Tag: Marketo

The Best Practices for Bold Marketing Strategies, Learned from Marketo’s CMO

Posted on by Drew Neisser

Marketo’s bold marketing strategies are well known across the marketing industry. For this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite, Drew interviews their CMO, Sarah Kennedy. He also introduces a new segment on the podcast, Renegade Rapid Fire, where listeners can get to know Sarah in an informative and engaging Q & A session. Discover her best advice for CMOs, why she chose a career in marketing and her recommendation for a book that will renew your courageous marketing spirit.

Sarah left a 10-year tenure at a previous company and leapt into a five-month interview process at Marketo in order to diversify her experiences and pursue bold marketing. She is passionate about building an empowered and talented team as well as removing the shackles of perfectionism that plague the marketing industry.

You don’t want to miss the insights Sarah brings from Marketo into this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite. Discover why CMOs should be called to lead with conviction and the critical importance of risk-taking and experimentation through marketing.

This interview will unveil Marketo secrets that will push your own company to greater success. Click here to listen now.

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Why “fearless and bold marketing” is the mantra guiding Marketo into the future

When Sarah Kennedy joined the Marketo team, she immediately recognized the need to build a stellar team and fully understand the current Marketo brand story. Once she accomplished those tasks, she wanted to be able to have a single direction that would guide the company forward. That’s when “fearless marketing” was born. CMOs are born to lead, not waffle on ideas, and Sarah pursued fearless marketing relentlessly. She wanted to always circle back to customer engagement while also telling an even more powerful brand story that had been told in the past. Marketo has taken fearless marketing and turned it into an all-encompassing identity and even leadership summit events. Be sure to catch the full story on this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite.

Learn from Sarah’s 15 years of experience at top marketing companies to discover what makes a fearless marketer

The definition of a “fearless marketer” is a CMO that is not afraid to experiment and take bold marketing risks. By setting aside fear of failure, CMOs are able to pursue THE idea they truly believe in. Fearless marketers aren’t afraid to experiment with platforms and strategies that other companies are ignoring. Bold marketing decisions, even if they fail by conventional standards, allow companies to learn and grow. Having the right infrastructure in place to be able to learn from mistakes is critical. Sarah shares all of this advice and more, so be sure to give this episode your full attention.

CMOs are called to lead with conviction and empower their teams to pursue bold ideas without fear of failure

Sarah believes that it is a moral imperative for CMOs to empower their teams to make bold marketing decisions. When Drew asks her about the most Renegade thing she’s ever done in marketing, she explains that it’s any time she steps up and serves as a voice for both the customer and her team. Sarah also explains that CMOs should never doubt their ability to succeed. This interview is filled with even more inspirational advice that will leave you hungry for success and it should not be missed.

What You’ll Learn

  • [0:30] Drew introduces his guest for this episode, Sarah Kennedy, CMO of Marketo
  • [2:07] Drew gets to know Sarah through his new segment, Renegade Rapid Fire
  • [11:25] The most intriguing part of Marketo culture that drew Sarah in
  • [13:55] How the fearless mentality was created at Marketo
  • [16:53] Sarah’s definition of a fearless marketer
  • [23:20] CMOs are called to lead with conviction & stick to the ideas they truly believe in
  • [27:07] Content marketing and brand stories at Marketo
  • [32:54] Sarah’s final words of advice for CMOs
  • [34:19] Drew summarizes his conversation with Sarah Kennedy

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Thriving in the Engagement Economy

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At one point in our conversation, Chandar Pattabhiram says “I’ve always believed that people buy candles not because they need candles, but because they need light.” As CMO of Marketo, Chandar brings a floodlight to the world of marketing, leading to an episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite you won’t want to miss.  Among his many illuminating ideas, Chandar espouses “engagement marketing” as the only way to overcome the radical shift in power from buyer to seller and proposes that we’ve entered the “engagement economy.”

Expecting a conversation about the science of marketing, marketing automation and perhaps the latest in artificial intelligence, his focus on engagement, the art of storytelling and advocacy provided a show that is as surprising as it is informative. It also got me that much more excited about attending Marketo’s Marketing Nation Summit where I’ll get to hear Chandar speak among many other great speakers.  Even yours truly will take the podium, twice in fact (Monday 4/24 at 12:15 PST and Wednesday 4/26 at 9:15 PST) and then I’ll be signing books (Monday 3pm PST).  So please say hello if you’re at this event and in the meantime, here are a few of the key takeaways from my conversation with Chandar as gleaned by Renegade’s newest star intern Magda Lewandowska:

The shift from old school marketing, to new school engagement

“Listen, learn, and engage.” – Chandar Pattabhiram

Think of the last meaningful conversation you had with a friend. The conversation probably started at one point, and ended at another. Between those two points, the conversation flowed, and it adapted to perceived feedback. Pattabhiram describes adaptive marketing similarly, in that there is a continuous loop of marketers needing to listen, learn, and engage throughout the lifespan of a consumer’s relationship with a brand. Rather than launching a singular campaign to the masses (old school marketing), it’s important to consider the needs and values of the individual (new school engagement).

The art of storytelling

“The true roots of marketing lie in effective storytelling.”– Chandar Pattabhiram

Consumers are constantly surrounded by the noise of similar and multiple brand offerings. What this has done is created a shift in the power balance from marketer to customer. Storytelling allows for a brand to not only differentiate themselves, but to also create a unique engagement opportunity. When we talk about storytelling, or brand stories, we’re not referring to the attributes of a brand, or competitive advantages. The goal of storytelling is to create an emotional connection with your consumers

Principles of storytelling in the “engagement economy”

  1. Go from product-driven to outcome driven, or as Pattabhiram refers to as, “customer-obsessed” since customers don’t care about the actual product, they care about what the product means to them.
  2. Make your story memorable–facts are less important than the epic nature of the details in a good story.
  3. Be authentic–Build connections with your consumers on an individual basis.

Engagement economy in action: Marketo and Aetna

As the marketing industry’s innovation leader and best solution for high growth enterprise businesses, Marketo is focused on helping marketers shift from the traditional styles of marketing to the new style of engagement. In today’s engagement economy, it’s important to build continuous, meaningful, and relevant relationships at every step in a consumer’s journey. This focus will allow for the growth of not only revenue, but also lifetime value. By capturing what is in your consumer’s mind, you are ultimately securing long-term engagement.

Marketo has helped healthcare organization Aetna in their engagement marketing strategies, with great success. With the altruistic goal of delivering better healthcare to people, they aimed to campaign directly to employees. They have effectively combined their social channels with their own website and associated pages, creating a unique and personalized experience for their customers. After their initial investment of $500K in their campaign, they have seen a 16x return.

Driving B2B Revenue Growth

Posted on by Drew Neisser

Most service providers like to say they “eat their own dog food.”  Not Jon Miller, co-founder and VP Marketing of Marketo. Miller prefers “drink your own champagne,” and not just because it sounds classier.  This preference is based on the stunning fact that Marketo is according to Miller, “currently the fastest growing software-as-a-service company in the world,” a feat accomplished by using their own software to turn marketing into a science.

Founded in 2006, Marketo already has over 1,000 clients, who pay just under $30,000 per year with the goal of improving the yield of their marketing activities.  Miller and his team rejected the notion that marketing was an art form, relegating that to the “Mad Man” era, preferring to focus on “process and analysis,” and in doing so delivered to this interviewer 8 delicious ways to drive revenue.

1. Don’t call a lead before its time
For most marketers, a lead is a lead, entered into a CRM system like Salesforce and treated with equal urgency.  According to Miller’s research, this approach means that, “only 6% of leads ever close” and “only half of the sales people make their sales goals.”  Having been able to identify key buying signals, Marketo’s system separates leads into two buckets, the 20% who are “ready to buy,” and those that require nurturing.

2. Know the buying signals of your prospects
Just because a visitor to your site gives you their contact information for something like a white paper, doesn’t mean necessarily that they a qualified lead.  Explained Miller, “if somebody downloaded our webinars or thought leadership [documents], we know they’re at the early stage.”  However, reported Miller, “if you go to our website and see the detailed pricing pages or register to watch a detailed demo, you’re very likely to enter a buying cycle with us.”

3. If they give the sign, call your leads post haste
When all leads are given equal value, they naturally clog up the sales process, wasting the time of both the prospect who isn’t ready and the sales person who then becomes skeptical of all the leads, further diminishing the yield.  But if only truly qualified leads go into sales pipeline, the sales force is reading and willing to jump all over them. Added Miller, “if you show buying signs, we’re going to be dialing your phone in 3-4 minutes!”

4. Reward your marketing team more and raise quotas
At most companies, marketing generates about 30% of the leads, which means the sales force needs to be heavily incentivized to not just close but also to find the leads themselves.  “At Marketo our marketing team generates 80% of the sales pipeline,” explained Miller.  This has allowed them to “radically reduce the salesperson’s risk” and “change how [we] compensate the marketing department.”  And because Sales has better quality leads, they close at a higher rate, allowing Marketo to raise quotas and hire fewer sales staff.

5. Focus sales team on closing not educating
According to Miller’s research, at most companies “almost half of the salesperson’s time is spent on unproductive activities.”  This includes educating prospects on the category and the product.  “This is outmoded thinking,” explained Miller, since today “70% of the buying cycle is complete before the buyer wants to connect with Sales.”  Assuming you are providing all the necessary educational material online then you too can “optimize the demand chain” by only giving Sales leads that are ready to be closed.

6. Hire a CRO
After all this talk of marketing efficiency, one of the more surprising outcomes of my conversation with Miller was his suggestion that companies hire a Chief Revenue Officer and place Marketing and Sales underneath that person.  Explained Miller, whose company just hired a CRO, “I don’t believe you can have a CMO and a CRO.”  This is not “a glorified Head of Sales,” added Miller, but someone who can lead “a fundamental transformation about how you think about generating revenue.”

7. Nurture all your other leads
While the bulk of this conversation has focused on identifying and converting hot leads, this is only half the secret to Marketo’s success.  The other half is the recognition that today’s tire kickers are tomorrow’s buyer as long as you have a strong “nurturing process to educate and stay in touch with them over time,” noted Miller. He added, “a full half [of our leads] are coming from seeds we developed earlier.”

8. Invest heavily in content development
When explaining Marketo’s success to-date, Miller revealed that they invest heavily in marketing, spending three times the ratio of most companies but because of their lead conversion rate, they are also more efficient and profitable than these other companies.  A huge portion of that investment goes into content development including webinars, white papers, blogs and social media.  In addition to creating “a lot of inbound leads and SEO, [this content] also helps to build trust and credibility with buyers who are starting to perceive us as innovators and thought leaders,” explained Miller.

Final note: A magna cum laude physics major at Harvard, Miller’s desire to find the math in marketing shouldn’t be all that surprising.  What may come as a surprise is the extent of Miller’s foresight as exemplified by the fact that he “actually started writing [his] blog before writing any product.”  For more on Miller, see my follow up interview here on TheDrewBlog.com.  This article first appeared on FastCompany.com.