Latest / Connect To Market / Stop Talking About Features. Start Showing Value: Troy Rockman - Episode # 70

Transcript

Stop Talking About Features. Start Showing Value: Troy Rockman - Episode # 70 · Connect To Market

0:00
tools are helpful.
0:01
Doesn't mean you don't stay true to, to what the marketer's job is, which
0:05
is educate, show value, get conversion
0:12
Welcome to Connect to Market.
0:14
I'm Casey Cheshire.
0:15
Join the conversation with the marketing leaders driving the
0:18
fastest growing B2B brands.
0:21
We're sponsored by Ringmaster, building B2B podcasts and communities
0:24
to reconnect you with your audience
0:28
Okay, we're doing this thing.
0:30
I'm excited.
0:31
It's like hut, hut, hike.
0:33
Let's crush this episode.
0:36
We are going Omaha.
0:37
Who's, who's yelling Omaha?
0:39
Somebody's yelling Omaha, and this episode is about to get started.
0:43
I can't wait to introduce my guest today.
0:45
He is absolutely awesome.
0:47
He's a great guy to talk to.
0:49
I've had some fantastic conversations, both as a human
0:53
and as a marketing strategist.
0:55
He's also in our CTM community.
0:57
But let me get to some details.
0:59
Marketing leader, thought leader, pipeline builder, company grower.
1:04
Like he is, he is just the person to follow, and he's got
1:07
these stats that trail him.
1:09
He's done things like drop his customer acquisition cost by 50%.
1:14
Who wants that?
1:15
Raise your hands.
1:16
I want that.
1:16
Let's learn from him today.
1:18
24% growth in sales leads.
1:20
I want that, too.
1:22
And not to just throw another stat out there, but 50% reduction in
1:26
the cost per lead as well, and growth numbers, and you name it.
1:29
It's just all there.
1:30
VP of Marketing and Channel Strategy at Hooray Health, Troy Rockman.
1:35
Welcome to the show
1:37
Casey, thank you very much.
1:38
Glad to be here.
1:39
Glad to have an opportunity to talk a little bit.
1:42
Well, dude, let me ask you the first question.
1:44
I'm excited to get this thing going, but in order to ask you this question,
1:48
I need to enlist the help of a friend.
1:50
One second
1:55
I need a giant blue foam finger to ask you this question.
2:00
Troy, what is the number one thing, number one, get it?
2:05
The number one thing that marketers need to do in order to connect to their market
2:11
thought leadership, connecting with sales that then has an actual impact
2:15
and doesn't just turn into noise.
2:17
Um, too many times you start talking and then it just doesn't get heard
2:22
Dang, man.
2:22
Uh, like drop the mic.
2:25
H- what, why do you think this is happening so many times with
2:29
marketing groups, with companies?
2:30
Why are they acting this way?
2:32
Well, I think really sometimes they're talking about themselves
2:36
so much that they're not even giving any value to their buyer.
2:41
Uh, they tend to talk about their features, their benefits, and really
2:45
at the end of the day, the, the, the buyer just wants to be able to know,
2:49
what am I gonna… As a result of my purchase, I'm investing in this,
2:53
what am I gonna get out of it to make sure it improves my situation?
2:57
And that's where you gotta go and be, uh, above and beyond and
3:00
really provide a value, just not feature, benefit, service, product
3:05
Yeah.
3:06
Like the, man, we, we geek out on these features and benefits.
3:09
It, but it's like, it's, it's like we're talking about ourselves, you know?
3:13
It's like the guy… And nobody likes the guy at the party who's just
3:15
talking about himself the whole time.
3:17
You're like, "Excuse me, I'm gonna go get some food now." You
3:19
know, "Let me go get another beer.
3:20
I'm just not interested." Like, yeah, but we, yet we do that in our
3:24
email, we do that in our marketing, in our collateral, everything.
3:27
It's all about me.
3:28
So we gotta reverse this thing, and you're saying build that value.
3:32
How, how, how do you do that?
3:34
Hey, if, if someone's listening to this and they've just been, you know, they're
3:37
like guiltily enough, and I'm not gonna ask anyone to raise their hands, but like,
3:40
if you've been maybe too over-indexed on your own features and benefits, and
3:45
listen, I've done that with podcasts.
3:47
So like, how do we reverse the curse and get them talking value?
3:51
Well, and it's taking the step back, right, Casey?
3:53
So really just understanding what your customer is wanting and needing, uh,
3:59
and leveraging the assets and tools you have available to yourself, right?
4:03
You got a sales team, they've got feedback understanding.
4:06
You've got your, uh, customer support or, uh, uh, uh, so, uh, benefit advisors,
4:13
just anybody else that's talking to the customer within your organization.
4:16
And, and now we even got the whole beauty of a chat bot, you know, that
4:20
are on your website or wherever else you may have it, uh, your YouTube channel.
4:26
And it's just paying attention to those conversations and then reversing it
4:29
back out to say, "Okay, based on these conversations, what are we seeing?
4:33
There's opportunity to have a higher con- uh, higher different level conversation
4:39
about our, uh, about the situation."
4:41
And bring something of value to the table that, yes, your product solves, but have
4:46
them have the aha moment that, hey, I didn't realize that if I, you know, were
4:52
able to save XYZ on buy… You know, in, in this situation my company saves
4:58
this, oh, well this is the product, this is the service that solves it.
5:02
Now let them have almost the aha moment of the connection
5:06
Yeah, and that aha comes from, "Crap, man, I can, I can save this money," or,
5:11
"My company can make this money," or maybe even, "I make this money 'cause
5:14
of bonuses." Man, that sounds like value and it's not, "Cool, did you know
5:19
we have this sprocket that, uh, if you click on it, it twirls around and does
5:23
nothing and then makes your day smile?"
5:26
Like I… That's like not value at all.
5:28
So it like, hey, connecting to dollars and cents sounds like the way to go.
5:32
your sales team understand about how, how to be a thought, a thought leader
5:36
slash, um, uh, just sitting and listening,
5:40
Yeah
5:40
right?
5:41
Being a listener, being a, in essence what I call a sales therapist,
5:45
Yeah
5:45
really at the end of the day, their job is to help facilitate the conversation.
5:50
But if they're not listening all they're doing is talking, never gonna get to the
5:55
value and get- getting that connection for that, uh, that company or that purchaser
6:01
Right.
6:02
Well, you mentioned, you mentioned, you know, like reverse engineer
6:06
those conversations you had.
6:07
Where, where do you like to go?
6:09
I'm curious if you, even if you have any stories of like those human
6:12
interactions, where do you like to go, and how do you like to best, you know,
6:16
connect one-on-one with a customer?
6:18
Well, it's, it's just h- getting the help of the assets you have available to you.
6:24
Um, you know, one of the situations I had in the past was,
6:27
uh, yeah, we had a sales team.
6:29
I was trying to listen to them.
6:31
They were giving advice.
6:32
Um, but one of the places I actually found, uh, was I had a company that
6:36
did IT support, and I actually went and talked to the engineers, the guys that
6:42
were rubber hit the road meeting with clients every day, where in, in talking
6:47
with them, they actually introduced me to some thought leaders in the arena,
6:52
uh, Gartner, uh, there's, you know, obviously other research firms, but they
6:56
were a- actually to lead a trail, uh, for me to find, you know, a, an excellent
7:01
source, uh, to be able to, to help the sales teams with an individual that
7:06
validated our business model without even know- knowing we existed, right?
7:11
So it was being able to, to pull from the assets you have available to yourself
7:16
and just go a little deeper, um, and just spend some time with some folks that you
7:20
don't, you wouldn't think would know, but they're doing it every… They have their
7:24
own, uh, situation that they're trying to solve for too, and they have insights
7:28
Yo, that's such a good point, man.
7:30
The, the fact that there's the one-to-one conversations, but
7:34
there's also the one-to-many that you have different people on the team.
7:37
You know, one time I was doing this, like, sales strategy, like,
7:41
workshop with this company, and they had everyone in the room, um,
7:45
thankfully, you know, to, to their credit, they had everyone in the room.
7:49
And, you know, I'd ask these questions you'd think would be simple.
7:52
Like, you know, what's, like, the biggest problem, the pain that we solve, right?
7:57
And, uh, not naming any names or anything, but, like, head of sales
8:01
and head of marketing not really connected enough to answer that.
8:06
That's a problem.
8:07
Red flag.
8:07
But you know what?
8:08
It was their, their head SDR guy, or actually maybe just an SDR guy.
8:12
He's just one of the guys just, you know, entry-level sales, dialing for dollars.
8:16
But that guy knew.
8:18
He goes, "You know what? When I call and I leave a voicemail about, you know,
8:22
topic A, nobody calls me back. But if I mention topic B, I get insta callbacks."
8:28
And he's like, "So that's the value for me.
8:30
That's how I do my job." And we're, we're… Everyone had a collective oh
8:34
shit moment, like your aha moment, where they're like, "Holy crap, we should
8:38
probably build every single one of our marketing strategies, or at least a lot
8:42
of them, on this particular topic that we maybe were just treating as one of many,
8:47
because this is something that, you know, the, the prospects are actively seeking."
8:52
Right.
8:52
Well, and it's funny you mention that.
8:54
So the fact that the marketer and the salesperson wasn't on the same page, but
8:59
you had the, the, the guy that's on the frontline calls, and so many times they
9:05
just get left out of the conversation.
9:07
Why?
9:07
I don't know why you wouldn't bring some of those kind of folks into the
9:10
conversation, 'cause again, to lead where you're going, then it's then making sure
9:15
that transition occurs that, okay, we have identified that opportunity of how
9:20
to go to market or how to, how to present the, the product in a campaign, how are
9:25
you aligned with sales at that point,
9:28
Yeah
9:28
right?
9:28
And not just aligned with sales.
9:30
How are we then gonna make sure from, you know, developing that lead all the
9:36
way through to the meeting, all the way through to the closed deal, everywhere
9:41
along the step of the way, you've got data, you've got a way to be able to
9:44
track it, make changes, make adjustments.
9:47
You're agr- you know, you and sales can agree with that
9:51
pipeline and that, that process.
9:53
Because if there's not that alignment, you-- marketing can always push,
9:57
push, push and develop more leads or, you know, get more meetings.
10:01
But then if marketing can't see how the sales process is working, then it's
10:07
just over the fence conversations and the one gets frustrated with the other,
10:12
and then you've just got a frustrated organization that isn't seeing the
10:16
revenue or the sales they expected
10:18
Yeah.
10:18
And that's, I mean, that's like lighting your cash on fire right there.
10:21
I mean, that's so huge.
10:23
I mean, if, if you're locked in with your, your sales counterpart, the… I mean,
10:27
it's, it's not a guaranteed win, but man, you're not gonna leave stuff hanging.
10:31
I, I remember one time I, I, I came into an org and I looked at,
10:34
uh, their connector between their CRM and their marketing tool.
10:39
You know, the marketing tool fed stuff into the CRM at
10:42
certain points in time, magic.
10:44
Um, and I looked in there and man, they had something like 10,000 leads stuck in
10:49
that connector, meaning it tried to send them over, but it didn't send them over.
10:54
Marketing's like, "We sent them." Sales is like, "We never got them."
10:57
And they're just in there, and they're not staying fresh all day.
11:00
They're not, they're not, you know, sitting on a deodorant stick in there.
11:04
They are g- they are dying on the vine.
11:06
And I was just like, "This is a considerable spend just hanging out here."
11:10
And that, it just, it was such a example of what you're talking about, the idea
11:14
of like, they're not connected, man.
11:16
You… It doesn't matter how much cash you throw at that thing at that point, you're
11:19
just eith- they're disconnected and you're just gonna have so much waste in there
11:24
Well, and it's even little things back to where you're saying throw, you
11:27
know, you've got those 10,000 in there.
11:29
It's also even them making sure from a sales perspective, are those leads even
11:34
properly identified and in your CRM?
11:38
Because that's where, that's where I've, I've had situations on most
11:41
recently where, you know, the sales team's asking, "Hey, you know, we don't
11:46
really see any, any connection here."
11:48
And it's, well, but the LinkedIn post or the email or whatever
11:54
it is, it's getting traction.
11:56
But then finding out that contact isn't even in HubSpot or Salesforce or
12:00
Sure.
12:01
and you're trying to help them understand, guys, you've got to
12:04
be able to make sure, you know.
12:06
It's two sides here.
12:08
I can drive it, but you have to help them make the connection for them to us take
12:12
it the next step and try to close it.
12:14
So, a- and that's the thing.
12:16
If there's not that regular conversation between sales and marketing, where,
12:21
that's where the, the, the finger-pointing begins and the regular conversations
12:26
of what's working, not working doesn't help rapid cycle success, right?
12:31
Because one's gonna be pointing at the other, the other one's
12:34
gonna be pointing at the other, and then no one's gonna benefit
12:38
Yeah.
12:38
Man, well said.
12:40
Um, I'd love to transition and ask you a little bit about community.
12:44
We have the Connect to Market community.
12:46
This is the Connect to Market pod.
12:47
You're a member.
12:48
You're in there.
12:49
You're in the breakouts.
12:50
You're dropping wisdom and knowledge, and there's something about learning
12:54
from peers in the industry and also not in the same industry, maybe grabbing
12:58
some strategies from elsewhere.
13:00
What's your take on the CTM community and just the community in general?
13:04
Oh, just h- have I been, has it been four months, Casey,
13:08
Man, it, you know, it's, it feels like it's been both four
13:11
months but also four years.
13:12
I feel like we've,
13:13
been, it's been great.
13:14
And the thing is, I think the reality is it goes back to you- strategy, right?
13:21
You get into your way, sometimes you can't see around the tree.
13:27
And by having someone else in the conversation, um, alleviates that.
13:33
Uh, case in point, I had a situation recently with, with, uh, the prod-
13:38
this product, and we're pushing it, and someone had made the comment of, "You
13:43
know, there's another way with Meta that we can go directly to employees
13:50
to be able to serve them ads about the product." common sense would be,
13:57
okay, why would I ever wanna put our product on Facebook or Instagram?
14:01
But the reality is the target audience, that's where they're consuming.
14:06
So why would we not?
14:07
And if we have the ability to target them, and the, the conversation occurred,
14:13
uh, actually at a happy hour with a, with a person from a- at, not, not even
14:19
the a- agency we were using mind you.
14:23
Uh, it was, it was, uh, someone from another agency that had, uh,
14:26
you know, taken the hood off, taken the hood off and just said, "Hey,
14:31
maybe you should look into it."
14:32
And it has completely altered, um, participation
14:36
and exposure about our product
14:39
Right?
14:40
And, and that initial judgment where, "Oh, you know, Facebook ads." Yeah, maybe for
14:45
your, you know, someone listening, yeah, maybe your ICP doesn't go on Facebook.
14:50
You know, cool.
14:51
But hey, if the ICP or the customer or the customer's customer, if,
14:55
if that's, if that's where they're at, man, go to where they're at.
14:59
You know?
14:59
No judgment.
15:00
Like, right on
15:02
be scared, and don't be scared of the fact that just because you think
15:05
they're not there… I, I can tell you, I have been shocked between, you
15:09
know, uploading LinkedIn audiences, uploading Facebook and, and Instagram
15:15
audiences and thinking, "Oh, you know, it's a list of 2,000. We're not gonna
15:21
get much of a connection." And I get, we get feedback that, you know, there's
15:25
a 90-plus percent connection of users on the platform to our targeted list.
15:33
So yes, they are there.
15:35
Yeah
15:35
is, it took me, it, you know, takes seven to 14 hours to get
15:39
the data back to go, "Yes, I'll do it," or, "No, I don't." Okay.
15:42
Well, that was worth my time.
15:44
100%.
15:45
go back to your point though, to CTM and why I love it so
15:49
much is because of that, right?
15:51
It's, it's having someone else give a perspective of their business
15:56
that is just as relevant to you in some way, shape, or form.
15:59
Maybe not today, but something else may occur in your, your process, your systems,
16:05
and as you're talk- as you talked about today, we're coming up to, you know,
16:08
budget, end of year, spend your money.
16:12
You know, what, what do I need to be on the lookout for that I need to,
16:15
A, be budgeting for 2027, think about it, think about for 2027, or do some
16:21
investigation in preparation for it
16:24
Yeah.
16:24
You know what?
16:25
My breakout group had, uh, someone in the ag industry, and y- you know what?
16:31
J- to your point, you, like, you never know.
16:34
And we actually had really good conversation.
16:36
I'm so glad she was there because that just kinda, it kinda shook up
16:40
the room a little bit, and then we had to think about it in terms of a
16:43
totally d- different sales cycles, different business structures.
16:47
And you know what's interesting?
16:47
Because of the, you know, planting harvest seasons, it kind of forces
16:51
there to be these shorter sales cycles.
16:53
Never even thought about that.
16:55
And then you kind of go, "Well, how does that compare to the longer sales cycles
16:58
that you might ex- have in healthcare or in some of these other things?"
17:01
Totally different.
17:02
And, but, like, it ju- it can be so helpful to, you know, like you picked
17:06
up that idea from another agency, and it just, to bounce ideas off each other.
17:10
Man, I'm, I am, uh, w- I'm long on community
17:13
Well, and interesting you mentioned the ag thing, right?
17:16
And they were talking about shorter sales cycle.
17:18
And our conversation today was about, you know, urgency.
17:21
Well, the reality is, is there some urgency in having another type of
17:27
conversion help if you have a longer sales cycle, So what, what are the other things
17:33
that, you know, again, from a thought leadership perspective, conversion, blog,
17:37
content that you can put in between there that then helps create and elongates that
17:43
conversation to get to, you know, the bigger sale that you wanna have happen
17:48
I like that.
17:48
I feel like that's, that's like, uh, you know, it's like applying that
17:53
age-old idea of like getting out of the waterfall development of apps where
17:58
people just spend nine months building something only to push it live and find
18:02
out, yeah, they don't actually want this anymore and it doesn't have any…
18:06
yeah
18:07
go lean, right?
18:08
And so to your point with, with that, man, you know, get it out there quick, find
18:13
out, adjust, adapt, and go on from there
18:16
And by the way, it can't… You, if you're waiting for perfection,
18:20
you've just lost another sale.
18:22
Yeah, for sure.
18:23
For sure
18:24
the- these, this day and time, um, you know, I understand the fact you
18:28
don't want to look bad in terms of having misspellings and mistakes,
18:31
and yeah, I, I agree with that stuff.
18:34
But at times getting to market can be such a battle within an organization.
18:40
That's, that… we were talking about competition, and Steve was talking about,
18:45
you know, your biggest competition, X, Y, Z. You know, one of the things
18:48
that popped in my head was competition is just your own organization.
18:53
Your own organization not being able to make a decision or putting marketing
18:58
in a, in a stagnant situation of not making a decision because, "Well, wait,
19:03
we can't, we can't quite go there yet because of this or because of that."
19:07
Yeah
19:08
let's figure out some other scenario to stopgap it if that's the case.
19:13
Yeah
19:14
say, we cannot not be in the market
19:17
Right.
19:18
It's like it's not, it's not an option, man.
19:21
We have to be out there.
19:22
I do like the idea of those like mini transactions, um, so that we're not just
19:28
trying to get that five-year sales deal.
19:30
Like what are the smaller deals?
19:32
Um, and even not even deals, but to your point, like they converted on a
19:36
form or a took you up on a webinar or a consult or something and get them
19:42
committing even if there's no money and maybe they buy something small.
19:46
You know, and I, someone… I think it's probably everyone says this, but
19:50
like, you know, the customer's given you some money tends to… It's easier
19:54
to give you more money, you know?
19:55
Right.
19:55
Right?
19:56
So you kind of like grease the skids a little bit so that you
19:58
can convert them to that larger deal that, that takes more time.
20:02
yeah, proof of concept and all.
20:04
of those bigger ticket, uh, like when I was mentioning the IT services situation,
20:10
you know, that was, that was trying to get a company to fundamentally, you
20:15
know, take sometimes hundreds of, of software people and basically either,
20:22
A, hand them over to us or, uh, you know, unfortunately let them go and, you
20:28
know, they have to find other things.
20:29
But, you know, that's a per- that's a huge swing.
20:32
That's a huge process.
20:33
But back to your point, what is something in between there?
20:37
What's something smaller that is maybe more palatable that they can manage
20:42
or have the person that's, you know, that may need to have more buy-in by a
20:47
bigger part of the organization that, hey, if I just do one server or I just
20:53
do, uh, this smaller transaction where it really won't cause a problem, but
20:58
I can validate my purchase, then I can go make the five-year, you know, big
21:04
investment purchase because now I've val- I've been able to validate it.
21:08
But I've under- now I even understand the value, right?
21:12
My, my product is showing value to you.
21:15
Now you can a- appreciate it, absorb it, and then be able to be
21:19
an advocate of the bigger sale, have that person be an advocate
21:24
Man, that, this is good stuff.
21:26
I, I'd love to throw this next question at you.
21:28
It is, actually has a name.
21:30
That's how you know it's a serious question.
21:33
It's called the framework.
21:35
So here we go, Troy.
21:36
All right.
21:37
Yes
21:38
If you had to build a connect-to-market strategy from scratch, no budget
21:42
for ads, what would be your top three moves to get in front of and
21:46
build trust with your ideal buyers?
21:48
Yeah.
21:49
Well, I'm gonna go back a little bit to
21:50
Please.
21:51
Already talked
21:51
about,
21:52
Yeah, bring it in
21:52
it's there, right?
21:54
Again, who in the organization understands our customer?
21:58
Who's got some information?
22:00
Where can I find the details, the little nuggets of opportunity to be
22:04
able to start beginning or to begin to understand where can I find, uh,
22:09
a, a v- a speaker, internal person, something of a advocate to help me
22:17
find an advocate in, in that arena?
22:20
Yeah
22:20
you know, that's, that to me is number one.
22:22
And that can take time.
22:24
That does not mean it has to be done in a week.
22:26
Um, again, different scenarios, but, you know, to at least be able to identify
22:31
that and begin to put that as your, uh, to bring in Ted Lasso, right?
22:36
Gotta have your belief, and if you got your belief, then, you know, you can
22:40
have everything else begin to follow.
22:42
So, um, uh, just a great way to be able to, to start that process.
22:47
And then the second part is what is that voice?
22:50
Who is that voice?
22:51
You know?
22:51
It does not… Your thought leader doesn't have to be an internal person.
22:55
Uh, as I mentioned before, I used a, a, a phenomenal individual from
23:00
Gartner, um, that basically had a publica- you know, he published this
23:05
huge research document as related to, you know, building or not having, I'm
23:10
sorry, not internally building, but outsourcing IT, and it fundamentally
23:15
changed how we were able to gain market share just from a simple, uh, I think
23:21
it ended, it was like a three-page, uh, started as a three-page document.
23:27
we ended up hiring him.
23:28
He blew it out to a, to a 10-page white paper, and we used him to go
23:33
on… We used him in trade shows.
23:36
We used him at face-to-face luncheons with golf tied to
23:41
Hell yeah
23:42
there's a lot of decision-makers in the C-suite that love a
23:45
little lunch and a little golf.
23:47
Um, but it, it doesn't have to be an internal person, but it's just, it's
23:51
getting someone out there that validates the value you bring to the market.
23:56
Um, and again, yeah, they could be paid.
23:58
They could not be paid.
24:00
at times it, it's really not about that.
24:02
It's just, it's a matter of someone being able to make the connection
24:07
Hey marketing leaders.
24:08
It's Amanda here from Ringmaster B2B, podcasting in today's market.
24:11
B2B buying is built on one thing, trust, and there's no better way to
24:15
build that trust than through a podcast that builds connection at Ringmaster.
24:19
We hope you launch and grow shows.
24:20
That will amplify your brand and can help drive real demand.
24:24
The best part, we handle all the heavy lifting so you can
24:27
focus on the big picture.
24:29
So if you've been thinking about starting a podcast for your brand or taking your
24:32
existing one to the next level, visit ringmaster.com to chat and book a call.
24:37
I love that, man.
24:38
Before we get to number three on, on that, the fact that you need a thought leader
24:43
and that it doesn't have to be internal.
24:44
I guess I never really thought about that.
24:46
And, and quite honestly, I bet you jumped over a bunch of hurdles by even
24:50
just having it be someone at Gartner.
24:51
I mean, uh, because they're, they're like, they're the analyst, and if
24:55
the analyst is saying something that furthers your, your company, well, crap.
24:59
And then Gartner's not gonna have a problem with that.
25:01
They could use some free publicity.
25:03
So you're just like, "Hey, we're gonna parade you around everywhere
25:06
Well, and, and the beauty part was is once we connected, I,
25:08
I… So marketing connected with their marketing team, right?
25:13
So yeah, there was a symbiotic situation that we were l- able to level, uh, uh,
25:18
Wow.
25:18
off each other, uh, to be able to take advantage of it.
25:21
So yeah, I mean, they, they had the conversation didn't just turn
25:26
from, you know, you being able to leverage him, but it turned into a
25:29
conversation of, you know, helping invest back in to get that white paper.
25:33
Otherwise, would they have done the white paper?
25:36
But then they had a partner to be able to facilitate.
25:40
So that those are the kinds of things that you can kind of uncover
25:43
and be able to, to leverage.
25:45
'Cause originally I thought, "Okay, this thing will maybe have legs
25:49
three, maybe four months." We, we pumped that thing for a year.
25:54
Wow
25:55
We're, we were able to leverage it for a full year.
25:57
And then it real- really wasn't at the end of that year, uh, that we started kinda
26:01
seeing, uh, just started falling off,
26:04
Sure
26:04
a little bit.
26:05
But still, and, uh, but actually that'll lead into to
26:09
Yeah, please
26:10
is has got, has gotta be along with us on the journey, right?
26:16
And, and the beauty part that we were able to leverage with, with that situation
26:20
was, um, you know, I made sure the sales team was involved in, you know, if we went
26:28
to an event or, you know, we had, uh, we created a video or we had LinkedIn posts
26:34
or whatever email campaigns, I wanted the sales team to be intimately involved and
26:40
educated with, um, him as a researcher.
26:44
I had him spend time with the sales team for them to get his kind of
26:50
thought process and knowledge at a, at a, on a research style, right?
26:55
So then, then they're kind of, uh, we were talking earlier about, uh,
26:59
being able to be consultative, right?
27:02
Now we're not just talking about, uh, some sales guys throw and
27:06
dribble about IT and, um, servers and, you know, whatever it may be.
27:11
It was more about, hey, understanding the financial impact, uh, being able
27:16
to better manage, uh, the, the flow of, of, uh, funds within an organization
27:22
to be able to make other investments as a result of, of changing, uh, internal
27:27
support of IT service versus outsourcing.
27:31
Man, you know what?
27:33
Like some people have sandwiches named after them.
27:36
I'm gonna name this, uh, this move after you, the idea of getting a, a,
27:41
an analyst to be your thought leader.
27:43
You don't have to pay them salaries or anything, you know?
27:46
Like this is a gr- I'm calling this the Troy right now.
27:49
So, uh, so those listening, consider, consider the Troy as
27:53
a move in 2027 because man, they have that third party backing.
27:58
You can collab with their marketing team and you know, you know,
28:02
some of these, uh, analysts have had, they had some hard times.
28:05
They, they need, they need a little help with the limelight too.
28:08
So if you can scratch their back, dang.
28:10
And, and, and if they're saying stuff that already helps you
28:13
out, man, that is fantastic.
28:15
But yeah, point taken on making sure that sales is along the ride with you for that.
28:21
Um, my next question for you here is like, we haven't talked about it yet.
28:25
We've been going hard on the human side as, as we should because the
28:29
noise is getting noisier out there.
28:31
But talk to me for a second about your approach to AI.
28:34
Where, how does it, how does it fit in?
28:36
How do you keep it balanced?
28:38
And you know, how do you walk that line between the human strengths
28:41
and then also where you leverage AI?
28:43
Yeah.
28:44
So again, the good thing about AI process, right?
28:47
Being able to shorten timeframes of content development, uh, being able to,
28:53
to get some tasks done a little faster, uh, being able to, uh, again, back to
28:59
content, just being able to get the variety of content you need these days,
29:04
um, done faster and, and when you don't have a big team or, you know, you d-
29:10
you, uh, one of the guys in CTM, David, is a big marketing department of one.
29:16
So he-- But he, you know, the, the amount of content he has to develop and,
29:21
and be able to have at his fingertips to be able to provide his sales team
29:25
and also his, uh, CEO, who gets pulled into a lot of exposure situations.
29:30
So again, from that perspective, love it.
29:34
Uh, being able to work faster creatively, being able to get some assistance,
29:39
um, really be able, trying to also to make sure you got your guardrails with
29:44
your brand, uh, within the system.
29:46
Um, and I, will say from a strategy perspective, get pers- get the, um, having
29:53
kinda back again where we were talking about getting other people's input, AI can
29:57
still be that other people's input, right?
30:00
It's still a way to ask it questions, um, to see what kind of response you get,
30:05
uh, in terms of validating what you're thinking or do you need to maybe try to
30:08
find a different, different angle to take.
30:11
So again, AI, we all hear it, right?
30:14
AI is gonna give you what you want to hear.
30:17
Um, but I've also, I've also experienced if you prompt it right, you can get some
30:22
pretty interesting perspectives to say, "Okay, that makes sense. Maybe I need
30:27
to try to investigate this other angle."
30:29
Yeah.
30:29
I mean, absolutely.
30:30
And, and what's crazy is, like, even across the different ones, the same
30:34
prompt gets different answers sometimes.
30:37
I recently, Perplexity impressed me.
30:39
I was like, "Okay, coming out of left field over here, Perplexity."
30:42
But yeah, like, what I, what I like about what you're describing
30:46
is that you're leveraging all of the assets, like you said before.
30:50
Like, who knows the customer, and hey, what, what can I learn from, from AI?
30:54
And it's not like an anti-AI.
30:56
You're not over-indexing on it.
30:57
I feel like you've got the right approach where you're, you've
31:00
got that healthy balance of, like, it is absolutely a, a tool.
31:05
It can be an advantage.
31:06
If your competitors aren't using it and you are, man, you're
31:08
helping that company grow.
31:10
Um, but you're also not, like, outsourcing your brain to it, you know?
31:14
Right.
31:15
Well, and again, do I wanna take two weeks to find a writer that's gonna
31:19
write me, you know, the different assets of my campaign that I need to get done?
31:24
Or do I, you know, spend a day just hyper-focused, tied in on it, and
31:31
again, you know, put the prompts in, understand what I wanna get out of it.
31:35
And again, doesn't mean I don't check it, 'cause we all know we still, just
31:39
because you did it, you still need to make it, take a moment, check it, make
31:42
sure you don't have your em dashes and all your other crazy commas that come
31:47
out of the AI, uh, sphere of, of spelling
31:51
Oh yeah, all that slop, right?
31:53
Yeah.
31:53
You know what?
31:54
Death to the em dash, man.
31:56
You know, any of those people listening, they're like, "But I love the em dash.
31:58
I keep writing with it." Well, like, well, it's dead now, so stop writing
32:01
with it, 'cause even if you, even if you are really good at your grammatical
32:06
punctuation, then you're, uh, you're, you're shooting yourself in the
32:09
foot by just even using the em dash.
32:11
But you know what?
32:12
Good riddance.
32:13
Well, and it's funny you say that.
32:16
did anybody know what an em dash was before
32:18
Right
32:19
Like, if you saw it, it would probably have been in, and be old school for
32:24
me, an encyclopedia or… You know, I was trying to really think about
32:28
before AI kept throw- putting it into everything that, you know, we were
32:32
trying to develop in terms of content.
32:36
I really don't remember ever seeing an em dash on, uh, in anything.
32:41
It was just weird how that started to be such a big deal
32:44
Uh, y- uh, 100%, man.
32:45
And I just know that it's hard to actually get that thing to happen on a computer.
32:48
I think you gotta do, like, Function and that… I don't know.
32:52
It's not Shift.
32:53
Maybe it's Shift.
32:53
I don't even know, man.
32:54
Like, I don't even know how to make one.
32:56
I'm s- looking at it right here, I'm like, "There's a big one and there's…"
32:59
I don't even know, right?
33:00
So, like, bunch of nerds were like, "Well, I use the em dash." Yeah,
33:03
right next to the semicolon friend.
33:05
You know, that's like in the old days, and you saw a semicolon,
33:07
you're like, either… Like, I don't know where that came from.
33:10
Like, who even… In, in… And even cooler if you'd used it the right way.
33:14
But, like, I don't know.
33:15
It just simplify the human communication.
33:17
But, but man, Troy, my next question for you is, is like,
33:20
you know all these things.
33:21
Who are you?
33:22
Who are you?
33:23
How do you, how do you know this?
33:24
How, how you m- you know, obviously this marketing leadership and
33:27
some great strategy that you have.
33:29
Take me back in time, little Troy days.
33:31
Did you know you were gonna be a marketing leader teaching people stuff on a podcast?
33:35
What was it like?
33:36
So, uh, gonna again go old, old school.
33:40
So, uh, my dad started, um, uh, he was with a, a company called Palos Cashways.
33:48
And, uh, part of the responsibility of the, uh, manager was had to
33:54
put together the Sunday flyer.
33:56
Talking old school, right?
33:58
Let's go
33:58
ev- every Wednesday night, he had to put the Sunday flyer together.
34:03
So literally marketing, advertising started with me helping my dad, taking
34:09
rubber cement and a red Sharpie and putting together the big, the big
34:13
flyer, uh, for what was gonna be in the Sunday paper for the next week, and,
34:18
uh, literally just started that simple.
34:20
Um, so from there, just always had a, had a f- uh, a… I knew it was
34:26
business, but I liked a little bit more the creative development side.
34:31
Uh, so that's where the advertising came in, and really then just looked at, uh,
34:36
go… Out, out of high school, went to Texas Tech for an advertising degree.
34:41
Uh, then the real slap in the face came, right?
34:44
Because I thought I was gonna be this, you know, set the
34:47
world on fire creative director.
34:49
And I had a, a gentleman, uh, who came down to Texas Tech.
34:53
We had to do our f- our, our final th- thesis, if you will, and,
34:57
uh, put together some campaigns.
34:59
He… Uh, I happened to have an internship in Minneapolis that summer.
35:03
I went to go spend some time with him at his agency.
35:07
He was at one of the biggest agencies in Minneapolis at the time, we…
35:10
He s- he s- he lovely gave me an hour of his time.
35:14
But Casey, the first five minutes, I felt like I needed
35:19
to put my tail between my legs.
35:20
He basically said, "Troy, you are not creative. You, you do not need to go down
35:26
this path." Um, and actually, I was about to invest in a whole going to creative
35:30
arts school, gonna take it to that level.
35:33
And he said, "I think, I think what you really need to do in terms of your, your
35:37
problem-solving skills is look at the data and the business side of where you
35:43
could use your skill." And so really, it r- soon as I graduated from Tech,
35:48
I was blessed, walked into a company that did of all things coupon tracking
35:53
Wow, you got that data flowing
35:55
then the data l- and, and I happened to learn, I happened to know how to use a
35:58
Mac at Texas Tech 'cause we were, Texas Tech happened to have a Mac school as
36:03
part of the advertising, curriculum.
36:06
So from right there it was data.
36:09
It, it wasn't about, it wasn't about I think, I feel, right?
36:12
It was about data, understanding offers, understanding, you know,
36:17
creative, understanding how to piece it together to optimize the outcome
36:22
of, of what was being invested in.
36:25
And then I would j- I just took that and built it and, you know, as you
36:29
get, as, you know, we talked in the CTM, you start seeing other industries,
36:34
other businesses, you just alter…
36:36
You have your core set of ability, but how do you alter it based on
36:40
the situation and the product or service you're in that to make sense?
36:45
'Cause I, I think there's always, uh, from a marketer perspective,
36:50
you've got your knowledge.
36:51
Yes, you've got your specialty healthcare, maybe you've got a vertical in SaaS or
36:56
whatever it may be, but I truly believe a, a, a really good marketer at the end of
37:01
the day really can really market anything if you have the tools available to you.
37:07
As long as you have the tools.
37:09
Because really then it's just understanding offer, value, transaction
37:14
Man, seems so simple when you put it that way.
37:17
Dang.
37:18
Sometimes I think we overcomplicate it a lot of the times
37:21
I true, I, I agree with you.
37:23
I think we've got in this age and time of, um,
37:29
When we were talking the other day, Y2K, right?
37:33
The dot com.
37:34
the, the just, just add AI now being a part of this mix.
37:39
There is complexity there, but the reality is it still comes back to
37:45
person wants to buy from a person, and all these other things are tools.
37:50
We have to know how you use them to help us do a better job.
37:54
But marketing's job in connection with sales, how to make it a personal
37:59
situation to where they feel they can trust who they're buying from
38:04
and they, they know they're getting value out of their investment
38:08
Yeah.
38:09
Dude, fantastic.
38:12
It makes me wonder though, are you, are you secretly painting on the
38:14
weekends or something like that, keeping that little creative going?
38:17
Or you, or you just, you took that advice and you ran with it
38:19
Yeah, I just, I, I, I don't think I've picked up a pen or, uh, a
38:24
color… I think, I take that back.
38:26
I apologize.
38:27
I, while my, my nephews and niece were in town, I did get the coloring
38:33
book, the coloring menu out, and I had fun with them doing that, but
38:37
that's as far as it goes these days.
38:38
m- and maybe that's enough, right?
38:41
That's enough
38:42
your advisor had said, like, "Hey, you know what? That's, that's the sweet spot."
38:46
It's, and then, and then after that it's the offer, the value, the transaction.
38:49
Let's stick to the data wherever we go.
38:51
Exactly
38:52
I've got one final question that I'd just love to ask you, but it is a bit of a
38:56
hypothetical question, so I need to check to make sure you're prepared for this.
39:00
Sure.
39:00
you ready?
39:01
Ready
39:03
Set, hike.
39:04
Okay, here we go.
39:05
I may or may not have a time machine up here in New Hampshire.
39:11
So let's say you come visit, customer event, you know, doing
39:14
something in Boston, drive up north, we get some lobster, some beer.
39:17
And look, it's in the backyard covered in a tarp, but don't tell anyone.
39:20
That's just between us.
39:22
So you use this time machine, but it's a special kind of time machine
39:25
where you get the chance to go back in time and you get to meet yourself,
39:31
and you get to meet yourself four days after getting that ad degree, right?
39:37
And you, I don't know if you've had that conversation yet with that
39:40
advisor, um, four days after grad.
39:43
And, and so what do you tell yourself?
39:46
You can have a conversation with yourself.
39:48
What are you saying?
39:49
Really the biggest thing in terms of telling the, uh, then 24-year-old
39:56
Troy, one, congratulations, you finally graduated.
40:01
Amen, right?
40:02
Thank you.
40:03
Let's just put that, the, the diploma up on the wall.
40:06
The parents are thrilled.
40:08
Uh, and I think it, a little bit of what we talked about before in terms
40:12
of understanding what my role is in an organization as the marketer stay
40:19
focused on that, the data, trust yourself with data, trust yourself with, uh,
40:26
understanding the customer, how to communicate, uh, value, how to work.
40:31
And one thing we didn't even bring up, Casey, is, is a marketer's
40:34
ability to re- having a relationship also, not just with the sales
40:38
team, but across the organization, operations, finance, C-suite.
40:44
Um, a marketer really has the beauty of being able to unify an organization
40:52
if, if presented to them, and really ha- can have the ability to impact
40:57
a lot of areas in the organization that sometimes people don't think
41:01
marketing can really make a difference.
41:03
But if things are working well, know who's a marketing person.
41:09
Everybody knows them.
41:11
Because in some way, shape, or form, they're always gonna run into them.
41:14
So I would just always tell that 24-year-old, that, but also be ready
41:21
for the t-the changes of tools,
41:24
Yeah.
41:24
Yeah
41:25
tools changed fast,
41:27
They did
41:28
they only will change faster.
41:30
And a- again, tools are helpful.
41:33
Doesn't mean you don't stay true to, to what the marketer's job is, which
41:37
is educate, show value, get conversion
41:41
Dang.
41:42
I feel like we've got something like 30 sound clips in this whole conversation.
41:46
I feel like you somehow, and not everyone can do this, I think I have a lot of
41:50
conversations with people where their wisdom is spread out over a two-minute
41:54
period with a bunch of stuff in between.
41:57
But man, how, that was concise, that was powerful.
42:00
Now my follow-up question then is, does young Troy listen to older Troy?
42:06
Well, probably not.
42:10
And, you know, uh, I will say, you know, it takes time.
42:13
Yeah.
42:14
know?
42:14
Yeah
42:15
age and time just, they, they are, even though they're on the same path, they're
42:21
just kind of at a different level, right?
42:24
You get to a different stage, you learn things, and, you know, you look back and
42:31
you just go, you made some decisions from a, from a career perspective that got
42:37
the dollar or got a title, w- at the end of the day, did that make you happier?
42:44
Or did you make that change because you were chasing something?
42:47
And I, you know, speaking for myself, I probably have made at least two,
42:53
uh, decisions in my career where it was about chasing and not just, I
43:00
don't wanna say be happy with where you're at, but just understanding your
43:03
environment pushing that environment.
43:06
Instead of going somewhere else and pushing, what can I do in the environment
43:10
I'm in, and am I getting too complacent?
43:13
Do I need to be looking for new tools, right?
43:16
Educating myself on new platforms and stuff like that, versus just going
43:20
and chasing a title or, or more money
43:24
Dude.
43:25
Fantastic, man.
43:26
How can people connect with you?
43:28
Where do you want them to reach out?
43:29
My personal, uh, email address is T, D as in Doug, T-D-R-O-C-K-M-A-N uh, gmail.com.
43:39
Um, and then of course, I've got my LinkedIn profile, uh, which is the typical
43:44
LinkedIn and just Troy Rockman at the end
43:47
Hell yeah.
43:48
Man, that's fantastic.
43:50
Folks can connect with you.
43:51
I know you are rocking it right now.
43:54
Um, and, uh, you're a good guy to get connected to.
43:57
and I just want to say, Troy, thank you so much for coming on here.
44:00
I feel like this was like a master class in marketing and just, oh
44:05
man, there's just so much to it.
44:06
The idea of the bringing the value, the aha moments come from solving problems
44:11
and, and thinking bigger picture about how we can connect to the market
44:15
with the assets we have available.
44:16
Who knows the customer in those orgs when you first come in, finding
44:20
them, and then, hey, m- and, and the Troy has forever been created now.
44:25
We got that move where we can
44:26
I
44:26
partner with Gartner.
44:27
Absolutely, man.
44:28
So thank you
44:29
Thank-- Casey, thank you so much, and appreciate the opportunity to, uh, have
44:34
a chance to get on the platform and express, express my thoughts and ideas.
44:37
So I greatly appreciate your time, energy, and effort
44:40
Well, absolutely, man.
44:41
Well, I-- feeling is mutual.
44:42
For those listening, if you've learned something, and I freaking know you have,
44:46
'cause I literally have two pages of notes over here, front and back, right?
44:50
I've run out of paper.
44:51
I'm starting to write sideways.
44:53
So, um, I've got some learnings here.
44:55
I've got some to-dos.
44:56
I've got some things I gotta go, uh, fix thanks to this conversation.
44:59
I got some, some conversations I need to have.
45:02
I gotta make sure I get back in that value.
45:04
Maybe see if I can't pu-pull a little Troy move off as well.
45:08
Um, so I've got some moves.
45:09
But if you learned something, share this episode with someone else.
45:12
One person, three people, nine is cool.
45:15
Nine thousand's cool too, but even one person who needs to hear this, right?
45:19
Who needs to get reconnected to their market.
45:22
Um, so many power plays in here.
45:24
Uh, this is definitely the thing to send to someone else if you care about them.
45:28
If you don't like them, don't send it to them 'cause it's
45:30
definitely gonna help them.
45:31
Um, and with that, Troy, thank you again, sir
45:34
Talk to you soon.
45:34
Appreciate you
45:35
All right, everybody.
45:36
This has been a crazy cool, very exciting episode of the Connect to Market pod.
45:40
We will see you all next time