On this episode of the Unlearn podcast, Join hosts Kelly and Asher as they talk to Kristen Jacobson, a growth marketer and head of digital operations at UST. Kristen unfolds her unconventional journey into marketing and how her entrepreneurial background has shaped her unique approach to growth marketing. Their discussion spans a spectrum of intriguing topics, from the influence of pop culture on B2B marketing to forging emotional connections with customers.
00:00 - Introduction & Background
01:30 - What's top of mind for you right now?
04:41 - How B2B marketers create emotional connections like B2C.
08:12 - B2B buyers expect B2C-like experiences.
12:53 - Career in marketing.
17:20 - Digital marketplaces blend with crucial in-person interactions.
20:55 - Craft compelling, immersive in-person and virtual experiences.
23:42 - The importance of break-out sessions for fostering engagement..
27:51 - Creating the community experience
29:18 - The importance of localization.
35:30 - Inspiring people through engagement.
37:51 - B2B tech firms overlook people and process challenges
41:36 - Focus on business agility and efficiency.
43:55 - Offering objectivity, problem-solving, and a structured approach to digital transformation.
45:24 - Evoke emotional resonance by articulating and naming pain points in marketing.
48:31 - Challenging to shift from 'billboard mentality,' emphasize trust and problem-solving.
"B2B tech fails to look at the consumer side of things enough"
Asher Mathew
00:17.90
Hey everybody welcome back to another episode of Unlearn and we have a new guest and the same old Kelly with us. So just kidding for the record there were like a few jokes made before the podcast started. So I figure I start with mine first and I'm sure Kelly will have 5 more on me.
Asher Mathew
00:36.55
But as the podcast goes Kristin welcome to the show tell us a little bit about yourself.
Kristin Jacobson
00:38.80
Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Kristin Jacobson
00:45.72
I'm Kristin I guess I'd say a growth marketer, my current title is head of digital operations at UST, but I would say my whole career has been focused on growth marketing, and just over the last year I've been more focused on the digital marketing side of things.
Asher Mathew
01:13.70
Super, tell us what's top of mind for you. That's how we always kick these things off.
Kristin Jacobson
01:19.13
I mean, to be honest, it's really all about Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift because I want to know if they're dating and I’m very invested. He is my tight end on my fantasy football team and I’m a huge fan.
Kelly Sarabyn
01:32.92
So funny. HubSpot has been talking about this internally and I'm like I am so out of the pop culture loop I'm like I have no idea who Travis is or what this is going on. But thank you for explaining.
Kristin Jacobson
01:48.56
he's well Taylor is bringing lots of new views to the NFL for sure, so it is kind of an interesting phenomenon I mean it has taken over the world. and . Yes, so on a serious note like oh yea, yea, she is
Asher Mathew
02:03.19
Her tour was like sold out for every location, wasn’t it?
Kelly Sarabyn
02:10.80
Well, here's the question then is there anything to learn from B2B companies? Those who are looking for marketing can learn from Taylor Swift
Kristin Jacobson
02:20.16
It's well that is good, that's a perfect lead to something that I've been thinking about because yes in B2B Tech I think that we fail to look at the consumer side of things enough.
Asher Mathew
02:24.53
Always the greatest.
Kristin Jacobson
02:37.26
Like I think Taylor Swift she's a fantastic marketer and has controlled every aspect of her brand forever. , but also really connects emotionally to her audience in ways that we all need to do as marketers right? So, yes. That's an interesting segue I mean I spent a lot of years in, consumer marketing and also sales and operations and now on the B2B side of things. It’s interesting because marketers who are B2B focused rely on sales. Seems like they often forget about all the selling you need to do in your marketing., and that seems to be coming to a head right now I think with all the digital touchpoints that everybody has, and decisions are made way before the sales team is ever contacted., and. I think, more well especially B2B marketers need to be thinking about the consumer experience and, it’s hard to sell like in B2B from a marketing perspective, right? I mean you are. You're trying to inspire and build trust., and it’s a long transaction. So, that is difficult and so the people who love consumer marketing probably don't end up in B2B, because it's frustrating.
Kristin Jacobson
04:09.00
And hard., and you get the rewards, very, incrementally versus with e-commerce or any sort of, even a smaller tech company. It would be just a lot easier to find that satisfaction you get from selling.
Kelly Sarabyn
04:30.38
What are some of the ways that you think that B2B Marketers can kind to foster that emotional connection because I think that it's not baked into the playbooks? It's just viewed differently and it's something Consumer Marketers Do very well I think it's been. Baked into their playbooks more from the get-go. Do You have any advice for B2B marketers to kind of understand the concept of hey, business is made up of individual people and individual buyers with individual KPIs and goals? I agree with you too. I don't think there are a lot of switchovers like you, people who go from consumer to B to B you mostly see people spending their whole career on one side of the table. But. The Buy journey for the business has become more digital. It has become more hands-on which is more similar to a lot of consumer purchasing. So, do you have any advice for someone who wants to try to create that emotional connection with a business?
Kristin Jacobson
05:34.32
Ye, I think, as a marketer you have to think about the buyer experience all the time, right? But, what people fail to remember is that its decision-making in businesses is way more critical than it is on a consumer level and but marketers and B2B tech want to talk business talk and I think they don't want to delve emotionally into a lot of things a lot I mean most of the time, I wouldn't say all the time but a lot of the times they're afraid of trying to be emotional in their copy or their experiences that they build. But for an executive if he makes a bad decision as a businessperson, he might lose his job where if you buy a car that's a bad decision- It doesn't affect his whole life. It's not so comprehensive. So, I think remembering that you're selling to people- I have this conversation a lot actually because a lot of, like social media for example, social media. Everyone wants to just focus on LinkedIn.
Kristin Jacobson
06:47.59
in a B2B world., and we don't live on LinkedIn the time and so we want to meet our customers where they're at and with appropriate messages for the channel, but like remembering that. Where they're spending their time where they find passion I mean I have conversations a lot about brand-safe channels that we want to be on and being careful about what we want to be positioned next to and does it looks bad if we're on Facebook versus just on LinkedIn and , my , my argument back is yes I mean they're going to be remembering the experience as a whole, not just one channel. They're not going to just associate it with one social channel., but. I think if you don't get inside of the mind of your customer then you're going to miss out and like a huge opportunity for, conversions., I just kind of rambled ped there, But , like I think that.
Asher Mathew
07:59.20
Well, I Guess you'll double-click just a little bit on the buyer now right? But for pretty much like all B2B. Is not being trained for buying through the B2B Tactics right? Or B2B let's call it activations if you will. They're learning from B2C experiences and then now expecting that their B2B experience would be the same right?
Asher Mathew
08:28.71
Because I'm spending way more time. Let's call it Costco or Whole Foods or Trader Joe's or things like that where the experience has been brought to me and then I have a lot of variety and I have a lot of options. I can stroll around. There's no pressure if I want to return something. It gets renewed so now we have this B2C way of life and B2B way of doing business and that's kind of like what we're also seeing on LinkedIn because like LinkedIn is way more like Facebook now than ever before right?
Asher Mathew
09:04.76
And now people are pushing like I guess I'll take the blame for this one too. But like today for the first time, I posted a TikTok video on LinkedIn and I'm not even on TikTok, right? like somebody shared it with me I looked at it I was like oh this looks pretty interesting and then I so. Now you have like other platforms that are more B2C-ish or at least that's where our families hang out in,, being brought into the B2B journey and so there was back in the day there was like a stack that like a.
Asher Mathew
09:39.79
You needed five 5 or 7 touchpoints with a customer or with a prospect before they would even be ready to take a phone call and I think that may be still true or would love to get your opinion on this, nut those 5 to 7 touch points are now like over I don't know like 7 to 9 channels.
Kristin Jacobson
10:03.40
Yes, we all have to compete with Netflix in a way like if you think about it because Netflix is so seamless- your experience on your app on your computer on your iPad. You can pause something in one area and then go to another and pick it right up so like yes, that's important to be able to create these great multilayered experiences but they have to be seamless, and I think. We are missing out on all the touch points from a B2B perspective if we're not looking at things like Reddit things like TikTok things - all the different publications that, people want to be on. Back to what you're asking about, 5 to 7 channels I think. , that's a really interesting point because , we especially in digital marketing. We're looking at all these differences., are we cookie less are we able to capture buyer personas anymore and. First-party data second-party -all these things that go into building these customer personas and all the privacy stuff that's happening. We have to sort of pivot a lot and at the end of the day I think we have to go back to the roots of traditional marketing. Where are we are thinking
Kristin Jacobson
11:33.37
how do we? How do we get people to start thinking about us? How can, is it 5 to 10? Is it twenty? I mean there’s I’ve seen lots of , publications saying like you need to have 15 minimum 15 pieces of content. For a B2B consumer before they're going to reach out and in, in our world like fifteen pieces of content on 1 subject is pretty big task. when you have 5,000 verticals that you're trying to market. So it’s, I think I think I think that's true. The more touch points the better., and we have to have a lot more channels and a lot more, like a big content supply chain. to meet the needs of all the content that we need to create., and touch on all the different channels., but I don't think that's different from B to C don't.
Asher Mathew
12:36.13
Ye I mean I would think B2C marketers are good at understanding all the touch points I mean actually just so that we know you get to you a little bit better. Like when did you come up through marketing? Did you come up through demand gen through Corp comms through branding?
Kristin Jacobson
12:53.95
So yea I have kind of a nontraditional background. I started marketing when I was 4, to be honest, and I'm not joking about my grandmother. my grandmother was an entrepreneur and she founded natural childbirth in the country.
Asher Mathew
12:54.59
Okay, that's great.
Kristin Jacobson
13:10.91
As a little kid I often helped her with building her newsletters and my first newsletter cover was on her monthly newsletter. I was four and I remember doing that. So, like I've always been involved in some sort like business world growth things even from really little. In college I worked with my family's staffing firm. so, we did nurses, we placed nurses and so I worked in staffing. I
Kristin Jacobson
13:46.30
took a break from the staffing world and after college went into the financial world and I worked with a couple of consulting firms doing financial consulting and, quickly realized that I could not see myself doing monthly closes and budgets the rest of my life I loved understanding the operations of a business, but I kept on gravitating to, how do we grow? How do we make more and so, when I had my son, my first son I took a break from working for about a year, and then I.
.Kristin Jacobson
14:25.56
I got back into staffing actually and started - I had a friend reach out to me and he needed some help with some executive recruiting, and I started doing that for his firm and that morphed into talent branding, and it did that for, several years and then went into it like full blown marketing after talent branding. So. It's kind of a weird path., and I studied philosophy in college, so I had no business classes, even.
Kristin Jacobson
15:05.33
But I grew up in business. So, I felt like that was already sort of second nature.
Kelly Sarabyn
15:08.44
Ye, I think an entrepreneur mindset, right? like your family had successful businesses and I think that that is very aligned with growth marketing, right? because at core entrepreneurs always need to be thinking.
Asher Mathew
15:10.37
of this grade.
Kelly Sarabyn
15:21.85
How am I going to grow and it's and it's more strategic I think the idea behind growth marketing is that it's not just demand gen right? That already existed. It's looking at the bigger picture. It's more innovative and it's more strategic because it's looking for different ways and more attuned to how these like buyer Journeys are. Changing what I think of demand generation and am very plugged into what already is working and how you optimize it., but I think an interesting thing that was raised and it's interesting here because you named retail stores., that is in person.
Kelly Sarabyn
15:56.74
One thing that I think is rapidly evolving on the consumer side. and also, the B2B side is how you kind of weave together in-person to digital experiences right? So, Netflix but also there's Amazon Prime, right? I think that's transformed how we buy and how we expect to be catered to and not have to deal with. With a person., I will say that they purchased whole foods, right? which gives you this in-person experience, and at my Whole Foods [your whole foods too, Kristin], they have, they have like an Amazon return box where you can just go in and put it in the box right? So, they are working to integrate the experiences.
Kelly Sarabyn
16:35.28
If you have an Amazon Prime credit card. You get 5 % off at Whole Foods. So. It's an interesting acknowledgment because Amazon also had tried to do the in-person grocery stores that they built which I think were largely a failure, still in progress is my understanding. I think somebody realized hey this is a different expertise set. So, let's acquire instead and then try to weave these two together. But I think this is an interesting topic because as Asher and I know B2B marketplaces like digital marketplaces are becoming a larger and larger part of the purchase.
Kelly Sarabyn
17:12.95
experience. But you also still have these in-person touchpoints, right? Like whether they're the sales team or their top of the funnel and it's a community event, right? Like we just had inbound at HubSpot where you have 11,000 people many of them who are prospects coming to have this like in-person.
Kelly Sarabyn
17:30.53
experience where you form that connection. But it is just one touch point for them on the journey. That's like a mix of digital and in Person. So be curious if that's something you've been giving thought to as well like how you make sure to weave. The in-person and the digital.
Kristin Jacobson
17:49.20
Yes I mean the concept of merging the virtual and the digital and then the in-person world is super top of my mind, especially for all digital transformation efforts, all of our clients currently [I'm not going to give any client details] But, that's something they're all thinking about all the, the large organizations are trying to tackle that how do they do that effectively for their consumer customers because that is the world and , like an interesting point I think. And we're all talking about AI right now and how AI is going to transform everything, and I don't want - know Kelly was like we don't want to talk so much about Ai, but I mean I feel like it's such a thing, but I think that AI is a tool that's going to enable our virtual worlds more. I'm still not sold that virtual worlds are, old news. They're not old news in my opinion. I feel like AI is going to allow us to lead these more virtual lives, so we need to focus on all the digital experiences, not forgetting that in-person events are probably where most of the major relationship-building happens, we still have to nurture those in-person relationships virtually and all the different channels. So, I think I'm like that’s I think that's a huge touch point that during the pandemic everyone thought was going to go away and I think.
Kristin Jacobson
19:22.42
In-person came back with force, just from a human perspective. We all miss connections, and thinking about how it, I mean since I think B2B marketing is all about building relationships just like consumer-based marketing and, it's that's how you build trust, like, if we could just recreate the referral virtually. I mean the closest thing we have is social media but it's really about the introduction, and this trusted person who you respect recommend this company to you. And interesting, the company I'm working at now has been around for 24 years, and for 20 years they didn't have marketing at all. They never needed it because they had deep relationships that just referred to them and they grew. All that way and so now we’re looking at or I'm especially looking at how we nurture and build relationships virtually but we can't skip that in-person experience either.
Asher Mathew
20:40.43
So, I guess let's ask the question a different way, right? So, because I'm intrigued, right? Because all the data points that I'm getting right now is that people want to meet in person. and up until like let's call it. The first is September and I think we're at the end of September right now. So, like a lot of the partner people that at least Kelly and I hang out with right now have been on the road for like six weeks and people are already exhausted, right? They're like we're done and so so so if we were to create a
Asher Mathew
21:15.13
I don't want to use the word perfect but a highly engaging in-person and virtual experience to connect with our prospects, right? We can come to customers a bit later, right? But right, like what to do. What do you think that would look like?
Kristin Jacobson
21:33.74
I mean I think that a lot of companies did that during the pandemic. They had the virtual and the in-person experiences and I think that I don't know if anybody who did it super successfully - to do both at the same time. But I don't think you cannot do both now. I think you have to have that as an option., and just because there are a lot of people who don't want to, have to go or have their lives have been sort of recreated around convenience with virtual options.
Kristin Jacobson
22:09.65
What would a super successful event look like? I mean I don't know like we'd have to think - I don't think I've seen, or I haven't experienced it, and I think I think getting people- I think there was one event that had a -trying to remember event it was- but there were breakout rooms that were done well. I think it was Adobe. Actually – it was Adobe, and they had 4 different stages and then they had in-person. They didn't try to integrate the virtual and the in-person. They created two separate experiences and the virtual was fully virtual and there wasn't an effort of trying to coordinate those 2 things., so that made it a lot more engaging, so you had everyone have that same shared experience. Regardless of whether it was in person or not you could still, see the whole speaker and feel connected to the event. I think that is probably the best I've seen it so far.
Kelly Sarabyn
23:16.22
Ye, I think if you're going through the effort of putting on a big in-person event. Why not create a virtual track right? I think as long as you can, you can support one. The content's being created but I think you raise a good point about doing it well, right? Because. In-person events thrive on that human-to-human energy those one -on one conversation that occur after the talk or during the talk and I think that that is I think the breakout room is a good callout because I think the main challenge for these virtual events.
.
Kelly Sarabyn
23:52.55
And everybody has the attention span of a gnat. So how do you ensure they're not actually on their iPhone like Asher is right now when he should be listening to me not but like the engagement component?
Asher Mathew
24:05.49
Ha! How can you tell I'm getting good at this where I'm like looking at the screen, but I also like.
Kelly Sarabyn
24:11.74
But thought you were being subtle., but I think that's the real challenge right is not only capturing people's attention virtually and then adding that engagement layer where they feel connected to it and as a participant not just a passive consumer right? Because we're used to being able to get things on demand like I can go to my Spotify, get any music I want, Netflix, get any video I want, the challenge is if you want people to show up and feel different about this as an event versus just something that I'm consuming in one of a thousand things I'm consuming there have to be components that enable you and kind of force you almost to connect with other participants. So, I do think breakout rooms are one way that I've also seen. That will be successful because you get a small group where you can't hide right? If there are 5 people and people are forced to say they have their cameras on then you're going to feel accountable in a way you're not when you just see like hey I’m 1 of 700 people watching this talk. , so I don't know.
Kelly Sarabyn
25:20.76
Asher, I'm sure this is something you've given a lot of thought to. I mean you are the CEO of a company that is, very much integrated virtual and in-person events and is kind of doubling down on that. So, I don't know if you have thoughts on ways to make it more effective because I think.
Asher Mathew
25:28.00
Ye, yep.
Kelly Sarabyn
25:39.22
Is a real struggle to fully unpack the virtual experience in a way that.
Asher Mathew
25:41.92
Yea, so actually this is a good point, right? And so, because partnership leaders started during COVID. The first thing that we focused on was engagement. We did not focus on monetization, right? And
Asher Mathew
25:59.48
And what we realized was that providing multiple points of connection that were connected to a theme was really important right? and so and then and then we're still not done yet, right? So, we did tons and tons of webinars and breakout rooms and this and that and stuff like that and then and then all of a sudden, our members said Hey why don't we do a conference right? And then we did a conference and there was lots of energy that came out of that and then people said, well can we create local experiences that give us a little bit of flavor of the bigger conference right? And then we started doing that and so if I distill it down, I think companies have to create a sense of belonging right? And it is more than just use cases, right? If there has to be a hero of the story and the hero of the story has to be identified and amplified, I will say right and then and then and then there has to be something built around this hero story... And start just signing a manifesto and stuff like that right? They have to be like okay here's where you're trying to get to and then here's why we as an organization exist and then when those 2 connect, we should connect more about this stuff and discuss it because change doesn't happen overnight.
Asher Mathew
27:32.40
Personal change definitely doesn’t happen overnight and so so so then keeping engagement as a metric and then building the connection points to increase levels of engagement and then again we don't have this thing completely figured out but that seems to be working for us.
Asher Mathew
27:51.99
The best and I know this notion is called Community Led but I think it's a lot more than just community, right? It's just like a company right? And so, you're creating digital Connections. You're creating email connections and like all of these things have to kind of be orchestrated on a theme, and then you'll ultimately get to engagement and then people will just buy themselves, right? You don't have to keep reminding them of all the things that you do.
Kristin Jacobson
28:15.50
Yea, Well I mean when you create an experience when you create an environment that you can connect emotionally to people and build a positive experience. That's when you're winning. Communities like if you're having an in-person and virtual event, virtual people are going to connect just because they're like-minded. They're like their experiences virtually so they're going to have more in common and they're going to likely want to chat with the virtual people than the in-person people so like just keeping in mind that you're creating with
Kristin Jacobson
28:52.21
Community You're trying to create the most positive environment that is memorable. So that people want to come back, and I think if you just keep that top of mind I mean and that means so many different things to different people. Having a lot of different options for people to form their little community within your community is, like probably I would say one of the best ways to build positive experiences don't force track because they want to choose.
Kelly Sarabyn
29:18.10
I think the local ye and I think that localization is a really good call out of a way that companies can do that at scale right? because and if we go back to the consumer side. There's an NFL game going on right? The vast majority of people are not in person, but you see people meeting up at their local bar to have that shared experience even though it's a virtual experience for them, right? They're just looking at the television. They're not there in person while we have a huge number of people that would be in person. So, I think, and I'll say from the HubSpot perspective. They.
Kelly Sarabyn
29:52.76
have something, called a hug which is these user meetups that are localized right, and they're usually led by a solutions partner or just a super user of HubSpot. Essentially someone who's like the admin and they're all local and HubSpot has created kind of the framework and the platform for it. But we don't get very involved in the local execution of it which I think is a really powerful way to connect people and scale and potentially enable that event. Maintains an in-person element to it because you're a local group meeting up together to consume the same information which is different than trying to get people to engage with each other virtually which sometimes just going to be the only tactic right? if you live in Rural Iowa. There's probably not a local meetup for you to go to. But I think that localization is a great callout that B2B companies can do at scale and I agree with you, the community-led growth term can be misleading because it can imply that the company doesn't need to provide the platform and the structure for it, Which I think ultimately will be a successful business. It does like when you look at open-source projects often. They are, truly organically community but at the point that they get super Successful. You find a company like say Redis Labs comes along and commercializes it and puts a structure around it.
Kelly Sarabyn
31:23.13
While continuing to kind of leverage the community and have that community grow the moment it becomes a business there has to be that kind of platforming of the experience.
Kristin Jacobson
31:33.70
I think a great example of people who do that well are multi-level marketing companies., and I mean people hate them.
Asher Mathew
31:42.91
I know it's just like okay we went there next, we're going to talk about Grant Cardone? yea, I mean one of the persons who's done an excellent job with community is Tony Robbins like if you went to one of his events.
Kristin Jacobson
31:50.84
But they do that really? Well, I feel like an industry. Oh, totally amazing. Yes
Asher Mathew
32:02.28
It's incredible, like the guy can talk nonstop in a sequence with sequence collateral, content for like 8 hours or so, and then it's extremely and like. Everybody said there's this stigma, right? If you go to Tony Robbins' thing you must be lame. you're probably like need psychiatric help and stuff like that right? And ye me being curious I just went I was like let's just go check it out right? Like what is so special about this right?
Kristin Jacobson
32:25.71
Ye, you're looking for help. Yes
Asher Mathew
32:39.62
That screening was full, and people were energized and was completely in that he would walk around the crowd. And take questions and some people were extremely pissed off and then he would just say look let's work through this and they were like workshop this problem live.
Kristin Jacobson
32:56.94
Interesting. Well, I've never been to one of his events, but I have never met anybody who has negative things to say about him at all.
Asher Mathew
33:04.50
Yes, the production. Yes, the quality of this thing, and I was like yes to me I didn't go to grad school- it’s a publicly known thing, right? So, I just study organizations and why organizations are successful at what they do and what type of experience they are creating. And so, I just went I'm like oh okay here and I had a friend Jordan who was like hey I really would love for you to go do this with me and I'm like sure like I'll go with you and then when I stepped into the I think it was at the scp center here when I stepped in and I started just observing I'm like wow this is like a setup like a concert. Ye, and then the ushers knew exactly how to guide people, and then they were like and there were people in the audience that were like hey so if you are struggling with x then there's a y.
Kristin Jacobson
33:41.71
Yes, that's what I've heard as well.
Asher Mathew
33:59.49
And they had this whole upsell mechanism built out right? and stuff and it was it was a production like it. It would be technically a B2C conference, but it was as if.
Kelly Sarabyn
34:10.85
This is another example though of where B2B marketers and field marketers could learn from the production quality, and I think that it doesn't happen, but it would be instructed for them just to go and to look at the top side of it and the production quality but also.
Asher Mathew
34:14.72
That was amazing.
Kelly Sarabyn
34:25.92
Your point is the engagement at scale, right? I'm assuming there were tons of people there, but it sounds like he was able to create a sense of connection and engagement with the audience which is something that I think B2B Companies could learn more and I think that
Kelly Sarabyn
34:43.60
And it is a great call out like let's leave aside that some people have the ethical issues around it, but a lot of those organizations have done a great job of that localization and of engaging people at scale and having people who quite frankly aren't necessarily seeing a huge financial benefit, feel connected. Feel engaged and care and I think that is a lesson to be learned for B2B companies on how you connect with your prospects and connect with your buyers so that you essentially have primed them for the salesperson to be.
Kelly Sarabyn
35:22.50
You want to buy essentially, right? even if you don't win out on price or product features but they have such an emotional connection with you that.
Kristin Jacobson
35:30.62
You've inspired them. That's what Tony Robbins does. He inspires people, he makes them believe and if we could recreate that in a B2B world from like a webinar. Let's just say very simply we're having a webinar. And then afterward you have your highest chance of converting to a sales opportunity. If you don't execute it well people are going to go away not inspired, but it's building that expertise and inspiration you have to infuse that in every single marketing avenue.
Kristin Jacobson
36:02.36
B2B B2C whatever it is but Tony Robbins is a master at it I would say I don't hate multi-level marketing because I think that a lot of people have benefited - especially women. and they've been able to build their businesses and learn about marketing themselves.
Kristin Jacobson
36:20.25
The whole marketing training opportunities in multilevel marketing are immense for somebody who doesn't have schooling or training and it’s led by the community who believes in, and rallies around a product. Building evangelists is never a bad thing…
Asher Mathew
36:36.40
So, I think I just saw you share something because I think that it's actually a pretty cool thing and I've been waiting forever to kind of share this thing, right?
Kristin Jacobson
36:44.78
Uh oh
Kelly Sarabyn
36:45.33
Oh, expectations are big now.
Asher Mathew
36:53.90
Because we're naturally coming to a point where like the B2B Buyers experience right? Basic right? And if you think about it right? like all the famous analysts and the consultants all talk about how people process technology data right? That's the framework, right? It's the Triangle framework.
Asher Mathew
37:13.83
And if you think about it and I sometimes think about like hey if I was CRO today. What would I do, right? like what would my bag look like because a CRO’s job is to create a more progressive style a VP of sales' job is to kind of drive rigor and create all the process of selling and sticking to it but the CRO’s job is to optimize revenue and then create more selling opportunities right? So that team just goes sells right? And so, I always think about like hey so if we just take this simple thing as People- Process - Technology data which is one of the most well-known frameworks out there.
Asher Mathew
37:51.72
And, and you think about what B2B companies are. Do they focus a lot on the technology and data piece and then they'll kind of say like hey the people in the process piece is like somebody else did it and then they'll go pay a bunch of analysts to like kind of do the - people and process -work for them and then the result becomes a problem and then voila the B2B tech company is the savior because that's the solution to the problem. Now here's a different way to think about it say I want to sell. CIO’s, right? Then I think if I'm building a modern company, we may have a little bit of conflict with venture-back returns on this 1, right? But let's see how you both like this if I want to build a modern company. It's my job now to think about CIOs that are icy CIOs who are managers CIOs who are VPs cs who are CXLs right? And as I'm starting, I want people to transact with me. They may not transact with me and buy my software today. But I want them to transact with me and the big things that all those people face before they buy a product are kind of in the -people and process - bucket because managers are trying to figure out how to manage my team better right? How do I get productively right?
Asher Mathew
39:23.67
VPs are trying to figure it out. Well, how do I create repeatable processes at scale right? And so, B2B tech companies don't offer any products to fix those problems, right? And so, and. I'm pretty much going to get called out by Kelly for this being a selfish but like it's just a warning because when it comes people know okay like we’ve noticed that for a while now but they but if a company starts selling like things like community licenses for example, right? or.
Asher Mathew
39:59.22
professional development licenses that are not their academies because like people don't like a company's academy because they're like well they're just going to pitch me on the product again.
Kelly Sarabyn
40:07.30
Just got to call out that HubSpot Academy has tons of loyal fans and does a ton of activity for HubSpot.
Kristin Jacobson
40:11.76
I like HubSpot academy.
Asher Mathew
40:11.99
I'm sure they do like yes, I'm sure and you may be the exception that ruled that which makes the rule correct right? But the key is like what if people were like hey.
Asher Mathew
40:26.61
Okay, what you get on a phone with the prospect and they're like hey like do you have this problem of like selling more to CIOs and then you're like yes I do but I'm not ready to buy that and then you're like well where are you struggling and they're like what the way I'm struggling is I wanted like really figure out like -How do I organize my teams and then you're like okay well I guess let's fix that problem first and I have a product that is like an assessment with an expert that you can get and by the way, it's like five thousand bucks to buy it right.
And then here's all the things that you get and then once you're there then I will actually have something on the process side and then I'll have something on the technology side and then I'll have something on their data side and then then like this whole thing comes around and round and then you are nurturing an industry versus just getting a sale done immediately right? so. I don't know what the sales gurus would think about this, but I've always thought that the CRO buckets are so full of like products on the technology and data side. But if they had complementary products on the people and process side, they would win hearts and minds.
Kristin Jacobson
41:36.86
I mean I think you're talking about like, business agility more and there are a lot of companies that do sell that as a concept and as a service. , and yes, it's really how you work more efficiently. How is your organization? How do we integrate technology and people? and that's I think that's a really interesting whole line of work, to be honest, especially in tech.
Asher Mathew
42:11.57
Ye, have you ever gone to a company I mean I'm sure you're a marketing leader- you get pitched a lot, right? And they're like hey I just don't have the problem that you're saying but I have this other problem and it's a little bit more the people in process side and the tech company are like oh I'll just come back to you in six months right versus being like.
Kelly Sarabyn
42:28.55
So, you seem Asher. Well, you're proposing a partnership at that Juncture though right you're suggesting an external company vendor community is being recommended to solve the early problem.
Asher Mathew
42:31.20
I have something for you.
Asher Mathew
42:39.47
20 to and how we commercialize that arrangement is like a different thing but I'm just like I don't think people even think like that today where they're like I just need to get a transactional relationship going.
Kelly Sarabyn
42:54.57
Because that requires this deep work that we were discussing earlier in the podcast which is understanding the hero of your story which is essentially the customer right? And so, I think you're saying what would sales leaders think of this I think if you can prove to them that this is removing an obstacle that will
Kelly Sarabyn
43:13.14
result in an early purchase. they're going to be totally on board, right? I think what your point is that they're not thinking that way today and nobody's done the work in the organization to have properly identified that this is what is causing these 6 twelve eighteen months delays while the person kind of flails around to solve the problem that needs to be solved to become a buyer. So, I think.
Kristin Jacobson
43:38.90
Offering that sort of problem Framework, I think a lot of Tech executives are just CTO’s CIO]s They often don't know what the problems are right? They are living them. I mean. So.
Kristin Jacobson
43:55.41
Having some objectivity and having some outside eyes on something and being able to have somebody walk you through what your problems are and show you an organized way of approaching them. Recently we were talking about how digital transformation is a big issue for so many companies because they're operating on old tech, really old tech. that they need to modernize and so it's overwhelming like some of our customers have thousands of apps on top of their systems and it's like how do or where do I start? and we’ve seen traction with how can help you figure that out., here's our process. , so as part of like our marketing it. talking about the process showing that we have expertise in figuring out or just identifying the pain point we have a whole like -anyway like this organization that I work with has a framework on how to identify the problems and that's like a huge opportunity for I think a lot of tech companies.
Kelly Sarabyn
45:08.60
And I think that marketing that we were discussing early in terms of tapping into the emotional side, right? I think a huge part of that exercise is being able to articulate the problem emotionally. The pain points around it because to your point So many times.
Kelly Sarabyn
45:24.78
people are living it. They don't even articulate it to themselves properly. But if you do it right? when they hear it. It resonates with them at an emotional level and they're like you're right I am experiencing this nightmare of having 5000 systems many of them which were built decades ago.
Kelly Sarabyn
45:43.28
And I think even just putting a name to the problem can cause that emotional connection right in a sense of gratitude that you've been able to articulate something that's frustrating, but they've just spent so that's just their day-to-day work, right? Like many times people have been working for those companies themselves for 15 years So it's just a given about their life. So, I think that ties in nicely to that. How do you create that story and how do you do it? What are different ways that you can leverage the emotions in the B2B buyer?
Kristin Jacobson
46:12.79
Yes, how can you? How can you prove that you're capable and build the trust? But if you can identify the pain point and you can - well It's that's an old marketing technique, right? We cause Pain. We recreate the pain so that we can show you we can solve it and we relieve that pain and that's like a very powerful marketing tool that is used.
Kelly Sarabyn
46:34.52
And then the flip side is painting the end state, right? like hey first we're articulating the pain we're showing you how we can fix it and then here's how you're going to have a glorious life whether that’s promoted.
Kristin Jacobson
46:42.44
Yes, here's the way.
Kelly Sarabyn
46:49.46
no more crazy workflows for yourself like it depends on what it is but I feel like those are the key components to striking that emotional chord and understanding your buyer enough to know. What are their core goals and what do they feel emotional about right because it might not simply be their job? It might be something bigger or deeper or to the side that they care about in their professional life. So, I think doing the work to understand that is where it all starts.
Kristin Jacobson
47:15.50
Making them the hero in their story. Yes, absolutely, they thought they didn't even know that that was a possibility. Like they could solve the pain of the world and I think chief revenue officers going back to what you said Asher, I think it's a really interesting point -we're seeing a lot of like growth marketing in B2C it's very common. It's not so common to see growth marketing as a term in B2B.
Kristin Jacobson
47:51.84
But it is becoming a thing. It's slowly becoming a thing because that's that melding of the two worlds, right? there and being able to tell that story and to put people into the hero of customer-centric messaging not just -here's what we can do for you.
Kelly Sarabyn
48:09.24
Or like or talk about us. That's the most common mistake that brands make right? They just go on and on about themselves and their product and it's like you should. You should not go to someone's website. It's just all about you. The hero should be the front and center of the customer and their journey should be on your website but it's very hard for B2Bcompanies to understand that.
Kristin Jacobson
48:15.86
Oh, constantly still.
Kelly Sarabyn
48:28.99
Kristin Jacobson
48:31.91
It's so hard to convince people that that's how it should be. It's so hard - every organization I've consulted with over the last ten years I've had to push this concept. because they have the billboard mentality -here's what we want. We need to show what we're doing. How do we do that now I think, as a consultant or a leader in an organization you have to convince people that’s how it works. Show how this is effective, this is getting, getting people to trust you and, really you show that’s how to solve their problems. , getting to the next step essentially whether it's the. The shopping cart or the sales meeting either way.
Asher Mathew
49:28.50
Ye, all right I know I mean almost all these conversations can go on for hours and stuff like that and maybe we need to do something like a podcast day or something like that here and then just like have these conversations I've had 8 people in a year in a master podcast and.
Asher Mathew
49:46.54
Whoever has to go take a meeting. They go to a meeting. They come back right, and stuff and we still have a pick exactly I mean that can be pretty cool the cool., cool thing to that too. Ye and then and then we're like here's a virtual event guys and then come meet us after.
.
Kelly Sarabyn
49:48.15
This one long 12-hour conversation but
Kristin Jacobson
49:52.56
That would be an excellent idea. You could do that.
Asher Mathew
50:02.76
Dream force or like or sorry Inbound and we'll do like this in Barbi
Kelly Sarabyn
50:06.53
Thanks Asher, let's go to Sas Connect next.
Kelly Sarabyn
50:18.20
So, I know likewise.
Asher Mathew
50:22.22
Well, Kristin, thank you so much for joining us today; we love it. We love to stay connected with you as we explore more and more growth marketing on this podcast. Is there anything in closing that you'd like to give a shout-out to or tell our audience?
Kristin Jacobson
50:23.70
Thank you for having me come on.
Kristin Jacobson
50:40.46
I'm sorry not and I can't think of anything.
I think yes, just, as we see these two worlds.
Kristin Jacobson
50:58.15
continue to combine I think, if you're wanting to compete in the world I think you have to, start looking at marketing as not one or the other it's really about you, you’re marketing to humans
Asher Mathew
51:15.88
Super all right? Well, thank you so much for having an amazing weekend.
Kristin Jacobson
51:18.98
Yea, it's great. Thank you, you too. All right see you guys, bye.
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