Forrester’s Ross Graber on Perfecting the CMO Dashboard

CMOs and marketing metric fiends–this is the episode for you.

Forrester VP and Principal Analyst Ross Graber joins us on this “Bonus Huddle” episode to enlighten us on which metrics should be on every CMO dashboard–and which should be left off. He shares formulas for calculating important metrics like marketing revenue lift, how to turn seemingly flimsy marketing concepts like “value add” into a solid metric, and how CMOs can set proper expectations for their CEOs.

What you’ll learn:

  • Which metrics should actually be on your CMO dashboard
  • How to measure marketing lift
  • How shifts in buyer behaviors are affecting marketing metrics models

3 Savvy CMOs Share SaaS Marketing Secrets

SaaS is a 145 billion dollar industry that touches almost every aspect of our work lives. Even this podcast is brought to you by SaaS—a collection of 7+ tools to record, publish, and house countless marketing insights.

You’d be hard-pressed to find a successful software product right now that isn’t either fully SaaS or migrating to it. There are 35,000 SaaS products from over 15,000 companies competing in over 740 vertical markets, which means there’s a noteworthy number of CMOs out there navigating a competitive market with massive growth potential. To help us understand what makes SaaS marketing such a distinct challenge are CMOs Grant Johnson of EmburseAli McCarthy of Skience, and former CMO of BynderAndrew Hally (he’s now CMO at Markforged). Tune in to hear how these CMOs have navigated the choppy waters of marketing SaaS and how they are using their past experiences to inform future decisions.

What you’ll learn:

  • How to stand out as a SaaS brand in a competitive market
  • The differences in marketing SaaS versus non-SaaS products
  • How to lower the barrier to trial and put the “service” in SaaS

Resources Mentioned

Traackr CMO on Interactive, Data-Driven Content

As the world of influencer marketing has evolved, so has Traackr, an influencer marketing platform that’s been around since before Instagram and TikTok. In the early days, the brand was all about answering: What is influencer marketing and why should you care? Now, they’re hyper-focused on enabling word-of-mouth marketing at scale for their customers.

How? Via interactive, data-driven content. In this episode, Traackr CMO Evy Lyons shares how the marketing team transformed their State of Influence report into an interactive app, creating an experience that prospects and customers couldn’t ignore.

She describes the development as a “hack”—a hack that has become a vertical marketing tool with a 40%-win rate, that is. No wonder, too, as one survey found that CMOs who invest in interactive content are 72% more likely to meet or exceed their sales and marketing targets.

Tune into this episode to learn more about what it takes to develop a B2B marketing strategy that proves business value, enables sales, and engages audiences all in one.

What you’ll learn:

  • How Traackr is making marketing more human
  • The business value of interactive, data-driven content
  • Why marketers should be thinking like product managers

What B2B CMOs Need to Know About Sales Enablement

For many B2B companies, the sales process is broken yet the solution is remarkably simple. It’s time to treat buyers as collaboration partners instead of targets. Time to approach selling as something you do with a prospect rather than to them. Time to make selling more human and more effective in a world where more qualified leads is not resulting in higher win rates.

Simple, right? But not easy. As laid out in Sales expert Andy Paul’s new book Sell Without Selling Out, it takes true courage to transform the current playbook, but those bold enough to take the leap will see shorter decision cycles and higher win rates, any B2B organization’s dream.

In this episode, Andy shares how marketers are uniquely poised to enable sales teams through insights into buyer behavior—introducing a new way of selling that ditches “salesy” to make way for connection, curiosity, understanding, and generosity. Don’t miss it!

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

  • The problem with B2B selling today
  • How marketing can improve the buyer experience (and increase win rates)
  • How CMOs can build trust with their CRO

The Thrill of Being a B2B Startup CMO

Are startup CMOs gluttons for punishment? The CMO role is tough enough these days, but strap on high expectations, limited resources, and the pressure of a low life expectancy for startups, and you’ve got yourself a real challenge.  

For CMOs Allyson Havener of TrustRadius and Ajay Khanna of Explorium, startup is a way of life. They don’t see their roles as punishment; instead, they see an exciting opportunity to build something great in a fast-paced environment, with a close-knit team of others who are like family. Tune in to this fascinating episode to hear how both CMOs navigate their roles, standing up the marketing function while building a team and a brand with an eye towards long-term success. 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

  • What’s so exciting about being a startup CMO
  • How to create a strong employee culture at a startup
  • How to market effectively with a limited budget

Flipping the Funnel with Klaviyo CMO

If you’ve ever wondered how much a CMO can do in a year to change the trajectory of a company, this is the episode for you. Enter Kady Srinivasan, who has kicked things up a notch at Klaviyo, a marketing automation platform dedicated to helping its customers discover a new, more effective way to grow their business. 

Grow their business how, exactly? By flipping the funnel on its head, focusing on the bottom first, which has resulted in something like 65x higher ROI for Klaviyo customers. In this episode, Kady shares how the brand developed this new positioning, using it as a centerpiece to unite employees, customers, and prospects alike. Tune in to learn how they made their refreshed brand come to life in a myriad of ways, as well as how Klaviyo measures marketing, and more.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

  • How Klaviyo refreshed its brand strategy
  • How Klaviyo brought its new brand to market
  • Kady’s 5 key marketing metrics