Mike, the real nuggets are down in the comments. They're really deep into the survey where an engineer at your customer will open up and say, this was the moment where I decided that, you know, I'm gonna go with you, or do you really helped. And then, of course, the opposite. This is the moment I decided to walk away and go somewhere different. That's where you really get, you know, the juicy bits, by the way, they can bring sales back to the table, because sometimes it will be comments about, you know, application support or something that sales directly controls or influences. And so that can get them back to the table as well.

Mike: I think I've seen right, I mean, I don't know if you know, we actually run NPS scores twice a year and APIA with our clients. We're currently running our, our survey at the moment, I always find it some of the most stressful times of the year because you almost take those people who wouldn't recommend you very personally. But you know, it's a really valuable metric. And I agree that it's not just the number you get and the trend. It's absolutely also the comments. Yeah. I'm interested, do you see trends in consumer that you've adopted or you think should be adopted in B2B? I mean, how do you feel B2B is doing his generally felt, perhaps unfairly that B2B lags? and humor in terms of innovation, there

Thomas: is that perception. And you know what, there is a little bit of truth to it, we have to step back and look at it and say there is some truth to it. I've seen in my experience, I don't want to emerge as the wrong expression, because there's certainly things you do in a B2C setting more often, or in some cases still only, whereas in B2B, you wouldn't and vice versa. However, I do see more of emerging more of a looking across the aisle, if you will, and saying, Okay, what are they doing over there? In our industry, the company that really started this right and got everyone to really start to analyze it more deeply was Intel. You know, their, their campaign and the way they went about things and using B2C concepts to create their brand image while complementing it with that, you know, end of funnel backlog acquisition. I mean, it was revolutionary, and no one had ever thought of it. And I think that opened everyone's eyes to not just the obvious things that we all can talk about when it comes to Intel, but the subtle techniques, and just, like I said, looking across the aisle, and I think the consumer side, did the reverse, they had the same thoughts like, Whoa, no, why can't we use some of these tactics that the FBI is using effectively and steal them? borrow them? adopt them? So I do see a merging of techniques today? Yeah.

Mike: Do you think also, sometimes, I mean, B2B gets a bad press, because a lot of B2B marketers are talking about their lead generation, the things that drive the money. Whereas if you look at consumer, you know, we all get to see the flashy TV adverts, we don't necessarily get to see the direct mail campaign that really sells the automobile or whatever else has been promoted.

Thomas: I think you're hitting on what's really behind this natural division that happened. And our reluctance to move, which is, marketers that go into B2C are typically the expression that comes to mind is the pure marketer, that the creative, the person that can come up with a great jingle or a great visual, or something like that. Whereas in B2B, it's more of the data nerds, like myself, I'm guilty of that. So a Berlin day is starting to happen. The B2C types are like, wow, like, yeah, okay, data can really be used to drive our marketing decisions. It's not just gut feel of what would work, you can do something, you can measure it, and you can adapt to the situation. And I think the opposite is happening in B2B, which is we're really good at this data stop. But of course, what our website as an example, looks like visually is very important. You can just look at the semiconductor industry, evolution of the web pages over time, they used to be so data rich that it was almost like the internet was a data sheet, it was to the point of being ridiculously funny. And today, you've got appealing visuals, the use of whitespace, you have all these things you've been in B2C has always existed. So I think there was a natural tendency for the data folks to head the B2B path and the quote, unquote, create creative types that had the B2C route. And we're now seeing, we need the diversity of both to really reach top performance.

Mike: That's an amazing summary. Thomas, I think it's a really good point that, you know, generally speaking, the geeks tend to gravitate towards B2B and the creatives go to B to C. One of the things that, that we're seeing at the moment, which I think is, you know, pretty consistent across both B2B and B2C is the importance of sustainability. I mean, how do you see that impacting B2B? And and particularly, you know, do you see some of the legislation coming in and really forcing the hand of some of these B2B companies to be much more proactive about their sustainability credentials?

Thomas: This is one of the top I mean, certainly in the top 10, maybe top five topics in the industry, and I'm glad you brought it up. It's obviously really important for our planet, everyone agrees on that. And any manufacturing industry needs to answer the question of what impact are you having on the environment. And this all speaks to at the end of the day, your your brand image no one wants to work with. So thinking about our customers, the second be in the B2B. No one wants to be working with someone that's seen as impacting the environment negatively that's or any other negative activity. It's it's kind of like in the B2C world, when maybe you have a celebrity do something naughty in his private life, and they drop him instantly, right? You just don't want to be associated with someone who's doing something that gets gets judged that way. So this sustainability question. I think it's table stakes to not be seen as bad. Everyone is doing that fairly well, making sure that they're showing at least the perception of a genuine concern for what's going on. And some companies have really embraced this and are truly making it part of their their DNA. I think the term is greenwashing. It's not just talking about it, it's fundamentally changing the way you say things, it's almost the only analogy I can think of that I've recently run into as well myself, is if you're in the medical field, and you're marketing, you have to be incredibly careful in what you say every word choice can get you in legal trouble. And I think that starting to happen in the sustainability world here, you crashing legislation coming in and saying, if you're going to make these claims, you have to really be able to back them up. And the best companies are taking that mentality, and extending it across everything. I love it when I walk into a room and an engineer will say something like, this is the most efficient solution we've ever had. And they're expecting me as the marketer to like, love that sentence. And I hate it. My typical response is I'll say something like, you know, I know I'm a marketer, but I really hate adjectives. Can we really talk about the actual performance and how you measured it? And how are how are you saying it's more efficient. So I do believe that adjectives have become the enemy of a really good marketer in the B2B space. And to get really precise, in what you're talking about has become incredibly important, documenting it and being able to prove your claims has become not quite the medical field realm yet, but it's leaning that way.

Mike:  think is really interesting. I mean, even worse, you see a lot of press releases, still in B2B that have relative comparisons with nothing to compare against. So you know, the new product is more efficient, more cost effective, but more efficient, more cost effective than what?

Thomas: That's right. And that goes to the whole conversation explaining in that press release, or at least providing a link from it. Because sometimes it can get to really go into the details. A lot of people be like, Whoa, this is too much for this particular medium, but including in the press release to learn more here. And then that's where you wouldn't really explain how did you measure this? What were the operating conditions? And what are you comparing it to you directly?

Mike: I have a great point. I'd like to switch gears a bit now Thomas and look a bit towards the future. So the role of you know marketing executives, marketing directors, CMOs, you know, seems to be changing the number of channels is changing. How do you see that role evolving over the next five years?

Thomas: Mike, of my 28 years of experience in this industry, and in this career path has taught me one thing, it's I'm really bad at predicting the future. But I'll try to answer your question this way. I think the trends we're seeing towards the use of data, the need to be accurate in what you say. It leads to credibility in what you say. But one of the things that would be in the Dilbert cartoons all the time, right is making fun of marketers who would make these outrageous claims. And I think the world has pushed back on that. I also think that's has been the enemy of sales, marketing. And the business units that come together, is this belief that marketing people live in outer space and make these outrageous claims and the closer we get, and the more we push towards all of those things are important. So to your question, I believe, in today's world, if you want to be an upper level executive, so director, certainly CMO, you need to embrace the need to be able to analyze data, you can no longer be just a creative, you're gonna have the most creative mind ever create the most amazing images and things like that. But to lead a team, you need to attach what you're doing to the goals of the company, and that it just requires data. So I think the number one change that's happening is your upper executives becoming more and more comfortable in opening up a tableau worksheet and digging into it and saying, Okay, this is what we need to do as a team in providing direction, as opposed to counting on the team, the subordinates to do that. There needs to be a willingness at the upper levels to dig into the data and own it and drive it. That's where you see the most success. That's where I've seen the most success is where the that's the embrace of the upper leaders.

Mike: I love that. And I think that's really interesting when you have, you know, a lot of people pushing these rather simplistic management dashboards, because actually, what you're saying is engaging with the data and understanding it really matters rather than just seeing whether the number is red or green.

Thomas: Correct in real time. And so, if you take snapshots like quarterly, which is very common, right, so cool. quarterly, we're going to look at this. The issue with that is sometimes I mean, so using the Six Sigma philosophy, right? If all you do is look at the summary data quarterly, you could miss a really golden nugget that was a quote unquote outlier. That happened in the month of February on the 14th. Right? You've just missed it, because you're only looking at it. Before a big management review before the big quarterly business reviews, and engaging with the data is a very different life. It's every day pulling up a dashboard, and looking at what happened yesterday. Is there anything in here that I can take and adjust my campaign and do? And again, that's what the best companies do? Is this constant attention to it? And it's like a muscle. Some folks say, does it take a lot of time, it well, in the beginning to set it up? It sure does. But once it's often running, I would come in every day, and pull up my dash, we'll call it a dashboard. But again, it was interactive, I could jump around and change different selections and look at different things. But I was been 20 minutes, roughly, looking at the data, it invariably I would find something and be like, wow, wow, I didn't expect that. Or yes, that's exactly what I expected. Either one, and then go to the team, talk about it and adjust what we're doing just slightly, you know, engineers like to talk about big innovation, or the small little innovations, everything marketing needs to have that same kind of approach. You know, one of the hot topics you and I were discussing before this call is AI. That's a major point of innovation right now, in the marketing world. But little innovations happen when you're living in the data every day. It never shows up as this big, huge difference. But it's that nice, directly Correct. Wow, our Bounce Rate got lower. How'd that happen? Well, we saw one little outlier that we would not have seen if we weren't living in the data.

Mike: That's amazing advice. I think that's emphasizes how important data is. I really appreciate you being so generous with your time, Thomas, before we finish, there's a couple of questions, we always like to ask everyone. So you've given us some amazing marketing advice. But I'm interested to know, what's the best marketing advice you've ever been given?

Thomas: When I was thinking about this podcast today, and you were nice enough to share some of the questions you might ask when I saw this one, I immediately smiled and I thought of, and I will definitely give a shout out. This is my very first boss in the semiconductor industry. He really shaped me in terms of who I am as a marketer and a person, his name is Mike Hastings. And he called me in and we were talking about something that had happened. And I said, well, that's just the perception. Mike is coming out of the marketers mouth, right? Mike looks me right in the eye. It says Thomas, perception is reality. And that person's mind. Perception is reality. And so that was the best piece of advice I ever got. Because it really was talking about empathy, the ability to empathize with someone because their perception is their reality, and you've got to meet them where they are. And if they think that I think this conversation Mike and I were having was about the effectiveness of doing a press release. And even though we were arguing for this particular purpose, the press release wasn't good. It wasn't the right channel to use, the person we were arguing with discussing with believed that that was the only way to get it done. And that was his reality in that moment. And we had to work to change his perception of a press release in order to just get off the dime, if you will. So that's the best advice I ever received. Perception is reality for that person.

Mike: I absolutely love it. That's fantastic advice. I'm sure I'll use that as well. The other question, you know, we're always interested to know is if you're talking to someone who's at the start of their career started a marketing career. What advice would you give them?

Thomas: If I could change your question just a little bit, I would take out the words marketing, career, meaning, or marketing, excuse me, anyone starting their career, I would give the same advice. It's one of my favorite expressions. I like uses. It's an acronym. And it's all in I like to say, and a lot of people say, are you all in? And this was recent. It was about a year ago that someone said that to me. What does that mean? When we say we're all in like, everyone thinks they know what that means? And they kind of like instinctively go, oh, yeah, I'm all in. I'm bought in, I get it. And what does it really mean? For me, it means the A stands for accountability. You have to be accountable as a team and an individual, for what you've done and how effective it was. Without that. Nothing can really get started. The second is loyalty. And it's both ways. It's between people. I've also heard expressions like, well, this is corporate America, and this is how things happen. For me, I'm corporate America, you are, you know, like all of us collectively. We are what makes up the culture of the place we're working. And so having loyalty to one another to the process. Last is of the first word is love, which, again, in business setting sounds a little strange, but it just means passion, interest, a genuine concern for the team doing well. And then N stands for inclusivity. Everyone talks about diversity they typically talk about in a very traditional sense, diversity of thought, is really what we're all after. And having multiple people in your team coming from different cultures, different experiences, and having a mind to receiving that is super important. So I would say anyone starting their career, those are the four factors you want to look for in an employer? Will they hold you accountable and hold themselves accountable? Do you think you can be loyal to them? And they'll be loyal to you? Do you think you're gonna love it? Do you think you're really gonna wake up every day and have that? Whatever it may be? 20% of us wake up and go, I can't wait. Can't wait to get in look at that marketing dashboard. And will they be inclusive? Will they give you a voice? Will they hear your voice? And will you hear there's because when all of that comes together, those the teams that I've been on where magic happens? You've exceed anything you ever thought that team could do. Those are the four building blocks, I believe,

Mike: What an amazing way to end an interview. I think that that's really great advice, and certainly useful for anyone starting any career. Thomas, I so appreciate your time and your insights. If people are listening, and I'd like to get in contact with you. What's the best way to get ahold of you?

Thomas: You can reach out to me on my LinkedIn profile. That's probably the best way to go about it. And I believe it's in H P. Oe is my username, I think but just look for Thomas Lewis, and analog devices or Texas Instruments. I should pop up.

Mike: Amazing. Thomas, thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast. I really appreciate it.

Thomas: Thank you, Mike. It was a pleasure.

Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Masha Petrova - Nullspace

Masha Petrova, CEO of Nullspace, a simulation software company joins the latest episode of the Marketing B2B Technology podcast to share her journey from aspiring astronaut to engineering expert and marketing leader.

She delves into the importance of effective marketing when targeting technical audiences and discusses the challenges of mergers and acquisitions in the engineering software industry. The conversation also explores current engineering tools, the role of AI in accelerating technological advancements, and the need for efficient simulation software.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Nullspace

Nullspace is a deep tech software company that develops products and solutions for RF and quantum computing applications across defense, aerospace, and automotive industries.

About Masha Petrova

Dr. Petrova is an experienced executive with a passion for leading multi-disciplinary global teams toward successful results by focusing on operations and creating a unified vision. After receiving her PhD in aerospace engineering, Dr. Petrova spent 15+ years in the engineering simulation and design software industry, including holding global marketing executive roles at Ansys, Altium, LLC, and MSC Software (during acquisition by Hexagon MI) as well as 3 simulation software start-ups all acquired by Ansys, Inc. in the last 10 years.

Time Stamps

[00:46:2] – Masha provides some background to her career and what led her to become CEO of Nullspace.

[01:50.2] - Masha discusses EDA and simulation tools.

[03:22:0] – Masha explains the impact of industry consolidation and acquisitions on marketers and CMOs.

[09:42:2] – Masha talks about how to balance the demands of wanting to get leads and drive sales quickly with the longer term goal of building a strong brand.

[18:34:9] – Masha discusses how she deals with the issue of sustainability and how she conveys Nullspace’s commitment to sustainability when talking to engineers

[24:52:3] – Masha gives her best advice to those entering a career in marketing.

[26:24:1] – Masha’s contact details.

Quotes

“Because of AI, there is a lot of acceleration in technology itself that's happening… but the tools that the engineers use are still kind of stuck in the past. These are still conservative tools that's been tested and validated for over 40, 30 years. So, it's like using a hammer to build a car or something like that.” - Masha Petrova, CEO of Nullspace.

"Measuring brand effectiveness is really hard. It's not like lead generation, where you can track from inception to a sales deal. With brand, it's much subtler, so we tracked our spend versus views, comments, and social media engagement to demonstrate interest in our content." - Masha Petrova, CEO of Nullspace.

Follow Masha:

Masha Petrova on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mashavpetrova/

Nullspace website: https://www.nullspaceinc.com/

Nullspace on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/nullspace-inc/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Masha Petrova - Nullspace

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Masha Petrova

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today. Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. I'm Mike Maynard and today I'm joined by Masha Petrova. Masha is the CEO of Nullspace. Welcome to the podcast, Masha.

Masha: Hi, Mike. So excited to be here.

Mike: It's great to have you on. So, what we like to do at the start is always get someone to talk a little bit about their career, and how they've got to where they are. So, can you tell me a little bit about your background, what you did, and what led you to become CEO Nullspace.

Masha: Sure. So, I am an engineer by background, my undergraduate was in mechanical engineering, and then I went ahead to get a PhD in aerospace engineering, I was going to be an astronaut, and then decided that I, I don't like risk that much. And Earth is a pretty exciting place to be. So, I got my PhD in Engineering and was a real engineer for about a year at a software startup. And then salespeople realized at that company that I was too extroverted to sit in front of a computer and kind of suck me into customer conversations. And I love that so much and fell in the world of sales and marketing and became head of marketing, but always in a very deeply technical engineering space.

Mike: I used to be an engineer as well. I think I got moved into sales and marketing, because I wasn't very good at engineering.

Masha: That's not true. You're probably too extroverted as well.

Mike: So, your background, you've been through a number of different companies, one of the areas I think you've been focused on has been, you know, electronic design tools. EDA, is that correct?

Masha: That's been one of the areas. Yeah, so my focus, where I've headed up marketing was a span of engineering software. And that's been EDA was one of the areas but also simulation of a wide variety type of application. So, engineering simulation, and now I actually head up a company called Nullspace, that develops stimulation software for electrical engineers as well. So engineers, developing antennas, radars, various RF devices, they need to test those devices, right as they're designing them to make sure the device is performing properly, your phone, spearing with the antenna on your whatever it is your ATV, your vehicle, your smartwatch, and so on properly, in order to do that, engineers test those RF devices and computer through simulation by doing an electromagnetic simulation or running electromagnetic simulation with tools like tools from an old space.

Mike: That’s fascinating, because, you know, you're obviously selling to a very technical audience, I think something similar to a lot of our listeners.

Masha: Yes, very highly tech. I mean, it's highly technical as you can get PhD, you know, electrical engineers and RF engineers. Yes.

Mike: Before we really delve into what you do at Nullspace, and how you approach marketing to these engineers, one of the things I know about the simulation and EDA industry is there's been a lot of consolidation or acquisition. And I think you've been through quite a few acquisitions, both for being on the acquiring side and also being acquired. How do you feel that impacts marketers and CMOS?

Masha: Yeah, that's very true. And I'm happy to talk about that. One note, just an interesting industry shift that I have been watching, I've been in the space of engineering software for the last 20 years or so. And we really haven't seen that much acquisition has been pretty conservative, slow-moving space, for the most part. You're an engineer, it's very exciting. If you're not you don't know what these companies are probably never heard of them. The ones that develop engineering tools and engineering software, but they are these kinds of companies. And this kind of software is key to developing any new technology, whether it's a car or plane train, any kind of technology, device, computer, smartwatch, smart tick, whatever it is, right, like anything you think of in terms of technologies, some engineer somewhere designed it. And to design it, they needed engineering tools. They didn't do it with the sketch paper, maybe initially, but at some point, they transferred it to a computer, and then needed to design and simulate that thing that they're designing in a computer. So, there's this whole space of companies that develop engineering tools that have been pretty, pretty conservative, non eventful, very slow growing, but kind of trucking along. And in ALEKS, the last six months or so there. You right, there has been quite a consolidation and m&a activity in the space of engineering tools, because we're seeing because of AI, there is a lot of solar acceleration in technology itself. That's happening overall, right? Again, any kind of technologies that you could think of from a plane to a satellite to a spaceship to a smartwatch to, you know, AI chip itself. All of that is being accelerated, but the tools that the engineer’s users still kind of stuck in it. Ask these are so conservative tools that has been tested and validated for over, you know, 40 30 years. So, it's like using a hammer to build a car or something like that. And so there has been a lot of acquisition activity, because the industry leaders are realizing like, hey, these engineering tools are super important, and technology is being accelerated. And so, more and more engineers will need more and more of these tools. So, this one, though, I wanted to make, like this m&a activity has been pretty new to our engineering tool space. And then as far as your question of kind of my thoughts or observations on being in an acquisition, so I have been through a total, I want to say six acquisitions, where being the I was the head of marketing, either VP or CMO on the small company side that being acquired, as well as being the head of marketing and a large company side and acquiring small company, having to assimilate all the marketing and all everything that goes through that. And if you've ever run marketing, whether you're just ran a marketing department, or ran the whole entire marketing team, and either been acquired or had to assimilate, like the Borg, that from Star Trek, the acquiring company, you know that that could be quite a bit of a headache, because you're dealing with? How do you kind of like, put the brands together properly? Are you just erasing the small brand? Because that happens quite often. And you're racing it as fast as possible? I've been through that kind of acquisition. Or are you sort of leaving the company alone and leaving the brand alone and it making it seem like, you know, things are going to run as is? And there's so much kind of thinking that has to go behind everything from the PowerPoint slides? And how do we present the branding there, right to training the sales team and giving the right talk tracks to kind of talking to both marketing teams and making sure they're working together. And a lot of times there's tension, because a lot of times a smaller company that's being acquired, they might have been around for a decade, and they might have had their own CMO or VP of marketing role kind of was the god of marketing in that company for a while. And now all of a sudden, they're almost irrelevant. That happens as well. How do you navigate that? So that's, there's a lot of really interesting topics that we can dive into on that side.

Mike: It’s interesting, I mean, the first thing is that this question of whether you keep the brand when you're acquiring or whether you basically assimilate into the acquirer’s brand. I mean, it seems like there's a difficult balance there, particularly, as you mentioned, that engineers can be quite conservative in what they buy when it comes to tools. And perhaps they want a brand they've known for 10 years, rather than wanting everything being, you know, merged into one, what's your view on that?

Masha: Yes, and that's been my experience in the space, for the most part, usually, that direction will come from the CEO, right, the CEO will kind of have an idea of what they want to do in terms of how closely do we want the brand to be sort of assimilated into the large, large brand. The idea right, in the engineering space, the tendency is to kind of leave the brand alone for a few years, and then just kind of slowly piece by piece. I mean, it takes a lot of times years, you know, five years or more to really kind of assimilate the technology in after the acquisition. And probably this time when I've seen a brand get, sort of, I don't want to say erased, because it sounds mean, but you know, minimize, should we say and not focused on as much is at a startup that was acquired that I was running, I was head of marketing, and the startup was acquired. And it wasn't around for very long, so the brand wasn't well known. And the branding was confusing, the naming of the tools was confusing. Also, when you're acquiring something from another country, like I remember, there was a company that I was a CMO at a larger company, we acquired a Japanese company, and one of the products was called pickles. It is a software product for engineers called pickles. You know, it's probably very cute in Japanese language, you know, or in that culture, which just didn't quite work. So, you know, we had to get rid of that pretty quickly, like within days. And then the other example that I was talking about where that was a smaller company that's being acquired. And it's just not a lot, there wasn't a lot of brand recognition. And it was easier to just kind of get the technology and fold it into the larger brand that's been around for a while.

Mike: It’s interesting. I mean, we've talked a lot about brand. And I think, you know, some people perceive that technical audiences by, you know, purely on features, but I think brand is super important. So, as a CMO, when you're marketing to engineers, how do you balance the demands of wanting to get leads and drive sales really quickly, with that longer term goal of building a strong brand?

Masha: That's a million-dollar question, right? I think for me, because I was an engineer myself for a while. I know that engineers being very conservative, they can smell BS very quickly. And so for me, my philosophy is build a brand that is built on trust as much as possible with engineers, which means you stick to facts as much as you possibly can, you know, you don't break that trust within with engineers as much as you possibly can, which means you can't move as fast can be as flashy as consumer space, for example, because consumers are much more forgiving much more, they'll take all kinds of BS, no offense to consumers. But if you compare, you know, engineers to just your main, middle of the road consumer, they'll forgive a lot more if you don't have all the facts straight, whereas engineers don't. And so, for me, it was always very important to have trust as the underlying side of things. So I will always push back because you always have that push for more leads, more leads, right sales always needs more leads, and getting stuff out there getting marketing campaigns out there, getting whatever webinars out there to just get more leads, I would always push back on that and try and make sure as much as possible, we're going back to like, will this break the trust of our customers or our engineers, as I think it's super important with technical audiences, and you just have to be really aware of that, especially if you're coming from consumer space and just know that the tolerance for intolerance for Bs and the tolerance for things that are not facts, is much lower in the space?

Mike: I think that's very true. I really like that point Masha. It's all about building trust and trust is built through basically being direct and being honest. I mean, do you think there are any elements of you know, consumer campaigns, you see, that can be used effectively to market for engineers? Or do you think you really have to take a fresh approach when you go to market such as specialist audience?

Masha: Oh, no, for sure. So, I would always look for innovation and marketing, I look to consumer space, for sure. Because there's really not much innovation in the enterprise space on the marketing side. Lots of innovation on the technical side, right. But marketing definitely lags as you probably know. So absolutely. consumer space is the kind of go to for, for inspiration for marketing. So, one of the things I've done, which was really interesting that I've adopted was, for example, product placement. So, product placement that's done quite frequently. And consumer marketing, and influencer marketing as well as engineering, software space are very technical enterprise space, at least a few years ago, that wasn't done at all. And so, I was at a company where I was very lucky. It was heading up brands, I was VP of brand marketing. And I did a project where we did many documentaries, where with our customers with engineers, where we kind of did many movies, we hired award winning filmmaker to do this, right. So, these were not testimonials. They were truly mini documentaries on our customers that were really interesting. And they took off like crazy, like, we got so much truck traction, I was a YouTube channel, that YouTube channel just blew up. Because they were really like really interesting informational, sometimes funny pieces of art, essentially right in many movies. But what we did there because it was not, we didn't do blatant testimonials, right? Like, the customers weren't supposed to talk about using our software. But we would have product placement, like we would have our software had a very distinct user interface. So, we would have our software with a distinct user interface. And like on a large computer, behind, you know, the engineer talking, we would do things like ship a bunch of branded mugs, T shirts, swag to the company before we went to film, right, and they would be holding a mug was the company's name, as they're talking about their own thing, not mentioning our company, by the name at all. So doing product placement was really cool. And that was a really cool way to kind of adopt a consumer marketing technique into our space that worked really, really well. I still don't see a lot of enterprise people doing that. Well, because I think engineers are very literal by nature. And so, for them, it's hard to understand how do you just how do you like, fit in a bunch of money on the marketing campaign, but don't actually talk about our product.

Mike: That's, I mean, that's very true. I love the concept. But as an engineer, I feel I have to ask, you know, how do you take the data you get from like the YouTube views, and understand whether those videos which can be, you know, placed your product in, but don't overtly sell a product? How do you understand whether they actually generate return? I mean, what's the data you use to analyze that?

Masha: Yeah, and that's hard. That's another issue with measuring brand effect effectiveness, right. And I've at my time, I read write a bunch of books and watched a bunch of videos on how do you measure brand effectiveness? And the answer is that it's really hard and there isn't a clear way of measuring it. And that's why the default a lot of times is lead generation. Because you can measure that very easily. You can track a lead all the way from inception all the way down to sales deal, right? If you have your sales operation set up properly, but with brand when you're doing a brand campaign like that, when you're doing things like product placement, or much subtler, subtler ways of marketing, it's much harder. And so, you know, all we had to rely on was we started a YouTube channel from scratch. And we had that company at the time had a huge A channel that was well established that was, I think, over a decade old, that had a certain number of views on it. So, we started a separate YouTube channel just for these movies for these documentaries that we were doing. And we just tracked our spend, right, which was the budget versus the number of views, comments, engagement, for sure. Social media engagement, and how much people were talking about these videos. And engagement was through the roof. Like, it wasn't even comparable to anything else I've seen in this engineering software space. And so, you know, that made it obvious. And just tracking, again, like views, likes, shares, things like that, that we can at least demonstrate that look, people are interested in this content, which means that the logo of our company is being placed in front of their eyes, right, like, our UI is being placed in front of their eyes. But, you know, there's a lot of internal marketing that I had to do explaining to the executive teams that, listen, branding doesn't work the same way as lead generation, you're not going to put out a brand campaign, and within a few months, all of a sudden, you have a ton more sales, it takes time, it takes persistence, it takes consistency, you know, people need to see something, whatever it is five, seven times before it actually starts to stick. And so yeah, that was a lot of internal education. And it's just, I don't have a clear solution for you for how do you measure brand effectiveness?

Mike: I think that's very true. I think a lot of us struggle with measuring brand effectiveness. And realistically some of the approaches that people use, particularly consumer a completely impractical in B2B. So, things like, you know, awareness and perception studies can often cost more than the actual campaign themselves, because it's so difficult to do it. So, I totally agree with it's very hard to measure brand.

Masha: Yeah. And you know, what's interesting now, as you're, as you're talking, kind of comparing contrasting my education, my engineering education, right, and engineering training, and my marketing sort of education by experience was marketing or 20 years, right, I educated myself, engineering is so much more rigorous. And there is such specific things that you need, like you either know what the equation looks like, or you don't you either solve the problem the right way, and you get the right answer or you don't in marketing, It's so fluffy, a lot of times, and I almost wish, like, and maybe this does exist, but I haven't seen it, there was a very rigorous marketing program specifically for enterprise marketing, that that has some of the structure of the engineering, oh, how do you properly measure brand? How long does it typically take to build broader brand effectiveness because that data exists, but it's kind of all over the place, you have to dig for it. And consumer marketing, I think, is very different from enterprise level marketing, especially in technical fields. And that's why it's easy for somebody to come in and say, oh, I've done marketing, like, how hard could that be? And kind of jump in and mess a bunch of things up. But you can't do that with an engineer. Like there's certain things that you either have a degree or you don't have a degree?

Mike: Yeah, I think I was very through I mean, engineering is very black and white marketing is definitely shades of gray.

Masha: Exactly.

Mike: I'd like to switch back a bit, Masha, and ask you something that, you know, I think lots of people care about, which is sustainability. And in your sector, I mean, you're obviously producing a tool that is pretty computer intensive, probably, you know, has a fairly significant energy demand to run it. How do you deal with the issue of sustainability? And how do you convey your company's commitment to sustainability? When you're talking to engineers? How important is it?

Masha: That's a great question. I mean, ideally, if we're talking about ideal sustainability, we wouldn't have things like engineering, we wouldn't have technology, and we'd all live in the woods peacefully with major, right, that's ideal scenario, if we're talking about sustainability, specifically, our tool because it's, again, fully in the computer. And yes, it's computer intensive, however, because we're modern solvers. So, our tools for engineers, especially for Engineering Simulation, have been developed 30 plus years ago, and kind of remained pretty much unchanged. Without that the kernel itself, the solver itself has remained unchanged for the most part. And so those solvers meaning the core of that engineering simulation engine, has been developed for prior computing architecture for all computing architecture, and has not been modernized. And so, it does take a lot of computing resources, and they can't solve really large problems. Our solver is more modern, and it has been developed for current parallel computing architecture. So, it's much more efficient as far as computing resources are concerned. So, number one, we could solve much larger problems, much more sophisticated problems, you know, next generation type of simulations. But we also are more up more conservative by nature with our software because of how it has been written. It has been written for modern computing architecture, and so it's much more efficient with the computing resources.

Mike: That's interesting, is something your engineering audience really care about? Or are they really focused on your ability to solve those bigger, more complex problems?

Masha: Not really. I mean, this these tools are a must, I don't know, for probably the most simple example is like trying to build a house without a hammer. Like these tools are the hammer of engineers, engineering simulation tools are a must. They at this point, you can't really design new technologies, whatever it may be, from any of your gym equipment that when you go to the gym and see that has electronics in it, to get into your car, to your smartwatch to your computer, like anything, at this point requires engineering simulation tools. And so, because they're a must, engineers are gonna have them, right. And because they're not like some sort of new social media craze, you know, or some sort of new CRM system or something like that. There are very solid, you know, hard to develop tools, there's only a few of them. So, it's not like engineers have a whole lot of choice. So as far as sustainability, it's kind of like, you got what you got. And there's we don't really get many questions. And again, probably, engineering software tools are the most conservative, the simulation tools are the most conservative as compared to, you know, your alternative, if you didn't use the engineering simulation tools would be to design whatever technology you're designing, to build the whole thing, test it. So physically build it, right. So, it's a part of a car, it's a whole part of a car that you are buying the parts from, you're shipping them from somewhere, you putting them together, assembling them, you measuring them, that is a lot less sustainable than simulating the whole thing in the computer.

Mike: And that makes a lot of sense. So, you know, I think it's great. You've obviously got some sustainability credentials. But I think we often see with a lot of engineering audiences, sustainability isn't always that top priority, particularly when it comes to developing products. I really appreciate all you've talked about Marsha, it's been really interesting, before we end the interview, there's a couple of general questions we always like to ask our interviewees and, and, you know, really build up knowledge on, you know, things like marketing advice. So, I'm interested to know what's the best piece of marketing advice you've ever received.

Masha: I think one of the areas that I had to learn the most in has been on the art directing side of things. So, I worked with a few really good art directors, because I was lucky enough to actually lead the brand, right. And so I actually would build an in house agency and a few of the companies that I worked at as a CMO or head of marketing, they would actually build an internal agency, because I felt it was a lot easier to control, you could move a lot faster, you know, and I had always had specific creative vision that I wanted carried out, as opposed to hiring an outside marketing agency. For brands, specifically, probably the biggest thing I learned is how important the detail is, when it comes to branding, specifically, you know, the little curlicue on a letter and a font could all of a sudden create a completely different mood on your you know, Banner, or an advertising campaign or something else, just from like, where the letter is slanted to the left or to the right, or you know, how curly little edges of the letters are the color, and being the ability to create a mood board first. So I would say this is one of the biggest things is working with an art director, when you're trying to sell to executives in your company, let's say you're a CMO and you're trying to sell an idea or campaign or get more budget for executives in your company, getting buy in on sort of the mood board and storytelling piece first before you actually create a campaign makes such a difference. Because all of a sudden, they're allowed to voice their opinion about how I like the color yellow, and you know, I like whatever certain name for this product, and you kind of flush that out. And a good sort of art director and a good, you know, storyteller will be able to work through all those issues with the executive team and tell them you know why yellow does not work in this case or whatnot. And then the executives feel like they have a buy in, right, like it's a campaign, it wasn't just shoved on their lap, and you haven't spent a whole bunch of time actually creating a full-on campaign, you just kind of playing around with you know, putting together a story for a particular campaign. And you can change it and you haven't dumped a bunch of time in it. And so, I'd say that's one of the biggest learning experiences and things I recommend is putting together sort of a mood board for whatever your brand campaign is, get the buy in from your executive team at that stage, and then work from that.

Mike: love that. That's such good advice. The other question we asked it's advice from you. If you were talking to someone who was just entering a career in marketing, what would you tell them what would be your advice to them?

Masha: Well, okay, so there is a lot of people who think they want to do marketing. So I would say if you're going into marketing, don't do it just because The default and you don't know what else to do, like have a passion for it, you know really feel like you are very creative and you love to create and you love to work with colors and fonts and stories, and you truly love it, and then go into it and then explore it and be rigorous about it. Or if you think you want to go into enterprise marketing, because let's face it, a lot of times, that's where the money is, I recommend getting a technical degree first. And you know, either minoring in marketing or kind of studying it on your own because you can study marketing on your own. All the marketers are gonna hate me for this, but I'm gonna say it anyway. You can study marketing on your own, but you can get you know, you can study physics on your own, but for the most part, like no one's gonna take you seriously as a physicist, you kind of need a physics degree or you need an engineering degree. Or if you're going into FinTech, right enterprise market or you're interested in a FinTech area, get a finance degree and minor in marketing, or starting to study marketing on your own or study art on your own. For example, because you really need an artistic eye for that or study, study storytelling or on your own. That would be my advice.

Mike: I love it. That’s great advice. And as a, you know, a recovering engineer, I really appreciate it as well. Marsha, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate all your insights. If somebody's listening, and they'd like to find out more or contact you what's the best way to learn more about you know, either no space, or get hold of you.

Masha: So, on LinkedIn, I am Masha V Petrova. And if you want to learn about null space if we do have some engineers listening, it's Nullspaceinc.com.

Mike: That's awesome, Masha, thank you so much for your time.

Masha: Thank you so much, Mike. It's a pleasure.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at NapierB2B.com, or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Xenia Muntean - Planable

Xenia Muntean, Co-Founder and CEO of Planable, a content collaboration platform, shares some great tips for repurposing content on social media to extend its lifetime, ensuring it remains evergreen and continues to engage audiences after its initial release.

She also discusses the challenges of achieving executive buy-in, how to navigate internal approval processes, and explores the potential impact of AI on social media marketing teams.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Planable

Planable is the content collaboration platform that makes marketing teamwork a breeze. It’s the spot where you can create, plan, review, approve, and analyse all your marketing content for social media, blogs, newsletters, press releases. Experience a faster, smoother workflow that helps your team work together like never before.

Started in 2016, Planable is trusted by over 5000 marketing teams behind iconic brands such as Hyundai, Christian Louboutin, Royal Canin, KFC, and SMEG.

About Xenia Muntean

Xenia is the CEO and Co-Founder of Planable, a content review and marketing collaboration platform used by over 10,000 creators behind iconic brands such as Hyundai, Christian Louboutin, Viber, and United Nations. Prior to launching Planable, at 20 years old she built a digital marketing agency and led social for clients such as Coca-Cola.

Xenia Muntean is a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree, Techstars alumna, and Webby Awards judge. She’s also a frequent speaker, startup mentor, and avid runner.

Time Stamps

[00:50:6] – Xenia provides some background to her career and why she founded planable.

[02:06.6] - Xenia discusses the benefits of being based in Europe versus the United States.

[04:33:1] – What does Plannable do? Xenia explains what makes the platform so loved amongst users.

[09:53:6] – Xenia offers some tips on achieving executive buy-in.

[12:03:0] – How to reuse content to extend its lifetime.

[15:18:7] – What role can AI play in content generation?

[21:45:2] – Xenia’s contact details.

Quotes

“When you build a software as a service product, it's all about the people… building a team that you can resonate with and have less cultural barriers with I think is really important.” Xenia Muntean, Co-Founder and CEO at Planable.

“I think for content it's all about the distribution, right? So, it's really important to have really good, really meaningful content, but also to not forget about the second part. How do you get the most out of that content?” Xenia Muntean, Co-Founder and CEO at Planable.

Follow Xenia:

Xenia Muntean on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/xeniamuntean/

Planable website: https://planable.io/

Planable on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/planable/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Xenia Muntean - Planable

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Xenia Muntean

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today.

Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology for podcasts from Napier. I'm Mike Maynard and today I'm joined by Xenia Muntean is the co-founder and CEO of a Martech company called Planable. Welcome to the podcast Xenia.

Xenia: Thank you so much for having me here.

Mike: So it's great to have you on the podcast to start off with, we always like to have people give a little bit of a background as to how their careers developed, and how they've ended up in their current roles. So I don't know if you can just explain, you know, what your career journey was, please?

Xenia: Absolutely, my 90% of my career journey is in Planable. So that's, that's where, you know, I built, I built my entire background professionally. But before Planable, I did have a Social Media Marketing Agency. So I was building a lot of content for brands such as Coca Cola, and some other brands locally back in my home country. And I was doing a lot of, you know, besides social, I was doing websites and branding and everything, you know, everything, digital marketing, everything, you know, was wearing a lot of path. And I've started building that agency whilst I was still in university. And then I can discover this problem that we're currently solving at Planable, and specifically, the back and forth that happens behind digital and social media campaigns. And I've jumped on board on, you know, solving this, this problem and building bannable. And that's what I've been doing for the past eight, nine years, almost. So yeah, so as I mentioned, my entire career has been here, invested in Planable.

Mike: That's great to hear. And it's one of those sort of, you know, nine year overnight successes, I guess.

Xenia: Exactly, yes.

Mike: So one of the things you mentioned Sr, which I always find interesting is, you're based in Europe, you're running a company that I guess primarily serves American customers, and is also incorporated America. So what do you see as the benefits of being in Europe versus moving across to the States.

Xenia: I think, considering the type of customers that we have, that are very digitally savvy ones that have a very thorough buying process, and the entire product, which is very, very easy to use, and also very easy for users to onboard, it's a self service process, through our website over zoom. So there's no point in actually having people on the ground, we do visit our customers, our top customers from time to time for you know, to establish a relationship and for customer success. But other than that, it's all an advantage, considering obviously, you know, the costs of building something, when you build a software as a service product, it's all about the people. And obviously, Eastern Europe is a little bit more affordable than North America. So it's all a big advantage to us. And also culturally, you know, building a team that you can resonate with and have less cultural barriers, I think is really important, especially when the team is quite small, you know, under 100 people, it's really important to have that sync and have that cultural fit.

Mike: I love it. I think that's really fascinating to try and build a stronger culture within the business by bringing people together who have a similar background. But that's a really interesting point. And I think a challenge for a lot of people who try and build international businesses.

Xenia: Yeah, something else that is also very dear to us is our in person culture, which I know is very anti the current trend. But it again, because we're such a small team, we're still a start up in terms of how we think and in terms of how we move, again, you know, having a distributed team or having food on the ground and in North America, that will be really hard for us to incorporate in the current very bonded very in person type of culture that we have.

Mike: That makes a lot of sense. Moving on. I mean, let's let's look at panel itself and the product. Can you give me you know, a little bit more of a description as to what you were trying to solve when you built pluggable?

Xenia: Sure. So when I started building Planable, together with my co founders, I was working on my agency at that point in time and they were working in other digital marketing agencies. And we all kind of stumbled individually into this problem of how do you present work to clients in a really neat and elegant way? And how do you put the work that you're creating for your clients in the best light at that point? In time, and still, now in the present, I don't think PowerPoints or spreadsheets or Google Docs are the best way to present moving graphics, you know, very beautiful content that you're creating for clients, and the entire bank Bonga. And the entire back and forth of that happens over email when you have to discuss that content is also not very efficient. So those are the problems that we stumbled upon, on our own through through the work that we were doing in our agencies. And we did a bit of customer discovery. And we realized that, hey, this is not a problem that we just ourselves are struggling with. But seems like it's, you know, a larger problem not just in agencies, but also in larger companies in house and not just in Eastern Europe, but all across the world. You know, people collaborate on social media posts, in PowerPoints and spreadsheets, they send it back and forth over email, they discuss it there. And you know, a lot of mistakes can happen, a lot of things can fall through the cracks, when you don't have a very smooth process. That's what Planable does. It's one single space where you can bring everyone who needs to be involved in the process of discussing content for social, from the actual people who are creating good copywriters, and designers and social media managers, but also everybody else who is involved and has a word to say in what that content should look like. Other teams, right? So product teams, may be employer, the Vaca, C teams, HR departments, stakeholders, the leadership, everybody who who has a say in that content or has specific knowledge to inform and build that content, can basically bring everyone on the same page, prototype that content, iterate on it together, discuss it, and then you know, obviously, schedule it, and Cloneable is going to take care of the publishing as well. But it's really that workflow and that back and forth process that we really shine at.

Mike: And I mean, there's obviously quite a lot of products out there who do something vaguely similar in terms of presenting content for people to review. You know, you said you really shine a showcase in that content. Can you dig a little bit deeper and unpack you know, exactly why Planable is loved by your users? Yeah.

Xenia: Yeah. So how visual the product is, I think one of the first things that our users see when they discover the product is that oh, wow, you know, it's really visual, and it looks so good. The interface is so clean Lake, it's really easy to use. So the interface and the usability are probably the things that people you know, love a lot about the product. And I think that's really, really important considering that it is a product where you showcase the work and where everybody looks at the work, looks at the content discusses it collaborates around that. So it's really important to put it in the best light and basically yes to, to do good by that content. And the way we do that is by allowing you to see how the posts are actually going to look like once they're live. Right. So imPlanable, when you create content, when you create social media posts for your campaign, you can actually see a live markup, a preview of how that content is going to look like on any social media network, right. So if you're creating content for LinkedIn, you're gonna see posts as though they're on LinkedIn already. Right? So for Instagram, the same, you can see the grid on Instagram where everything is going to look together, once the entire campaign is live, you can see the stories and the tech talks and all the posts for every social media platform. Pinterest has the same, you know, native format as a pin. So all of them are kind of destination aware. And you are able to experience it as though it's live, which is really great for you as a creator. Because you're working in a more delightful way you can actually see how your work is going to look like. But it's also very good for everyone who is involved in the process in terms of approving that content, right? It's very often social media managers work with people who are not very social media savvy, all kinds of stakeholders that don't know how a specific format of posts is actually going to look like. So you're taking that friction out of the equation. And people can see the content, no miscommunications, no question, they just get how they're going to look like. And it's all a matter of, let's change this, or let's improve that part to make the entire process of collaborating and approving contents moves.

Mike: So that's interesting. I was going to ask you about mistakes that people make. And it sounds like one of the big ones is assuming the audience internally who's got to review and approve the posts, actually understands the social media network. You know, we've got a primarily B2B audience. We probably have a bigger problem with executives not understanding social media, that maybe even consumer people do.

Xenia: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's really important to be able to gather feedback from state encoders in a way that is very easy to them, right. So when you need people to get involved in that process, you really need to make it super easy for them to give you feedback. And I know that from my own experience working with clients, if they need to log in into some tool and learn how that tool works, it's just not going to happen. They're gonna call you, they're gonna email you, they're gonna give you feedback and some other ways that is more convenient and easier for them. So you need to remove all those barriers to entry when it comes to feedback, right. So you need a tool that is very, very simple to use, where they see everything in a familiar way, right. So if you work with executives on content for LinkedIn, they need to log in. And it needs to look as though it's actually on LinkedIn. So it makes it super, super easy for them to be able to give feedback and also give feedback in a granular way. Right? So we take feedback to the next level asides plan and ball, kind of like how Google Docs does it rides on in Google Docs, you can give feedback as annotations, right? So you can give feedback on specific words, like the specific words and give feedback, or even do suggestions where you can delete an entire part and rewrite it yourself. So it makes that feedback more specific. And it brings more clarity in that process. And that's exactly what Planable does, as well, so that there are no mistakes or miscommunications around what needed to be changed, or to what part of the social media post were you referring to? Right. So it's crystal clear.

Mike: That's super important. I've seen a lot of feedback that's coming in, that's a little bit vague. And then the changes that are made are not quite right. And it ends up wasting time for everybody, you know, whether it's two people within a brand or an agency in a brand, I love that idea of making the feedback, crystal clear. Just moving on now. So one of the things I think a lot of people are looking at is to be able to reuse their content. So maybe that's across different social platforms, or maybe that's generating multiple posts around the same topic. I mean, what's your view on content reuse? And how does Planable you know, help you create a workflow that's more efficient?

Xenia: I think for content, it's all about the distribution, right? So it's really important to make really good, really meaningful content, but also to not forget about the second part, how do you get the most out of that content very often. And I see that inside our team as well, very often, we produce really, really good content, and that we launch it once we promote it once and then it kind of you know, sits somewhere and collects dust to basically, so you need to get as much out of that content as possible. And one way Planable helps with that is by bringing other formats of content inside your calendar. Right? Though very typically, when you look at social media management platforms out there, it's only focused on social. So we are more focused on the content. And we're helping you bring newsletters and articles and any other format of content that you can think of into your calendar into your editorial calendar. So you can see it alongside your content. So you can, you know, say that, okay, this, this article can collaborate on it. And then you can you know, trust format, we have a very, very solid integration with open AI and site findable, so you can take an article, and then you can rewrite it and make it into you know, multiple posts that you can use it on LinkedIn, or you know, on any other channel that works best for your audience. So this is really, really helpful in terms of getting the most out of the content piece. But also, we do have an evergreen functionality, right, where, if you have a post that you know, has performed very, very well, maybe you can reuse it and reschedule at you know, every couple of months, so that you can get you know more out of it. And again, customize it, personalize it a little bit so that it's not always you know, the same single pose, but maybe the concept is the same. And then you tweak it, again, with AI. So you can make things you know, very efficient. And you can get that post on an evergreen schedule. So you can recycle and use that content and in more ways than just one initial launch and then forgetting about it.

Mike: I love and am I right? I mean Planable also has the analytics built in so you can understand which of those posts should be evergreen. Exactly,

Xenia: Exactly, yes. So you look at the performance, we have a snapshot. So we don't go extraordinary in depth, you can get a lot of data from the platforms themselves, when we give you a snapshot, a real time snapshot of how your page is performing, but also how individual posts are performing. So you can look at what success looks like on your page and what content is successful and gain insights either about producing more content in that direction. Or directly as you mentioned, Mike just taking you know one post and rewriting it, tweaking it and putting it on evergreen schedule. That's

Mike: perfect. And it sounds like it shortcuts a lot of time because you've got everything in one platform, which I think is great. And you mentioned earlier ai ai and the use of AI to rewrite repurpose existing content? I mean, how do you see AI impacting a tool like Planable? In the future? Are you going to have more AI actual origination of posts and images? Or do you think that still needs a human to be creative and write the first draft,

Xenia: you absolutely absolutely needs like you're meant to be creative AI is a copilot, it's a tool that helps you either sometimes maybe with inspiration, but also in other times, it helps you make your work a little bit more efficient, but it's obviously not gonna replace social media managers, I can see that you still need the human touch, you still need that authenticity, someone to understand the brand and to come up with the concepts and the strategies and the creative ideas. And then yes, you can use AI to polish it, you can use AI to rewrite some pieces. But definitely, I can't see, at least not at the moment, to replace this entire profession, the way we have aI inside Planable is integrated into the creation process. So as I mentioned already, can help you rewrite things, it can help you make it punchy, or short or longer, whatever you need, or you can even give it images and it's going to create captions out of those images, which you can then you know, Polish and you know, work with them 40% of creators inside Planable use AI and 75% of what they're getting from the AI is actually being used live in production. So it has, you know, a great acceptance rate when it comes to the the output. So I think you know, it's a really great tool, but it's definitely not something that is going to replace the work, you still need genuine connection with your audience and a genuine understanding of your brand and your audience.

Mike: I think that's great. The really understanding the brand and connecting with the audiences is really good advice. I mean, do you have any other advice for people who are generating social media posts, and I'm thinking particularly of agencies like Napier, that might be generating social media posts for our clients? How can we do a better job?

Xenia: That's the big question. And that's a big one, I think it needs to be very much in collaboration with the client, and you need to be very, very close to the business as an agency, right? You need to really understand what the businesses objectives are, kind of what they're after what the goals are, but also you knew really in depth understanding of the products and the services. And yeah, you really need to be very integrated into into that business. And it sounds like a no brainer, but I think that is where you need to get started. And then all kinds of ideas and problems and solutions appear once you're very, very close to the business. And in a strong collaboration with a client. I know a lot of agencies are kind of against this entire approval process. And you know, ideally, they just do the work and not have the client involved in the collaboration that you know, they've been hired for that. But there is a very big added value to having the client involved in the process. They know so much about the business, they know so much about the brand, that they're building the product. And I think, you know, if you establish a really strong, really candid relationship with your clients, you can get more out of the content and the services that you're providing for them.

Mike: Absolutely. I think that's great advice. And I know, you know, I've heard people complaining about the client being involved and the classic brand police complaint. What you said about honesty is absolutely right on if if you're really candidate, and you've talked to a client, I think you can then overcome. And to be honest, from agency's point of view, I think it's generally feeling the client is being too cautious, which is then going to impact the results. But I think an agency can be candid, that's great advice. I love that. So I really appreciate your time Xenia, it's been really interesting. Before we finish, there's a couple of questions, we always like to ask people. And the first one is what's the best piece of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Xenia: I had a very good conversation around positioning. And positioning is really important to us, because we're in a very, very crowded market, you know, B2B technology, but also marketing technology. I don't know if you've seen those marketing technology maps, but they're gigantic. So it's really important to understand who your ideal customer is, who is actually getting the most value out of your product and your service, who loves you the most basically, and think about your positioning around that. And I think we should have thought about how we position our brand earlier. I wish we did that earlier. But I think this advice and this, you know, conversation that I had the wrong positioning with someone that was really, really good and I'm happy we finally did it and you know, it clarified a lot of things internally as well.

Mike: think that's great. That's really important. I think quite a stir theatric bit of advice as well. The other question we'd like to ask people is around marketers entering the industry. So if you were talking to someone who maybe is just finishing a university degree about to enter marketing as a career, what advice would you give them to help them be successful?

Xenia: I try as many things as possible in the marketing space, I started as a generalist. So I think, you know, if you try a lot of things, you get the occasion to do that, to get the opportunity to actually wear a lot of hats in the marketing space. I think that's great. I think you expose yourself to a lot of things and you can understand what are the things that interests you the most, what are the things that you're good at, you know, by getting that really broad exposure to all of the things marketing, you can find? What are the directions that maybe you want to specialize in? Or maybe you want to be, you know, continue as a generalist that, you know, path, a swab. But I hear that a lot of you know, people, especially early in their career, you know, complain a lot about like, Oh, you didn't, you can see a lot of memes on Tik Tok, as well about all of the hats that you wear as a marketer. And I think that's great, especially early in your career, I think that kind of exposure, you get to learn a lot from it. And it's really, really good opportunity. If you want to specialize later on, obviously, you know, you can go into that path. But I think that early exposure, teaches you a lot about the different mixes and parts that are, you know, the world of marketing.

Mike: Thank you. I think that's awesome advice for anyone starting a career in marketing. So thank you very much. I mean, Sr, I really appreciate your time all the insights you've shared, if somebody's listening to podcasts, they want to find out more about Planable on maybe, you know, ask you some questions about what you've said, What's the best way to do that.

Xenia: So the best way to do that is either to reach out on LinkedIn, and let me know that you've heard me in this podcast and absolutely connect with me, I'd be more than happy to talk. And also, if you want to learn more about Planable, you can just go to our website Planable.io. We have a free plan. You can test the product on your own for a month, you can see you know if it's a problem that you have, and if this solution that we're building is something that works for you. But yeah, reach out on LinkedIn. And you know, just go to our website if you want to check us out.

Mike: Thanks so much. I really appreciate your time. And thank you for being a guest on marketing B2B technology.

Xenia: Thank you so much for having me here.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Andrus Purde - Outfunnel

Andrus Purde, Co-Founder and CEO of Outfunnel, an integration platform, discusses the importance of sharing data between marketing and sales teams and the challenges businesses face when their tools don't communicate effectively.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Outfunnel

Outfunnel is an integration platform that makes it easy to connect sales and marketing tools, keep customer data in sync across the MarTech stack, and record all marketing engagement in the CRM.

About Andrus Purde

Andrus Purde is Co-Founder, CEO and ‘recovering marketer’ at Outfunnel. Andrus founded the integration platform in 2017 following a career in marketing, including positions at Pipedrive and Skype.

Time Stamps

[00:01:0] - Andrus introduces himself and talks about his marketing career before starting Outfunnel.

[00:03:2] - Andrus discusses Estonia as a great place for startups and the benefits of being based there.

[00:06:0] - Importance of Two-Way Data Sync: Andrus explains the significance of syncing data both ways between CRM and marketing tools.

[00:10:3] - Andrus talks about the popular integrations and connections made using Outfunnel.

[00:14:0] - Andrus discusses the strategies used to promote Outfunnel.

[00:18:3] - Andrus shares the best marketing advice he has received.

[00:21:4] - Andrus's contact details.

Quotes

“Some companies operate years, or forever, with data in isolation… marketers and salespeople who are doing the work... they shouldn't worry about how the tools have been sourced in their company. They should just have access to the data.” Andrus Purde, Co-Founder and CEO at Outfunnel

Follow Andrus:

Andrus Purde on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andruspurde/

Outfunnel website: https://outfunnel.com/

Outfunnel on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/outfunnel/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Andrus Purde - Outfunnel

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Andrus Purde

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today.

Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. I'm Mike Maynard and today I'm talking to Andrus Purde. Andrus is the Co-Founder and CEO of Outfunnel. Welcome to the podcast.

Andrus: Hey Mike, thank you for having me. I think as to my title, I think I can also call myself a recovering marketer. I've been in marketing all my life before co-founding and leading Outfunnel, and I think it's something I will never get out of whether I want to or not.

Mike: That's an interesting position, recovering marketer. I mean, maybe just to start off, you could give us a little bit of background about your marketing career and what you did before you started Outfunnel.

Andrus: So I was in non-tech, traditional marketing before in my early career. I worked at the newspaper, fast food and consumer goods consulting. And then at some point I realized I'm doing the same job over and over again until the baby grass is greener on this other side, which is technology, which had started to take off already. And so I joined Sky pretty early and then worked in product marketing at Sky here in Tallinn, where I'm from, and also in London. Then got involved with a more unknown startup called Pipetribe back when they were getting started and spent seven years there as a first marketer and then first head of marketing. And then co-founded Aftelet and I've been working on it for more than six years now.

Mike: That's fantastic. And I'll talk about out front in a second. But you mentioned you're based in Estonia. You know, how's that as a place to base a startup? Is it a great place with a good startup scene? Or do you wish you'd gone to Silicon Valley?

Andrus: It's a great place for building a company because the weather is usually so bad that you're inclined to stay indoors and work on your startup. Also, I think the startup scene here, the technology scene here is pretty good now. 15 years ago, I would have had to move to either Valley or maybe Boston or London, or depending on what the company was doing. But right now, I think you can, especially after COVID and all this remote thing, you can work everywhere. And the startup scene, both in terms of A company started and tech talent and investments in Estonia is very good. I think we are probably the best or the top of the list in Europe, if not the world.

Mike: That's fantastic and it's very positive to hear that in Europe there are these startup hubs that are really growing and developing and clearly Estonia is one of them.

Andrus: Yeah, it's all related to the weather.

Mike: I think by that logic, the British should also be amazing at startups as well, because we've not had great weather.

Andrus: I think the British summers can be pretty long and pretty warm. So if you ever want to complain about the weather, come up north, come to Estonia, and let's check out our winters.

Mike: I'll definitely do that at some point. It's one of the countries I've wanted to visit and never been to. So I will definitely come and see you.

Anyway, Andrus, going back to Outfunnel, you know, you're working with Pipedrive. I think if anyone's in a small business, in a marketing or sales function, they'd absolutely know Pipedrive. Maybe some of our enterprise listeners might not be so familiar. But you're working there, and then you decided that you wanted to go and start Outfunnel. So what drove you to want to create Outfunnel, and what problem was it solving?

Andrus: So I think two answers to that. First answer is boredom. So I had been a tech marketer for quite a while, and I had this itch of perhaps wanting to try something on my own, to break out of this marketer job title and be an entrepreneur. And second is that working with Pipetribe customers, and I think a good marketer has to work closely with customers. I noticed that the companies, small businesses were loving the sales software that we were offering, but they were finding it hard to connect marketing tools and the workflows to Pipetribe. And then my wish to try something else, and then the need which I saw exist in the market emerged into a project first like a research project and then a small minimal viable product and then a company around it.

Mike: That's fantastic and I don't think that it's users of pipe drive that are alone in the problem of syncing marketing and sales data. I mean why do you think it's such a problem to get that data together?

Andrus: Because they usually exist in different tools, at least for many non-enterprise customers, even maybe for enterprise customers if you look at the size of the data-syncing market. Usually driving revenue happens in collaboration between the sales team and the marketing team. And sometimes there's a chief revenue officer who's leading it, but oftentimes there's a sales leader, the marketing leader, and they want to do what's best for their team because that's the best thing usually for the company. And they pick their stack, their tools. And if a sales director or sales VP picks something like HubSpot as their CRM and the marketing VP pick something like ImageImp as their main tool, then these tools don't talk to each other natively. There are some integrations, some of them even pretty good ones offered by the vendors themselves, but it's very hard to get the tools to work in order for the teams to be able to work together. So there's usually some one-way data syncs available, but if you want the tools to sync up two-way, you need to look for a specialist integration. Building it on your own as a custom integration or using one of the integration platforms out from the list is just one of the options.

Mike: And that's interesting, you talk about this important difference between a one-way sync and a two-way sync. So in your experience, what do you get from syncing both ways, so to and from the CRM, as opposed to just sending data to the CRM?

Andrus: That depends really on the type of company and how their sales and marketing operations have been set up. Some companies operate years or forever with data in isolation. So the marketing team doesn't have access to the same data the sales team has. Or only one person maybe in the marketing team has access to the sales data and vice versa. So even thinking one way is a step forward and it helps sales and marketing teams work together better. Marketers and salespeople who are doing the work, they shouldn't worry about how the tools have been sourced in their company. They should just have access to the data. They need to do their job. They shouldn't do manual work. And also the leads on the receiving end shouldn't be receiving messages from a company that are completely irrelevant to what they have purchased or been interested in before.

Mike: I'm interested because, you know, you've talked specifically about marketing and sales data. Outfunnel, I guess, is continually developing and it's already starting to add data from other sources, so obviously form, fill data, but also you've even got some ad integration with Facebook. Is that something you see Outfunnel growing into, more of an integration across all sorts of marketing and sales tools?

Andrus: Definitely, I mean, because I think one of the benefits of using a big platform such as HubSpot, who offers both the CRM and marketing automation tool, and also a website CMS tool with forms. One of the major benefits is that all the data is synced up. Salespeople know where a lead has come from, which campaign or source to have they engaged with emails, what emails have they engaged with, et cetera. So clearly there's good reasons to have all the data synced up in one place. But then the slight, or actually not too slight, downside is that it can cost an arm and a leg. So using a major platform such as HubSpot or Salesforce can cost thousands or tens of thousands of dollars, euros, pounds per month. So as a smart or small business, you want to maybe look for the same benefits, at a lower budget. So using best of breed and nifty tools, and then suiting them up with either custom integrations or something without funding, I think is a great alternative to using one of the major all-in-one platforms.

Mike: That's interesting. It's a great point around value as well as what you talked about earlier with maybe sales and marketing want different tools. I'm interested, you know, you've got all these integrations, you know, what are the most popular integrations? What are the biggest, you know, connections that you tend to make or your customers tend to make using Outfunnel?

Andrus: So, I think maybe due to my own background and we have some other team members that are Vija alumni. We have a lot of Pipetribe customers as our customers. And then our popular integrations are then connections between Pipetribe and MageImp or Pipetribe and Xavio or Pipetribe and Brevo, formerly Sendinblue. So we're just linking up CRM and the marketing automation tool so that nobody needs to do manual contacting, import, exporting. And so the email engagement can be linked back to the CRM for the marketing automation tool to offer salespeople more context. So I think these are some of our popular integrations and also similar integrations with HubSpot as the CRM. So I think that, yeah, our bread and butter is linking a CRM and the marketing automation tool. And I would think the second category is just other revenue generating related apps. So calendars among our popular integrations. If you want your Calendly meetings to arrive in your CRM instantly and with all the submitted data coming to the right fields and with the marketing source also attached to the lead, then we can do that for our customers.

Mike: That's fascinating. I mean, another thing I'd like to understand, you can sync things like history together. There's a lot of tools that can just bring the basic fields across. But syncing history where you have multiple items for contact is much more difficult. It's something that's hard to do, for example, in Zapier. How important is that to get that record of what people have done across from one system to another? Or is it more just making sure that you've got the same email address, the same spelling of the first name and things like that?

Andrus: Second, it depends. I think for some use cases, it's perfectly fine to use something like Zapier. So if you need to submit form submissions from website to CRM, then Zapier can be just fine. But then there's cases where you'd want to do whole segment-based syncing. So I want to sync maybe customers and leads as a list from the CRM to the marketing tool. And maybe there's a list of secondary leads or other types of leads that I want to sync from the marketing tool to the CRM. Some of them are new, some of them have some history. And then trigger-based syncing is not enough and you'll want to use a specialist. solution for that. You could use Outfunnel, you could build it your own, there's other tools like Outfunnel that help you. Usually I think if there's a database in CRM and another database in marketing automation tool, you want this synced in a way which is not trigger-based but more holistic and it would include more historical data.

Mike: That makes sense, that makes a lot of sense to give a richer picture. I'm interested as well on the platform. So Outfunnel, we've talked a lot about syncing. You also offer other features in Outfunnel. So for example, visitor tracking on websites. Can you talk a little bit about why you've chosen to do that in Outfunnel, why that makes sense rather than maybe using a marketing platform that would have that built in?

Andrus: We built it because not all marketing tools have it. So HubSpot had it, and then HubSpot users who use the whole suite don't need ours or anybody else's. But if you're a PipeServe user, for example, or a copy user who uses MailChimp as a marketing automation tool, then MailChimp doesn't have a website visitor tracking feature. And yet, understanding what leads to on your website and which lead has visited which page is hugely important in understanding how warm a lead is or how self-reliant they are. So we think we picked it because customers were asking for it. And as soon as all the marketing platforms or CRMs have added their own, we're happy to drop ours because our bread and butter is in taking data between There's the marketing tools, but in order to offer a holistic solution for a company that you have your CRM data and your email data and your website data and your ads data in one place, then we need to either offer our own website visitor tracking feature or integrate with the tool which offers it.

Mike: That makes a lot of sense. I totally understand that. I'm just changing a little bit in terms of focus here. I'm interested to know how you promote Outfunnel. What works for you? What do you find the best tactics? And marketers are always, I think, interested in knowing what works for other people in other companies.

Andrus: One thing which I think is both a plus and a hindrance is that we tend to, our purchase of decision for something like Outfunnel tends to be very close to purchase decision of a CRM. And then if somebody stops using a CRM, they will also probably stop using something like Outfunnel. So then the communities that CRM companies have built around them are our biggest source of leads. And we just need to be present there, we need to make sure that we have good reviews there. We need to make sure that we are active in the communities which are online and sometimes offline. So that is by far our major source of lead. So we are present on Pytron Marketplace, HubSpot Marketplace, Copper Community and Salesforce we are not that active with yet, but we are definitely be more active with Salesforce in the future as our integration gets more advanced. The other important way for us finding customers and for customers finding us is we're just findable. I think there's a category of products which people are not aware of. There you really need to be active in media advertising or social media or PR, but we belong in a category which people tend to know. So if they want to take Pipedrive and MainChimp, they start Googling it. And we just need to be findable. which means that our content at SEO Cave needs to be somewhat strong. We need to buy some ads through the rated keywords. And then we just need to make sure that sites that come up when you search for something like connecting HubSpot and ActiveCampaign feature us, which is a combination of SEO content, some review management, and then working with platforms like AppJarra and whatever sites come up with online searches.

Mike: That's great. And it's really interesting how you're focusing all your SEO around solving problems, you know, you're not optimizing for your brands. In fact, you're optimizing for the brands or the vendors that you're you're gluing together.

Andrus: Exactly. And then sometimes A PyTorch user may just want to know, how do I get more value out of the CRM that we picked? And then they search for PyTorch integrations or PyTorch tips or PyTorch hacks. And then these are also keywords where we want to be present. This is not our large source of lead, but it's important enough to warrant some attention and some work from us.

Mike: That absolutely makes sense. I'm interested actually now, we've talked a lot about Outfunnel, and you integrate with all sorts of products, from MailChimp up to Salesforce. So who do you think you're really designed for? Is it designed for a particular size company or people with particular problems? Where do you think you fit in the market? And the question everybody's wondering as well is, what does it look like in terms of pricing for the products?

Andrus: So I think we are targeting larger, there's a term which I don't love, but I use it a lot nevertheless. So SMBs, so small and medium businesses. So we're targeted at SMBs. Some are solopreneurs, so about 1% each. Some are very large companies, but I think our sweet spot is 10 to 200 people in the company. And then the company would need to have a marketing function or team and a sales function team. If a company only has a sales team, let's say, I don't know, if you're selling to government, you don't really do much marketing. You don't need your marketing and sales data to be joined, then there's less relevance for us. If you work in e-commerce, you're mostly doing advertising, there's no sales team. There's no need for something called funder. There's no need to unite your data. But yeah, I think companies where The sales team, marketing team, which are medium-sized, and then where sales and marketing need to work together, that's where usually there's a bigger data integration need. And then these companies tend to want to sync up their sales and marketing data.

Mike: Perfect. That's really clear, and I'm sure really helpful for listeners to work out, you know, where you sit in the market. I really appreciate your time, Andrus. I'd just like to ask, there's a couple of questions we like to ask everybody who guests on the podcast. And the first thing is to know, what's the best bit of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Andrus: That's a very good question. And I thought about it hard, but then the best advice I've given depends on where I've been in my career and what stage the company has been. So there's no, I think there's no universal advice in marketing other than talk to your customers. Everything else depends on the stage of your company. the budget of your company and then how your customers buy. So I would say talk to customers. They will tell you how they want to buy, which I think is a good guideline for how you should market.

Mike: That's awesome. That's actually incredibly good advice. I love that. And the other question we always ask is about people starting off in marketing. So you said it's important to understand where you are in your career for the best advice. Well, what about someone who's, you know, maybe just left university is going into their first marketing job? What advice would you give them?

Andrus: I would advise them to not look for advice, but just try it out. So try different marketing roles, try to see where, like, does marketing suit them overall? And if it does, then try to get experience. And then I think the good thing nowadays is it's easy to get, like, bite-sized jobs, work via freelancing platforms or work on a contract basis. Try to work in B2B, B2C, different areas and see where you connect, where your skills and strengths really shine. And then go all in if you find something where your skills make sense.

Mike: Awesome. That's really good advice. I think really strong advice for anyone starting their career. Just to summarize, is there anything you feel we've missed or how would you like us to remember Outfunnel and what it can do for customers?

Andrus: A good place to start is that do your sales and marketing teams need to work together? If they do, is the data joined together already? If they're not, starting from data is usually a good place to start because it's relatively easy and relatively inexpensive. So if the data is not joined, I would stop there. But if the data is already joined, and if the sales and market teams are working off the same data, then you would need to look into areas such as communication or collaboration or joint goals, which are harder to manage. They take longer to solve, but great next things to do after data has been joined up.

Mike: That's fantastic. I think that's a really good summary. Thank you so much for your time on the podcast, Andrus. Just one question. If people have something they want to ask you or they'd like to find out more information about the product, what's the best place to go either to get a hold of you or to learn more about Outfunnel?

Andrus: I am active on LinkedIn. So Outfunnel is easy to find on LinkedIn and my name may be a bit complex to pronounce in English. A-N-D-R-U-S-P-U-R-D-E. But yeah, I'm usually easy to get hold of there. And I'd love to answer any questions relating to B2B marketing or connecting sales and marketing data.

Mike: That's awesome. That's very kind. Thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast, Andrus. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Mike. Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at napierb2b.com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Mark Donnigan - Virtual CMO

In this episode of Marketing B2B Technology, Mike chats with Mark Donnigan, a virtual CMO who works with tech companies. Mark shares insights into his career journey, discusses his approach to building long-term client relationships, and emphasises the importance of understanding the market and customers.

Mark also shares his advice on marketing tactics, highlights the value of focusing on go-to-market strategy, and talks about the importance of getting into the field to understand customers.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Mark Donnigan

Mark Donnigan designs and executes marketing programs and go-to-market strategies to establish and grow markets for disruptive startup companies. As a transformative B2B marketing and business leader, Mark understands what’s required to succeed in today’s winner-takes-all market.

Well-versed in SaaS, software licensing, enterprise technology, and platform business models, Mark helps companies build efficient marketing teams that routinely outperform larger marketing departments.

Time Stamps

[00:44.0] - Mark shares his career journey and explains his role as Virtual CMO.

[12:57.0] - The benefits of hiring a Virtual CMO versus full-time CMO.

[14:45.0] - Mark talks about his approach to building marketing plans.

[18:42.0] - Overrated marketing channels and tactics

[23:26.0] - Challenges with fixed KPIs in marketing

[24:37.0] - Mark offers some marketing advice

[25:52.0] - Mark's contact details

Quotes

“Get into the field. Know the market. Know the customers. Know how they think. Know what they care about. Know how they make decisions.” Mark Donnigan, Virtual CMO.

Follow Mark:

Mark Donnigan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markdonnigan/

Growth Stage Marketing website: https://growthstage.marketing/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Mark Donnigan - Virtual CMO

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Mark Donnigan

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today.

Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. Today, I'm joined by Mark Donnigan. Mark is a virtual CMO who works with tech companies. Welcome to the podcast, Mark.

Mark: Yeah, well, thanks for having me. Really looking forward to the conversation. Well, it's great.

Mike: So Mark, firstly, we like to understand a bit about people's background. So can you tell me a little bit about your career and how you got to the point of working with all these different tech companies?

Mark: That's right, yeah. Well, I like to say my career is like all of ours, right? It was absolutely perfectly orchestrated. I had everything planned, knew exactly where I would be at each juncture. Obviously, that's a joke. Yeah, so I am technical by nature. I do consider myself a technologist, but really I'm a marketer. I'm a creative. I play music. And, you know, so I kind of have this left brain, you know, this right brain thing going on, which, which I guess serves well in marketing, you know, the data side and then the art side of it. But I started my career, I actually did go to music school after dropping out of a computer science program. Long story about how that was, but that's for another show. But yeah, I went to music school and I realized, oh no, not everybody is a rich rock star. And so I found my way into sales and started building my sales career. Along the way, I very quickly discovered the power of marketing as an accelerator to sales and revenue. Initially, I would say it was sort of just out of necessity that I began to really become a student of marketing. Again, I wanted to make my numbers, and as I was growing in my sales career and managing teams, I wanted my teams to make their numbers. You know, I took a very fervent interest in how marketing works and eventually took on formal responsibility for marketing, but always running sales, you know, it's always in a revenue context. My career really pivoted more into the marketing realm, I guess you would say, when I started getting involved in startups and started doing a lot more around strategy, more business development, you know, looking out at markets, how are we going to build markets? What markets should we go after? where there are opportunities, you know, market inflections, all those things that you do, you know, when you're growing, especially a startup, a technology startup that just sent me increasingly down the path of looking at marketing. really my full-time focus and so I've been living in the marketing world full-time you know or really I guess you could say in a dedicated way for oh a dozen years or more and been working in technology and technology sales for 25 years.

Mike: I love that enthusiasm around, you know, helping companies scale. I mean, what is it that really excites you about that? Is it the fact you can have a big impact in a very short time or you can see massive growth? What's really cool about that?

Mark: Yeah, it's a great question. You know, I actually introduce myself when people, most of the time I do anyway, when people say, hey, so what do you do? You know, I say I build companies. I actually say that before I say something like, oh, I'm a virtual CMO or I work with startups and help them in the areas of marketing. I usually say I build companies because really at the end of the day, that is what we all should be doing, right? But I believe that that is the ultimate mission of marketing, you know, really. And that may seem like a completely obvious statement. And yet I think we've all seen too many examples where, you know, marketing is a little closer to the arts and crafts department or the keeper of the brand. Important things, you know, look creative absolutely matters. And yes, brand absolutely matters. But, you know, when you're building a company, especially today and especially in the tech world, there's a lot to that, you know, there's a lot to it. So yeah, I really enjoy the elements of building, creating something that, that, that is new and that's, you know, fresh and different. That's, uh, that's what I love.

Mike: And one of the things that interests me is probably most of the people who listen to this podcast, they're probably employed in a large enterprise rather than a smaller company. I'm sure they're interested to know what it's like to be a virtual CMO. What kind of engagements do you have? How much time per week do you work on each client? Are you working on multiple projects at the same time? Tell us a little bit about the role.

Mark: Sure. So nowadays, the fractional executive role, so whether that's a virtual CFO, virtual CMO, virtual, you know, the whole C-suite is being virtualized, it seems. It does mean different things, and some of it is really based on how the individual chooses to work. So the way that I choose to work is I don't do projects. So that is one model. You know, one model is to drop in as a virtual executive and maybe you're kickstarting building a team. Maybe the CEO or the founder feels, hey, you know, I really could use kind of a confidant for six months while I'm trying to kind of understand, maybe they're not a marketing person, they don't understand marketing, so they want someone to walk alongside them. That's fine. That's not how I work. So what I do is I come into environments, into organizations where I can add value. That involves obviously bringing my marketing toolkit with me, you know, meaning, you know, all my experience. But it generally also means going into markets that I know very, very well. So very commonly, I actually come in as a subject matter expert in that industry. For example, one industry that I primarily work in is video technology, video streaming. You know, if you think, I think all of us probably have a Netflix subscription. So any service like Netflix that is streaming high quality video, there's a whole set of technologies that come together behind the scenes to make that happen. That's a market that I know very, very well. I just came from the National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas. And I actually spoke on a couple panels and moderated an executive session. And so I'm out there not as a CMO. I'm actually out there as a subject matter expert presenting and speaking to the industry. So that sets me apart in how I work. And it also is an incredible differentiation when, you know, when there's a lot of very, very talented marketing folks out there, marketing leaders, some who probably have way more experience and can bring even more than I could. But generally the fact that I know the market in a way that maybe another you know, marketing leader does not, is why companies want to work with me and why they do work with me. So, I typically engage for multiple years in my clients, typically two to, you know, I have an engagement coming up on four years and it's, you know, it's not showing any signs of ending. The working relationship is really, you know, well fit. So, works well for the client, if it works well for me, then we keep going.

Mike: That sounds good that you're really looking to build that long-term relationship.

Mark: It's the only way to do it, I've found, at least I feel.

Mike: No, absolutely, completely agree. I mean, I think I'm interested, you know, why people would call you in rather than maybe hire a full-time CMO. Is there a certain stage in a company's development or have they hit a particular problem? I mean, what's normally the trigger?

Mark: Yeah, very good question. So, uh, it can be at a couple different points. First of all, I don't engage with real early stage companies. So if you think about it as funding rounds, um, I'm almost never working with, in fact, I'm trying to think. Actually, I have had one client that was seed, seed funded, meaning that, you know, that I actually helped them a little bit. but they actually were not a real long-term engagement. So typically they're at series A to series B. They're doing somewhere between five to ten million dollars of revenue. They are at a stage of what you might say is product market fit. They're in a scale up. And so they call me for a couple reasons. One is, is that they finally have the resources to be able to build a marketing function beyond, you know, maybe a founder and a founder and a freelancer or a founder, a freelancer and a first marketing hire, you know, in other words, everybody starts, you know, pretty, pretty simple. It's, it's pretty much, you look around and you say, what do we have? You know, and if there's somebody who took a few courses of marketing in the, in the startup, they're usually congratulations. You're now our director of marketing, you know, in a lot of startups, that's the way it works. But the challenge is, is that that's one way to get started. You get a website built and you can, you know, go to a few trade shows and you can kind of get something started, but it's not a way to build a real. engine, you know, you just, you just need typically more experience. And so they'll call me in for that. Uh, in some cases, maybe there was a failed high profile hire. Many, many startups fall into the trap of, they look at either who the leader in their, in their particular space is, or maybe somebody who's, you know, who's, um, one step removed. You know, and a common one that gets, you know, that gets bantered around is if we could just get someone out of HubSpot, if we could just hire someone from the HubSpot marketing team, we're going to crush it. That's what we need. So they go tell their, you know, their recruiter or their third party recruiter, or they start scouring LinkedIn, looking for an end to get somebody who's, you know, looking for that next promotion at HubSpot, you know, to recruit them away. The problem is, is that those marketing hires almost always fail. They certainly don't succeed in the way that most people plan them to, not because it's the individual's fault. but because there was a complete mismatch between what that company needs, the stage of the company, and the HubSpot, for example. It's just a complete mismatch. And so I get called because sometimes, you know, the founder is scratching their head because they're saying, but we love this person. They were an incredible fit for the culture. You know, they were smart. Look, they were at HubSpot for seven years, you know, and, you know, they were a senior member on the growth marketing team. and you know or fill in the blank right there's always some rationalization that says you know we can't figure out why they failed but the net result is is that we haven't gotten any leads and they've been here 18 months and you know we're not really happy with what they're doing so what's wrong you know help us out Then I come in and, of course, the very first thing I do is I tell them, no, actually, it's not the person's fault. And if you fired them, you know, that's a little bit sad because you mishired. They were not bad. In fact, they were very good. You just mishired completely wrong person, you know. So the next person coming out of HubSpot is going to fail to go get someone from Salesforce. They're going to fail because that's not the stage you need. And then people begin to ask, well, what's the stage and how do I know and, you know, help us here. So I get engaged and we start building a function.

Mike: Yeah. And I totally agree with that. I think sometimes previous success can be a real disadvantage if you're moving from one situation to a different situation, because you, you try and do what worked with you in the past, but the reality is the world's moved on and the company working for is different. Absolutely agree.

Mark: And it is complicated. I was listening to some folks on an interview show last week, and they were observing what we know to be true, is that The problem is, is that if you're bringing your playbook, and they were talking about in the context of like CMOs, it's well known that CMOs churn faster than any other chair in the C-suite. And so they're having a discussion about why that is and then what CMOs should do. Like, you know, and one of the big takeaways was that stop bringing your playbook. By very definition, the playbook that worked, even if it is a similar phase, similar scale, same industry, they're two different companies. By very definition, there is going to be a different set of tactics. You know, there's going to be a different set of plays that need to be executed in company A versus company B. And too many senior leaders come in with kind of their playbook. And how many times do we hear, well, this is how we did it. Well, you should run from somebody who says that. That's what I've learned anyway.

Mike: Absolutely. I agree. And I'm interested now, Mark, when someone calls you in, how do you go about prioritizing and building a marketing plan? What's your process to start from the ground?

Mark: Yeah, good question, because like, well, wait a second, if you're a virtual CMO, you work with all these companies, don't you bring a playbook? Of course, there is a set of established, I like to think of more as like frameworks, because the way that I think of a playbook versus a framework is a little bit different. A playbook is a set of tasks or activities that you basically don't deviate from. you might deviate slightly but basically you have step one then you do step two then you do step three maybe step four can be split to an a and a b path but basically it follows right that's a playbook and you know those of us that played sports like you don't deviate from the play you know the play is the play a framework is different though because a framework is a way of thinking that you apply on some prescribed challenge or some objective. And that way of thinking comes with tactics that you execute, of course. You know, like email marketing and email newsletters and the email channel is absolutely a tactic that you need to deploy. But saying that we always wrote our newsletter in this manner, we always use this voice, we always sent it on Tuesdays exactly at 3.34 p.m. Eastern, you know, as a play may or may not be the right thing to do. But executing well on the email marketing channel, of course. It would be probably fairly unusual to say, oh no, we don't need to do email. And so I think of it as frameworks and that's how I approach it. And I really default to first principles at the end of the day, Mike. I have just found that marketing is problem solving in a lot of cases. And if we approach from a first principles, then we start by, are we producing the value that the enterprise needs us to be producing? And the value, it might be direct translation into leads. I mean, obviously, it's revenue, right? But it could be leads. There can be other ways that, based on the context, the business model, et cetera. But that all comes back to first principles, right? So if we say, wow, marketing is not keeping the sales team fed, well, let's look at what is our sales engine? How does that engine work? Do we even have the right sales engine that we're deploying against the market? And in so many cases, we don't. And so marketing is viewed as failing, or marketing is the whipping post. And in reality, we need to go back to the go-to-market, which is why I almost always am involved in go-to-market strategy and go-to-market leadership, almost always. And 9 out of 10 of the companies that I work with I'm anywhere from, you know, involved to an influencer to even very closely working with the founders, the founding team, the executive management to look at and to make decisions around go to market, because marketing is not divorced from the go to market plan.

Mike: Now, absolutely. And I think you're absolutely right that kind of, you know, trying this cookie cutter approach doesn't work. Yeah. But having said that, I'm going to have to ask you, what do you think is maybe an overrated channel, overrated marketing tactic in B2B? Is there something you feel that actually people are trying that really you've not seen working?

Mark: OK, I would have said events, but people have woken up to events. But before the pandemic, you know, I'll even say that some people should be very thankful to the pandemic because it saved them from making many, many more years of incredibly costly and just wasteful expenditures in events. I worked with one company that for two of the major trade shows, they were spending in the $400,000, $450,000, $500,000 a year. And by the way, this was after cutting back from like $700,000, $800,000, $900,000 in a single event. Single event. This wasn't their whole events budget. This was one event. And here's the here's the amazing thing, Mike. I mean, this just just blew my mind. You know, mind blown is that they did not have data on even one deal that had been furthered in the pipeline as a result of their last event they went to. And yet, and yet the marketing manager who was over events was absolutely insistent would have died on the sword that if we don't go with at least the same presence or even increase our presence, the industry is going to think we're dead. But that's one channel. The second channel, which is, again, this one though, people are still flushing money down the drain, Google AdWords, Google Ads. If you are buying Google Ads, I have to challenge you, they are incredibly hard to defend. Incredibly hard to defend. Go into your Salesforce instance and map, map your leads. Look at your CAC payback period. I just haven't seen an example yet where somebody can prove that there is ROI. I mean, you're just not going to get there. So I would say Google AdWords, um, you know, or just Google in general, stop it. Just stop it. It's, it's an absolute waste, absolute waste.

Mike: I think that's interesting. And we've seen campaigns that really haven't been very good. And I think one of my biggest frustrations is where you're spending money on Google ads and you're top of the organic search results because all you're bidding on is your own brand terms. So I think, you know, it's a difficult problem because attribution in Google ads is relatively easy, particularly if you've got online sales, but showing it's incremental revenue rather than revenue you've got already is very hard.

Mark: Yeah, now just, you know, for anybody who's like, well, hang on, you know, like, does that mean all paid is dead? No, not all paid is dead. So this is channel specific and it depends on what your intent is. So, for example, too many B2B marketers are running effectively direct response ads. Nobody wants to get a demo ad. The ironic thing is if we think about our own behavior, and you know, we all work for companies, right? So you think about your own behavior, you need to buy something for your business. Are you really clicking on get a demo? And then is that actually how you made that last purchase decision? Like, if we're really honest, the answer is no, we're not clicking on it. And even if we did, it probably was because it was for a product that somebody had already told us about. So then you're like, okay, fine. I did click on the ad. I did actually legit attend a demo, but I would have just gone to the website and signed up or I would, you know, like I would have found it. So it's not like I was just stumbling along, but using paid to promote content. in ways that I might normally not get that organic reach. Now that is, sometimes it's hard to do. And depending on the niche that you're in or the market that you're in, I'm not suggesting that you can just buy traffic, you know, to your white paper. Also, you have to have content people care about, right? And it has to be meaningful. But that is an application where paid traffic can be very useful. But if it's effectively direct response, you know, give me your, um, you know, your email address to download my white paper, get a demo, you know, kind of your very typical transactional direct response kind of mechanism. I'm just finding, at least I found in the markets that I'm working in, um, doesn't work.

Mike: And I think, you know, one of the problems is, is that marketers get measured on certain KPIs. And the KPI quite often from sales is, well, we need demos, because when we demo something, we sell it. And the answer is, yeah, through the normal sales process that works. But if you try and game the system, just get as many demo requests as possible, the quality is very different. And I think That is a challenge, particularly for marketers in the enterprise environment, where they have fixed KPIs. To some extent, to progress in your career, you have to optimize for the KPI rather than optimize for marketing success.

Mark: So it's true. The sad thing though, is, is that it keeps that marketer stuck doing the things that are working increasingly less. And it doesn't give them the knowledge and the experience to grow in the tactics and the strategies and the, that are actually going to allow them to go into another company and do something meaningful.

Mike: And that's, I think, an interesting challenge and some really good advice for people thinking about looking for a new role. I'd like to finish on something positive. So what's the best bit of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Mark: Get into the field. Know the market. Know the customers. Know how they think. Know what they care about. Know how they make decisions. And all of this is like, well, yeah, of course, of course we have our personas, you know, we've gone out and done our studies like. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know you have. And chances are somebody doing that work did go out, maybe did exhaustive interviews, you know, maybe traveled, maybe shadowed the sales team, you know? So of course, somebody in your company did that, but was it you? How well do you really know like how that customer thinks? How are they making decisions? Yes, they're telling you one thing, but what are they actually doing, you know, quote, behind closed doors? I'll tell you this right here is the number one turbocharger, the supercharger to a career, to a marketing career.

Mike: I love it. That's amazing advice. And I really appreciate, you know, all the insights you've given us today, Mark. It's been fantastic. I mean, if somebody is listening, they'd like to contact you, you know, maybe they've got a question. Maybe they are looking for a virtual CMO to scale their company. How could people get a hold of you?

Mark: Yeah. So my website is growthstage.marketing. And I I've got just a ton of resources up there, you know, for marketers who might be wanting just some more. I mean, there's no shortage of, of wonderful resources out on the internet, but, uh, I am, I am proud of some of the things that I've written and put up there. So, um, growthstage.marketing and then LinkedIn, just Mark Donnigan. You will find me.

Mike: That's awesome. Mark, thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast and sharing all your knowledge.

Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes or on your favorite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at napierb2b.com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Molly Bruckman - Mutiny

Molly Bruckman, Head of Growth Marketing at Mutiny, a website personalisation platform, shares some top tips on how marketers can effectively leverage personalisation to enhance engagement and drive results. She also explains the potential pitfalls of over-personalisation and how it can negatively impact marketing efforts.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
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• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Mutiny

Most Marketing teams can’t play a meaningful role in breaking through to target accounts because the 1:1 marketing strategies that work don’t scale, and what scales doesn’t work. Mutiny helps B2B companies generate pipeline and revenue from their target accounts through AI-powered personalised experiences, 1:1 microsites, and account intelligence. Backed by Sequoia Capital, YCombinator, and CMOs from leading tech companies, Mutiny is rewriting the Go-To-Market playbook.

About Molly

Molly Bruckman is a customer-obsessed marketing and CX leader. With 10+ years of experience building personalization, CRO and ABM teams and programs, Molly thrives on developing creative solutions that propel marketers to new heights. Her journey spans diverse landscapes, from nimble B2B startups to dynamic B2C enterprises, orchestrating growth programs across various channels such as web, email, community and events - always with an eye for innovative strategies.

Time Stamps

[00:44.9] – Molly discusses her career journey from mathematician to marketer

[05:44.4] – Molly explains what Mutiny does.

[06:32.0] – Molly discusses the best data points to base personalisation on.

[12:03.5] – Molly explains how over-personalising can impact marketing efforts.

[17:41.0] – Who can benefit from Mutiny?

[18:55.1] – How does Mutiny effectively promote itself?

[29:19.1] – Molly shares the advice she would give to someone starting their career.

[27:41.7] – Molly's contact details

Quotes

“Marketing strategies that work don’t scale and the tactics that scale don’t work." Molly Bruckman, Head of Growth Marketing at Mutiny.

Follow Molly:

Molly Bruckman on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mollybruckman/

Mutiny website: https://www.mutinyhq.com/

Mutiny on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/mutinyhq/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Molly Bruckman - Mutiny

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Molly Bruckman

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today.

Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from my Napier. Today, I'm joined by Molly Bruckman. Molly is the Head of Growth Marketing at Mutiny. Welcome to the podcast. Molly.

Molly: Thank you so much for having me my.

Mike: Well, it's great to have you on. And you know what we'd like to do first of all, is get a bit of background about people and understand how you got into Mutiny. Well, so can you use give a bit of a description about what you've done in your career and how you've ended up at Mutiny.

Molly: Yeah, absolutely. So actually, I found my way to marketing through math, which is a little unconventional, but always kind of had a love for math growing up, like the numbers, the quantitative, like how all systems work together. And then I also like, have this creative side, I've always had a creative side. So I was in the drama club growing up, I was a figure skater. And I've like, always sort of just liked to create. And so I after, like, graduating with a math degree, I joined a experimentation company where I was an analyst. So I was like, learning how to test and create new experiences and analyse the results and look at web data. And so it sort of like blended those two worlds for me. And fast forward a little bit, ended up at Mutiny, because basically have the same skill set. So I was the first second hire at Mutiny. And basically, our vos Ally was looking for somebody who had both sides, like the left brain, the right brain, somebody who could do the quantitative side, but who also had customer experience. And I'd been working as a consultant. So I had the customer experience in the programme building aspects. And then also new web, and conversion rate optimization personalization, really, really well. And so yeah, I decided to take a really big leap, join, fly across the country, I was in DC at the time, I moved to San Francisco, and and join a startup as basically like the second employee of the company, to build out our CX team, but actually like how we engage with our customers, how we help them. And back in the early days, we didn't have product yet. So it was a lot of sort of r&d and figuring out what our customers need. And then working with our product team to build that. They grew up our CX team. And then I moved into our marketing org to actually like, do even more creative work. So start to build some education and content and activation programmes with customer base. And now I'm sort of blending the two together at leading our customer experience team and continuing that kind of education advocacy evangelism path that I was building in the marketing. org.

Mike: That's awesome. And I love people who find their way into marketing from more technical disciplines. I mean, I used to be an engineer when I started my career, so, uh, I totally get the attraction of marketing.

Molly: Yeah. I think the blend of like, just understanding how different pieces work, but then having expression over how you communicate, that just really brings a lot to the table. And just depending on what you're marketing, sometimes the technical side really, really helps you. I'm marketing to marketers, so I don't need to be that technical anymore.

Mike: I love it. And also, you're actually not based in San Francisco anymore, you're based in Germany. So tell me a little bit about your trip to Europe and, um, you know, how you find working in Germany.

Molly: Yeah, I didn't spend enough time to come up with a creative backstory there. So I guess I'll tell you the truth. Actually, I can tell it dramatically, there was this wild global pandemic event. It was insane. You've never seen anything like it. But yeah, we were at the time, we were eight people at Mutiny working out of basically an apartment in the mission. And we were growing really, really quickly, we were going to outgrow that space, nobody could go into the office anymore. And so we all you know, went to a work from home model. And San Francisco, sorry If anyone loves San Francisco, but it just deteriorated as I was there. And so I was happy to get out. I was happy that we were like moving to a remote model. We started hiring people anywhere in the world. And my husband got an opportunity in Europe, he chose to come to Munich, which is why we're here today. But he's he travels all over Europe and we both actually travel a lot. So really take advantage of the like, work from anywhere kind of mentality.

Mike: Amazing. We've kind of hinted at what Mutiny might do. But could you just briefly give an explanation of what Mutiny does and how it helps marketers.

Molly: Yeah, absolutely. So I think where we're at today in kind of the marketing world is that marketers can't really play a meaningful role in breaking into target accounts because the one on one marketing strategies that work don't scale and the strategies that scale don't work, where they're sort of left in a world where they can choose 10 accounts that get this one to one really special, bespoke treatment. And then everyone else sort of has to just like, maybe get some scale treatment. And so Mutiny actually helps B2B companies generate pipeline and revenue from their target accounts with AI powered personalised experiences, one to one microsites and account intelligence. So really, really helping our customers actually scale that one to one activity to many, many, many more target accounts.

Mike: So what you're doing is you're taking some existing content, maybe enhancing that with some data from perhaps the most relational CRM system, and then producing something that's purely customised to that visitor on the website. Is that Is that a good summary?

Molly: Exactly, yeah. So we, we integrate with first and third party data sources like your CRM, like you mentioned, marketing automation, on the third party side platforms like sixth sense, clear bed that can tell you who anonymous visitors on your website are and help you customise those experiences. And then I don't know if I don't know what category this is in, but like, many owned data sources, as well for like, which sets up pages people are looking at and starting to build an intelligence layer on what interests people have on the site.

Mike: That's great. There's a lot of integrations there. , what do you find are the most valuable attributes to personalize on then? What, what's the data that people pull in and it really makes a big difference to their results?

Molly: Yeah, it depends on the business, I think, you know, where I'd start, if I were advising a new customer or somebody to build a programme is start with how your sales team is segmented. So probably they're segmented by region, maybe they're segmented by vertical or industry. Usually, that's for a specific reason, right? That's to keep the account intelligence and learnings that you're getting across the industry consistent and make sure that those reps get better and better and better at selling into that market. And so if you can map your ABM strategy or your personalization strategy in a similar way, where you can kind of apply marketing tactics to those same segments, tends to be really effective. As more of a broad like generic rule, I would say industry personalization always performs really well. And again, depends on your business. If you have, you know, a lot of reference customers already in a certain industry or not, you're gonna do better. But industry personalization does really well, company size, personalization. Also, you know, the way you speak to a startup versus the way you speak to a large enterprise is completely different. You're going to talk about different sets of use cases, you're going to use different language, you're going to talk about different value prop so so that one definitely matters a lot too. And then buying stage, I would say is another like critical way to be personalising. So when somebody needs to sort of be solution informed, like you need to teach them about the problem you solve. And as they move through the funnel, you need to start changing your messaging to how you solve the problem, and why you and not your competitor. So you can get really custom based on, you know, how far somebody is in their buying journey with you.

Mike: That's great. I mean, there's a lot of things you can do there. So maybe you could dig just a little bit deeper and explain, you know, how people might achieve that personalisation, what they might change on the website, or what, you know, kind of experience a visitor might get that makes it feel like the website is really personalised for them.

Molly: Yeah, definitely. And this, this depends on the channel of distribution. So somebody comes into your website, let's say clear bed or six cents matches their IP address to accompany and then you know, which company they're coming from. If you change your headline to, Hey, meet me good to see you're there. Like that is way too much for like somebody who just came to your website on the first time they're on your website, they're gonna be like, very creeped out and confused and concerned. So don't do that. There's definitely like a right and a wrong there. But where you find the sweet spot is basically using all of the data you have as intent signals to help you adjust the message to get closer to what they might be looking for, though, maybe you look at Mutiny, and you say, Okay, this is a smaller tech company in the mahr tech space, they are probably working on scaling right now. So we want to give them a message about how we can help them grow faster. And then we see a headline that says, grow faster with blah, blah, blah solution, whatever it is, versus like a large enterprise comes and maybe you're trying to replace another solution, or maybe you are, you know, you need bigger access controls for large teams like you can change that message and those value props depending on who's there without being over the top. So I think like headline messages like text on a site, especially obviously content above the fold, like that's always going to be what matters the most. And then CTA is so CTA is that match should kind of buying stage stage of funnel you know, don't ask somebody to take a demo when they don't know who you are yet, tell them learn more and like Teach, you know, send them to a video where they can learn more. So you can kind of map your CTA your asks per your, your visitors based on where they are in your binary funnel. And then social proof, I think is the other really big thing. So mapping your social proof to companies that are similar to the company that's visiting your site, whether that is by industry or by company size, showing the right set of logos in your logo bar showing the right case studies showing the right like competitor takeouts and things like that can really, really help that whole experience just jive with the person that's looking at it versus be like over the top built for you. Now, if you're talking about microsites, that's a different story, because that is built for you. And so that's where you get to be over the top. These are kind of one to one pages, usually used in ABM programmes that you send or your your BDR SDR team sends out in email sequences, and they're saying, Hey, I built this overview for you. And so at this point, now you have all the freedom in the world to like, use their name, use their title, go way over the top with personalization to say like, Hey, Mike, I built this page for you. Here's three things I think you're struggling with, here's how we help. Here's some case studies and playbooks they picked out for you, and a link to like book a meeting with me my Calendly link is at the bottom if you want to chat. So these ones you can get really, really personal. But it depends on how you're distributing that page and how people are getting to the page if it's organic, or if you're kind of bringing them in.

Mike: So that's fascinating. You said something there that I think maybe a lot of people don't think about.  The level of personalization depends upon the context. So what someone's expecting, if they just come organically to the website, then over personalizing can actually be a bad thing. You know, is that something you actually see reducing performance, where people over personalize and it feels, as you say, a bit creepy?

Molly: I mean, it depends on your industry. So if you are like selling to engineers, and security people and type people, you can't do that, right, they're gonna be really creeped out. They're gonna be very concerned, they're gonna be you know, they care a lot about privacy. So you have to think about who you're marketing to. Now I'm, I work at Mutiny, I sell a personalization software, I can call you by name, because I'm selling the product that shows you that I can do it. So it's like a little, you know, it all depends on the context at the end of the day. So I think in general, like different industries value different things. And actually, I've even seen a security customer of ours tried personalising using the company name on the inbound experience, and it didn't perform well. And they changed the audience to only tech companies. And then it performed really well. So I think also, like tech companies tend to kind of value the more creative, personalised experiences and things like that versus like, education, health care, they don't want to see their information on the page.

Mike: that's fascinating. I think it's an extra layer that maybe people don't think about when it comes to personalizing content. So great advice, Molly.  Um, just moving on, you know, in terms of how Mutiny works, understand it. I mean, you as a marketer really have to select what gets personalized. So you might say, well, this is the headline that's going to change.Is that how it works? And in that case,  Does it take a significant amount of time to actually get up to speed and work out how to use Mutiny and what to choose to personalize?

Molly: Yeah, that is, for the most part, how it works today, although AI, obviously, is an area that we along with everyone else is investing quite heavily in and continuing to build in. And so one thing that is like very clear to us, and our strategy is, we need to allow marketers to be in the driving seat here. So we're not going to be like a black box platform where you just say like, click headline change, and AI does all the work and it changes all of these things, and you have no control over the message or what actually goes out there. So we're always going to leave the end decision up to the marketer where the marketer can, you know, AI can maybe suggest a lot of things and you can approve and say yes and no to certain things. But it should be your copilot and your helper and not just like, oh, cross my fingers and hope they do on brand or don't tell a lie about our product features or anything like that. So yeah, I think like technology will continue to is best there for new customers that to your question on like, does it take a lot of time to learn these things? We actually pair all of our customers with a Mutiny in house growth strategist. And that is a team that I grew and I built and I felt very, very passionately about but I have not hired CSMs I have hired marketers, and so everybody is here to actually be an extension of our customer team and make sure that they are implemented. think best practices and steer them away from, you know, using the company name on the in the headline like we wouldn't recommend and you know the sort of some of these best practices that we've seen, our team is here to help guide and give ideas and share best practices and things like that. And as we continue to grow and develop more and more of that gets absorbed into the product experience as well.

Mike: That's great. And the other thing I really liked about Mutiny when I looked at it was, it's not driven from a marketer's opinion. It's very much driven from data. So I've got to ask, you know, How often do optimizations work and how often do the marketers have to go back to the drawing board and, you know, maybe tweak what they're optimizing to get best performance?

Molly: Yeah. And I told you, I have a conversion rate optimization background. So I was running. Before I joined Mutiny, I was running experimentation programmes and a B tests for large large enterprises, like a gap and Oppenheimer funds and big big brands. And they'd be pretty happy with a 1%, lift, 3% lift like pretty Thrall lifts. And in general, I'd say like one in four, or one in five tests would win. So you have like a 25% ish when, right? The cool thing about personalization, so on the CRM side, it is very life. What if we change the headline to this, what if we change the button to get started, it's sort of like random ideas that you are trying to find a better solution for the average person, but the average person doesn't exist, right? Like, there is somebody who is like 10 feet tall, and somebody who's two feet tall, and to say that your average person is four feet tall, which you know, the math doesn't work out there. But you get what I'm saying. Like, you can just take the average of any given person, it's really about how different segments are behaving. And so the difference with personalization is, you're actually segmenting your audience, you have a specific person that you're building for not an average person, and you know a lot more about them, or you can do more research about them. And so you're actually crafting an experience for a specific person rather than some broad idea of the average visitor on your site. And so they actually win more like three and four times. And the lifts are more like 30% to 50%, even like 100% Plus left, so you're much, much bigger gains. And you're winning a lot more often.

Mike: With all this testing and with the ability to, to really scale up the personalization, I mean, does this mean Mutiny is really an enterprise product? You need a decent amount of web traffic to really benefit from it.

Molly: So I think this again, comes down to how you're going to use the product. So if you want to identify who's coming into your website, segment those audiences and then deliver personalization. Yeah, the trade off there is yes, while you win more often, you get big lifts, you get big lifts for smaller segments. So although those smaller segments are your ICP, so it's a good trade off. At the end of the day, you are cutting down your audience size. And so for inbound website, personalization, you should have I would say like 10,000 monthly visitors, at least on your site in order for those segments actually be meaningful volume for you. But for outbound personalization, like these microsites I was talking about that's only constrained on how many emails your team can send, right, like your BDR team, your SDR team can send and so there's no kind of traffic requirement for that use case. You just have to have a muscle around outbound email.

Mike: Interesting, so lots of flexibility. But it's been great talking about Mutiny Molly. I’m also interested  in how you promote the product yourself. I mean, you're responsible for growing the business to a large extent. So one of the most effective tactics you find to get marketers engaged and interested in Mutiny.

Molly: Yeah, so this is the fun part about marketing to marketers where, you know, you get to use your own product, talk about your own product, to sell your own product. And so I think I have something cheeky on my LinkedIn, like, I use Mutiny on Mutiny to grow Mutiny, or I'm a marketer, selling the market, just selling a marketing technology to marketers and talking about marketing or, you know, something that is just very confusing. But I think, yeah, we get that benefit of using our own product in a lot of our programmes. And so we really think about how do we bring more people to our website so that we can tailor that experience and show them the product in action when they come to our website. And then we have a really, really big microsite strategy. And actually, our microsite product was built out of our own early days when we didn't have website traffic we had, I think, like 2000 people coming to our website every month. And so we needed a way to talk about ourselves to market ourselves. So we built our own microsite product in order to help us get in front of the right people because we're targeting B2B marketers and CMOS You know, marketing leaders like we have a very defined ICP and audience, if we can build a page that demonstrates the product to them and show them, we're always going to do really, really well. So our own ABM programme brings in 60% of our pipeline and Mutiny. So it's really, really effective for us even to this day. Now we've grown our website traffic quite a bit too. So we can use both use cases and Mutiny. But in the early days, it was really on the microsite side, outside of using a Mutiny, like customer stories. And creative campaigns, I think are two really important levers for us. So putting the customer at the centre of everything we're talking about, making them the heroes showing, you know, marketers always want to learn from marketers. So making our customers look like heroes telling their stories, getting those out there, it helps our customers continue to activate and it helps our customers like brand build and further their personal careers. And then it also helps the market and everyone on our team kind of grow from there too. So actually did launched an ABM MBA programme, which is a fun play on words, but it features some of our customers that features non customers too. So just ABM errs, who are doing really, really good work and dives into the programmes that they're building and developing. So that one's really fun. And then creative campaigns. This is like a passion child. For me I love like big creative campaigns. In the fall, we ran a survivor programme was was spelled with AI in the middle sister of AI vert. And it was all about kind of educating around AI teaching workers how to use AI in their workflows. And it was gamified. So there was a big game platform, there was a $10,000 prize at the end, we had a lot of partners involved. So really, really just fun creative through like running games and different types of activation than just like a boring webinar programme.

Mike: I love that. I love that you're, you're so obviously having fun with some of your campaigns as well. That's brilliant.

Molly: I think that's the one thing like anyone looks at mutinies brand. They're like those guys have a lot of fun over there, huh?

Mike: It's awesome. I mean, you did mention the survivor, the AI campaign. Um, I, I'm interested, you know, how do you personally use AI in your marketing or do you use AI in your marketing?

Molly: Oh, yeah. I mean, I always have at least one probably many chat up T tabs open for real things and for fun things. And for life things like sometimes I'll just be like, Hey, here's the ingredients I have in my fridge and in my cupboard what can I make? I was thinking of soup is there what if I added ginger to it? Is that good or bad? It'll like make me recipe do I have Mutiny are like logo and mascot is a raccoon. And on social media, we have you know, with mid journey and things that have popped up, we've got like an AI version of the raccoon that's looks a little different than our logo, but he's pretty consistent. And whatever setting we need to put him in, his name's at chew. And I made an issue custom GPT builder so I trained it on all of our like brand approved to choose so that I can just say like, like we launched a Mean Girls campaign to go back to having fun with marketing. We, we didn't Mean Girls theme campaign, and I made all of these versions of it chew in like the classic mean girls to us, like, you know, at the cafeteria and things like that. So that one's super fun. And then for work, like with a BM MBA programme, for example, my process for getting to very high quality episodes is I do a prep session with the speaker. And we sort of like pre plan, what our agenda is going to look like and shape the story together because I don't want to just come in and like ask the same leaders all of the questions, same questions, I want to kind of dig in and tell a unique story with everyone. So we find that angle. And then I have a chat GBT process where I basically like turn that into the agenda for how we're going to speak together. I turned that into the copy that I need for the landing page. I turn that into the speaker notes and everything I'm going to need at the end of the day, so I have all of that processing kind of work through a workflow there. And outside of chat, GBT, our team also uses copy AI, which after the ABM MBA episode is recorded and published, we will put that through a copy AI workflow to come up with several different blog posts, newsletter posts, social posts, where we can like chop that up. And then on top of that, it's all of the AI that's just built into the tools that we're already using like Riverside and you know, production tools and things like that.

Mike: That's a lot of AI actually. That's interesting to hear how proactively you're using AI for everything from image generation through to written content and, and uh, podcasts. So, fascinating you're so bought into it.

Molly: Yes. And, and actually, uh, Stu on my team, he's our head of content. he sets a goal for himself to try a new AI tool every single week. So he's always testing something new and, and actually like replacing workflows. Like he's using copy AI now, but he was using something else previously. And just, you know, he won't settle, he'll keep going until he finds something that really, really works and has the right quality of output for us.

Mike: So that's amazing. I mean, trying a new AI every week. That's a real commitment to learning and testing new technology. this has been really interesting money. I'm sure I could talk for a lot longer, particularly about AI. But there's a couple of standard questions we'd like everyone to answer just to see what people think. So the first thing I'd really like to know is, what's the best bit of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Molly: I would say actually, not just marketing advice like generic advice, but simplify, very true for marketing too. But simplify, you get one ask you get one CTA, you have to prioritise what is that one is going to be. And if you get a good result, you can have another Ask you can have another CTA. And that's true for marketing funnels, marketing, language and messaging. But also, when you're working with customers, or communicating really with anyone, right is, you know, don't give people a laundry list of asks and things you need from them, simplify it to that one thing, and you're going to be much, much more likely to get a good result.

Mike: That's, I mean, that's great advice, I think, in a lot of areas. So I love that. We have another question we'd like to know is, what advice would you give, but particularly to one person who's just embarking on a marketing career?

Molly: Yeah, I think from a student perspective, I don't know if I would recommend like, go and get a degree in marketing, I think it is just the landscape is changing so rapidly that I don't think that is necessarily like, how you can set yourself up to like, become an online marketer, like the textbook background isn't necessarily going to help you as much as like, on the job experience. What I would say is probably really helpful is psychology or behavioural economics, or, you know, more kind of education time spent on how people think how people understand and process information, how they behave. And then you can learn the specifics of the marketing to whatever role industry tech stack, the company that you're in, is using, but if you have the foundation of understanding how humans operate, and how humans think you will, you'll be able to learn the tools and apply different strategies that are current. I mean, now it's like every six months, were like so rapidly developing and changing that, that I think you just need to stay on top of the market.

Mike: that's great advice, and I think it's important to remember that, you know, even people who have done the degree,  their, uh, knowledge, their information very rapidly ages. I mean, I actually qualified as an engineer, and we had exactly the same problem all those years ago, that, you know, by the time you finish your degree, what you'd learnt, it was already becoming out of date.

Molly: And I think that, that's absolutely the case in marketing.Yeah, for sure. And that's kind of cool to see. Right. Like, think people know it in the tech field that like, C++ isn't really the future anymore. But But yeah, I mean, marketing is moving really, really quickly to I'm sure all of business, every role kind of has that that vibe as well.

Mike: Absolutely. Molly, it's been fascinating talking to you and thank you so much for all the insight you've given. I mean, if somebody wants to learn more about Mutiny or maybe even ask you some questions, what would be the best way to find out more and perhaps get in touch?

Molly: Yeah, LinkedIn, feel free to follow me connect message me. I'd love to meet you, people. Awesome.

Mike: Molly, thank you so much again for your time. I really appreciate it. Thanks for being a guest on Marketing B2B Technology.

Molly: Thank you so much for having me.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favourite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Lisa Rees - Avnet Silica

Lisa Rees, Director of Marketing Communications at Avnet Silica, joins Mike for the latest episode of our leading B2B marketing professionals series. Lisa discusses the importance of understanding the customer journey, why having a non-technical background can be an advantage, and emphasises the value of measuring success based on metrics such as the customer lifecycle rather than just lead generation.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Avnet Silica

Avnet Silica, a division of Avnet, is a European semiconductor distributor and specialist that supports projects from idea to concept to production. Avnet Silica acts as the connection between customers and suppliers, providing creative solutions, technology and logistics support.

About Lisa Rees

Lisa Rees is the Director of Marketing Communications at Avnet Silica and is responsible for all aspects of marketing and communications, including supplier marketing, digital strategy, media, content and events. She joined Avnet Silica after ten years as Director of Marketing Communications at Avnet Abacus.

 Time Stamps

[00:49.2] – Lisa discusses her career from the French chamber of commerce to Avnet Silica.

[02:52.8] – Lisa explains what Avnet Silica is and what they do.

[04:16.3] – Lisa shares why having a non-technical background can be a benefit in marketing.

[07:49.3] – What marketing activities make the biggest impact at Avent Silica?

[13:48.2] – Lisa discusses how to measure the impact of marketing.

[24:51.9] – How is Avnet Silica incorporating AI into its marketing activities?

[21:10.6] – Lisa shares the best piece of marketing advice she’s ever been given.

[22:58.7] – Lisa’s contact details

Quotes

“Hang out with your customers… get to know your customers inside out. Every opportunity you can take to understand your customer is going to give you everything you need to be a good marketer." Lisa Rees, Director of Communications at Avnet Silica.

“If you're just measured by leads, you're probably not generating the right outcomes... the biggest return for the business tends to be in a small number of very high-quality leads.” Mike Maynard, Managing Director at Napier.

 Follow Lisa:

Lisa Rees on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisa-rees-9548484a/

Avent Silica website: https://my.avnet.com/silica/

Avnet Silica on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/silica-an-avnet-company/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Lisa Rees - Avnet Silica

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Lisa Rees

Mike: Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. I'm Mike Maynard, and today I'm joined by Lisa Rees. Lisa is the Director of Marketing Communications in EMEA for Avnet Silica. Welcome to the podcast. Lisa.

Lisa: Thank you, Mike. Thank you for having me.

Mike: Great to have you on. I'm really excited because I think you're the first marketing leader we've had from our channel company, on the podcast. So I think we're going to talk a lot about you know, how things work in a B2B channel. But before we do that, can you just give us a bit of background tell us about your career? And why you chose to join Avnet?

Lisa: Absolutely, yes. So a little bit of background, my career, I think, I've always worked on my life, or very early on, I've always had a strong work ethic. I originally started my career in France, I studied French and economics at university. And I ended up working for the Chamber of Commerce in France, because I wanted to kind of mix the two, the two elements of my studies together. And then I kind of had a weaving path, I worked in a PR company, I worked in an insurance company. But ultimately, I was trying to get to Tech, I did a little bit of a business development at the start of my career. And I was also trying to get to marketing. So eventually, I made it into tech marketing. And that's how I ended up at Avnet. Silica. So a winding career, but I got to where I wanted to get to in the end. And why did I join AF net? I've met silico it's, for me, it's a, it's a really exciting place to be. It's, you're looking at the future developing all the time. That's what's interesting for me, and it's fast moving, you know, I love to know, kind of almost feel like I'm telling stories for the future. It's a little bit like we're in science fiction, maybe. But I think it's about the exciting developments for the future.

Mike: And so, is that really, you know, why you wanted to get into tech is it's all about the excitement, the speed of movement, rather than, you know, without wishing to be disparaging about some of your previous companies know, some of your industries you've worked in, have been notoriously conservative when it comes to marketing.

Lisa: They have and that's what I definitely wanted to get away from without any disrespect. But yes, ultimately, I wanted to work for a forward moving company. I was also interested in where that tech can take you from, from a society perspective. You know, I think I want it to feel like I was adding some value to the world. So I think from a tech perspective, there are advancements in terms of sustainability and was interesting for me.

Mike: That's great. I mean, it's a really positive view of tech. Before we go any further, I think we ought to really just clarify what Avnet does that mean, some of the people listening might not be familiar with the company. I'm sure a lot of people are because they're from the tech sector. But can you just give us a little bit of background about who you are, what you do and where your position is in the industry?

Lisa: Absolutely. So I've Avnet silica, well, I haven't actually chorus part of ASP NET. So a bigger corporation that said, global, my role is within Avnet, silica, and Avnet. Silica is a distributor of hardware components. Traditionally, that's where we sit in the middle of the technology design chain, I would say the technology and supply chain. So kind of like with the vantage point on what's what's happening, we work very closely with many manufacturers to distribute their hardware products. But I think things have evolved as well over the last few years in terms of we're no longer just looking at delivering the parts, we're actually looking at offering a whole kind of value added service, we're working with customers, right from the start from the ground up, I would say, because now we're implementing IoT, and AI and security and, and looking at different ways to bring value to those customers that maybe they never had before from one partner. So it's also about helping them innovate faster, helping them get to market faster. And I think that evolution for me is really exciting. It's kind of like from something that was traditional to something that is way more kind of holistic, I would say in terms of of planning and working with customers.

Mike: But I guess I mean, there's a lot of technical services you're providing, and you're not technical by background, as you said, and in fact that that's not unusual. I mean, I meet a lot of people in this sector that are not technical. But I mean, what challenges does that present you when you're working in a sector that is so driven by engineers?

Lisa: I mean, for me, I see it as an opportunity. I'm first and foremost, I'm a content marketer, I'd say that's where my passion lies. So I just want to sit and hang out with the engineers, it's what I've always wanted to do. I think it's this kind of ideal blend, really, of finding a subject matter experts that understands what our ideal customer base is looking for what they need to know. And then it's pulling that information. And then I'd bring my value as a marketer in terms of kind of how you position it, how you pitch it, how you get that content to the right people in the right places at the right time. So I'm always trying to find out what's the value prop behind what we're trying to say. And I think because I'm not an engineer, I can ask what other people might say, are really silly questions. And I can always start my sentence with, Hey, I'm not technical. Can we just go into that a little bit more. And for me, I think that brings a value that maybe I wouldn't have if I were a technical marketer.

Mike: I love that. I think you know, the way you see yourself working with the technical specialists and bringing that market expertise, I think is it is a way that a lot of great marketers in the sector operate. So that's really positive to see that you're almost using this non technical background. And I know you do understand quite a bit of the technology now. But using it as a bit of an advantage.

Lisa: Absolutely. I always say, I know a little about a lot of things. That can be a dangerous thing sometimes. But I think as long as you making those subject matter experts, your friends, and they very much are, you know, the people that I go to that I listened to, that I spend so much of my time talking to, and where my passion is to be honest, that I think it does work.

Mike: So moving on a bit more to your role and what you do. I'm always intrigued when people have rows, like, you know, director of marketing, communications and cover the whole of emir, and are in a company with a very broad range of products. I mean, how do you prioritise and start building a plan when there's so much to cover?

Lisa: It's tough, it is tough. If I'm honest, I'd say there's two, there's almost two prongs. Ultimately, you have to remember what we're here for, it's very easy to get bogged down, I would say in all the things that everybody would like to throw at you. Because when you're marketing, you're kind of like the frontline for anything that anybody needs. But for me, what's the main thing you want to do is you want to drive some pipeline, and you want to drive the revenue, and you want to disrupt you want people to know you and know who you are. So it's that, you know, is that focused on top of the funnel? And then getting to the bottom of the funnel? And how can I really work with those people. So I think you just have to keep sight of what's important, and what's going to make a difference to you. And I'm always looking to, to stand out to be different, not for different sake, but because I'm not trying to catch other people at their own game, I think that you can't do that. So it's like, I'm always the that mindset, if that if everybody's eggs, you've got this egg, you know, it's like, that's the way you stand out a little bit. So I'm trying to find a way to, I think you can disrupt a lot of the time with a tone of voice, even, I'm a very personal oriented person. And I think sometimes it's amazing what a tone of voice can do for your brand. You can be approachable, or friendly or knowledgeable or expert lead, or you know, all of those things. And you can change that just by the tone of voice that everybody uses within the business when you go to market. So I try to focus on, on the things that are going to move the needle, if I'm honest.

Mike: So that's interesting, I love you know, that focus on the detail as well as that very broad portfolio of tasks. But when you say, move the needle, I mean, can you unpack that? You know, do you have particular things you're trying to achieve in the marketing? Is it you know, all about lead generation? Is it about branding? Is it about positioning and perception? What do you think are your priorities?

Lisa: It's really interesting, because that priorities change, of course, over time, and I told you at the start of the chat that we're having about, however, that silica has moved from, I'd say a traditional supplier of hardware components into more of a kind of a consultant solution kind of approach. And I think getting that message out to the market takes a lot more time than you realise, you know, it's kind of constantly reinforcing it, constantly talking about it, constantly making sure that the white people are hearing it. So I think a lot of the focus for me is on that awareness. But ultimately, you've got to drive this balance, tread this tightrope between driving leads and driving demand generation, I was as I would call it, and building an audience takes time and patience. And I think focusing on leads can be sometimes a short term activity. And I think it's focusing on building the right kind of leads, and you have to do the demand generation and build that audience and put the real effort into kind of getting that content out there to drive the right kind of leads, I would say, and for me, that's the best the perfect balance.

Mike: I love that. And I think in B2B, some marketers are a bit guilty of thinking of demand generation as handing over a spreadsheet of leads, but you've made a real distinction between driving demand and generating leads. I mean, do you just wonder, maybe unpack some of the things you do that generate demand that maybe don't necessarily directly generate leads? I'm really interested in, you know, are you not dating everything to you know, every time someone downloads something, you generate a lead, presumably, you're taking a slightly different approach.

Lisa: I am taking a different approach for me, you know, kind of gating a white paper is, is a bit old school. And I like to make sure that I'm, you know, work, working with the way that people like to work. And I think so much is available now to our customers at their fingertips is that if I make the customers jump through hoops to get the stuff that they need, it kind of like creates this barrier. And also, I don't want 1000s of leads. It's not about volume for me. I think if you if you're measured on leads, you're driving the wrong outcomes. So I think you know, of course, I want those good leads, I want those sales qualified leads. But I think that I get those by giving away some of my best stuff free you know, if people read really cool stuff that's answering that their problems or their pain points are addressing the challenges that they have building that trust with you and you're building the authority and I think then people are more likely to come to you so I am focused on that inbound, then you have to make it really easy for people Pull to contact you, how do they get to you? How do you how do you create an urgency in the form that they fill in, over and above a normal query from somebody that maybe is not so valuable as it leads. So there is always that kind of like making sure that if you do focus on demand generation and inbound, that you know how to deal with it quickly and effectively, and straightaway, put it to the right person so that if you've got a really high value, potential customer coming to you, you hit them hard straightaway with what they need. See what I mean. So I think there's there's a lot of balancing going on. But ultimately, I'm focusing on educating to build that authority that said that the right people engage with us.

Mike: I love that. And I mean, I think that might be a little controversial for some people. But But I think you're absolutely right, when you said, you know, if you're just measured by leads, you're probably not generating the right outcomes. I've seen that where there's been an over focus on lead generation. And quite clearly, the more leads you generate, the lower the quality is where actually the biggest return for the business tends to be in a small number of very high quality leads.

Lisa: Exactly. And I say also, the more you create a disconnect with sales, you know, I want to work with sales. I also think about this attribution model where people go, Oh, marketing, at the first touch your marketing had the last touch, or, you know, it's a marketing source lead, ultimately, I'm lucky that I'm in a business that doesn't measure me like that. But the business focuses on alignment. So as a business, we're bringing together all the different facets of the organisation that can work together to drive the right outcomes and drive the right leads. And I think I'm very lucky to be in that environment that understands that it's a collaborative approach to lead generation rather than each individual feeling the pressure to kind of go, Hey, I've done a great job, look at all these leads up bought in. And actually, that's not helping sales at all, you've got to have this disconnect, where sales go, I can trust you, I trust that your what you're bringing to me as a marketer is going to be the stuff that's valuable for me to spend my time on, that is so important, I think, within the business, so that we don't have silos.

Mike: I love that. And I think quite often, you know, marketing's doing their job, when the role of being a salesperson becomes easier. And it's not necessarily throwing them a million, you know, contacts, they have to phone up who are actually probably not interested. It's about making the customer have this positive perception that when the salesperson, you know, talks to them, the customer immediately wants to work with avidex, silica, or whoever it is, rather than, you know, asking, well, who are you? And why should I work with you? And, you know, that should be the marketing job?

Lisa: Absolutely. And, you know, top of the funnel, absolutely, you know, we want to tell people our story, we want people to come in, and we want them to believe in us. But ultimately, where I need to spend a lot more effort, and a lot of more of my time is towards the bottom of the funnel. And don't get me wrong, I do gate stuff, I do wait, you know, you have to sign in to come to a webinar where you've got an expert talking for 45 minutes, we only need to sign in once and then you can access everything. So we still make it easy. But then working with those customers who are at that stage who are maybe working with reference design, or you know, they're looking at samples or I know they're actively involved in in kind of putting a design together, it's well how can we help those customers? How can we be of value to them? And I think getting that piece right, is where to put a lot of your effort as well.

Mike: So it was interesting. I mean, you seem to be saying, you still gate but it's right at the bottom of the funnel rather than, you know, higher up. I mean, that must be a much better user experience for prospects you're engaging. But how do you approach measurement? How do you measure how well you're doing? If you're not generating those leads?

Lisa: It's a really good question. Right? If the age old question for a marketer, you know, how do you know that all of your effort is giving you all of your results, and the course is a challenge, I've always stuck to the idea that if you try to measure too many things, too precisely, you can drive those wrong outcomes, you know, clearly lead numbers is is an easy metric to measure. It doesn't mean it's the right metrics to measure. It doesn't mean I'm doing a great job as a marketer. So I think you can look at sales qualified leads back to my point is like, what leads or sales going great job, that's exactly who I want to talk to. This is the kind of lead I'm looking for. So for me, that's probably a good measure. You can go further. I mean, we have a long lifecycle from design to actually, volume production could take, what 18 months, two years, but if you can get an idea of the lifetime value of those customers. That's an interesting metric. But again, because I'm not focused just on marketing, attribution, I'm focused on collaborative attribution. Again, you know, it's hard to say I did this, I got that bit, right. And it's not actually what I'm trying to do are ultimately focused on pipeline and revenue. And I think, therefore, those sales qualified needs for me so it's kind of like the bit that makes the difference.

Mike: I think you've put out beautifully and that's a really great approach. I think a lot of people could, you know, learn from so thank you for that. I'd like to change tack a bit and find out about you in terms of managing a marketing team. I mean, you're in silica which is A big company. And that's part of F net, which actually is a gigantic global company. How do you get a marketing team across, you know, different sub brands inside such a big company actually driving in the same direction?

Lisa: It's a really good question. I think driving in the same direction, it's all about a vision. I think if you've got a vision, and people understand how they're contributing to that vision, that strategy for success, that strategy for growth, everyone has an idea about where they go. In fact, I would say that's how the whole of silica is one, you know, we have a president that brings a very clear vision, and every single person in the business knows what they're doing to contribute to that vision and that strategy for growth. So it's a culture within the company, I think, which is really successful, and really works. And I think the same goes for, for me and my marketing team, you know, we know what we want to do we know our tone of voice, we know what our message is, we know how we want to feel like an open company that's very focused on people. It's focused on expertise, it's focused on knowledge, collaboration, proactiveness, all of those things, you know, we as a team live and breathe that. And I think that's my job is to spread that message and make sure that everybody feels a part of it. And I do it with a big tonne of energy, that's the only way I can describe it is, you know, I sell it as a concept maybe, and we feel together, we're succeeding. And for me, that's, that's what works. I'm also very collaborative with my colleagues in other speedboat companies with global marketing teams with the corporate marketing teams, I'm very much as I'd say, a team player, I enjoy collaborating with people across the whole business and where they can bring me value and I can bring them value, and we can not reinvent the wheel. That's the way to go for me. So I'm very open, I would say in my approach to working with the people.

Mike: I love that I mean, that there's definitely a theme of collaboration coming through this interview, which I think is great. I'm intrigued to know, I mean, you've got a marketing team, what's your management style? How do you go about, you know, motivating and developing the team,

Lisa: I am very focused on individual growth and individual development, you know, I want to hire people better than me. I don't feel threatened by having amazing people in my team. In fact, I feel completely kind of calm, the fact that I think, okay, now I got all these experts. And to be honest, we are a very close knit team. So everyone has their area where they do Excel, where they focus with what they're good at. But each of us at any point will step into each other's shoes in a way that's very kind of fluid, and very easy to do. So I think it's the fact that there is this commitment to grow. And I try to not be the first port of call for the business, you know, that I think that's how it possibly was in the past. And now I'm thinking, don't come to me, we've got a brilliant webinar expert, we've got an amazing events person over here, we've got a social media expert, you know, go to those people directly. They know what their vision is, they know what their strategy is, they know when to say no, they know when to say sure I can support you with this, you know, what do you need. So I think it's about giving them the opportunity to be visible to grow to develop, and I'm very committed to that. It's important to me.

Mike: That's fantastic. And I think it's always a sign of a good manager when they start talking about how good their team is. So I'm sure you're too polite to actually say anything, but I'll absolutely say that. I'd like to move on. I mean, unfortunately, Malin, I feel we always have to, you know, visit AI. Lots of people have very different views on AI. I'm interested, how are you currently using AI within your marketing team and for your marketing activities?

Lisa: We obviously, it's a really good question. Because it's a new ik we've only probably been using it for what a year and a half. We started using it a little bit to maybe write some strap lines to write some copy for webinars. But very quickly, it became very samey, and I got very frustrated with it very quickly. So that's out. You can't replace individuality, creativity, understanding the value of the problem. I don't honestly believe for the moment that AI can do that. So I can see straightaway when when the headlines been written by AI, and I can see whether it's been someone in my team or someone in the competitors team. I'm like, Oh, if we see unleash again, I'm gonna literally go. So I think where AI will take us is, it will be like this sort of hyper personalised marketing, it's going to be much more efficient. I can say, tell me the competitive landscape for this kind of technology. And it will tell me in a flash, tell me where who's got the competitive advantage, you know, who's bringing out something new, I mean, to go and search for all that information and put together exactly what you're looking for, I think is super efficient. It's super personalised, it means that we can be much more focused on what we do the customers, I think we go faster. But for me, I'm not scared of AI. I think you go with AI and you develop with AI, you'll be fine. But I think there's always going to be that role for creativity. I mean, AI can't develop something, as far as I know, that's not been created already. Right? You're looking at a pot of stuff that's out there. If you want to disrupt you got to keep ahead of the curve. And I think, for me, I embrace it.

Mike: That sounds really positive, you know, both in terms of the benefits of AI I know also in terms of the fact that you still see this very important, crucial role for people within a marketing team. Yeah,

Lisa: I really do. I think that creativity will always be important. I have seen people's roles kind of feel a little bit eroded though, for example, mostly with around if you look at SEO and Google, I mean, how much do people search on Google anymore? Do they just ask that DPT instead? So I understand that there are threats as well, it's not all rosy. But I think it's just about learning to quickly adapt and find new output for that creativity and make sure that you know, you're, as I say, working with it, rather than against it or feeling too threatened by it.

Mike: No, thank you. That's a brilliant piece of advice. I'm really worth your time. And I know you're really busy. And you've been very generous to spend time on the podcast, there's a couple of questions we'd like to finish off with. And the first one is also about advice. So I'm interested to know what's the best piece of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Lisa: Oh, hang out with the customers without a doubt, just get to know your customers inside out. Every opportunity you can take to understand your customer is going to give you everything you need to be a good marketer, I think it's that insight that you can't replace, don't think you know them, go and actually learn about them. That's always been my best piece of advice.

Mike: I love it, that's quite a popular piece of marketing. Last time we tried to meet up was at a trade show and you're super busy, clearly, you know, actually taking your advice and talking to customers. So So that's brilliant. The other thing, you know, I'm interested in is what about someone starting their career in marketing? What advice would you give them?

Lisa: I mean, you know, marketing is always changing, you know, so I think be adaptable, be flexible. But also, it's never too early to start implementing to start only your go to market strategy to start showing your, your abilities. You know, I don't think you have to stay in a box. But always listen, always listen, start by understanding the customer journey. And I think as long as you go back to my, you know, my last point, as long as you understand that the customer, you can start to really kind of build your influence, build your trust and do it as early as possible in your career. You know, you don't have to have years of experience to make a difference in blockchain. That's what I would say.

Mike: That's amazing. I think that that's, you know, again, it's really positive advice. I love it. As I say, I appreciate your time. Is there anything you feel we could have covered that perhaps I've missed during this interview?

Lisa: I mean, now, I've really enjoyed chatting with you, Mike, I think we've covered all of the important points for me as a marketer. So I think we're good.

Mike: That's brilliant. If people have questions for you, Lisa. Or, you know, maybe they're looking for a place to work where they can grow and develop and get responsibility. What's the best way for them to contact you?

Lisa: I definitely say on LinkedIn, it's where everything happens these days. Anyway, find me on LinkedIn, Lisa Rees for Avnet Silica and connect with me drop me a line more than happy to chat.

Mike: Lisa has been fascinating. I've really enjoyed our conversation. Thank you very much for being a guest.

Lisa: And thank you so much for having me, Mike. It's been a pleasure.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Georgios Grigoriadis - Baresquare

Georgios Grigoriadis, Founder and CEO of Baresquare, an AI-driven analytics platform, discusses his career journey from data scientist to founder and the development of Baresquare. He shares how the tool leverages AI-powered insights for marketing analytics, the challenges and opportunities in B2B marketing, and the potential of AI to empower individuals in marketing rather than replace them.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Baresquare

Baresquare redefines data analytics by transitioning from traditional dashboards to proactive, AI-powered insights delivered directly to the right person at the right time. Baresquare pioneers a new approach where manual dashboard analysis and human intervention are unnecessary for identifying crucial business events and their underlying causes. This frees marketers, strategists and analysts to focus on creative endeavors and expanding business opportunities while providing insight that no other data set can provide.

About Georgios

Georgios Grigoriadis is a data advocate and the founder and CEO of Baresquare, a tech startup turning data analytics on its head by shifting from traditional dashboard-based analysis to proactive AI-powered insights, delivered directly to the right person at the right time. Fueled by the belief that data should empower, not overwhelm, Georgios built Baresquare to transform complex analytics into clear, useful answers for anyone to understand.

 Time Stamps

[00:46.1] – Georgios discusses what led him to build Baresquare.

[06:11.9] – How can marketeers use Baresqaure?

[06:48.8] – Georgios shares if he thinks the B2C industry is further ahead in using analytics.

[19:47.1] – Georgios offers some marketing advice.

[17:52.4] – Should young people embark on a marketing career? Georgios shares his opinions.

[24:51.9] – Georgios and Mike talk about the future of AI and its impact on the industry.

[31:48.9] – Georgios’s contact details

Quotes

“Baresquare today is turning data analytics on its head. And, we are not talking in terms of tables and numbers, but rather in terms of words and paragraphs." Georgios Grigoriadis, Founder and CEO at Baresqaure.

“It’s very frustrating when those insights, they don’t find themselves driving action. But action, it’s more a matter of communication. It’s bringing people together and aligning their understanding.”  Georgios Grigoriadis, Founder and CEO at Baresqaure.

Follow Georgios:

Georgios Grigoriadis on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/georgiosbaresquare/

Baresquare website: https://baresquare.com/

Baresquare on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/baresquare/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Georgios Grigoriadis - Baresquare

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Georgios Grigoriadis

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today. Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. Today I'm joined by Georgios Grigoriadis. Georgios is the CEO and co-founder of Baresquare.

Georgios: Very happy to be here. Thanks for the invite.

Mike: Great having the podcast Georgios. So just to start off with, can you give us a bit of background about your career, and in particular, I'm interested to know when you move to America and why you decided to make that move?

Georgios: Absolutely. My background is in computer science and math, not an electrical engineer, which I know that it's your background, but still, it's rooted very well in in math and science. But I quickly realised that the most compelling puzzle for me to show was not about gold and algorithms, but rather what makes a product a success. So I have always been fascinated by data, information, and drawing conclusions and the power that those insights and information can have. In hindsight, I think that I was naturally drawn to the stories that data can tell. And as I told you, and the power that they contain, but at that time, my understanding my interpretation of this fascination was on what was possible and not possible with the data that I was available. So as right now we are having this artificiality in intelligence crop yard, where people are putting together some solutions that work and some others that don't. Back in the day, it was exactly the same with data driven tools, approaches and processes. So I was working very much on now, that part of the industry, where today we know these technologies are Adobe analytics, or Google Analytics. And the challenge was how to put together data visualisations that they can drive results. I advocated for verbalising data, it was rather a radical approach where everyone was trying to visualise data. But I did so because I thought that communicating insights with natural language was more impactful. So I moved to London from Greece, and establish that an AI software company and in London, I found out what our positioning was. Now, this is the the point that I moved to New York, while I was trying to discover what should be our go to market approach. And I mean, New York has a very unique vibe, as you know, in a sense, performance under pressure of the melting pot that Manhattan has it's it's more about human skills and creation. And that is making it totally different from the West Coast startup centre. Now that the go to market team has been established in the US, I'm enjoying the Mediterranean climate and cuisine. I am right now. I'm based in Athens, Greece, but this will probably change very soon again.

Mike: Well, having experienced winter in New York, I think you've made a good decision going back to Greece. So certainly for the winter. That's a great move. So lucky. So talk a little bit. I mean, you said you were interested in really explaining data and information in words, how did that come about? And how did that lead to Baresquare becoming a product.

Georgios: So it's very frustrating for people that are putting with a long hours to really understand what they're what data have to say. It's very frustrating when those insights they don't know find themselves into driving action. But action, it's more a matter of communication. It's bringing people together and aligning their understanding. Now, every team every company is having people with different skills, and data and deep data science knowledge is not really a common language. Natural Language is a common language. So at the end of the day, we always had to rewrite what we're finding and take out the detailed data science out of the insight for our misunderstanding. So, at the end of the day, no matter what was the analytical algorithm used to drive the result, the end result was always a couple of sentences, that the more that they communicate that the true meaning of the finding in business terms, the better. So we said, why not just go to the last step, and trying to recreate a new language that is successfully communicating those insights.

Mike: So it sounds like what you're trying to do is almost cut out that data scientist, and let people who need to understand how to use the data, get information delivered in the language they use is that we are trying to do,

Georgios: I would say, this is how we are framing it today. Back then it was more about not having those pressures, insights slip somehow, and a natural language filled, the best way to communicate.

Mike: That's great. So I can see how people would benefit, can you give us some examples of where bare square would be used, and how people particularly marketers might use it to help them in their jobs.

Georgios: Today's turning data analytics on its head. And now we are not talking in terms of tables and numbers, but rather in terms of words and paragraphs, we take their traditional analysis that is done on dashboards, which most of the times is reactive. And we are using these AI powered insights so we can deliver to the right version, on the right moment in time, on the wrong way of understanding. The insight. Shown wereBaresquare has been particularly successful is in companies that are having a lot of data volume and complexity. You see, the more complex the data set, the more we thrive as a platform within that complexity, because that's the pain that we eat is taking out that complicated and bit.

Mike: And so would a good example would be companies that are running large Google Ads campaigns and then trying to track the performance across the website is that the kind of thing people are doing.

Georgios: So typically, marketing analytics is the starting point. But if it is to look at experience from the user side, imagine that one morning you receive a Beresford notification on your phone before you go to work. And the platform is informing you that there was a sudden drop on the conversion rate, let's say 20% on a particular product. And that has a reference point, let's say that the reference point is, since the day before, our AI has investigated the issue and determined that the root cause is a recent price chains on one of your main competitors. That is what have made the product offering less compelling. Now, our platform not only can identify the problem, but also provide recommendations on how to address it. And an easy way of solving this problem is to enable a promotion, that is bringing down the price and making the product compelling again. So that's how an analyst or a subject matter expert, a marketer, if you like they can leapfrog into action in the beginning of the day.

Mike: So that's interesting, because, you know, you're not only integrating over the company's analytics, but you're also looking at competitors pricing. I mean, are you having to integrate with a lot of different packages to pull that data? How does that work?

Georgios: So first of all, it's important to highlight that Baresquare is not collecting data, we don't have a tag, in other words, similar to what Google ads or Google Analytics is doing. And that is because we think that collecting data, it's more or less a solved problem. What we are doing instead is to quickly understand what are their behaviours, see them in a digital journey that otherwise would have been blind spots within the dashboard. And then once we have that, that's our starting point, then we can interrogate many different datasets. For example, we can pull in experience analytics, those datasets that really show where people are having a problem during their digital journey. Also, we have product analytics, or CRM data, which is more about if people are keep on engaging with the digital experience or the product and so on. Now, at some point, and especially with the latest technologies of autonomous, dedicated AI agents, we can really use those little guys to go and gather more contextual information, go and visit the website, see how the website is being rendered on a specific browser. And also, if the product availability of a competitor or the price, or even the weather, a public holiday, a promotional calendar, could also be part of the explanation of the root cause. And that is what is compiling the why as very much people in the analytics world, like to call it to really understand why. But what's very exciting is that now we have a new era that is taking out the subject matter expertise. So even people who are adjusting the beginning of their career or in the beginning of this job engagement, just during the onboarding period of their lives, perhaps they don't really know how they can influence the business goals or the revenue. And this is where an LLM can also provide very detailed personalised next steps on how to cross check the validity of the results, and how really, they can act.

Mike: That's interesting. One of the things I feel compelled to ask is a lot of the examples you you're giving, they feel quite orientated towards the business consumer market rather than B2B market. I mean, do you think the consumer market is further ahead in terms of using analytics? Or do you think it's in a position where, you know, maybe it's easier to get data because there's a lot of online transactions?

Georgios: I think it's because of the second, the B2B marketing still has a lot of ambiguous touch points. And many of these are within the physical world. Let's think of an exhibition, a conference. Now, that part of the experience is not very much digital, or at least not yet. And therefore, there are many of these data points that somehow are being not captured. However, on the other side, what is unique with B2B is the longer sales cycle that happens many of the times, and these touch points, they can very much exist within a CRM database, where in the consumer market, of course, you can have CRM and look into the lifetime value of a customer. But it's less of a complex problem. While in the B2B world, it is very much so. And also, I would say that the element of personalization, it's way more important on B2B Cause the offering needs to align with the narrative of the business, the pain of the business, work with the ambiguity of all of the different data points that we've just talked about.

Mike: That's interesting. So I mean, from that, do you think that actually B2B is got an opportunity in the future, to actually make better use of analytics understand data more, and therefore generate better campaigns? Or do you think that B2B is always going to struggle because of the longer sales cycle and the physical touchpoints?

Georgios: No, on the contrary, I think that companies that are employing B2B marketing will have way more of room to manoeuvre and provide new innovative ways to engage with customers. Taking that back to the example of the conference, think how underutilised The stand can be within a conference, think about how difficult it is to match someone who is interested for technology and a technology vendor and finding about correct person within the organisation that can explain the solution. Exactly for the needs of the customer. This is where personalization can go totally on that on the next level.

Mike: It sounds great. I mean, the one thing I'm wondering now is bare square is actually quite complex. It's pulling in data from a lot of different places and using AI to produce conclusions in natural language. I mean, is this something that that's a really very expensive product? Or is it perhaps more accessible to businesses?

Georgios: Better square is a company about is a startup which means that we are working on our go to market and we have found the best way for us to reach out To the market right now. And it happens to be that the best approach for us is to go for enterprise customers show also our licence and our business model is better optimised for enterprises. However, this is just a go to market approach. And it means that this is where we can prove our value in a better way. It's not to say that it's only that enterprises that they need this type of solution, because at the end of the day, it's also a matter of their reference for an enterprise has an efference point of many analysts, many people who are working with dashboards or complex datasets on a daily basis. However, if we think about smaller organisations, those teams, perhaps they don't have dedicated resources. So in proportion, with the complexity for them that they have to deal every day, it's as Ben, I would say that the application of AI powered insights go across all different types of businesses. And even for us as consumers or people by ourselves, I can totally imagine solutions that are operating exactly with the same logic, and they are applying to our everyday lives.

Mike: I love that that sounds like a bit of a hint as to where you know, possibly in the future, you might go moving from the enterprise level down to more mass market. I'm interested there any other features that you're thinking of you'd like to add to Baresquare, to you know, either help your customers or improve the performance,

Georgios: I would like to take you straight into what excites me the most. And that is, for some reason, session replays. I don't know what kind of beef I unconsciously have with session replay. But perhaps is the facts about where it comes to data collection. And how we are utilising these datasets. Perhaps these technologies that are capturing absolutely every move of the cursor is where I see that we are under utilising the dataset. In a way, I think that is more like a graveyard of data points that are being utilised only as much as people have time to stand in front of a screen. And looking into session replays. Of course, you have already some solutions. The best one that people might know is Microsoft clarity, and their experience analytics platform of rds using GPT technologies to write a quick summary of what happens into that session. However, what I'm flirting with, and I'm talking very strongly with my product team is whether we need to proactively record absolutely every session, or is it something that we just need to do on an ad hoc basis, or even more just employee agents to go and we create a session with all the different paths that a user could take, and then use these NLM technologies just to summarise where exactly that problem became a hurdle for the user.

Mike: That's fascinating. That sounds like not only you're going to save some poor marketers from watching session replay after session replay, which is not the most fun job in marketing. But also you're actually going to be able to preempt those potential problems. If you have the AI navigating around, then presumably you can see problems before even your customers encounter them. Absolutely.

Georgios: I would say that it's definitely something that exists within our roadmap. But then again, going back to the state or for where we are as a technology and what we need to introduce first, I'm afraid that it's not the absolutely next feature that we are going to bring to life. But definitely it's it's the one that could generate this biggest change when it comes to when and how we collect data.

Mike: I love that Georgios. So love the the dreaming about what might be possible in the future, rather than just telling us about an incremental feature enhancements. So that was a great answer. There's a couple of questions we always like to ask people say, one of the things I'm really interested in Georgios says, What's the best bit of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Georgios: That's a good one. That's an excellent question. Well, first of all, I think that it makes sense to do a little bit of definition of what marketing is. And for some people Will like myself that I was taught marketing in the beginning of early 2000s. Marketing was all about Kotler and the four P's, price, promotion, placement, and product, of course. And then we have the more contemporary definition of marketing, where people these days, they think of marketing as the overall go to market most. So finding the exactly the needs, and matching them with solutions. And this is where tools like the business canvas, that approach and all other contemporary ways that we have to understand the business, they'll notion that I really love the most when it comes to marketing, is thinking of marketing being all about finding ways for people to find him. So I think it applies because both has consumers, buyers or working on on behalf of a company, we really like to have the sense of freewill. Now we can debate on a philosophical level, whether free will exist or not. But we all love that sense, especially in the in the Western world. And always we operate within the limits of our understanding of our current pains and interests. And now we would like to have the sense that we are driving the show, we would like to solve a problem whenever we feel that that problem deserves our time and resources to be sold. And it's only natural if you think about it that in the past few years, we have seen this rise of self serve product lead approaches. So marketing, it's all about discovering where to leave breadcrumbs for the right people to discover you. It's a more natural, organic, perhaps even a respectful and fun way of contacting marketing.

Mike: I love that I love that approach of it's not about pushing it to people, it's about helping them come to you. And I think, you know, that probably reflects a lot of the sort of theories around inbound marketing, for example, that, you know, has been very effective. Certainly, you know, a lot of HubSpot users are really into it. Of course. My other question, George is around advice for young people in marketing. You know, we're very keen at Napier, to get young people into their marketing career. But what would be your advice to a young person if they were wondering whether they should go into marketing or not as their career?

Georgios: This is very relevant. And I'm thinking a lot about it. Just because I have a nephew, who just decided that he would like to go and become a developer, he would like to study computer science. And in the same week that He's declaring that we have Devin AI, just coming in and claiming that something like one out of six different types of tasks that an engineer needs to solve with gold today, perhaps there is an end to end automation for these weights, poses the question, Will marketing still be relevant for people that are young right now and they are kicking off their career? So I was thinking that a lot. And I think that people should absolutely pursue a career in marketing. And let me tell you why. In essence, I think perhaps it's not the popular opinion. I mean, I would love to hear yours. But I think that marketing, it's all about competing over limited resources, it's always going to be there. And people are always going to be competing for finding a better way compared to everyone else, to reach to that audience. So in a way, marketing will never go out of fashion. Perhaps people should be informed about what they think that marketing practices are today, the most certain thing is that those practices will not be the same in the future. But the overall idea, the fact that we try to appeal to words of the limited time and attention that people are having and be better than everyone else, this is going to stay.

Mike: I love that. And I personally think you know, marketing could become a lot more interesting as a career, particularly as AI takes out a lot of less exciting jobs, like sitting and watching session replays a great example of something that I don't think any marketer can say they enjoy, but sometimes you have to do it. So I agree. I think there's huge opportunities in marketing for a career. It's going to be tough. I think it's going to be more competitive, but so well, everything else as AI comes in and impacts it.

Georgios: How do you understand AI and marketing these days, Mike?

Mike: It's really interesting. So our business is actually quite niche. So we focus on deep tech business to business clients. And AI is less effective in very specialist areas like that, presumably, because the training data is much less than in more general areas. So we're using AI in all sorts of different ways. And I think the reality is, is that actually everybody's using AI in marketing, if you're using Google ads, there's AI tools in there that Google have implemented. And I think that's quite a good model. You know, people, when they go to Google ads, don't think about using the AI, they think about using the tool and the AI is kind of hidden away. And it just does good things, it just optimises your ad, and you can be at home sleeping, and Google is still optimising your ad and still using AI. And I think that's a very interesting model going forward that more and more, you know, my belief is we'll see AI as a separate standalone thing disappear. And I actually think what we'll see more and more AI just get buried into tools. And so when you're using a tool, more will be done for you automatically. But you won't think of it as using AI. So definitely, that there's gonna be issue as to how many marketers or computer programmes or anyone else we need in the future. But I don't think AI strength is actually replacing people completely. I think it's replacing people on the very repetitive, the straightforward, the less creative jobs, but I have no idea whether that's you know, 10% of marketers 50% of marketers or 90% of marketers will be replaced, it will be interesting to see.

Georgios: And that is quite a lot to unpack. But if it was to, to offer one thing that I found very compelling in what you said, it's also the the zeitgeist of these days, we think of AI as an entity by itself. And it's, it's crazy, it's like thinking knives as an entity by themselves. It's like if people versus tools or people versus knives is a thing, which is not. At the end of the day, the value is created by people. And it's being accepted, endorsed by other people shown. AI is just just another tool. And of course, this is something that all of us believe, and we rationalise it like this. But when it comes to the most emotional responses, we still respond as if we are talking about a replacement. So I was thinking quite a lot, perhaps we need to start rebranding AI. And thinking it less about technology, and more about a vertical, perhaps, where we unpack the human needs in a very deep way.

Mike: I think that's interesting and probably more reflective of the truth of AI Georgios but I do wonder whether there's so many companies that are trying to sell this dream of AI replacing, you know, as many workers as possible, that actually perhaps overhyping it is in their interest at the moment.

Georgios: And also, I wonder how this could also become a self fulfilling prophecy, the more that we are thinking AI as a replacement. And the more that we start marketing, AI as a replacement, the more it can become a replacement. So a few years back around 2018 2019, I joined a conference when it was all about policymaking in AI. And the discussion was all over the place with the famous, dynamic or far or whatever an autonomous car should do in case of absolutely having only two paths forward killing one person or killing a group of people. There was a lot of debate when it comes to that. But at the same time, Cambridge Analytica was operating, and almost publicly announcing the way that they are breaking down and creating micro segments based on the Big Five ocean cycle metric classification. So those guys were already talking about their methods. And at another point in the world, we are having a discourse when it comes to all what an autonomous vehicle should do. Now, my point here is that there is a matter of sequencing. The next problem that will we'll try to solve or understand or perhaps create a blueprint. And a few years back, we had the option to start thinking about data Schumann Nolan's watch going on with intellectual property. And of course, should be earning some sort of commissions or having at least intellectual property owned or what has been written. And we didn't do that, we still like to be talking about the autonomous car dilemma. And it feels to me that we are doing the same thing right now, we can be just thinking about how to apply AI in such a way that we can enable more people to pursue their dreams, even if they don't have the capabilities. Data driven marketing is a thing, but not all people understand data. And we have people that really would like to change the world. And they have an idea that they would like to communicate to the world. And AI for them can be the absolute tool to overcome their lack of competence. But if we don't think as such, if we don't think about how to roll out these solutions, in a way that we can empower people, and we create more and more narratives of replacing people, then eventually, the solutions that we will create, will be replacing people and making them obsolete. So I think that there is something to be said about that self fulfilling prophecy of AI. If we think it in a different way, the future can be different.

Mike: I think that's super positive and a great way to end the podcast, the thought that, you know, what we should be doing with AI is helping people achieve their dreams, not trying to replace them. And that's what's going to generate the best product. So thank you very much, Georgios, it's been amazing if people would like to, you know, learn more about Baresquare, or, you know, indeed ask you about some of the things you've said on AI, what's the best way they could contact you.

Georgios: Go on the website, baresquare.com. This is where we are going to be keeping people up to date with what we are doing. And I'm trying to become more and more active on LinkedIn. With the time that is being allowed to me it focus on that extra version, while at the same time, we are preparing for a really big product launch of our new platform. As I told you, it's trying to enable as many people to go out and explain to the world what they are doing and why they think that there is a solution, product or idea. It's worth the attention.

Mike: That's fantastic. And I certainly look forward to the launch of the new platform. And I'm sure a lot of people that don't enjoy data, but love marketing are looking forward to it. So, Georgios Thank you very much for being on the podcast.

Georgios: Thank you.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favourite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Stefan Debois - Pointerpro

Stefan Debois is the CEO and Co-Founder of Pointerpro, an assessment software that allows users to produce surveys and highly personalised automated reports. Stefan joins the Marketing B2B Technology podcast for a discussion on how the software works and how it can be leveraged for marketing and lead generation.

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• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Pointerpro

Pointerpro is an all-in-one assessment software platform where users can create online questionnaires and surveys that auto-generate personalised advice and reports into PDF.

About Stefan

Stefan Debois has a background in engineering and has over 15 years’ experience in Enterprise Software. Stefan’s experiences are foundational to Pointerpro, which he co-founded in 2012.

Time Stamps

[00:50.2] – Stefan shares what led him to co-founding Pointerpro and what the software does.

[08:41.2] – Stefan explains how Pointerpro can be used for lead generation.

[11:42.5] – What is the future of Pointerpro?

[17:43.4] – Stefan shares what marketing tactics are used to promote Pointerpro.

[22:50.2] – What is the best piece of marketing advice you’ve been given?

[24:45.3] – Where to go for more information and Stefan’s contact details.

Quotes

“Double down on what works instead of trying to experiment with new things all the time. That doesn't mean that you don't have to do experimentation…but don't fall into the shiny new object syndrome… double down on what works.” Stefan Debois, CEO and Co-Founder at Pointerpro.

Follow Stefan:

Stefan Debois on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stefandebois/

Pointerpro Website: https://Pointerpro.com/

Pointerpro LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/Pointerpro/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Stefan Debois - Pointerpro

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Stefan Debois

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today. Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. Today, I'm joined by Stephen Debois. Stephen is the CEO of PointerPro. Welcome to the podcast, Stephen.

Stefan: Thank you for having me, Mike.

Mike: It's great to have you on. And we're talking a little bit about this later. But actually, it's really interesting. You're actually the CEO point Pro, we've recently signed up as a customer appointed Pro, like the product so much, we wanted to get you on to talk about the product. But before we dig into point Pro, perhaps we can just find out a little bit more about your background, Stephen. So can you tell me a little bit about your career?

Stefan: Yeah, sure. My educational background is engineering. I started immediately after my studies in consulting, and that's where I stayed for about 15 years. I think I started with Price Waterhouse, in 98. That's a long time ago, and then became Price Waterhouse Coopers. And then I switched to CSC, a computer science Corporation, which is now called the exceed or I mean, in that industry does quite a lot of mergers, and so on. Yeah, in consulting, I was mainly involved in large scale ERP implementations, like ERP, like management systems for companies like SAP and the like. And we did implement those systems with large multinationals like Nestle, or Atlas, Copco, and similar kind of company. But then I always had the feeling, or the wish to do something myself to start a company as an engineer to create a product and also create a company around that product. And then, of course, as I was, like, professionally involved with software, enterprise software, and that became the most logical choice also, back then, a lot of the barriers that you used to have to start a software company were becoming less important, like you didn't have to buy your own servers, everything goes via the cloud cloud, and no expensive software, because a lot of development software was available open source.

Mike: And that's interesting. And you've decided to start a company in Belgium and obviously, because you live there, but how is the startup culture in Belgium? I mean, it's not necessarily as renowned as somewhere like Berlin, is it for startups?

Stefan: No, that's true. But it's not that bad. Sometimes complain a lot. But there's a lot of initiatives to support startups, sometimes you have to find which initiative fits you the best. But even back then, talking about 14 years ago, we participated in an incubator programme from KBC. That's a large Belgian bank. And I mean, it's a huge, huge benefit for us, like boats, network, talking to people that have done certain things before, in different areas, legal, commercial, everything. But also just having the office space having, if you go to the coffee machine, that you have someone to talk to, it can sound maybe a small thing, but I think it's important, versus before we were just at home, and the two of us, me and my co founder, and then yeah, we didn't have these kinds of interactions. So I'm gonna say this. Since then the startup culture in Belgium has evolved to has become more like, more professional for the people who consider to start and would not, I would say that this should not be a barrier to start in Belgium.

Mike: That's nice to hear. It's good that Belgium is putting effort to supporting startups. So let's move on to talk about PointerPro, you mentioned you wanted to start a company based around software development. What led you to decide to found point a problem in what drove you to look at research and surveys?

Stefan: Yeah, so first, I wanted to start something in the area of CRM, customer relationship management, because it was close to my experience as a consultant. And then I started doing some research about that. And then I saw like that it were like, a lot of competition in that area. So I gave up on that ID. But in the meanwhile, I started something else just to, like, get used to the state of the art technologies again, because I'm an engineer, but technology as of course, you've often so I started like a quiz app, just as I'll be project to get used to the new programming languages and everything. And that was to call tablet quiz. It was also like the start of the iPad. So quizzes for iPad with like a nice visual, making use of all the possibilities of the iPad, I launched as Yaffe free products and that's got some traction, not only from people who want to make a queries about her grandmother or so but also from professional companies, for example, us that used it for HR events and all the things after a while, and after also talking to these people, we decided to launch it as like a formal company. And then we called it survey anyplace that was the name before. PointerPro, of course, because it was like, besides quizzes, we want also to focus on surveys, and combination of quizzes and surveys. So then that was when the company started.

Mike: And so now, I mean, PointerPro does a lot more, doesn't it, it does a lot more than just do surveys and quizzes.

Stefan: Yeah, exactly. So with the surveys, we, I think we had a good start, because we want to make the surveys more interactive, and more like, we want to improve the experience from the respondents. And then also, as a result, get better and more data. For the ones that organise the survey. And beginning we had some traction went well. But then after a while, we have seen that there was a lot of competition on that market. It's kind of a commodity survey or survey software. So we knew, according to the startup logic, that we had to find a niche that we had to find product market fit, so not just surveys of everybody, sometimes you try, like a certain thing that you want to do, and that you only see that it's not working, then you have really invested some that some time and effort in it. That's why it took from 2012 to 2019. So seven years, that's a long time. I mean, of course, we had customers as well, but the Dakotas, not really spectacular 2019 VM, we have editor, he bought a functionality so that you don't have like only questionnaire. But that's after having completed the questionnaire, that respondent gets a customised report like a personalised report depending on the answers that he or she has given in the questionnaire. And those that was really the killer functionality, or the combination of those two, the questionnaire and report that we needed to find that product market fit.

Mike: That's fantastic. And I mean, just to explain to people what the report does, can you give us some examples of how your customers are using this reporting function? What are they actually doing with it?

Stefan: Yeah, yeah, for example, the common goal is always to automate it twice. Before we deserve it was more like data collection. But now it's to collect the data, that's a first step. But then the data is used to get some, or to extract some customised advice. Like, for example, financial advice, we have a customer of ours, where's the website, free financial plan.com. It's worth looking at it, it's us customer. And there's financial assessment, you enter your data, like your income assets and other details. Now you get the personalised financial advice plan, which can say like, you have to go for this kind of investment, or that kind of investment ends on that quite details. And of course, in that plan, there's also links to other third party vendors who can help you and to implement that advice. So that's one example. Although examples are like cybersecurity, maturity assessments, but also HR. Some assessments have often asked year to date HR, but HR is a minority, but still an important use case like wellbeing assessments, psychological assessments, and so on.

Mike: And I think one thing a lot of companies are doing in the B2B sector is they're using these on my reports or diagnostics, to actually generate leads, it's all about lead generation, isn't it?

Stefan: Yeah, in fact, we have both lead generation for I mean, our main focus for customers is professional services, it's still quite bold, and professional service companies can use it for lead generation Yeah, before to give it to a prospect before someone is becoming a customer, then you can also use it during project delivery, to automate the advice delivery. But the degeneration is an interesting use case, in marketing, I think we have two trends, you have a trend towards a content marketing, like give more educational content to your customers. And then in that way, you educate them and you are seen as, as an authority. That's one trend. And the second trend is personalization. I think, like thanks to data and all the information that you have about your audience, like to try to personalise the message as much as possible. So the assessments are really at the crossroads of those two trends, I think, because you give content. So when, for example, a cybersecurity assessment is on the website of of a consultant that is specialised in that area. People can also the question to invest some time, but they get some useful content in return, which is valuable and which also builds trust. So if your content and secondly I've also the personalization because you don't have That's the advantage against like, a generic white paper about cybersecurity. If I if as a business owner to read the white paper, but like 20 pages about cyber security, I'm not that interested in comparison to when I have like a one pager that says, okay, based on your answer, these are the three things that you have to focus on cybersecurity, and that's exactly what we want to do with our tool.

Mike: I think that's a great point, Stefan, I think that hugely personalised advice. I mean, traditionally, people would have done that by getting a survey, and then having somebody you know, manually go through, make the recommendations, maybe even meet with the client, now it's automated. And it's a really good way, I think, from my point of view, of helping people move along that customer journey a little bit quicker, by automating some of the stages that would have slowed down. So you know, when somebody is in that mindset about talking about their problems, then getting almost immediately some answers. So I really love that I think it's a great feature points Pro.

Stefan:  Yeah, thank you. Yeah, we call it sometimes like, it's fast onboarding, but also like in bits consulting, talk, time to business value, reduced time to business value, what you hear a lot about consultants from from customers is that it takes too long to get results really. And then like this initial face, like the collection of the SS situation, as we used to call it like the current situation, collection about data like and then also giving the first most straightforward advice. That can be of course, shortened thanks to a technology thanks to our tool.

Mike: Absolutely. And what about the future? I mean, is this the direction you see point a pro going in are some features that you know, you're planning to add to enhance the performance?

Stefan: Yes, of course. So when our product vision is that every professional service company that in the future, will offer services to its customers, of course, but besides the services, we also offer a digital tool to their customers, like a kind of portal that a customer can use to log in, and that they can use to do three things, basically do self assessments, to get a personalised advice, and to monitor their performance. So that's easy to say. But we are far from that. If you look at reality, where the consultants are, I mean, we are also customers, from various consultants in various areas. And those except for Deloitte, there is nobody that really has a bottle with like this kind of information that I can use to follow up these things to get advice, and so on. So there's still a lot of work to do. So we want to help to reach that vision for the consultants More concretely, in our product, I think, especially for the performance monitoring, we still have some work to do. So we are going to work on the dashboarding, where the content of the dashboards will not only contain information from the assessments, but also from third party sources, because we see that sometimes the information has to be combined, the assessment is not the only source. So that can be done via professional services also by the customer. That's important. And that's the second important thing is integration, like integrations with other systems. We can do we already do it now. But we want to do it more. Yeah, easier. No coach, so that you can do it without an IT guy or girl. I mean, not that we don't like it. But mostly it's it, it slows down the process so that anybody can integrate our point of sale system will be their internal systems. That's the second thing that we are working on. And then the third thing is also AI. Of course, we think that this will be part of every software tool in the future, including ours to increase productivity from the users. And we see it especially in kind of an assistant, when you're making the assessment and also the report that it can assist in not only the content, but also design. For example, it could look at the design of your website, and you say like, Okay, I'm going to apply the design to the report. And then maybe it's it's 8% Ready, and then the 20 remaining pulsant has to be done by a human, but then still you have huge time gain, of course, thanks to AI. So that's what we're also looking into.

Mike: I love those features, I think like they're, you know, really interesting. And the idea of being able to recreate these diagnostics and reports even more quickly, I think would be super useful. I mean, one thing I'm interested in is, you know, you've mentioned that a lot of your businesses in the consultancy sector, what we're seeing with clients is a lot of product companies are actually trying to really grow their consultancy business. And so that they're they're moving away from being you know, purely driven by selling things and much more about you know, selling their knowledge and expertise. Are you seeing this and are you seeing this also drive more interest from you know, what might be seen as engineering or manufacturing industries? Yeah.

Stefan: What I see I mean in software Companies like like ours, like product companies. And these are not manufacturing companies because we don't make physical things. Of course, what I see is that customers are more and more asking, like for combination of software and services, because I'm convinced the software on itself will not generate any business results as a standalone thing. I mean, you have to activate it, you have to make sure that your users are using it in the correct way. And I mean, of course, you can automate, but you still have to do often some, some services. And then like traditional companies, and then I was in consulting those big companies like SAP and other software companies, but you see now with Salesforce and even in tufts, but also, they do it with partners. So they say, okay, partner, and as a service, and we do the software. And it's been you usually beneficial for those companies, because it allows them to scale. If you have the partner network, you don't have to worry about or services, the partners can do it. And you can focus on as often are we as small company, I mean, we cannot yet afford like such a Partner Network. Also for partners, our software is too small to earn, like a lot of money. So then we tried to do the services ourselves. But these are only the services that are directly related to our software, we are not going to advise on content like on cybersecurity assessment, which questions to ask. So because we are not specialists, our customers are specialists, or we don't want to take over the job of our customers. Of course, I'd like more technical things or design or so we do it also for them. And to have it all in one, that offering has been beneficial for us. Maybe there's also like competitors who are not self funded. Or more under pressure of VCs. VCs don't like services, or they only like, like 10% or so services. And those VC looking over our shoulder so we can do as much service as we want or I mean, we can do it independently.

Mike: That's really interesting, actually, because you're absolutely right. I mean, with startups, VCs are very reluctant to fund startups that are service driven, because they said it's not being scalable. But when you get large, established enterprises, you know, multibillion dollar corporations, they're all moving into the service industry. So it seems to be an interesting time where large companies want to get out of products and small companies want to get into them. I mean, thank you for talking a lot about pointer price stuff. And I'm interested in some other things as well. So I mean, one of the things that fascinates me is when we talk to guests on the podcast, is how they approach marketing. And I'm really interested from your point of view, what are the most effective tactics for promoting point a pro

Stefan: Traditionally, when we started, we have always focused on inbound marketing. So meaning that people find you online, and then come on your website and then see your offering and are interested and get in touch with you and then you can convert them into customer. So in my marketing, more specifically, search boats, organic search, when you just started, just like in the beginning, then it was more like personal network. That is what I would advise also to, to other starters. So personal network to add some large logos, hopefully you have some then in your network, and you can convert them. So we had, for example, big Belgian bank here as a customer in the early days. Now you use that to go beyond your network, because it's important to go beyond your network pretty quickly. Because that proves that you can really make a business on top of it. And then yeah, we started as I said to be content marketing, slash SEO, search engine optimization. Back then it was maybe easier than now I mean, comes more difficult, of course, but we get some traction organically. And then afterwards, when we started the assessments in 2019, the value of our licence or high school became higher, then became worthwhile to do and paid advertising also, especially Google AdWords, some, some other other channels, also, Captiva for software vendors creating interesting, but then the combination of the two organic search, then paid search and then also like the third one is online presence, like for example, on Capitol Hill on G to this review site, and also on all the publications that you are like, literally everywhere, if you type like assessment software that you're in the page results in organic results, and also on third party sites, like tryptophan and Jeetu. That's where we want to be but then of course also other channels that you're looking into now. We already doing those because we are quite dependent on inbound and there is also like it's not infinitely scalable, because there's only so many searches per month on on those keywords which are interesting for us. So now we are trying to do two additional channels like top of funnel more brand awareness and making sure that people know us before they need us. It's easier said than done. So that's the first one. And the second thing is on our existing customers trying to expand. For example, if we have Deloitte, Netherlands, as a customer tried to sell it also in the other countries for Deloitte presents, it would be a pity not to do that if you have these kind of customers, it's easier to get business in existing customer than always having to acquire new customers.

Mike: I love the way you know, obviously, as an engineer, you structure that approach to marketing. And I think it's great that it's a very structured sequential approach and very interesting, really useful lesson for people.

Stefan: Yeah, thank you. Yeah, we try to also measure everything. That's the advantage of course of digital marketing. We try to measure everything like the funnel, the conversions, and so on, depending on the source. That being said, we will also try to do some non digital things like I don't know if you have heard of Jason Lemkin, in one of his podcasts, he talks about 10 marketing tactics that you should apply. And, to our surprise, we almost did none of them. The tour that we are going to do now is one that he said like is do weekly webinar. And do it about you're not only about your product, I mean, sometimes about your product, sometimes about something like which is related to your product, but not immediately about your product. But do it weekly, we do it not bi weekly because of capacity constraints. And does matter if there's only five attendees or so just do it consistently. Okay, for us it of course, we put it on YouTube, and we can do content, repurposing it all the types of content. So that's one thing that we are doing now. And the second thing that we want to do, and that is a non digital thing is what he says is organising steak dinners. It doesn't have to be steak. If you have some customers who are vegetarian. It can also be other kinds of dentists. But face to face, dentists, just small scale restaurants, up to three prospects and three customers together on a table together with of course, someone have a point of poor and no formal presentation, you can give some more informal presentation about the whole map. And that always works. And I also know it from my previous company from a consultant when you put prospects together with customers, it always works. Of course, you have to take happy customers, but otherwise it will not come and you invite them to stick them. So if you if your candidate we can we can have next. Can you on the next stage? Denisha

Mike: Oh, I love that. That's, that's great. I really appreciate you giving us your time. Stephen, there's just a couple of questions, we'd like to ask everybody at the end of the podcast. And the first one is what's the best bit of marketing advice you've ever been given?

Stefan: Probably need to double down on what works instead of trying to experiment with new things all the time. And that doesn't mean that you don't have to do experimentation, I think we also do it. But yeah, don't fall into the shiny new object syndrome. And most of the effort should go to double down on what works I think I

Mike: thought you were gonna say that it's more nice restaurants. But so that's great advice. I love that double down on what works. I remember the last question is, if you're talking to a young person that was thinking about a career in marketing, what would your advice be,

Stefan: probably get some knowledge about technology, and even programming. But programming also, I mean, also didn't didn't know, quote, tools to design your own application, before getting into marketing and to create something yourself, maybe solving a personal problem or something else, and then go into marketing that will give you an additional advantage, I think so gets a little bit familiar with technology first. And then you go into marketing doesn't of course mean that the basic principles of marketing, like with digital marketing, the basic principles of like knowing your customer, and also this move towards content marketing and try instead of trying to sell your product. Those principles are still very important. But I would Yeah, if you have the chance to get familiar with technology before, I would recommend.

Mike: That is great advice. And I'm also previously was an engineer, so anything to do with technology is a good thing. Stefan, I really appreciate it's been fascinating. We're really excited at Napier. We're fairly early on in our journey with PointerPro and trying out some projects but you know, things that great if anyone listening to the podcast would like to try point Pro or find out more would be the best place to go. Yeah,

Stefan: for PointerPro is the website, point upload.com. You can, of course, try it out. You can get a demo. You can also find information about modern underlying principles about how to automate your consulting. We have blog, articles, testimonials, and so on, that you can explore. And when you want to find out about me or get in touch, then you can also use LinkedIn and just find it through my name Stefan Debois. I will be happy to get in touch with listeners to help or to exchange experiences.

Mike: Stephen, I really appreciate it's been a fascinating conversation. Thank you very much.

Stefan: Thank you for having me, Mike.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favourite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Emir Zecovic - CMO

Emir Zecovic, an experienced marketing professional in the B2B and SaaS space, joins Mike for a discussion about how to market B2B technology products.

Emir highlights how marketers often miss opportunities by not focussing on large non-English speaking markets like South America and India. He shares why marketers should be data-obsessed to understand what influences the buying journey, and why working within start-ups may offer new marketers greater career opportunities.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About TextGrid, 12min and OpenGraph

TextGrid offers communication APIs for SMS, MMS, voice and email. With cloud communications, businesses are empowered to build, scale and innovate.

12min is a platform that chooses, reads and summarises the most important non-fiction books.

OpenGraph generates meta tags and social media previews for any URL on the web in a few simple steps.

About Emir

Emir Zecovic is CMO at 12min and is currently also in transition between roles as CMO at TextGrid and Senior Business Development Consultant at OpenGraph. He is a determined, data-driven and versatile marketer with over 7 years of experience in managing teams, devising and implementing growth strategies for SaaS B2B and B2C companies.

Time Stamps

[00:51.1] – Emir shares how he got to this point in his career.

[04:46.8] – Emir discusses why it is important not to overlook non-English speaking markets.

[08:49.7] – Emir shares his approach to marketing as a CMO.

[16:27.0] – How does Emir encourage form fills?

[20:26.8] – What impact is AI going to have on the industry.

[23:58.1] – Emir offers some career advice to new marketeers.

[26:42.9] – Emir’s contact details.

Quotes

“Trying to be as international as possible in a business is always a good idea, don't underestimate countries you're not familiar with.” Mike Maynard, Managing Director at Napier.

“I've heard people say that they don't like Google Ads or Facebook ads or SEO, but I doubt anybody has ever said that they regret having a good email list” Emir Zecovic, CMO at 12min.

Follow Emir:

Emir Zecovic on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emir-zecovic-074882166/

TextGrid Website: https://textgrid.com/

TextGird LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/textgrid/

OpenGraph Website: https://www.opengraph.xyz/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Emir Zecovic - TextGrid/OpenGraph

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Emir Zecovic

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today. Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. Today I'm joined by Emir Zecovic. Emir is currently in transition as we record so he has been working at text grid. But now he is moving across to a new position at OpenGraph. So we're going to have an interesting conversation with him about how to market B2B technology products. Welcome to the podcast, Emir.

Emir: Thank you. Glad to be here.

Mike: Great to have you on. So I mean, obviously your career is in a bit of transition. But can you just tell us you know how you got to this point now in your career?

Emir: Yeah, it's actually an interesting start. So probably you saw on Lincoln, I was born in sculpin. Nord must Estonia. Honestly, nothing about the background was nothing hinted that I will be interested in marketing, just how it happened. I started studying and got interested about when I was 20. And I started doing freelance work and got very interesting. And somehow I don't even know how I got involved with 12 Min, which I'm also there as the CMO. The tolzman actually was founded by Devo Gomez, who is currently the founder of rock content, the biggest B2B SaaS company in all Latin America, somehow promoted to the chief marketing role after two or three years, three years if I'm not wrong, and it just took from there. Meanwhile, I did four, I actually got my master's degree from University of Sheffield. Actually, it didn't travel to the UK for that, because they have international faculty presence in almost, if I'm not wrong, in Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia and Romania. But maybe I'm wrong for some of the countries. And I don't want to dwell too much on that. Because at the end of the day, it's more like practice. I don't think that the formal education has a huge role or anything of the kind. But it was a great experience. Actually, I learned a lot while it shuffled specifically. And right now I'm here. I don't know. It's kind of interesting. I was like to work at to play someone. I love, b2c, and B2B. So that's why I currently have kind of like two roles. It's fun. I don't know, I don't know why else would they did. Definitely fun.

Mike: That's awesome. I mean, you mentioned 12 Min. So let's just, you know, look at that for a minute. I understand that that's a bit like Blinkist, which might be a more well known brand name to our listeners, because I think our listeners are generally North America and Europe. But tell tell me a little bit about 12 Min.

Emir: Yeah, actually, we are direct competitors. So blinkers we kind of started at the same time, if from what I know, Linkous currently is more focused on US and Germany, while we are more focused on South America and Central America, are also expanding, we have us burners, which is great. It actually was founded in 2017, early, like I said, by Guillermo Gomez, who is also the founder of rock content, a huge company very successful one. And it it kind of, I believe, he was looking for ways to read a lot of books, which sounds a bit cliche, but that's exactly how he got the idea. And at that time, he couldn't find anything in Portuguese, or or in Spanish. So he thought, okay, maybe this will be a good idea. I don't know if at that time blinkers was already established, I think yes, if I'm not mistaken. But Pokemon started primarily for the Brazilian market and then moved Spanish and got to English. And now even the our English bases expanding. And we're also looking there to go into B2B, which is also very possible. And it requires a different set of strategy altogether. It's very different than just selling high ticket software, compared to 1000s. of subscriptions. And I don't know if you know, the but the average subscription price on the stores is $40. So I'm you cannot go super high. Like I would say the top markup that you can sell in in countries like Singapore, or the US, which are, let's say, more prosperous. It's 70 to $80 Max, and you have to be very careful what you're doing developing countries and so on. It really depends on the market.

Mike: That's fascinating. And I think, you know, it highlights something that perhaps people like myself who come from an English speaking country, sometimes we're not so aware of what's going on in other countries, particularly if it's not an English language product. And certainly South America is a gigantic market. And I think all too often overlooked.

Emir: Oh yeah, absolutely. And I'll just give you an insight. Do you know the average cost per click mean the difference is 10 to one compared to the US and sometimes even 15 to 108 If you compare, in Great Britain, it's in my opinion, it's even more expensive than the US for some industry. So you can compare that. If you have a conversion rate, that's two times less than what you have in first world countries, so anything from Germany to the UK or US, you can make a tonne of money and the profits, the profit margin is much greater actually, even though it sounds counterintuitive, but the sheer competition in in the US, for example, is crazy. You get high conversion rates, but you also get good lifetime value, whether you're going into B2B or b2c, but the acquisition costs for both of them are super high. Like I remember when we were running ads for things where it's for classic comparison based landing pages with highest, okay, someone might disagree, but they're one of the best converting landing page models out there. Without a doubt, at least in my experience, the average cost per click was $20. If you do the same thing in Brazil, is between 0.5 and $1. In the conversion rates, the conversion rates are somewhat similar with the US having two to one advantage. Now, of course, your order value, if you're running an E commerce shop, or you're providing service of any kind, is going to be lower, you cannot charge the same rates. But just the verified is 20 times cheaper to advertise, it already gives you a huge advantage. So you can you can adjust the price to fit the market, of course, but the advertising costs allow you room to lower your service fees, or I don't know, whatever you're selling, give ecommerce or even a software. So it's a it's an advantage, especially Brazil with with one with 200 million people.

Mike: That's a great point. I mean, I love that I think trying to be as international as possible in a business is always a good idea. And don't underestimate countries, maybe you're not familiar with.

Emir: Absolute in India is also a situation where I think everybody who misses out on India especially or Bangladesh, is missing out on a lot good conversion rates, very low cost per 1000 impressions for both Facebook and Google ads or anything else, for that matter. Yeah.

Mike: And that's a great point, too. I think, you know, there are other markets that perhaps people tend to underestimate. I'd like to move on to where you're going to see, you're moving to Open Graph, I'm not sure that, you know, all our listeners will be familiar with that company. So can you just briefly describe what the company does?

Emir: Yeah, I don't know if they're familiar with the Open Graph, man attacks, which were built in the early 2000s, and tense while I was still in high school, but it allowed that preview function of sharing information, like for example, if you wanted to share an article on Facebook, or Twitter or YouTube, it gave that metadata, you just extracted the metadata from a website or from a link. And it just made things a lot easier. So you can scrape the web, you can do all sorts of things in a much more efficient way, then I don't know then if you try any alternative use, but if they Google, for example, what's an Open Graph meta tag, they will understand just by the preview of how it would look if you remove the metal tags of a link or if a website, so OpenGraph does that.

Mike: That makes sense. And I think, you know, we probably don't need to dig too deep into exactly what the company does. What I'm really interested in as you as a marketing executive going in and looking to drive the marketing strategy, when you started a company or when he even you look at a new year. I mean, how do you approach building a marketing plan as a CMO?

Emir: I think the first thing that, for example, I never heard anyone say especially not in Marketing School, and not even at shovel that you have to be data obsessed, and other main data drives kind of like cliche, I mean, literally obsessed with, we always use this analogy. It's like being lost in the Amazon forest. And unless you're nowhere you're going, you better not move anywhere, you better stay where you are. So the price you might pay if you don't know where exactly you're going is higher than if you just stay where you are. So the first thing that I always do is I obsessively analyse the data. And by that I don't mean just the marketing. I mean, the business data. So you have how many touchpoints to conversions. What's the average lifecycle? Well, how many months days weeks does it take for a product qualified lead to get to a sales qualified position from a sales qualified to actually become a client? And I'm trying to find patterns? Where exactly what where's the elephant in the room? So for example, if you were to Google Open Graph, you would notice that in this you're gonna find his data but I'm saying the traffic like most most of the traffic is run through ads. So you have definitely a problem in the top of the funnel, it's very clear. So you have huge opportunity there. Next, you can move on. And there you think about how the the lifecycle goes, What's the conversion rate on the page, what actually, if someone converts from what was the previous page from where they converted, to become, let's say, subscriber to the newsletter or anything else, for example, we we have a sort of a freemium model, which is you have a free service, but we try to convert you slowly nurture you, and then push you into the one of the two paid plans. But it's not always the case. For some businesses, the main priority is a call immediately, you need a call, ASAP. So I would say, my way of doing things is always, at least in the first week or two, if more is needed, that's fine. Just obsess over the data and tried to find issues. And I mean, all sorts of issues from the top of the funnel all the way to the bottom, what channels are being used, was the performance. And especially if there are data problems, whether that's the the forces of data, where's the data stored, or there's, like, I don't know, if you notice, but the most common problem, for example, is in which is kind of so the little bit is tracking, where we will always find the same problem, the tracking is wrong, you would think everybody would be focused on tracking, make sure that the solid, no errors, but it's not the case. And if you have tracking problems, my advice, put the 110% into, into fixing it as soon as possible. So that's, that's how and then from that point onwards, I usually would go with my round and square the huge Board have everything that they found, and I started crafting my plan. Based on the resources, of course, sometimes you just cannot do what you want to do. Because there's there are limited resources, so you have to take that into account. But I would attack first the low hanging fruits. And I can give you an example, in SEO, you go away, and you have, let's say 510 15 keywords that rank from position 10 to 20. Those are low hanging fruits, you go there, you improve the content. And those things rank in two, three months. So my strategy first and foremost, is to attack the low hanging fruit. While we are working on the, let's say, not long term, but like midterm strategy, which I would say it's between three to six months. And the that's usually how I divided zero to three months, three to six months and long term six plus. And but first you target the looking for so that you get the most possible in the shortest time possible.

Mike: I love that, you know, going for quick wins, I think is always a good strategy. And it kind of clears away some of the things you could do and actually focus on perhaps some of the more difficult tasks. I'm interested when you're you're building a plan, do you look to use his broader mix of tactics as possible? Or do you feel that there are some primary tactics that really worked well for you? And that those are kind of your go to things?

Emir: Yeah, that's a amazing question. I love that. I've been debating that with people in the industry for so long. I remember I was reading an article maybe two or three months ago that said, and correct me if I'm wrong, it is. But I think that the email has 29 to one return on investment compared to paid advertising. I'm trying to say that, if there's anything that has proven to never fail, is that you need to build your email list. Now, I'm not saying that's the only way or the only focus. But if there is, any channel that you can never fail, if you do it right is definitely the email. I mean, we always look for shiny object syndrome. So let's say what AI can do, or what that can do, or this can do. Email never fails, the average person opens their email at least 10 times a day. It's a channel that they prefer. It's a preferred method of communication, especially in in B2B, I will always use a broad approach. So I would I would split them between inbound marketing and outbound see where we can go with cold. But the problem with cold outreach is that at some point, it eventually just hits a wall cannot scale more. You can always expand the persona or build a new one, you have different products. Some companies don't have that. Now if you're an electrician and other know if you do something other on the side. Yeah, maybe you can expand and then instead of targeting just one group, you go after another but if you're running just one product line or division, you certainly will hit a wall at some point. And then the question is what now? But if you have an email list, I don't I've never I've heard people say that that they don't like Google ads or Facebook ads or SEO. But if nobody has ever said that they regret having a good email list. There has never been such a As in history, so there's a reason for that is a reciprocal relationship because you're giving something for free in exchange of the user did. They don't feel like you're selling something to them? You're nurturing them. So it's reciprocal. We're not asking for something while giving nothing in return, so as long as you provide something of value, of course, they're going to reciprocate. And that's something that they found it works crazy. Well, to be honest, the only I've never said that's the only strategy far from it. But I'm saying, if you're building your email list, by very definition, you also need to work on paid ads, conversion funnels, data, front, and of course, you need to optimise the landing page copywriting, it just carries with it. Five, six different, completely different areas. In lead gen demand gen, all of that. You just create so much work. But if you nail it, I didn't doubting that anyone has ever said that they regret building their email list.

Mike: Yeah, I mean, I think that's great advice. Obviously, the challenge is really building that that list and getting the tactics right to encourage people to sign up. So I'm interested in how you do that, how you actually encourage people to fill in that form or to hand their details over so you can actually add them to the list. Do you have approaches for that?

Emir: Oh yeah, absolutely. Till 2020. Most of the companies, both in b2c and B2B use to one step approach. So what you do is send them to a page, you try to create as much value as possible to Beijing in exchange for their information. This is public knowledge, but I'm going to share something with you, we have something called the bread crumbs approach, which is 20 steps, our average landing page to lead currently is 35%. The average industry is like four or 5%. Of course, it requires testing, I'm not saying everybody should have 20 days, but a good test would be like this. So let's say you have four elements on the forum. So you have name, email, phone number, and I don't know maybe something else, but let's say company, email, or whatever, it's whatever is mandatory. But if you flip that with four steps, which means four separate steps, not all in one form, and the US first for the less intrusive ones. So it could be like, what's your name? Or where do you work with or what's your age, whatever, it's an issue. So as long as a person commits more, it will psychologically make them commit. Further, as you demand more personal things. So let's say their phone number, or their email, or maybe some company information. So what we generally use, and what I would advise is that whatever is the most difficult thing to ask, leave it for less. So as long as they invest in the form, in our case was the Select plan. So if you want, for example, let's say if you have a if you're running a b2c, this is the same actually with B to B. But if your conversion model is most of the sales happened between zero and three days, for example. So you need them to convert past. So how do you do that? So that's how you do it, you make them select the plan endl? And the last step, will having them commit to 15 Steps beforehand. And they're much less likely to abandon it. If the investment is high, as the counterintuitive argument is, is something like why would anyone bother to go through so many steps? The crazy part is that they will rather do that, than just give you all the information into let's say, a single page form with everything was done. In I've tested this so many times, and there has never been one case where the single page four outperforms the breadcrumbs. So in B2B, you don't need 20 steps, because you don't, nobody requires that kind of personalization. But if you find a way to split them, if from one to five, six, leave what you need the most last and tested. And I I mean, I have the one that I don't want to over promise, but it works on us.

Mike: I'm not sure we'll all get 35% conversion rate, but if we could all move it up from the low single digits, I think everyone would be happy.

Emir: Absolutely. Absolutely. The key is to be better than yesterday. Not not for some random industry to average plus the b2c is kind of a bit deceiving, because you cannot measure the B2B and b2c investment in forms. In b2c. The last I saw the average ones like 10% in B2B is between three and five.

Mike: that's great advice. I mean, I think that's interesting. And bread crumbing is certainly something you know, people are not familiar with, they should look at. It's something that I know a number of guests have talked about on the podcast. Emir, I'm interested to look forward. Now. I mean, you've talked about what you're doing today. How do you see marketing changing over the next few years? I mean, is AI going to completely transform things? Or is it going to stay, you know, much like it is today?

Emir: Yeah, that's, if you look at now than the main AI tool. So I don't know if you're familiar with magics. A, it's a company out of Tel Aviv. I don't know I don't want to sound biassed, but in my opinion, they have the best marketing automation software for paid advertising. Maybe I'm biassed I've tried a couple of them. I really liked them. I think the company was founded in Israel, if I'm not wrong, or in Austria, I think it was in Israel. It's actually an amazing software. And right now they even created something called marketer AI is interesting, because you don't see a lot of AI tools actually doing the thinking for you. So usually what AI is focused on is cutting your time. So what does it mean? So let's say if you are running a CRM, or an email marketing software, or at Creative AI, powered software, so what they usually do is that they try to cut the manual work. What I'm trying to say is that what I see is that AI will certainly reduce the need for copywriters for marketing research, anything that was previously done manually, but it requires human input to a much greater degree. Magic has one of their tools is actually that they give you recommendations based on your ads performance. AI based so it says, Well, this was happening the last seven days, I recommend that you do X or Y or Z doesn't matter. So it tries to replace the thinking process. That's revolutionary. So it's not just some task that they're trying to replace, as far as marketers focus on data interpretation, that cannot be easily replaced by AI. But as long as their primary focus is a task, or very tight niche, so let's say link building outreach. Now, you can definitely improve that using AI. But if your focus is interpreting what happens, once you get those links, and how those links transform your rankings, that's not something AI can do. Or at least not not as well as someone who's experienced can do so my focus will be to simply focus on things that AI cannot replace, which is interpreting the results of your strategies. And moving slowly away from things that are repetitive, so including you and to an extent copywriting because if almost every software out there now has an AI assistant, so that you can churn out emails, and usually they're very well written. So it's not something that that you can compete, and plus it cuts the cost for employers, that that will be my worst. That's why they think that AI will definitely impact and I don't think they will impact marketing jobs a lot. Because marketing is still a very creative industry. So it still requires a lot of human potential.

Mike: I think that's that's great insight to the future. And certainly, you know, everyone, check out magic, can you just give the URL for that so the listeners can find it?

Emir: Madgicx.com.

Mike: Perfect. And I think people would want to check that out. So thank you for that. I mean, it's been really interesting, this discussion, you seem very positive about the future of marketing. I mean, presumably, if somebody was young was thinking of entering the industry came to you, you'd be, you know, quite keen for them to become a marketer. So I'm interested in what would be your advice as to how to successfully start a marketing career.

Emir: Probably the best advice that I can give them is that too, especially at the outset to avoid working for big companies. And I know it sounds counterintuitive, but you will usually be just a hog in like hogging the machine. And you won't get enough exposure to real problems. So if you're starting out and all you're given is a task and you're not allowed to question the system, which something that happens super often, you will never get enough exposure to problems to grow as a marketeer. And it creates a problem because AI will replace most of the repetitive things. So I'm not saying that, of course every business is different than it STEM is different. How it operates is pretty much unique. My advice would be to find someone that is willing to throw them in the fire. And at least for the first couple of years to work for either a startup and I know it's not very popular because startups can get really demanding and sometimes They don't have that same kind of work life balance. But starting out, I would definitely give that advice. Because everybody who has worked for a big company, what they usually receive is a set of tasks they perform, not getting exposed to real problems. So you can learn and grow. And even if you want to get exposed, you're not allowed to because the system is already created, you cannot challenge it without creating a mess on for other different areas. So that will be my advice to girls. And the second one is to read a lot, especially understand data. It may sound crazy, but what I would advise them to do is that they take any channels, whether that's SEO, Google ads, LinkedIn doesn't matter. And try to understand the KPIs read all of them, and understand how it impacts further down the funnel. So if you have for example, let's say you haven't a lot of new visitors, but at the same time your bounce rates goes up. So what does it mean? It means probably are getting a lot of referral traffic. And that interpretation of the data is a I remember what I was reading one book about the CHS old intelligence in the world means nothing unless you have someone to act on it. You can have all the data, all the intelligence, if you don't know what it means you cannot act on it. So it's meaningless. Pretty much data doesn't do anything by itself.

Mike: I love it. That's brilliant advice. I mean, Emir, this has been fascinating. You've been very generous with your insight and your advice for people. I mean, if anyone's listening and they'd like to get in touch, what would be the best way to reach you?

Emir: Probably with LinkedIn. I mean, that will be one way and a via email. Zitzewitz Emir 199 four@gmail.com, which is my personal email. Awesome.

Mike: That's very generous. Emir, this has been fascinating. I really appreciate your time. Thank you for being a guest on the podcast.

Emir: It was a pleasure. And thank you a lot for the opportunity actually to be here.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favourite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale

A Napier Podcast Interview with Sean Campbell - Cascade Insights

Sean Campbell, CEO and Founder of Cascade Insights, is the latest guest to join Mike Maynard for the Marketing B2B Technology podcast. Sean discusses the benefits of using market research platforms, explores the pros and cons of qualitative versus quantitative data, and talks about the challenges of getting research responses within the B2B industry.

• ‎Marketing B2B Technology on Apple Podcasts
• Marketing B2B Technology on Spotify
• Marketing B2B Technology on napierb2b.com

About Cascade Insights

Cascade Insights empowers B2B technology companies with customized market research and marketing services. For over a decade, we’ve served Fortune 500 enterprises like Microsoft, Adobe, IBM, Dell Technologies, AWS, and Google as well as mid-markets and startups.

In an industry that’s ever-changing, we deliver the tools and resources to help businesses navigate the market and seize opportunities for growth. Want to learn how well your brand resonates with buyers, or why your superior product keeps losing to a competitor? Maybe you need updated messaging to win more deals and generate more leads.

About Sean

Sean has been training, mentoring, and educating all his life. An exceptionally well-regarded conference speaker and author, Sean has delivered talks for Fortune 50 companies and top-tier conferences. He has also been the author of several books on technical and business topics.

Sean has also been a professional services firm owner for over 20 years. He is passionate about running a remote-first company, and has been doing so long before it was cool – dating back to the 20th century!

His professional services work has spanned consulting engagements with the Fortune 50 and startups you have heard of; the sale of his first professional services company, and the growth of delivery, sales, marketing, and operational practices inside professional services firms.

 Time Stamps

[00:41.5] – Sean discusses his career and what lead him to market research.

[03:54.0] – Sean talks about Cascade Insights, what it is and its capabilities.

[06:09.8] – Sean discusses why he chose to focus on the B2B industry.

[16.10.4] – What are the benefits of using a market research platform vs in-house research?

[19:39.7] – Sean shares how he thinks market research is going to change in the future.

[21.59.7] – What advice would you give to someone joining the profession?

[26:07.2] – Sean’s contact details.

Follow Sean:

Sean Campbell on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seancampbell/

Cascade Insights website: https://www.cascadeinsights.com/

Cascade Insights on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/cascade-insights/

Follow Mike:

Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/

Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/

Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform.

Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Transcript: Interview with Sean Campbell - Cascade Insights

Speakers: Mike Maynard, Sean Campbell

Mike: Thanks for listening to Marketing B2B Tech, the podcast from Napier, where you can find out what really works in B2B marketing today. Welcome to Marketing B2B Technology, the podcast from Napier. Today I'm joined by Sean Campbell. Sean is the CEO and founder of Cascade Insights. Welcome to the podcast, Sean.

Sean: Thanks for having me.

Mike: It's great to have you on. I mean, what we'd like to do first off is just find a little bit about people's background. So keep telling me a little bit about your career and how you ended up founding cascading sites.

Sean: Well, first thing is I didn't, I didn't want a business. I always thought the kids who went to business school classes at 8am for accounting were just boring. I don't know why they would go do that. I was a liberal arts grad. My classes started at six at night. But no, I was actually going to go be a college professor. Then I met a girl that I was worried about being broke. She wasn't God bless her. But like I said, Well, maybe I should go do some other form of teaching. At the time, I wasn't sure if that was a temporary diversion or not. But I ended up teaching Windows for Workgroups in Microsoft Word when a mouse was a new thing when people would use it as a foot pedal. That's a true story. By the way that actually happened in my classroom, somebody put it on the ground and tried to use it as a foot pedal, like it was a sewing machine or something. So I ended up becoming a technical trainer, teaching networking, databases, programming, and then I decided to go become an independent trainer, started a first company with two other guys, that company grew and eventually got sold. Then I started cascade with one of those two guys, he has now moved on to other things cascade solely owned by me. And I've owned cascade for 17 years now, first company out for about seven. So I'm on your 24 of self employment, basically, at this point.

Mike: Not a bad record for somebody who never wanted to do it.

Sean: Well, the funny thing is, I look back, right. And I still love teaching, like all my hobbies are teaching. I'm basically incapable of learning something and not wanting to teach it. Like I've just like, if I find a new thing, I want to go turn around and teach it. And there's a lot of learning if you have the right orientation to a business, like I know. And I know people get into it for different reasons. It's why I struggle with somebody's like, so what are your growth plans? And I'm like, learning. And that's worked for me. I mean, you know, our first business, we got up to like, 25 people, this business, I've got 15 people, so it's not just like me learning. It's like, I feel like I built an organisation that learns and then go figure. What do I end up doing? The first company did what we used to call technology evangelism work back in the day from Guy Kawasaki, but nobody calls it that anymore. And then this company was a market research firm, which is, oddly enough, something professors do, too. So I have this kind of weird circular thing, I think is kind of happened career wise. And at the same time I, I've had the opportunity to be an adjunct in an MBA programme. I still like teaching and volunteering. And so it's it to me, it makes a lot of sense. And obviously, I should say this, I mean, so nobody thinks it's Pollyanna have I had to learn things like what's p&l? Have I had to learn accounting? Have I learned to learn business and operational processes? Have I learned all the vagaries of HR policies by state in the United States? Yes, I've either hired someone to do that. And or I've had to learn that myself. And if I read contracts long enough to put the most caffeinated person to sleep, yes, I've done that, too. But like, there's plenty of running a business that I had to learn. But no, I didn't even really think I was going to do it. At the start. No, I love it. I love everything about it, mostly. But if I said I loved everything about it, you shouldn't believe me. But mostly, I love everything about it.

Mike: That's great to hear. It's worked out. Well. So you mentioned cascade, is the market research firm? Can you just unpack that and tell us a little bit more about what you do and who you work with?

Sean: Yeah, I say we get hired for pain or opportunity. So we either get hired because a competitor has done a better job selling or marketing or building products. Or you've done a poor job selling and a poor job marketing, and a poor job building product, or we get hired for opportunity. So somebody who wants to move into a new market, they've got a brand new products, that doesn't really have a market yet, or there's like, you know, industries they want to move into. And you go one layer below that. We do a lot of qualitative and quantitative research to answer the questions that fall out of those pain and opportunity buckets. Because clients will sit around a table or virtually or otherwise in their office and say, We really need some market insight to make this decision effectively. And so they'll come to us. And I think of us is like great recommenders right. We're certainly really good plumbers we understand how to conduct research really well. But fundamentally we get hired because we produce great recommendations. And the reason we do that to kind of bring the circle all the way Around, is we only work with B2B technology companies. So if you're a business to business oriented company, and you have a technology based solution, and the reason there's a little asterisk there is like, you know, we wouldn't work with Merck, talking to surgeons about cancer drugs, but we might talk to Merck, about a life sciences oriented solution that is SAS based to manage clinical trials, right. So like, there has to be like a strong technical underpinning which in this era of cascade, you know, your 17 predominantly means cloud based solution. So if you're a cloud based solution, kind of regardless of the vertical you're in, that's a great choice for us. On the other hand, if you were like, selling H back solutions to high rises, which we get a lead like that, every once in a while, they'll say, Well, we're technology. And I'm like, Yeah, but not the technology we work with. You know, you're absolutely technology, and you're absolutely B2B, but it's not what we would work with.

Mike: And that's interesting, you've got such a clear focus of what you do, because, I mean, there's this view that B2C, you know, consumer does a lot more market research than B2B. So why did you pick B2B?

Sean: It's more interesting. I mean, that's part of it. I mean, for sure, part of it's, it's more interesting, it's chewier. Now, I know there's a B2C researcher out there, that's like, but there's so much into like, whether they pick the rose coloured phone or the gold phone? And I'm like, Yeah, but it also feels kind of manipulative. So like, I wouldn't really get excited about that. And I'm not trying to be dismissive of the army of people to do consumer packaged research and like, what colour the Clorox box should be, I mean, I understand it's valuable. But it's just different. I also feel like it ends up being a lot more focused, you know, our audiences are very narrow and B2B that we go after, right? We don't serve a, you know, the swath of millennials, right? You know, it's very rare for us to do a study that would be based on like demographic characteristics, it's a lot more like, what are you using? What is your day, like, you know, what is your title? Like? What are the business problems you're trying to solve? That's how we target people. So I just find there's kind of a richness to it. And I think the other thing is, and this is honestly part of the entrepreneurial journey, so try to make this really short. But it's, it's fundamental to what happened to me, our first client in the first business was Microsoft, in 1999. And if somebody listening thinks of market dominance in tech, you don't really understand what it was like, except if you worked with Microsoft. And when they own 97% of computing, that doesn't exist. Now. There's not 97% of iPhones, AWS doesn't have 97% of cloud compute, you know, there's nobody, there's 97% of laptop sales, Microsoft and Intel, were something that's just probably never going to be seen again, unless, like, open AI does it to us, right? You know, or something like that, where you got like, 97%, of something happening in one building. And I say only that for this one reason. We ended up working with their developer division at that time, a lot. And they were very business to business focus. And so I ended up getting I didn't know it at the time, I didn't even think about it that way. At the time, I got this incredible education, on what it meant to do business to business marketing and business to business product development, just because we lucked out is our first account as these guys. Right. And it's it's almost like a version of graduate school for me that I didn't really think about it the time, but that's what was happening. And again, that analogy would hold true even for B2C. I mean, I know those people who like, you know, hung around a big CPG company, and they're like, as a vendor, they just ended up being educated in the world of that, and God bless them. That's great. But for me, I just got drawn into it. And before I knew it, that was the space that I really felt like I could provide a lot of value. And there's some fringe benefits. I'd say, too. I mean, I think the research is, well, I don't want to say it's monetized better, because that's not really maybe the best way to put it. It's not even really what I think it's just really chewy and rich. And that creates one problem, I'd say it's a huge one maybe that falls under the like when I send it like the job mostly is it can be very challenging for us to get feasibility on a study. I mean, one of our perennial problems is cmo wanders up to us of technology company and says, I want an n of 1000 survey. And we go nope. And they go, why not? And then there's this like math problem, we have to explain to them and they're like, I don't understand. And you're like, it's hard to get B2B research respondents. It's really hard. And it's probably the biggest day to day challenge we face in our business at least. So

Mike: I'm going to ask you that because obviously, I think most B2B marketers have tried research at some point or another. And most of them have come across this, you know, situation where they go, we want you know, even if it's a couple of 100 responses, that's really tough and B2B. So how do you go about trying to get higher responses from B2B surveys? Or do you do market research a different way for B2B? Well,

Sean: Well, so that's interesting. So a couple of things in that one underlying that question, you're getting at something that I want to pull out which is that me Many marketers in B2B have to recognise that they might not get a quant study, they might end up with a call study. Just because of the math, right? Even things like a brand study that you would really traditionally want as quant, you might just not have enough people at the top of the funnel. Another classic example of that is competitive studies. You know, somebody says, I would really like a quantitative survey of XYZ competitor customers, and it's like, okay, we'll just do the math, right? I mean, if you want an end of 200, and your response rates are in the low single digits, you need a lot of people at the top of the funnel, and somebody has to have that whole list of competitor customers, that's going to be hard to find. And if you try to organically sourced that list, well, now that's nowhere near the cost that you thought that study would be right, which is a lot of times why the CPI, you know, the cost per respondent can be like, really, really high. And that creates some challenges for client. Basically, I'll give you a short version of how we find people, we could dig into it more if you want, because it's it's definitely an area we could do a whole show on. But like, the short version is don't use a panel, use an expert network, or somebody that is preferably which expert networks do but they don't do always sourcing participants organically, like they're actually going out and looking at LinkedIn and their or some other tool. And they're trying to find people who have exactly the right profile. And then they screen those individuals. Because the problem with the panels are there may be all right for B2C. But they tend to break down very quickly for B2B for one simple reason that I can give you a short analogy on that is absolutely true, and is the heart of the problem. We even have a short video on the website that somebody on the team here did wants that we call B2B Brian, that's kind of a cute way of putting it together. But like so B2B, Brian is 53. And he likes baseball and pasta equally. And at 54. He likes baseball a little more and pasta a little less, you can track that somewhat in a panel of a bazillion consumers and send out surveys. The challenge is the timeliness of it breaks down with business because you are in a study this year, because you work for big Corp, Microsoft, and you are an HR benefits leader. And in a week from now you're going to quit and go be an HR benefits leader in a startup, you're not even in the same study anymore, you're solving completely different problems. And the reality is we do have a database, it's live and out there all the time. It's called LinkedIn the tracks that for us, but that's not the same thing as having a proprietary database. And then you have the the one factor that the barbarians are at the gate, meaning you know, if you can get 50 bucks or 75 bucks as a research participant to fill out a 15 minute survey, you will try desperately to fake and be whoever that person is, there's just a massive amount of challenges there. And whereas in B2C, they get paid a lot less. So there's kind of this like Cold War always going on with like professional survey takers. And you solve a lot of that by recruiting organically because you're going to someone who is most likely to they are they have the background, all that stuff anyway. So wait a little longer on that than I intended. But that's that's basically it. And we just have to constantly be staring at the vendors we work with for recruit and figure out you know, you're good with this audience. You're good with that audience, you're great with this audience. And that's how it plays out. But the short answer is just for the love of God, don't use panel, because you will end up with a survey that you may not even know you shouldn't trust, but you shouldn't trust.

Mike: I think that's that's really interesting advice. I'm gonna have to ask, What about focus groups in B2B? Do they work? Or are they hard to be effective?

Sean: They work? I think they work honestly. Great. We try to steer clients slightly away from them. Because like, I really tried to ask why are you asking for a focus group is it preference that you come from B to C, here because there's some dynamics, maybe this is what you're alluding to, in B2B focus groups that you have to kind of watch for right and things that are harder to create dynamic wise, because people might be a little more reluctant to share, especially on certain topics, because they don't really know who else is in the focus group, it can be a little harder to just collect the focus group participants at the same date and time. And it's also one of the reasons that, at least in our experience, we have a lot more success with virtual focus groups in B2B, that if we tried to do it in person, the only exception to that is like when we run them at a conference. Like for example, we've run focus groups for AWS at reinvent, but there's 10s of 1000s of people already there for you to grab. So that's not a really fair test that you know, in person focus groups work all the time. It's just the nature of a conference draws them in in a different way. But yeah, we don't really have a huge issue running them in short, I think you just have to factor in a little different dynamic that plays out and the places we would use them. Message testings a call Number one, that's probably the most common. I would say it's sometimes shows up in crossover studies, maybe like an ICP study, you know, and I'd say one of the thing about it one thing, just and this is probably more personal preference, I tend to steer people away from them a little bit, because I don't know if it's necessarily the best bang for your buck, because I think people over index on the popcorn thing that will happen in the focus group, which all happens in like 90 minutes. And they don't think about, well, if I turned all that cost of running a focus group, and I did X number of interviews that I could listen to, I could read the transcript, I get a much more longitudinal feel. And I can tune the study as it goes along in a different way, for roughly the same amount that you might have run a single focus group. But that's maybe more personal preference than anything else. I'd

Mike: I'd sounds like good advice, though. I mean, it sounds like a very sensible approach. I mean, one of the things a lot of companies do is they try and do I mean, what they see as being very informal market research, but try and do something in house, maybe ask the sales team to go talk to a couple of customers. I mean, what do you see as the issues behind companies running market research in house?

Sean: Well, first thing is, I think it's great. I think if you have a mindset that you want to learn about your market, whether you hire a firm or not, I will just say you're probably ahead of half the people you're competing with, right at that moment of you making that decision, whether you hire a research firm or not to do it. The second thing is it has a lot to do with how you staff, the team that's going to do that research. Have you given them actual time to do it? Do you as a leader understand some of the dynamics we've already discussed? You know, if you go say, go run a survey with our current customers, do you understand response rates? Do you understand that you can't just like say, Oh, they're our valued customers, I'm sure they'll respond to our survey, you have to understand some dynamics that are just like, everyday realities for somebody that runs a research firm. And some companies are good at that, you know, and I think that's great. As far as the specific example of talking to customers, or talking to the sales team, I'd split the two a little bit, I think it's great to talk to you to our customers, I don't think you necessarily need a research firm as an agnostic intermediary. I don't think you'd need it, I think that it can be very helpful because the discussion guide and some of the things that you're going to develop might be canted to meet the needs of a particular stakeholder group and might not necessarily be as balanced as it could be. And that's definitely a rule that we take on. And I would say from the, you know, salesperson standpoint, I actually love it. When we talk to sales books, I say that they are running a never ending qualitative research project. And they need to be interacted with as such. Now on the other hand, they can sometimes be a poor research participant, because they might generalise a lot from a specific or the last deal they closed. But you contrast that with they're sending messaging downrange all day long in a complex B2B sale. And they are understanding where where it comes from, and where it lands a perfect example of that. And I should emphasise this a complex sale, I'm not talking about somebody like selling selling e signature solutions and waiting for the next lead to show up on their screen. And they're just reading a script. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the more complex side of B2B. But like there was a stakeholder meeting, we were in one time with a recognisable fortune 100 tech company and the sales guy pops off when one of the marketers said I think we should test digital transformation is a phrase and the long standing sales guy, probably comfortable poking everyone in the eye, because he probably kept selling a lot. Said, I think there should be a swear jar around here every single time somebody utters the phrase digital transformation, and they're forced to put $100 in it, because it just drives people batty when you say it in a sales conversation. And I was like, oh, yeah, you're here, right? I mean, and I like I said, I think there's this misplaced notion that sometimes talking to the sales team is invaluable. And I think done right? It's, it's a goldmine. It's an absolute goldmine. So I think we provide a lot of value. And I could get into that. But that's probably not the best use of a listeners time to hear a commercial where our value is, but I would inspire people to say, yeah, go learn back to what I said earlier. Like, if you're learning about your market and your competitors, you're way ahead of probably half the companies out there just by making that decision alone. That's

Mike: That's a really positive view of what people can do, Sean. So I really appreciate that. You know, one thing I'm interested in about market research is, obviously today it's quite a labour intensive activity. How do you see market research changing in the future? Do you see technology really affecting what you do? Yeah,

Sean: Yeah, I think in terms of the future market research, there's probably two things I would point to, although there's a tonne of things, one is synthetic respondents, which hold a lot of promise and certain amount of risks, but I'm excited about it. I think, you know, if you're a craftsman of any sort, you shouldn't be worried about new technology. Right, you know, the analogy I've used with a lot of the AI tools around here is that it's more like it's a supersuit, right, or it's like a nail gun versus a hammer, you know, houses were built with hammers for millennia. And then some guy came around with a compressed air tank and a big hefty nail gun, and somebody was dismissive of it. And somebody else said, I think my customer just wants a well built house, and they'd like it a little sooner. And now it's rare to go to any job site and not see guys like putting the house together with nail guns doesn't mean that it's a worse house. So synthetic respondents are a big one. There are some risks and rewards to that, like I said, but I think they're going to be a really interesting adjunct to the the more kind of human centred research that I think we're still going to continue to do. The other thing is AI tools for qualitative analysis, we've always had tools that can help go through quantitative results. But I think the place where it's more interesting is around analysis of qualitative survey, qualitative data where you have a tonne of transcripts and textual data that for all of the vendors who build solutions that would analyse that pilot tax, they weren't nearly as good as some of the tools I see that are AI based now. And that takes a lot of manual labour out of the equation that takes a lot of the time out of the equation, that leads to some consistency when it comes to coding and analysis. You know, back to what I said earlier, I ultimately, nobody's working with us, because they care what tools we use. As long as those tools are appropriate. They want to buy the house, they want to have great recommendations, they want to have a way to change their business. And if we can get to that quicker through some of these AI based tools, I think that's fantastic.

Mike: That's great. And that's a super optimistic view of the future, which I love. As we come to closer podcasts, it's always a couple of questions we'd like to ask, and the first one is around people thinking of entering marketing, or in your case, maybe market research. What advice would you give to someone thinking of entering the profession?

Sean: Well, if I was to give very specific advice to market research, I would say spend time looking at qualitative research. You know, I think it's a real common misstep and mistake to kind of look at market research as surveys. And I think schools sometimes do an injustice there, too. I think when I even taught in the MBA programme, it felt like every student assumed that what I did all day was right, and send out quantitative surveys. And they miss the richness and understanding that comes from qualitative. So I would say that's a big piece. And it also sometimes inhibits somebody who's looking at a market research as a career, right? Because if they see themselves as somewhat of a behind the scenes person, or someone who wants to look at the data, and analysing qualitative research puts you right in touch with the customer. And I think that's going to be ever more important. As we get more and more data from AI based solutions, right? That we have this kind of ability to talk to customers in their element human to human. I think that's like really, really going to be critical. I've even seen some organisations start to emphasise a lot more qualitative research, even technology organisations, because they see the same gaps starting to develop, you know, mountains of data, but not a lot of qualitative research being done. So that's being and a more meta level, I would say read stuff you disagree with. It's it's a general piece of advice. If somebody asked me like, what's the major piece of advice I'd give anybody, business or otherwise read stuff you disagree with? You don't have to agree with it when you're done. But if you really ask yourself, How much do I read that I disagree with? Do I watch the news channel that I don't like? Do I read the articles that I don't like? Do I read books from business authors that just based on the cover, I might not necessarily agree with? One of two things is going to happen. Either you're going to have your own views kind of positively reinforced by engaging with something that's different, or they're going to be changed somewhat. And that's good. So those are the two big things. That's

Mike: That's awesome advice, Sean, I think not just for people new to the industry or thinking about the industry, but also people who've been in the industry a while. So really appreciate that. Thank you so much for your time and all your insight, Sean, is there anything you'd like to sum up with or anything you feel we've missed?

Sean: I know, I think we hit a lot of things. I mean, I would just say, you know, my career has been blessed by just an emphasis on wanting to learn approach problems from that mindset. And I'll leave you with one personal example. Let's just say people are watching the US presidential election, this time around with a certain degree of interest, perhaps not just in the United States, much like they did on the last few elections. And I saw that I'm a citizen here in the States. And the last election happened and I said, you know, I want to learn more about US presidents. I want to learn more about the process around electing presidents and all that and I said, you know, one of the coolest things I think I could do is I'm going to go read a biography on every single US President. So alongside of us bunch of other reading over the last three years. I did that. And I just finished it up a couple months ago. And I can tell you I learned a tonne, I was at times surprised by how our own electoral processes changed. I was somewhat surprised also why things are the way they are. And that led to all kinds of interesting thoughts around, you know, what presidents were good, which presidents were bad, what made a good president? You know, what was the typical characteristics of a president? Well, I don't think everybody needs to do that to vote. I think having a lien to learning more about the process than just talking about it. I think he's the biggest piece of advice I could give anybody, both personally and professionally.

Mike: That's amazing, even if the thought of reading a biography of every American President seems just a little challenging at the moment.

Sean: Well, it was it was actually pretty fun. But I'm a history buff, so but not everybody has. Anyway, anyway.

Mike: Also, Sean, thank you so much. It's been such an interesting conversation. I mean, you've talked a lot about loading if people want to learn more, or maybe even get you to help them do their next market research project. How can they get in contact with you?

Sean:  Just check out cascade Insights.com. You know, thankfully, to the heart efforts of our marketing team, if you just type cascade Insights in Google, I think you're gonna find this pretty quick. So that's, that's the fastest way.

Mike: That's, that's amazing and nice and simple. Sean, thanks so much for being a guest on the podcast. I've really enjoyed our chat. Thanks

Sean: Thanks for being here, man. Take care.

Mike: Thanks so much for listening to Marketing B2B Tech. We hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you did, please make sure you subscribe on iTunes, or on your favourite podcast application. If you'd like to know more, please visit our website at Napier B2B dot com or contact me directly on LinkedIn.

by Natasha Websdale