Latest / The Prompt / Ep. 577 | How humanizing B2B and brand resonance drive GTM success

Transcript

Ep. 577 | How humanizing B2B and brand resonance drive GTM success · The Prompt

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  This is on base your one stop shop for solving your most
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  pressing B2B go to market challenges.
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  Each week, host Chris Moody and Paul Gibson talk to sales and
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  marketing leaders to get you in depth insights and creative
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  strategies to set your revenue teams up for success.
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  Well, hello everyone, and welcome back to the latest in
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  the award-winning on Based podcast series.
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  I'm your host, Paul Gibson. And as you know, we always look
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  for different hot topics to discuss and today's no
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  exception. I'm pleased to say I'm talking
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  today with Kate Mackie, Global Marketing Leader, EY.
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  And the topic we're discussing today, an interesting one,
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  scaling brand resonance and humanizing B to B for GTM
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  success. Quite a mouthful, but it's a
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  really interesting topic. Kate, I'm excited to get into
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  this with you. Thanks very much for joining me
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  on the show. Thank you.
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  Pleasure to be here. Excellent.
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  So I always like to start before we get into the the meat of the
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  topic, simple question, Kate, you've built a career, I think
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  at the intersection of brand and GTM strategy.
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  So could you walk us through your journey and what led you to
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  focus particularly on humanizing B to B marketing?
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  Yeah. So I started agency side out of
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  university and did maybe 8-9 years there, moving through kind
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  of large scale group agencies into digital later and worked
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  across both B2C and B2B. And having those roles on both
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  sides of the campus alongside being an advisor led me to think
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  about the customer journey from a more human experience.
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  So really thinking about who do we sell to and what are they
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  buying and why and what they need to make the decision as
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  they get close to a purchase. And I don't think from having
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  kind of done both sides and advised on both sides that
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  there's much difference when we're talking to people every
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  day. And so I do think that
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  humanizing of the B2B brand is highly, highly timely and
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  something we should have been doing from the beginning.
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  So I think really focusing on it now will elevate not just those
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  companies, accounts, clients that we work with from AB2B
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  perspective, but then also us as marketers in that space.
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  You know, we do as good a job, a more valuable job in terms of
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  the total revenue within the Footsie and similar is B2B, not
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  B2C. And actually, we should be
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  really thinking about the power that we can wield in that space.
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  Yeah, absolutely. And and you're right, it's very
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  timely. I mean, everyone's talking about
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  AI and the removal of human from all of these interactions.
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  So it'd be really good, a really good topic that I'm sure the
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  listeners are very interested in.
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  So, so when you look back on on what's already been an
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  interesting career, what was the moment you realized that maybe
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  the traditional separation between brand and demand is no
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  longer effective in what we class as modern B2 BI mean?
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  I think it's a scale and a scope because both brand and demand
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  incredibly important to B2B. The traditional funnel people,
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  you know, throw rocks at it all the time.
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  But I do think it's a really good way and a great framework
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  of really thinking through what we need to do.
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  And I think if we just play in the demand space, you're getting
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  ever diminishing, ever decreasing circles of the 5%
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  that are in the market. Whereas actually what we need to
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  do is think about how we broaden the aperture at the top of the,
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  the funnel through brand and to really enable those, those leads
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  to be bigger, more enterprise level, more scaled as you get to
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  the, to the demand side. So for me, brand and demand are
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  one and the same. It's just are you talking to a
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  mass market or to more of a targeted market?
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  And how are you thinking from broad to narrowcast through that
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  through that process? Because B2B trust is huge and
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  B2B and you can only really build that through having that
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  trusted band and the relationship with the right
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  levels. But then you can use to really
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  elevate the conversation when you get into that buying cycle
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  as well. So for me, it's a spectrum and I
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  just think dividing it creates yet another camp of folks that
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  you need to play with in the right way.
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  Yeah, absolutely. And we have lots of discussions
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  on on based podcasts in the past, but also day-to-day around
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  the importance of brand and importance of trust and you know
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  because a lot of the stuff we do is around identifying those
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  anonymous buying signals. But because we found an
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  anonymous buying signal doesn't mean may give that to sales.
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  If they've never heard of you, they've never been to your
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  website, don't know your brand going out there and and trying
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  to sell to them is wrong, right. You need to get that trust and
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  that awareness there long before.
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  So I think that's really important.
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  The other thing that I've had a couple of conflicting
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  discussions with brand managers around, brand awareness is
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  vital, but only in the companies you can sell to, right?
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  If you're, if you've got a product that only works in the
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  financial services market, where's the brand awareness
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  benefit of getting someone like a French Connection, clicking on
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  an ad to go into your website, ending up in your pipeline?
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  All good positive signs, but they're false positives really,
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  because it's not someone you can ever sell to.
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  So. I think the biggest and the
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  biggest issue with targeting the wrong folk is that you're
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  warming up the market for your competitors.
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  So it's not even, you know, if you look at your demand and
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  supply side, you've got to make sure that wherever you are
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  creating that demand, you have supply.
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  Otherwise it's wastage. Whether it's wastage on A to
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  your point around being unable to realize that sale because
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  it's not a product that individual can buy, but also if
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  you don't have bench strengths in that space, but you might
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  have globally, it just means that you're warming up the
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  market for your competitors. So you've got to be really
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  targeted. You know, brand at a mass level
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  still has to think about who it's who is right to to drive
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  awareness with and who is right to resonate with.
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  And I think you've got to be, you know, you've got to be top
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  of mind when buyers are looking at their biggest problems.
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  And you've got to have that creative consistency to enable
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  that kind of drum beat through the ever longer buying cycles
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  and the the greater kind of buying demand units that we're
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  seeing as well. Yeah.
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  And when we touch on those longer buying cycles, because
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  we're all seeing them now on your, your past experiences,
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  have they shaped your conviction that the brand salience is the
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  key to negating today's cycles, especially as we say these these
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  cycles are getting longer and longer?
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  Yes, there's some LinkedIn research that showed that
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  they've moved from kind of 12 to 18 to 24 months on a buying
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  cycle and the individual kind of members of that buying unit have
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  moved from 7 to 15 on average. So to keep those individuals,
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  you know, warm as it were through that 18 month process,
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  even if they're not necessarily in the process itself, just
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  takes a whole focus on the brand space, not just demand.
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  You have to have that bigger, broader perspective because you
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  don't know that you don't have the names, you don't have the
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  data of everybody in that demand unit, and neither are you going
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  to see buying signals because it's it's influenced as much as
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  it is an actual purchase decision that matters in that
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  group. So I think we have to have
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  individually focused and targeted awareness for the
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  issues and needs that your product is trying to solve for
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  that group. So I was looking at it in terms
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  of who is your primary audience and your secondary and tertiary
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  audiences, because you can then think about, well, who's the
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  actual person who's going to sign on the dotted line, you
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  know, and how do you convince them is very different to how
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  you convince the influencer who is actually the tertiary user.
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  You know, and if you're thinking about like an ERP finance market
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  buying the ERP, but your sales teams are also going to be using
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  the data. And so if there's, you know,
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  dissonance rather than resonance in the at the brand level, you
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  won't end up with that collegiate approach to the
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  buying demand unit, which is what you need to drive the sale
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  at the end of the day. Yeah, makes complete sense to
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  me. So, you know, we're saying that
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  it's getting more complex and more crowded and more difficult.
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  These enterprise sales cycles are taking longer and, and the
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  buying group is getting bigger and bigger.
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  And you hit on a really interesting point actually,
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  because I'm in sales and there may be 3 or 4 people in that
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  buying group that I will engage with.
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  Brilliant. But there's half a dozen others
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  that I never will. And probably they'll stay
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  anonymous. So getting that brand awareness
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  and making sure the messaging that I'm giving to the three or
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  four contacts I've got is getting to all those other
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  buyers in the group, whether they're just looking at stuff
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  offline, coming to your website, like whatever is just as
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  important. How do you think a human centric
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  brand strategy will help, you know, combat all of that
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  complexity and the extended cycles etcetera?
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  Well, for me it's finding the brand truth.
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  What is it that you as a brand do and what is it that you can
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  really drive to that enables anybody in that buying demand
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  unit or buying group to be able to look at you and see you as
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  somebody that is trusted. So you know, are you trusted in
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  delivering what they need? And it does come back a little
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  bit to the you never get fired for buying brand, whatever in
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  your category. And so there is always that
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  trusted fear free purchase. And you need to be in that space
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  with those outside of the specific sales targets, which
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  means I think about really building that humanized approach
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  to the brand and enabling trust between you and that kind of
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  bigger, broader mass. So the messaging has to be
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  consistent. You're, you know, from a brand
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  perspective, it's not about having matching luggage.
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  I would say it's about how do you make sure you've got a
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  common narrative, common message, common purpose that is
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  built through and recognizable as you start to look at how
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  those pieces come together. So that if you're, you know,
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  down kind of really in the consideration space with the
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  sales targets and you're giving them case studies and use cases
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  and, you know, really confirming that their decision is right.
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  They have to be able to resonate and connect up to the
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  conversation. That might be more of a mass
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  brand conversation at the at the top of the funnel with the
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  broader Behind Demand group. Yeah, absolutely.
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  And that consistency is so important.
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  I mean, I get sold to all day every day as as much as I'm
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  trying to sell to other the people.
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  And the thing that frustrates me is most is you might get a
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  really good conversation with a salesperson.
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  I think that sounds really relevant.
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  And they go to the website and it's saying something completely
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  different. That's a frustrating thing and
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  it happens all the time, right? Brands is an interesting thing,
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  right, because a lot of leaders we still see that as a fluffy
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  concept. What do you do and what would
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  you recommend doing to prove that that brand resonance is, is
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  really a hard driver of success in the GTM world and and driving
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  better revenues etcetera? Well, I think first of all, it's
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  brand, you know, it's brand and demand on the spectrum.
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  So to me it's a 2 horse race. It's long and short term targets
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  and revenue and long and short term growth.
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  And I think you need to show runs on the board in the short
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  term whilst you're also proving the long term.
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  So really start to think about how you might use some of the
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  tech that you've got because everybody's got fantastic
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  technology these days to really show that AB testing, where are
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  you showing creative consistency all the way through the funnel
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  versus where aren't you? And show that actually the
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  growth is greater and bigger with with Brat, but then also
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  use metrics like excess share of voice.
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  So you can really show that if you outspend your market share,
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  you do grow and you grow consistently over time.
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  So there's a whole host of really depending on your
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  category, depending on your budget, depending on your
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  objectives, there's a load of different measurement metrics
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  and processes and frameworks that can help you get there.
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  It's just about, I think making the conversation pertinent to
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  your like commercial leadership so that they can see the growth
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  aligns to their objectives. Because I think we often talk to
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  each other in, you know, marketing speak and marketing
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  language, which can really dilute what we're actually
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  trying to say is that marketing's a revenue driver and
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  a growth driver. And you know, brand and
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  marketing together are you know where you wouldn't need to hit
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  that sweet spot because that will help you be the the growth
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  lever for the firm or for the organization that you're
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  working. Yeah.
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  And we, we think a lot about the demand Gen. side of it and
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  finding those new opportunities a lot of companies still
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  overlook it's just as important for your existing customers,
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  right? You've got new people coming
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  into the business, you've got new products to sell, they've
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  got the risk that they might be looking at competition.
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  So keeping that brand trust and consistency and relevance is
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  just as important for customers as well as new prospects, right?
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  And it's cheaper if you can convert and expand the footprint
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  within your current customers. You don't have to pay the
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  acquisition costs. So really, I mean, if you're
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  looking at your ideal customer profile, you should be looking
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  at your full segmentation, where's the most valuable, but
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  also where's the headroom to become the most valuable.
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  And then, you know, potentially that is where, you know, that's
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  the lowest hanging fruit. That's where you should be going
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  initially. And that could also be where you
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  can prove the brand matters because you can start to have
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  conversations with your clients that talk to the the brand
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  questions that you might have and really test some of that
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  that thinking that will help you then have the more broader
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  commercial conversations with your executive committee, your
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  board or wherever you report. Yeah, absolutely.
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  Yeah, Good points. So we've emphasized consistency
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  and all that sort of stuff. When you look back at maybe some
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  of the projects you've been involved in, what's the biggest
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  mistake you see companies make when they're trying to maintain
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  a consistent human brand voice across all of their different
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  GTM motions? To me, it's where it's too
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  consistent, it's not actually targeted.
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  So you know, people think that it has to be cookie cutter
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  exactly the same. Actually, you know, the buyers
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  need different things at different, there's different
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  roles in that buying demand unit.
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  You procurement people need to to see something that's more
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  kind of features and benefits and facts and delivery.
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  And then your sales people need more of a kind of what's in it
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  for me, what's it going to give me?
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  And the business itself needs to see how you'll enable growth or
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  how you'll deliver to the objectives that you've
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  collectively agreed to deliver against.
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  So I think having two consistent where it's an expectation that
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  everything must be exactly the same starts to then lose what is
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  human. The fact that we're all total
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  individuals and need to be thought about in a slightly
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  different way. So really in the same way that
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  you would think about your segmentation more holistically
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  within a large scale enterprise level pursuit, I'd be thinking
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  about what the groups need and what do the teams need so that
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  you can nuance the use cases, case studies, the detail that
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  you might share with them that will help.
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  Yeah. And I think technology has
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  eased. It's a lot of that, right.
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  So if you can identify when someone comes to your website
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  that they're an enterprise level financial services company and
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  probably in this C-Suite or a marketer or something, you can
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  make sure that they're seeing relevance there.
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  And if you, if you're delivering an ad, come on, comes to the
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  website again, you know the industry, the size of the
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  business, you can give them not so much generic, but you can
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  give industry based or size of their business based or plane
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  based stuff. That was always really
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  difficult, right, Because the time and resource to build all
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  those individual things. Now you can dynamically do that.
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  I think it's allowing us to be much more personalized without
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  having to go down and create something for each individual.
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  So it's definitely the way to go and.
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  There's no excuse not to anymore.
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  I mean, the, the I remember years ago working through in the
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  development of assets when you're doing data-driven kind of
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  targeting and you'd have, you know, 600 different pairs of
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  trousers because of various things that you might need in,
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  in an e-mail base. And you just think, you know,
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  all of that's been taken out. That's all automated, which
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  means we can have those higher value conversations around
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  targeting, around segmentation, around growth, which makes a
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  bigger difference. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
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  So this, this I'm sure is all making sense to the to the
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  listeners. But if we talk about the
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  fundamentals, how would you define the connection between
• 14:33
  brands go to market demand generation and why is that
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  alignment so critical right now, do you think?
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  Well, I think partly because of the impact of technology, we can
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  do more with less and we're continually asked to do more
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  with less. I mean that is the one question
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  that every single marketer has to deal with at the moment.
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  And it means that, you know, budgets are tighter, You do have
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  to prove yourself more within B to B than B to C It's less of A,
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  there's less of a kind of expectation of large, large
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  scale budget. So I do think you need to really
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  define the swim lanes and the value chain that interconnected
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  value chain between brand marketing, go to market and
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  sales. How do you work as one across a
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  buying demand unit or or target audience?
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  Because another thing that I was reading the other day from
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  LinkedIn showed the sales and marketing, the overlap between
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  their target alignment around audiences.
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  There's only 16%. So there's so much wastage
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  because people operate in silos that you're actually never going
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  to get the optimal outcomes because you're only focused on
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  an overlap of 16% of target audience, which means that, you
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  know, that's 84% wastage in terms of targeting.
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  So the more that you can see it as an interconnected value chain
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  using that same audience data, really, you know, leaning on
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  your CDP and making sure that your CRM works so that you've
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  got an understanding of buying signals that can flow all the
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  way through that value chain. And really knowing how you hand
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  off, how you interlock. And to me, that's absolutely
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  critical to then go back to the fundamentals of who are you
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  targeting, What's the right message to the right people at
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  the right time and kind of play that all the way through from
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  from brand all the way through to sales.
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  Yeah. And as you say, technology is
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  really helping it now because you can have that view of the
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  people you know and what they're doing within your CRF market to
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  automation. But now you can see all that
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  anonymous activity that's happening maybe on your website
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  or maybe out there in the ether on B2B sites or whatever binding
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  that all together gives you that true 360° approach, right?
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  And then you can start really working.
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  I'm sure many of the listeners or some of the listeners may be
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  working at companies now that are struggling to humanize their
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  brand. And so I suppose a good thing to
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  to focus on what would you say the first step to maybe the most
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  impactful steps they can take so they can start driving a bit
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  more resonance in their target audience?
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  So the first step for me always has to be the customer.
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  What is it that they want that they need?
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  What's the problem that you solve and how can you learn and
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  understand exactly why you've been chosen by your current
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  customers? So, you know, no matter the size
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  of your organization, if you have customers that you're able
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  to speak to, I would start there and just really get a deep dive
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  kind of focus group into what is it that made them choose you
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  right now? And then think about how that
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  reflects to the to the brand that you're putting out there.
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  Is that something that you're doubling down on?
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  Is it an opportunity that you could actually elevate?
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  And then, you know, really thinking about those category
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  entry points as well. So, you know, have people come
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  in the way you thought they would or have they actually
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  started using your product on a broader scale for, for different
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  things? And actually then that can look
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  at how you, you know, how you met segment into slightly
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  different use cases or slightly different conversations around
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  the the way in to a purchase conversation.
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  And so I do think really honing in on what it is that that is
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  your kind of human insight that then can align to that brand
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  truth that you can double down on and start to push forward.
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  Yeah, makes sense. Good point, Sarah as well.
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  We're always after instant results, right?
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  That's the modern world we're living in.
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  And sometimes proving effectiveness is becoming more
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  vital but more difficult. So how do you measure the
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  success of brand salience, and what key metrics do you use that
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  show you're not just making noise, but you're actually
• 18:12
  building a connection with someone?
• 18:14
  And I think you can start to look at awareness and prompted
• 18:17
  awareness consideration and how people are moving through that
• 18:20
  cycle. But again, speaking to your
• 18:22
  audience and speaking to your focus groups, making sure that
• 18:24
  the resonance is exactly where you thought it was going to be.
• 18:27
  And learning, testing and learning along the way.
• 18:29
  Doing pre and post brand surveys so that you can check those,
• 18:32
  those creative executions have really landed the points that
• 18:34
  you were trying to. And just making sure that your
• 18:37
  your social listenings on you understand what people are
• 18:40
  saying about you as a brand and then bringing that back into the
• 18:43
  fold. So it's a constant kind of
• 18:45
  learning cycle as you move forward, but doubling down on
• 18:48
  kind of the brand truth as the kind of central core and then
• 18:51
  executing from that. Because then what you're doing
• 18:53
  is changing the execution, not necessarily changing the brand.
• 18:56
  So you're listening to the audience about how they feel,
• 18:58
  how that brand is resonating and how that then starts to move
• 19:01
  forward. Yeah, absolutely.
• 19:03
  And listening is such an important thing.
• 19:05
  We are involved in lots of communities and you do
• 19:08
  listening, but we also have customer advisory boards and
• 19:11
  that's not just is our method messaging resonate and we
• 19:13
  actually use that for product development and things like
• 19:15
  that. What is it you need rather than
• 19:17
  what do we want to build for you?
• 19:19
  So I think that listening is a really key thing.
• 19:21
  Now we've probably got marketing leaders listening to this today
• 19:25
  who maybe they would like to do all this, but they're struggling
• 19:28
  to get buy in from sales which offer that sales and marketing
• 19:31
  alignment is a constant constantly also, but maybe even
• 19:34
  from the C-Suite so that they can build long term brand LED
• 19:37
  strategies. What advice would you give to to
• 19:40
  those? Listeners, I'd say with your
• 19:42
  exec and your business leaders, you need to really have a
• 19:45
  conversation with them to understand what their objectives
• 19:47
  are and then to align how you start to report back to those
• 19:51
  objectives and thinking about how you drive, you know, long
• 19:54
  term versus short term reporting.
• 19:56
  Short term reporting, absolutely no bottom of funnel, really
• 19:59
  easy. I'd say easy marketing influence
• 20:01
  revenue or you know, direct. Influence of revenue and they're
• 20:04
  tracking around those brand is more difficult there is more of
• 20:07
  a trust play you do have to think about you know it's a long
• 20:09
  term goal so you it's going to be hard to prove in the short
• 20:12
  term but you can show the pre and post you can start to
• 20:15
  segment some of your audiences and really you know carry out
• 20:18
  proof of concept test campaigns. So depending on the size and
• 20:21
  scale of your market, you should be able to ring fence space that
• 20:25
  you can show and prove that it works in a market where we layer
• 20:28
  in brand as well as demand and can then drive growth at scale.
• 20:32
  And I think, I think if you can then show that you know that
• 20:34
  it's a risk free approach to testing and then move and expand
• 20:38
  where you can, but failing fast and then kind of implementing at
• 20:42
  scale is where I would go. Yeah.
• 20:43
  And that's really important because if you don't get the buy
• 20:46
  in from the C-Suite and you don't get buy in from sales, you
• 20:49
  know, it's always, I've sat in so many customer meetings where
• 20:52
  you get the sales and marketing in the same room and marketing
• 20:55
  is saying aren't we great? We got 1000 leads and sales are
• 20:58
  saying, yeah, but 950 of them were irrelevant.
• 21:01
  And you'd say you really do need to get that alignment and then
• 21:04
  the C-Suite have to support it. So I think it it's a really
• 21:07
  important area to cover off. We work really closely with our
• 21:10
  sales teams to make sure that they see us as complementary,
• 21:13
  not combative so that we're actually working together on
• 21:17
  things. We're not trying to steal
• 21:18
  compensation metrics or you know there's nothing kind of, you
• 21:21
  know, we're not, we're in it together.
• 21:22
  The more that we can drive, the more that they can then turn the
• 21:25
  pipeline into into actual opportunities.
• 21:28
  I do think having those conversations, having those
• 21:30
  really close relationships with your sales teams, building very
• 21:33
  clear interlocks and swim lanes helps because it means that, you
• 21:36
  know, there's no misunderstanding that you're
• 21:38
  trying to take their role. You know, their role is hard
• 21:40
  enough. Our role is hard enough.
• 21:41
  Actually, together it's better. So making sure that you have
• 21:44
  those relationships in the right place isn't just, you know,
• 21:46
  reporting upwards, but also kind of holding hands around the
• 21:49
  problem as well helps. Yeah.
• 21:50
  And we, we see a lot of you know where marketing will just say to
• 21:54
  the salesperson, look, that account that you're interested
• 21:57
  in, we've just identified they're starting to show some
• 21:59
  buying signals. Don't know who we are, never
• 22:01
  been to our website, way too early to engage you yet, but
• 22:05
  just letting you know it's happening.
• 22:07
  And then come to your website. They've just seen this white
• 22:10
  paper. We're getting close now.
• 22:11
  Just keeping you aware. And these are the buyers we
• 22:13
  think we should go after. And then saying, hey, this is
• 22:17
  the right time. They've engaged, they've done
• 22:19
  this. They're at this stage, this
• 22:20
  stage in our bird journey. Reach out to them.
• 22:22
  Sales start getting the confidence that what's going
• 22:25
  into their pipeline are opportunities that a, they can
• 22:28
  close, but they're only get the trust and the awareness that's
• 22:31
  needed. So I think it's really
• 22:33
  important, but get it right. There's nothing better.
• 22:35
  And we always have this discussion.
• 22:37
  Account based approaches are always seen as a marketing
• 22:40
  thing. ABM, it's marketing.
• 22:42
  It's not, it's a business related thing.
• 22:44
  You're concentrating on the same accounts and being effective
• 22:47
  with shared messaging. Oh, it's really important.
• 22:50
  So understanding those connected buying signals really helps when
• 22:53
  you're on both sides. So whether you're marketing or
• 22:54
  sales and what is it that is seen as a sales buying signal
• 22:57
  and what is seen as a marketing and a prospecting signal and how
• 23:00
  do they start to come together? So one of the things that we're
• 23:02
  always very keen to do is really work through that sales
• 23:04
  acceptance process together so that you understand why that 950
• 23:09
  are seen to be particularly rubbish and what can you do in a
• 23:12
  different way that means, do you need to have some inside sales
• 23:15
  teams that are checking that those leads are actually
• 23:18
  pertinent to sales teams? You know, again, it's back to
• 23:21
  your your piece around you. Is it passing French Connection
• 23:23
  through when they can't buy and just making sure that you
• 23:26
  haven't you haven't given the wrong targets over that have
• 23:29
  been showing they're interested, but actually we can't drive
• 23:31
  supply side. So making sure you've got that
• 23:33
  connectivity through the kind of NQL to SQL process and and they
• 23:38
  understand that it's not you sending through everything you
• 23:40
  are doing diligence to get to that means that you know, people
• 23:43
  start to respect what you're handing over.
• 23:45
  So and having those conversations all the way
• 23:46
  through, as you point out, is absolutely brilliant and enables
• 23:49
  that transparency in that trust. Yeah.
• 23:51
  And we all, we all believe it's quality, not quantity that
• 23:54
  matters. But if their pipeline is
• 23:55
  starting to better quality leads and they close more of them,
• 23:58
  that alignment is just a natural, natural occurrence.
• 24:01
  So I think that all this makes sense and I'm sure our listeners
• 24:03
  will believe in it all. Have you got an example of AB2B
• 24:06
  company, whether you name them or not that has successfully
• 24:09
  humanized its brand and and saw a direct impact on it's on.
• 24:13
  It's not just his execution, but also its revenue.
• 24:15
  So I would obviously talk about ourselves.
• 24:18
  So EY, we've humanized our brand of, you know, we are a purpose
• 24:22
  said brand. We're humanized.
• 24:23
  We're all about shaping the future with confidence and that
• 24:25
  matters at a human level. And the brand that the team have
• 24:28
  built over the last 10 years has enabled us to double our
• 24:32
  revenues. So you know, we've done a great
• 24:34
  job as a BM&C team to really drive that forward and enable
• 24:39
  that growth from 25 to 50 billion in the last 10 years,
• 24:42
  which is no small part down to some of the brand stuff that
• 24:46
  we've done and really driving that humanized brand approach.
• 24:49
  But I would also call out ServiceNow.
• 24:51
  So they're putting AI to work campaign with Idris Elba is
• 24:55
  brilliant. I mean, it's really taking a
• 24:57
  very technologically driven product or platform into
• 25:02
  something that's much more humanized and really talking
• 25:03
  about what it can do for you and why you as an individual should
• 25:08
  believe that that product and platform can really enable you
• 25:11
  to get to where you need to get to in your journey around AI.
• 25:15
  Excellent. Yeah, both really good examples.
• 25:17
  And we're in a market, both you and I, that's constantly
• 25:20
  changing and evolving and now probably faster than ever.
• 25:23
  So what do you think the next evolution is in humanizing B2B?
• 25:28
  And what should ambitious marketers who want to get
• 25:30
  involved in it be preparing for? I mean, I think when we look at
• 25:34
  the disruption that's happening, it's, it's not only constant,
• 25:37
  but it's getting more transformed, more disruptive.
• 25:40
  And some of the stuff that we're talking about is that the
• 25:43
  current market is now is now in a Navy state.
• 25:46
  So it's a, you know, disruption has changed, it's non linear,
• 25:48
  it's accelerated, it's volatile and it's interconnected.
• 25:51
  So all of those kind of pieces are unusual.
• 25:54
  It used to be for, you know, more linear than it and
• 25:56
  predictable than it is today. So that unpredictability and
• 26:00
  the, you know, the interconnectedness of everything
• 26:02
  where things can just knock into each other and, and have a huge
• 26:04
  knock on effect means that I personally think we need to go
• 26:07
  back to the fundamentals. Because whilst absolutely AI and
• 26:11
  tech will change our world and will change, you know, marketing
• 26:14
  in an increasingly accelerated way.
• 26:17
  I, I do think when we use AI, we need to make sure that we
• 26:21
  recognize that our buyers are using AI as well.
• 26:23
  And when our clients and customers use AI as a buying
• 26:27
  partner, as a researcher, the human experience becomes the
• 26:31
  biggest differentiator. And that's why we need to focus.
• 26:33
  Yeah, absolutely. AI is no doubt is with us now
• 26:36
  and it's going to become a more and more part of of what we do
• 26:40
  and how we work. But I think AI is also dangerous
• 26:43
  if you if you get it wrong. I mean, a lot of AI stuff,
• 26:46
  there's companies everywhere right now.
• 26:47
  A lot of them aren't relevant. And I think AI with relevance is
• 26:51
  important. And I like I termed the phrase
• 26:53
  AI with the Y is really important because we hear so
• 26:56
  often, you know, AI is driving like salespeople or SDRS to go
• 27:01
  after this account because we say so.
• 27:03
  And it's the black box environment that never actually
• 27:05
  tells you why to go after them or where they are on your bio
• 27:08
  journey or even what the signals are.
• 27:10
  So you aimlessly go after this company and you don't know what
• 27:14
  messaging to use or what stage they're at.
• 27:16
  And so we're seeing a lot of, and it does affect sales and
• 27:20
  marketing alignment where sales are going.
• 27:22
  We just don't trust your signals anymore.
• 27:24
  So as AI without the Y, right, if there's no Y behind it, I
• 27:28
  think it's risky. But yeah, there's no, there's
• 27:30
  never AI here to say, do you see AI and brand having a, well, AI
• 27:35
  having a big effect on the brand side of things?
• 27:37
  Yeah, and I think it's because your AI and Y is my confident
• 27:41
  intelligence. So I kind of think about, yes,
• 27:43
  we've got artificial intelligence, but you still need
• 27:45
  it, still needs to be confident with that intelligence.
• 27:47
  It can't just be, you know, here's a plethora of stuff
• 27:50
  thrown at the wall because that's just more forgetting at
• 27:53
  the wall that we've always had, you know, people telling you
• 27:55
  that this is a fantastic lead and when it's not.
• 27:57
  So I think I think the AI and brand piece will mean that we
• 28:00
  can accelerate personalization at a pace we've never seen
• 28:03
  before. So back to the how do you make
• 28:04
  sure you've got some segmentation within your
• 28:07
  creative? And I think that will be further
• 28:08
  up, further up the funnel so that we'll be able to
• 28:11
  personalize at scale, which is something that I know has been,
• 28:14
  you know, the Holy Grail for many years.
• 28:16
  But I also think that it means we can get greater feedback and
• 28:20
  greater on the fly targeting, which will help in terms of both
• 28:23
  media, but also the creative messaging that that we know will
• 28:26
  resonate to particular audiences that might be, I don't know,
• 28:29
  finding advertising in various kind of native channels.
• 28:32
  And that kind of targeting will be able to be something that can
• 28:35
  happen, you know, real time, and then the feedback from that will
• 28:39
  be able to optimize what happens further down your journey in
• 28:43
  real time as well. So I think it's even more
• 28:45
  important to make sure that you've got your segmentation
• 28:47
  properly set up, you understand exactly who your audiences are,
• 28:50
  you know what your industry messaging is, you know who your
• 28:53
  ICP are. So you can cut out those that
• 28:55
  aren't valuable and really start to think about how AI becomes
• 28:59
  your execution partner and you are the thought partner to that
• 29:03
  execution partner so that you're confidently and intelligently
• 29:06
  driving. Drive both together.
• 29:08
  Absolutely, and AI can take away all those mundane time consuming
• 29:13
  tasks that building lists and doing all this sort of stuff.
• 29:15
  And creative people can be creative and marketers can
• 29:19
  market and salespeople could just sell.
• 29:21
  So I think if we get it right, I think it's just going to benefit
• 29:24
  and ease all of us. You sound like someone who
• 29:27
  probably consumes lots of content.
• 29:28
  Is there a particular book or a blog or podcasts you recommend
• 29:33
  our listeners look out for? So I tend to err away from
• 29:37
  marketing content, which is terrible because I know we're on
• 29:39
  a marketing podcast because I think you need to have thoughts,
• 29:43
  ideas outside of your kind of pureplay kind of focus.
• 29:48
  And so things like Wired, where it brings marketing, science and
• 29:51
  tech together, you know, all the areas that I prefer.
• 29:53
  And I did AI, did a degree in the history and philosophy of
• 29:55
  science, and I started off with a chemistry degree and ended up
• 29:59
  in, you know, changing to the history and philosophy of
• 30:01
  science. So for me, it's more about
• 30:03
  thinking about what is that serendipitous global view,
• 30:06
  erring away from politics and just thinking about what does
• 30:10
  science enable us to do? What does nature enable us to
• 30:12
  do? And how can we learn from that?
• 30:13
  And what is it? You know, behavioural
• 30:14
  intelligence is something that I'm also really interested in.
• 30:18
  But yeah, I generally have wired and a number of kind of comedy
• 30:21
  shows just to give the levity to the situation because we're
• 30:25
  always so focused on the marketing piece, Actually trying
• 30:27
  to plan and have serendipitous thought around the edges is
• 30:32
  useful. Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:33
  And it's got to be fun, right? Whatever we're doing, if it's
• 30:35
  not fun, there's no point doing it.
• 30:37
  I think those comedy ones are really good.
• 30:39
  So you've been an awesome guest. I think there's definitely an
• 30:42
  argument for a follow up session because I think we've only just
• 30:44
  scratched the surface and in the time we've had today.
• 30:47
  But so a cheeky ask, if I might, would you be able to share the
• 30:50
  names of any others people that you think we should bring on the
• 30:53
  show in the future? Yeah, so I'm going to err on the
• 30:56
  side of three women because there's an awful lot of men in
• 31:00
  marketing podcasts and I see an awful lot of the same names all
• 31:03
  over the place when I start to listen to things.
• 31:05
  And I don't know how I say her name because I've only ever read
• 31:08
  her books, but Jenny Aker, A AA KER, she's a professor at
• 31:13
  Stanford in behavioural science. And how do you bring humour into
• 31:16
  business? And so she's an award-winning
• 31:19
  writer, New York Times bestseller and has done some
• 31:21
  fantastic work around humour in business and behavioural science
• 31:25
  and how you helped that that kind of conversation move
• 31:27
  forwards. I would also say an ex
• 31:29
  colleague, Caroline Day now leads the LinkedIn B to B
• 31:33
  Institute and so she's very much in that space on that platform
• 31:37
  working out what does that mean for AB to B audience.
• 31:39
  So I think she would be be great.
• 31:41
  Somebody I spoke to the other day who is doing an awesome job
• 31:45
  in a very data centric role is Denise Pearson, the CMO at
• 31:51
  Snowflake, who has driven immense growth through marketing
• 31:55
  and really got all of her commercial teams and more broad
• 31:58
  on site to to enable her. Awesome.
• 32:00
  Yeah, 3 guests that I'm pretty sure we haven't got on now.
• 32:03
  I would like to say though, I think this year I've had more
• 32:06
  females than males on there. So I'm definitely, definitely
• 32:10
  doing mine, doing mine as much as I can.
• 32:13
  Thank. You.
• 32:13
  So Kate, before we go, I know you've recently launched your
• 32:17
  book. I'd be rude of me not to give
• 32:19
  you a chance to tell us a bit about it.
• 32:21
  Thank you. So my book handily on my desk is
• 32:25
  B2B marketing Fundamentals, Dr. impact across brand reputation,
• 32:29
  relationships and revenue is targeted very much at the early
• 32:32
  to mid market here and gives you as AB2B marketer, the legs to
• 32:37
  grow and the space to really think about how you can go from
• 32:42
  brand all the way through to revenue.
• 32:44
  And it's a practical guide with hints, tips and tricks to to
• 32:47
  help you on your journey. So yeah, it's available at all
• 32:50
  good booksellers. Please do buy if you're
• 32:52
  interested. Awesome, sounds like a good
• 32:54
  book. I'll definitely be checking out
• 32:56
  myself. I reckon we opened up lots of
• 32:58
  future questions and conversations with people who
• 33:01
  have been listening to this. If you're happy to, what's the
• 33:04
  best way for people to get in touch with you after this
• 33:07
  podcast? So I'm on LinkedIn and I manage
• 33:09
  my own LinkedIn and like many people, and so I am always open
• 33:13
  to conversation, to contacts, to connection points and to
• 33:16
  conversations. Yeah, rate chat and LinkedIn,
• 33:19
  Kate, there are a few. I am not the scientist in
• 33:22
  Australia. I am at EY in marketing.
• 33:25
  So yeah, reach out. Perfect.
• 33:26
  You very nearly could have been the scientist with your
• 33:29
  chemistry background, but. You could have been and I met my
• 33:31
  husband in Australia, so who knows.
• 33:34
  Awesome. Well, listen, Kate, you've been
• 33:36
  a great guest, so thank you very much.
• 33:37
  It's a really interesting session.
• 33:39
  As I say, I think there's more to come from this, so if you're
• 33:42
  open to it, maybe we can have a follow up session in the
• 33:45
  meantime. Thanks very much for your time.
• 33:47
  I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
• 33:48
  And listeners, I hope you enjoyed the episode.
• 33:50
  Don't forget there's nearly 600 other episodes in the series, so
• 33:54
  check them out. Thanks everyone for listening
• 33:56
  and until the next time, here we go.
• 33:59
  Thanks for joining us for On Base.
• 34:01
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• 34:04
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• 34:08
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• 34:14
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