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Episode 132: From Backroom to Boardroom, with Debbie Qaqish

Ep 132 Debbie Qaqish

This is the second episode in our Revenue Ops series. 

As Partner and Chief Strategy Officer of The Pedowitz Group, Dr. Debbie Qaqish has helped marketing teams drive revenue growth, foster customer centricity and lead digital transformation. With a focus on revenue operations, the customer experience and a personalized, omni-channel marketing mix, Dr. Debbie has established herself as a thought leader and digital pioneer, spearheading the overdue shift of traditional marketing strategies to what she coined as “revenue marketing” in 2011. Since then, marketing operations became her area of expertise, devising strategy-to-execution plans that earn marketing a seat at the table.

Dr. Debbie has published over one hundred articles, blogs, podcasts, webinars and white papers and in 2021 published “From Backroom to Boardroom”

Dr. Debbie earned her doctorate in 2019 from the University of Phoenix.

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Dr Debbie Qaqish’s personal site

To receive The “From Backroom to Boardroom” eBook, send an email to Debbie 

Steve Woods

PayCor

MarTech stack appearing in book, used with permission
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Episode 131: Revenue Ops, with Lawrence Quan

Lawrence Quan

Sales has been around forever. But how long have we had marketing? In North America, it’s the late 1800s and  early 1900s. 

You’d get an idea of what they were focused on by reading the journal of the US agricultural economics Bureau. In it, they chronicled the 1937 annual meeting the National Association of marketing officials (You may know it by its current name, the American Marketing Association). The proceedings were entirely about the marketing of… farm products. Producing and selling as many commodities as possible, to as many regions as possible.

Despite being in just one category, this assembly of academia and Industry was trying to formalize how this function would blend in with the other departments, like sales, within the average American business. Fast forward nearly a century, there seems to be a new framework on the horizon for how the marketing and sales functions should be organized – and it’s called Revenue Operations. The purpose of this four part series is to go inside businesses where it’s being used and listen to thought leaders who have written about it. 

For this first episode of the series, we going into the trenches with someone possessing a diverse blend of experience spanning Revenue Operations, Marketing, Sales, and Product, Lawrence Quan brings a holistic view of revenue to startups of all stages. 

He is Director, Growth Marketing with LTSE. He has also built growth teams at Rewind and led Growth Marketing at Clearco. On the side, Lawrence works with seed, Series A, and Series B SaaS companies to build and scale go-to-market engines.

 Listen to the various places he’s seen RevOps in organizations but wherever it sits, he stresses that it is a team sport. Hear how a revenue-focus gets infused into the Marketing Mix, and how the best marketing ideas don’t always come from marketing. 

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Lawrence’s LinkedIn profile 

Rewind.io

Clearco

Gong

Archival records from early days of marketing. The group working to advertise farm products here later became the American Marketing Association.
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Episode 130: How to Interview Customers, with Ryan Gibson

Hot to Interview Customers with Ryan Gibson

We spend a lot of time demonstrating who our company is built around. We leave an open chair for them in board meetings. We put notices on the footer of our website, We provide automated feedback mechanisms so we can gauge how they feel, and when we hold in-person events or trade shows where they appear, we make every effort to give them swag and confirm their upcoming purchase plans (hopefully, buying from us). I’m talking about customers, of course, and though we do all these things, there seems to be one thing we dance around; the one simple  activity that could give the most intelligence –  talking to them. 

I’m not saying we don’t talk to customers. But most of that talk is anecdotal. I don’t know about you, but as a marketer, I wouldn’t go to the C-suite and defend a marketing program and budget based on a customer’s anecdotal comment. 

But done in the right way, that’s systematic and that follows qualitative Research principles, talking to customers can take the pulse of our market. We can analyze their experiences, making those findings available,  doing it in a way that would not only stand up to any Executive’s scrutiny, they’d insist on basing more corporate decisions on this information. 

Over his 20 years in marketing. Ryan Gibson has worked with dozens of businesses overseeing programs from the bootstrapped variety, on up to million-dollar budget variety.  

Using skills he got early in his career he worked in TV & Radio and film, doing a stint as reporter for Canada’s public broadcaster, CBC, which got him so used to interviewing, he kept doing it and figures that he’s now conducted over 1800 of them

He now heads up Content Lift, a Marketing Strategy consultancy centred around Customer Research. 

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Ryan is prolific on LinkedIn 

Ryan’s How to Run Customer Interviews course

Related show: “Lean B2B” with Etienne Garbugli

Wynter online panel

Respondent software

As you interview, pretend you’re detective Columbo
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Episode 129: Marketing a SaaS product, with Mark Evans

Marketing a SaaS Product

Let me run a scenario by you: I want you to have something I’m not finished making, and I’m not going to let you buy it, but I will let you pay to use it. and you will continue to pay me over time to use this thing that I continue to work on. And while you use it, I will get to see what you’re doing with my product. And I’ll use that information to figure out how I can sell you new things.

It doesn’t sound like a very good deal for you as a buyer,  does it? But this is exactly how SaaS works, and most of the software in B2B and the world for that matter is now bought & sold this way, marketers don’t skip a beat explaining this aspect of their product. But surprisingly, some things about SaaS products do trip them up. And today we’re going to talk with someone who’s seen almost everything that can go wrong in marketing SaaS.

Mark Evans has worked in & written about the SaaS space for his whole career.  He began as a technology journalist for the Globe & Mail, National Post, and Bloomberg News. Moving on from there, he co-founded what ended up being a wildly unsuccessful startup. Some of the mistakes you’ll hear are ones that he himself has made.

He now helps B2B SaaS companies accelerate growth with rock-solid marketing foundations underpinned by positioning, messaging, brand storytelling, and go-to-market plans. 

Through his consultancy Marketing Spark he works with B2B SaaS companies as a fractional CMO, strategic advisor, brand strategist and coach.

he spends a lot of time focused on positioning, strategy, and systems that drive consistent and successful marketing, 

We spoke to him in his hometown of Toronto, where in off-hours you can find him playing hockey and tennis.

People/Products/Concepts Mentioned in Show

Mark on TikTok

Mark on Twitter

Mark’s Marketing Spark podcast

Mark’s book: “Marketing Spark”

Eric Ries, author of “Lean Startup”

Rand Fishkin

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Episode 128: High Tech Marketing Simplified, with Ted Marena

High Tech Marketing Simplified, Ted Marena

This is the last episode we’re covering in our series around product marketing books. The books in the three previous shows gave foundational advice that would benefit any product manager or  product marketing manager in their career. But there’s a single vertical that has idiosyncrasies setting it apart from other industries, and you should know about them if you’re going to market these kind of products. 

The industry that does things differently is High tech – and today’s book not only explains how to market these products, it boils it down into simple steps that you can apply on the job.  

Ted Marena has been in the tech sector for  over 25 years, working his way from engineering to sales and onto marketing roles.

Marena came out with the book “High-Tech Marketing Simplified” in 2022. It builds upon his initial book “Marketing Simplified.” He earned a BSEE from the University of Connecticut and a MBA from Bentley University. I caught up with him in the High Tech mecca of Silicon Valley where he lives with his wife & sons. 

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Ted’s email: ted.marena@gmail.com

Get EducaTed by Ted – YouTube channel

High-Tech Marketing Simplified book on Amazon – https://www.amazon.com/High-Tech-Marketing-Simplified-Insiders-Experience-ebook/dp/B0BC83D4PC/

High-Tech Marketing Simplified book on Kobo – High-Tech Marketing Simplified eBook by Ted Marena – EPUB | Rakuten Kobo United States

If you are a fan of Tesla, check out Ted’s product reviews – Tesla Owners Silicon Valley – YouTube

“Moore’s Law” coined by Gordon Moore of Intel

Raspberry Pi

Avoid the problem of marketing “Trombone Oil” or a product with too small a niche audience (illustration used with permission).

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Episode 127: The Launch with Yasmeen Turayhi

The Launch with Yasmeen Turayhi

Product Marketing Managers go through trying times, but possibly the moments where these stresses are most concentrated are when their function is initially being formed, and of course when a new product is being launched. Key decisions are made at these times, and they are extra stressful when you have to make those decisions in a vacuum, without a formulated strategy to guide its development.  

Our guest’s book takes you through a dry run of this whole process. It gives you questions that begin at the genesis of a product, following through topics that you ought to readily answer at that particular stage. 

By testing how well you’re able to answer those questions, you can catch any gaps before they turn into stress-inducing all-night work marathons.

Yasmeen Turayhi is an authority on  product management. She’s taught Bootcamps and workshops for Global companies and universities such as Harvard and MIT, and been a mentor at Founders Institute.

In addition to her three books on this subject,  she has also written dramatic screenplays, one of which was feted at International Film Festivals in Beirut and Hollywood. She is the host of “Gateways to Awakening” a podcast dealing with wellness, personal development, and higher consciousness.

People/Products/Concepts Mentioned in Show

Yasmeen’s twitter profile

Yasmeen’s LinkedIn profile

Yasmeen’s Instagram profile

Yasmeen’s Medium profile

Yasmeen’s book “The Launch”

Yasmeen’s Latest book, “Breaking into Product Marketing”

Jobs To Be Done framework

Ed Catmull’s book Creativity, Inc.

Evelyn Watts

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Episode 126: Lean B2B, with Etienne Garbugli

Lean B2B Etienne Garbugli

Unicorn, Incubator, Angel, Seed round, Pitch deck, CAC & CLV. These are all buzzwords used by startups. 

There is one word that’s used in startup culture which, unlike the buzzwords, is grounded in reality. Its methodology nudges them to design products that fit the dire needs of the early adopters, and then ride a wave of growth as the wider mainstream market adopts it. 

We call this methodology Lean and from Eric Ries on down, there have been some great founders who have taken time  out and written down how they have implemented lean.  Today’s guest is one of those people. He thought there ought to be a book explaining the differences in the lean approach when you’re in B2B. 

The resulting book,  “Lean B2B: Build Products Businesses Want”, guides those of us in these kinds of startup companies just as well as direct to consumer folks are helped by the best lean books out there that revolve around B2C. I know that B2B product Marketers, especially those trying to  generate demand for new products, will be keen to hear the methods in this book.

Etienne Garbugli is a five-time entrepreneur and in three of those, he was a Founder. Feeling he should help  other entrepreneurs and innovators build products for this market, he released Lean B2B initially in 2014 and the second edition in 2022. He is also the author of the books: Find Your Market, The SaaS Email Marketing Playbook, and Solving Product.

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Etienne’s Twitter profile

Etienne’s LinkedIn page

Etienne’s Medium page

Lean B2B Book website

LeanB2B podcast

Dixon & Adamson’s ‘The Challenger Sale’

Sean Ellis PMF survey

John Cutler, creator of ‘Your Customer’s World’ Venn diagram:

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Episode 125: Loved, with Martina Lauchengco

Loved, with Martina Lauchengco

This episode is the first in a series on product marketing. In my opinion, this is one of the toughest roles someone can have in a company. As its two-word name suggests, it sits in no-mans land between other well entrenched corporate functions. Yet, to get external clients to fall in love with what you make, you’ve got to have good product marketing. 

As squishy as the concept of Love is, it’s what today’s guest chose as the theme for her book on Product Marketing, which came out in 2022.   

Martina Lauchengco is the product marketing partner at SVPG (Silicon Valley Product Group) and a partner at Costanoa Ventures, a boutique early-stage venture capital firm. Those positions combined have her advising Fortune 500 companies and early-stage startups on product marketing.  Her writing has been featured in TechCrunch and VentureBeat. Prior to this Martina worked at Microsoft and Netscape after receiving her BA and MA from Stanford.

She lives in San Francisco with her husband and two kids, and lectures at nearby Berkeley in their engineering graduate program.  

People/Products/Concepts Mentioned in Show

Pocket vs Instapaper

Questions Product Marketing Managers should ask about users:

  • What are they trying to do?
  • Do they recognize and prioritize this problem?
  • What is motivating them to solve the problem?
  • What compels them to take action?
  • What in this product delivers the most value?
  • Who is most likely to value and buy this product?
  • What starts the journey toward acquiring the product?
  • How might a product get discovered and become more desired over the entire journey?
  • How might we reduce friction in acquiring the product?

Malcolm Gladwell

HEART metrics: 

  • Happiness 
  • Engagement 
  • Acquisition 
  • Retention 
  • Task Success 

The book’s Amazon page: “Loved: How to Rethink Marketing for Tech Products”

Martina on LinkedIn

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Episode 124: The Year 2022 in Review

Guests from 2022 review the year gone by

Here is a look back at marketing trends, as seen by 19 of this past year’s guests. What they feel is most important in marketing and where they think we’re going next.

Five key themes of 2022 that will carry into 2023:

  • Analytics is Everywhere
  • Translating data into revenue dollars
  • Recasted relationship with Sales
  • Doing More with Knowing Less (privacy concerns)
  • Things made possible by AI

Here are the people you will hear on this episode:

Gary Amaral

Eric Boissonneault

Jodi Daniels

Kevin Dieny

Janet Driscoll Miller

Rick Endrulat

Amanda Farley

Richard Fergie

Kevin Hartman

Jon Hinderliter

Leona Hobbs

John Jantsch

Ameet Khabra

Cathy McPhillips

Drew Neisser

Keith Perhac

Paul Roetzer

Brett Serjeantson

Julia Vyse

Thanks to them and all of the guests featured on shows throughout 2022!

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Episode 123: PPC Health Check, with Amalia Fowler

My guest, after receiving a degree in psychology, worked as a barista at Starbucks and a local high-end hotel. In a conversation about career paths with the hotel’s HR manager, she heard about the British Columbia Institute of Technology‘s two-year co-op and classroom-based marketing communications programme. She enrolled.  Her first co-op internship was with a start-up automotive marketing company, where she was supposed to shadow their Pay-Per-Click campaign manager. After her first week, the supervisor resigned, and an executive asked her to take over, and right after getting her marcomm certificate she worked there full-time,  growing out their PPC team. That led to working as a PPC expert at an agency, and within three and a half years she rose to a director-level position there.

In 2021 she went on her own, founding Good AF Consulting which focuses on helping find and fix issues within a brand’s PPC and SEO efforts. Wanting to exercise her passion for sharing time and knowledge with new marketers, she has also gone back to BCIT but as an instructor in the very marketing programme she graduated from. In addition to teaching, she mentors new marketers, writes and works hard to leave the industry in a better state than the way she found it. 

Please welcome someone who’s been named to  PPC Hero’s list of the Top 25 people in PPC, Amalia Fowler.

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Episode Reboot.