Category: Podcast

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Episode 45: How General Should a Marketing Generalist be? with Robert Decher

A Marketing generalist is known for having abilities in diverse fields, but what exact combination of abilities does it take? And when should a marketer try to go deep in one skill area instead of going broad.

One problem is that you can’t judge whether your skills are commonplace or exceptional, it always depends on who’s around you and how many of them can do what you do. After all, everyone is an expert to someone else 

I’m lucky enough to have known Robert Decher for the better part of a decade. Listen to the show where he explains how:

  • Good Careers don’t always go in straight lines, but broad abilities acquired along the way are augmented by one skill that goes deep, together forming the shape of a T. Hence the name T-shaped career. 
  • There’s no substitute for experience.

People/Products/Concepts Mentioned in the Episode

Episode Reboots

  • It takes trust to do work that’s at the fringes of someone’s skills, by both the person paying for the work and the person doing it.  
  • A good generalist is able to think out and talk about how something should work, even if they aren’t the one building all of it. 

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Episode 44: Social Networks for the 2020s, with Mandi Relyea Voss

In this episode I talk with Amanda Relyea-Voss (who also likes to be called Mandi), owner of a 5 person social media marketing agency, Like a Voss, that serves B2C and B2B companies. Listen for the ways Mandi has used social media to interact with prospects and how this has propelled them to buy from her customers.

Last time Amanda was on the podcast, we covered LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. Since then, there have been many changes to these platforms – Stories; a way for users to watch a short, possibly edited, video of anything they wish to upload. We have also seen new platforms which have become popular in just a short amount of time such as TikTok and Clubhouse. In this podcast, we talk about these platforms and see if they can add value to companies who need help with their social media marketing.

Catch this video excerpt from the episode:

People/Places/Concepts

Episode Reboot

“Show up as yourself”

How to Contact Amanda

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Episode 43: Marketing Within the Limits of Data Privacy

A lot of changes have happened with Data Privacy lately, as people have grown more aware of information that companies have on them. Cookies were introduced to allow sites to improve the visitor experience. But their usage has mushroomed so much, we now need pop-ups on sites just to say how many cookies are being used.

With privacy regulations passed and more looming, big tech players like Apple and Google are pre-emptively changing data tracking. Google’s taking away the individual targeting on which they have sold ads for the last 20 years. 

There will be more episodes on this topic, because it is changing and we won’t know how it fully impacts marketers for another year or two. But for now, let’s explore all that’s happened and look at tactical alternatives we as site owners and marketers can take to react to this.

People/Places/Concepts

Apple Technologies:

  • ATT – App Tracking Transparency
  • ITP – Intelligent Tracking Protocol
  • IDFA – Identifier for Advertisers

Google Technologies:

  • FLoCs – Federated Learning of Cohorts
  • FLEDGE – First “Locally-Executed Decision over Groups” Experiment
  • Turtledove – “Two Uncorrelated Requests, Then Locally-Executed Decision On Victory”

Lawsuits brought by Governments in US against Google

Surveillance Capitalism (term coined by author Shoshana Zuboff)

Porter Model:

Resources:

Google Ads Announcement on Privacy Sandbox and FLoCs

Page that Julie Bacchini and the #ppcchat community are curating: Privacy & Cookieless Resources

Eric Seufert’s podcast on this topic

Episode Reboot:

Ensure your site complies with opt-in provisions and limited data collection policies.

Collect first-party data on your leads/buyers, including which advertisements they saw. Form inferences on which ads your entire potential-buyer population should see, based on this statistical sample. 

Encourage visitors to provide their email early, so you can track them as they go from visitor to lead to customer. You will be better prepared when Google Ads switches to selling cohorts of users based on interest.

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Episode 42: Structuring Marketing Automation for success with Steve Shock

Until recently, contacting prospects and customers was difficult and came with enterprise-sized price tags. Only 25 years ago, the CRM landscape was dominated by PeopleSoft, Oracle and Siebel. To send out mass emails, products like Yesmail, UnityMail, ExactTarget and FloNetwork used to be the only games in town. But around the year 2000 the cloud-based CRM Salesforce entered as well as entry-level email tools like MailChimp. Then followed by a newer breed of tools that sent emails and bolted onto a website, letting you trace when email recipients revisited your site. This marked the start of Marketing Automation platforms, which has the power of old enterprise systems at a much lower price point, and they talk to CRMs. Around 2010, Steve Shock got so intrigued with Marketing Automation’s potential, he decided to act as a consultant to show companies how to take advantage of the tools. 

Steve specializes in revenue generation engines for SMB’s in B2B. As head of Shock & Co, he works independently or part of a larger team. He also works with the non-profit organization, Invest Ottawa, as an advisor to companies who are trying to scale. 

Listen in the episode where Steve talks about how to set up marketing automation campaign’s so they will keep in touch with buyers throughout their journey. I love that he avoids jargon when describing the technical parts of this, and he has actionable tips for both prospect and customer communication. 

Steve can be contacted on LinkedIn or at shockandco@gmail.com

People, products, concepts mentioned:

  • Forrester’s research showing it takes a minimum of four, and typically seven+ touches of a prospect to get them to engage.
  • How CRM and Marketing Automation should be considered as a single database
  • Try to send ‘marketing emails’ from a person’s email address, such as head of marketing or the CEO

Types of Drip campaigns:

  • Sequence sent to raw leads to turn them into qualified prospects (demo or free SaaS user)
  • Sequence sent to qualified prospects to turn them into paid users or closed customer
  • Sequence sent once they have become a customer 

Reboot:

For inspiration on how to write copy to use in automated emails, look at emails you/your sales team have already sent to prospects.

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Episode 41: How Google Analytics 4 Impacts Marketers with Jim Cain

In fall 2020, Google released version 4 of their Google Analytics tool (here is the official announcement of GA4). Despite its description as a new version, this is actually a brand new product. In fact, it’s part of Google’s switch to a whole new technology stack, and the ripples of their move extend to the remotest corners of a marketer’s world.

What do you need to know about GA4? For one, it has a different interface from the existing “Universal” version of GA. It doesn’t have some features and functions that you assume are in GA. At the same time, there are things that GA4 has that you haven’t been able to get before without paying for GA Premium. 

My guide for this tour of GA4 is Jim Cain, who founded the analytics consultancy Napkyn in 2009, one of only a few Premier Google Marketing Platform Solution Partners. If you want to know what to do about GA4, Jim will tell you how Napkyn is dealing with it in their client work.

People, products and Concepts mentioned on the show:

Episode Reboot

Set up a GA4 Property onto your existing GA account as soon as possible, to run it in parallel with GA3. 

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Episode 40: Giving Search Engines what they want with Brock Murray

You’re looking at a screen that’s empty, aside from a little box that you type or talk onto. A zillionth of a second later, you see all that the internet has, relating to what you entered. 

We’re talking about search engine results pages and though they may seem to simply fetch information, there’s a whole lot that we marketers need to know in order to appear there. 

I want you to listen as he explains Snippets markup XML schema, Info boxes, web stories open Graph, Search console and other technical aspects of how search data is indexed. 

Brock Murray is a full-stack marketer who specializes most in SEO. He started coding websites for friends and family members. He started his agency around 2012 and I met him recently after that, hearing him on a panel and liking how transparent he was in giving advice. Later I ran an event and asked him to speak at it.

Zooming ahead to the present, the agency is now a 7-figure business that does ecommerce sites, local service businesses, you name it. What I like most of all is how Brock still practices what he preaches in SEO, sharing real time experimentation he’s doing in his work, and what we can all learn about web search from doing it.

Follow Brock on Twitter or find out about his agency, SEOPlus+

People, products and Concepts mentioned on the show:

Episode Reboot

Brock created a tool that checks how well websites are optimized for search. To have your site checked, visit FreeSEOReport.ca

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Episode 39: Mistakes Marketers Shouldn’t Make (and some they Should) with Jordan Danger

Mistakes so ingrained in our present-day world, we even expect them in depictions set in the future. If you watch Star Trek you’ll know that anytime they beam down on an away mission, something’s going to go wrong and usually someone wearing a red shirt won’t last until the end of the episode. 

Beyond hearing Star Trek references in this show, you’ll hear the roles that automation, documentation, realistic deadlines and self-assessments all have in determining whether mistakes happen. You’ll also hear how they can be avoided, but also why bending ourselves into pretzels trying not to make them is wrong.

My guest Jordan Danger, founder of Danger Co., a 360° marketing consulting and coaching practice. Right off the bat, you need to know that Jordan isn’t afraid to make mistakes. In fact, when you hear her last name in a moment, you’ll see how aptly it describes her fearlessness. And how she makes her opinions about marketing known. 

Jordan went to school for youth & social work, but has always had a flair for communications. Ever a believer in the power of the internet to share stories, a personal life event gave her the chance to build an audience off her blog and social media accounts. The explosive success of that project gave her the spark to enter marketing, which led her to sell her expertise to companies she met through her personal project. 

That led to working for a City Councillor and then working as an independent marketing consultant to tech firms, ranging from startups to ones going through successive investment rounds.  In addition to her consultancy, she’s an artist, writer, an Advisor at a local business accelerator, an Ottawa Forty Under 40 Recipient, a part time professor at Algonquin College and someone who’s enthusiastic about youth wellness, animals and nature. 

Products, People and Concepts mentioned in this show:

Episode Reboot

Jordan’s advice to marketers:

  • Study outside your field. 
  • Participate in teams outside of your department 
  • Focus on psychology, economics and consumer behavior. 
  • Listen – all the time listen.
  • Follow what your audiences follow like you are Star Trek’s Spock on an away Mission, without emotion.

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Episode 38: A Cooperative Approach to Content with Paul Schneider

Disclaimer: The company featured here is not a sponsor of the show, nor have I affiliated with them. They simply bring a perspective that I think you’ll get some use from.

A simple marketing model goes something like this: We have a product that solves a problem; a buyer who has that problem finds us, decides it’s a fit and a sale happens. Right? Sounds great! But it puts some big expectations on a buyer:

  • that they can feel their unmet need, their problem 
  • That there’s a well-known product category for out there and that they can find the vendors 
  • That they can predict the success they’d get from buying our product 

It’s a stretch to imagine a buyer could independently do all these. That’s what content marketing is meant for, to educate the prospects, informing them of the solution’s value and elevating us, the content’s author, in the process. Relax marketers everywhere, Content is the answer to your prayers.  Content is all you need. What’s that you say? You don’t have enough Content?  Or You don’t know how to deploy it externally to its maximum effect? 

Well, our guest has good news for you, he feels content can be found internally in our companies. And, for those who sell technology products, he’s also full of ideas on how content draw in prospects, getting them to use and come onside with our products. 

 My guest is Paul Schneider, came to using content for marketing by using content for a different purpose: training & education. Content has posed the same challenges in their field as ours, as they tried to modernize training content, letting people take it in at their own pace, no matter how distant they were from a classroom.

He got into this field by studying in education and psychology, which led him to the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign for a PhD. Illinois is practically the American epicenter of large-scale computing, which onto the internet through tools like Telnet, Eudora, the Mosaic browser. Companies built by U of Illinois alumnus include Netscape, Siebel Systems, PayPal and YouTube.  

Being at this school while all this was going on, he witnessed efforts to take learning onto the internet, built on top of browsers. He got in on the ground-floor and a decade and a half later is SVP of business development at a company that makes eLearning authoring software Dominknow.

Paul spoke to me from Colorado; he shares how his company, Dominknow Learning Systems use content to market their SaaS-based software. 

Show Notes:

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Episode 37: Taking B2B beyond the Big Three: Running Paid Social on Smaller Networks with Andrea Cruz

A lot of attention is given to the largest ad platforms (Google/YouTube and Facebook proper, along with Instagram & WhatsApp) – eMarketer says this duopoly accounts for two-thirds of all digital advertising.

If you include Amazon, whose market share is somewhere in the teens and should be in the 20s soon, over 80% of all the money paid to reach buyers is spent on three platforms. Does it make sense to take our advertising beyond these big players to smaller networks, that account for only one out of every five? Our guest, Andrea Cruz, says yes. A Manager with Boston-based agency KoMarketing, she feels these lesser-known Social Networks pose a great opportunity for B2B advertisers. In this show, she will talk about three networks, and how it takes a different approach to campaign on them successfully. 

Persons, concepts and products mentioned:

Episode Reboot

Don’t go too big, don’t go too small. Try to go for a medium-amount of data so you can learn.

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Episode 36: Adapting How Marketing is Taught in Higher Ed with Jonathan Simon

Are colleges and universities keeping up with the changes in marketing? To answer this question, Prof Scott Cowley of Western Michigan University surveyed 529 US University marketing programs. Here are the results: out of all higher education institutions that teach marketing, 27% do not offer a single digital marketing course. Of those that do have digital in their curriculum, half of them offer only one digital marketing course. It seems even when schools have a digital component that they’re uncommitted to it.  Students at 9 out of 10 of these schools can graduate with a degree without taking a digital marketing course.

Prof Cowley pointed out the mismatch between schools and the outside world.  “Traditional marketers are struggling to upskill, marketing graduates have studied a syllabus that doesn’t include digital techniques, and digital professionals have inconsistent abilities due to a lack of standardized skills training”

But there’s a growing number of Profs that are bringing Off-Campus experts and their ideas into the classroom to help the next generation of marketers meet today’s needs. One of them is our guest, Jonathan Simon, who, since becoming a professor at U of Ottawa’s Telfer School of Business, has influenced how their marketing programs are taught.  He not only uses his educational background (which includes a BA and an MBA) to teach   but he also draws from time in the private sector where he worked with media companies and in the mobile technology space.

People, concepts and products mentioned:

Episode Reboot:

“If you are out in industry, keep learning. These students are hungry and they are gunning for your job”