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We are a podcast for product marketers and B2B SaaS who feel misunderstood of what they do.

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From someone who truly gets what you do and basically help you feel less like a misfit to be unignorable in your role.

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Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of We're Not Marketers.

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Today we have an amazing guest that

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We've been rescheduling countless times with him and we're very excited.

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Finally,

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we were able to find time.

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But before we introduce that guest,

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let's tackle who's talking to you,

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right?

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You might be wondering right now,

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you're listening,

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who the hell is this guy talking to me?

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First of all,

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it's Gab Nujo.

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I'm there with you and I'll pass it out to one of my co-hosts,

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Eric.

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Yeah,

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I was even wondering who the hell was talking right there.

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I know,

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dude.

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I'm surprising myself too.

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Yo,

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Eric Holland.

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I'm the Franken marketer of the group.

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and we'll let the third trio finish it up.

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Zach,

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give them an intro.

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Hey this is Zach Roberts on the mic,

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the sales water lad,

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and Gab back to you my friend.

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Thank you,

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thank you.

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So before you start Gab,

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this is the first time we've had a guest on that I've met in person before meeting on an atmosphere.

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Very cool.

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Listen if you're hearing more of that camaraderie aspect

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please meet us in person first.

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It will make better content and better episodes.

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But yes,

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so very excited today to introduce to you Drew Giovannoli.

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Drew is the founder of BuriedWins.

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It's a win-loss and competitive analysis agency,

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and their goal is to help you discover why you're losing winnable deals.

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So his expertise is in win-loss and B2B research for competitive SaaS,

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going after mid-market deals.

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But before being that,

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Drew

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is a veteran in the product marketing space.

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He was a VP marketing at Rev,

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he was a product marketing director,

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he was a PMM and product marketing director at multiple startups and companies.

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And we're super excited of having him with us today because if you don't do win-loss,

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your credibility as a product marketer is at stake.

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And this is what we're going to be talking about today.

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Drew,

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welcome to the show.

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Awesome.

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Thank you for having me.

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I'm excited to be here amongst the dead and ready for the podcast.

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I love what Gab said that product marketing credibility is at stake without win-loss,

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because I feel like product marketing credibility is always at stake regardless of what you do.

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It's always at stake,

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but yeah,

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go ahead,

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Drew.

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I think that it is,

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we don't have much that we bring to the table.

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Like in general,

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we're not building products.

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We're not going out and setting campaigns.

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We're not selling shit.

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And yeah,

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I think that if product marketers don't

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understand the buyer,

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however you want to do it and understand the market,

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then you don't have much to stand on but to be a like a sales deck monkey and responding to just requests from everybody in the org.

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So yeah,

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I think it's the foundation of what good product marketing is.

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You're already cooking and we haven't even asked their first question.

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So dude,

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let's go.

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It's going to be a fire episode.

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Well,

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the man's a chef Come on,

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let him cook.

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Yeah,

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I know.

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He's cooking in and out of the kitchen.

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Drew,

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our marketers.

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Speaking of marketers.

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Oh man.

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Sorry.

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Man,

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you know I had the funniest line Gab and you're just so antsy I can feel it.

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He's excited.

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I need to ask if Joe.

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We always ask one question to every single guest that comes on and the man with the flavor saver is about to ask it.

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Go ahead Gab.

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Ooh,

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the flavor saver.

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I love it.

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Drew.

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Are product marketers actually marketers?

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Why or why not?

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If I wasn't prepared with this question,

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I'm a bad guest.

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I'm thinking about this.

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And your alter egos,

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I might have...

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I'm going to be a little bit on their side,

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but I actually think in disagreement with you guys,

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I'm going to be more in agreement than most.

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So number one,

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yes,

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I do think product marketers are marketers,

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but I also think

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The product people are marketers.

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I think sales are marketers.

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I think the executive team is marketers and they don't realize it.

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And the more that a company appreciates that kind of everybody at the company represents the company and their product to market,

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the better the company does.

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I think it's odd.

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Like we're all kind of LinkedIn junkies here.

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And so no one would argue the fact that like you should have your executives online,

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promoting their personal brand and then helps your business.

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Right?

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So if you can accept that fact,

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can you accept that the more that product folks talking about themselves and their vision of the product helps market the business?

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Can you accept the fact that maybe like the way you build your

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and whatever kind of viral loops you build into it,

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the more shareable you make the product,

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the more engaging you make it helps with marketing the product.

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I think we can have this conversation about should product marketing sit in marketing or should it sit in products?

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But like,

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I think if we're going to have this conversation,

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it's a super fun one.

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I think that not only do I think of product marketing,

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but I think of like most of the company should at least feel like they've got some responsibility to marketing.

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That's totally dodging the angle and taking it in a cool way.

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One,

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I think the general sentiment of marketing is very much not pleasant,

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no matter what stage really.

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And if you look at those other departments and you were to just ask them,

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do a win-loss interview on them,

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right?

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On how do you feel about the marketing team and just marketing in general?

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I don't think you'd have an overwhelming majority of positive feedback.

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answers.

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And so that's a great point of everyone start thinking of themselves as contributing to the marketing engine.

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I think that when people consider investing in a marketing team for the first time,

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usually it's this idea that we,

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and let's just talk about kind of enterprise sales motion first,

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and then we can go in other areas,

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but it's usually,

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hey,

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we need to generate pipeline.

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Like we need to do reach people at scale,

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right?

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so that our sales reps can then close them in a one-to-one basis.

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And like product feels,

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I think some of that impression is like product feels,

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oh,

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if the product's good enough,

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we don't even need marketing.

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And then sales feels,

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I'm doing the work to close the deals.

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Why do you need them?

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I think it all comes down to like,

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how are you defining like marketing,

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right?

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And there's a lot of discussion of what's the value of brand today,

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especially in the age of AI.

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What's the value of

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running these campaigns,

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people turning off paid acquisition.

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But really just like marketing is how you represent yourself to an audience and how you reach that audience so you can go win business.

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And attribution is probably one of the biggest problems,

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like why people don't give any respect to a marketing group as it's evolving.

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Eric,

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this is like,

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cool,

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can you prove it?

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Like,

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we're going to throw a bunch of money at a problem.

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And...

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You're not directly closing the deal and you're not directly building the product.

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And so you're in this messy middle,

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but the companies that do well understand how to reach that customer and make them understand their value prop.

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So Drew,

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tell us this then,

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like you've been in all levels of marketing.

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You've been in leadership,

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you've been in IAC,

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you've got your own agency right now.

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Let's go back to when you were in-house.

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And can you tell us about a time when you were on a

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an executive call,

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you were on a all hands or team meeting.

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You're like,

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damn,

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I don't feel like a marketer.

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Like what prompted that reaction?

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Yeah,

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definitely.

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And I think it happens a lot because of what we believe marketing is right.

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So you have to feel like cool.

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Am I feeling like marketing?

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Cool.

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Am I doing marketing activities?

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And I think coming out of school and maybe reading and being inspired by books or podcasts,

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you think it's a lot of inspiring positioning.

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Maybe like you go in the Mad Men lens,

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or you can think about investing a ton of money in creative campaigns that drive eyeballs and attention.

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That's another view of what it is.

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I've found so much of marketing,

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and let's note,

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I've been in B2B my whole career,

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so I don't have a B2C lens.

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But in the B2B lens,

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so much of what

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do marketing is not market.

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So there is the research part,

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which like I didn't,

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it's like my whole job now,

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but I didn't think of as marketing beforehand.

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But before you write brilliant campaigns and before you launch positioning that you hope works,

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like you think it helps to know who the buyer is and what the competitors are doing and where the market's going,

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their needs and pain points.

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I don't think Eric is spinning up Mojo off of just like generic,

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okay,

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hey,

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I've got a client in the healthcare space,

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like spin up positioning.

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I'm like,

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no,

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you have to know what they're paying.

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So yeah,

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research is an area where I didn't feel like I was like doing marketing work.

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Another big one,

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I've talked about this a lot in the past.

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I think a great product marketer is like over 50%

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the job is influence.

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And to influence...

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people,

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I think you have to have extreme like empathy.

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So to know if I'm going to support sales to be successful,

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I've got to spend a lot of time with sales and I've got to understand their pain and how they're pitching and what they're doing.

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That's not necessarily marketing work.

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If I have to go launch a product,

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I got to spend a bunch of time with product,

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understand what they're building and why that's different from the competitor and how that's going to affect the customer.

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Is that writing sexy positioning and launching campaigns?

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No,

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but it's the foundation for doing those things well.

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And so yeah,

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early in my career,

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I felt like the majority of what I was doing was not marketing until I realized that it's all the components of good marketing.

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Oh,

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go.

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Yeah.

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So we've guys,

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what are we going to be on here?

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Like episode 65,

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00:10:37.069 --> 00:10:37.709
75,

267
00:10:37.729 --> 00:10:38.369
something like that.

268
00:10:38.889 --> 00:10:39.250
I don't know.

269
00:10:40.750 --> 00:10:44.152
I've been waiting for this conversation to get broken open naturally.

270
00:10:44.892 --> 00:10:46.233
So this is very much,

271
00:10:47.093 --> 00:10:48.594
I don't like to say it out publicly,

272
00:10:48.634 --> 00:10:49.174
but fuck it.

273
00:10:50.074 --> 00:10:59.238
This is where I feel like the other marketing teams don't do what you just acknowledged is that there is a core component of

274
00:10:59.342 --> 00:11:00.782
particularly research,

275
00:11:01.823 --> 00:11:03.943
but it's about like the understanding the business,

276
00:11:04.043 --> 00:11:04.984
understanding the market,

277
00:11:05.084 --> 00:11:06.084
understanding the customer,

278
00:11:06.204 --> 00:11:07.344
understanding the competitor.

279
00:11:07.804 --> 00:11:16.007
And then you just added that layer of understanding the product all to it that I believe it's just been it's just given to product marketing.

280
00:11:16.867 --> 00:11:17.067
Right?

281
00:11:17.087 --> 00:11:18.808
And there is no curiosity,

282
00:11:18.908 --> 00:11:22.969
there's no appetite coming from those other marketing functions.

283
00:11:23.969 --> 00:11:27.190
And now you've just landed into like really my whole route

284
00:11:27.330 --> 00:11:32.912
of where I feel why we're not marketers is because what you just really said is like,

285
00:11:32.932 --> 00:11:34.753
you didn't view that as marketing,

286
00:11:34.913 --> 00:11:36.474
even though now you may think it is.

287
00:11:37.834 --> 00:11:43.457
I don't think the vast majority of B2B looks at that part as marketing.

288
00:11:43.477 --> 00:11:45.397
And so they give it over to us and they're like,

289
00:11:45.398 --> 00:11:50.319
go do it because we're not going to go spend enough time with our customer and learning their pains.

290
00:11:50.339 --> 00:11:53.241
We're not going to spend enough time with product to learn how things actually work.

291
00:11:53.761 --> 00:11:56.202
We're not going to spend enough time with sales,

292
00:11:56.282 --> 00:11:56.442
etc.

293
00:11:57.210 --> 00:11:59.231
So that was a lot of shit to throw on you,

294
00:11:59.271 --> 00:12:00.752
but how are you feeling about all that?

295
00:12:01.532 --> 00:12:01.652
Yeah.

296
00:12:01.712 --> 00:12:03.814
I think the analogy would be like,

297
00:12:04.154 --> 00:12:10.277
do we think that negotiating a contract is part of sales?

298
00:12:11.478 --> 00:12:11.798
So no.

299
00:12:11.998 --> 00:12:18.622
Do we think that doing buyer research before you hop on a sales call is part of sales?

300
00:12:19.602 --> 00:12:21.603
Like you're not selling.

301
00:12:21.943 --> 00:12:26.926
So do the pieces that you need to do your job well outside of the act

302
00:12:27.066 --> 00:12:30.327
of selling the deal or marketing the product or building the product,

303
00:12:31.888 --> 00:12:33.229
are they part of the job?

304
00:12:33.429 --> 00:12:35.750
Or are they some ancillary thing?

305
00:12:35.950 --> 00:12:37.090
Now like a lot of product orgs,

306
00:12:37.091 --> 00:12:38.131
they have research group.

307
00:12:38.891 --> 00:12:39.011
And

308
00:12:40.111 --> 00:12:40.752
I also think...

309
00:12:41.212 --> 00:12:41.492
So yeah,

310
00:12:42.312 --> 00:12:45.253
I still believe that it gets pushed to us,

311
00:12:45.333 --> 00:12:45.553
yeah,

312
00:12:46.154 --> 00:12:48.995
but as a critical engine for marketing.

313
00:12:49.115 --> 00:12:56.478
I think a problem with research big time is that it's looked at as academic

314
00:12:57.002 --> 00:13:00.003
And it's because it's treated academically.

315
00:13:00.123 --> 00:13:02.564
Like maybe you do some of it,

316
00:13:02.604 --> 00:13:05.886
maybe you pay for some of it and then it sits in a Google Drive and you're like,

317
00:13:05.986 --> 00:13:06.926
why are we doing this?

318
00:13:06.946 --> 00:13:11.708
Why don't we invest all this money in some like ICP campaign that sales doesn't give a shit about,

319
00:13:12.108 --> 00:13:13.469
like products doesn't give a shit about,

320
00:13:13.489 --> 00:13:14.589
they're not changing anything,

321
00:13:14.649 --> 00:13:18.271
like we're back to just creating one pagers that no one's gonna look at.

322
00:13:18.931 --> 00:13:19.111
Like,

323
00:13:19.511 --> 00:13:20.191
that sucks.

324
00:13:20.271 --> 00:13:21.572
I think if,

325
00:13:22.312 --> 00:13:25.073
why care about research and why is that even marketing?

326
00:13:25.173 --> 00:13:26.194
It comes down to...

327
00:13:27.790 --> 00:13:27.930
Okay,

328
00:13:27.950 --> 00:13:29.731
you're going to sit down and you're going to build a sales deck.

329
00:13:29.791 --> 00:13:31.271
Or you're going to write web page copy.

330
00:13:31.492 --> 00:13:34.813
You're going to build a solutions page or a product page.

331
00:13:35.733 --> 00:13:36.634
What is it based on?

332
00:13:38.614 --> 00:13:42.756
You had a conversation with the product team and you think you know the market.

333
00:13:43.076 --> 00:13:47.278
It's just so useless and you have no credibility to back that up.

334
00:13:48.258 --> 00:13:49.619
So you listen to gong calls.

335
00:13:49.620 --> 00:13:50.980
That's a great start.

336
00:13:51.060 --> 00:13:52.580
Let's focus on a sales deck for a second.

337
00:13:52.640 --> 00:13:53.260
To me,

338
00:13:53.261 --> 00:13:56.782
a great sales deck is one that's adopted.

339
00:13:57.570 --> 00:13:58.110
First of all,

340
00:13:58.650 --> 00:13:58.891
right?

341
00:13:58.971 --> 00:14:00.971
And so it doesn't matter how good a job you do.

342
00:14:02.552 --> 00:14:04.913
You have to put the end output above,

343
00:14:05.533 --> 00:14:06.394
above the input.

344
00:14:06.514 --> 00:14:08.935
And so that it doesn't matter if you're the most brilliant market in the world,

345
00:14:09.175 --> 00:14:10.055
that has to happen.

346
00:14:10.075 --> 00:14:11.496
So first you engage sales,

347
00:14:11.497 --> 00:14:13.657
you figure out what slides are they already using?

348
00:14:13.737 --> 00:14:14.517
Are they using three,

349
00:14:14.617 --> 00:14:16.238
four and eight of the current deck?

350
00:14:16.758 --> 00:14:17.698
Why do they care about those?

351
00:14:17.718 --> 00:14:19.079
Why are they ignoring everything else?

352
00:14:19.859 --> 00:14:19.979
Well,

353
00:14:19.999 --> 00:14:20.240
cool.

354
00:14:20.760 --> 00:14:22.120
What objections are they facing?

355
00:14:22.160 --> 00:14:23.381
You can hear from them directly.

356
00:14:23.401 --> 00:14:24.401
You can look into Gong.

357
00:14:24.461 --> 00:14:26.022
You can see what questions they get a lot.

358
00:14:26.970 --> 00:14:28.811
And then you can start to research those things.

359
00:14:29.071 --> 00:14:31.753
So then your 20 slide deck includes three,

360
00:14:31.793 --> 00:14:32.513
four and seven,

361
00:14:32.793 --> 00:14:35.415
and then maybe four more that answer the biggest questions,

362
00:14:35.435 --> 00:14:36.575
the biggest objections.

363
00:14:38.056 --> 00:14:44.620
And it's a type of research that sales wants to use as they feel like you're helping them solve their problem.

364
00:14:45.420 --> 00:14:47.881
And the same thing goes for kind of web copy.

365
00:14:48.302 --> 00:14:49.342
It's just cool.

366
00:14:49.882 --> 00:14:52.284
What part of the site do we think is converting now?

367
00:14:52.344 --> 00:14:53.764
What's resonating people with not?

368
00:14:53.864 --> 00:14:54.705
Let's strip it back.

369
00:14:54.725 --> 00:14:56.506
Let's do some research and then let's test.

370
00:14:56.986 --> 00:14:58.615
I think another problem,

371
00:14:59.037 --> 00:15:00.243
maybe rambling on a little bit,

372
00:15:00.283 --> 00:15:01.208
we can chop this up,

373
00:15:01.228 --> 00:15:01.369
but

374
00:15:01.966 --> 00:15:03.628
You put in the work as a product marketer,

375
00:15:03.648 --> 00:15:05.489
maybe you do some research and then you have an output.

376
00:15:05.850 --> 00:15:07.391
And then people treat it like this,

377
00:15:07.451 --> 00:15:08.792
like holy launch day,

378
00:15:09.213 --> 00:15:12.216
like you created some finished sculpture.

379
00:15:12.896 --> 00:15:16.540
And the reality is that's a beautiful beginning.

380
00:15:16.680 --> 00:15:20.844
It's what really is a new baseline that you're going to judge everything else against.

381
00:15:21.644 --> 00:15:25.268
And hopefully two weeks in and a month in,

382
00:15:25.288 --> 00:15:25.568
you're saying,

383
00:15:25.588 --> 00:15:25.768
cool,

384
00:15:26.269 --> 00:15:27.610
what's better or what's worse?

385
00:15:28.246 --> 00:15:33.229
The worst thing that can happen is you have a sales team that just gives you a thumbs up and says nothing about it.

386
00:15:33.589 --> 00:15:35.690
That probably means no one's using your shit,

387
00:15:36.350 --> 00:15:36.550
right?

388
00:15:36.711 --> 00:15:37.831
What you want them to say is,

389
00:15:37.891 --> 00:15:38.071
hey,

390
00:15:38.451 --> 00:15:40.252
slide eight and nine suck.

391
00:15:40.292 --> 00:15:41.133
I don't use this.

392
00:15:41.473 --> 00:15:42.594
Can we have something else?

393
00:15:43.414 --> 00:15:43.574
Now,

394
00:15:43.914 --> 00:15:47.496
we're not going to grant sales like full rights to be like,

395
00:15:47.497 --> 00:15:47.616
oh,

396
00:15:47.636 --> 00:15:51.999
we need four more case study examples and we just need more testimonials.

397
00:15:52.819 --> 00:15:58.022
Your job as product marketers is to look across all the salespeople and look across all the sales calls and bring more like aggregate

398
00:15:58.082 --> 00:15:59.063
context into place,

399
00:15:59.083 --> 00:16:03.927
but it's just about thinking about the end use,

400
00:16:03.987 --> 00:16:05.648
not research for academic sake,

401
00:16:06.128 --> 00:16:10.772
not just some like checkbox item.

402
00:16:11.273 --> 00:16:15.076
It's about having again back to credibility as product marketer,

403
00:16:15.077 --> 00:16:17.017
like partner with the team,

404
00:16:17.237 --> 00:16:21.641
bring something new to the table and then create a new baseline to improve the way you're going to market.

405
00:16:22.662 --> 00:16:26.625
One challenge I've seen with research in the past is that like in sales calls,

406
00:16:26.645 --> 00:16:27.706
like I'll give you an example

407
00:16:28.134 --> 00:16:34.457
is that let's say you have a prospect that is in cybersecurity and they are gung-ho

408
00:16:35.237 --> 00:16:36.057
CrowdStrike.

409
00:16:36.918 --> 00:16:40.699
There is nothing you can say about CrowdStrike.

410
00:16:41.740 --> 00:16:41.860
So

411
00:16:42.340 --> 00:16:42.760
I'm curious,

412
00:16:42.761 --> 00:16:44.081
like from your perspective,

413
00:16:44.181 --> 00:16:46.622
like from organizations you've worked with in your house,

414
00:16:46.642 --> 00:16:55.986
like how do you help sales use research in a way that builds credibility instead of like the what we

415
00:16:56.722 --> 00:17:01.265
have gotten accustomed to in product marketing is the gotcha Intel.

416
00:17:01.985 --> 00:17:02.145
Yeah,

417
00:17:02.505 --> 00:17:09.329
I think somewhat surprisingly to me now having done like 30 months of exclusive,

418
00:17:10.109 --> 00:17:18.214
like product marketing work and research is that a lot of the time it's not just discovering things about the buyer's preferences.

419
00:17:18.574 --> 00:17:19.534
It's discovering that hey,

420
00:17:19.554 --> 00:17:25.978
that customer that's going to go with CrowdStrike with an end complete focus and choice.

421
00:17:26.410 --> 00:17:27.790
they just might not be your customer.

422
00:17:28.291 --> 00:17:32.092
The learning is that research is just as much about defining who your

423
00:17:32.552 --> 00:17:33.732
ICP is a little bit better.

424
00:17:34.352 --> 00:17:35.113
So much of the time,

425
00:17:35.114 --> 00:17:35.913
I'll get a question like,

426
00:17:35.914 --> 00:17:36.033
"Hey,

427
00:17:36.153 --> 00:17:38.094
are we priced too expensively?"

428
00:17:38.554 --> 00:17:39.814
And the answer will come back like,

429
00:17:39.834 --> 00:17:40.054
"Cool."

430
00:17:40.514 --> 00:17:40.754
40%

431
00:17:41.035 --> 00:17:41.595
of the time,

432
00:17:41.655 --> 00:17:43.855
the answer is no and 60%

433
00:17:44.115 --> 00:17:45.396
of the answer is yes.

434
00:17:46.756 --> 00:17:48.897
You could either go and change your pricing,

435
00:17:49.577 --> 00:17:52.198
you can either go and change the perception of your pricing

436
00:17:52.734 --> 00:17:53.875
Or we can figure out that 40%

437
00:17:54.475 --> 00:17:58.237
who thought the price was right and like absolutely appropriately valued.

438
00:17:58.657 --> 00:18:01.899
And you should stop wasting sales time going after that other 60%.

439
00:18:01.900 --> 00:18:03.200
Your win rates are going to go up,

440
00:18:03.540 --> 00:18:04.761
you're going to find your ICP,

441
00:18:04.781 --> 00:18:08.823
you're going to be able to better market to them because they're gonna have slightly different needs and pain points.

442
00:18:09.523 --> 00:18:09.643
So

443
00:18:10.023 --> 00:18:10.364
I don't know,

444
00:18:10.664 --> 00:18:11.804
for your specific example,

445
00:18:11.864 --> 00:18:13.465
my first reaction is just cool.

446
00:18:13.505 --> 00:18:14.726
Maybe that's not the right vibe.

447
00:18:16.927 --> 00:18:17.527
But I'm like,

448
00:18:17.547 --> 00:18:18.008
but like Drew,

449
00:18:18.108 --> 00:18:18.808
I'm a marketer,

450
00:18:18.848 --> 00:18:19.068
man.

451
00:18:19.208 --> 00:18:21.730
Like my job is to get leads.

452
00:18:23.434 --> 00:18:26.075
- Feed the pipeline - Feed the,

453
00:18:26.215 --> 00:18:27.035
okay I'm gonna stop.

454
00:18:27.195 --> 00:18:28.156
Okay tell me more,

455
00:18:28.296 --> 00:18:28.996
tell me where I'm wrong.

456
00:18:29.796 --> 00:18:31.437
- Your job's not to get leads,

457
00:18:31.457 --> 00:18:34.577
your job is to get well qualified leads.

458
00:18:35.838 --> 00:18:39.359
So it's not just to fill the funnel with people who might buy,

459
00:18:39.459 --> 00:18:49.602
it's to fill the funnel with the highest qualified pipeline that your sales are gonna go close and is gonna stick with you the longest amount of time and not churn.

460
00:18:50.002 --> 00:18:50.122
Yeah,

461
00:18:50.123 --> 00:18:58.309
like incentives may be flawed in an organization where they're just trying to pump up pipeline and have to hit some forecasts because their VC put it in front of them.

462
00:18:58.369 --> 00:19:02.232
But if you have an organization leaders who can think long term enough,

463
00:19:02.432 --> 00:19:05.355
it's about getting the people who are actually your customers.

464
00:19:05.395 --> 00:19:06.596
That's what's best for the business,

465
00:19:06.676 --> 00:19:07.777
not just getting any lead.

466
00:19:09.538 --> 00:19:10.279
And the fact is,

467
00:19:10.539 --> 00:19:11.960
if you target better leads,

468
00:19:12.040 --> 00:19:13.622
better ICP that fits it,

469
00:19:14.102 --> 00:19:17.545
you will get higher account per opportunities.

470
00:19:17.785 --> 00:19:18.946
Your sales will increase.

471
00:19:19.186 --> 00:19:21.047
stop wasting time on those bad fit.

472
00:19:21.127 --> 00:19:28.610
And essentially you will just be a better instrument to make sure that higher quality leads get into a pipeline and more revenue gets out of it too.

473
00:19:29.010 --> 00:19:30.111
So at the end,

474
00:19:30.151 --> 00:19:33.492
it's not just about more work for sales.

475
00:19:33.552 --> 00:19:36.573
It's the work that sales will be doing is just more efficient too.

476
00:19:37.194 --> 00:19:39.194
And the more focused you get in marketing,

477
00:19:40.035 --> 00:19:44.497
just it's just marketing becomes so much easier with the more you focus.

478
00:19:44.517 --> 00:19:47.358
It's just like vanilla boring ass.

479
00:19:47.722 --> 00:19:51.505
messaging and positioning comes from trying to target too many people at once.

480
00:19:51.705 --> 00:19:56.949
You just lose your ability to say anything interesting when you don't know a specific person.

481
00:19:57.930 --> 00:19:59.011
The more you know them,

482
00:19:59.091 --> 00:20:00.372
the more specific it gets,

483
00:20:00.392 --> 00:20:02.514
the more you can like truly speak to their pain,

484
00:20:03.184 --> 00:20:03.984
their goals,

485
00:20:04.345 --> 00:20:05.005
their industry.

486
00:20:06.066 --> 00:20:07.747
Everything gets better the more you focus.

487
00:20:08.687 --> 00:20:16.712
And that's a good point for some clients like we've seen in the past is that you will have that energetic startup founder that

488
00:20:17.492 --> 00:20:18.312
I believe you drew,

489
00:20:18.332 --> 00:20:24.496
but I have this company vision and in my head it includes payroll,

490
00:20:24.536 --> 00:20:27.638
it includes someone who works in construction.

491
00:20:28.418 --> 00:20:31.820
I need to get those people right now and that is my vision

492
00:20:32.080 --> 00:20:40.024
So how do you talk to like a startup founder that it cares more about the company vision being realized today?

493
00:20:40.444 --> 00:20:44.786
Versus what you're saying we need to focus on one ICP and build from there.

494
00:20:45.826 --> 00:20:45.986
Yeah,

495
00:20:46.046 --> 00:20:47.387
everyone's driven by incentives,

496
00:20:47.447 --> 00:20:47.647
right?

497
00:20:47.687 --> 00:20:51.068
And so that that founder is saying that because they just got out of

498
00:20:51.509 --> 00:20:58.872
30 investor calls or board meetings where they're getting pushed on their billion-dollar vision and so the answer is not to say hey,

499
00:20:58.873 --> 00:20:58.992
I

500
00:21:00.324 --> 00:21:04.045
You can't have what you just promised the board or you can't even have that vision.

501
00:21:04.065 --> 00:21:04.565
The answer is,

502
00:21:04.985 --> 00:21:05.105
hey,

503
00:21:05.566 --> 00:21:05.786
cool.

504
00:21:06.046 --> 00:21:13.148
Let me help you achieve that by phasing this into sections where we have an incredible amount of success in phase one with this industry.

505
00:21:13.588 --> 00:21:14.728
And as that matures,

506
00:21:15.048 --> 00:21:16.829
we're going to dive in six months later,

507
00:21:16.830 --> 00:21:18.569
a year later to that next phase.

508
00:21:18.570 --> 00:21:22.910
Let's just phase it out so I can help you tell the story back to the people you have to report to.

509
00:21:23.471 --> 00:21:24.891
So it's back to that empathy comment.

510
00:21:24.911 --> 00:21:25.231
It's like,

511
00:21:25.291 --> 00:21:26.511
why are they saying that?

512
00:21:26.872 --> 00:21:27.752
These are smart people.

513
00:21:27.852 --> 00:21:28.292
They're not...

514
00:21:28.904 --> 00:21:33.088
they got the spot that they're at and building the company that they're at not being crazy,

515
00:21:33.208 --> 00:21:43.557
not like this ambition is not hurting them but they've got other influences and you just have to help them achieve that vision while still being realistic about what you can achieve.

516
00:21:44.077 --> 00:21:55.868
And so I like very specifically and tactically I'd say cool let's phase it out we can win you a lot more deals and a lot more dollars if instead of splitting the pie three ways now

517
00:21:56.372 --> 00:22:02.857
We put all that focus and energy and like marketing investment into one of those industries right now.

518
00:22:04.018 --> 00:22:05.719
And then we're going to do the next one and the next one.

519
00:22:05.720 --> 00:22:06.600
If you have a preference,

520
00:22:06.640 --> 00:22:08.922
let's talk about why and what and set that up.

521
00:22:08.982 --> 00:22:11.824
But I think it's just about reframing it to match their goals.

522
00:22:13.465 --> 00:22:15.407
You mentioned academic earlier.

523
00:22:15.487 --> 00:22:18.989
I think it's a great adjective to put towards that type of research.

524
00:22:19.870 --> 00:22:21.771
So an example might be...

525
00:22:23.188 --> 00:22:31.450
A new report comes out that says you got to do this thing with your SEO or for your AI to start picking things up,

526
00:22:31.730 --> 00:22:38.272
or some perspective about a tactic in marketing that's going to change how people convert.

527
00:22:39.413 --> 00:22:46.755
How do you feel like that type of research is received versus the type of research that you would be doing,

528
00:22:47.575 --> 00:22:50.956
which is actually talking to the buyers who actually might be buying

529
00:22:51.736 --> 00:22:56.379
into your business as opposed to these individual marketing tactics?

530
00:22:56.459 --> 00:22:58.480
I consider them completely separate budgets,

531
00:22:58.560 --> 00:22:58.740
right?

532
00:22:59.040 --> 00:23:02.962
One is what tactics do we use in marketing to work to achieve our goal?

533
00:23:03.903 --> 00:23:04.963
When I ran a team,

534
00:23:05.004 --> 00:23:06.764
when I first got the team at Rev,

535
00:23:06.765 --> 00:23:07.905
it was 33 folks.

536
00:23:08.626 --> 00:23:13.868
And I think the way we looked at it was that there was a portion of the budget that was like experimental.

537
00:23:14.849 --> 00:23:19.912
And so that experimental budget allowed us to do things like if you want to go hard on

538
00:23:21.096 --> 00:23:21.496
GEO,

539
00:23:21.676 --> 00:23:23.617
AAO for the quarter,

540
00:23:24.157 --> 00:23:24.817
we can do that.

541
00:23:24.957 --> 00:23:28.258
Or if we want to be in B2B influencer land and test that out,

542
00:23:28.278 --> 00:23:28.978
we do that.

543
00:23:29.698 --> 00:23:33.880
And we acknowledge that the known things are going to carry the weight of hitting our goal,

544
00:23:34.600 --> 00:23:38.941
but hopefully the experimental is going to unlock growth maybe in this quarter,

545
00:23:39.041 --> 00:23:44.102
but we're going to find the one by adjusting constantly that's going to get us the next phase of growth,

546
00:23:44.122 --> 00:23:46.783
whether it's the following quarter or in the next year.

547
00:23:47.483 --> 00:23:49.584
I think when it comes to questions about

548
00:23:50.620 --> 00:23:51.521
Buyer research,

549
00:23:51.601 --> 00:23:52.622
where we spend our time,

550
00:23:52.682 --> 00:24:00.069
it's about how do we keep a pulse on knowing what the audience we're trying to sell to cares about.

551
00:24:03.752 --> 00:24:05.573
It's strange that it is a problem at all.

552
00:24:05.974 --> 00:24:06.855
I think about this a lot.

553
00:24:06.875 --> 00:24:07.896
When a company starts,

554
00:24:08.876 --> 00:24:12.940
usually the founders either have been in that industry or they've sold to that industry before.

555
00:24:12.960 --> 00:24:17.124
They're like intimately close to the buyer and then they sell to that buyer for a while.

556
00:24:18.016 --> 00:24:19.557
But what happens is you scale,

557
00:24:19.577 --> 00:24:21.978
you hire a sales team and you've got execs and VPs.

558
00:24:21.979 --> 00:24:22.619
And all of a sudden,

559
00:24:22.659 --> 00:24:26.141
you're just removed from the buyer and you lose that pulse.

560
00:24:26.142 --> 00:24:27.762
So I think that's part of the problem.

561
00:24:28.422 --> 00:24:35.026
And another part of the problem is that people don't buy based on reality.

562
00:24:36.107 --> 00:24:38.888
And so what I mean by that is it's not just like a feature comparison.

563
00:24:38.928 --> 00:24:40.109
And if it's equal,

564
00:24:40.129 --> 00:24:41.150
we go with a better price.

565
00:24:41.730 --> 00:24:44.131
It's all based on buyer perception.

566
00:24:44.752 --> 00:24:44.912
Right?

567
00:24:45.232 --> 00:24:47.895
how do they perceive you to be versus the competitor?

568
00:24:48.295 --> 00:24:50.037
And so much of the research is not even,

569
00:24:50.457 --> 00:24:58.144
you hear back that there's an issue with an integration that you don't have or that you're not innovative enough.

570
00:24:58.625 --> 00:24:59.666
The pricing structure is wrong.

571
00:24:59.667 --> 00:25:00.727
And then the question is always,

572
00:25:01.207 --> 00:25:06.032
is this something we actually need to go fix or is there something we need to fix the perception of?

573
00:25:07.205 --> 00:25:19.772
I'll give you like a very quick example from one of our clients is that they were the leading player in the space and they started to lose deals to newer startups who are coming to the market and saying,

574
00:25:19.812 --> 00:25:20.012
hey,

575
00:25:20.152 --> 00:25:27.176
we are dead focused on the beauty industry or the like health and fitness industry.

576
00:25:27.677 --> 00:25:29.538
And so we're going to be able to serve you better,

577
00:25:29.898 --> 00:25:31.539
way better than that big behemoth.

578
00:25:31.540 --> 00:25:32.099
They don't care.

579
00:25:32.159 --> 00:25:32.860
They're agnostic.

580
00:25:32.880 --> 00:25:33.960
They're trying to scale whatever.

581
00:25:35.221 --> 00:25:37.842
our customer success team dedicated to this.

582
00:25:38.382 --> 00:25:39.583
So they started to lose deals.

583
00:25:40.223 --> 00:25:42.024
And my client didn't really understand why.

584
00:25:43.504 --> 00:25:45.925
Once they figured out that was the reason that they were pitching,

585
00:25:46.045 --> 00:25:49.007
these little startups were pitching themselves like industry experts,

586
00:25:49.647 --> 00:25:50.267
we realized like,

587
00:25:50.268 --> 00:25:50.367
hey,

588
00:25:50.368 --> 00:25:50.967
my client,

589
00:25:51.368 --> 00:25:52.348
they have five,

590
00:25:53.008 --> 00:25:53.208
six,

591
00:25:53.308 --> 00:25:58.711
seven X the amount of clients in that specific vertical and each of those verticals that these startups had.

592
00:25:59.531 --> 00:26:02.012
And so all they needed to do is shift the narratives to say,

593
00:26:02.072 --> 00:26:02.232
hey,

594
00:26:03.092 --> 00:26:04.453
when you start to talk to someone,

595
00:26:04.849 --> 00:26:06.250
in the health and fitness space,

596
00:26:07.130 --> 00:26:10.112
let's introduce a deck specific to that industry.

597
00:26:10.192 --> 00:26:14.074
Let's make sure we've got case studies and referral clients specific to that industry.

598
00:26:14.514 --> 00:26:17.716
Let's talk about all our experiences and scale in that industry.

599
00:26:18.697 --> 00:26:21.818
And likely you're going to go talk to one of these competitors.

600
00:26:21.898 --> 00:26:23.259
Let's give them questions to ask.

601
00:26:23.820 --> 00:26:23.980
Cool.

602
00:26:23.1000 --> 00:26:24.980
They say they're an expert.

603
00:26:25.280 --> 00:26:26.221
Here's what we've done.

604
00:26:26.761 --> 00:26:29.383
Ask them about how long in market they've been serving that industry.

605
00:26:29.723 --> 00:26:31.084
Let's test that knowledge.

606
00:26:31.784 --> 00:26:33.545
And so that's a perception shift

607
00:26:33.785 --> 00:26:36.047
It's not always like a real problem you have to solve.

608
00:26:36.087 --> 00:26:36.367
It's a,

609
00:26:37.048 --> 00:26:39.610
how do you solve the perception of why you're losing deals?

610
00:26:40.731 --> 00:26:42.652
So once you provided that recommendation,

611
00:26:42.653 --> 00:26:43.593
what happened next is,

612
00:26:43.773 --> 00:26:45.134
or is it too early to say or?

613
00:26:45.935 --> 00:26:46.055
No,

614
00:26:46.475 --> 00:26:47.816
they stopped having that problem.

615
00:26:47.836 --> 00:26:54.822
They started winning a lot more deals against those new players and an industry focused go-to-market approach is like a big part of the way they're going to market now.

616
00:26:57.164 --> 00:26:57.764
That's awesome.

617
00:26:58.145 --> 00:26:58.265
Yeah.

618
00:26:58.825 --> 00:26:59.285
And actually,

619
00:26:59.565 --> 00:27:01.786
fun fact that you mentioned that I was on a reference call today.

620
00:27:02.146 --> 00:27:05.767
Another company wanted me to hop in and see if I could help them close down a deal.

621
00:27:06.747 --> 00:27:11.829
And the sales rep had a totally different idea of what the objections were.

622
00:27:12.809 --> 00:27:14.350
And they told me straight up,

623
00:27:14.390 --> 00:27:14.570
hey,

624
00:27:14.690 --> 00:27:17.030
I was wondering if they would be innovative enough.

625
00:27:17.170 --> 00:27:18.891
They seem like they're becoming a bigger company.

626
00:27:19.511 --> 00:27:20.051
And I'm like,

627
00:27:20.071 --> 00:27:20.191
whoa,

628
00:27:20.311 --> 00:27:21.192
that's so interesting.

629
00:27:21.252 --> 00:27:22.232
Deal's not even done yet.

630
00:27:22.692 --> 00:27:25.533
But that's the type of information I feel like is being missed out.

631
00:27:25.713 --> 00:27:26.213
Personally,

632
00:27:26.333 --> 00:27:31.977
I feel like people are spending more of their budget on those experimental things or tossing a bunch of money in ads,

633
00:27:32.037 --> 00:27:32.917
doing A-B tests,

634
00:27:33.137 --> 00:27:33.838
that type of thing.

635
00:27:36.439 --> 00:27:47.785
Explain to me why I'm feeling people are more willing to throw money at that problem as opposed to throw money at you or other buyer insights type of problems where they're getting firsthand information about their go-to market.

636
00:27:48.766 --> 00:27:48.886
Yeah,

637
00:27:48.946 --> 00:27:51.848
I think it's an easier ROI story to tell.

638
00:27:52.188 --> 00:27:52.368
Cool.

639
00:27:52.588 --> 00:27:53.989
I'm going to put money here and I think...

640
00:27:54.129 --> 00:27:56.630
think that if I can turn this dollar into three,

641
00:27:57.351 --> 00:27:59.172
like it's a lot more attributable.

642
00:27:59.652 --> 00:28:01.373
There's just like closer connection to it.

643
00:28:01.374 --> 00:28:06.856
The problem is if you throw a whole bunch of money at like the wrong person or the wrong pain point,

644
00:28:06.857 --> 00:28:07.977
it's just not going to convert.

645
00:28:08.577 --> 00:28:11.159
And so yeah,

646
00:28:11.259 --> 00:28:11.379
I,

647
00:28:11.699 --> 00:28:11.899
listen,

648
00:28:11.979 --> 00:28:18.143
I don't think that I don't really don't think that everybody should use buried winds or an agency like buried winds,

649
00:28:18.144 --> 00:28:22.045
but like everybody should be talking to their buyers.

650
00:28:22.709 --> 00:28:24.610
and everybody should be doing research on the competitors.

651
00:28:25.190 --> 00:28:25.470
And

652
00:28:26.290 --> 00:28:27.070
I think it comes to,

653
00:28:27.071 --> 00:28:27.610
we can talk about it,

654
00:28:27.611 --> 00:28:31.451
I think it comes down to just the volume of deals you have and the resources you have.

655
00:28:31.491 --> 00:28:35.453
But there's no reason not to do the work as a product marketing team,

656
00:28:35.473 --> 00:28:36.273
'cause like we said at the beginning,

657
00:28:36.333 --> 00:28:36.793
what else?

658
00:28:37.133 --> 00:28:38.293
What other credibility do you have?

659
00:28:39.194 --> 00:28:41.554
- So like about that piece around research,

660
00:28:42.154 --> 00:28:44.295
a few months ago or I don't know how long ago,

661
00:28:44.515 --> 00:28:45.235
deep research

662
00:28:46.516 --> 00:28:48.096
AI capability was released.

663
00:28:48.636 --> 00:28:48.776
- Yeah.

664
00:28:48.936 --> 00:28:50.897
- It's a very exciting time

665
00:28:51.509 --> 00:28:53.390
For founders to now say,

666
00:28:55.911 --> 00:28:56.072
"Well,

667
00:28:56.712 --> 00:28:58.733
why do we need a competitive Intel team?"

668
00:28:59.774 --> 00:29:02.495
I can just type in the prompt and I get

669
00:29:02.955 --> 00:29:08.118
20 pages of Intel across 67 different competitors.

670
00:29:09.519 --> 00:29:09.639
Like,

671
00:29:09.640 --> 00:29:10.119
"Hey Drew,

672
00:29:10.159 --> 00:29:10.339
like

673
00:29:11.200 --> 00:29:12.120
I got deep research.

674
00:29:12.340 --> 00:29:13.701
Why should we hire you?

675
00:29:13.721 --> 00:29:14.742
How do you respond to that?"

676
00:29:15.882 --> 00:29:16.022
Yeah,

677
00:29:16.262 --> 00:29:16.443
sure.

678
00:29:16.943 --> 00:29:20.745
I think that if I was one of the tools

679
00:29:22.185 --> 00:29:35.533
in the competitive landscape world that pretty much presented alerts about competitors changing their landing pages or hiring new people or putting out a press release.

680
00:29:36.953 --> 00:29:37.073
Yeah,

681
00:29:37.113 --> 00:29:42.817
I think deep research actually does a pretty good job of keeping you updated on what's changing in the public web.

682
00:29:43.728 --> 00:29:43.928
right?

683
00:29:44.468 --> 00:29:44.888
And a lot of,

684
00:29:44.928 --> 00:29:46.108
there were a lot of tools,

685
00:29:46.309 --> 00:29:47.389
like well-known tools,

686
00:29:47.870 --> 00:29:48.768
like Crayon,

687
00:29:48.807 --> 00:29:49.370
for example,

688
00:29:49.788 --> 00:29:50.651
that like does that.

689
00:29:50.749 --> 00:29:51.686
And I think that

690
00:29:52.288 --> 00:29:52.569
I would,

691
00:29:52.889 --> 00:29:53.194
I don't,

692
00:29:53.467 --> 00:29:55.249
I'm not into that tool like today.

693
00:29:55.374 --> 00:29:56.288
I don't know how they're innovating,

694
00:29:56.289 --> 00:29:56.569
but like,

695
00:29:56.772 --> 00:29:58.155
I would be a little bit worried about that.

696
00:29:58.210 --> 00:30:02.733
I think deep research is really good at finding publicly available data.

697
00:30:03.889 --> 00:30:04.733
Unfortunately,

698
00:30:05.311 --> 00:30:13.280
your buyers are not spending 30 minutes typing out their feelings about you and your evaluation process and how they compared you to competitors.

699
00:30:13.496 --> 00:30:14.217
putting it on the web.

700
00:30:14.957 --> 00:30:15.858
And so there's just like,

701
00:30:16.379 --> 00:30:18.901
and so,

702
00:30:19.541 --> 00:30:19.702
yeah,

703
00:30:20.163 --> 00:30:25.069
you need to go talk to buyers because that data isn't available on the web.

704
00:30:25.452 --> 00:30:30.436
And an LLM has a brilliant aggregation of what's publicly available.

705
00:30:31.639 --> 00:30:31.920
And so,

706
00:30:32.530 --> 00:30:32.655
yeah,

707
00:30:32.656 --> 00:30:33.374
that's the difference.

708
00:30:33.389 --> 00:30:43.108
Like we are finding and product marketers through interviews and surveys can find out what buyers in the past month

709
00:30:43.624 --> 00:30:48.630
thought about them versus their competitor and why they chose to make the decision they did.

710
00:30:49.829 --> 00:30:50.790
And when they learn that,

711
00:30:50.833 --> 00:30:55.435
they can use it to affect the future sales cycles to convert more deals in their favor.

712
00:30:55.692 --> 00:31:01.138
That's just information that's not available through ChaiGBT because the data source is not there.

713
00:31:01.700 --> 00:31:03.341
Let's say I'm the executive team.

714
00:31:03.591 --> 00:31:06.622
We were all at Drive a few weeks ago and they're like,

715
00:31:06.653 --> 00:31:06.950
Drew,

716
00:31:07.653 --> 00:31:09.153
I was talking to my buyers.

717
00:31:09.263 --> 00:31:10.606
We were out there at the bar.

718
00:31:10.669 --> 00:31:11.606
We're having drinks.

719
00:31:11.638 --> 00:31:13.216
They're telling me about their business.

720
00:31:13.808 --> 00:31:14.028
Like,

721
00:31:14.329 --> 00:31:15.530
how's your approach?

722
00:31:15.831 --> 00:31:15.969
Like,

723
00:31:15.970 --> 00:31:22.860
what am I missing in me having a casual drink with our buyers at the bar versus your approach,

724
00:31:22.915 --> 00:31:25.438
what you're highlighting of those emotional sentiments?

725
00:31:26.282 --> 00:31:29.321
I guess if they're spending every weekend at the bar with their buyers,

726
00:31:29.344 --> 00:31:30.126
that would do the trick,

727
00:31:30.204 --> 00:31:32.344
too.

728
00:31:34.641 --> 00:31:36.329
Yeah,

729
00:31:36.547 --> 00:31:41.969
if I could shift my career to just instead of being on these interviews for a lot of the day to go into,

730
00:31:42.719 --> 00:31:42.891
yeah,

731
00:31:42.938 --> 00:31:43.079
like,

732
00:31:43.372 --> 00:31:46.956
open air bar with a band playing and dogs around.

733
00:31:47.097 --> 00:31:47.854
That sounds great.

734
00:31:47.878 --> 00:31:49.558
I don't think it's a reality.

735
00:31:49.757 --> 00:31:52.464
Maybe cool if they were at Drive and they spoke to five buyers.

736
00:31:52.940 --> 00:31:55.886
That should inform a lot of information.

737
00:31:56.222 --> 00:31:58.589
Are they spending 30 minutes asking them questions?

738
00:31:58.628 --> 00:31:58.823
Great.

739
00:32:00.167 --> 00:32:04.526
What motivated you to move off your old platform or tool to evaluate something new?

740
00:32:04.854 --> 00:32:05.026
Great.

741
00:32:05.073 --> 00:32:05.230
Okay.

742
00:32:05.292 --> 00:32:05.980
Thanks for sharing that.

743
00:32:05.995 --> 00:32:06.120
Now,

744
00:32:06.167 --> 00:32:08.480
what was your criteria for making that decision?

745
00:32:09.354 --> 00:32:10.854
What reputation did we have?

746
00:32:11.176 --> 00:32:13.178
those are not the conversations they're having at the bar.

747
00:32:13.557 --> 00:32:14.259
And if they were,

748
00:32:14.399 --> 00:32:14.540
like,

749
00:32:14.559 --> 00:32:14.819
great,

750
00:32:14.860 --> 00:32:16.343
but they're not at the bar that much.

751
00:32:16.401 --> 00:32:19.585
And if they are at the bar or at a Coldplay concert,

752
00:32:19.600 --> 00:32:20.405
they're probably like,

753
00:32:21.468 --> 00:32:21.608
yeah,

754
00:32:21.609 --> 00:32:24.085
they're just not there enough to get the information they need.

755
00:32:25.874 --> 00:32:26.350
I love it.

756
00:32:27.397 --> 00:32:30.960
It reminded me of my grandfather used to be a salesman.

757
00:32:31.054 --> 00:32:36.819
And what he was doing he was bringing a bottle of cognac to people that he was visiting.

758
00:32:37.260 --> 00:32:38.822
So he was always like drinking with them,

759
00:32:38.902 --> 00:32:39.521
chatting with them,

760
00:32:39.703 --> 00:32:40.222
making sales,

761
00:32:40.223 --> 00:32:41.263
and then going back on the car,

762
00:32:41.724 --> 00:32:43.447
which would not happen today at all.

763
00:32:43.545 --> 00:32:46.107
It's way too dangerous to don't drink and drive folks.

764
00:32:46.592 --> 00:32:46.748
Eric,

765
00:32:46.749 --> 00:32:48.170
I don't know if you had a follow-up question,

766
00:32:48.193 --> 00:32:54.334
but I would like to maybe cover the part that we talk about in terms of like product marketing and helping sales.

767
00:32:54.335 --> 00:32:54.896
So if you have,

768
00:32:55.021 --> 00:32:56.021
if you don't have a follow-up question,

769
00:32:56.037 --> 00:32:57.615
I would just like to dig in a little bit.

770
00:32:59.256 --> 00:32:59.959
Go for it,

771
00:33:00.006 --> 00:33:00.662
Gabbaroni.

772
00:33:01.865 --> 00:33:02.271
Perfect.

773
00:33:02.532 --> 00:33:20.146
you wrote recently you will take orders from sales until you earn credibility as a product marketer and it spoke a lot to me it reminded me of when i was trying to help sales and i was working in a sales deck in a dark corner and then hoping that they use it without success how

774
00:33:20.271 --> 00:33:31.537
can product marketers listening right now how can they juggle between being the sales and a counterpart that can help them with partner french yeah let's just take a

775
00:33:31.716 --> 00:33:33.197
let's like look at it from their lens.

776
00:33:33.216 --> 00:33:35.856
I think we should take the theme of empathy in this episode.

777
00:33:36.797 --> 00:33:40.278
They are looking at you building a deck.

778
00:33:41.074 --> 00:33:43.457
They're in sales calls all day long,

779
00:33:43.637 --> 00:33:44.403
all week long.

780
00:33:45.660 --> 00:33:52.926
And you who are in zero calls are building the tool that they're going to use to go do their job.

781
00:33:55.067 --> 00:34:00.738
And what leg do you have to stand on except for them to tell you what they need and why they need The only reason...

782
00:34:00.984 --> 00:34:01.465
they should,

783
00:34:02.205 --> 00:34:02.826
is if you say,

784
00:34:03.647 --> 00:34:04.508
that's great feedback.

785
00:34:04.688 --> 00:34:08.912
I also talked to eight other reps and I interviewed these buyers.

786
00:34:09.815 --> 00:34:11.893
I paired that with the competitive research I did.

787
00:34:12.377 --> 00:34:13.416
Like here's,

788
00:34:13.838 --> 00:34:20.205
I suspect that we can close more deals if we focus on this because it's differentiator and the buyer said they cared about it.

789
00:34:20.206 --> 00:34:23.549
And it actually works on like these two other examples for your industry.

790
00:34:24.721 --> 00:34:26.112
Like all of a sudden they're like,

791
00:34:26.612 --> 00:34:26.736
oh,

792
00:34:26.737 --> 00:34:26.924
cool.

793
00:34:27.143 --> 00:34:28.799
I do want help closing deals.

794
00:34:29.404 --> 00:34:31.548
I just thought I had more information than you.

795
00:34:31.648 --> 00:34:33.290
And it's not about being a better seller.

796
00:34:33.632 --> 00:34:34.734
Like product marketers,

797
00:34:34.735 --> 00:34:41.023
you're really just like a solicitor of customer truths and your connective weave between product.

798
00:34:41.710 --> 00:35:00.659
and sales and marketing right and so if you like put yourself in a sales enablement setting if you're standing up there trying to present this deck that you created in a vacuum with no sales experience like there's no reason for them to use it there's just no trust there but if you start with here's

799
00:35:00.737 --> 00:35:11.378
what i learned here's why i believe it can help you guys and like i talked to seven of you before i built this and i think that like

800
00:35:11.518 --> 00:35:12.699
we kept the best slides,

801
00:35:12.700 --> 00:35:13.721
we got rid of the worst.

802
00:35:13.779 --> 00:35:15.303
It's just a different tone,

803
00:35:15.502 --> 00:35:15.701
right?

804
00:35:15.783 --> 00:35:16.244
All of a sudden,

805
00:35:16.245 --> 00:35:17.705
they're going to respect you.

806
00:35:17.706 --> 00:35:19.127
I'll put it one other key point,

807
00:35:19.146 --> 00:35:20.686
which is not directly part of this question,

808
00:35:20.748 --> 00:35:28.654
but does speak to why product marketing ends up being so reactive and not proactive in a lot of times.

809
00:35:29.357 --> 00:35:35.154
I think so few product marketers take the time at the beginning of a quarter or a year and say,

810
00:35:35.904 --> 00:35:38.920
socializing their plan with leadership and saying,

811
00:35:38.921 --> 00:35:39.045
hey,

812
00:35:39.389 --> 00:35:40.373
Here's what I think.

813
00:35:40.646 --> 00:35:41.787
can help our company grow.

814
00:35:42.427 --> 00:35:43.709
Like within my world,

815
00:35:44.050 --> 00:35:46.632
here's like five initiatives or here's eight initiatives.

816
00:35:47.414 --> 00:35:48.195
What's your opinion?

817
00:35:48.355 --> 00:35:48.515
Like,

818
00:35:48.535 --> 00:35:49.496
what do you think they are?

819
00:35:49.597 --> 00:35:50.418
And you work through them,

820
00:35:50.433 --> 00:35:51.496
you socialize them,

821
00:35:51.777 --> 00:35:53.082
and then you've got a list of these,

822
00:35:53.121 --> 00:35:56.285
maybe the top five things you're going to focus on with your team that year.

823
00:35:57.957 --> 00:36:00.878
Once you have that and something comes up,

824
00:36:01.894 --> 00:36:04.347
then you actually have the place to say,

825
00:36:05.254 --> 00:36:05.363
cool,

826
00:36:05.488 --> 00:36:08.347
you're asking for this new like sales asset.

827
00:36:09.922 --> 00:36:10.683
If I do that,

828
00:36:10.803 --> 00:36:14.868
I can't do one of the five things we agreed were important,

829
00:36:15.669 --> 00:36:15.829
right?

830
00:36:15.946 --> 00:36:17.149
And we can make that call,

831
00:36:17.290 --> 00:36:18.673
but let's make that call together.

832
00:36:19.048 --> 00:36:19.548
And at this point,

833
00:36:19.571 --> 00:36:21.813
you know where I'm focusing and why.

834
00:36:22.977 --> 00:36:25.680
Most people don't socialize anything.

835
00:36:25.696 --> 00:36:26.876
They know the product marketing,

836
00:36:26.923 --> 00:36:28.376
like maybe they do some pricing,

837
00:36:28.501 --> 00:36:29.501
maybe they write some copy,

838
00:36:29.923 --> 00:36:31.204
maybe they build some sales decks,

839
00:36:31.470 --> 00:36:32.938
but they don't know what you're working on.

840
00:36:33.266 --> 00:36:33.610
And they just,

841
00:36:33.720 --> 00:36:34.720
they ask you for help.

842
00:36:35.470 --> 00:36:35.641
Again,

843
00:36:35.720 --> 00:36:37.141
you've got nothing to stand on.

844
00:36:37.142 --> 00:36:37.891
You've got no...

845
00:36:38.326 --> 00:36:42.590
reason you can say no because you haven't told them what you are focusing on and why.

846
00:36:43.012 --> 00:36:46.196
And so I think that's another piece of being responsive,

847
00:36:46.197 --> 00:36:46.391
I think,

848
00:36:47.055 --> 00:36:50.000
to sales needs is one,

849
00:36:50.016 --> 00:36:53.204
you haven't told them what you're focusing on that's going to help them in advance.

850
00:36:53.500 --> 00:36:54.141
And then two,

851
00:36:55.219 --> 00:37:01.704
you give them no reason to believe that the information you have is better than their week full of sales calls.

852
00:37:01.813 --> 00:37:03.266
I love it.

853
00:37:03.710 --> 00:37:06.473
the way you are approaching it in terms of tone and context,

854
00:37:06.553 --> 00:37:07.495
I spoke to those people,

855
00:37:07.534 --> 00:37:08.694
this is what I think we should do.

856
00:37:09.213 --> 00:37:10.217
I think it is a key thing.

857
00:37:10.518 --> 00:37:11.256
Something I heard,

858
00:37:11.299 --> 00:37:13.237
especially when starting a role and again,

859
00:37:13.378 --> 00:37:13.862
it might be,

860
00:37:14.620 --> 00:37:15.659
not everyone might agree with this,

861
00:37:15.682 --> 00:37:25.378
but do you think PMMs at the beginning should jump or shadow sales people and be with them to get at least closer to their reality or the problem that you were solving?

862
00:37:27.010 --> 00:37:27.130
Yeah,

863
00:37:27.190 --> 00:37:27.411
I mean,

864
00:37:27.431 --> 00:37:30.573
I remember pre-Gong days where that was like the only way to do it.

865
00:37:30.675 --> 00:37:33.839
So you'd come into your new role and you would just shadow sales.

866
00:37:34.339 --> 00:37:41.222
I don't think it's as required from a like to see them actually act because you can just watch the recording.

867
00:37:41.362 --> 00:37:42.643
You can do it on your own time.

868
00:37:42.644 --> 00:37:43.542
You can do more of it.

869
00:37:44.261 --> 00:37:52.932
But building a relationship with sales is pretty key to your success.

870
00:37:53.374 --> 00:37:55.157
If they don't use the things you create,

871
00:37:55.216 --> 00:37:57.579
what you've created is worthless no matter how good it is.

872
00:37:58.880 --> 00:38:01.419
And so maybe you don't have to shadow their calls,

873
00:38:01.420 --> 00:38:03.622
but should you be in the weekly team meetings?

874
00:38:04.145 --> 00:38:09.286
Should you be trying to serve them with information when you find it and building that rapport?

875
00:38:09.755 --> 00:38:11.880
Should you be meeting with them to find out what's working,

876
00:38:11.911 --> 00:38:12.708
not working?

877
00:38:13.380 --> 00:38:13.630
Yeah.

878
00:38:14.052 --> 00:38:14.880
If nothing else,

879
00:38:14.881 --> 00:38:18.442
for the sake that when you need their help or you want to make a change,

880
00:38:18.473 --> 00:38:20.473
they have some trust in you.

881
00:38:20.782 --> 00:38:23.404
And they know that you care and you know you're putting in the time.

882
00:38:26.990 --> 00:38:27.170
Sorry,

883
00:38:27.350 --> 00:38:27.787
go ahead.

884
00:38:27.810 --> 00:38:33.474
I was about to say that it's also a key requirement if you want to run any type of positioning or repositioning initiative.

885
00:38:33.537 --> 00:38:34.693
If it doesn't start with sales,

886
00:38:35.318 --> 00:38:38.240
you're going to be having a hell of a bad time.

887
00:38:39.834 --> 00:38:45.787
I think it's a good reminder of you never want to be caught with your pants down with one of these types of questions.

888
00:38:46.162 --> 00:38:46.287
A,

889
00:38:47.303 --> 00:38:49.428
how many other sales reps did you run this by?

890
00:38:50.306 --> 00:38:50.426
B,

891
00:38:50.666 --> 00:38:53.187
how many customers or prospects did you run this by?

892
00:38:54.228 --> 00:38:57.826
And I think that's just the really good takeaway that I'm picking up is,

893
00:38:58.291 --> 00:38:58.408
yeah,

894
00:38:58.525 --> 00:39:00.385
as great as it could be,

895
00:39:01.486 --> 00:39:07.822
bringing everyone in and making it seem like it's part of their idea to begin with seems like the best recipe for success.

896
00:39:08.697 --> 00:39:14.104
We start every win-loss program by interviewing all of the internal stakeholders.

897
00:39:14.744 --> 00:39:17.432
And it is half so that we know questions that will...

898
00:39:17.926 --> 00:39:19.408
give us answers they're going to care about,

899
00:39:19.488 --> 00:39:19.648
right?

900
00:39:19.649 --> 00:39:20.489
So it's not academic,

901
00:39:20.490 --> 00:39:21.450
it's going to hit their goals.

902
00:39:22.088 --> 00:39:27.252
And half because we want them to know that we're solving their problems,

903
00:39:27.299 --> 00:39:28.518
not adding work to their plate.

904
00:39:28.776 --> 00:39:29.799
Because with win-loss,

905
00:39:29.815 --> 00:39:30.658
you could come and say,

906
00:39:30.737 --> 00:39:30.862
hey,

907
00:39:30.901 --> 00:39:32.018
the demos aren't working,

908
00:39:32.041 --> 00:39:33.541
or the sales team isn't doing X,

909
00:39:33.542 --> 00:39:33.619
Y,

910
00:39:33.643 --> 00:39:33.924
or Z.

911
00:39:34.049 --> 00:39:35.627
And if that's the first time they're hearing from you,

912
00:39:36.002 --> 00:39:37.112
they're not going to use it.

913
00:39:37.113 --> 00:39:37.987
They're not going to care,

914
00:39:37.988 --> 00:39:39.065
and they're going to be upset.

915
00:39:39.424 --> 00:39:40.987
If you've talked to them first and said,

916
00:39:41.640 --> 00:39:41.860
you know,

917
00:39:42.481 --> 00:39:42.641
what,

918
00:39:42.781 --> 00:39:44.302
how can I help you hit your number?

919
00:39:44.882 --> 00:39:47.566
And then you come back with data that helps solve their problem.

920
00:39:47.906 --> 00:39:48.628
They're going to use it.

921
00:39:48.667 --> 00:39:50.085
And it could be the same exact stuff.

922
00:39:50.890 --> 00:39:53.468
And are these organizations that you typically work with,

923
00:39:53.609 --> 00:39:57.890
do they already have a win-loss program or are they literally started from scratch and they're like,

924
00:39:57.921 --> 00:39:58.062
Hey,

925
00:39:58.249 --> 00:39:59.796
get help us build it from the ground up.

926
00:40:00.640 --> 00:40:01.624
It's a pretty mixed bag.

927
00:40:01.874 --> 00:40:02.093
I mean,

928
00:40:02.515 --> 00:40:07.218
they definitely have a product marketing person or team already.

929
00:40:07.328 --> 00:40:09.249
They usually have 10 plus reps.

930
00:40:10.024 --> 00:40:10.204
right?

931
00:40:10.224 --> 00:40:11.606
These are like for the work,

932
00:40:11.607 --> 00:40:14.287
the product that I'm doing it like buried wins.

933
00:40:14.928 --> 00:40:15.151
Really,

934
00:40:15.190 --> 00:40:16.069
I think like under

935
00:40:16.451 --> 00:40:19.690
30 opportunities closed a month,

936
00:40:20.635 --> 00:40:22.940
just like you're going to get maybe a 10%

937
00:40:22.994 --> 00:40:23.619
conversion rate.

938
00:40:23.838 --> 00:40:24.955
It could be 20%,

939
00:40:24.956 --> 00:40:26.174
but just depends on your industry.

940
00:40:26.221 --> 00:40:29.971
If you're trying to sell to lawyers or HVAC technicians or marketers.

941
00:40:29.972 --> 00:40:30.721
So under 30,

942
00:40:30.799 --> 00:40:32.049
let's say it's three interviews,

943
00:40:32.393 --> 00:40:33.002
product marketing,

944
00:40:33.049 --> 00:40:34.205
just send emails,

945
00:40:34.565 --> 00:40:35.549
offer incentives,

946
00:40:35.768 --> 00:40:37.127
follow up on those emails,

947
00:40:37.955 --> 00:40:39.393
get a few calls booked

948
00:40:40.052 --> 00:40:56.425
host them yourself no need to but everybody should be doing something no excuse hashtag accountability hashtag accountability and then dm eric let him know that you did it this week yeah

949
00:40:56.441 --> 00:41:08.097
and then your ass encounter so let's pivot real quick to the fractional world because like you said before your work in-house form like latest roles like bp of marketing at rev

950
00:41:08.572 --> 00:41:13.038
We've got listeners all the time that they get to hear guests like yourself.

951
00:41:13.577 --> 00:41:14.718
They're working in-house.

952
00:41:14.737 --> 00:41:15.999
They're drowning under the work.

953
00:41:16.038 --> 00:41:17.843
They have incredible expertise.

954
00:41:17.921 --> 00:41:18.522
And they're like,

955
00:41:19.585 --> 00:41:20.085
dang,

956
00:41:20.444 --> 00:41:21.444
I just heard Drew.

957
00:41:23.030 --> 00:41:24.843
He is killing it.

958
00:41:24.844 --> 00:41:27.452
He's got his own fractional work.

959
00:41:27.858 --> 00:41:29.749
But just 51 months ago,

960
00:41:29.874 --> 00:41:30.749
he was just like me.

961
00:41:32.202 --> 00:41:34.952
Like to listeners that are hearing you right now,

962
00:41:35.140 --> 00:41:37.968
can you give us a bit more insight of what was that process of?

963
00:41:38.024 --> 00:41:42.344
of going in-house leader to agency boss today.

964
00:41:42.345 --> 00:41:43.383
So let's start from there.

965
00:41:43.407 --> 00:41:43.747
Cool.

966
00:41:45.086 --> 00:41:45.227
Yeah,

967
00:41:45.266 --> 00:41:50.344
it starts with a call from your CEO who says you've got two weeks left until you're fired.

968
00:41:51.368 --> 00:41:54.524
And then what do you want me to do?

969
00:41:54.525 --> 00:41:54.727
I mean,

970
00:41:55.680 --> 00:42:00.149
I took over a big team and then there were a couple rounds of layoffs and that landed me there.

971
00:42:00.212 --> 00:42:00.368
Now,

972
00:42:00.727 --> 00:42:01.055
granted,

973
00:42:01.196 --> 00:42:04.446
I've started before then multiple other businesses,

974
00:42:04.993 --> 00:42:07.727
usually like VC backed or...

975
00:42:07.972 --> 00:42:24.209
tech focused that weren't services based and this is the first one that's like really worked but what yeah what drove me to this specific business was i was part of a big layoff i knew i wanted to start a company right away and

976
00:42:24.271 --> 00:42:35.365
when i was looking for what i wanted to do next i was looking at things i had just no business being in like fun stuff like oh wind turbines and like

977
00:42:35.820 --> 00:42:38.042
How do I apply AI to renewable energy?

978
00:42:38.122 --> 00:42:38.964
Like both of which,

979
00:42:39.403 --> 00:42:40.303
this is two and a half years ago,

980
00:42:40.304 --> 00:42:41.487
I had no idea about,

981
00:42:41.905 --> 00:42:42.448
no knowledge.

982
00:42:42.565 --> 00:42:43.788
And in that process,

983
00:42:43.811 --> 00:42:45.546
I reached out to an old boss and I said,

984
00:42:45.632 --> 00:42:45.788
hey,

985
00:42:46.374 --> 00:42:53.280
what fractional work do you have for me that I can do so I can figure out what I'm going to do next?

986
00:42:54.686 --> 00:42:57.608
And one of them said,

987
00:42:57.968 --> 00:43:01.280
I have a windmoss consultant that we're using now.

988
00:43:01.540 --> 00:43:02.781
I think you would do as good,

989
00:43:02.801 --> 00:43:04.443
if not a much better job doing it.

990
00:43:04.444 --> 00:43:05.863
Would you like to take on that work?

991
00:43:06.683 --> 00:43:07.187
And I said,

992
00:43:07.246 --> 00:43:07.566
yes,

993
00:43:08.367 --> 00:43:13.113
with no expectation that would be the business I like develop today.

994
00:43:14.035 --> 00:43:17.136
And what's weird,

995
00:43:19.121 --> 00:43:20.996
so strange that I didn't see it.

996
00:43:21.277 --> 00:43:22.886
This is like such an obvious statement.

997
00:43:23.808 --> 00:43:28.933
If someone is willing to give you money to do a thing.

998
00:43:30.128 --> 00:43:33.511
and you have some expertise around the thing and you happen to know the buyer,

999
00:43:34.894 --> 00:43:37.656
that's a pretty good direction to run in.

1000
00:43:40.035 --> 00:43:40.722
Oh,

1001
00:43:41.800 --> 00:43:45.519
my first two customers were my last two bosses.

1002
00:43:47.238 --> 00:43:48.004
And then from there,

1003
00:43:48.050 --> 00:43:55.879
I just started reaching out to every sales manager and every marketing leader that I'd ever worked with and told them that I was thinking of going in this direction.

1004
00:43:56.707 --> 00:43:57.316
For six months,

1005
00:43:57.332 --> 00:43:59.535
I got nothing except for those two.

1006
00:43:59.864 --> 00:44:01.927
And then the annual planning cycle happened.

1007
00:44:02.846 --> 00:44:04.249
And out of those meetings,

1008
00:44:04.850 --> 00:44:05.768
a few people said,

1009
00:44:05.811 --> 00:44:05.948
hey,

1010
00:44:05.972 --> 00:44:08.995
we don't know the buyers the way we wish we did.

1011
00:44:09.331 --> 00:44:12.112
And we don't understand the competitor that's coming to the market.

1012
00:44:12.659 --> 00:44:13.901
Because I had those conversations.

1013
00:44:13.902 --> 00:44:16.081
We had a past reputation.

1014
00:44:16.706 --> 00:44:18.659
They called me and I won some more business.

1015
00:44:19.503 --> 00:44:20.425
Let's be super clear,

1016
00:44:20.487 --> 00:44:20.737
Zach.

1017
00:44:20.800 --> 00:44:25.050
Like it is we're doing pretty well as a business.

1018
00:44:25.112 --> 00:44:27.768
I have a team now about there's about five of us,

1019
00:44:28.206 --> 00:44:29.237
three full time.

1020
00:44:29.508 --> 00:44:31.250
couple fract or part-time,

1021
00:44:32.190 --> 00:44:32.991
but it is,

1022
00:44:33.534 --> 00:44:33.651
yeah,

1023
00:44:33.671 --> 00:44:35.995
I wouldn't say we're like absolutely crushing it.

1024
00:44:36.014 --> 00:44:38.417
Like shit's super hard and stressful.

1025
00:44:38.917 --> 00:44:40.776
And I don't think it is always the right call.

1026
00:44:41.237 --> 00:44:43.604
I think that like almost anybody can do it,

1027
00:44:43.620 --> 00:44:44.323
but it's a total.

1028
00:44:45.255 --> 00:44:47.217
shift from being a product marketer.

1029
00:44:48.559 --> 00:44:50.582
Being a founder is like being a product marketer,

1030
00:44:51.121 --> 00:44:52.844
but first you need to be a salesperson.

1031
00:44:53.442 --> 00:44:54.207
To survive,

1032
00:44:54.208 --> 00:44:55.965
you need to go win business.

1033
00:44:56.465 --> 00:44:58.348
And then you can do the product marketing stuff well.

1034
00:44:58.410 --> 00:44:58.668
And yeah,

1035
00:44:58.707 --> 00:45:02.324
you have to do product marketing for your own business to know who you should go sell to,

1036
00:45:02.418 --> 00:45:03.449
with what pain points,

1037
00:45:03.590 --> 00:45:04.434
what are you going to serve?

1038
00:45:04.481 --> 00:45:06.012
But ultimately,

1039
00:45:06.074 --> 00:45:07.121
if you can't sell a deal,

1040
00:45:07.153 --> 00:45:08.793
you're going to have to go get another in-house job.

1041
00:45:09.074 --> 00:45:09.684
And I don't know,

1042
00:45:09.918 --> 00:45:13.262
I told you this started or was inspired by a layoff.

1043
00:45:13.684 --> 00:45:13.981
And I...

1044
00:45:14.351 --> 00:45:19.316
always knew that I was going to go in this direction because I've repeatedly done it.

1045
00:45:19.977 --> 00:45:22.219
And this one happens to work when you talk about why,

1046
00:45:22.281 --> 00:45:27.266
but I think it comes down to your goals and your tolerance for risk.

1047
00:45:28.149 --> 00:45:30.164
Do you have a partner that can help you financially?

1048
00:45:30.165 --> 00:45:31.289
Do you have some savings?

1049
00:45:31.727 --> 00:45:32.242
Do you like,

1050
00:45:33.149 --> 00:45:33.695
do you need to,

1051
00:45:33.696 --> 00:45:34.414
do you want to do it?

1052
00:45:34.914 --> 00:45:35.133
Why?

1053
00:45:35.227 --> 00:45:36.258
I think it can be a great,

1054
00:45:36.273 --> 00:45:37.836
there's a lot of different versions of it too.

1055
00:45:37.899 --> 00:45:40.336
You can use fractional to tide you over to the next gig,

1056
00:45:41.023 --> 00:45:43.523
you can do it full time.

1057
00:45:43.867 --> 00:45:44.608
but it's fractional.

1058
00:45:44.648 --> 00:45:45.529
You're charging hourly.

1059
00:45:46.149 --> 00:45:47.369
You can move in the direction.

1060
00:45:48.170 --> 00:45:49.553
If you really want to do it long-term,

1061
00:45:50.334 --> 00:45:51.616
move to project-based,

1062
00:45:52.213 --> 00:45:55.018
which allows you when you charge per project to hire other help.

1063
00:45:55.698 --> 00:45:58.299
That helps you improve the margins and increase the scale.

1064
00:45:58.338 --> 00:45:59.541
But yeah,

1065
00:46:00.119 --> 00:46:04.260
it is great for flexibility and there's huge potential upside.

1066
00:46:04.323 --> 00:46:07.885
And it's also way more stressful and incredibly hard.

1067
00:46:08.369 --> 00:46:12.088
And at times you want to quit and then there are great days too.

1068
00:46:12.843 --> 00:46:13.063
Yeah,

1069
00:46:13.064 --> 00:46:13.484
it's not,

1070
00:46:13.524 --> 00:46:16.547
I don't think anyone should look at me and you guys can speak for yourselves,

1071
00:46:16.586 --> 00:46:17.109
but be like,

1072
00:46:17.508 --> 00:46:17.687
cool,

1073
00:46:17.726 --> 00:46:19.691
I made the leap and it's fucking rocks.

1074
00:46:19.891 --> 00:46:20.531
Come join us.

1075
00:46:21.148 --> 00:46:21.492
Let's go,

1076
00:46:21.672 --> 00:46:23.094
dude.

1077
00:46:23.095 --> 00:46:25.898
I think Zach said it on a couple of episodes or just together,

1078
00:46:25.937 --> 00:46:27.414
but it's basically choose your heart,

1079
00:46:27.476 --> 00:46:27.695
right?

1080
00:46:28.195 --> 00:46:29.265
And I think for listeners,

1081
00:46:29.312 --> 00:46:30.594
like with your journey,

1082
00:46:31.344 --> 00:46:32.141
it's essentially,

1083
00:46:32.797 --> 00:46:37.250
don't be afraid to try something and to get the validation that people are willing to pay you for it,

1084
00:46:37.312 --> 00:46:37.984
which is what you did,

1085
00:46:38.047 --> 00:46:38.234
right?

1086
00:46:38.235 --> 00:46:38.484
Hey,

1087
00:46:38.625 --> 00:46:39.984
I feel like you would be much better.

1088
00:46:40.599 --> 00:46:57.088
one last consultant or doing one last analysis at that person let's try it out and then the other end goal is also you're trying it out but you have to understand that the context will be incredibly different it's not a nine to five it's a 24 7 and it's your business there's a lot that relies on it and

1089
00:46:57.089 --> 00:47:09.682
of course one of the key element is sales if you cannot sell your own offer if you cannot sell your service uh there's no one coming to save you to help you do it so you're just putting a lot of stress as you said and

1090
00:47:09.935 --> 00:47:26.297
there's a lot to be riding on that you have to understand the different reality of the new role and that lead basically i'm gonna hire a sales rep because gab just said no one's coming to save me i'll show you gab yeah

1091
00:47:26.344 --> 00:47:37.297
hire a perfect sales rep and just pay them by commission and then see what happened lots of people interested in that job i'll pay him in fake mustaches but drew this was

1092
00:47:37.963 --> 00:47:38.744
Awesome stuff.

1093
00:47:38.844 --> 00:47:43.026
And I always love talking about research-based conversations.

1094
00:47:43.069 --> 00:47:50.315
I don't think we're having enough of them on the pod and I definitely don't think we're having enough of them as a product marketing group.

1095
00:47:50.557 --> 00:47:50.698
So

1096
00:47:51.714 --> 00:47:55.339
I personally really love this and it got me thinking about a lot of new things.

1097
00:47:55.885 --> 00:47:56.120
Guys,

1098
00:47:56.121 --> 00:48:02.651
do you have any more big questions for Drew before we let him go be a full-time solo dad?

1099
00:48:03.823 --> 00:48:06.073
I just have one.

1100
00:48:07.023 --> 00:48:08.104
I just have one to end.

1101
00:48:08.244 --> 00:48:09.146
If I'm a PMM,

1102
00:48:09.426 --> 00:48:14.830
I'm listening right now and either I got laid off or I feel like I might get laid off.

1103
00:48:15.994 --> 00:48:19.095
What's one tip you would give them if they're thinking about taking a leap?

1104
00:48:19.096 --> 00:48:27.595
If they're thinking about taking a leap,

1105
00:48:28.299 --> 00:48:28.611
as in,

1106
00:48:28.924 --> 00:48:29.049
hey,

1107
00:48:29.361 --> 00:48:31.705
I think I want to become a fractional product marketer,

1108
00:48:31.706 --> 00:48:32.205
what should I do?

1109
00:48:33.486 --> 00:48:34.986
Taking a leap into entrepreneurship.

1110
00:48:35.127 --> 00:48:35.252
Yeah.

1111
00:48:35.691 --> 00:48:37.373
either a fractional consultant agency?

1112
00:48:37.613 --> 00:48:38.594
Yeah,

1113
00:48:38.613 --> 00:48:38.953
two things.

1114
00:48:39.035 --> 00:48:39.155
One,

1115
00:48:39.156 --> 00:48:40.215
I think you got to figure out your goal,

1116
00:48:40.496 --> 00:48:40.676
right?

1117
00:48:40.918 --> 00:48:43.762
Do you want to be a fractional product marketer who sells your time?

1118
00:48:43.903 --> 00:48:44.676
And like,

1119
00:48:44.677 --> 00:48:45.723
you want to do that for a few years,

1120
00:48:45.739 --> 00:48:48.785
you're trying to build a business because there's like different things you do for each.

1121
00:48:49.442 --> 00:48:50.129
Either one,

1122
00:48:50.348 --> 00:48:55.145
I think that the most common mistakes I see are,

1123
00:48:55.973 --> 00:48:56.207
one,

1124
00:48:56.567 --> 00:48:59.379
they become a generalized product marketing consultant.

1125
00:48:59.942 --> 00:49:04.239
And I think there's just the market's flooded with product marketing consultants.

1126
00:49:04.679 --> 00:49:06.020
It doesn't mean you're not going to win business,

1127
00:49:06.080 --> 00:49:08.604
but you're not going to be thought of when people need work.

1128
00:49:09.483 --> 00:49:15.287
And the number one thing I need you to find success is to niche down into something that you become known for.

1129
00:49:15.373 --> 00:49:16.311
You can talk about,

1130
00:49:16.312 --> 00:49:17.233
you can be referred to.

1131
00:49:17.248 --> 00:49:19.194
When somebody knows they've got a problem with X,

1132
00:49:20.014 --> 00:49:20.670
they come to you.

1133
00:49:21.358 --> 00:49:23.077
So decide your goal,

1134
00:49:23.842 --> 00:49:24.592
find your niche,

1135
00:49:24.858 --> 00:49:27.717
and then finally go try to sell it.

1136
00:49:28.217 --> 00:49:30.701
Nothing matters unless you can sell the thing.

1137
00:49:31.639 --> 00:49:32.311
It's not real.

1138
00:49:32.823 --> 00:49:41.414
until someone pays you for that work and Repeatably and I think maybe the easiest way to do that is to go talk to all your colleagues see where they're spending money today

1139
00:49:42.178 --> 00:49:43.939
and try to replace one of the things,

1140
00:49:44.019 --> 00:49:44.918
whether it be a person.

1141
00:49:45.438 --> 00:49:45.619
Yeah,

1142
00:49:45.678 --> 00:49:47.139
I think it's not simply,

1143
00:49:47.401 --> 00:49:47.537
oh,

1144
00:49:48.780 --> 00:49:51.998
there are product marketing teams and people are looking for fractional help.

1145
00:49:53.459 --> 00:49:57.444
I think a lot less of that exists than people think,

1146
00:49:57.639 --> 00:50:00.022
but there are a lot of people trying to solve problems in the business.

1147
00:50:00.100 --> 00:50:03.959
If you can be someone who creates a solution to those problems,

1148
00:50:04.006 --> 00:50:05.100
then I think you can build a business.

1149
00:50:06.506 --> 00:50:06.756
Awesome,

1150
00:50:06.757 --> 00:50:06.944
man.

1151
00:50:07.303 --> 00:50:07.928
Such a great tip.

1152
00:50:08.444 --> 00:50:09.756
When can people find more about you?

1153
00:50:09.757 --> 00:50:10.772
If they listen to your organization,

1154
00:50:10.803 --> 00:50:11.928
they want to learn more about you.

1155
00:50:12.146 --> 00:50:12.667
where did they go?

1156
00:50:13.027 --> 00:50:13.687
What did they check?

1157
00:50:14.628 --> 00:50:15.330
Yeah.

1158
00:50:15.609 --> 00:50:16.609
LinkedIn at

1159
00:50:17.453 --> 00:50:19.652
Drew Giovinoli or buriedwinds.com.

1160
00:50:21.378 --> 00:50:21.777
Amazing,

1161
00:50:21.793 --> 00:50:21.957
man.

1162
00:50:22.418 --> 00:50:22.699
Cool.

1163
00:50:23.519 --> 00:50:27.519
So that's about it for another episode of We're Not Marketers.

1164
00:50:28.082 --> 00:50:28.363
Thank you,

1165
00:50:28.378 --> 00:50:28.628
folks.

1166
00:50:30.597 --> 00:50:31.238
Next time.

1167
00:50:31.269 --> 00:50:31.504
See ya.

1168
00:50:34.550 --> 00:50:36.832
Thank you for listening to We're Not Marketers.

1169
00:50:37.425 --> 00:50:38.457
If you like what you heard,

1170
00:50:39.847 --> 00:50:40.972
review our podcast.

1171
00:50:41.270 --> 00:50:43.212
and share this episode with other PMMs.

1172
00:50:43.752 --> 00:50:45.255
Going out and setting campaigns,

1173
00:50:45.275 --> 00:50:46.396
we're not selling shit.

1174
00:50:46.838 --> 00:50:47.115
And so,

1175
00:50:47.998 --> 00:50:48.119
yeah,

1176
00:50:48.158 --> 00:50:52.658
I think that if product marketers don't understand the buyer,

1177
00:50:52.759 --> 00:50:54.080
however you want to do it,

1178
00:50:54.345 --> 00:50:55.244
and understand the market,

1179
00:50:55.783 --> 00:51:05.853
then you don't have much to stand on but to be like a sales deck monkey and responding to just requests from everybody in the org.

1180
00:51:05.947 --> 00:51:06.478
So yeah,

1181
00:51:06.479 --> 00:51:08.681
I think it's the foundation of what good product marketing is.

1182
00:51:09.418 --> 00:51:12.178
You're already cooking and we haven't even asked the first question.

1183
00:51:12.198 --> 00:51:12.579
So dude,

1184
00:51:12.598 --> 00:51:12.919
let's go.

1185
00:51:12.938 --> 00:51:13.778
It's going to be a fight.

1186
00:51:13.880 --> 00:51:17.997
One question to every single guest that comes on.

1187
00:51:18.083 --> 00:51:21.122
And the man with the flavor saver is about to ask it.

1188
00:51:21.123 --> 00:51:21.544
Go ahead,

1189
00:51:21.583 --> 00:51:21.840
Gab.

1190
00:51:22.583 --> 00:51:22.840
Ooh,

1191
00:51:22.841 --> 00:51:24.442
the flavor saver.

1192
00:51:24.458 --> 00:51:25.262
I love it.

1193
00:51:26.184 --> 00:51:26.356
Drew.

1194
00:51:26.934 --> 00:51:29.216
Are product marketers actually marketers?

1195
00:51:29.700 --> 00:51:30.997
Why or why not?

1196
00:51:32.325 --> 00:51:34.044
If I wasn't prepared with this question,

1197
00:51:34.122 --> 00:51:34.309
like,

1198
00:51:34.310 --> 00:51:34.590
you know,

1199
00:51:34.606 --> 00:51:35.466
I'm a bad guest.

1200
00:51:35.528 --> 00:51:36.466
I'm thinking about this.

1201
00:51:37.200 --> 00:51:37.528
And.

1202
00:51:38.826 --> 00:51:39.868
your alter egos.

1203
00:51:40.268 --> 00:51:40.948
I might have,

1204
00:51:41.049 --> 00:51:43.248
I'm going to be a little bit on their side,

1205
00:51:44.733 --> 00:51:47.194
but I actually think in disagreement with you guys,

1206
00:51:47.217 --> 00:51:48.936
I'm going to be more in agreement than most.

1207
00:51:49.217 --> 00:51:50.358
So number one,

1208
00:51:50.459 --> 00:51:50.741
yes,

1209
00:51:51.077 --> 00:51:52.819
I do think product marketers are marketers,

1210
00:51:53.459 --> 00:51:56.920
but I also think the product people are marketers.

1211
00:51:56.983 --> 00:51:59.092
I think sales are marketers.

1212
00:51:59.108 --> 00:52:02.717
I think the executive team is marketers and they don't realize it.

1213
00:52:02.811 --> 00:52:07.920
And the more that a company appreciates that kind of everybody at the company.

1214
00:52:08.630 --> 00:52:11.893
represents the company and the product to market,

1215
00:52:12.936 --> 00:52:14.155
the better the company does.

1216
00:52:14.518 --> 00:52:15.076
I think it's odd.

1217
00:52:15.158 --> 00:52:15.615
We're all

1218
00:52:16.198 --> 00:52:17.362
LinkedIn junkies here.

1219
00:52:17.455 --> 00:52:25.463
And so no one would argue the fact that you should have your executives online promoting their personal brand and that helps your business.

1220
00:52:25.901 --> 00:52:27.526
So if you can accept that fact,

1221
00:52:28.135 --> 00:52:35.901
can you accept that the more that product folks talking about themselves and their vision of the product helps market the business?

1222
00:52:36.998 --> 00:52:43.665
Can you accept the fact that maybe like the way you build your product and whatever kind of viral loops you build into it,

1223
00:52:43.666 --> 00:52:44.165
the output,

1224
00:52:44.525 --> 00:52:46.087
and that people treat it like this,

1225
00:52:46.126 --> 00:52:47.446
like holy launch day,

1226
00:52:47.892 --> 00:52:50.892
like you created some like finished sculpture.

1227
00:52:51.571 --> 00:52:52.556
And the reality is like,

1228
00:52:52.571 --> 00:52:52.892
you're just,

1229
00:52:52.907 --> 00:52:55.079
that's like a beautiful beginning.

1230
00:52:55.080 --> 00:52:55.470
It's like,

1231
00:52:55.564 --> 00:52:59.501
what's really is a new baseline that you're going to judge everything else against.

1232
00:53:00.314 --> 00:53:03.939
And hopefully two weeks in and a month in,

1233
00:53:03.970 --> 00:53:04.251
you're saying,

1234
00:53:04.267 --> 00:53:04.407
cool,

1235
00:53:04.423 --> 00:53:06.282
like what's better or what's worse.

1236
00:53:06.906 --> 00:53:12.030
The worst thing that could happen is you have a sales team that just like gives you a thumbs up and says nothing about it.

1237
00:53:12.412 --> 00:53:14.514
That probably means no one's using your shit,

1238
00:53:15.174 --> 00:53:15.377
right?

1239
00:53:15.534 --> 00:53:16.815
What you want them to say is like,

1240
00:53:16.854 --> 00:53:17.018
hey,

1241
00:53:17.393 --> 00:53:19.198
slide eight and nine suck.

1242
00:53:19.237 --> 00:53:20.080
I don't use this.

1243
00:53:20.682 --> 00:53:21.799
Can we have something else?

1244
00:53:22.643 --> 00:53:22.784
Now,

1245
00:53:23.143 --> 00:53:26.721
we're not going to grant sales like full rights to be like,

1246
00:53:26.722 --> 00:53:26.846
oh,

1247
00:53:26.847 --> 00:53:30.049
we need like four more case study examples and we need like,

1248
00:53:30.050 --> 00:53:31.674
we just need more testimonials.

1249
00:53:32.487 --> 00:53:36.455
Your job as product marketer is to like look across all the salespeople and look across all the sales calls.

1250
00:53:36.546 --> 00:53:38.868
to bring more like aggregate context into place,

1251
00:53:38.909 --> 00:53:43.753
but it's just about thinking about the end use.

1252
00:53:43.792 --> 00:53:47.234
With your pants down with like one of these types of questions,

1253
00:53:47.593 --> 00:53:47.718
A,

1254
00:53:48.757 --> 00:53:50.898
how many other sales reps did you run this by?

1255
00:53:51.780 --> 00:53:51.898
B,

1256
00:53:52.140 --> 00:53:54.671
how many customers or prospects did you run this by?

1257
00:53:55.749 --> 00:53:55.968
Right?

1258
00:53:56.405 --> 00:54:01.593
And I think that's just the really good takeaway that I'm picking up is,

1259
00:54:02.390 --> 00:54:02.515
yeah,

1260
00:54:02.655 --> 00:54:04.515
as great as it could be.

1261
00:54:06.135 --> 00:54:12.503
bringing everyone in and making it seem like it's part of their idea to begin with seems like the best recipe for success.

1262
00:54:13.100 --> 00:54:13.464
Totally.

1263
00:54:13.465 --> 00:54:13.604
I mean,

1264
00:54:13.605 --> 00:54:18.987
we start every win-loss program by interviewing all of the internal stakeholders.

1265
00:54:19.651 --> 00:54:24.300
And it is half so that we know questions that will give us answers they're going to care about,

1266
00:54:24.393 --> 00:54:24.534
right?

1267
00:54:24.535 --> 00:54:25.378
So it's not academic,

1268
00:54:25.379 --> 00:54:26.346
it's going to hit their goals.

1269
00:54:26.972 --> 00:54:32.143
And half because we want them to know that we're solving their problems,

1270
00:54:32.175 --> 00:54:33.425
not adding work to their plate.

1271
00:54:33.630 --> 00:54:34.672
Because like with win-loss,

1272
00:54:34.692 --> 00:54:35.533
you could come and say,

1273
00:54:35.594 --> 00:54:35.714
hey,

1274
00:54:35.775 --> 00:54:38.939
the demos aren't working or like the sales team isn't doing X,

1275
00:54:39.001 --> 00:54:39.118
Y,

1276
00:54:39.119 --> 00:54:39.321
or Z.

1277
00:54:39.439 --> 00:54:41.025
And if that's the first time they're hearing from you,

1278
00:54:41.403 --> 00:54:42.505
they're not going to use it.

1279
00:54:42.506 --> 00:54:43.364
They're not going to care.

1280
00:54:43.365 --> 00:54:44.247
They're going to be layoff.

1281
00:54:44.669 --> 00:54:46.052
And I always knew.

1282
00:54:46.984 --> 00:54:50.325
that I was going to go in this direction because I've repeatedly done it.

1283
00:54:50.966 --> 00:54:53.209
And this one happens to work when you talk about why,

1284
00:54:53.291 --> 00:54:58.252
but I think it comes down to your goals and your tolerance for risk.

1285
00:54:59.135 --> 00:55:01.158
Do you have a partner that can help you financially?

1286
00:55:01.159 --> 00:55:02.276
Do you have some savings?

1287
00:55:02.735 --> 00:55:04.908
Do you need to do it?

1288
00:55:04.909 --> 00:55:05.579
Do you want to do it?

1289
00:55:06.079 --> 00:55:06.298
Why?

1290
00:55:07.704 --> 00:55:08.721
I think it can be a great,

1291
00:55:08.752 --> 00:55:10.298
there's a lot of different versions of it too.

1292
00:55:10.361 --> 00:55:12.815
You can use fractional to tide you over to the next gig.

1293
00:55:13.485 --> 00:55:15.985
you can do it full time.

1294
00:55:16.356 --> 00:55:17.075
but it's fractional.

1295
00:55:17.136 --> 00:55:17.995
You're charging hourly.

1296
00:55:18.615 --> 00:55:19.856
You can move in the direction.

1297
00:55:20.636 --> 00:55:22.019
If you really want to do it long-term,

1298
00:55:22.796 --> 00:55:24.097
move to project-based,

1299
00:55:24.694 --> 00:55:27.476
which allows you when you charge per project to hire other help.

1300
00:55:28.155 --> 00:55:30.757
That helps you improve the margins and increase the scale.

1301
00:55:30.819 --> 00:55:31.999
But yeah,

1302
00:55:32.984 --> 00:55:37.093
it is great for flexibility and there's huge potential upside.

1303
00:55:37.155 --> 00:55:42.108
And it's also way more stressful and incredibly hard.

1304
00:55:42.577 --> 00:55:43.749
And at times you want to...