Podcast appearances and mentions of mark benioff

SaaStr 801: AI, M&A, and the Future of SaaS: Lessons from Marc Benioff, Chair, CEO & Co-Founder of Salesforce Join us for as SaaStr CEO and Founder Jason Lemkin sits down for a conversation with Mark Benioff, the CEO, Chair and Co-Founder of Salesforce. Together, we delve into the practical applications of AI in the B2B space. With 40 billion under Salesforce's belt, this discussion sheds light on how AI is transforming enterprise software. Learn about Salesforce's major acquisitions like Tableau and Slack, the evolution of their product offerings, and how they seamlessly integrate AI with business intelligence and analytics. Mark also shares insights on the strategic direction of Salesforce, the significance of data management, and the role of AI assistants in revolutionizing customer service and product development. Tune in for a glimpse into the future of enterprise software and the impactful initiatives driven by Salesforce. -----------------  Hey everybody. SaaStr Annual is almost here. It's May 13th to the 15th, right here in the SF Bay, the heart of the AI Revolution, and you've gotta be part of it in B2B and be it SaaStr 2025. We'll have an incredible line above speakers, the best in SaaS and AI. From HubSpot and Perplexity from Anthropic, to OpenAI, from Snowflake to Cursor, to Google Coud, to Box to IBM and more. We'll have AI matchmaking for founders and investors for the first time,  and we'll have over 1,000+ C-level executives at our VIP summits. It's gonna be great. So we'll see you there. If you want to come in person, use my code Jason20 before tickets sell out.  And we'll see anyone that can't make it in person on our live streams. It'll be all over my Twitter and LinkedIn and everywhere. May 13th to the 15th 2025. It's gonna rock. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  Hey, are you tired of listening to hours and hours of sales calls? Recording is yesterday's game, folks. Yesterday's game attention.com unleashes an army of AI sales agents that auto update your CRM build custom sales decks. Spot cross-sale signals and score calls even before the coffee cold. Teams like Bamboo, HR, and scale AI already automate their sales and rev ops using customer conversations. Step into the future at attention.com/saastr. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Do you know what would make your customer service helpdesk dramatically better? Dumping it and switching to Intercom.  But, youʼre not quite ready to make that change. We get it!   Thatʼs why Fin, the worldʼs leading AI customer service agent, is now available on every helpdesk.   Fin can instantly resolve up to 80% of your tickets,  Which makes your customers happier. And you can get off the customer service rep hiring treadmill.   Fin by Intercom. Named the #1 AI Agent in G2ʼs Winter Report.      Learn more at : inter.com/saastr   --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Monte Wood, former CEO of Opus Agency and author of Generosity Wins, knows that generosity isn't just about being nice—it's a game-changer in business and life. From working with icons like Steve Jobs and Mark Benioff to lessons from his mom, Monte has seen firsthand how small acts of giving create big returns. In this episode, he breaks down why generosity is the real secret to happiness and career success—and why it's more powerful than you think.Key Highlights of Our Interview:Generosity Beyond Kindness: Lessons from Steve Jobs, John Chambers, and Andy Jassy“Steve Jobs' goal to democratize technology was generous, even if his approach wasn't. Leaders like Chambers and Jassy showed that while generosity doesn't always come with kindness, the drive to uplift others' success is, in itself, a powerful form of generosity.”The 600-Day Challenge: How Practicing Generosity Daily Transforms You“Documenting a daily act of kindness, whether it's a smile or genuine listening, became a habit that revealed a thousand ways to be generous—proof that practicing generosity opens new perspectives.”Unexpected Generosity in a Hot Tub: A Chat with Elon Musk“In an unexpected encounter, Musk showed genuine interest and warmth, sharing laughs and stories. It was a small gesture, but a powerful reminder of the impact of unexpected generosity from those at the top.”The Hidden Costs of Greed and Division in Today's Media“With opinion-driven media stirring division, the challenge lies in overcoming these forces with conscious generosity and mutual respect—proving that true strength is found not in agreement, but in the ability to disagree respectfully.”_____________________Connect with us:Host: Vince Chan | Guests: Monte Wood______________________--Chief Change Officer--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Deep Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives, Visionary Underdogs,Transformation Gurus & Bold Hearts.10 Million+ All-Time Downloads.Reaching 80+ Countries Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.>>>130,000+ subscribers are outgrowing. Act Today.

Monte Wood, former CEO of Opus Agency and author of Generosity Wins, knows that generosity isn't just about being nice—it's a game-changer in business and life. From working with icons like Steve Jobs and Mark Benioff to lessons from his mom, Monte has seen firsthand how small acts of giving create big returns. In this episode, he breaks down why generosity is the real secret to happiness and career success—and why it's more powerful than you think.Key Highlights of Our Interview:True Generosity in Leadership: More Than Just Charity“Being generous isn't just about grand acts of philanthropy. It's about caring for the individual. Whether it's helping employees grow beyond their roles or driving an old Toyota to work, leaders like Andy Grove and Mark Benioff show that humility and connection are what truly drive success.”Why Generosity is the Key to Confidence, Courage, and Success“Generosity isn't just about giving—it's a strategic move toward success. Helping others builds faster, more meaningful relationships, while also boosting your own confidence and courage. Harvard's 50-year study shows that close connections are the top predictor of happiness, and generosity is the engine that powers those relationships.”Tracking the Untrackable: The True ROI of Generosity“Generosity doesn't fit into the typical business models of ROI—no one's handing you a direct return. Yet, the rewards are undeniable. Life has a way of paying you back tenfold, proving that being generous might be the most strategic investment you can make, even if it can't be measured in dollars.”Generosity Isn't Always Grand – Sometimes It's Just a Smile“Even the smallest act of generosity can be life-changing. A smile, a kind word, or even cleaning up a public restroom can shift someone's day. In a world full of loneliness and depression, simple acts of generosity may be the most powerful way to create joy and connection.”_____________________Connect with us:Host: Vince Chan | Guests: Monte Wood______________________--Chief Change Officer--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Deep Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives, Visionary Underdogs,Transformation Gurus & Bold Hearts.10 Million+ All-Time Downloads.Reaching 80+ Countries Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.>>>130,000+ subscribers are outgrowing. Act Today.

The Big Themes:AI and Humans Working Together: Salesforce envisions a future where AI and humans collaborate rather than compete. Rather than replacing human jobs entirely, AI is seen as a tool that enhances human productivity by handling repetitive tasks, improving decision-making, and streamlining workflows. Salesforce's AI-driven offerings, like Agentforce, are designed to integrate seamlessly with existing systems to empower employees.Rapid Adoption of AI Agents: At Dreamforce, Salesforce onboarded over 10,000 companies onto Agentforce in just three days, demonstrating the speed at which AI adoption is occurring. This large-scale deployment suggests that businesses are eager to implement AI-powered solutions that can immediately improve efficiency. Unlike traditional software rollouts, which can take months or even years, Salesforce's AI systems can be integrated within minutes, allowing companies to see immediate benefits.AI's Future Includes Robotics: Salesforce anticipates that AI will soon extend beyond digital applications and into robotics, enabling automation in physical environments. AI-powered robots could be deployed in manufacturing, logistics, field service, and even household tasks. For instance, AI agents could be embedded in robotic systems that perform maintenance, deliver goods, or assist with healthcare services.The Big Quote: "Our CEO, Mark Benioff, kind of kidded around in Davos to a room full of CEOs saying, 'Congratulations, you're the last CEOs who ever managed an entirely human workforce . . . the punch line is, going forward, there's going to be AI and humans working together to help customers on every company around the world."

In this episode, we sit down with Eldad, the visionary founder of WinAI, to explore his journey from a diverse career spanning the Navy, nonprofits, and sales to building a groundbreaking AI solution that transforms the sales experience. Eldad's unique perspective combines his passion for fixing inefficiencies with his deep understanding of human nature, creating tools that empower sales teams to work smarter, not harder. Join us as Eldad shares his insights on: The LinkedIn Takeover: How a bold marketing campaign captured attention and inspired sales teams. CRM Frustrations: Why sales reps hate updating CRMs and how WinAI addresses this pain point. Generative AI in Sales: How AI aligns with human nature to streamline workflows and boost efficiency. Marketing Innovation: Eldad's unconventional approach, from rage rooms to smashing sales norms. Building WinAI: The journey from ‘Liger' to creating a name that resonates with winning. Overcoming Bottlenecks: Eldad's strategy to tackle IT reviews and streamline enterprise sales. Marketing Inspiration: Lessons from Mark Benioff and Vince McMahon on narrative and branding. AI in Practice: How Eldad uses AI tools daily to lead his team and outpace competitors. If you're a sales leader, SDR, or just fascinated by how AI is transforming sales, this episode is packed with insights and practical takeaways. Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more expert conversations and strategies.

Part Two. How many people do you know who walk into a public restroom and leave it cleaner than they found it? I do—and so does the wife of today's guest, Monte Wood. Turns out, small acts of generosity like this aren't just about hygiene; they're about making things better for the next person. Monte, author of Generosity Wins and former CEO of Opus Agency, has collaborated with heavyweights like Mark Benioff, Andy Grove, Steve Jobs, John Chambers, and Andy Jassy. He's learned from the greats, his mentors, and even his mother that generosity isn't just nice—it's transformative. In his world, giving back is more than a feel-good slogan; it's a life strategy. In the last episode, Monte unpacked his definition of generosity and explained why he sees it as the ultimate secret to happiness and career success. And that's just the beginning. Today, we'll tackle why generosity feels so hard in today's hustle culture and how you can cultivate a mindset centered on giving without burning out. Still skeptical that generosity pays off? Join the conversation and see how giving a little can lead to getting a lot—just maybe not in the way you expect. Key Highlights of Our Interview: Generosity Beyond Kindness: Lessons from Steve Jobs, John Chambers, and Andy Jassy “Steve Jobs' goal to democratize technology was generous, even if his approach wasn't. Leaders like Chambers and Jassy showed that while generosity doesn't always come with kindness, the drive to uplift others' success is, in itself, a powerful form of generosity.” The 600-Day Challenge: How Practicing Generosity Daily Transforms You “Documenting a daily act of kindness, whether it's a smile or genuine listening, became a habit that revealed a thousand ways to be generous—proof that practicing generosity opens new perspectives.” Unexpected Generosity in a Hot Tub: A Chat with Elon Musk “In an unexpected encounter, Musk showed genuine interest and warmth, sharing laughs and stories. It was a small gesture, but a powerful reminder of the impact of unexpected generosity from those at the top.” The Hidden Costs of Greed and Division in Today's Media “With opinion-driven media stirring division, the challenge lies in overcoming these forces with conscious generosity and mutual respect—proving that true strength is found not in agreement, but in the ability to disagree respectfully.” Connect with us: Host: Vince Chan | Guests: Monte Wood ______________________ Chief Change Officer: Make Change Ambitiously. Experiential Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives Global Top 2.5% Podcast on Listen Notes World's #1 Career Podcast on Apple Top 1: US, CA, MX, IE, HU, AT, CH, FI 3.5 Million+ Downloads 80+ Countries

Part One. How many people do you know who walk into a public restroom and leave it cleaner than they found it? I do—and so does the wife of today's guest, Monte Wood. Turns out, small acts of generosity like this aren't just about hygiene; they're about making things better for the next person. Monte, author of Generosity Wins and former CEO of Opus Agency, has collaborated with heavyweights like Mark Benioff, Andy Grove, Steve Jobs, John Chambers, and Andy Jassy. He's learned from the greats, his mentors, and even his mother that generosity isn't just nice—it's transformative. In his world, giving back is more than a feel-good slogan; it's a life strategy. In this episode, Monte unpacks his definition of generosity and explains why he sees it as the ultimate secret to happiness and career success. And that's just the beginning. Tomorrow, we'll tackle why generosity feels so hard in today's hustle culture and how you can cultivate a mindset centered on giving without burning out. Still skeptical that generosity pays off? Join the conversation and see how giving a little can lead to getting a lot—just maybe not in the way you expect. Key Highlights of Our Interview: True Generosity in Leadership: More Than Just Charity “Being generous isn't just about grand acts of philanthropy. It's about caring for the individual. Whether it's helping employees grow beyond their roles or driving an old Toyota to work, leaders like Andy Grove and Mark Benioff show that humility and connection are what truly drive success.” Why Generosity is the Key to Confidence, Courage, and Success “Generosity isn't just about giving—it's a strategic move toward success. Helping others builds faster, more meaningful relationships, while also boosting your own confidence and courage. Harvard's 50-year study shows that close connections are the top predictor of happiness, and generosity is the engine that powers those relationships.” Tracking the Untrackable: The True ROI of Generosity “Generosity doesn't fit into the typical business models of ROI—no one's handing you a direct return. Yet, the rewards are undeniable. Life has a way of paying you back tenfold, proving that being generous might be the most strategic investment you can make, even if it can't be measured in dollars.” Generosity Isn't Always Grand – Sometimes It's Just a Smile “Even the smallest act of generosity can be life-changing. A smile, a kind word, or even cleaning up a public restroom can shift someone's day. In a world full of loneliness and depression, simple acts of generosity may be the most powerful way to create joy and connection.” Connect with us: Host: Vince Chan | Guests: Monte Wood ______________________ Chief Change Officer: Make Change Ambitiously. Experiential Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives Global Top 2.5% Podcast on Listen Notes World's #1 Career Podcast on Apple Top 1: US, CA, MX, IE, HU, AT, CH, FI 3.5 Million+ Downloads 80+ Countries

In this episode of the Road to Growth podcast, we are pleased to introduce you to David Leighton. David, President and CEO of WITI - Workforce Innovation, Trust, and Influence, has been an instrumental figure in shaping the global technological landscape since 1989. Under his leadership, WITI has emerged as the premier global organization for professionals for whom technology plays a pivotal role in their careers, businesses, and personal endeavors.   A visionary relationship builder, David boasts a vast network that spans multiple industries, underscoring his unparalleled expertise in forging strategic partnerships. He has been the driving force behind various start-ups and has an impressive track record of steering companies towards innovation and growth.   David served as the Chairman of Risk Analysis Group, an esteemed security strategies firm focused on Integrated Risk Management (SM). This initiative emphasized the enterprise-wide application of business principles designed to safeguard and optimize organizational workflows. Further enriching his portfolio, David co-founded Criterion Research. This research firm has garnered acclaim for pinpointing and engaging highly specialized technologists and executives tailored for internet, software, and semiconductor companies, as well as venture capital firms. It was under David's insightful leadership that WITI and Criterion Research united, amplifying their collective influence and impact in the tech world. David's professional journey also includes a significant association with Borland International, where he played a pivotal role in elevating the company to the #2 position in the global software industry. His collaborative efforts with Transmeta revolutionized chip manufacturing, and he was integral to Mark Benioff's final project at Oracle before Salesforce's inception. David is currently an Advisory Board Member for Cuva.AI, TheCalendar.com, MeetYourself.me and Author's League.   Learn more and connect with David Leighton by visiting them on   Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@PoweredByWITI Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidleightonwiti/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidleighton/         Be sure to follow us on Twitter: Twitter.com/to_growth on Facebook: facebook.com/Road2Growth   Subscribe to our podcast across the web: https://www.theenriquezgroup.com/blog Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2Cdmacc iTunes: https://apple.co/2F4zAcn Castbox: http://bit.ly/2F4NfQq Google Play: http://bit.ly/2TxUYQ2 Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKnzMRkl-PurAb32mCLCMeA?view_as=subscriber   If you are looking to be a Guest on Podcasts please click below  https://kitcaster.com/rtg/  For any San Diego Real Estate Questions Please Follow Us at web: www.TheEnriquezGroup.com Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKnzMRkl-PurAb32mCLCMeA or Call : 858 -345 - 7829 Recently reduced properties in San Diego County * Click **** bit.ly/3cbT65C **** Here* ************************************************************ Sponsor = www.MelodyClouds.com

In this episode, Salesforce founder and CEO Marc Benioff sits down with Ann Berry to discuss the company's growing Agentforce product, valuations in the AI sector today and Salesforce's track record in start up investing. Ann also asks Marc if we will see him working with Elon Musk on DOGE, and whether Twitter / X is an asset he wished he'd bought. $CRM 0:00 START 01:54 The Impact of AgentForce 03:04 AI Bubble and Market Valuations 06:00 AgentForce in Action: Heathrow Airport 07:51 AgentForce vs. Microsoft's CoPilot 09:17 Balancing Human and Digital Workforce 11:47 Government Applications of AgentForce 13:01 Mark Benioff on Public Service and Politics 19:44 Salesforce's Acquisition Strategy 22:37 RTO and Leadership 24:08 Succession Planning at Salesforce 26:43 AI Startups and Industry Leaders After Earnings is brought to you by Stakeholder Labs and Morning Brew. For more go to https://www.afterearnings.com. Follow Us X: https://twitter.com/AfterEarnings TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@AfterEarnings Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/afterearnings_/ Reach Out Email: afterearnings@morningbrew.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of Tech Sales Insights, Randy Seidl is joined by John Hinshaw, owner of Blackbird Vineyards, and previously an executive at HSBC, HPE, Boeing, and Verizon. The discussion focuses on sales lessons, the importance of relationships and trust in business, and the strategic value of partnerships. John shares anecdotes from his career, insights on sales strategies, and the role of philanthropy in building strong relationships. The episode also highlights John's transition from corporate roles to acquiring and managing a vineyard.KEY TAKEAWAYSBuilding trust and relationships is essential in sales and partnerships. Effective communication and understanding of the customer's business needs are crucial.Collaborating with partners on product development and exploring joint market opportunities can enhance business growth.Philanthropy and doing good together can strengthen business relationships and create positive impacts.Combining technology expertise with business acumen and strong communication skills is key for successful technology leadership.Smaller vendors should consider trials and leveraging venture funds to gain trust and break into larger enterprises.QUOTES"It's totally about trust and relationships.""Technology doesn't matter unless it's got a business outcome.""In every corporation, your ability to balance revenue and costs is super important.""Understanding your customer's business and what drives them makes a huge difference.""Doing good together is an amazing opportunity."Find out more about John Hinshaw through the link/s below:https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-hinshaw-96433b121/This episode is sponsored by SmartSource, the Event Success sponsor of the Sales Community. With over 35 years of experience, SmartSource provides comprehensive IT, AV, and interactive technology solutions to a wide range of industries, from legal and finance to entertainment and events. Their national presence, extensive inventory, and deep expertise in logistics and technical support ensure that businesses can successfully communicate and operate, no matter the challenge.

Agents, agents, and more agents! In Episode 27 of Mixture of Experts, host Tim Hwang is joined by Volkmar Uhlig and Vyoma Gajjar. First, the experts chat about Mark Benioff's spicy tweet, and what this means for the future of AI agents. Next, how much energy is needed to power AI models, and should we be concerned? Then, the experts debrief Anthropic's release of computer use. Finally, Google is integrating SynthID-Text into Gemini to help watermark AI-generated text, do we need this feature? Learn more on today's Mixture of Experts.The opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of IBM or any other organization or entity.

Part Two. How many people do you know who walk into a public restroom and leave it cleaner than they found it? I do—and so does the wife of today's guest, Monte Wood. Like me, she does it because she wants to make things better for the next person. Monte, author of Generosity Wins and former CEO of Opus Agency, has worked with industry legends like Mark Benioff, Andy Grove, Steve Jobs, John Chambers and Andy Jassy. He's learned from them, his mentors, and his mother what generosity truly means and how it leads to success in life and career. In yesterday's episode, we looked into Monte's definition of generosity and why he believes it's the key to a happier, more successful life. Today, we'll explore why generosity is tough in today's world and how to nurture a mindset focused on giving. Still skeptical about how generosity can lead to success? Tune in and join the conversation. Key Highlights of Our Interview: Generosity Beyond Kindness: Lessons from Steve Jobs, John Chambers, and Andy Jassy “Steve Jobs' goal to democratize technology was generous, even if his approach wasn't. Leaders like Chambers and Jassy showed that while generosity doesn't always come with kindness, the drive to uplift others' success is, in itself, a powerful form of generosity.” The 600-Day Challenge: How Practicing Generosity Daily Transforms You “Documenting a daily act of kindness, whether it's a smile or genuine listening, became a habit that revealed a thousand ways to be generous—proof that practicing generosity opens new perspectives.” Unexpected Generosity in a Hot Tub: A Chat with Elon Musk “In an unexpected encounter, Musk showed genuine interest and warmth, sharing laughs and stories. It was a small gesture, but a powerful reminder of the impact of unexpected generosity from those at the top.” The Hidden Costs of Greed and Division in Today's Media “With opinion-driven media stirring division, the challenge lies in overcoming these forces with conscious generosity and mutual respect—proving that true strength is found not in agreement, but in the ability to disagree respectfully.” Connect with us: Host: Vince Chan | Guests: Monte Wood Chief Change Officer: Make Change Ambitiously. Experiential Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives World's Number One Career Podcast Top 1: US, CA, MX, IE, HU, AT, CH, FI Top 10: GB, FR, SE, DE, TR, IT, ES Top 10: IN, JP, SG, AU  1.5 Million+ Streams 50+ Countries

Part One. How many people do you know who walk into a public restroom and leave it cleaner than they found it? I do—and so does the wife of today's guest, Monte Wood. Like me, she does it because she wants to make things better for the next person. Monte, author of Generosity Wins and former CEO of Opus Agency, has worked with industry legends like Mark Benioff, Andy Grove, Steve Jobs, John Chambers and Andy Jassy. He's learned from them, his mentors, and his mother what generosity truly means and how it leads to success in life and career. In today's episode, we dive into Monte's definition of generosity and why he believes it's the key to a happier, more successful life. Tomorrow, we'll explore why generosity is tough in today's world and how to nurture a mindset focused on giving. Still skeptical about how generosity can lead to success? Tune in and join the conversation. Key Highlights of Our Interview: True Generosity in Leadership: More Than Just Charity “Being generous isn't just about grand acts of philanthropy. It's about caring for the individual. Whether it's helping employees grow beyond their roles or driving an old Toyota to work, leaders like Andy Grove and Mark Benioff show that humility and connection are what truly drive success.” Why Generosity is the Key to Confidence, Courage, and Success “Generosity isn't just about giving—it's a strategic move toward success. Helping others builds faster, more meaningful relationships, while also boosting your own confidence and courage. Harvard's 50-year study shows that close connections are the top predictor of happiness, and generosity is the engine that powers those relationships.” Tracking the Untrackable: The True ROI of Generosity “Generosity doesn't fit into the typical business models of ROI—no one's handing you a direct return. Yet, the rewards are undeniable. Life has a way of paying you back tenfold, proving that being generous might be the most strategic investment you can make, even if it can't be measured in dollars.” Generosity Isn't Always Grand – Sometimes It's Just a Smile “Even the smallest act of generosity can be life-changing. A smile, a kind word, or even cleaning up a public restroom can shift someone's day. In a world full of loneliness and depression, simple acts of generosity may be the most powerful way to create joy and connection.” Connect with us: Host: Vince Chan | Guests: Monte Wood Chief Change Officer: Make Change Ambitiously. Experiential Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives World's Number One Career Podcast Top 1: US, CA, MX, IE, HU, AT, CH, FI Top 10: GB, FR, SE, DE, TR, IT, ES Top 10: IN, JP, SG, AU  1.5 Million+ Streams 50+ Countries

Guest: Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO and co-founder of KlarnaLiving and working in Stockholm, Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski thinks a lot about how he's perceived in Silicon Valley: “I feel like here I am, I am the small, country cousin from Sweden.” And on top of that, he knew that someone like Sam Altman wouldn't initially think of a European banking startup as an ideal partner for OpenAI — so, he made up an excuse to fly to San Francisco and meet with Altman. “I felt like, OK, this is going to be the busiest man in the world very soon,” Sebastian recalls. “When I first booked it with Sam, I think I got three hours in his calendar. By the time I arrived in San Francisco, it was down to 30 minutes.”Chapters:(01:02) - Workday and Salesforce (06:01) - Rolling your own (08:45) - AI-driven customer service (15:33) - Automation at scale for business (19:28) - The Toyota way (23:40) - Sam Altman (25:36) - Playing offense (28:25) - Reinventing Klarna (31:44) - The startup journey (35:37) - Common equity (39:28) - Champions League (42:24) - Hype cycles (47:35) - Sebastian's father (52:28) - Control and stability (57:23) - Comfort zone vs. stretch zone (01:02:27) - Creating resilience (01:06:23) - Why Klarna isn't hiring Mentioned in this episode: OpenAI, Seeking Alpha, Slack, Workday, ChatGPT, Stripe, CRMs, Mark Benioff, Twitter, Anthropic, Waymo, Devin AI, the Collison brothers and Stripe, Pieter van der Does and Adyen, Daniel Ek and Spotify, General Atlantic, DST Global, Anton Levy, Michael Moritz, Sequoia Capital, Niklas Adalberth, PayPal, CNBC, “Under Pressure” by Queen, Boris Johnson, Elon Musk, Google, Sam Walton, Made in America, Nina Siemiatkowski, and Snoop Dogg.Links:Connect with SebastianTwitterLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

Check out the New Bond account with an initial APY of 6.9%, only at https://public.com/csi Big software companies like Salesforce are going all-in on AI, as pressure mounts in a new era of computing. Is Salesforce in trouble because of a new army of AI startups? Will AI disrupt big enterprise SaaS companies? Chip Stock Investor thinks disruption will happen, and is making a portfolio change. Get the details in this video from Nick and Kasey. Join us on Discord with Semiconductor Insider: https://ko-fi.com/chipstockinvestor

Ready to Make a Difference? In this episode of the Happy Hustle Podcast, I want to introduce you to the 1-1-1 philosophy by billionaire Marc Benioff, founder and CEO of Salesforce. This game-changing approach is about leveraging your equity, time, and products to give back to communities. Trust me, this simple pledge can create a ripple effect of positive change! So, what's the 1-1-1 philosophy?Equity: Donate 1% of your company's equity. This can be corporate equity, personal equity as a founder, or a mix of both. It's a legal commitment, but it's worth every bit of the paperwork.Time: Volunteer 1% of your time. Whether it's litter picking, tree planting, or meal prepping, there are countless ways to give back. Plus, it's a fantastic team-building activity!Product: Donate 1% of your product or service. This could mean offering free subscriptions, discounted licenses, or any other resources your company provides. Think about what fits best for your business size and scope.Ready to make your mark? Start small, think big, and watch the ripple effect of your generosity. Connect with Cary!https://www.instagram.com/cary__jack/https://www.facebook.com/SirCaryJackhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/cary-jack-kendzior/https://twitter.com/thehappyhustlehttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFDNsD59tLxv2JfEuSsNMOQ/featured Get a free copy of his new book, The Happy Hustle, 10 Alignments to Avoid Burnout & Achieve Blissful Balance (https://www.thehappyhustlebook.com/)Sign up for The Journey: 10 Days To Become a Happy Hustler Online Course (http://www.thehappyhustle.com/Journey)Apply to the Montana Mastermind Epic Camping Adventure (https://caryjack.com/montana)“It's time to Happy Hustle, a blissfully balanced life you love, full of passion, purpose, and positive impact!”Episode sponsorBIOptimizers Magnesium Breakthrough (https://bioptimizers.com/happy )This stuff is a game-changer! Magnesium Breakthrough packs all 7 forms of magnesium, designed to support stress management, promote muscle relaxation, regulate the nervous system, control stress hormones, boost brain function, increase energy, and enhance sleep.I take 2 capsules before bedtime, and it's been a game-changer for me. The best part is, BIOptimizers offer a risk-free.

Air date: 03-09-2024 On this live call-in episode of The Financial Quarterback, Josh dives into the trend of billionaires like Mark Benioff and Mark Zuckerberg acquiring vast lands in Hawaii and their implications on local communities and housing affordability. He juxtaposes these acquisitions with their recent stock sales, sparking speculation about their foresight into economic downturns. Josh also explains immediate annuities, offering insights into their role in retirement planning and the considerations for starting an automatic withdrawal program. Josh also fields multiple live callers, discussing a range of topics from Elon Musk's Twitter rebrand to NVIDIA's stock performance and the broader economic signals these actions may send. Listeners contribute with personal anecdotes and questions, touching on tax experiences in New York, conspiracy theories in Hawaii, and the intricacies of changing trust arrangements. Josh navigates these discussions with expert advice on retirement planning, emphasizing the importance of understanding immediate annuities, the strategic use of trusts, and the value of diversification in investment. Can't get enough of the Financial Quarterback? Click 'Subscribe' to ensure you never miss a play. New episodes touchdown right here! And if you're loving the playbook, drop us a 5-star rating and leave a review. Your feedback drives the game!

There's an ongoing debate about where the most value will accrue in AI between incumbents and startups. Of the incumbents, few have shipped product faster than SalesforceAI. Today on Unsupervised Learning we had on Clara Shih, CEO of SalesforceAI and one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in AI.  (0:00) intro(0:50) work practices that will become irrelevant(1:37) revolutionizing reply recommendations and case summaries(4:57) newest Salesforce products(5:53) structuring teams(7:22) engineering trust into AI products(11:58) combining in-house models with ChatGBT(13:33) Gucci's AI adoption(16:01) how does Salesforce choose who to share their data with?(20:29) AI costs(26:29 creating unique voices for brands(27:45) AI incumbents vs. startups(29:54) what Clara would build if she had the time(32:28) the future of Slack(35:55) what percent of customer support questions can be answered by AI?(38:37) over-hyped/under-hyped(39:32) working with Mark Benioff(40:46) Jacob and Pat debrief(44:42) Slack is the perfect interface for generative AI(46:10) Abridge investment(48:15) Ideogram investment With your co-hosts:  @jacobeffron  - Partner at Redpoint, Former PM Flatiron Health  @patrickachase  - Partner at Redpoint, Former ML Engineer LinkedIn  @ericabrescia  - Former COO Github, Founder Bitnami (acq'd by VMWare)  @jordan_segall  - Partner at Redpoint

Welcome to Growthmates — the place to connect with inspiring leaders to help you grow yourself and your product. Here you can learn how companies like Dropbox, Adobe, Amplitude, Canva, and many more are building excellent products and growth culture. Subscribe to get all episodes right to your inbox on katesyuma.substack.com.Listen now and subscribe on your favorite platforms — Apple, Spotify, or watch on YouTube (new!).Exciting announcement! If you're keen on Mastering Product Growth and User onboarding, join the upcoming course in April. You will get personal guidance to create a stellar onboarding experience and frameworks to turn it into live. Get a 10% discount before 15 March.Learn more and get early access → https://maven.com/growth-course/self-serve-onboardingThis time we talked to Emily Wang, CEO of Bento, previously Product Manager on Growth Team at Intercom.  Emily shared her authentic story of becoming a founder, the role of leadership, creating a company culture, and building a strong team. Our conversation went beyond that, and we also discussed: * What's The Right Time to Introduce Experimentation* Why Killing Features is necessary to grow and evolve your product * Why the PLG model sometimes is not the right fit, and what we all should be aware of in the current market landscape If you find our show valuable, please share it with your colleagues and friends, and leave us a good review.Follow Growthmates updates on:* Substack Newsletter (for instant inbox delivery): https://katesyuma.substack.com/podcast* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/growthmates-podcast/* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/growthmates_/Where to find Emily Wang, CEO of Bento:* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emilyyidanwang/ * Website: https://www.trybento.co/Where to find Kate Syuma, Growth Advisor (ex-Miro):* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ekaterina-syuma/* Newsletter: https://katesyuma.substack.com* X (Twitter): https://twitter.com/kate_syumaWhere to find Oscar Torres, Product Designer at Miro:* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/oscartorrestryme/* Website: https://www.oscartorres.me/* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/oscar_towers_/What we've covered in this episode:00:00 Emily's Mission to Start Bento03:46 Emily's Personal Mental Model Shift05:00 The Importance of Building a Company10:00 Understanding Different Parts of a Company12:14 The Right Time to Introduce Experimentation15:00 The Role of Leadership in Company Building16:44 Killing Features and Simplifying the Product17:12 Balancing Product and Design Team Priorities20:00 Creating a Company Culture22:32 Product-Led Growth and Finding the Right Fit25:00 Building a Strong Team30:00 Effective Communication within a Company34:47 Shifts in the Macro Environment and Impact on Product Growth40:00 Balancing Short-Term and Long-Term Goals47:33 Onboarding vs Everboarding45:00 Conclusion51:03 Where to Connect with EmilyResources referenced:* Get a 10% discount for the Maven course on Onboarding and Activation before 15th March: https://maven.com/growth-course/self-serve-onboarding* Behind the Cloud, Mark Benioff: https://www.amazon.com/Behind-Cloud-Salesforce-com-Billion-Dollar-Company/* Leadership and Self-Deception, The Arbinger Institute: https://www.amazon.com/Leadership-Self-Deception-Getting-Out-Box/If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to share it with your colleagues and like-minded friends. For sponsorship and other inquiries reach out to ekaterinasyuma@gmail.com.Subscribe to get more episodes right in your inbox: katesyuma.substack.comThanks for reading Kate's Syuma Newsletter & Growthmates! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit katesyuma.substack.com

Episode 056 – Marc Benioff, CEO & Founder, Salesforce  On this episode of the Executives' Exchange, we spotlight a recognized leader in the world of business, Mark Benioff. Mark is the CEO of Salesforce, as well as a New York Times bestseller, and an advocate for ethical business practices. Hear what insights Mark thinks helped to propel Salesforce to its extreme success and explore the principles that guide Mark's leadership.    00:00 – Intro  00:19 –greetings banter (his new tower being opened)  01:39 – early life, video games, leading up to salesforce  05:03 – career path, college, guidance/ mentors  08:11 – AI, where it's going and how its transforming salesforce  17:32 – leadership style, innovation   20:36 – Shure Sponsor  21:05 – How to help better vision the future  23:56 – How salesforce operationalizes its values as well as personal values in business  28:35 – 1:1:1 model and philanthropy  34:52 – Chicago investments, the new tower opening again, singer song writers  41:11 – Closing remarks  41:48 – Outro  Episode Link: Salesforce  Host: Margaret Mueller, President & CEO, The Executives' Club of Chicago  Producer: Eva Penar, Chief Content & Communications Officer, The Executives' Club of Chicago  Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.  Thank you to our podcast sponsor, Shure Incorporated. For nearly 100 years, Shure Incorporated has developed best-in-class audio products that provide high-quality performance, reliability, and value. Headquartered in Niles, Illinois, our history of innovation and expertise in acoustics, wireless technology, and more enables us to deliver seamless, transparent audio experiences to a global audience. Our diverse product line includes world-class wired and wireless microphones, networked audio systems and signal processors, conferencing and discussion systems, software, a loudspeaker, and award-winning earphones and headphones.  Find Shure on: Facebook | LinkedIn | Instagram 

Savage is back for the daily news, views, and reviews listeners have come to know and love. Hear the best moments from Savage's daily take on the pressing topics of the week including: The Biden whistleblowers could be in danger; Savage shares Teddy's plaque; And why this is truly a battle of freedom vs. tyranny; Is fitness racist? Biden nibbles on a scared young girl and orders 3,000 reservists to be ready for European deployment; Zelensky's NATO snub; Conservative defeatism; Black and Hispanic New Yorkers who failed teacher's test strike $1.8B in NYC settlement; Irish Rambo says Ukraine war is a horror, genocide, and slaughter; Has the world turned on NATO and Zelensky? Kamala Harris' fake accent at Jesse Jackson retirement party; Mark Benioff says San Fran-Psycho will never be back to pre-pandemic standards; Savage's prayer book he's kept since he was 13; How the far Left conquered America; The Left's plan is similar to the Bolsheviks. Is the Gilgo Beach murder suspect a cover up? Woman dragged climate activist by hair off streets in Germany. Don't miss this captivating run down of the stories you might have missed! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this episode, Dan connects with prolific author, seasoned marketer, communicator, academic, and entrepreneur, John Davis. John has spent the last two decades in academia, holding various positions in universities across the US and Asia. Currently a professor of practice at the University of Oregon's Lundquist College of Business, John's passion for sustainability and transformation shines through his work. With eleven books under his belt, his latest, Radical Business: How to Transform Your Organization in the Age of Global Crisis, highlights the importance of curiosity, innovation, and sustainability in today's ever-changing business landscape. A leader in sustainability, John's unique perspective and experiences make him a sought-after voice in the world of business transformation. Listen in and... Understand the power of curiosity, innovation, and sustainability in revolutionizing businesses. Explore methods to develop comprehensive corporate social responsibility programs. Find out how prioritizing purpose, advocacy, and meaning can elevate an organization's triumph. Understand the importance of ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) reporting and why organizations struggle with it. Grasp the importance of synchronized stakeholder engagement for transparent decision-making. Realize ways to inspire younger generations to champion sustainable change. Actions and ideas mentioned in this episode: Read John Davis' book, Radical Business: How to Transform Your Organization in the Age of Global Crisis, for insights on how to create a sustainable and successful organization. Consider incorporating sustainability into your organization's strategy and operations to become a force for good in the age of global crisis. Cultivate curiosity and encourage it within your organization as a key leadership quality and driver of innovation. Adopt the concept of traveler's eyes by seeking out new experiences and perspectives to stimulate imagination and personal growth. Encourage open and honest dialogue within your organization, even when it means challenging established norms and potentially uncomfortable discussions. Be willing to collaborate with other organizations and share insights to address global challenges and drive positive change collectively. Recognize the importance of balancing short-term targets with long-term goals, allowing your organization to maintain focus on the horizon and avoid getting stuck in the weeds. Continuously seek out new learning opportunities and experiences, both within your industry and beyond, to keep your organization adaptable and resilient in the face of change. Resources & Links Dan Nestle https://nestle.libsyn.com/ http://twitter.com/dsnestle https://www.linkedin.com/in/nestle https://www.facebook.com/thedannestleshow John Davis https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnadavis http://www.brandnewview.com/  https://twitter.com/1JohnDavis     Timestamped summary of this episode: 00:00:00 - Introduction, Host Dan Nestle welcomes guest John Davis to the show and introduces the topic of business transformation and sustainability. 00:00:58 - The Need for Positive Societal Impact, The conversation touches on the need for businesses to move beyond profit and create positive societal impact, with the involvement of all stakeholders. 00:03:09 - Journey to Academia, John Davis shares his journey from a career in business, primarily marketing and strategy roles, to falling in love with teaching, joining academia, and eventually becoming a professor of practice and sustainability. 00:07:00 - Influence of Singapore, John Davis talks about how his time in Singapore, with its smart city initiatives and diverse community, influenced his perspectives on sustainability and led to working with companies all over the world. 00:11:21 - The Role of Curiosity, Curiosity is highlighted as a critical quality for leadership and strategy, with a need to cultivate wonder and openness to new experiences and viewpoints to stimulate innovation and creativity. 00:14:35 - The Importance of Curiosity, John Davis emphasizes that curiosity is the epitome of exploration and imaginative responses. He highlights that it stimulates different kinds of responses and encourages individuals to notice differences rather than fighting them. 00:16:43 - The Need for Reinvention, Davis discusses the drivers of reinvention, including climate change, economic inequality, and social injustice. He believes that companies need to pivot differently to stay in line with consumer values and investor interests to be successful in the long term. 00:22:51 - Influence of Leaders, Davis talks about the influence of leaders on promoting stakeholder capitalism and creating momentum for change. He believes that individuals like Mark Benioff and Elon Musk can wield an outsized influence on society and businesses. 00:26:08 - Taking Action, Davis emphasizes that it is crucial to take action and integrate sustainability into business strategies to stay ahead of the market. He acknowledges that it may not be easy, but it is necessary for long-term success. 00:29:57 - Drivers of Business Transformation, Davis highlights the importance of consumers, capital markets, and influential people as drivers of business transformation. He recommends starting where you can start and taking that first step towards integration. 00:30:29 - Getting Started with Innovation, John Davis suggests using human-centered design or design thinking to ask the right questions upfront and understand what the target audience is looking for. He emphasizes the importance of recognizing the different stakeholders and having conversations with them to create a purpose-led tent that everyone is invited into. 00:32:10 - Recognizing the Complications, John Davis highlights the importance of recognizing the complications in today's world while approaching stakeholder conversations. He mentions the significance of sustainability, diversity, and inclusion, and how they are influential in creating value for businesses. 00:34:00 - ESG Metrics, John Davis discusses the importance of having ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) metrics while reporting sustainability initiatives. He highlights the different reporting standards and the overlapping nature of these standards. 00:37:35 - Climbing the Transformation Ladder, John Davis talks about the difficulty of climbing the transformation ladder for large companies with many internal stakeholders. He emphasizes the importance of decision-making capability and comfort with discomfort to make progress towards the goals. He also highlights the significance of transparency and communication while working towards the goals. 00:43:17 - Radical Business, John Davis suggests organizations should take a look at their purpose and align it with the context to answer the big question of why they exist. He mentions the importance of having an aspiration and thinking intentionally about what their mark on the world will be. Thinking abstractly about aspirations is more difficult than a mechanical approach, but it is crucial to move forward. 00:44:43 - The Importance of Aspiration, John Davis emphasizes the importance of having a guiding star or aspiration for an organization. He explains that this helps put in place next steps, decide on the kind of people needed, and create meaningful experiences. He notes that many organizations have mission statements but lack an aspiration, which creates an imperative for organizations to define one. 00:46:05 - Purpose, Behaviors, and Values, The host and John Davis discuss the importance of purpose, behaviors, and values in an organization. They highlight the need to get employees on board with the culture, which requires having a clear aspiration. They discuss the concept of discretionary effort and how people want to know that their work matters and that they're contributing to something beyond earning a wage. 00:50:10 - The Changing Work Environment, The conversation shifts to the changing work environment and the need to move away from the industrial revolution thinking of a fixed nine-to-five workday. They discuss the importance of accountability and productivity while allowing for more freedom and flexibility. They note that there's a big systemic issue around this cultural mindset. 00:54:25 - Cause Advocacy and Meaning, John Davis introduces the concept of cause advocacy and meaning as a more effective way to understand people and their motivations. He notes that this approach goes beyond the traditional segmentation, targeting, and positioning model in marketing. Cause advocacy involves understanding what drives an individual, while meaning taps into what gives their personal and professional lives meaning. 00:57:38 - Moving Forward in Marketing and Communications, The host asks John Davis what marketers and communicators need to do to move forward. Davis emphasizes the need to move away from the traditional marketing model and focus on cause advocacy and meaning to better understand people. He notes that marketing is an evolutionary discipline and that this approach is a powerful set of tools that goes beyond traditional marketing tactics. 00:59:06 - Understanding the Meaning that Drives Organizations, John talks about finding out the meaning that drives organizations and how it can help talk to stakeholders. He also shares an exercise he used to do with MBA students that highlighted the importance of context and how it impacts innovation. 01:01:30 - Creating Societal Value, John discusses how societal value doesn't always mean the latest gadget or innovation but often comes from looking at underserved populations. He highlights the importance of looking at these populations where a lot of innovation is likely to happen. 01:04:20 - Using Resources Creatively, John talks about how innovation is not necessarily dependent on abundant resources and uses examples like GreenCake in the West Bank, which created building blocks from rubble, and a man who created a $5 prosthetic leg. 01:06:28 - John's Final Thoughts, John shares that his book is a starting point for organizations to figure out what steps they need to take to transform, but he believes that we have infinite capacity and capability to make the changes we want. He's optimistic about the future and mentions how younger generations are already ahead of the game in terms of wanting to make positive changes. 01:10:31 - Closing Remarks, Dan thanks John for being on the show and encourages listeners to check out John's book and consulting work. He also asks listeners to leave a review and share the podcast with friends to help spread the word. *Show notes have been partially AI-generated, but The Dan Nestle Show is 100% human. 

The Digital Deep Show is all about showcasing incredible technology and the exceptional people building it, using it, and the impact it has on society at large. In this episode, we discuss current news in tech, a Chicago spotlights on Redshelf, a Podcast feature on Kara Swisher's interview with Mark Benioff, how Spotifying is devoting more resources to Podcasts, and where I am going to be IRL so we can connect and eat cake together :). You can find the Digital Deep Dive Show on Linkedin, Pogpage and Apple Podcast, Anchor, Google Podcast, and Spotify. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button and have all the episodes downloaded automatically to your device. #DigitalDeepDiveShow #Digital #Digital3DShow Listen and Subscribe: Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3GNBF9b Anchor: https://bit.ly/3Br8p79 Google Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3rSL7DS Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3GO9yGF LinkedIn: Subscribe Online Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@digital3dshow Web: https://www.podpage.com/digitaldeepdiveshow Connect with the Show: Instagram: https://twitter.com/Digital3DShow Twitter: https://Instagram.com/Digital3DShow Connect with the Host: Instagram: https://www.Instagram.com/ReedDailey Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/ReedDailey Linkedin: https://www.Linkedin.com/in/ReedDailey Post: https://post.news/reeddailey Website: https://www.ReedDailey.com

While most faithful Catholics would associate the power and influence of the Vatican with the sacramental gospel of Rome, the dispensing of grace and the canonization of saints, the Vatican and the current Pontifex Marximus have been more concerned with promoting socialism through ecumenical organizations such as The Council for Inclusive Capitalism (https://www.inclusivecapitalism.com/the-moral-imperative-for-inclusive-capitalism/). As with nearly all movements created by the cabal of investors, governments, corporations and movers and shakers associated with the World Economic Forum, the fertile fallacy known as “inclusive capitalism” is anything but capitalism. In fact, inclusive capitalism is nothing more than costumed socialism creating a revenue redistribution scheme - and using guilt, virtue and religion to qualify their strategies. Joining Pope Francis in this cabal are Lynn Forester de Rothschild, Mark Benioff, Mark Carney and corporations and financial institutions such as AIG, Bank of America, AT&T, BP, Deloitte, Dupont, Franklin Templeton, H&R Block, IBM, Johnson & Johnson, Mastercard, Merck, Visa, RNS and a host of other “Great Reset” supporting organizations. What is happening? What is happening is a reset of our national and global financial systems. Join Michael O'Fallon as he explores “inclusive capitalism” on today's Public Occurrences Both Foreign and Domestic. https://sovereignnations.com Support Sovereign Nations: https://paypal.me/sovnations https://patreon.com/sovnations Follow Sovereign Nations: https://sovereignnations.com/subscribe/ © 2022 Sovereign Nations. All rights reserved.

Tiffani Bova is the global growth evangelist at Salesforce – working for Mark Benioff – and the author of the Wall Street Journal bestselling book “GROWTH IQ: Get Smarter About the Choices that Will Make or Break Your Business.” She's been named to the latest Thinkers50's list of the world's top management thinkers.  Along with Columbia […] The post Tiffani Bova: Salesforce's Growth Guru Explains Why Employees Must Come First appeared first on Mark C. Crowley.

Award-winning AI research - check. Startup and enterprise experience - check. Venture capital and Mark Benioff backing - check. Is that enough for Richard Socher's you.com to take on Google? Here is why and how he aims to do that. Article published on ZDNet

The World Economic Forum is something that takes place every year in Davos, Switzerland. Mark Benioff, Billionaire CEO of cloud computing company Salesforce who frequents this forum, is an evangelist for a concept known as stakeholder capitalism. The notion that corporate executors have an obligation to not just do what's best for its shareholders, the folks who bought the stocks and reaped the dividends, but for all its stakeholders including the company's workers, consumers, suppliers, and more broadly, society at large. It's positioned Benioff as that most admirable of characters at the annual retreat, a progressive CEO committed to ending climate change, promoting diversity, and otherwise making the world a better place. But according to our guest Peter S. Goodman of The New York Times, and author of the book Davos Man, it's all a charade. In addition, our hosts discuss the latest developments into Jan. 6th, the newly discovered Draft Executive Order for the Military to cease election machines, as well as the recent news out of Georgia in regards to the infamous Trump phone call to find him more votes. GUEST:Peter S. Goodman (@petersgoodman), @nytimes global econ corr. Author of DAVOS MAN: How the Billionaires Devoured the WorldHOSTS:Michael Isikoff (@Isikoff), Chief Investigative Correspondent, Yahoo NewsDaniel Klaidman (@dklaidman), Editor in Chief, Yahoo NewsVictoria Bassetti (@VBass), fellow, Brennan Center for Justice (contributing co-host) RESOURCES:Pick Up Goodman's book - Here.Watch Rutger Bregman Viral Clip from Davos - Here.Follow us on Twitter: @SkullduggeryPodListen and subscribe to "Skullduggery" on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.Email us with feedback, questions or tips: SkullduggeryPod@yahoo.com. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Max Porterfield started his career with an opportunity to work in global resource company investment, and then gold and uranium, before taking over Callinex Mines.  A unique opportunity to explore for minerals in Canada, in areas well served by infrastructure, with no geopolitical risk, and potential to benefit remote communities.  Because government policies are requiring a shift away from hydrocarbons and there are very large infrastructure projects ongoing or planned in the world, the demand for base metals is forecast to increase exponentially.  However, minimal investment in new exploration over the past decade means the current mines are becoming end of life and new discovery is urgently required.Callinex Mines is exploring, with a well-respected technical team and a modern exploration approach, at properties in Newfoundland, New Brunswick and Manitoba.  It is however the Manitoba, Flin Flon, property that exposed a rare base metal volcanogenic massive sulfide (VMS) rainbow deposit in 2021 that will receive most attention through 2022.  The development may be urgent as it is in close proximity to an established mine that is due for closure in May 2022.  This will eliminate jobs for this remote community, and trigger large reclamation liabilities. Max counsels that the best business decisions are made with a calm mind; there is significant value in meditation or in the potential that the research in psilocybin will deliver.  Maturity has taught him to make decisions with a calm mind and patience rather than in a panic or driven by fear, and to let the world come to him rather than chasing it.  Exploration is not for the faint of heart!Tune in to hear about Valuable lessons that can be learned from Steve Jobs, Mark Benioff, and Robert Friedland. How to know when the return on mining or exploration shares will start improving. How timely and important the Callinex exploration and discovery is. The benefit mining brings in long-term lasting job creation in remote communities, and strong focus on best practice social and environmental standards. And more. Mentioned in this episodeCallinex Mines Inc. websiteTSX.V – CNX    OTC - CLLXF

Jack Verson was the founder of JV Software, where he programmed and published several games for the Atari 8-bit computers: Action Quest, Ghost Encounters, and Journey to the Planets. Roklan Software repackaged Action Quest and Ghost Encounters into a single game, titled Castle Hassle. As part of On-Time Software, Jack programmed the Atari versions of Gyruss, James Bond 007, and perhaps other games, published by Parker Brothers. He ported the Atari 8-bit version of Joust to the Commodore 64. As Applied Systems Engineering, he programmed Time Tunnel for Commodore 64. This interview took place on December 2, 2021. AtariMania's list of Jack's software James Bond 007 Gyruss Journey to the Planets version differences and bugs Larry Kalpan thanks Jack in the manual for 2600 Activision Bridge Time Tunnel for Commodore 64 Jack's company, CDOAN  Mark Benioff review of Action Quest Popeye "V1" for Commodore discovered Verson quoted in Compute! "How the Pros Write Computer Games"

One of my biggest "ah-ha's" and "takeaways" from day 1 of our highest level mastermind. Hit me up on IG! @russellbrunson Text Me! 208-231-3797 Join my newsletter at marketingsecrets.com ClubHouseWithRussell.com ---Transcript--- What's up everybody, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome back to the Marketing Seekers podcast. I'm in a good mood today. I'm in a really good mood today. I hope you are as well. We relaunched my Inner Circle. We opened a new level called the Category Kings. We had a chance to meet with him yesterday, and actually I'm driving to downtown Boise, because I'm going to be hanging out with that group again for the next two days and then my Inner Circle for the next two days after that. And so this is like a week of hanging out with my favorite people in the world, and so I'm excited. I've got some long car rides back and forth this week, so you'll probably get some episodes of me talking about what we're talking about, what's happening. And I'm doing this for a couple reasons, number one is I want you to learn from some lessons and the key takeaways that I'm getting from these events. And number two, hopefully it will inspire you to want to set as a goal someday to be in my Inner Circle, and eventually to send up with the Category Kings and things like that. So there you go with that said I'm going to cue the theme song, when we come back I'm going to share with you guys some of the cool aha I had from our meeting yesterday. All right everybody. So yeah I'm driving downtown Boise here, about to go hang out with my Category Kings, which is a small group mastermind I have with some of the Category Kings here inside of the Click Funnels universe, which is fun. When I decided, as some of you guys know I've run my Inner Circle mastermind program for seven or eight years, and then two years ago, about six months before the COVID lockdowns I decided I needed a break. And so I paused Inner Circle. I shut it down, whatever you want to call it, and decided to take a two year hiatus, actually I didn't know how long it was going to be at the time. So decided to take a hiatus and maybe it was going to be forever. But over the last two years, I missed it. For me there're different ways to learn, like you can learn from a book, you can learn from a course, you can learn from a seminar, and for me I've done all those things. I'm a voracious reader. I go through everybody's courses. I love going to seminars, but eventually for me it gets harder and harder to like mine the gold out right? Because you just are more aware of things. And I've been doing this game now for almost 20 years. And so I've been to more seminars than most of you guys probably even knew existed in our industry. So for me it gets harder and harder to find like that gold nugget. And I was in, I remember my very first mastermind group I ever joined was Dan Kennedy and Bill Glazier's, which some you guys heard we recently acquired their company, which is such a cool thing. But in those groups it was interesting because it wasn't like I was learning, it wasn't like here's course curriculum. It was like the mastermind group, we get together, we all get share and talk, and ideas. And like that's where I started getting these nuggets of things that were just like, oh wow, I can apply that. Oh I can apply that. It was a different type of learning I never experienced before, but I fell in love with it. And I was in Bill's mastermind group for six years. And then when he retired and sold his company I wanted to go see if I could find another mastermind group to join. And I ended up joining all of them. Like all the ones I could find in my world in similar markets, I would join them all. And I never got the same experience. I didn't know why. And that was about the time I decided to launch my Inner Circle. And I think the reason why most of the masterminds I tried to join was like you join them, and there were a whole bunch of internet marketers in the group. And so everyone, I don't know, it was just, it never felt awesome. But what was cool about the Inner Circle I launched it, because we have ClickFunnels we didn't just have internet marketers who are using the platform, we had people in every market you can dream of. We have 100 and something 1000 active members now. And again, there's people that are chiropractors, dentists, doctors, people in curing cancer, wellness, health filled, people in marriage, family, counseling, relationships, dating, every market you can dream of are using ClickFunnels. And so when we opened the Inner Circle, it was crazy, because it wasn't just like, oh a whole bunch of internet marketers joined to talk about internet marketing stuff. It was like the best people in each industry joined it. And it was so cool, because now in this mastermind I was learning like what's working now in the relationship market? What's working over here in the supplement market? What's working here, because we had such a such wide variety of people. And man for me it lit up. And if you've read, specifically the Expert Secrets book, the Expert Secrets book was written in the middle of when the Inner Circle was at its peak. When people like Brandon and Calum Poland and Alex Hormozi and I could list all, the most of the names you guys know in the ClickFunnels community today were in the Inner Circle during that time. And it was fun, because I was writing that book, I would like test ideas and then I would test it on my business, have some success, I'd share it with the entire Inner Circle and within hours it was being tested in 40 different industries. And we got feedback and course correction, and tweaks back and forth and back and forth. And really the Expert Secrets book was born from that testing process inside the Inner Circle. It was so cool. Anyway, I digress. So for me after two years of having it closed down I reopened it, specifically because I missed learning. Like I've been in a weird spot where we've been growing, we've been acquiring companies, we're doing things, but I don't feel like I've been personally growing and you know growth is a big value for me. That's why I have so many books that I study so much, is I'm looking for ways to grow all the time. And so I reopened it with the excitement to start regrowing again with a small group of really cool people. So the Category Kings have 15 people in it. Each of them spend $150,000 a year to be part of it. And then the Inner Circle is $50,000 a year, and there's a 100 people in that one. And so those are the two groups, the Category Kings one was funny, I thought that was going to, I was like there's no way people are going to spend that much money. That one sold out in two days and Inner Circle, man we ended up from Funnel Hacking Live, we only presented it to people at Two Comma Club. We had a special luncheon. And from that I think we had 60 or 70 people join during the luncheon. And so anyway, so there's some context to what it is, why it is, why it's exciting, why I'm so passionate about it. So with the Category Kings, to kick off kind of this new group some of you guys have read the book Play Bigger, which teaches you how to become a category king. And I thought, how cool, and it's funny, because half of our, the Category King group are actually women. So as of yesterday I'm calling it the Category King and Queens, because there's as many Queens in the group as there are Kings. But anyway I digress, I thought it'd be really cool to have one of the authors of that book come and actually present. And so Dave Peterson came and he presented on how to like design your category. And it was interesting, because I've read the book multiple times, I've referred it to, I think he told me I was probably the top refer of his book, because I told everybody about it. And so it was interesting, because as we were preparing for this I had it in my head what he was going to do. He was going to use the principles in the book. We're going to map it out. We're going to category design. Like I thought, I really thought that was the direction we were going to go. It was interesting, because he told me, he's like, you know everything I've learned about category design for the most part happened after I wrote the book, we wrote the book based on these principles and he's like, we've been coaching for the last decade now. And he's actually now doing it in a company again. And he's like you know most of what I've learned about category design, I have learned since the book. And so there's a lot of things that are different. And so anyway, we had a four hour workshop with him and what was fascinating to me was we didn't cover most of the things in the book. In fact the first hour was all spent on something that seemed so simple. I'm almost nervous to tell you guys this, because you'd be like, oh that's so simple Russell. But me and 15 other people in this room of arguably Category Kings in their industries, none of us were able to really answer it. And that's what I want to share with you guys today. So the question and it's interesting, because like the way that I, the lens that I view the world at typically for me is like, okay I'm going to go find, who's my dream customer? And then I'm going to create an offer for them. That's like for me, like ground zero, that's where I begin this process. And then if you've read Extra Secrets, you know it's like, hey do we make an improvement offer? Or a new opportunity? Create a new opportunity. There's this whole thing around like down that rabbit hole. And that's where I begin. That's where I kind of start running with. And I always knew that when we're creating offers and creating products, and services and things like that, where like our goal to solve a problem. But what was interesting is that Dave asked us, he's like, what is the problem that you solve? And he showed a bunch of the big companies you're aware of. Like the billion dollar brands and most of them have like a really simple, less than 10 word statement on the problem that they solve for the market. Like for example the wetsuit guy, I don't know who it was, but like his problem he's trying to solve is I want to swim in cold water longer, but that was it. I want to swim in cold water longer, eight words right. And like, what is a wetsuit? Oh it helps people swim in cold water longer. What was the problem you try to solve? Boom this is a solution and billion dollar brand. And every company had something like that. And then he was interesting, he said that he would go to, or he was talking about some of his friends that have big companies. And he said that he started doing this exercise with them, when he'd get in the car with them, and he'd be like, Hey how's it going? How's business? Real quickly, what do you think the problem is you guys as a company solve? His friend would tell him the answer and he'd write it down, and next time they hung out three or four days later he'd be talking, he's like, wait real quick, what was the question? What is the main problem you solve again? And the guy would be like, oh, he'd tell him again, and then he'd do it again, he'd do it five or six times over the next month and a half or so. And eventually the guy came back and said, you know the seventh or eighth time he asked him, he's like, dude you got to quit asking me this. Like you keep asking and I keep telling you the problem we solve. And then Dave came back and said, actually what's interesting is I've been writing them down. He's like every single time I've asked you that question, you've given me a different answer. And the guy was like, oh my gosh. And he started looking at him and he was disagreeing with himself, not knowing it. But if you look at like, he's like I solve this problem, I solve this problem. And I solve this problem. And they kept changing around. And he said a lot of times he'll do consulting with people and they're in category design, and he'll ask everybody in the executive team, what is the problem you solve? And everybody's answers different. And then he'll ask the employees and everyone's answers different. And he's like, this is the foundation. Business is all about solving a core problem for an industry. Like what is the core problem? And what's interesting he said that if you figure out the problem correctly, he said, the category will take care of itself. Like you don't have to go and figure out the category and design, all kind of stuff. He's like it all relies on this one thing, is what is the problem you solve? And it was interesting, because as he said that, instant I'm like oh sweet I can answer this. And then I was like, wait a minute. I could answer this seven years ago when ClickFunnels first came out. That was the problem we were solving seven years ago? It was that entrepreneurs couldn't code. And so we had to make this easy drag and drop builder, oh sorry this is the solution. The problem is that entrepreneurs aren't coders, that's the problem right? And so we built ClickFunnels, because someone like me who's an entrepreneur who needs funnels, I can't code. And so it was like this simple thing. And so that was the problem we solved. Now fast forward seven years later, that's not the market problem anymore. There's a million ways that entrepreneurs can code something. There's a million Wix's and WYSIWYG editors, and WordPress and Shopify, and Etsy and Amazon, like there's a million ways to do it. So, that's no longer the core problem. Although, that's the problem that we solved initially. And so it got me thinking, what is the problem we solve today? Like the problems change in a market and an industry over time. In fact, I asked someone, I was like, does the core problem stay the same forever? And he's like, no, no. He's like there's a core problem, and you got to figure out and identify that, because that'll define the category and everything else. But he's like markets shift, markets change. And he showed this graph of the CRM industry over the last 50 years or 60 years, initially he was it was business cards. And then it was some dude figured out you could take a business card and type it into a data processor. Now you had a digital business card, and then the next wave was like... Sorry, we can come back to the problem. So the first problem is like I needed contacts. So business cards became the thing. That was the problem. And then next thing I have all these business cards, I don't know how to manage them or track them. And so someone made a program where you could type it in. It's like, oh I have a digital version, I can look at it. And if my book of business cards burns up I don't lose my business. So problem solution, and then a little while later it's like, okay this is tough I hate typing in these things. And so the next wave of that industry was card scanners, where you take a business card, you scan it and boom it's in your computer now, you've got it there. And that solved the next set of problems in the industry. And then later it was I don't just want a business card. I want a business card, but to be able to take notes. And if I talk to somebody and things like that, and it was like the first version of CRM, and he showed, was it Seabolt and showed how they became the Category Kings and they dominated. But then eventually it was like well, first Seabolt was really hard to install and all these kind of things. And that's when Mark Benioff came out with Salesforce, which was not software, it was hard and confusing and you had to have people come install it and set up. It was just web based software. And he was the very first to do SAS based software. And so like that became the next thing. And he kept showing them the industry shifting, because the problem shifts over time. And it was interesting, because in your market if you're not shifting your problem over time, someone else is going to solve the problem and that's when you lose the category. That's when the person passes you, which is so fascinating. And so the question came down to, what is the problem you solve? And so that's the thing I want to identify for you guys. And the problem that us entrepreneurs have is like, oh we solve a ton of problems. We do this and this and this, and this and this, and this and this, this and that is the wrong answer. You don't solve a whole bunch of problems. You've got to solve one problem for the category. And by doing that, by creating that, by understanding and identifying and framing that problem from there the category is built. And then we got deeper and talked about POV statements and things like that, it got deeper from there. But that was the core foundation, that again, if I was teaching, I'd be like step one find a problem, step two, what is the offer? And then like you know, and I'd go directly into that, but it's like, no, no, we got to step back to the foundation, which is really what is the problem that you're solving for the industry? When you figure that out the category will take care of itself, which was so fascinating. And again, he said, try to keep your problem statement to under 10 words. And that's hard to do. I spent 45 minutes talking about, 15 minutes work shopping it, and then I spent the next four hours like noodling on it, like try to figure this out, like what in the world, especially as I know some of you guys know we're launching ClickFunnels 2.0 soon, so like with this whole new launch, this new thing, what is the problem we're trying to solve? How do I identify? How do I structure? How do I make it so simple that it keeps us as the Category King? So anyway I hope that's helpful. Obviously there was a lot of stuff yesterday that was really, really cool, but that was the one that was like the biggest insight. It was funny, because we came back from the first workshop, I raised my hand initially, I was like, all right I don't know if it's just me, but that was really, really hard. And I looked around at everybody else, every other Category King and Queen in the room looked back and said, oh, then Kevin's like, we're so grateful it was hard for you Russ, that was really, really hard for us and we thought we were the only ones. I'm like, no, I'm going to be vulnerable here too. That was really hard. And then it was fun, because it opened the dialogue with us all trying to figure it out and work with each other. And Annie Grace, a lot of you guys know her, she spoke at Funnel Hacking Live two years ago, she actually wrote out mine and my POV statement and all these things for me, it was like I think this is what yours is. And like, anyway it was magical. So anyway that was the first half day of Category Kings and Queens. And so I'm heading into the event room now, I'm getting close actually. And I'm excited because I was up till two o'clock last night working on my presentation, because I'm going to, based off of what we learned yesterday with the problem I'm going to take that as the foundation point and then show everybody over the last seven years how ClickFunnels has built to the place it is. We've got over half a billion dollars in sales, well over that now, we built the category, we've done these things. So I'm going to kind of show the next phases for me to the group. I'll probably spend two or three hours going deep into that, which I'm so excited for. And this is like Russell raw, like if you guys see me live, I'm Russell polished where I'm, I've got slides, I've got things. Russell raw you get me and a black marker and that's about it. So I'm excited for these guys they're going to, for those who haven't been with Russell raw this will be my first hardcore doodle session with them going through the principles of how we build ClickFunnels into the category king it is. Things I've learned along the way, the pros, the cons, the ups the downs, and yeah stuff I don't get to talk about typically. So, that's the cool thing about these groups, if you look at our coaching programs we have all the base level stuff. And then if you come in one funnel way and courses and all that kind of stuff, but when you decide to ascend up and get into coaching with us, the first is our Two Comma Club X coaching program. The goal of that is to get somebody from where they are today to Two Comma Club. After you get done with Two Comma Club and you've made a million dollars inside of a funnel, that's when you get invited into the Inner Circle and then from there into category Kings. But it's interesting because the reason why we break it up like that, we used to always have it all together and everyone would be dumped in one coaching program. And it was tough because, or one mastermind group, but it was tough, because there're different conversations that happen at different levels. Like the conversations I'm having with people that spend $150,000 to be in a group, they have to make a minimum of five million a year, and have had to sold over 10 million. They had to have won at Two Comma Club X award. The conversations they have in that room are different than the conversation that happen in a room with people who just passed the million dollar mark. And they're different than the conversation I've going to have with somebody who is in a startup mode trying to get into Two Comma Club. So it's just fun, because again these are things I don't get to talk about, or share ever. And so the place it gets to happen is here inside Category King. So for you guys who are looking to say, okay this is the path, I'm going to hit Two Comma Club X. And then from there Inner Circle, then Category Kings, just know we do record these things and there's a private members there. So when you get to Category King some day, come in here and watch Dave Peterson's talk on Category Kings and watch my presentations from the next day. And you'll have a chance to kind of see where I went from there. So with that said, thanks for listening. This is a long episode because I got a long ride. Hopefully you guys enjoyed it. I miss doing stuff like this, I'm going to try to... We have some fun updates to the podcast coming that I'm doing a few things more long form, I'm going to have someone come and interview me on some topics, because I think those make fun episodes and yeah it's going to be anyway... I'm going to be spending more time with you guys here, is my plan and my goal. So with that said, thanks so much for everything and we'll talk to you guys all again soon.

Topics Discussed:Justice Department seeks emergency order to block S.B. 8Article from the Daily Beast comparing S.B. 8 to the Fugitive Slave actsSalesforce CEO Mark Benioff offer to move workers out of Texas due to S.B. 8Update on Portland's vote to ban Texas trade and travelThe racist attack on Larry Elder & the hypocrisy of the Left  Links Mentioned:Justice Department seeks emergency order to block Texas abortion law - CBS NewsWhy Texas' Abortion Snitches Will Target Black Women Most - The Daily BeastTexas abortion law disproportionately affects women of color, patient advocates say - USA TodayWatch our documentary Maafa 21  For Free!Life Dynamics Report: Racial Targeting & Population ControlEmployees Are Calling Out Major Reproductive Rights Organizations For Racism And Hypocrisy - Buzz Feed NewsSalesforce billionaire CEO says he'll move workers out of Texas due to abortion law - Fox BusinessPortland to Vote on Banning Texas Trade and Travel in Reaction to Abortion Law - WBAPPortland scraps Texas boycott, changes response to the state's new abortion - Dallas Morning NewsRate & Review Our Podcast Have a topic you want to see discussed on the show? [Submit it here.]To learn more about what Life Dynamics does, visit: https://lifedynamics.com/about-us/Support Our Work Be Sure To Follow Life Dynamics:Our WebsiteFacebookTwitterInstagramYouTube  

On today's episode you will hear part 4 of 4 of Russell's interview with Andrew Warner about the Clickfunnels start up story. Hit me up on IG! @russellbrunson Text Me! 208-231-3797 Join my newsletter at marketingsecrets.com ClubHouseWithRussell.com ---Transcript--- Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome to the 4th and final installment here of the interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club, where he's going deep into the Clickfunnels startup story. I hope you've enjoyed it so far. You know, throughout this entire interview, it was really fun. He brought my wife onstage and some of my partners onstage, and brought other people who didn't like me at first onstage and kind of shared all these things. I hope all you guys are enjoying it and really enjoying this interview. I hope that this starts making you think about your startup story. Some of you guys are living your startup story right now, and maybe you're depressed or nervous, or scared, or afraid or whatever. And hopefully this gives you motivation to know that I was there too. In fact, I'm still there many times, but it's okay and it's part of the game and part of the process. And someday you'll look back and you'll have someone like Andrew interviewing you about your startup story and you'll be so grateful for the trials and things you're going through now. So with that said, we're going to queue up the theme song, when we come back we'll listen to part 4 of 4 of the Clickfunnels startup story interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club. Andrew: And I know a lot of you have asked me what's coming up next and Russell's going to talk about that, how you're going to get to Sales Force level, but why don't I take a couple of questions from someone. Is there anyone who's been sitting here going, “I can't believe Andrew didn't ask that.”? Is there anyone who has something standing out for them? Should we just have them onstage. Unknown person: We got mic's. Andrew: We got mic's from over there, okay. Audience member: Alright, a little bit deeper of a question. What is something, I know you're strong in your faith, family, God, I mean kind of all around, what's something that's really made you who you are? You've mentioned before that made you as a marketer with your dad, you're up late watching an infomercial. But what's something that inherently that could have been experienced, maybe a quote in the back of your mind that's just driven you, it could have been something that your parents taught you when you were young. What is, is there, it's kind of a little bit difficult of a question to look back, there's probably a million things. But what are one or two that really stick out, that make you the person that you are? Russell: I have a million thoughts just racing through my head. The one that just popped in the front, so I'll share that one, hopefully it's good. I remember when I was a kid my dad gave me a job to go clean the car. I went out there and I cleaned the car, I did my best job, I thought. And I came back in and I was like, “Hey dad, it's clean. Can I go play?” I was like, “Come look at it.” So he could let me go out and play. And he was like, “Well, is it good? Are you proud of it?” and I'm like, “I don't know.” And he's like, “Well, are you proud of it.” I was like, “I don't know.” And he's like, “Go work on it until you're proud of it, then come back and let me know.” And I was like, oh man. So I go back out, and I was like, “Am I proud of this?” and I was thinking about it, I guess technically I'm really not that proud of it. So I was like trying to do more things, trying to clean it better, and to the point where I was actually proud of it. And then I came back and I'm like, “Dad, okay the car's clean now.” And he's like, “Are you proud of it.” I'm like, “I am.” And he's like, “Okay, you can go out and play then.” I think for me that was such a big thing because it was just like, that internal “Am I proud of this thing that I'm giving, that I'm putting out there?” and if not, keep doing it until you are. And I don't know, that was one of those little weird dad moments that he probably didn't mean as a teaching opportunity, but definitely has been big for me ever since then. Andrew: Good question. Is there one on this side? While you're finding a person who has a question, Whitney, did you have more to say? You were going to ask more, right? Yeah, can you get the mic over to Whitney, please? She's right over here. I know I didn't ask your full question. Whitney: Hi Russell, how are you? Russell: Awesome, how are you doing? Whitney: Good. So with your business, what is, back to like when you were first starting, I kind of want to know, what's the one thing when your business was really hard, when you were really struggling, what's the one thing that kept you going? Just in the back of your mind. And then I have a second part of that. What would you say was your biggest failure and what was the greatest lesson you learned from it? Russell: That's not an easy question. Andrew: The biggest failure. Russell: Oh man. So the first question was, what was the first one again? Thinking about the biggest failure, I'm trying to…Oh, what kept it going? Andrew: Give me a sec. Are you going through that now? You are, what are you going through right now? Can you stand up and get close to the mic? I can see that this is a meaningful question for a reason. What's going on? Be open. Whitney: I'm just trying with my business, I'm trying to get my message out there. I'm really, I'm just baby parts of Clickfunnels, so I'm just figuring out how to do a funnel still. But my company is called Creating Powerful Women, so I am just trying to teach women how to grow a business while they grow their family at the same time. And I'm doing that right now, because I have 3 little tiny girls. So I'm just like, okay, I'm still trying to figure out this myself and then teach women how to do it at the same time. So it's just, I'm still in that struggle phase. Andrew: Is it partially because you feel like an imposter, how can I tell them what to do? That's what I was saying to you earlier. Whitney: When I don't even know. Yeah. {Crosstalk} Whitney: I feel like I need to have that success level before I can teach women to go out and do it. But the reason when I found you in the hall, and I said, “I want Russell to be vulnerable and tell like the nitty gritty parts of the story.” And those stories are what make people relatable to you, that's kind of where I'm at, as I realize that I grow a bigger following and a bigger audience when I'm more relatable to them, which I realize I don't need to be up at that level to do that. Andrew: I get that. Russell: So my question for you is, have you been working with women? Helping them so far? Tell me a story of someone you've helped. I'm curious. Whitney: So I went through post partum depression a couple of years ago, after I had a baby and a lot of the women I've been reaching out to when I shared those stories, those women have been coming to me saying, “Hey, how do you get through this struggle? I know you've gotten past that, so I want to hear the hard stories that you went through.” So a lot of the people who I've been coaching one on one have been people who have gone through those exact same things  that I have. Russell: Okay when you do that, and you share the stuff with them, and that clicks for them, how does that feel? Whitney: Like I'm fulfilling what I was put on this planet to do. Russell: That's the thing. That's the thing that keeps me going. It doesn't happen often, but it happens often enough that I crave that. I'm super introverted, so it's always awkward for people to come to me, but I still love when they come to me and they're like, “Hey, just so you know real quick…..” Like last night, we were in San Francisco, or San Diego, excuse me. Someone came up to me in the hall and I was kind of like, I'm nervous to talk to you but you're going to talk to me. And he said, “Hey, just real quick, you legitimately changed my life, you changed my family.” And started tearing up. And I was just like, I let myself feel that just for a second and then I go back to the awkwardness, but for a second I feel that. And It's just like ahh. That's what it's about you know. I use Voxer for my coaching clients. So every time they Vox me and say something like that, there's a little star button and I star it and it stores them in this huge thing of all the starred ones. So now days I'll go back and I'll listen to that and I'll listen to people like 2 years ago that said something about how something I did effected them, and it's just like, that feeling. Because everything we do in this life is for feeling's right. Everything is just a feeling we're looking for. We eat because we want a feeling. We did this because we, I wanted a feeling. We're doing everything for a feeling. So it's like if I can remember the feelings of the thing I'm trying to get, and I can experience it again, then it, that's what gets me and keeps me going.  And I think that any of us that are lucky enough to have those feelings, a lot of times we forget about them. No, remember that because that's the thing, when it's hard and it's painful and it's dark, it's that feeling that's just like, that's the, you remember that and you let yourself experience it again for a minute. And then for me, that's like, okay, I can get back up and I can go again. Andrew: Great question, I'm glad you asked it. How about one more over there? You know what, yeah, let's give her a big round of applause, please. Audience member: I was actually going to ask a little bit about that vulnerability. I was surprised, I'm big in the SAAS space, I've been to Dream Force, follow a lot of Clickfunnels. It's pretty rare to see a CEO want to put themselves kind of on the roasting side of things. You're from here, from Sandy. I was just kind of surprised, what was it that really compelled you to kind of want to come back and do this in Utah? When I saw your email I thought it was a clickbait scam. Russell: Oh it is, we're selling you something next. Audience member: I really thought I was going to come and it was going to be a video of your face spinning and it was going to be like, “Hi, we're here.” Because I follow Clickfunnels, but it's just really rare, especially being down in Utah county, that was kind of unique that way. Andrew: Wait, one sec. Does Clickfunnels allow me to actually place someone's city in the headline, like I want someone from San Francisco, you could. Oh, alright, I get it. Audience Member: It said like Idaho, we're in the surrounding areas, it's going out to 8000 people, limited seating. So as a marketer I was just like, is this a real thing? You know. So I showed up and I was excited to see you. But why come back to Utah, what does this event mean to you and why want to be vulnerable and kind of open up? I learned a lot about you personally that was great to hear from a business side. Russell: So my beliefs are, and I believe we have the best software company in the world, so I'm going to start with that. But if it's just about the software, then it comes down to who's got what feature. People are moving and shifting and changing because of the features. That's the thing. So Clickfunnels was like, no it has to be more and it has to be a thing. And it's interesting, people who sign up for Clickfunnels, who click on an ad, they come and sign up. That's why John can't do, it doesn't work that way. They sign up for a web, clickfunnels is a website builder for crying out loud. You boil it down, we are a website builder. That is boring. So people don't come for that. They stay for that. That's why they stay, that's why they stay. But they come because of a feeling, and they come because of a connection. I want to be able to take the videos from here because if I can more people who come through my funnels to hear this story, they're going to stick with Clickfunnels because they realize we have a soul. There's a reason behind this, it's not just the software company who's trying to make a bunch of money. We're actually, we have belief behind it. So that's why we do all these things. That's why I still write books. That's why we do videos. That's why we do vlogs. That's why we do this fun stuff, because it builds connection with people, and connection really keeps people staying, even if some other company's got a different feature than we do, or it's cheaper and we're more expensive, or whatever. So that's the big reason why we still do it. And then I thought it would be fun to come down here because I grew up not far from here and it's just kind of a fun thing. We've been working with the Harmon Brothers and we started another project with them and their family owns the Dry Bar Comedy Club, if you guys have ever watched Vid Angel, that's one of their families companies. When Vid Angel had their little hiccups, they shifted all the programming to this, the Dry Bar Comedy Club, so we used to watch all the comedians here. And I was like, this is like the coolest location to do something like this. And one of the other side jokes, I don't know if I shared this with you or if it was just in my head, but Andrew is famous for doing these big scotch nights, and as a Mormon I can't drink scotch. And I was like, what if we did this, but at a Dry Bar, just this funny play off of that? And it all worked out. Andrew: You know, usually at events I do scotch night afterwards and say, ‘Everyone come back to my room.' That's not going to go over very well. But Dave's been to mine. He drinks water and feels comfortable. We have good water for Dave. How about one more, then I want to get into the future. Audience Member: So you always talk about how, like for Clickfunnels you guys took like 6 tries to finally make it work, right. And how most of the time when you guys start something it doesn't work the first time, that's why you have audibles and all those things. So I was wondering as someone that, you know I'm starting and getting that, kind of like that lifts, what is the biggest thing that you see, versus like a flop funnel versus something that kind of takes off and explodes? What's the audible or the change that you normally do that shift or the message change or whatever it is, that makes it finally take off? Russell: Traditionally the difference between a funnel that works and doesn't work, I'd say it's probably 50% offer. Like if the offer's wrong it's not gonna, that's usually the first thing. But then if it's actually a good offer, that people actually want, second then is usually copy. So like what's the hook, those kind of things. And then design is probably 3rd. All that stuff that Theron and those guys didn't like at first. The things that, because it's not like we just made up this stuff, you saw 8000 funnels we tested and tried in the journey of 15 years of this, that now we know what things people convert on. So it's just like looking at stuff that you know is working and modeling it because you this structure works, this kind of thing. But usually when something is broken it's coming back and figuring out, this offer's not right. People didn't want it. And that was the problem with Clickfunnels. The offer, we took 4 or 5 times to get the offer right, and then as soon as the offer is right, you can tell when it's right because people will buy, even if everything else is bad, if your offer is amazing people will give you money for it, you know. So that's definitely the biggest part, and from there it's copy, then design, then all the little things that stress some people out, like me. Andrew: So I've got, we'll come back. I see there are a few people that have more questions; we'll come back to them in a moment, including you. I promise I'll do more. But you did tell me about all the different things you guys are working on now. Of all of them, what one is going to get you the closest to Sales Force level? Russell: That's a good question, there's so many things. So I would say, I'm going to ask you a question is that alright? Have you ever played bigger yet? Played bigger? Playing bigger?  Andrew: No, what do you mean by that? Russell: That's the name of the book right? Play Bigger? Andrew: Oh Playing Bigger, the book. No. Russell: Yes. So that's book's been interesting, if you guys haven't read it, it's one of the biggest ones as a team that we've been reading. But it's all about designing the category and becoming the king of that category. So I feel like we are the king of sales funnels, and that's our category, the thing that's going to be there. And then if you read through the book, the next phases are like, building out the ecosystem that supports you as the category. And the fascinating thing about sales force, if you look at it when, I probably shouldn't say this on video because someday Mark Benioff's going to watch this and be like, “I'll never give you money.” But sales force isn't great software, right. It's this hub that things are tied into, but the reason why they did 13 billion this year, they're trying to get to 20 billion is because they built this ecosystem. The ecosystem is what supports this thing and grows it up, and builds it. And that's like the next phase. So I think for us, it's like we have this, we have funnels which are the key. It's like the CRM for them, it's the central point. But it's then bringing all the ecosystem, it's building up all the things around it, right. Andrew: Letting other people create things on your platform, becoming a platform. Russell: Yes, becoming a true platform. Andrew: can you create a platform when what you want is the all in one solution when you're saying, “you don't have to plug in your chat bot to our software. We're going to be chat bot software.” “You don't have to plug in infusion soft, we've got email marketing in here or mail chimp.” Russell: It depends, because you look at Sales Force is similar too. They have their own things that they either acquire and bring them in, or they build their own, things like that. And I think it's a hybrid of that. I think it's, we allow people to integrate because some people have tools. We will, our goal is to always be the best sales funnel builder on planet earth. We may not be the best email auto responder in the world, we have one and that increases our revenue. And people who love us will use our email auto responder, but there may be some other one that's better. But it's not our big focal point. There may be a chat bot that's got more features and more things, that's not gonna be our focus to make it the best, but we've got one built in to make it. So theer will be, that's kind of our thought, that we will have the things included, so if people want to go all in they can use it. But if they love yours because of these things, they can still bring that and still bring it in. You know, and then as we grow, who knows what the next phase is. Is it acquisitions, finding the best partners? People that most of our members are using, start acquiring companies and bringing them in, internally similar to what Sales Force does, growing the platform. Andrew: Just keep letting people build on your platform and then does that make the platform more valuable, or do you guys get a share of the money that people spend on these external tools? Russell: Both, I think. Stripe for example, Stripe, I think we process 1.7 billion dollars through Stripe. We make over a million bucks a year from Stripe referral fees, for just letting them connect with us. So there's value on both sides because it makes the platform more valuable because people can use it easier, but we also make money that direction as well, and those type of things. Andrew: Okay, what is Actionlytics, Action… Russell: Actionetics. Andrew: Excuse me. Russell: So that was Todd's name. He loved that name. So Actionetics is, it's what we call internally, follow-up funnels. So we have sales funnels, which are page one, page two, page three, page four. Then a follow-up funnel is send this email, send this text message. “Here's the retargeting pixels, here's the thing.” So it's the follow-up funnels. It's all of the communication that's happened after somebody leaves the page with your audience. Andrew: And that's a new product that you guys are creating? Russell: Yeah, it's been, actually we make more revenue from Actionetics than we do from Clickfunnels right now. We've never marketed it outside though. Andrew: I can't get access to it, it asked me for my username and password. I said, I don't have that, so how do I sign up for it? Russell: it's only been in beta. So we opened up at Funnel Hacking Live, people signed up there. And then we kept it down for a year, then we opened it, so two Funnel Hacking Lives we opened it, and then my birthday we opened it. So that's it. But we have, it's over, 12-13 thousand members who have upgraded to that. And then we're probably a couple weeks away from the actual public launch where people will be to get, everyone will be able to get access. Andrew: And already people are spending more money on that than Clickfunnels? Russell: Yeah, because it starts at $300 a month versus $100. So it's the ascension up. So they go from $100 a month to $300 a month and then the new one, it scales with you. Because we're sending emails and Facebook message, it gives us an ability to grow with the platform as well, and not just have a $200 a month limit. Someone might pay $1000 or $5000 depending on how big their lists are. Andrew: You're really good at these upsells, you're really good at these extra features. How do you think about what to add? How do the rest of us think about it, based on what's worked for you? Russell: Okay, that's a great question, and everyone thinks it's a product, the question most people ask is, what price point should my upsells be? It has nothing to do with that. It has 100% to with the logical progression of events for your customer. So when someone comes to you and they buy something, let's just say it's weight loss. So they come to you and they buy a weight loss book right, and let's say it's about how to get abs. So they buy that, the second they put their credit card in and click the button, in their mind that problem has now been solved. I now have six pack abs, the second it's done. And people don't think that. So what people do wrong is the next page is like, “Cool, you bought my abs book. Do you want my abs video series?” it's like, “No, I just solved that problem. I gave you money. It's been solved.” So what we have to think through, for logical upsells is like, “okay, I just got abs, what's the next logical thing I need?” So it's like, “Cool you got abs now, but how would you like biceps? We can work it out. This is my training program to grow here.” For funnels it's like, here's this funnels software, or here's this book teaching you how to build funnels, but after you have a funnel you need traffic. So traffic's the next logical progression. So as soon as someone's bought something, the customer's mind, I believe, that problems been solved. And it's like, what's the new problem that's been opened up, because that problem's been solved. That's the logical… Andrew: I got my email addresses because of Clickfunnels, the next problem I'm probably going to have is what do I send to people? And that's what you're solving. What about this, fill your funnel, it's a new software. Russell: Yeah. Andrew: What is it? Russell: How do you know these things? That is good, you have been digging. So I'm writing my third book right now, it's called Traffic Secrets, and then on the back of it we have software that's called Fill Your Funnel, that matches how we do traffic with the book. So when someone reads the book, you login and the way we do traffic, we focus very heavily on influencers. We call it the Dream 100. So you come in and you login and you're like, “Here's the people in my market. There's Tony Robbins, there's Andrew..” you list all these people and it starts pulling all our data, scraping all their ads, their funnels, everything  and shows you everything that's happening in their companies, so you can reverse engineer it for what you're doing. Andrew: So if I admire what John is doing for you guys, I could put you in the software, you'll show me what you guys are doing, and then I'll be able to scrape it and do it myself. You're nodding. And you're okay with that? John: It's awesome. I'm excited. Russell: Excited. Andrew: Have you been doing that? Is that part of what's worked for you guys at Clickfunnels? John: Yeah, we like to, we call it funnel hacking. We like to look and see what other people are doing. Andrew: So you're actively looking to see what other, man as an interviewer that would be so good for me to understand what people are doing to get traffic to their sites. Alright, so… Russell: We buy everyone's product, everyone's. I bought Drew's like 6 times. Yeah, you're welcome. Just because the process is fascinating to see. Andrew: And then the book. What's the name of the book? Russell: Traffic Secrets. Andrew: Why is everything a secret? What is that? Russell: I don't know. Andrew: No, I feel like you do. I remember I think it was… Russell: It all converts, 100% because it out converts. Andrew: Because the word, “secret” out converts? In everything? Russell: Everything. I used to onstage be like, “The top three myths, the top three strategies, the top three lies, the top three everything” and like “secrets” always out converted everything else, and then it just kind of stuck. Andrew: And then that's the name of this book. I'm looking here to see…yeah, Melanie, she told me when you organized this event you said, “Secret project”. That's it. Russell: If I just tell people what's happening then they like, “Oh cool.” I need to have to build up the anticipation. Andrew: Even within your team? Russell: Especially within the team. Yes. Andrew: Especially. So secret is one big thing. What else do you do? Russell: Secrets, hacks… Andrew: No, within the team. So now you get them interested by saying it's a secret. Russell: So I'll tell them a story, I'll tell them the beginning of a story. I'll be like, “Oh my gosh you guys, I was listening, I was cleaning the wrestling room and I was going through this thing, and I was listening to Andrew and he was doing this campfire chat and it was amazing. And he's telling this whole story, and I have this idea, it's going to be amazing. But I'll tell you guys about it tomorrow.” So what happens now, is they've got a whole night to like marinate on this and be like, “What in the world?” and get all excited. And then when they show up, they're anticipating me telling them, and then when I tell them, then I get the response I want. If I tell them they're like, “Oh cool.” I'm like, no, you missed it. I need that, in fact, I'll share ideas all the time, I'll pitch it out there just to see. I know it's a good idea because Brent will be like, “I got chills.” Dave will start freaking out, and that's when I know, “Okay, that was a good idea.” If they're like, “Oh that's cool.” I'm like, crap. Not doing that one. It's the same thing. Andrew: I've heard one of the reasons that you guys hang out together is one, he's an extrovert and you're an introvert, but the other one is Dave will one up you. Russell: It starts the process. This is the bubble soccer event we did. Initially it was like we're going to have influences, or we were launching the viral video and like we need, let's bring some people into it. And then we were asking how someone could bring big influencers, like “you have to do something crazy. Like get a Ferrari and let them drive over it in a monster truck.” I was like, “That seems extreme.” I was like, “What if we played football on the Boise State Stadium?” And Dave's like, “What if we did bubble soccer? What if we tried to set a Guinness book of world records…” and then next thing we know, we're all Guinness book of world record champion bubble soccer players. It was amazing. Andrew: And that's the thing that I've heard about your office environment. That it's this kind of atmosphere where, see for me, look at me, I've got that New York tension. When I talk to my people and I talk to everyone it's like, “You've gotta do something already.” And you guys like fun, there's a ball pit or whatever in the office. Am I right? You go “we need a, we're gonna create a new office. Let's have a bowling alley in it and a place to shoot.” That's the truth. Russell: It is the truth. It's going to be amazing. Andrew: Does he also tell you, “We need to do something this weekend. Date night, it's a secret.”? Russell: Maybe I need to do more than that, huh. Andrew: Yes, does he use persuasion techniques on you? Russell: It doesn't work on her. Andrew: No. Russell: She's the only person I can't persuade. It's amazing. My powers are useless against my wife. It's unfortunate. Andrew: Do you actually use them, or when it comes to the house you go, “come on, I'm tired already, just…”? Russell: I tried to do something today and she was like, “That was the worst sales pitch ever.” I'm like, “Dang it. Alright, I'll try again.” Andrew: Hey Siri, text my wife “I've got plans for tomorrow night. So good, Russell just told me about it. I'll tell you later. Secret.” Period, send. Russell: That's amazing. Andrew: Wowee. Does anybody know how I can get a babysitter here. {Audience speaking indistinctly} Andrew: They're a little too eager to spend time with my kids. Thank you. Alright, I said I would take a few more questions. I know we're almost out of time here. Who was it, it was someone on the right here that was especially, you looked, uh yeah you, who just pointed behind you. Audience Member: Hi, okay, Russell I've been in your world since about 2016.. Andrew: Hang on a second, who the, I'm sorry to curse, but who the f**k comes to a software event and goes, “I've been in your world.”? This is amazing about you. I'm in San Francisco, there's nobody that goes, “I'm so glad I've been in the hubspot world.” It doesn't work that way. I'm sorry, I had to interrupt. Okay. I've been in your world. He's selling you software, you're in his world. Sorry. Audience member: You have to listen to his podcast, it's a.. Andrew: I've listened to his podcast. It's just him talking. Audience Member: He talks about it, it's a universe. He creates a universe. Andrew: You know what, here's the thing that blew my mind. I thought it was him in a professional studio, I saw him in San Francisco, he's talking into the voice recorder on his phone. Okay, yeah. I gotta feeling that Russell's going to go, at some point, “Religion is just an info product. I think I could do a better job here.” Alright, yeah. Audience Member: okay, I entered the Clickfunnels universe in 2016 and since that time, I came in with a lot of hopes and a lot of, it was just a really exciting experience to have you break down the marketing, you really simplified it right. So I see that, I'm an ambassador for the one comma club challenge right now, and people are coming in with such high hopes and such tremendous faith and trust in you. And I have a friends that I brought into it and everything and they're coming in, just like, they're really staking a lot on how they've persuaded to join your universe. Sorry, universe is the wrong word. But from that, I guess the question is, there's a few things. I think a lot of people are afraid of that type of responsibility in the products that they're delivering, and of course there is a tremendous failure rate of people who don't get what they're persuaded in. So there's a lot of magnification on the two comma club, and the people there that are the successes, but the question that I have is, the responsibility that you feel for that, I feel that you feel the responsibility because you're constantly looking for new ways to simplify, bring in new coaches, bring in the new team, make products and offers that are completely irresistible. Truthfully, I went to Funnel Hacking Live, I'm not spending any money, 20 thousand dollars later. I mean it was truthfully so irresistible, but you've crafted such unique things in an effort to truly serve that client and really get them to the place that they're looking to go. So I'm not sure if the question is coming out, but there's a lot of responsibility that all these bright eyed, bushy tailed you know, wannabe marketers are coming in really truthfully feeling the genuine just truth that you're telling them, but then there's a big crash and burn rate too, which is normal in that space. I'm not sure what the question is. Andrew: Congratulations  to the people in the two comma club, what about the people in the no comma club. What do you feel is a sense of obligation to the people who aren't yet there? What do you feel about that? Russell: Is that the question? Andrew: Is that right? Audience member: I guess the question is, there's two parts, one is the responsibility that other people are feeling, the fear that they're feeling to put something out there because they're afraid of a failure rate. So just like, Whitney over there was talking about, she's got those fears. So there's normal fears that come along with that, so how you deal with that, in that it's not because of lack of delivery on your end, but there's still people who are spending tremendous amounts of money, or small amounts of money that just aren't getting what it is. So it's really about your internal feelings about that topic. Russell: It's a good question. There's a lot of different ways I could answer it. I'm trying to think, for me it's a big reason I do have a con stripe, because I do feel like I have a huge obligation to people who sign up for our stuff. So I'm always thinking, how do we simplify this, how do we simplify it? What's the best way to do it? What's the thing? But that's also what creates innovation right. It creates the ideas, it's that, how do we serve these people better? How do we serve them better? Probably the best analogy, in fact, Brandon over here was working on a video that he sent me last night, that I had a chance to watch, it was really cool. We had Sean Stephenson speak at the second Funnel Hacking Live. Was anyone there for that one? A couple of you guys. Sean Stephenson, if you know him, is the 3 foot giant. He's this little dude in a wheel chair, one of the coolest humans on earth. And he told this story, it was funny because man, I had another emotional connection watching it last night actually, watching it. And he talked about stories like, “How many of you guys here are upset because you got 17 followers on Facebook and you've got 13 likes on your YouTube video, and you're pissed because of all this stuff.” And I think of a lot things that way. “I'm trying this thing, I'm not a millionaire yet, I'm not making any money, blah, blah, blah.” And they're upset about that right. And what Sean said, he's like, “Do you know how they choose who they're going to save when a helicopter is flying into an ocean and there's a boat that's wrecked with all these people. Guess how they choose who they're going to save?” and he said, “What happens is the helicopter drivers, they fly over there and go down to the people, going to save them, and guess who they save, they save the people who are swimming towards you.” He says, “That's how you do it. If you try to save everyone, it will drown you, it'll drown the boat, and everybody dies. But you save the people who are swimming toward you.” And then he came back and said, “Those 17 likes on your video, those are the 17 people who are swimming towards you. You have to understand that.” So for me it's like, we talk about the money because that gets people inspired, but when it all comes down, the really internal belief, no one really cares about the money. They want the feeling of the connection and the help and they want to change the world. They have their thing, and so it's like, we talk about the money because it gets people excited, but I don't know anybody who that's the real reason why they're in business. They're in because they want, they want to help those people that are coming towards them. So you notice when you get deeper into the culture, it's not just money, money, money, money. It's how do you serve, how do you impact, how do you change the world, how can you get your message clearer, how can you do those things? And when you shift from the money to that, then the money starts magically coming. So for me, it's just like how do we get more people thinking that way more often. I don't know if that's the right answer or if that helps at all, but it is definitely something I feel a big obligation for but I also feel like I'm super grateful for the people who are willing, I'm grateful to Don Lepre, spent all that money doing the infomercial on that thing. And I didn't implement it back then, when I was 14, right. I'm grateful to the next guy who re-inspired me and I bought the thing and didn't do anything and then next person and all those things, because eventually it stuck. So for me, it's like I'm going to keep creating offers and keep doing cool things, and trying to inspire people because it might not be the first or the second or the fifth, but eventually if I keep being consistent on my side, it's going to keep getting it and eventually the right people, those who actually have something they want to share, something they actually care about what they're doing will figure out the way. And we're just going to keep trailblazing and trying to do our best to make a path that they can all follow. So that's kind of how I look at it. Andrew: Great question. Let's close it out with one more. Yes. Dave did you find someone, because I just found someone right here. Why don't we do two more then? Since you found one and I found one. What's your name? Sorry, Parker? Parker. Go next. There we go, let's go to Parker next and we'll close it out with him. Parker: Alright, so the biggest question I have for you Russell is, I've seen you guys' amazing group you guys have at Clickfunnels, and every time I go in your guys' office it's nothing but excitement, energy, and not only you don't have to inspire your workers to work for you. They come there excited and hearing your amazing stories that John and Brent had of, they stayed with you for all this time and you pushed them and they pushed you and there's this amazing cycle. I'm curious as far as, because I want to have an amazing group like that one too so I can affect the world the same way that you have, and even do better than you did. And that's a completely admiration thing, that's I don't know. Dave: Cut from the same cloth here. Russell: That's his dad. Dave's son. Andrew: Oh got it. That makes sense. Parker: The question I have for you is, how do you find those people? Is it nothing but like a whittling out process or do you see these characteristics already in the people that you have? Andrew: One sec, how old are you? Parker: I'm 20 years old. Andrew: 20 years old and you admire your dad and the guy that he works with so much that you want to not just be like him, but be more like him? Can you take of my kid tonight? Sorry, that's amazing. Does your dad come home with this energy like this energy like, “We're going to capture the world. This is what we're going to do.” Parker: it is the funniest thing. Oh my gosh. Every way you see him online, social media, whatever the heck it is, it's exactly the same way he is at home. When you see him on the tv talking about like, “Oh this is…” or when you interviewed him. Andrew: I've watched his podcast, I see that thing. {Crosstalk} Parker: you know as much as I do then. Andrew: What did he motivate you to, like to sell as a kid, or to upsell as a kid. Parker: So he would like talk to us like he was a sales person basically, in the aspect of he talks about things as far as, this person did a terrible job at selling. They could have done this, this, this and this.” And we're like 10 years old, I think at the time, I think. I don't know. It's more of a recent change since he joined clickfunnels and he's got this amazing excitement and energy. It's an amazing thing and I wish to have to people like my dad when I become a, when I start to do my own thing. Andrew: It is contagious isn't it? Parker: yeah, it totally is. Andrew: And I've been watching, what's this new Vlog that you've got. It's on Russell, it's on Russell Brunson's YouTube channel right? I'm at the end of it going, “Hell yeah, why am I taking a shower now. I gotta go, I got stuff to do.” Right. These guys are out there taking over San Francisco, that's my city. So I guess you're feeling the same way at home. Now, he's there twice, he suddenly owns a place. So your question was…? Parker: My question was basically, how do you find these amazing people to work, not only for you, but with you and to help you accomplish your dream? Is it whittling out process or it you have innate ability to find people? Russell: So as you were saying that I started thinking, I'm thinking about the partners on our team, who none of them came through like a help wanted site. None of them came through like, Brent went to church with me and he showed up every single week, every single month, he was my home teacher and showed up every single month consistently and we became friends and we did stuff together. John married my cousin. We were on the boat in the middle of the lake and he pitched me on a network marketer opportunity and I was like, I love this guy. And then I pitched him back and we just, and it was amazing. And then Dave, we were at an event like this and we had a signup sheet if you wanted to take the speakers out to dinner and Dave ran back and signed up every single line under mine. So I went to every single meal with him for 3 days. I think it's just, I think a big part of it, I think most entrepreneurs can't build a team because they're waiting to build the team. And I think for me, I didn't know what I was doing so I just started running, and what happens when you're moving forward and motion is happening, people get attracted to that. And some people will come for bad reasons and they'll leave, and I've been taken advantage of multiple times, things like that will happen, but the right people will stick around. But it's all about, it's the motion right. That's what people are attracted to. If something's happening. I don't know what's happening, but I want to be on that train and they start coming. So I think it's taking the initiative of “Okay, I'm going to start running and I have no idea if anyone's going to follow me ever. But If I do this and I keep doing it consistently then people will.” And you know, it's been a consistency thing. I'm 15 years into this business now, 8000 funnels deep. But it's a consistency, and when you do that and you're consistent, then the right people will just start coming into your life. But not waiting for them initially. If I would have waited to build my team initially, we wouldn't have a team. Everyone we met was like in the, as we were having motion, the right people started showing up. Andrew: Alright. Thanks. Speaking of, thank you. How many people here are actually at Clickfunnels, if you work at Clickfunnels. Can you guys stand up if you work at Clickfunnels. There you go. I feel like at the end of this everyone's going to want to go and meet Russell. Everyone's going to want to go and mob him. And he's not that social, number one. Number two, I feel like you're going to pass up these fan-freaking-tastic conversations, I've gotten to know the people who work here a lot really well in preparation for this, I really urge you to see the guys, the people who are wearing these t-shirts. Get to know them. Push them into a corner, understand what's working for them. And really, you're fantastic people, thanks so much for helping me do this. And thank you for having me on here. I really appreciate you being open, being willing to let me take this anywhere. You said, “I understand what Andrew is trying to do. He's trying to figure this out. I'm going to let him run with it and let him make the magic happen.” And I think we made a lot of magic happen. Thanks so much for having me here. Russell: Yeah man, it was amazing. Andrew: Thank you all for coming, I'm looking forward to meeting every one of you. Thanks.

In a companion interview to his June 7 talk with Stanford's Michael Snyder, Harry speaks this week with Noosheen Hashemi, who—with Snyder—co-founded the personalized health startup January.ai in 2017. The company focuses on helping users understand how their bodies respond to different foods and activities, so they can make diet and exercise choices that help them avoid unhealthy spikes in blood glucose levels.January's smartphone app collects blood glucose levels from disposable devices called continuous glucose monitors (CGMs), as well as heart rate data from patients' Fitbits or Apple Watches. The app also makes it easier for users to log the food they eat, and see what impact each food has on their glucose levels. Once the app has enough data, January's machine learning algorithms can start predicting the effects of different foods and activities on blood glucose. It can then recommend meals and exercise that'll help users keep their blood glucose in a healthy target range. The goal isn't to prevent glucose spikes completely, but rather to prevent diabetes from emerging over the long term in people at risk for a cluster of serious conditions known metabolic syndrome. That could help individuals live longer, healthier lives. And at a population level it could save billions in healthcare costs.Please rate and review MoneyBall Medicine on Apple Podcasts! Here's how to do that from an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch:• Launch the “Podcasts” app on your device. If you can't find this app, swipe all the way to the left on your home screen until you're on the Search page. 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Thanks!Full TranscriptHarry Glorikian: I'm Harry Glorikian, and this is MoneyBall Medicine, the interview podcast where we meet researchers, entrepreneurs, and physicians who are using the power of data to improve patient health and make healthcare delivery more efficient. You can think of each episode as a new chapter in the never-ending audio version of my 2017 book, “MoneyBall Medicine: Thriving in the New Data-Driven Healthcare Market.” If you like the show, please do us a favor and leave a rating and review at Apple Podcasts.Harry Glorikian: I've been making the show long enough that you can see a kind of family tree emerging, with branches that connect many of our episodes.That's definitely the case with today's interview with Noosheen Hashemi, the co-founder and CEO of the precision health company January AI.The branch leading to Hashemi started back in June of 2021 when I interviewed Professor Michael Snyder, the chair of Stanford's Department of Genetics.Snyder is a huge proponent of using wearable devices to help people make better decisions about their own health. In fact, the day we spoke he was wearing seven separate devices, including one called a continuous glucose monitor or CGM.A CGM is standard equipment these days for about 3.5 million diabetics in the U.S. who need to know when their blood sugar is too high and when it's time to take more insulin. But Snyder believes that blood glucose data could also help tens of millions of other people who don't yet take insulin but may be on their way to developing full-blown diabetes.Back in 2016 Snyder got a visit from Hashemi. She's a longtime Silicon Valley tech executive and philanthropist who'd been searching for a way to use AI, wearable devices, and big data to get more people involved in medical research. Hashemi told me it took just two meetings for her and Snyder to decide to join forces to co-found January. The company makes a smartphone app that collects blood glucose data from disposable CGMs, as well as heart rate data from patients' existing wearable devices such as their Fitbit or Apple Watch. The app also makes it easier for users to log the food they eat, and see what impact each food has on their glucose levels. Once the app has enough data, January's machine learning algorithms can start predicting the effects of different foods and activities on blood glucose. It can then recommend meals and exercise that'll help users keep their blood glucose in a healthy target range. The goal isn't to prevent glucose spikes completely, but rather to prevent diabetes from emerging over the long term in people at risk for a cluster of serious conditions known metabolic syndrome. That could help individuals live longer, healthier lives. And at a population level it could save billions in healthcare costs.As you're about to hear, Hashemi and I talked about why glucose monitoring is so important and what companies like January can do in the future to make the predictive power of AI available to more people.Harry Glorikian: Noosheen, welcome to the show. Noosheen Hashemi: Thank you, Harry. Harry Glorikian: So, it's great to have you on the show. It was interesting that, you know, the minute Dr. Snyder mentioned the company, I was immediately Googling it. And I was like, oh, I have to talk to this company. I have to understand what they're doing and, and what's going on.And to be quite honest, I've been doing my homework for the past couple of weeks. And I'm like: I think I have to call my doctor and get a ‘script to actually use the product. Just to help everybody get up to speed on this, can you bring people up to speed on where we are with glucose monitoring and health in general? Whether they have diabetes or whether they're just, you know, what, I, maybe someone like me who I hope is a generally a healthy person.Noosheen Hashemi: Sure, absolutely.  Yeah. So from Mike Snyder's four-year multi-omic IPOP research,  we learned that people who are so-called healthy and have healthy A1C levels could actually have huge glycemic variability. He sometimes calls these people with pre pre-diabetes.  I think eight people developed diabetes during his four-year study.There haven't been enough longitudinal studies in healthy people with glycemic variability to suggest that they will necessarily develop diabetes. So to date, there's really no conclusive evidence that healthy people can benefit from balancing their blood sugar. Also, not all sugar spikes are bad and a two-hour bike ride might produce a big spike, but that's fine. It's not the spike by itself that we worry about. It's really  how high the spike is against our baseline, against the population, whether the spike comes down quickly, the shape of the curve, the area under the curve. These are the things that are illuminating in terms of our state of metabolic health.So  at January we really view metabolic health as a spectrum. So we want to support people to figure out kind of where they are on that spectrum. And to try to really help them move up to healthier points on that spectrum. So we don't see it as a moment in time where you are something or you are not something. You are kind of on a spectrum of metabolic health, and we continuously want you to be self-aware and, and really improve your location on that spectrum. Now, something to keep in mind,  and why I think it's important for people to take action on this, is that 84% of the 88 million people believed to have pre-diabetes today, and 22% of the 34 million people that are believed to have diabetes today, are not diagnosed. They are undiagnosed. That's 75 million people walking around with pre-diabetes and don't even know. So, if we don't measure people's health, that doesn't mean they're healthy.  So we really encourage people to be  you know, vigilant with their health learn so that they can, they can act, you know, self-advocate. Be able to self-manage.So we do think that wearables are an easy, useful way to kind of see where things are, but then you need companies like January to make sense of it all. Harry Glorikian: Yeah. I mean  you know, it's interesting because you know, I'll go to my doctor and they'll do that one time measurement. It's like taking your car in and you're like, it was making a noise. It's not making the noise right now, but, you know, try and diagnose when that event is not happening. Whereas with the wearables, I can, I can actually see, you know, my, my heart rate variability change depending on my exercise process. I can see my sleep change if I had one too many glasses of wine. I have to tell you, I hate it because I would like to have more wine than my monitor allows me to have, but you know, you see the immediate feedback, which would let you sort of course-adjust accordingly. And you know, when I, there was a paper, I believe that was published in Israel where there, I think it was 500 people that they looked at and where you could see that every person, they could eat the same foods, but their spikes would be different or how long that spike would be based on genetics, based on their microbiome. And so if you're not monitoring, how will you know that your quote, healthy diet is actually healthy for you? Noosheen Hashemi: You don't.  You definitely don't. And yes, that's study shows variability between people, but also we've shown glycemic variability for the same person. So we had somebody at the office have the same good sleep nine days in a row, and they had a different glycemic response to that. Mostly every single day, nine days in a row, depending on how much they had slept, how stressed they were, how much workout they had done. And most importantly, how much fiber was in there.  So we are radically different person to person, and this is why we encourage people.  No one is going to know you as well as you do. And no one's going to be as interested in your health as you are  as you should be, as you might be. So we really encourage people to learn, learn, be self-aware self-advocate, self-educate. Harry Glorikian: So, help people understand this term metabolic syndrome, you know, and, and talk about how many people, maybe who are pre-diabetic go to full-blown diabetes, you know? Noosheen Hashemi: Okay. Yeah. So  I mentioned that 122 million people have either diabetes or pre-diabetes in America.  88 million plus 34 [million]. And then a larger number of people, if you believe Mike Snyder's pre-diabetes number, that's even a larger number. But metabolic syndrome is a cluster of conditions that leads to type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and stroke. These conditions are basically high blood sugar—which has been historically measured by A1C  blood tests called hemoglobin A1C, but increasingly it's measured by time and range using a CGM—high cholesterol and triglyceride levels, high blood pressure, high BMI, and high waist to hip ratio. So this kind of fat right in the middle.So the 2002 diabetes prevention study showed that unless there's an intervention, 58% of the people that have pre-diabetes could end up with diabetes. And usually they think of this prevention as weight loss.That's what the DPP programs, diabetes prevention programs, are about.So if you have pre-diabetes the cells in your body don't respond normally to insulin. And insulin is a hormone that facilitates your cells taking up glucose, which is a source of energy for your body. Your pancreas basically makes more insulin to try to get the cells to take up glucose. You sort of get into this terrible vicious circle. So eventually your pancreas can't keep up and then you have this sort of excess sugar sitting in your bloodstream, which is really a problem. And it can really lead to microvascular complications like retinopathy or neuropathy or diabetic nephropathy.So as you know, diabetic retinopathy is the most common cause of blindness in working adults in the developed world. And in diabetic neuropathy, essentially high blood sugar can injure nerves throughout the body. And usually damages nerves in the feet, in the legs and feet, which hear about foot ulcers and amputations coming from this.And of course  diabetic kidney disease. Nephropathy is something that  is the number one cause of kidney failure, actually. Almost a third of people with diabetes develop kidney disease. So you add this with the high blood pressure we can increase the force of blood through your arteries and damage arteries. And then you have excess blood pressure, you knowblood pressure and diabetes together, basically increase your risk for heart disease. So it's really a terrible cluster of conditions to have. And so if you have three of these conditions, three of these five, you essentially have metabolic syndrome. And if you have metabolic syndrome, you're at a higher risk of developing these different diseases. You really don't want to go down this path. The path itself is not great. And then the comorbidities from this path are just worse and complications of course are very painful, costly, and potentially, deadly.Harry Glorikian: And so that's one end of the spectrum, but in reality, even someone like me who tries to watch he eats, who goes running regularly, or tries to go running regularly. I mean, you know, I have sleep apnea because they tell me my BMI is too high. Right. So  but this sort of technology, you know, I could be spiking and keeping a high glucose level, which would inhibit my ability to lose weight, et cetera. So how can more data about blood glucose, and its relationship to diet, help people avoid diabetes?Noosheen Hashemi: Yeah. So for so long, we've been able, we've been told just to avoid refined sugar, refined flour, eat a lot of vegetables, walk 10,000 steps. You'll be fine. Or, you know, weight loss is given as the end goal to cure all diseases. You know, why don't you, Harry, drop 25 pounds? Or how about drop 5 to 10% of your weight? Harry Glorikian: Just like that!Noosheen Hashemi: It's true, weight loss really improves biomarkers. But how many people who get this advice can actually do that? And at the timeframe that they need to. So we feel like that's just not a practical approach to solving a problem.A more practical approach is to really figure out what works for each individual. You know, you mentioned you've dialed your own wine drinking based on its impact. I've done the same. I was, you know, enjoying two, three sips of wine. And then I learned that it would wake me up in the middle of the night. So I stopped having even the two, three sips of wine. So don't feel bad that you can't have your second and third and fourth glass. But basically we offer a multitude of levers that you can dial for your lifestyle. For example, intermittent fasting and calorie restriction together have shown benefits in clinical studies for improving insulin sensitivity, if you do them together. So you can't just fast and then gorge yourself. But if you fast and you restrict your calories together, you can really improve insulin sensitivity. So we let you, we help you using the January program to learn to experiment with fasting and calorie restriction and figure out what works for you. How much of it you can make. You know, slowly  help you essentially build it into your habits and your daily routines to fast. You know, we increase your fasting period 15 minutes at a time. So you may start with January you're eating 16 hours a day and you're fasting eight hours. You may end the program having reversed that.And other thing is we, we really pro promote fiber consumption. So increased fiber intake has been associated with higher levels of bacteria-derived short chain fatty acids, which is a regulator of GLP-1 production. As you know, GLP-1 is an incretin and a recognized regulator of glycemic homeostasis and satiety. So we help you track how much fiber you're eating. We encourage you to eat more, knowing what foods spike you, spike your blood sugar, helps you basically eliminate or reduce consumption of those foods. It tells you how much, how much of those things to eat  or alternatives that kind of honor your food preferences  and food tastes, but have lower glycemic index. If you can't walk 10,000 steps a day, okay. January tells you how much you need to walk, when you need to walk to keep your blood sugar in a healthy range. So you really need data  to, to dial your lifestyle. There are many levers and there are no silver bullets and there's too much to keep in your head. Which is why it's nice to have AI sort of help you kind of make, you know, take it all in to a platform and then synthesize it and give you insights.Harry Glorikian: Yeah. I mean, like,  I've got my, my Apple Watch. I've got my, you know, Whoop band. Right.I don't have as many as he [Mike Snyder] does, but  I know, I think my wife would kill me if I, if I was wearing eight things, but, but it's, you know, it's true. Like it's, you know, each one of these, because they're not holistically designed, give me a different piece of data that then I can then react to. You know, one is probably more of a coach that causes me to push a little bit farther, you know, et cetera. So  I mean, I hope one day we evolve to something that's a little bit more holistic so that the average person can sort of, it becomes more digestible and more actionable. But you know, I do believe, based on my conversation with him and even all the work that I do multi-factorial biomarkers or multi biomarkers are going to be how you manage, you know, yourself much better.But you know, tell me how January started. What is the thing that excited you about what you saw and what attracted you to this role? Noosheen Hashemi: Yes, absolutely. So January's origin story started with me deciding in 2016 to start my own company, essentially, after many years of running a family office, investing in, serving on boards of companies and nonprofits.  I had early success at Oracle  where I rose basically from the bottom of the organization in 1985 to vice-president by age 27. Along [with] Mark Benioff, who at the time was 26. It was quite the time, taking the company from $25 million to $3 billion in revenue. So  you know  a really, really amazing tenure there. In 2016, I started this massive research in, into theses that were getting a lot of attention, you know, big trends over the next decade. And most importantly, what I really knew. You know, the classic kind of [inaudible].  I happened to attend a conference, a White House Stanford University conference on societal benefits of AI and how to integrate sort of ever-changing AI into everyday life and into the real world. It was a healthcare panel that took my breath away. So Faith A. Lee who had organized the conference with Russ Goldman. They suggested that interested parties run off to this machine learning and healthcare conference in LA two weeks. I immediately booked my ticket. And there I met Larry Smarr. I don't know if you've come across him or not, but he was the first quantified self, maniacal quantified self person I had come across. And he had diagnosed his own Crohn's disease way before symptoms had manifested. And so, and then the common theme of this conference, between all of these presentations was that machine learning could essentially fill in for missing variables in research, not just going forward, but going backwards. So I was just hooked and I never looked back.But it was a hard problem. My own husband had been investing in healthcare and warned of like an opaque sector. He was like, “Honey, this is heavily regulated incentives are aligned with acute disease, not with chronic disease, not to mention even anything or prevention. It's just not a market economy.” And he knew how interested I am in market economies. My first love before medicine was economics. So that's a whole different podcast. So he warned that I'd be sort of fighting this uphill battle, but I was not discouraged. I basically kept on researching.I came across the MIT economist Andrew Lo. I don't know if you've come across him, but you should definitely talk to him. He's brilliant. His work showed that so little research had been done compared to what we really need to do in terms of medical research. And he comes up with ways of funding, medical research, he has a lot of innovative ways that we could really change  the whole model of medical and scientific research, but it kind of became obvious to me that the answer was that we needed to get everyone involved in research.So just, just putting things in perspective. After Nixon declared a war on cancer 50 years ago, we now have some therapeutics and some solutions to cancer. We have really nothing for neurological diseases. We're spending over $300 billion just on symptoms of Alzheimer's— don't talk about even the cure or anything like that. We have nothing for aging, which is the ultimate killer. So it was, to me, the answer was obvious, which was, we have to get everyone contributing to research. Everyone should be looking at themselves. And then with the data, we can also learn across populations. And so deep phenotyping of the population sort of in a multi-omic way was the answer.And that's what led me to Mike Snyder. I actually looked for multi-omics. I went to Stanford medical school and I met with the CEO. He said, what are you interested in? I said I'm interested in multi-omics. He said, you have to talk to Mike Snyder. And so  basically what Larry Smarr had done at the [San Diego Supercomputer Center] was to measure everything by himself. But Mike had essentially extended this kind of research to others, not just to himself. So not only sort of diagnosed himself with diabetes before the doctors, but he'd also run the Human Microbiome Project, the IPOP study, innumerable other research using metabolomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, wearables, and so on.So he had spent a lifetime studying how people went from healthy to disease essentially. And he had taken a whole person approach, which is what I was interested in.  And so in his role as chairman of genetics at Stanford and head of precision medicine at Stanford, he was kind of already living in the future. And that's kind of where I thought, you know, all of us needed to go. So our first meeting was supposed to take 45 minutes. It took 90 minutes. And in our second meeting, we agreed to join forces. It was like, it was instant.  It was just instant chemistry. Like the universe just brought us together.And then all of a sudden sort of everything fell into place for me. Looking back at my life, I been getting ready for this actually all along. Caring for my dad who had been diagnosed with cancer too late to actually give him  a surviving chance. My mom  had been misdiagnosed with asthma when she had heart failure. So I had to leave my family, you know, everyone get together and really intervene. Really changed her, her lifestyle in order to save her life. She is thankfully now 91 years old and living fine, but it has absolutely no salt in her life and a completely different, different life. My own health, my own health journey sitting in front of a computer for three decades, more than three decades, as we know that now they call it called sitting, you know, Harry Glorikian: Right, the new smoking. Noosheen Hashemi: The new smoking. My experience running a couple of hardware companies, my love of food, and my skills of kind of scaling companies. You know, all of this came together. I just basically became obsessed with prevention and I felt that, you know, food could play an outsized role.So wearables, you know, give you signals from the body continuously, which is incredible.  But you also need to understand what people are eating and, you know, we can talk about that a little bit later, but we can basically now imagine predicting chronic conditions, much like Larry and Mike had. And then, you know, postponing and potentially preventing them. And if they've already started, prevent them. Harry Glorikian: Yeah, I was lucky enough to be there and help when Evidation Health was getting off the ground and, you know, once we started to see the data coming in, I remember looking at the data. Is that real, like, is that actually happening? And I was like, the first thing I was thinking of was like, how do we design a clinical trial? Like if you're going to actually say that's happening, that trial is not going to be trivial to set up, to make that claim, but you could see it in the data.And, you know  I actually think some of the shifts that you're talking about, if it wasn't for things like the Affordable Care Act, if it wasn't for putting EMRs in place, if it wasn't for some of these shifts that have happened, you and I would still be, you know, battling this system that pays you no matter what. Right? And I think now is technology is a way that that can empower the average person to manage their own health. I'm not going to say optimally, but boy, a hell of a lot better than no information. I mean, at least some information can maybe give you an early warning light of something that you might be able to intervene in.And I don't know anybody that likes being sick. I mean, I don't do well when this thing starts to age a little bit and not function the way that I want it to. So I've tried to try and keep it in as good of a running condition as I can. So it lasts as long as possible. I mean, I'm one of those people that would listen if I just drop dead at 95, like just boom gone. I would be so happy. Right. As opposed to this sort of chronic  dynamic. [musical transition]Harry Glorikian: I want to pause the conversation for a minute to make a quick request. If you're a fan of MoneyBall Medicine, you know that we've published dozens of interviews with leading scientists and entrepreneurs exploring the boundaries of data-driven healthcare and research. And you can listen to all of those episodes for free at Apple Podcasts, or at my website glorikian.com, or wherever you get your podcasts.There's one small thing you can do in return, and that's to leave a rating and a review of the show on Apple Podcasts. It's one of the best ways to help other listeners find and follow the show.If you've never posted a review or a rating, it's easy. All you have to do is open the Apple Podcasts app on your smartphone, search for MoneyBall Medicine, and scroll down to the Ratings & Reviews section. Tap the stars to rate the show, and then tap the link that says Write a Review to leave your comments. It'll only take a minute, but it'll help us out immensely. Thank you! And now back to the show.[musical transition]So you mentioned AI, you mentioned machine learning. Where do machine learning and other forms of AI fit into January's service and you know, what do you do on consumer data? What kind of predictions can you make that wouldn't otherwise be possible?Noosheen Hashemi: Okay. I can first talk about exactly that. What did we do that hadn't been done before. What is really unique? What are we filling? So essentially in one word, it is prediction. You said it. So  as you know, there've been, there have been glycemic prediction models for type 1 diabetes, but type 1, as, you know, is a serious condition, which, you know, precision really matters for type one. It's life and death.But there hasn't been much done with type 2 diabetes. And so we set out to do predictions, for type 2 diabetes. And  the type 1 diabetes models are pretty simple. They basically are an insulin-carb calculus, essentially. But as we dug in, we realized that  you know, carbs are not all the same and that there are so many other factors besides carbs that affect glycemic response, including things like fiber fat and protein, water, and foods. We wanted to understand glycemic index and glycemic load of foods. So our major  machine learning  research projects, we basically did research for two and a half years before we sold anything.  One of the first things that we did was to try to understand the foods themselves. So we essentially built the largest database. Essentially we licensed all the, these curated food databases, and then we labeled the foods that didn't have food labels, because right now the only food labeling you really have is like grocery foods and chain restaurants.So we labeled foods and then, recognizing that glycemic response was better associated with glycemic index than carbs alone, we set out to create glycemic index and glycemic load for all these foods. Then we ran a clinical trial and associated people's glycemic response to the glycemic load of foods they were eating. And then we turned that into a prediction. So, the prediction model.  Why is it so cool? Well, why should you use your body to figure out how many glasses of wine is going to spike you? Why not have the AI tell you that? Why not do that in silico?  It's this weekend, you want to cook for your wife. You want to get her the right fried chicken recipe. Well, check those out in January, check out those recipes in January. If you know what the glycemic response of, of each one of those recipes could be, it really helps you compare foods. For kind of recipes you can comparefood items in your local cafe. You want to figure out what to eat. You don't have to put them through your body to figure out how you're going to respond, put them through the AI to figure out how you're going to respond.And then in terms of, you know, how we're different. I mean, we essentially live in the future. We, we don't  we don't live in blood pricks and strips and blood glucose meters. We kind of live in the CGM, HRM (heart rate monitor) precision foodworld. We've turned food into actionable health data, which is a necessary ingredient you need if you want to understand people's glycemic response. And if you want to be able to predict it, and that is our huge innovation that nobody has. And we have quite a bit of IP around it. There are a number of things that we're using. We're using meta-learning.  We're using  neural networks. I don't know how much I should say about what we're using. Yeah. We have one paper that we've put out, which is really, really, really simple.  But we, we always talk about, what kind of papers we want to put out and how much we should put out and how much should we not put out, but essentially you can look at the people that advise the company and you can see that, you know, we have a lot of expertise around  essentially… Harry Glorikian: But Noosheen, when you're doing this right, you need to, at some point, I think you need a baseline on say me for a certain period of time before the algorithm can then respond appropriately to that. And then doesn't that potentially change over time, time you mentioned the yogurt, the meusli, right.  And how that affects. So it's constantly gotta be in a feedback learning loop.Noosheen Hashemi: Yes. Yes. And the beauty of January is that essentially you don't have to wear a CGM 365 days out of the year. We think that with AI, we allow you to wear a CGM intermittently. So maybe you want to wear it every quarter  to update our models  just to see how things are going, but you don't need to wear it all the time. You can wear it for a period of training and then basically run your simulations in silico rather than through your body. Let the AI do the work. So you definitely should wear it intermittently so we can update our, our models because people do age. People do have inflection points in their health. They get pregnant, they travel, a lot of things change, but we don't think it's necessary for healthy people to wear CGMs all year long necessarily. Harry Glorikian: So now we're talking about consumer behavior, right, for a, for a tech product like this. And if, you know, if you look at some of the data that I've read in some of these papers, you know, the potential market is significant. It's, you know, it's quite large. I mean, if I just said, you know, 15% of the people have pre-diabetic levels of glucose after eating, that would translate to like 50 million people in the United States alone. But the service depends on the CGM, the app, the external heart monitor. It's, you know, users have to be diligent about monitoring and logging food intake and activities during the introductory month. So for a quantified self junkie, I get it. They're all over this.  What's the plan for getting everybody else on to this? Noosheen Hashemi: Well, I think it's all about the user experience. And I think we have a, we have a long way to go as an industry and for us as well.As a company we have, what we imagine to be the user experience is nowhere near where we are today.I'm old enough to remember world before Starbucks. So you would see ads on TV for MJB coffee, which is something you made at home. You know, I don't know if you remember that but Starbucks created a new experience, really a place between home and work where you would stop by for coffee.And so the outrage around the, you know, $3, $4 latteat the time, do you remember that?Well, Starbucks continue to improve the experience. They added wi-fi, they had ethical coffee, they had kind of a diverse employee population. People's initial wonder and worry gave way to this, you know, gigantic global brand. And I think all of that is because of the experience that people had. I think we need to make health a positive experience. We need to—we, including January—need to make health something that people….it's going to be a little clunky in the beginning, just like the old, you know, cell phones used to be. But while we're going through this process, the companies need to work on to improve the experience and people need to be patient with the clunkiness of everything  to get us to a place where these things become much, much more pleasant to use and easier to use, and essentially AI starts reading your mind about what you were eating and what you were doing. That is going to happen. You know, I've gotten so used to my Apple Watch now that I actually love it. It actually is doing a very good job training me. Just at the right time, you know, “Come on, you still have a chance. Let's go.” You know, all the things that it's doing  I'm actually liking it. It's it's enjoyable. Because it Is coaching. And I feel like the answer for mass adoption lives in experience. We need to improve the experience dramatically. Harry Glorikian: It's interesting though, because I I'm play with a lot of these different things and I noticed that depending on how they're designed, how they're put together, it nudges me to do that much more or et cetera. I don't always listen. Human beings don't always do what they're supposed to do for their better good. But  you can see how, when the app is designed in a way to nudge someone the right in through the right mechanisms. And that's the problem, right, is trying to—not the same mechanism works on everybody. So you may have to have multiple approaches that the system tries like AB testing for a website to, to get them to do that.But so, if the average person like me wants to do something like this, obviously I have to get a ‘script from my doctor, which just drives me crazy that I can't just—because I can buy a finger-prick, right, over the counter and poke myself a thousand times and then write down these numbers to see what happens. Which seems a little clunky in my opinion. But I can't buy the CGM that does it automatically. There's gotta be some medical person saying like, we're gonna make more money off this if we do this or do that, or, or it just doesn't make any sense to me.  How do you, how does January come at the expense reimbursement or the insured part of it, or is this just out of pocket for everybody? Noosheen Hashemi: Sure. So right now  government insurance, companies, and private insurance companies cover CGMs for people that are intense insulin users. So people that prick themselves four times a day. And so that's three and a half million out of 122 million people that have pre-diabetes or diabetes. So it's a very small population. And the rest is all cash paid. And it it's really out of pocket. So we have an early access price of $288. And we, you know, we include the CGM, but you can also buy CGMs only from January. You can just, if you just want a CGM, you don't want to do anything else. You're just curious. You want an introduction to this world? You can order a CGM from January for $80 if you want to do that. So if you're one of the 12 million people that are insured by Kaiser—and Kaiser doctors will not write you a prescription, you can go to your doctor and ask them, they won't write you a prescription—come to January. We will give you a CGM. You can be introduced to the program and then, you know, take, take up January from there and experience the magic of CGMs alone. I really do think they are a magical product because they they're showing you for the first time you kind of can see inside your body, which is really phenomenal. Unfortunately by themselves, they're not that effective and they're not that effective by themselves longitudinally. So if you really want to keep track of how you've been doing, what food spiked you, how you can, you know, what kind of exercise, things like that. They don't really have that additional intelligence, but they are magical, they are really magical tools. But, you know, you want an insightful experience on top of that. With the AI that can essentially synthesize this kind of data from your heart rate, monitor from your food, from your glucose monitor and sort of let you know how much to eat, what to eat, how to hack your food, how much to walk, how much, how much to fast, when to fast, how much fiber you're having, not having. That's where we come in. Harry Glorikian: I feel like at some point I'm going to need a big monitor in my house that just tells me these things as I'm walking by. But you know, it, it's interesting. I mean, we are entering the era of real wearables and apps and big data and, and, you know, but here's the question though. Soyou know, Apple just announced what's going to be the update to their iOS and, you know, pretty soon I'm going to be able to push a button and share data with my physician.  Which is funny because I go in his office and I pull up my phone and I'm like, here's my longitudinal. And here's my longitudinal. And I'm like, look, you can take the measurement because you're supposed to, but here's how it looks over the last three months as opposed to the one time when I'm here. Can January's customers export and share the data with their doctor? Noosheen Hashemi: We have a report  midstream at 14 days that you can share  with, with your doctor. But of course we intend to, you know, we have features planned that are going to make things way more easily done, much more easily in the future. We really strongly believe that people should own their own health data. We are huge advocates for people owning their own health data, because there are a lot of people hanging onto your health data and they don't want to give it to you. I'm talking about device makers and others. You're paying for the device, which comes with the data, but they don't want you to have the data. So they're like, “You can have the data and study it yourself, but you can't give that data to other people.” But that doesn't work.We are living in a multi-omics world. Single 'omics by themselves, the single side node biomarkers, you know, “Harry, you just manage your cholesterol. Noosheen, you can't keep two things in your head. Why don't you just manage your A1C? And Mike, you should watch your blood pressure.” That just doesn't work. There are many, many markers that you've just, as you just said, that we need to keep in our heads. We can't keep them in our heads, but that's where AI comes in. We need to feed them into something and people must have the right to own their data and share their data with whoever they want. If it's their coach, it's their doctor, it's their wife or spouse or significant other, their dog. They should be able to share the data that they own.As long as they provision it properly to whoever they want to give it to because you know, someone doesn't want their employer to know X, Y, and Z. Somebody else wants their coach to know that is people's rights. And coming from kind of a libertarian point of view, I really think people, you know, people should own their own data and they should be able to mix it with other data  for synthesis, if they want to. Harry Glorikian: Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I totally believe in that. I always, I also understand that people may not understand the implications of sharing sometimes.  And that's not clear, but I do believe that the next iteration of where we're going to see this technology go is multifactorial software programs that can take a number of different inputs to give a much more holistic view of what's going on with me, so I can manage myself better share that information. My biggest worry is most physicians I know are—it's not totally like, it's not their fault, right….Noosheen Hashemi: They're so busy, so they're spending 15 minutes a year with you. And during that 15 minutes, you know, they're taking a point in time, you know, to see a snapshot of your health. And your health is way more complicated than that. We're talking about reverse engineering, 5 billion, years of evolution. And you know, they're going to get, see if such an infinite small part of that. We need to be way more self-aware.Harry Glorikian: Well, it's funny because I do have, some of my physician friends will be like, you want me to understand that genomic marker that whatever, like, I can't, I can't get my patient to manage their insulin level!Noosheen Hashemi: I have a lot of empathy for that. They just don't have the time.  I completely fully understand. Which is why I think we should carry more of the, we should have more agency over our health and we should carry the burden a little bit more.Harry Glorikian: So what is wild success for January? Noosheen Hashemi: Well, we want to keep on this path of developing our multi-omic platform. We want to essentially  help people understand themselves deeply and figure out how to dial their lifestyles and sort of tweak and tune their health. This is non-trivial obviously because there's not enough research in food science or enough research on prevention. You know, out of the $3.8 trillion that we spend on healthcare, 2.9% goes to prevention and 10% goes to acute care end of life care. Just think about that. More than three times as much goes to end of life acute care than goes to prevention. And I'm talking about healthcare costs, I'm not talking about research costs in terms of what NIH and USAID and all of those people spend. So there's not enough research that's happening. You know, people's health data is not organized today. I'm sure there are companies who are trying to organize the world's data. You know, the company that tries to organize the world's data is trying to organize your health data. So I think that's pretty smart.  I think today it's still very opaque and it lives in silos, but I think in the future is going to be mixed.  I think today people just aren't fully empowered yet, you know, with the knowledge and with the agency and with the tools they need to really manage their health.Wild success for us means that people, that we're part of this revolution of consumerized healthcare. We're part of the food-as-medicine revolution, the precision nutrition revolution. So we see ourselves coming up with tools that can essentially get amazing experiences in the hands of millions of people.If you can think about a company like Livongo going public with 192,000 patients. Or if you think about everyone that's playing in the metabolic health today, if you put 12 or 13 companies together, maybe they have a million users, or maybe a million and a half users. Where is that compared to 122 million people that have pre-diabetes diabetes and another a hundred million people that are optimizers? They're either wearing a wearable, they belong to a gym, they're on a diet. You have the entire population as your market. And we have very little that has really made a major foray into health. So wild success means having a product that becomes mainstream. Harry Glorikian: So I think what you're saying is January is moving beyond just CGMs and metabolic syndrome, right?Noosheen Hashemi: Absolutely. Yeah, we, we imagine ourselves, we have built an expandable platform. Our goal is to keep doing deep phenotyping. So we will add 'omics  you will see us adding 'omics beyond what we have today. You will see us  get to other cardio-metabolic disease, you know, cardiometabolic disease, essentially going beyond metabolic disease to the rest ofmetabolic syndrome. You'll see us be ahardware-agnostic company. We want to essentially let people wear whatever they want.  Whatever works for them and, and still try to bring that data, synthesize it and make sense of it and feed it back to them so they can take action. Harry Glorikian: Excellent. Well, that's, that's a great way to end the program with. We have so much more to see from the company and what it's going to be able to do with the data and, and, and help  you know, people live a healthier life. Or like I said, with me I'm constantly trying to measure what's going on. It's just distilling it to make it easily consumable to do what I need to do rather than have me learn statistics so that I can figure it out. Noosheen Hashemi: We have to get, all of us need to get better than that. I remember when I first put on my Oura ring, you know, there's, you know, most people  first when they wear their Fitbits, you know, first it was like, how much did I sleep? And then they kind of learned about REM and sort of deep sleep and then slowly. And then Oura came and then it was like, oh, and Whoop had already had heart rate variability, but then, you know, Oura came in with their other markers, you know, restfulness. And efficiency, sleep efficiency and timing, et cetera. And so people are slowly wrapping their heads around this. It takes a little whil. And yes, January gives you a lot of levers. You know, there's fasting, there's fiber, there's calorie management. There's you know, the spikers. There is the activity counterfactuals—I ate this, but had I eaten this other thing, this would have been my glycemic response. Or had I walked X number of minutes after that, this would have been my glycemic response. At the beginning it's a lot, but that's where it goes back to the experience. We must make the experience enjoyable and better, and we must, companies like us should strive to make the experience enjoyable, make them fantastic consumer experiences like Apple products. But remember Apple's 45 years old and we're just getting going with this, But [Apple is] a great role model. Harry Glorikian: Wellyou know, my doctor may not like it, but I may have to get one of these. He's listening to this podcast. I know that he will, because he always comments on them. Noosheen Hashemi: We're definitely doing that. And you know what? You can have Mike Snyder, you can chat with Mike  about your numbers after. That would be a lot of fun.Harry Glorikian: Excellent. Oh, I look forward to it. So thank you so much for participating. Noosheen Hashemi: Thank you, Harry. It was pleasure.Harry Glorikian: That's it for this week's show. You can find past episodes of MoneyBall Medicine at my website, glorikian.com, under the tab “Podcast.” And you can follow me on Twitter at hglorikian.  Thanks for listening, and we'll be back soon with our next interview.

Salesforce announced their Q1 FY22 earnings and they once again had another strong quarter. CEO, Mark Benioff, mentioned that they are not only raising FY22 revenue guidance to $26B, but that this $250M increase is the largest raise they have ever had. On top of this, Salesforce once again reminded everyone how confident they are that they will hit $50B by FY26. Salesforce’s “super strong” pipeline and ability to hit an all-time high in 7-figure-plus transactions with more than 4 clouds on average is driving Salesforce’s success. In this podcast, Salesforce Practice Leader, Adam Mansfield, discusses where Salesforce will focus to accomplish these goals and the tactics they will deploy to reach their $26B revenue target this year and $50B target four years from now. He also shares how enterprise customers could potentially take advantage of some of these key insights in their upcoming Salesforce negotiations and renewals.

Episode 012: The Power of Women in Technology with David Leighton David Leighton is Co-founder and President of WITI- Women in Technology International, a global organization founded in 1989. WITI is the premier organization for women who consider technology central to their careers, businesses, and personal lives. David is a creative, highly motivated relationship builder. His network is strong and covers multiple industries. David has launched and led several successful start-up companies. He was formerly the Chairman of Risk Analysis Group- a security strategies firm specializing in Integrated Risk Management, (SM). This is the enterprise-wide application of business principles that protects and streamlines organizations. He is also the founder of Criterion Research, an executive search firm that locates highly specialized technologists and executives for internet, software, semiconductor companies and venture capital firms. He worked closely with the executive team at Borland International from 1989 to 1994 helping them grow to become the #2 software company in the world. He also performed key searches for Transmeta as they were transforming the way chips were built and for Mark Benioff's last project at Oracle before he started Salesforce. Mr. Leighton also co-founded Webolution, Internet infrastructure and custom web-presence consulting firm whose clients include Sun Microsystems, Paramount Pictures, Intel, etc.  In this episode, we discuss: ·   The ‘once in a lifetime' way David started in the field of Women in Technology International (WITI). ·   What has evolved over time with technology and where are tech companies headed?  · What's the real issue when it comes to women's confidence in the workplace?    ·   What's the no lip service way WITI is talking with companies about gender equality and helping their members find jobs in tech? And what does WITI's research show about the benefits of female talent? ·   What its like to be a white man doing the work of helping companies create cultures where women thrive?   ·   What fascinating opportunities is WITI providing for its international members?   Get ready for another powerful episode here on The Power Shift Podcast! Please let me know your thoughts!   Connect with David Leighton https://witi.com/ https://she.witi.com/ Connect with Dr. Sharon Melnick Website: https://www.sharonmelnick.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharonmelnick/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrSharonMelnick Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anneke Seley, the 12th employee at a little startup called Oracle, has had a career full of challenges and spectacular successes... interfacing with Larry Ellison, Mark Benioff and later consulting with Steve Jobs. Her classic books, Sales 2.0 & Next Era Selling preach looking at the future of sales with an eye on using technology to make business easier and more productive... and her present company, Reality Works Group, is currently helping companies retrain and focus on the fluid nature of today's sales atmosphere, and succeeding despite distance.

Anneke Seley, the 12th employee at a little startup called Oracle, has had a career full of challenges and spectacular successes... interfacing with Larry Ellison, Mark Benioff and later consulting with Steve Jobs. Her classic books, Sales 2.0 & Next Era Selling preach looking at the future of sales with an eye on using technology to make business easier and more productive... and her present company, Reality Works Group, is currently helping companies retrain and focus on the fluid nature of today's sales atmosphere, and succeeding despite distance.

Anneke Seley, the 12th employee at a little startup called Oracle, has had a career full of challenges and spectacular successes... interfacing with Larry Ellison, Mark Benioff and later consulting with Steve Jobs. Her classic books, Sales 2.0 & Next Era Selling preach looking at the future of sales with an eye on using technology to make business easier and more productive... and her present company, Reality Works Group, is currently helping companies retrain and focus on the fluid nature of today's sales atmosphere, and succeeding despite distance.

Anneke Seley, the 12th employee at a little startup called Oracle, has had a career full of challenges and spectacular successes... interfacing with Larry Ellison, Mark Benioff and later consulting with Steve Jobs. Her classic books, Sales 2.0 & Next Era Selling preach looking at the future of sales with an eye on using technology to make business easier and more productive... and her present company, Reality Works Group, is currently helping companies retrain and focus on the fluid nature of today's sales atmosphere, and succeeding despite distance.

Navigating the infrastructure, land and relationships in construction. Host Adam Morrisey interviews global leaders in the built environment exploring the people, ideas and innovations guiding the construction and civil engineering industries into the future.Emerging trends related internet of things (IOT), machine learning and artificial intelligence have continued to infiltrate how we interact with places, whether retail centers, commercial buildings or our homes. On this episode of Dirt Work, Shipshape AI co-founders Alexander Linn and Ryan Dalton join us to discuss their vision for the future of home automation.Shipshape is an early-stage start-up based in Austin, TX with the goal of making the home less expensive and demanding to own and operate through the practical application of IoT and AI technologies. Shipshape is aiming to empower the homeowner with data about the health of the critical infrastructure (think HVAC, sump pump, attic, crawl space, etc.) so that they can make proactive maintenance decisions about their homes, ultimately leveling the playing field between home owners and service providers. These technology trends have caused new risks for the homes beyond leaks and physical access due to data and cyber security. Shipshape is allowing users to continue to own their data throughout their customer lifecycle and aims to provide transparency to how this data is stored, secured and used. The application of these technologies has the potential to unlock value for a variety of individuals and organizations including energy providers, insurance companies, home owners and state legislators looking to “do good, while doing well”. Smarter homes can not only improve the health and quality of lives of users, through things like cleaner / higher quality air in the home, but also address economic inequalities related to the costliness of unexpected home repairs and maintenance. For listeners interested in keeping up on trends in home automation and technology, Linn and Dalton recommend the publications from Stacey on IOT and Mark Benioff's books Trailblazer and Beyond the Cloud.

Carley Hauck, Founder of Leading from Wholeness has a new book, Shine, coming out in February 2021 on conscious leadership and businesses. Shine highlights the way that anyone who feels called to lead can cultivate the qualities of consciousness on the inside and help to build a workplace and world that works for everyone and is living in greater harmony with the planet. In the book, Carley showcases 9 conscious leaders whom she has served who are really prioritizing people and planet as central to their businesses mission and making quite a positive wave of goodness as a result. Carley shares a sneak peek into 1 of those conscious leader case studies with us, and so much more! Notable leadership moments: Rhea Singhal...Founder and CEO of Ecoware We are part of an integrated system….Mark Benioff, Salesforce  By the Numbers: https://carleyhauck.com/developing-people/  Project ROI, by Campbell’s Soup & Verizon Want more from Carley? Hop onto her newsletter list for info on her free events and grab the book on February 23rd!

Mon, 9 Nov 2020 12:58:09 +0000 venturevoicegalant@gmail.com (Gregory Galant) http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/vv/~3/6qhgxw-H_Fk/todd-mckinnons-journey-taking-okta-from-0-to-a-25-billion-public-company-IvQUnasV Todd McKinnon's journey taking Okta from $0 to a $25+ billion public company Gregory Galant 01:06:24 I can still remember logging in to PeopleSoft at my first job to see what deductions had come out of my paycheck. Now, all these years later, I’m interviewing the man who wrote that very code. Todd McKinnon, my guest on this episode of Venture Voice, began his career at PeopleSoft before moving on to Salesforce and ultimately founding Okta. Todd’s company is now worth over $25 billion. This episode takes you on Todd’s entrepreneurial journey, from the Powerpoint deck he presented to his wife (subtitle: “Why I’m not crazy” for quitting my job at Salesforce) to the initial product idea (with a name that sounded “like a French perfume”) to successfully completing an IPO. Listen now on Apple Podcasts. “You had to be able to have enough confidence that you’d be able to build this iconic tech company around this initial idea. A lot of initial ideas — people will pay for them but they don’t have that long-term staying power. They become a feature.” Todd McKinnon is the founder and CEO of Okta, a $25 billion publicly traded software company that you may never have heard of, but it solves one of the most annoying 21st century problems: having to remember all of your various log-ins and passwords. Thousands of companies use Okta Identity Cloud to manage access and authentication for their employees. I can relate to Todd’s experiences as a scrappy entrepreneur and the challenges of founding and growing a business. My job as CEO has changed tremendously as my own companies, Muck Rack and The Shorty Awards, have grown from just a few employees to about a hundred today. I wanted to learn how Todd scaled to thousands of employees. “I think I try to combine the best parts of Salesforce and the best parts of PeopleSoft and throw in a little bit of my personality on the side, and let the chips fall where they fall.” As you’ll hear in this episode, Todd got his first taste of what technology can do for customers while working at PeopleSoft. From there, he moved on to Salesforce, where he had a front-row seat to the early days of SaaS — as well as the opportunity to work for Mark Benioff before he became a multi-billionaire. Todd was the first person to lead the Salesforce engineering team, scaling it from just over a dozen people to hundreds. Those professional experiences and the cultures of the two companies would stick with him and inspire many of the decisions he made as he embarked on his own start-up journey. “There was part of me that wanted to be the boss, and part of me that wanted to attack the challenge of creating a company from scratch, knowing that the odds are very long… I couldn’t be the person who didn’t take a shot.” Todd points out that whenever there’s a big disruptive technical shift — like the transition to the cloud — there’s an opening to build a new business. And young companies, which don’t have all the baggage of the bigger, more established players, are often better positioned to take advantage of that opportunity. Still, the odds are long. So when he sat down to sell his wife on the idea of quitting his very good job at Salesforce to start his own company, he says he “did what anyone would do, you know. I wrote her a PowerPoint deck presentation.” The deck included nine slides that explained how, when it didn’t work out, he could just get another job. Fortunately, though, he didn’t end up having to fall back on Plan B. “As a CEO, my decision-making process really slowed down…you have to make sure that you get involved in the right decisions, you don’t overly involve yourself in all of them. And you have to be ready to make them.” Now matter how much experience and insight you have from working as a leader in a big company, you’re going to encounter a steep learning curve once you start scaling your own business as its CEO. I was interested to hear how Todd adjusted to that role and how he grew into the job. As he shares, he had some good advisers on his side, but he also had to face the reality that he didn’t have all the answers — and that not having all the answers was ultimately a good thing. It helped him build the kind of collaborative culture he wanted, where employees have a stake in the decisions. “It was very important that the company, while we celebrated [going public], that the company didn’t use it as a reason to stop pushing or a reason to be satisfied.” Todd likes to compare the experience of going through an IPO to high school graduation. It’s a rite of passage, but you don’t want it to be the best day of your life. Like many entrepreneurs, Todd is motivated by challenge, and he is always on the lookout for the next big wave on the horizon. While it was challenging to build a successful business, he’s energized by the thought that the biggest challenges are still ahead of him — and so is the opportunity to build “an iconic technology company that will be remembered for decades in the future.” I can still remember logging in to PeopleSoft at my first job to see what deductions had come out of my paycheck. Now, all these years later, I’m interviewing the man who wrote that very code. Todd McKinnon, my guest on this episode of Venture Voice, began his career at PeopleSoft before moving on to Salesforce and ultimately founding Okta. Todd’s company is now worth over $25 billion. This episode takes you on Todd’s entrepreneurial journey, from the Powerpoint deck he presented to his wife (subtitle: “Why I’m not crazy” for quitting my job at Salesforce) to the initial product idea (with a name that sounded “like a French perfume”) to successfully completing an IPO. Listen now on Apple Podcasts. “You had to be able to have enough confidence that you’d be able to build this iconic tech company around this initial idea. A lot of initial ideas — people will pay for them but they don’t have that long-term staying power. They become a feature.” Todd McKinnon is the founder and CEO of Okta, a $25 billion publicly traded software company that you may never have heard of, but it solves one of the most annoying 21st century problems: having to remember all of your various log-ins and passwords. Thousands of companies use Okta Identity Cloud to manage access and authentication for their employees. I can relate to Todd’s experiences as a scrappy entrepreneur and the challenges of founding and growing a business. My job as CEO has changed tremendously as my own companies, Muck Rack and The Shorty Awards, have grown from just a few employees to about a hundred today. I wanted to learn how Todd scaled to thousands of employees. “I think I try to combine the best parts of Salesforce and the best parts of PeopleSoft and throw in a little bit of my personality on the side, and let the chips fall where they fall.” As you’ll hear in this episode, Todd got his first taste of what technology can do for customers while working at PeopleSoft. From there, he moved on to Salesforce, where he had a front-row seat to the early days of SaaS — as well as the opportunity to work for Mark Benioff before he became a multi-billionaire. Todd was the first person to lead the Salesforce engineering team, scaling it from just over a dozen people to hundreds. Those professional experiences and the cultures of the two companies would stick with him and inspire many of the decisions he made as he embarked on his own start-up journey. “There was part of me that wanted to be the boss, and part of me that wanted to attack the challenge of creating a company from scratch, knowing that the odds are very long… I couldn’t be the person who didn’t take a shot.” Todd points out that whenever there’s a big disruptive technical shift — like the transition to the cloud — there’s an opening to build a new business. And young companies, which don’t have all the baggage of the bigger, more established players, are often better positioned to take advantage of that opportunity. Still, the odds are long. So when he sat down to sell his wife on the idea of quitting his very good job at Salesforce to start his own company, he says he “did what anyone would do, you know. I wrote her a PowerPoint deck presentation.” The deck included nine slides that explained how, when it didn’t work out, he could just get another job. Fortunately, though, he didn’t end up having to fall back on Plan B. “As a CEO, my decision-making process really slowed down…you have to make sure that you get involved in the right decisions, you don’t overly involve yourself in all of them. And you have to be ready to make them.” Now matter how much experience and insight you have from working as a leader in a big company, you’re going to encounter a steep learning curve once you start scaling your own business as its CEO. I was interested to hear how Todd adjusted to that role and how he grew into the job. As he shares, he had some good advisers on his side, but he also had to face the reality that he didn’t have all the answers — and that not having all the answers was ultimately a good thing. It helped him build the kind of collaborative culture he wanted, where employees have a stake in the decisions. “It was very important that the company, while we celebrated [going public], that the company didn’t use it as a reason to stop pushing or a reason to be satisfied.” Todd likes to compare the experience of going through an IPO to high school graduation. It’s a rite of passage, but you don’t want it to be the best day of your life. Like many entrepreneurs, Todd is motivated by challenge, and he is always on the lookout for the next big wave on the horizon. While it was challenging to build a successful business, he’s energized by the thought that the biggest challenges are still ahead of him — and so is the opportunity to build “an iconic technology company that will be remembered for decades in the future.” no full 63 entrepreneur,venture,capital,vc,technology,entrepreneurship,s

Bernie Sanders an avowed Democratic socialist, never a member of the Democratic party, ran two failed presidential campaigns, and yet he has succeeded in moving the Democratic Party to the left.AOC, is a one-term congresswoman with no previous political experience and yet her Democratic Socialist views have gotten attention on a national scale.Particularly among young people, there is a growing dissatisfaction with the state of capitalism and free markets today. Even the likes of billionaires such as Chase’s Jamie Diamon and Salesforce’s Mark Benioff have talked about the need for a new more inclusive capitalism. While this is essentially about the economy, it’s also about shifts in the social, cultural, and political landscape. The coronavirus has laid bare many of the lurking flaws in our system and the politics of the moment magnify everything.Is this a tectonic shift in the politics of America or a temporary blip in an otherwise centrist nation?John B. Judis breaks this down in his new work The Socialist Awakening: What's Different Now About the Left.   My conversation with John B. Judis: 

How can any company - large or small - own their competitive market, charge more, and at the same time, build a customer base that absolutely loves it? This week on the Inbound Success podcast, Theresa Lina, author of the book "Be the Go-To: How to Own Your Competitive Market, Charge More, and Have Customers Love You For It," talks about the Apollo method - the system that she says is the secret to standing out as a brand. Theresa's method is simple and actionable, and something that any company can apply, and in this episode, she breaks down the details and talks about why so many companies get it wrong. Resources from this episode: Connect with Theresa on LinkedIn Buy the book Visit the Apollo Method website Check out some of the other resources Theresa mentioned: Visit ecorner.standford.edu Stu McLaren's website Salesforce's Trailblazers community Transcript Kathleen (00:15): Welcome back to the Inbound Success Podcast. I'm your host, Kathleen Booth. And this week, my guest is Theresa Lina, who is the author of the number one Amazon bestseller "Be the Go-To: How to Own Your Competitive Market, Charge More and Have Customers Love You For It." Welcome to the podcast Theresa. Theresa (00:35): Thank you, Kathleen. I'm so happy to be here. Kathleen (00:37): Yeah, I'm really interested to speak with you. First of all, I love the topic of the book. I mean, who does not want to be the GoTo and also have their customers love them and be able to charge more and all the things that you mentioned in the title? But also you have a really interesting background and mix of things that you do. You're not only a book author, you're a consultant. You are a teacher. You're involved in Stanford university and educating people about marketing. I wonder if maybe you could take a minute and talk a little bit about your background, how you got to where you are today and all of the different things that you're involved in today. Theresa (01:13): Okay. Yes. So yeah, my, my primary emphasis throughout my career has been strategy and marketing in the tech and mostly in the technology space and primarily B2B. So I've studied marketing and information technology at university. And then I got a job with Accenture coming out of college and spent many years with them and was in both the client on the client side. And then later helped start the industry marketing program there. And I had a global industry marketing role for one of the business units that I helped start with the partner in charge at the time. And we grew that to be over $850 million in a very short period of time with all organic growth, which was really incredible. It was an incredible ride. And now that business unit is a multibillion dollar business unit. Theresa (02:14): It's massive inside the company. And then I went off on my own. I, part of me, I had, I sort of wore two hats. I had one company that was an educational entertainment company for children, which was a personal project. And then I started a strategy and marketing consulting firm and worked with Accenture and other clients with that. And then over time, there were various times when I went back inside to become chief marketing officer and chief strategy officer for a couple of different companies, which kept me grounded because as a consultant, it's so easy to think you have all the answers and, Oh, everything's straight forward, just do this and you'll succeed. And of course we all know, any of us who've spent time on the inside, life is very different when you're, you know, dodging the bullets every day inside a company. Theresa (03:08): And one of those stints was during the dot com rise and fall. And so I lived through all of the dot com bust and the 9-11 and all of that. And then another stint was through the great recession. So you know, I definitely know what it's like to go through these hard times as somebody on the inside. And then I also have been involved at Stanford for a little over 15 years now in various capacities, both in helping with their own outreach to their alumni and their communities and stakeholders. And then also I help I'm on the teaching team for some courses and one of their executive ed programs at the business school. So I wear quite a few hats and then I have, I still have my consulting firm. Kathleen (03:59): Now let's talk a little bit about the book. Be the go-to. What does that mean? Theresa (04:03): Yeah, so, you know, one of the, the, the big problem that I was running into with my own business and that I was running into with companies that I was working for and with clients is that customers or clients started putting pricing pressure on us because they weren't seeing what made us unique and different from anybody else they could work with. And it was really frustrating because this was happening like say in my case with clients that I had had for a very long time who knew me, who knew our work, they, they had they knew we were a pretty different and the way we could execute and that we brought a lot of value. And yet they still would say, yeah, yeah, but, you know, we could go over here and get the same work for less money. Theresa (04:51): And it was really frustrating. And meanwhile, I knew that there were companies out there, Accenture, the one I, the organization I have have helped start within Accenture. We were a very high margin business getting paid very well for what we were doing. And I was on the phone with one of my subcontractors one day who told me about a friend of hers who was charging $50,000 a day for what she was doing. And she had less experience than we did. And we, you know, it was, it was incredible. And so I really became fascinated by this. What is it that makes some companies able to charge so much more than everybody else? And they can command these premium prices. They hardly ever have to compete for work. They are there the first name that comes to mind when somebody has a particular issue or problem. Theresa (05:41): And so I really wanted to understand what the recipe was. And a lot of the typical answers weren't in themselves enough having the best product, not enough having great PR or great market visibility, not enough you know, the, the list just went. So I did a, I did a lot of research and interviewed a lot of clients and executives and other people out there in the marketplace. And I came up with what seemed to me to be the recipe for my own business. And then as I wrote it down on a plane, on to Chicago, one day, literally I was jotting it down and I realized, Oh my God, all of my clients need this. This is, this is it. This is what you do. And that became what I ended up dubbing as the Apollo method for market dominance. Because later I came to realize that the parallels between what the Apollo space program had done to put a man on the moon actually were very striking compared to what a company needed to do to achieve sustainable differentiation and market leadership in, you know, a given market. Theresa (06:54): So that was the genesis of all of this. And the essence of what the book is about. I basically wrote down the methodology. I've said, I want this to be something anybody can go off and do. It's very step by step and actionable so that you don't need me to do it. And it's not a big pitch piece to get to the upsell. It's you can go off, read the book, and if you do what it says, you can, you can have a, make a remarkable difference in your profit margins and your longterm sustainability in a, even in a very competitive space. Kathleen (07:33): I'm sure everybody who's listening is thinking the same thing I am, which is, tell me more about this Apollo framework. What exactly does it entail? Theresa (07:45): On the surface it's so simple, and it almost sounds insulting because it's, it's very straight. It's very simple, but of course, when you dive into the details, it gets a little richer with some of the nuance of what you need to do. But a lot of it is bringing together pieces that a lot of companies do go out and do. There are some things that I, I see missing, which is why I did feel compelled to write the book, because I just was not seeing it discussed out in the market. So there are four phases or four pieces, and I present them in a chronological order in the book, but you can do bits and pieces. You can pull from different parts depending on where you are with your business. So the four stages at the high level are launch, ignite, navigate, and accelerate. So launch is where you decide what it is you're going to be known for. Theresa (08:35): You decide not just what product or offering are we going to put out into the market, but what, what do we want to own? What problem do we want to take full ownership for in the market where we are really the, the thought leaders around that problem. And we are the ones advancing progress in that area for the market. We have a vision for what the market needs to do and what will solve this problem. And we are in it for the long haul to to guide the market along. So that's, so during that phase, you decide what markets, what market or markets you're going to focus on, what you want to be known for. And then you develop your point of view on that problem. So what's why is it a problem? Why is it a pressing problem and what needs to be done about it? Theresa (09:24): And then you define, or you hypothesize or define your unique, what your unique approach to solving that problem is going to be. And then you put your stake in the ground and say, by golly, we own this. You might do it with a big launch event. You might do it with a press release, with a, with an ebook, whatever it may be. So that's your launch. Then ignite is where you take that point of view and you go out and your, your goal is to lead a movement in the marketplace around that issue, around that point of view, around that problem and what needs to be done about it. And of course your approach, but on a, at a higher level, it's really more about taking the market forward. So you see Tesla doing this with electric cars, you know. They have their, they have their higher purposes. Theresa (10:16): We want to accelerate the adoption of electric car technology in the marketplace. We really believe deeply that the world needs to move to electric car technology. And so when they talk about themselves, a lot of what they talk about is electric car technology, what we need to do to take the industry forward. You know, they, they talk about their cars to an extent, but it's really that, that bigger message and a key in the ignite phase is that you're getting other power brokers in the market to embrace your, your your point of view and your purpose. And so they become evangelists on behalf of you as well, out in the marketplace on your behalf. So the goal is to get that momentum going and really lead the market forward. We saw Mark Benioff do this with salesforce.com. Anybody who's watched that story unfold over the last 20 years saw him take a point of view, which said, we have got to get the world off of this expensive installed software that takes months, or if not, years, to install and millions of dollars, you know? We need to kill software. Theresa (11:24): He literally had a a logo, the Ghostbuster style logo that said, you know, get rid of software. And so when he would go out to conferences, he would not talk about the Salesforce technology. He talked about the need to put the world in the cloud. And at that time, this was incredibly controversial. And a lot of people didn't think it was going to be ever embraced. Because at that time you didn't dare put customer, your, your most precious corporate data in the cloud, no way would anybody do that. So he was an example of somebody who really went out and started a whole new movement in the marketplace. So that's the goal with ignite. The third phase is navigate, and this is where you have to walk the talk you have to deliver on your promises. So this is where you actually take your offering to market. Theresa (12:19): You sell and market your offering, you get your people on board. This is what people normally associate with the business. But the big difference is that you have a unique offering that is more than just a product. It's a true solution, so that you're, you're delivering a result. You're not just selling functions or features. You're delivering outcomes for the customer that really change their business and actually solve their problem. And we can talk about more, talk more about that later, if you want, because it's an important distinction between what, what a lot of companies need to be doing to truly be of high value and justify those higher prices versus the way they do it today. And then the fourth phase is accelerate. You have to invariably, even no matter how unique you are in the beginning, people are going to come out and start copying you, especially as you become successful. And the market is going to change. The world is going to change around you. So accelerate is all about staying ahead of the market and changing and adapting with the market. So those are the four key, the four phases. Kathleen (13:29): So I have a bunch of questions. You mentioned at the, well, let me back up. The first one is, in the world of marketing, I feel like there's a lot of buzz right now about the concept that people refer to as category creation. And and there's, you know, the book "Play Bigger", which is on that. And there's, there's a whole host of other books in that space that this sounds a lot like that. Can you talk about like, is, is that really what this is? Are there differences? Theresa (14:01): There are differences. There are differences. Yeah, I actually don't, I know, Christopher and I have had a conversation. He's a colleague in Silicon Valley and we have a lot of mutual friends. And I know that, that I know that they have a very strong, the authors of that book have a very strong point of view around category creation. And a lot of people talk about it. I personally don't believe that you have to go out and create a new category. In many ways, Salesforce did not create a new category. They, they did it differently. They did the same thing that Siebel and other salesforce automation companies were doing. They, they did the same thing, but in a different, unique way that solved a very particular problem. So my, my perspective is that the key is focusing on the problem. What, what problem are you solving for customers? Theresa (15:00): What, so it's, and it's more around coming up with a unique approach that solves that problem in a very, very high value way. So you do, I don't believe you have to go. There are many, many companies that have tremendous success that don't go out and create an entirely new category, and some analysts would even counsel you against trying to do that because it's extremely expensive and you're trying to really change, fundamentally change the market. And yes, it's doable. And I know Blue Ocean talks about those as well, to some extent, but it's, it's not necessary. The one big difference with my book is that you can apply this to any business, no matter what phase they're in. It could a solopreneur could go out and implement this for themselves, and a person trying to figure out their career could, who could apply this, or any product organization within a big company, or the company across the board. You know, it can really be applied at various layers. So it's not about category creation. Kathleen (16:10): I'm glad you've explained that because, and I'll just share, it's interesting. I have a point of view on this because, you know, I'm in a lot of different groups of CMOs and heads of marketing. And I feel like every single person I talk to says, they're creating a new category. Kathleen (16:27): And at the risk of violating my clean content rating on Apple podcasts. I just think that's bullshit. Every single company can not be creating a new category because then every single company would be in a category of one. Like, it's just, it's almost gotten ridiculous how common it is. Kathleen (16:46): And I do think there are companies that are genuinely doing it, and I think there's a lot of excitement behind that, but that, you know, I sort of like teed this up. I didn't tell you I was going to ask you that question, but, but I wanted to have that conversation because I just, I really do think it's become almost ridiculous that it's like, if you're today's marketer, you have to create a category, right? Theresa (17:07): Yeah. It also kind of depends, you know, you can define the word category and I guess in a lot of different ways you know, I think with Play Bigger, they have a great perspective and you can do that and have tremendous success. And with enough capital and enough support and resources behind you you can definitely implement their strategy. They talk about some great stuff in that book. I'm by no means denigrating what they talk about, or it's just that I don't feel that's the only way to go out and have tremendous success and and have a tremendous impact. And, you know, my focus is more on how do you go and have you know, deliver outcomes to a set of customers that are going to view you as, you know, the thought leader and the torchbearer in their, in their world. Kathleen (18:04): Yeah. So I like that. I like that you have a focus on making this accessible, accessible, I should say, because I think that that's one of the issues when people talk about category creation is it feels like you need to be VC backed and, you know, it's, it's a whole different play. Theresa (18:21): It's expensive. Kathleen (18:21): It is. It's very expensive. It's a long game, Theresa (18:24): Right? Kathleen (18:26): You mentioned at the beginning that it's, that this might seem like a big duh, but the reality is most companies are not doing these things. And so can you just take a minute and speak to why you think that is? Theresa (18:38): Yeah. You know, it really confounds me. I developed this 20 years ago and I I'm stunned that nobody has already come out and come up with it. To me, it was, you know, it's almost like writing down the chocolate chip recipe, chocolate chip cookie recipe that grandmothers have been making for eons. But so when I first came up with it, I actually found some resistance in the market. I think I was a little early and talking to people about this because it was pre-internet and they couldn't see how similar they were to other companies. As a consultant, I'm traveling around, I'm talking to lots of different people. It's like Gartner, you know, all day long. They talk to companies and every company that walks in and sounds like the last one, but to the company themselves, they, you know, they didn't see each other. Theresa (19:29): So they couldn't tell. Now that, now that digital marketing in particular has sort of put everything online companies, I think executives even now more see, they used to be very insulated from how much they looked and sounded like everybody else. And that's no longer the case. So I actually realized even last year, cause I've been trying to talk myself out of having to write this book for years, I've started and stopped thinking, Oh, well, I don't think we needed it. You know, I've heard about Play Bigger coming out. And with the way they talked about that book before it was published, I thought, I had a conversation with Christopher on the phone and after hearing him, I thought, well, I think their book might be the same as mine. Maybe I don't need to write this. And it came out and I realized, no, it's still not quite the same. Theresa (20:18): And last year I thought, Oh my God, you know, we, we need it now more than ever. And so because companies, they're there, there are a lot of, they do some of the pieces, but they don't quite put the pieces together properly. And then they're really missing the boat completely in other areas like, like a point of view, you know? Very few companies have an overarching, true thought leadership point of view about the market and where the market needs to go. They have a point of view about themselves and their product and, and their, how their product operates and why. But you should be able to take your product out of it completely and talk just about where the market is going, what the problem is and what they need to be doing about it, independent of your company. That's true thought leadership. So that's one of many examples of things that companies are, are missing the boat on. Kathleen (21:19): Yeah, I think that's, to me that's so important because I feel like it's that first step where probably 90% of the problems are. And I think you hit the nail on the head, which is that everybody thinks they are differentiated. Like, honestly, I mean, if you talk to any marketer, they're not going to say I'm doing a terrible job and I'm copying everyone else. Like they're going to give you their pitch and their value prop, and they're going to feel like they've done that. Kathleen (21:43): So I think maybe it would be helpful if you spoke a little bit more about really what it means to have that point of view, because I'm not sure that people listening are going to understand, like, what does that look like when it comes to life? Theresa (22:02): Okay. Yeah. So in the book, I have a very prescribed message framework that I believe companies should be using, especially if you are a solution to a problem. And what most technology companies, most B2B your audience has more of a B2B focus. Kathleen (22:19): No, it's, it's not, it is kind of all over the place, but I tend to talk a lot about B2B just because that's where my focus is. Theresa (22:28): And a lot of, I think a lot of it, it used to be interesting. It was so consumer and B2B were such completely different animals in the past and they still are somewhat different, but it's interesting how much more similar they are now than they, than they ever know, or in terms of how you do your marketing, but the point of view. So the message framework is this. It's three pieces. That's why there's a problem, what needs to be done about it and how you've uniquely solved the problem. So why, what, how. So the point of view is the first two. It's why there's a problem in the market. So it's not just that there's a problem. It's why is it a problem? What's the fallout from the problem? So for example, with me, I would say, you know, the problem is most companies don't adequately differentiate themselves in a way that's going to be sustainable over time. Theresa (23:20): And this was a problem because it leads to declining margins over time. It leads to price based competition. When your customers can't see what makes you different. And over time, companies have to compete on price. They have to lower their prices. Margins fall. They have fewer and fewer dollars to invest back into the business and back into their future and in marketing. And eventually they go out of business. I mean, we say, see with agencies all the time. I mean, there's some of the worst offenders and failing to differentiate. So, so what should they be doing about it? They need to come up, you know, they need to be, have a unique approach to a problem that they're, that they own in the marketplace. So that would be for me, my what. So I can talk all day long about those issues and all, all what companies are facing and what they need to be doing, et cetera, and never once talk about me or my, my company's services or, or even my book. You know, I can go all day long just on that point of view about what needs to be happening. So every company ought to have that for themselves. They ought to have that very strong perspective. Kathleen (24:38): You mentioned Salesforce earlier, which is a great example, and I love that story of Mark Benioff staging a mock protest with his sign. And are, are there any companies, maybe some more recent examples of companies that you think are doing that really well, that, that first step in your four step process? Theresa (24:57): Well, I think for sure you know, I like to use Tesla because I think again, they're kind of a textbook because they have taken such a unique approach to solving a problem that people have been talking about for a long time, which is how do you get electric car technology to be embraced? I don't think people realize that I have the year in my book, but electric car technology has been around since like the beginning of the 20th century. I mean, we're talking over a hundred years of electric car and the, and you know, gas and electric were sort of developed at the same time. And then gas took off and electric got left in the dust. So but you know, Tesla has this, this very you know, Elon Musk. I mean, he's a great example for all of his businesses. Theresa (25:42): You know, his businesses start with a higher purpose. You know, SpaceX, you know, wants to make space, travel more accessible and more practical. The Boring Company, you know, he wants to solve the traffic problem. You know, he, we need easier, better ways to get cars off, you know, to get across town. So, you know, those are examples. You know, REI, well, that's not a recent example that these, you know, I, I tended in the book, I tended to study companies that have been around for awhile. The whole point is being sustainable. You know, I think, you know, I know you talk, talk about HubSpot a lot in your podcast and, you know, I think they're a good one. The, the challenge with that company is that it's a little broad the way they talk about what needs to be done, but if they just were to focus on the, and they talk, you know, of course emphasis is on inbound, but you know, with them, I'd love to see a more focused message around, you know, what's wrong with the way most companies approach their inbound marketing and what needs to be done about it. Theresa (26:58): That would be an example of an opportunity, you know, for them to get more clear about leading the charge, even though they have done a great job of leading the charge in elevating the approach to digital marketing, getting people to be more integrated in how they do it and being more sophisticated and make it, making it more accessible to more companies. Kathleen (27:22): Yeah. Now I think it's interesting that you have your second step as ignite because it is, you know, it's one thing to have your point of view, but if nobody knows about it, it's the tree that fell in the forest. Right? Kathleen (27:35): So talk me through what that ignite step looks like or should look like, or how a company should approach it. Theresa (27:45): Yeah. So a key thing is is, is understanding the role of power brokers in an industry. So a lot of companies, a lot of marketers, I think don't quite appreciate this, and they certainly don't leverage this to their full advantage. So every single industry or every market has literally a handful of people who know everybody, are respected by everybody in that market. They, their tentacles reach, I, I nicknamed them tree trunks with vast root systems, because that's how you can think of it. You just see one person standing there, but underground unbeknownst, you know, because a lot of times you don't even know how far reaching their network is, but there's this vast network and they all talk to each other and interact with each other. So one of the keys to getting traction is getting those powerbrokers converted over to your point of view and to the point where they actually start evangelizing on your behalf and they help get the word out. Theresa (28:48): So it amplifies your message. So instead of having to reach 500 people, one person at a time, you can, with one power broker can just because they have so much power and such a voice in the market, they can immediately convert thousands on your behalf. You know, relative, let's say your market is, you have 10 or 20,000 people you're trying to reach. They can literally reach a giant chunk of it all at once. A good example of this in the technology space is Gartner. You know, if you get Gartner on board and behind what you're doing, they start writing about you in their reports. They start talking about you even informally in conversations. So and you know, the, the media can play that role, but there are also individuals just, you know, most industries have maybe a dozen who they know everybody, and they have the tipping point. Theresa (29:50): Malcolm Gladwell talks about personality types, and one is the connector. And so these power brokers are connectors. They just proactively spread the word about other people and other companies they know and put people in touch with each other. So you're looking for those types of people and that can propel you very quickly into a market in a highly credible way that you won't be able to do on your own. So this is something that a lot of companies don't fully leverage. They do go after media. And you know, of course there are social media influencers and some, some social media influencers fall into this a lot. Don't, you know, a lot of them just have their 50,000 followers and they put out a tweet or whatever. That's a flash in the pan that might give you some quick response, but you're trying to get enduring influence in the market. You're trying to become one of the powerbrokers yourself. And so you need these power brokers to help take you in that direction, but they can also make it happen a lot more quickly. Kathleen (30:55): So I think that sounds great in principle, but in my experience, a lot of the power brokers in any given market have a lot of people clamoring for their attention. And when we, you know, we started out by talking about how this approach is a very accessible one. So it's one thing if you're Elon Musk going to try and like get in front of power brokers, and of course, they're going to take your call. It's entirely another. If you are, you know, a first time founder who doesn't have a big reputation or VC backers, or, you know, that, that super powered network. So how does one go about brokering those relationships? Theresa (31:35): This is where the power of the point of view comes in because when you have a very powerful, provocative point of view on a really critical problem, and you have a perspective on what needs to be done about it, that's truly fresh and innovative. People will listen. They're, they're hungry to know to understand what's going on out there. You know, I think of, I mean, not everybody may be able to relate to this example, but I think of Jamie Oliver who is the chef out of the UK, who caught, captured a lot of attention with a Ted talk he gave about nutrition and how it, how the typical person's nutrition is literally killing them. And he gave this powerful Ted talk. He was, he was a nobody at the time, just some chef, but he had this very powerful point of view and a very passionate devotion to his point of view. Theresa (32:27): And he got the ear of lots of people and got onto the Ted stage. And eventually he got a TV show and, you know, he got a lot of notoriety, but it was because he had that point of view and Ted talks are actually a great example of points of view. They're not up there to sell anything. They have very powerful perspectives that are interesting enough for the rest of the world to listen. It's what's their slogan. Oh now I'm, now I'm drawing a blank on what it is. I'm sure somebody can put it in the show notes for us. Ideas worth sharing. So your point of view needs to be an idea worth sharing, because if it's provocative, I have four criteria, actionable, bold, controversial, and distinctive. And so the ABCD that's in the book, so you can have a reminder. But it needs to be provocative to get other people wanting to talk about it. Kathleen (33:28): I love it. So we're probably not going to go into detail on the, the last two stages because I think those are probably the ones that my audience is much more familiar with, which is having to do with going to market and really how you execute. I think, I think at least the first two stages are the ones that, that really trip people up. And let's be honest, you have to get through those to get to the second two. So I'm wondering if you, just, for people who are listening, who are thinking, I'm interested in maybe doing this, other than going out and buying the book, which they should absolutely do and we'll talk about how they can find it. What are some things like if they just want to get started, if they want to listen to this podcast and then go back to work, what are, what are one or two things that they can immediately start doing that can set them down on the path to get started with this? Theresa (34:14): Yeah, I think one thing is, first of all, it's just like any, anything else acknowledge the problem. Acknowledge that you have a problem. What I have found even as a chief marketing officer is sometimes having such a hard time getting the rest of the executive team to acknowledge that we have a problem. And marketers know how often do you feel like you're putting lipstick on a pig? You know, you inside, you know, know this company really isn't different. You know, I have to make it, I have to make it sound different, but in all honesty, it's not different. So if there's any way to get the rest of the full team to acknowledge that there's a strategic issue and that the company, this is not a marketing problem, this is a fundamental strategic issue for a company that the marketer and others in the company need to play a role in solving. Theresa (35:07): So I'd say that's one thing. It's get the team. And even, even if you're a product team or a unit within the company, just to agree that this is an issue and that you need to do something. And then the next thing is really get clear on what problem are we devoting ourselves to? What problem do we want to be known for in the market? What problem are we devoting ourselves to eradicating in the marketplace? And then, what is point of view about what it will take to solve that problem? And then figuring out how to make your approach. If you already have a product, how do we make it more unique or how do we turn it into a more comprehensive solution? And instead of just some SaaS offering with our three levels of purchase option, you know, a silver, gold platinum, or whatever you want to call it, you know, how do we turn this into a full solution? Theresa (36:05): I am, I, I have a support website out for the book Apollomethod.com. And there are some tools that I have in the book that you can also get. Just go to the website to get that. It will also help you start taking action on some of these areas right away. For example, an offering blueprint form can, it's sort of similar to the business model canvas, but it's an offering blueprint that will help you just define components of your offering. And you may see where some of your holes are right now that, that keep it from being a, a complete solution. Kathleen (36:44): Awesome. Well, those are really good tips to get started. And I think, you know, that's, that's the first step as we said. So for somebody who does want to really see this through you, you mentioned the URL for the book website. Can you say that one more time? Theresa (36:59): Yes. It's www.apollomethod.com. Kathleen (37:02): And is that where they can get the book or will that take them to it? Theresa (37:05): They can, yeah, there's a link to get the book, but they can also just go to Amazon and do a search on, on Be the Go-To and put my name in if they want, if they have trouble finding it. So Theresa Lina. And they can get the book on Amazon. It's also available on other platforms both in hard cover and hard cover paperback and ebook on Barnes and Noble and some others, I think. Kathleen (37:31): Great. All right. Now shifting gears, I have two questions that I always ask my guests. So now it's your turn. The first one is, of course this podcast is all about inbound marketing and we've talked about a lot of companies in this conversation, but opening it up, you know, when you think about inbound marketing is there a particular company or individual person that you think is really kind of setting the gold standard for what it means to do that right? Theresa (37:58): Well, right now, well, I've heard a lot of really good ones mentioned on your podcast. I listened to your podcast religiously. And so I won't, I don't think I'll duplicate that maybe they've been mentioned, but I really think salesforce.com still does. They're huge, but they do a phenomenal job of inbound strategies. Their trailblazer program is really phenomenal. It goes beyond just typical lead generation where they're really trying to, this is part of a strategy and the book, they, they, I did not work with salesforce.com, but they are a textbook implementer of the Apollo method for market dominance across the board. So they have so many great programs that are all about generating, you know, getting people to start using the product and then making the product more and more a part of their business. So I think they do a phenomenal job with all of their, the blogs and all their various blogs and materials and their free trials and the trailblazer program, the Dreamforce conference, et cetera. Theresa (39:09): And you can do everything they do. You can do it on a small scale. You can, you know, Harley Davidson started the Harley owners group with 50 people back in the eighties, and now they have, I think, hundreds of thousands. But they started with just 50 people. So you can you can start these programs with, you know, on, at a very small scale and still experience a lot of success. And then, you know, it's interesting. I don't know if you've ever heard of Stu McLaren, but he, he's a, he's one of these internet creator, you know, in the internet creator space. And he specializes in building member-based communities. And I really think he's doing some neat things around helping people and companies start membership programs, membership, or community based, or member based communities, paying members. And for example, he has this wonderful founding member strategy, which I think is really brilliant that he talks about. If you Google him and listen to some of his podcast interviews, you'll, you'll learn some interesting things from him, I think. Kathleen (40:23): Oh, I'm so interested to check that one out. Theresa (40:25): Yeah. He's one that's caught my attention lately. Kathleen (40:28): Well, funny enough. Yeah, you're right. I don't think anybody has mentioned Salesforce, even though it seems like it's obvious. Theresa (40:34): Is that right? Kathleen (40:35): But I also don't think anyone's mentioned Stu McLaren, so that's awesome. I like to get new ones. Second question, and you know the drill cause you listen, marketers always talk about how hard it is to keep up with everything. It's all changing so quickly. How do I do it? So how do you do it? How do you keep up? Theresa (40:50): Well, I definitely listen to a lot of podcasts. One of the things I love about your podcast is you get into the mechanics of things with people, especially when you're talking to people who have specific tools. You know, I just love that you dive right into exactly how did you do this? So I love listening to podcasts and reading articles and blog posts. And then I do monitor academic research because especially when it comes to analytics, because I find it useful to show me where things are going. One of the departments I'm involved with at Stanford is the management science and engineering department, which has a big analytics orientation. And so I try to pay attention to what our faculty are doing in that space. And then there's a great resource called ecorner.stanford.edu, which has lectures by different thought leaders in Silicon Valley. Theresa (41:50): And while not all of it relates to marketing, it is another, a lot of these are up and coming, for example. It's also part of put on by one of the groups in our department. And we had Mark Zuckerberg back when Facebook was just getting started. We had the Google founders when Google was just getting started. So they have a real knack for seeing what's coming down the pike. So I, again, I like to listen to that and look at what companies seem to be coming along and what they're talking about, because they're often on the front edge of things. Kathleen (42:25): That is a great suggestion. And yeah, and when I have not heard about before. Theresa (42:29): And then, you know, actually one more is political campaigns because they are, the stakes are so high. I like paying attention to what they're doing and what tactics they're using because a lot of times they borrow heavily from marketing, but they can also be borrowed from. And then my students in the Stanford marketing group are often at the front edge of what's going on out there. So I, I I like to watch what they're doing as well. Kathleen (42:55): I love that. Well, that sounds like a lot of really good suggestions. And of course, as always, I will put the links to all of those, into the show notes. So head there, if you're interested in checking any of those out this has been a lot of fun and really interesting. Theresa, thank you so much. Theresa (43:11): Thank you. This has been fun for me too. Kathleen (43:15): Yeah. Now of course you're going to want to go out and get the book. So I'll put the link to the website in there as well. And if you're listening and you enjoyed this week's episode, please consider going to Apple Podcasts and I would love it if you would leave the podcast a five star review so that others can find it as well. And in the meantime, if you think of somebody who would be a great guest, tweet me at @workmommywork. I really do check out those recommendations. And a lot of people who come on the podcast come by word of mouth. So let me know if you think that there's somebody who would make a good guest. That's it for this week. Thank you so much, Theresa. Theresa (43:53): Thank you. Thank you. This was really great. Thanks.

In de 22e aflevering van de Business Books Podcast bespreken Thijs Peters (hoofdredacteur GoodHabitz) en Remy Gieling (hoofdredacteur MT/Sprout)de lessen uit: >> De staatsbank van Ivo Bökkerink en Pieter Couwenbergh >> Trailblazer van Mark Benioff >> De Remote Playbook van Gitlab + een interview met Thijs Launspach over Werk kan ook uit

How can brands stand out and drive incredible customer loyalty? This week on The Inbound Success Podcast, Katie Martell talks about what it means to find your "exceptional truth" as a brand, and why that should be the guide for everything you do as a marketer. As Katie says, "the only thing in the middle of the road, is roadkill," and brands that fail to speak their truth get lost in the crowd. In our conversation, we wade into the controversial waters of whether and when brands should speak out and take a stand, and how to do it in a way that keeps you tightly aligned with your customers. Highlights from my conversation with Katie include: Katie says it is the job of the marketer to understand what is happening in the world. Marketing controls brand perception, and brand perception influences whether someone will buy from you. If you're in marketing, you have to understand where your brand fits in the world of your buyer's identity. When you know what your buyers care about, you can align that with your brand values, and you have an opportunity to take a position that will strengthen your place in the market. Katie says that brands that don't take a position get lost in a crowded marketplace and are not a part of the conversation. By taking a stance about what you believe, you can change the conversation in your market and, in doing so, become a market leader. Katie says brands need to find "exceptional truths" - little kernels of truth that get buyers to stop, pause, and rethink the way they see the world. When you've created that seed of doubt, buyers are open. They're leaning in, they're listening to what else you have to say. And that is when marketing works at its best. That's when they're more receptive to your pitch. This takes knowing buyers so well that you know where they're misinformed or what they don't know or what they don't understand so that you can challenge that. This approach is based on the concepts outlined in the book The Challenger Sale, which is typically used in the sales world but has a lot of application to marketing. Marketers need to be confident to convince the organizations they work for that this type of challenge is the right approach. This can be hard because marketing is a "voyeuristic" profession - meaning that everyone can "see" marketing so they think they are an expert and know how it should be done. As a marketer coming into a new company, its important to determine what your exceptional truth is and then find ways of rolling that out across your marketing in a way that makes your brand unique and different. Resources from this episode: Visit Katie's website Follow Katie on Twitter Connect with Katie on LinkedIn Listen to the podcast to hear Katie's take on why it is so important for brands to find their exceptional truths, and how to use that in your marketing to gain a competitive edge. Transcript Kathleen Booth (Host): Welcome back to the Inbound Success Podcast. I'm your host Kathleen Booth. And this week, my guest is Katie Martell, who is an on demand communications strategist based out of Boston, Massachusetts. Welcome Katie. Katie Martell (Guest): Hi Kathleen. Thank you so much for having me. Katie and Kathleen recording this episode. Kathleen: I am excited to have you here. For everyone listening, I heard Katie speak at Marketing Profs B2B Marketing Forum in, what was that? September or October? October of 2019. Back in the days when we still went to conferences in person. And I was just so blown away. She gave such an amazing talk on Rabble Rousers and it really not only struck me for the content of the talk, but also, you were just an amazing speaker. We can have a separate conversation about that. But anyway, that's why I wanted to have you on and share some of your amazing wisdom with everyone who's listening. So I could go on and on about you. but before I go down too much of a tangent, I would love it if you would explain what an on-demand communication strategist is and what you do, and also a little bit of your background and how you wound up doing that. About Katie Martell Katie: I would love to, and I have to start by saying thank you for the kind words about that talk last year. So the title of that talk was something like "Market Like a Rabble Rouser" and it came from this fascination I have with the world of politics and persuasion mixed with what I do as a marketer. So I've been a marketer in the B2B realm for 11 years now. And what's been interesting is, I've been marketing to marketers for the majority of my career. And that was first at a B2B data services company. We were an early sponsor of the Marketing Profs event. That was a startup that I grew up to acquisition. And then it was a PR firm, an analyst from my own MarTech startups. So I've kind of lived multiple lives, worn many different hats, but always marketing in this world of B2B tech, and MarTech specifically. So I've been a student of marketing in a time when it's completely changing from what was the kind of capital M marketing that we've known it to be. And so this talk was just honestly, they had asked me what I wanted to talk about, which is a moment in time where you go, "Oh, that's a dangerous, that's a dangerous ask of me." And I was honest. I said, "Let's talk about what's happening in the world of misinformation, persuasion." I'm talking Russian trolls, I'm talking campaign interference. I'm talking all the stuff that, you know, you read on the headlines, on whatever news outlet you choose to follow. And let's talk about what marketers can learn from it. So I get up on stage. I give this talk. It went over a little bit of time because that's, hello, it's me. Well, people were absolutely polarized in the audience. We had half the room, a little more than half, I will say, who were like, "Yeah, we got the takeaway. This is great. Thanks so much." And the other half that I just think, I don't know what, didn't go across as well for many, because I presented a lot of information about Russian trolls and some of the exact campaign ads they used and it was pretty incendiary stuff, but that was the point. I was trying to get people riled up and hey, achievement unlocked. Kathleen: But I also think, isn't that polarized response just such a perfect reflection of why that talk was needed in the first place? Katie: I hope so. I was encouraging folks to really, you know, rouse the rabble, you know,? Create emotional responses, shake things up, and that's kind of what I did on stage. Kathleen: Well, and to be clear, just to interject, your talk was not an inherently political talk in the sense that you weren't taking sides, you were presenting facts, right? And people can take that and do with it what they want, but I just wanted to put that out there. Marketers need to pay attention to what is happening in the world Katie: Well, I appreciate it. And let the lesson and the takeaway here be that we need, as marketers, to pay attention to what's happening in the world. I mean, the world around us, look at this past week and today's date. I don't know if you're going to give the date here. It's June 1st. So we are coming off of a weekend of civil unrest, Black Lives Matter protests. It is a time where, if you check social media, you're bombarded with hashtag activism and names and everybody from brands to individuals getting involved in this current conversation. We as marketers should be watching this and learning. Kathleen: Yes. I mean, actually, it's interesting that we are having this conversation today because I literally, just this morning, was online on social media and I saw one person saying something about how you have to speak out and you have to make your positions known. And another person's literally saying "I'm not going to support businesses that don't say anything." It's interesting. There's so many different sides to what's happening right now, but it really doesn't matter what you believe about the current situation. The fact is that the world around us is going to make judgments and make personal buying decisions. And they could be different ones, person to person, but they're going to be made based upon what you do and or do not say right now, right. So if you're not paying attention as a marketer, you're not doing your job Katie: Because this is our job. It is our job. Marketing controls brand perception, right? Brand perception is the reality for consumers. They make a decision about us before they engage with us by the way we act through marketing. That's the kind of inherent "duh" that we know about our jobs, but what that means at a time like this and what it started to mean over the past, I would say, decade or so as the world of social movements, identity, and brands and corporate world they've started to intersect. And so what that now means is, if you're in marketing, you have to understand where your brand fits in the world of your buyer's identity, whether they believe in the Black Lives Matter movements, right? These kinds of areas that were kind of gray areas before of, we don't want to get political. It's not appropriate for every brand to have a comment on what's happening. For example, we're talking about the treatment of African American individuals in the US, if your brand happens to live values that embrace diversity and inclusion and have large representation from that community and you take steps to make sure that their employee experience is great and yada, yada, yada, you might as well leverage that in marketing. You might as well show the world that you're on the same side as the giant movement that's now building in States and cities around the world. My God, this is a great opportunity for marketers, which I know sounds dirty to say out loud, but it's absolutely a time to take advantage of the global zeitgeist right now, and be part of the conversation, be part of the narrative, earn trust. It might help you differentiate. It is a way of saying to the world, "This is where we play, this is what we believe, this is who we are as a brand" that may go well beyond what your product or your service does. That is an opportunity. Kathleen: I agree with you. This is such an interesting conversation. In the past year, I had a conversation about this with someone who I've always considered to be very much a professional mentor/idol/role model. I've come to realize as I've gotten to know this person better that they feel very strongly about keeping all politics, all commentary on social issues, completely out of business. And that is their personal belief. It has come into focus, I think, with this last election cycle, and we had a big debate where the person was saying companies should never post about politics. I personally don't believe that, nor do I think every company should post about politics. People will disagree with me and that's fine, but I think that it all comes back to really understanding your brand. And in this case, especially for privately held companies, brands are very inextricably interwoven with the person that owns the company. This is going to come right down to the owners of the company and what they personally believe in. There are some companies where the person that owns it is never going to talk about politics because that person, as an individual, doesn't talk about politics even in social settings. But then you have companies, and there's some examples I'd love to cite, like Penzeys Spices. They are a spice company out of the Midwest. I had discovered them years ago because I was looking for some really niche spices. I like to cook and I had followed them, and then I started seeing this stuff on Facebook and they come out really, really strongly. This is a long story, but I got into a really big debate with this person. And the person was saying, you are going to lose customers and that's not good for your business. And you're going to alienate people and that's not good for your business. And my feeling is, that might be fine. If you're somebody who believes that you want to live your beliefs and you want your business to live those beliefs, you may lose customers, but you will probably have the ones you keep drive tremendous loyalty and you may gain as much, if not more, than you lose. So, diatribe over. You're the guest, not me! Katie: Oh, please! I love your point of view. I'm honored to be here because I think you are just brilliant and I love your work. You hit on something really polarizing right now which works at multiple levels. It also kind of hearkens back to the fundamental truth that not all marketing advice is going to apply to every company. And I feel like that's an important disclaimer, because we tend in marketing to say, brands should do this, they shouldn't do that. It's really, to your point, what is right for your business, your customers, and most importantly, your goals. Now that spice company, I don't know them, but I guarantee their goal is not to be the spice for everyone. It sounds like they know exactly who their buyer is and they know exactly what that buyer wants from them. They want a spice company that stands for more than spice. Great. Not all car companies are going to be a car for everybody, right? Just like with Patagonia, right? If you're buying a jacket to go skiing and they have a set of brand values that they know aligns with the subset of the total market, but that subset will be inherently loyal to them because Patagonia is an example of a brand that's been consistent against their values. For years, they've always been kind of counterintuitively anti consumption. They sell retail products. They need to drive consumption. Remember that famous ad that was like, "Don't buy this jacket"? You don't know it. You have to Google it. And it's Patagonia saying "We cause too much waste in our industry. We build products that may cost you a little more, but they're sustainably made and we want you to wear them for longer. We're going to help you repair them. We're going to give you some tools to make sure that you can make sure you get the most out of them. They're longer lasting." These are brand values that the buyer can relate to because the buyer also shares those values. So this really isn't a new marketing problem. We like to think it is because of social media and hashtag activism and all the propaganda that's happening. But this really isn't old school marketing best practice. Know your buyer, know where you fit in their world. Bill Bernbach has a great quote that's like, "If you stand for nothing, you'll find some people for you and some people against you. And if you stand for nothing, you'll find nobody for you and nobody against you." Which is worse for a marketer? To be completely out of the conversation or to be clear about where you sit and stand and who you're intended for? I love old time radio. There's a great Sirius XM station about the radio shows from the era of when that was entertainment. Somebody had this quote in the old timey accent. They were like, "The only thing you find in the middle of the road is roadkill my dear." Right now, today, brands do not have to have a comment on who should be president. That is politics. That is up to the individual. We each have a right to vote. Stay out of it unless you're relating to the campaign or you're lobbying for a certain group. Honestly, we need to have a say about issues that matter for our buyers. That's it. If it doesn't matter to your buyers, it shouldn't matter to you and your marketing. If you're a founder, I'm going to kind of disagree with you on this, but if you're a founder trying to lever your organization for your own political, personal views, that's a mistake because not everyone in your company is going to agree with you. Just like not every one of your buyers is going to agree with you. You have to find middle ground. That's what this is about. When you canvas for a political campaign and you're going door to door for, I don't know, Bernie Sanders, you don't open the door and knock on the door and say, let me tell you why you're wrong about insert political candidate. You find common ground. You say, what do we share? What are we aligned on? And how do we then move forward together? It's not about polarizing. It's about recruiting people to see the world the way you do. And those people likely bring the same set of values that you do. Kathleen: To be clear, I should say because I probably didn't explain this, I'm not advocating that businesses come out and say "Vote for so and so." I'm more coming out and saying that the context that came up when I talked about it with somebody, was that there were things happening politically that impacted other issues, whether that's the environment or social issues, et cetera, there was like a trickle down. And there were businesses that at the time were coming out and standing for or against those environmental or social issues. That was what sparked the conversation. It's very interesting to me because the things that swim in my brain when I get into this conversation are, there is an increasing amount of data that started to come out, particularly with younger generations, that they are actually much more likely to buy from businesses that are willing to say what they stand for. Again, I'm not talking about politics, I'm talking broadly about things that you stand for. And I loved your statement about the only thing in the middle of the road is roadkill. Because you know, you look at social activism and business today and you see companies like Tom's shoes, which stand for something, and Patagonia, which stands for something. These businesses are doing very, very well, particularly amongst a younger demographic. And so I think part of it is knowing who you sell to, as you said. Part of it is also recognizing that over time, things are going to change as this younger demographic ages and people follow them, who knows? I don't know what will happen with the next generation, but today's 20 year olds are going to be the 30 and 40 year olds of tomorrow and the next decade, et cetera. And so as our customer populations age, their preferences come with them as they do. It reminds me of the conversation that I've had with people about niching down as a business. I used to own a marketing agency and agencies talk about this all the time. Should we be the agency for everyone? Or should we declare that we are serving this one niche? And the fear that everybody always has when you get into that conversation is the fear of having to say "no" and turn people away. What most data shows, and most people find when they do it, is that when you niche down, you actually thrive. You make more money because you really find the right fit customer and they have a higher perception of you. They stick with you longer, et cetera. And so, there's an echo of that going through my head as I listened to us talk about this. Understanding your brand promise Katie: Absolutely. And again, it comes back to branding basics. You have to know the promise that you're going to make to anyone. That's what brand is. Brand is a promise. When they engage with you, they want to know that they're going to get something that you've promised them. You don't have to take a stance around hot button issues. Stay away from hot button issues, unless you're ready for that, unless that's really core to your business and your values and live throughout the organization. There are many examples, from our history, of B2B companies that stand for something in their industry. This is where this needs to be applied to B2B. B2B listeners might be thinking, this doesn't apply to me because I sell, I don't know, refrigeration. And I'm here to tell you, there is, within the world of refrigeration, a company called Stirling Ultracold, that was kind of a smaller player within this world of refrigeration. They would sell to pharmaceutical companies, and we're talking commercial grade keeping stuff cold, right? That's the extent of my knowledge, but they are ultra low temperature freezers that companies need. This is a great example of a company in a world that we would think, what is controversial about this space? The way they were disrupting their own industry was just with this idea of sustainability and energy costs and carbon footprint -- these things that their product enabled companies to decrease. They saved something like 70% of energy costs. Energy and sustainability and carbon footprint was never a consideration point for this buyer before. They just didn't look at it along that list of criteria that they're making their decision against. It didn't matter. Suddenly, here's a company who comes forward with a great PR program, really strong thought leadership, a leader who says, "I believe we have a responsibility to have a smaller carbon footprint. And guess what? My products enable you to have it." It suddenly changed the entire perimeter of an industry. That is the exact same advice that you and I are preaching right now. Just take a stance in what you believe in your own market. That's how you're going to change the conversation in market. That's how you're going to find buyers that are aligned with you around this value that now matters, and in a broader sense, you know, to the world, but really in this industry. And that's how you're going to differentiate and earn that trust, is when you declare "Here's what we're about." And you do that with confidence, because that allows the buyer to look at you and say, "I know exactly what I'm signing up for." Change the conversation in your industry Kathleen: I love that. And it reminds me of a talk that I heard by April Dunford. Katie: Love April Dunford, high five. Kathleen: I heard it at HubSpot's Inbound conference. April Dunford is an expert on positioning and she gives this talk about the four different ways you can approach positioning for your business. And I don't remember the nickname she has for it, but the example that she gives for one of the ways is about changing the conversation. And she talks about Tesla and how before Tesla, the leader in the electric car market was the Prius. And the whole conversation in electric cars was about battery life. How long could you drive before you needed to recharge? You could substitute refrigeration, but the bottom line is that, as a new entrant, if you think about coming into an established market, you're not going to have the first mover advantage. You're not creating a category per se. So how do you catapult yourself to the head of that market? You do it by changing the conversation. And so she talks about how Tesla came in and totally changed the conversation by saying, "Yeah, whatever. Battery life. Of course, we all have battery life. It's really all about how sexy is the design and how fast does the car go?" And now, you see a completely different dialogue happening in electric cars. You see Tesla as a front runner. And you see a lot more electric car manufacturers focusing on design and speed because they made it sexy. And that's the new conversation. And it sounds like that's exactly the same thing this refrigeration company did. Finding your "exceptional truth" Katie: They had to. And this is really where I think, and I know I'm a little biased. I come from a communications background. I've seen the power of content marketing and PR and all of that working in tandem to lift up brands. I mean, I'm a startup girl at heart. When you can't be the loudest voice in the room and you can't be the dominant player of which, by the way, there's only one in every industry. So the majority are not dominant players. All of us need to figure out how to get more strategic with the way we leverage PR and content. I think we've fallen into a bit of a trap, and I'll use that word gingerly because of the rise of inbound marketing, because of the rise of the tools and tech that allow us to publish a lot of content. What we've sacrificed are the kernels of little ideas that we're using to seed the market. We've become really good at publishing education tips and best practices, which are great and necessary. This podcast is a great example of one. The issue is that we've lost sight of what creates movements, what creates change in people. It's that little kernel of truth. I call them exceptional truths that get people to stop, you know, pump the brakes and go, "Wait a minute. I've been thinking about things all wrong." And when you get a person, a human being to stop and kind of pause, you've got them, that's it. When you've created that seed of doubt, the way that they saw the world may not be that capital T, truth, they're open. They're leaning in, they're listening to what else you have to say. And that is when marketing works at its best. That's when they're more receptive to your pitch, to your ideas and your path forward, but it takes knowing the buyers so well that you know where they're misinformed or what they don't know or what they don't understand so that you can challenge that. This is drawing from, everyone knows, The Challenger Sale. Applying The Challenger Sale to marketing Kathleen: I was just going to say, I used to be in sales and in the sales world, this is The Challenger Sale. Katie: Yes. I don't know what happened. I mean, how can The Challenger Sale extend its way to marketing? Not to say that it hasn't, but you know, is that a puppy? Kathleen: Yes. I have two who are laying at my feet and every now and then they lift their heads up and say, "Wait, there's a world out there!" They're getting excited about The Challenger Sale. Katie: They probably are just as confused as I am as to why The Challenger Sale didn't work its way into the world of PR and content marketing. To me, we need to challenge the way the buyer sees the world. I think very few brands do that. Kathleen: It's very true. I have worked in sales before and when I was in that job, I read The Challenger Sale. I used that approach in sales and it made me very successful. And you're spot on. That has so much applicability in marketing. I owned an agency for 11 years and I worked with a lot of different companies and there is, in marketing, this lemmings syndrome where we see the lemmings running ahead of us and we want to follow them off the cliff. If they're doing it, it must be the right thing to do. And it extends from everything, from messaging and the way we talk about what we do, to things like brand colors. I used to do websites for attorneys and they all wanted forest green and maroon and these very stodgy, old attorney colors. And I remember I had one client and I was like, "Let's just do something crazy." And they were like, "But nobody else did that." And I was like, "Precisely." There's this inclination both amongst marketers and within the business world to play within the lines. And I think that does hurt us. There's a sea of sameness out there and it's the content we create, it's the colors on our websites, it's the way we message. It's, you know, "Hey, you should or should not talk about this in our industry. We don't talk about that so I'm not going to" and I really think that that has tied our hands behind our backs, Katie: I have a lot of empathy. I mean, I'm a Pisces. I'm gonna look at every situation from both sides. And it's empath to the Nth degree over here. But I do have a lot of empathy for the modern marketer. And this comes from being one, but also selling and marketing to them for 10 years. I've been on the megaphone side of MarTech vendors back in the day when there was a hundred of us, marketing solutions in a world of digital marketing that was now starting to shift. Don't forget, 10 years ago, we now had to be good at becoming top ranked on Google. We now had to start using social media to develop a two way dialogue. We then had to automate everything. Then we had to start measuring everything. Now we're trying to leverage AI. It has moved at such a pace. It all happened in nine years. It has moved at such a pace that the marketer, the poor beleaguered marketing ops person and lead gen new roles that are being created because of this ecosystem in MarTech have inherent uncertainty, an inherent doubt and inherent fear because thinking about it, you and I work, we do marketing for a living. This is our income. How are we going to support our families? This is more than a job and an industry, buyers and marketing. I always had this kind of point of view when I was marketing to marketers. The buyer is more than a director of marketing at an IT company. They are an individual who's just trying to figure it out. And a brand like a HubSpot who comes out right at the turning point of an industry in flux to say, we have 10 ways that you can do this better. And five tips for this and seven strategies for success in that, that brand is going to win. That fearful buyer who's like, I just need a job, and I need to keep ahead. The biggest fear for the marketing buyer is falling behind. If we fall behind, we're no longer relevant. If we're no longer relevant, guess what? There's some 23 year old who's going to come up and take our spot because they know Tik Tok. I'm being hyperbolic, but that's constantly on our minds. And so we have to have empathy for that marketer who's like, we are going to do the things that work and copy the things that work because they work and we need a win. It's really those organizations that can allow their marketing team to do what they do best. That means leave them alone. Let them understand the buyer and the market, the way that they're supposed to. The challenge of being a marketer Katie: Somebody else said to me that marketing is a very voyeuristic profession. Everyone can see it. Unlike finance, unlike R&D or engineering, or even sales, to an extent. Everyone can see marketing. Everyone in a business thinks that they're an expert in marketing because they see marketing all day. They see billboards. They see ads. They feel like they know the science and the practice of marketing. That creates a lot of pressure on the marketing team to kind of do whatever everyone else thinks they should be doing. So we have a department that's not only fearful of falling behind, but also facing pressure from the business to do things that may be counterintuitive to what marketing should do. To your point, the lawyers with the maroon versus doing something different. The telling of exceptional truths, the disruption, the rabble rousing, it works on teams that allow marketers to operate with confidence and hire marketers that are allowing them the space to push back and say, "No, this is what marketing does. Our job is to understand who the buyer is, what they need and why we're uniquely fit that market. And that may look different than what you expect, but that's why you hired me." If you're listening to this and you're young and you love marketing, but you're unsure of the path ahead, that's the strongest thing I think you can do is to hone this sense of what marketing does for business and the sense of confidence that you need to bring to every meeting. You almost have to defend your job at every go, but the more you do it, the more resilient you get, the better you get at it. Kathleen: Well, I think it also points to what you should look for in a place of work. I completely agree with everything you just said, and, and I don't often talk about where I work now, but I'm at this company Attila Security, which is in cybersecurity. I knew I had landed in the right place and I had this sense when I interviewed. When I got into the company and I met with the CEO and I presented him with my 90 day plan and strategy, this was about 30 days in, he said, "Yeah, just do it. I hired you because you know what you're doing", you know? "You don't need my permission." And I was like, "Wow, what a great feeling". When you're interviewing, that's a thing to really watch for and to dig into and to see if that's a trait that you're going to find amongst the leadership team of the company that you go and work for. Katie: I wonder how to ask that in an interview. I'm a startup girl who's just been at companies where inherently, there's no one to tell me what to do. What would you ask if you were interviewing? Kathleen: As somebody who hires a lot, I've always been a big believer in behavioral based interview questions. Those are basically, you don't ask people "What would you do?", you ask, "What did you do?" And you ask people to talk about actual experiences. So I would probably ask something along the lines of, you know and it depends on if it's a company that's had marketers before. I would say, "Tell me about a time when a prior head of marketing proposed something that you weren't sure about or didn't necessarily agree with, what did you do?" And if they haven't had marketers before, if it's a startup, I would probably ask them something about being at a prior company. Or I would say, "Tell me about a time the head of sales proposed something," or somebody else in the company presuming that there are other leaders. Because I think past behavior speaks better than hypotheticals. Everybody can come up with the right answer, hypothetically. For what it's worth, that's kind of the approach that I've taken, but some of it is also just a feeling that you get from talking with people. And I think that's something that you hone over time as you work in more places and you're exposed to more different types of people. Standing out in a world saturated with marketing content Kathleen: But one of the things I was thinking about as you were talking, you mentioned HubSpot and how they solve for something very specific at a time when it was a real need. And, it got me kind of circling back to a little bit of what we started with here, which is this need to tell exceptional truths and should companies go there? Should they not go there? One of the things that I started thinking about as you were talking is that the interesting unique moment that we live in right now is that content marketing has become so commonplace. And there are so many companies creating content that there is this saturation. There's just a lot out there. There's a lot of blogs. There's a lot of newsletters. There's a lot of video out there. We're all busy. Nobody has the time to read all of it. So how do you choose what you're going to consume? And this applies to anybody, any buyer out there has this dilemma whether they're actively searching for something or not. And it seems to me that one of the factors that's really affecting what works now in marketing is that one of the most effective ways to stand out amongst a very saturated world of content is to have a point of view. We've talked a lot about in the marketing world about authenticity, and a hot topic lately has been email newsletters and getting really real in your email newsletters and showing personality and individuality, even in company newsletters. And the reason that that's working so well, I believe, is because it is different. Just the fact that it's different and just the fact that it doesn't sound like everybody else, people gravitate to that. So I'd love to know kind of what you think about that. Katie: I a hundred percent agree. Mic drop because you said it yourself. This idea that everyone is a publisher, everyone can produce content - it makes it more important than ever to do what we were suggesting 20 minutes ago, which is to know exactly who you're talking to, what they value, the ways you share that value and just be confident that that is the niche that you have decided to own. You cannot be all things to all people. I'm hearkening back to my marketing undergraduate. This was a long time ago now. It's the one thing I learned. This is not new, right? We just have a proliferation of information now available to us. It makes it more important than ever to have not only a clear point of view, but first a very clear intended audience. You cannot be the solution, in your case, for all CIOs. You're the solution for all CIOs that are extremely risk averse or something. There's something about your buyers that you are really aligned to. Well, many companies fail to understand what that niche looks like and where that alignment happens. I have a newsletter. I call it the "World's best newsletter." I started it when I started consulting, frankly, honestly, truthfully as a way of reminding the world that I wasn't gone. I was leaving a startup at that time that I had co-founded and I was the public face of, and I needed a way to take that momentum and transfer it into my consulting, speaking, whatever it is that I do, practice. So I started a newsletter. I had no intentions with it. I had no best practices around it. I probably break every rule in the book. People love it. And what I do with it is what I've done from day one. I collect the things that hook my attention throughout the week, that I believe more people need to read, and I send it out weekly. And I say, "Here's what is important to me". I am a human being with other other interests outside of marketing. I'm a fierce advocate for feminism, and I'm a fierce advocate for human rights. And I have a documentary coming out about the intersection of marketing and social movements. And all of that is jam packed into this little newsletter, seven links and a quote of the week. It makes no sense. If you were to tell me, as a marketing consultant, it wouldn't make any sense. There's a lot of marketing stuff in there, but sometimes there's a really important New York Times cover story about racism in America. It works for me because people know what they want from me. It's neat. I have been really reticent to do that. It feels wrong. It goes against everything I'm taught as an email marketer, but you know what? It performs. It might be because it's real. I think it's because it's honestly what people want from me. I think that's really what matters. And they come back to it week after week because it serves that need and it's fresh. They don't get it from other people. Finding your unique brand voice Katie: If you're a business, trying to figure out what to send in your newsletter, think about that first. Just like a product and the way that you develop a product, look at the consideration set. What are you up against? What are the other emails looking like from your competitors or even others in the same general industry? Do something different. Maybe it's just doing it shorter. Maybe it's coming at it from a totally different angle, right? Content and thought leadership should be treated like product development. Not only is it something new and different, but it's like this muscle that you have to work on. You've gotta be really good at coming up with the processes to uncover those insights from inside the business to say, "This is what we believe, what we know." And then really, really good at delivering that in a fresh and new way. That's what makes the job of content fun and hard. But it's not what most people do. Most people opt for the easy ebook, the 10 tips, best practices. And then they wonder why isn't this performing? How to find your exceptional truth Kathleen: So true. So if somebody is listening and they're a marketer, who's come into a company and they're thinking about - and let's talk about startups because I think that's the best way to illustrate how this works. If you come into a startup as the first head of marketing, it is a green field, right? You get to shape the clay. If you're coming into an established company, that's a different story, but it's still, the challenge is still there. It's just how you navigate. It might be different. Putting on my hat as head of marketing at a startup, I'm coming in, it's the first time we're going to have a marketing strategy. If I wanted to come in and really mine the richness of what you talk about as exceptional truths, what is the playbook for doing that? Katie: Well, good luck finding a playbook. The place to start, in my mind, is to ask yourself the question, just like you would if you were starting a movement and activism, "What is the change that you want to see in market?" What is that end result that you're hoping to get people to switch? It could just be, you want them to choose you instead of a competitor. Great. So what does that mean? What belief do you need to shift? What misinformation do you have to correct? What new insight, to quote the Challenger model, do you have to bring to the table to get them to see the world a bit differently? I'll give you an example from HubSpot again, because I think HubSpot did this so well. And it's an example that we can all relate to. Your podcast. The name is a great example of the power of what they were able to do, how this came to market. I hate to say it, they were just a blogging, search engine optimization, social media, and eventually an email tool mixed into one. They were not the only player doing this at the time. However, they thought about this brilliantly. They needed people to see the way they wanted things to change. They were advocating for us to use these tools instead of cold calling, billboards, et cetera. The way that they got people to make that shift was to create a dichotomy or create an enemy. I actually presented on this at their conference two years ago, create an enemy. You can find it on their inbound library. And they saw the world in two ways. There's inbound and outbound. There's the new way forward, Mrs. Beleaguered marketer, who doesn't want to lose her job, the way that you're not going to fall to irrelevancy. And there's the old way that you're going to fall behind if you keep using it. They were extremely polarizing with this perspective. It was just one article that started all of this, right? They were like, "Here's the way forward. This inbound and outbound. One is good. One is bad. White, black, right? Devil, whatever it is." And 80% of the market was like, "Oh man, there's no way I'm going to go there." They were pissed because HubSpot is over here, challenging the existing status quo, the way they sell. 20% saw that and went, "Oh, you're right. Let's opt into this." And so HubSpot now of course built an entire movement around inbound marketing. It is a practice. It is a job title. It is a category in and of itself because they started with that kernel of what changes do we need to create. We need to figure out a way to get people to move from A to B, to go from what they think they know to what we want to advocate for. And then they brilliantly built a movement around it. And they did so with a ton of content ideas, a community of people that were proud to call themselves inbound marketers and this kind of repetitive, consistent muscle they use to push the movement forward, now extending years and a $125 million IPO and19,000 people at their conference. It just has ballooned because they were smart about this kernel of truth that they've never deviated from. Are you going to be the next HubSpot? No. This is right place, right time, right conditions and market. But, you do have to find and be willing to provoke, with purpose, the existing beliefs of buyers, and then be consistent about that. If you can do that, your startup is going to make a lot of noise. You're going to punch well above your weight. Even if you don't have the biggest budget, you're going to make waves and you have to be willing to do that or risk falling into irrelevance. Kathleen: It's a really incredible story, that story of HubSpot and it's certainly not the only one. You have Mark Benioff at Salesforce who famously picketed outside with a sign that had a big red X through the word software. And he similarly named the enemy and it was software and his solution was move to the cloud, software as a service. That is an approach that absolutely works. I would say to go out and read The Challenger Sale. So many sales people read it, but so few marketers do, and I love that you brought it up in this conversation. Kathleen's two questions Kathleen: We are going to run out of time soon so I want to make sure I ask you my questions. I could talk to you forever. My first question that I always ask my guests is of course, this podcast is all about inbound marketing, and is there a particular company or individual that you think is just a great example of how to do inbound marketing in today's world? Katie: I think Rand Fishkin and his work with Moz and now with SparkToro which he actually details really well in a book called Lost and Founder. It's a great book. If you're thinking of starting a company read this first. It may scare you away, but he always was the example for me of somebody who was again, challenging white hat versus black hat, giving away all the industry secrets to become a trusted industry resource, to ranked the highest, but it really builds trust in his company and him as an individual. And I think it's just his consistency, Whiteboard Fridays, he was writing five days a week. That's still the best example of consistent inbound marketing. Kathleen: You know, it's so funny because I could not agree with you more. He is somebody that I have followed really closely. I read his book. I read everything he does at SparkToro. I follow him religiously. And I have been very surprised. I think you might be the first person that has mentioned his name. I ask this question of every single guest and that has baffled me because I think he's amazing. So I'm really happy that you said that. Katie: He's also the world's nicest guy. We both spoke at the SpiceWorld conference in, I want to say, 2018. Both of us were speaking in the marketing track and I'm sitting here backstage fan girling because I love him. Who hasn't read his stuff? He comes off stage with the mustache. He's the nicest guy. He's just, you know, very down to earth. And I think that's the secret. He wrote this content to truly help others. And I think that genuine purpose behind the content is really what sets him apart. More people should have mentioned him. Kathleen: Yes. I agree. And maybe they will now because we'll turn them on to his stuff. All right. Second question. You mentioned earlier that the biggest fear of marketers is falling behind. And the second question I always ask everybody is exactly that. It's like every marketer I talk to says, they feel like they're drinking from a fire hose. There's too much to keep up with. So how do you personally stay up to date and keep yourself educated? Katie: 100% LinkedIn. I'm a huge advocate for using LinkedIn appropriately. I have a big following there, so I love it as a platform, but I also use it to consume a lot of best practices. I ask a lot of questions. I'm constantly looking through comments. It's become a resource that just, I find invaluable. It's a mess. Sometimes now people take advantage of LinkedIn to post some really nonsense stuff, but at the core of it, it's there. Can I give two answers? There's a lot of Slack communities that are being built around specific topic areas. I'm not in marketing, but I'm part of a great marketing operations Slack group that keeps me knowing what's going on. I work with a lot of MarTech vendors still as an amplifier now and a community evangelist. I need to know what's going on. And so even on that, in the practice, these Slack groups are hidden sources of insight. So if there's not a Slack group for your world, your community, build it, invite people. They will come. This is not field of dreams. They're desperate to connect, one-On-one, sometimes outside of the loud world that is LinkedIn. Kathleen: That group would not happen to be the MoPro's would it? Katie: No, but now I want to join that one. Kathleen: I'll send you a link. A guy I interviewed once for this podcast has a marketing operations Slack group that I am in. But I agree with you. I have a ton of Slack groups and there's only like, let's say, two or three of them that I'm religious about checking every day. They're just insanely valuable. But, love all of those suggestions. Again, I could talk to you all day long, but we're not going to do that because we both have other things we need to do. Great conversation. I'm sure people will have opinions, both ways, about what we said here today, but that's okay. That's why these conversations are important to have. If you listened and you disagree, tweet me. I would love to hear your perspective. This is all about learning and listening and I'd love to hear what more folks think about this. How to connect with Katie Kathleen: But Katie, if somebody wants to learn more about you or connect with you online, what is the best way for them to do that? Katie: They can Google me. I'm very, very, very Google-able. You can LinkedIn me. You can find my website. I'm just, I'm everywhere. Kathleen, congratulations on over 150 episodes of this. This is a service to the community and we are grateful for it and it's a lot of work to put these together. So thank you for doing what you do and thank you for having me, really. Kathleen: Well, I very much appreciate it. And I will put links to your personal website as well as your LinkedIn in the show notes. So head there if you want to connect with Katie, and she does produce some amazing stuff, so I highly recommend it. You know what to do next... Kathleen: If you're listening and you liked what you heard today, or you just felt like you learned something new, I would love it if you would leave the podcast a five star review on Apple podcasts, because that is how other people learn about the podcast. And finally, if you know somebody else who's doing amazing inbound marketing work, please tweet me @workmommywork, because I would love to make them my next guest. That's it for this week. Thank you so much, Katie. Katie: Thank you, Kathleen. Everyone take care.

Who would protest a software conference? Salesforce. That's who. In this episode, Ross & Talia take you back into time to share one of the most impressive publicity stunts in B2B software history when Mark Benioff and the folks at Salesforce held a fake protest against their then rival Siebel Software. This story outlines how one single protest was able to generate tons of press, plenty of new customers and put Salesforce on the map as the brand to watch in the CRM space in the early 2000s. SUBSCRIBE to get all the latest: actiondrivenpodcast.com

My guest today is Dave Gerhardt, Director of Marketing at Drift, a conversation-driven marketing and sales platform that works as a virtual assistant for your website. Dave joined Drift as their first marketer two years ago, and he’s also the cohost of the podcast Seeking Wisdom with Drift CEO David Cancel. Dave is a true no-nonsense marketer, and on today’s episode you’re going to learn how to actually connect with people in your marketing and drive sales for your company. Topics Discussed in this Episode: Growing immunity to bad marketing The importance of side projects Conversation marketing and Drift Offline vs. online sales Sales barriers and how to avoid them Empathy and connecting with customers Company alignment and building a brand Dave’s recommended resources Resources: Drift Seeking Wisdom The Boron Letters by Gary and Bond Halbert Tech In Boston podcast A Side Project Helped Jumpstart My Career by David Gerhardt Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t by Steven Pressfield Ca$hvertising by Drew Whitman Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins Noah Kagan Presents podcast Behind the Cloud by Mark Benioff and Carlye Adler louis@everyonehatesmarketers.com

We've got some news on Softbank and WeWork, some formaldehyde in phone booths, Facebook to pay $40M, inside Zuckerberg meetings, AMC streaming services, Taco Bell and their huge recall on their beef, Mark Benioff, Elizabeth Warren's fake facebook ads, the backlash on LeBron and more! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On today’s episode you will hear part 4 of 4 of Russell’s interview with Andrew Warner about the Clickfunnels start up story. Here are some of the awesome things you will hear in this part of the story: Hear Russell get put on the spot when he has to answer various questions from the audience. Find out why Russell loves Voxer so much and uses constantly. And find out how Russell plans to take Clickfunnels to the level of Sales Force in the future. So listen here to the final part of this 4 part set of the Clickfunnels Start up story as Russell is interviewed by Andrew Warner. ---Transcript--- Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson. Welcome to the 4th and final installment here of the interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club, where he’s going deep into the Clickfunnels startup story. I hope you’ve enjoyed it so far. You know, throughout this entire interview, it was really fun. He brought my wife onstage and some of my partners onstage, and brought other people who didn’t like me at first onstage and kind of shared all these things. I hope all you guys are enjoying it and really enjoying this interview. I hope that this starts making you think about your startup story. Some of you guys are living your startup story right now, and maybe you’re depressed or nervous, or scared, or afraid or whatever. And hopefully this gives you motivation to know that I was there too. In fact, I’m still there many times, but it’s okay and it’s part of the game and part of the process. And someday you’ll look back and you’ll have someone like Andrew interviewing you about your startup story and you’ll be so grateful for the trials and things you’re going through now. So with that said, we’re going to queue up the theme song, when we come back we’ll listen to part 4 of 4 of the Clickfunnels startup story interview with Andrew Warner at the Dry Bar Comedy Club. Andrew: And I know a lot of you have asked me what’s coming up next and Russell’s going to talk about that, how you’re going to get to Sales Force level, but why don’t I take a couple of questions from someone. Is there anyone who’s been sitting here going, “I can’t believe Andrew didn’t ask that.”? Is there anyone who has something standing out for them? Should we just have them onstage. Unknown person: We got mic’s. Andrew: We got mic’s from over there, okay. Audience member: Alright, a little bit deeper of a question. What is something, I know you’re strong in your faith, family, God, I mean kind of all around, what’s something that’s really made you who you are? You’ve mentioned before that made you as a marketer with your dad, you’re up late watching an infomercial. But what’s something that inherently that could have been experienced, maybe a quote in the back of your mind that’s just driven you, it could have been something that your parents taught you when you were young. What is, is there, it’s kind of a little bit difficult of a question to look back, there’s probably a million things. But what are one or two that really stick out, that make you the person that you are? Russell: I have a million thoughts just racing through my head. The one that just popped in the front, so I’ll share that one, hopefully it’s good. I remember when I was a kid my dad gave me a job to go clean the car. I went out there and I cleaned the car, I did my best job, I thought. And I came back in and I was like, “Hey dad, it’s clean. Can I go play?” I was like, “Come look at it.” So he could let me go out and play. And he was like, “Well, is it good? Are you proud of it?” and I’m like, “I don’t know.” And he’s like, “Well, are you proud of it.” I was like, “I don’t know.” And he’s like, “Go work on it until you’re proud of it, then come back and let me know.” And I was like, oh man. So I go back out, and I was like, “Am I proud of this?” and I was thinking about it, I guess technically I’m really not that proud of it. So I was like trying to do more things, trying to clean it better, and to the point where I was actually proud of it. And then I came back and I’m like, “Dad, okay the car’s clean now.” And he’s like, “Are you proud of it.” I’m like, “I am.” And he’s like, “Okay, you can go out and play then.” I think for me that was such a big thing because it was just like, that internal “Am I proud of this thing that I’m giving, that I’m putting out there?” and if not, keep doing it until you are. And I don’t know, that was one of those little weird dad moments that he probably didn’t mean as a teaching opportunity, but definitely has been big for me ever since then. Andrew: Good question. Is there one on this side? While you’re finding a person who has a question, Whitney, did you have more to say? You were going to ask more, right? Yeah, can you get the mic over to Whitney, please? She’s right over here. I know I didn’t ask your full question. Whitney: Hi Russell, how are you? Russell: Awesome, how are you doing? Whitney: Good. So with your business, what is, back to like when you were first starting, I kind of want to know, what’s the one thing when your business was really hard, when you were really struggling, what’s the one thing that kept you going? Just in the back of your mind. And then I have a second part of that. What would you say was your biggest failure and what was the greatest lesson you learned from it? Russell: That’s not an easy question. Andrew: The biggest failure. Russell: Oh man. So the first question was, what was the first one again? Thinking about the biggest failure, I’m trying to…Oh, what kept it going? Andrew: Give me a sec. Are you going through that now? You are, what are you going through right now? Can you stand up and get close to the mic? I can see that this is a meaningful question for a reason. What’s going on? Be open. Whitney: I’m just trying with my business, I’m trying to get my message out there. I’m really, I’m just baby parts of Clickfunnels, so I’m just figuring out how to do a funnel still. But my company is called Creating Powerful Women, so I am just trying to teach women how to grow a business while they grow their family at the same time. And I’m doing that right now, because I have 3 little tiny girls. So I’m just like, okay, I’m still trying to figure out this myself and then teach women how to do it at the same time. So it’s just, I’m still in that struggle phase. Andrew: Is it partially because you feel like an imposter, how can I tell them what to do? That’s what I was saying to you earlier. Whitney: When I don’t even know. Yeah. {Crosstalk} Whitney: I feel like I need to have that success level before I can teach women to go out and do it. But the reason when I found you in the hall, and I said, “I want Russell to be vulnerable and tell like the nitty gritty parts of the story.” And those stories are what make people relatable to you, that’s kind of where I’m at, as I realize that I grow a bigger following and a bigger audience when I’m more relatable to them, which I realize I don’t need to be up at that level to do that. Andrew: I get that. Russell: So my question for you is, have you been working with women? Helping them so far? Tell me a story of someone you’ve helped. I’m curious. Whitney: So I went through post partum depression a couple of years ago, after I had a baby and a lot of the women I’ve been reaching out to when I shared those stories, those women have been coming to me saying, “Hey, how do you get through this struggle? I know you’ve gotten past that, so I want to hear the hard stories that you went through.” So a lot of the people who I’ve been coaching one on one have been people who have gone through those exact same things  that I have. Russell: Okay when you do that, and you share the stuff with them, and that clicks for them, how does that feel? Whitney: Like I’m fulfilling what I was put on this planet to do. Russell: That’s the thing. That’s the thing that keeps me going. It doesn’t happen often, but it happens often enough that I crave that. I’m super introverted, so it’s always awkward for people to come to me, but I still love when they come to me and they’re like, “Hey, just so you know real quick…..” Like last night, we were in San Francisco, or San Diego, excuse me. Someone came up to me in the hall and I was kind of like, I’m nervous to talk to you but you’re going to talk to me. And he said, “Hey, just real quick, you legitimately changed my life, you changed my family.” And started tearing up. And I was just like, I let myself feel that just for a second and then I go back to the awkwardness, but for a second I feel that. And It’s just like ahh. That’s what it’s about you know. I use Voxer for my coaching clients. So every time they Vox me and say something like that, there’s a little star button and I star it and it stores them in this huge thing of all the starred ones. So now days I’ll go back and I’ll listen to that and I’ll listen to people like 2 years ago that said something about how something I did effected them, and it’s just like, that feeling. Because everything we do in this life is for feeling’s right. Everything is just a feeling we’re looking for. We eat because we want a feeling. We did this because we, I wanted a feeling. We’re doing everything for a feeling. So it’s like if I can remember the feelings of the thing I’m trying to get, and I can experience it again, then it, that’s what gets me and keeps me going.  And I think that any of us that are lucky enough to have those feelings, a lot of times we forget about them. No, remember that because that’s the thing, when it’s hard and it’s painful and it’s dark, it’s that feeling that’s just like, that’s the, you remember that and you let yourself experience it again for a minute. And then for me, that’s like, okay, I can get back up and I can go again. Andrew: Great question, I’m glad you asked it. How about one more over there? You know what, yeah, let’s give her a big round of applause, please. Audience member: I was actually going to ask a little bit about that vulnerability. I was surprised, I’m big in the SAAS space, I’ve been to Dream Force, follow a lot of Clickfunnels. It’s pretty rare to see a CEO want to put themselves kind of on the roasting side of things. You’re from here, from Sandy. I was just kind of surprised, what was it that really compelled you to kind of want to come back and do this in Utah? When I saw your email I thought it was a clickbait scam. Russell: Oh it is, we’re selling you something next. Audience member: I really thought I was going to come and it was going to be a video of your face spinning and it was going to be like, “Hi, we’re here.” Because I follow Clickfunnels, but it’s just really rare, especially being down in Utah county, that was kind of unique that way. Andrew: Wait, one sec. Does Clickfunnels allow me to actually place someone’s city in the headline, like I want someone from San Francisco, you could. Oh, alright, I get it. Audience Member: It said like Idaho, we’re in the surrounding areas, it’s going out to 8000 people, limited seating. So as a marketer I was just like, is this a real thing? You know. So I showed up and I was excited to see you. But why come back to Utah, what does this event mean to you and why want to be vulnerable and kind of open up? I learned a lot about you personally that was great to hear from a business side. Russell: So my beliefs are, and I believe we have the best software company in the world, so I’m going to start with that. But if it’s just about the software, then it comes down to who’s got what feature. People are moving and shifting and changing because of the features. That’s the thing. So Clickfunnels was like, no it has to be more and it has to be a thing. And it’s interesting, people who sign up for Clickfunnels, who click on an ad, they come and sign up. That’s why John can’t do, it doesn’t work that way. They sign up for a web, clickfunnels is a website builder for crying out loud. You boil it down, we are a website builder. That is boring. So people don’t come for that. They stay for that. That’s why they stay, that’s why they stay. But they come because of a feeling, and they come because of a connection. I want to be able to take the videos from here because if I can more people who come through my funnels to hear this story, they’re going to stick with Clickfunnels because they realize we have a soul. There’s a reason behind this, it’s not just the software company who’s trying to make a bunch of money. We’re actually, we have belief behind it. So that’s why we do all these things. That’s why I still write books. That’s why we do videos. That’s why we do vlogs. That’s why we do this fun stuff, because it builds connection with people, and connection really keeps people staying, even if some other company’s got a different feature than we do, or it’s cheaper and we’re more expensive, or whatever. So that’s the big reason why we still do it. And then I thought it would be fun to come down here because I grew up not far from here and it’s just kind of a fun thing. We’ve been working with the Harmon Brothers and we started another project with them and their family owns the Dry Bar Comedy Club, if you guys have ever watched Vid Angel, that’s one of their families companies. When Vid Angel had their little hiccups, they shifted all the programming to this, the Dry Bar Comedy Club, so we used to watch all the comedians here. And I was like, this is like the coolest location to do something like this. And one of the other side jokes, I don’t know if I shared this with you or if it was just in my head, but Andrew is famous for doing these big scotch nights, and as a Mormon I can’t drink scotch. And I was like, what if we did this, but at a Dry Bar, just this funny play off of that? And it all worked out. Andrew: You know, usually at events I do scotch night afterwards and say, ‘Everyone come back to my room.’ That’s not going to go over very well. But Dave’s been to mine. He drinks water and feels comfortable. We have good water for Dave. How about one more, then I want to get into the future. Audience Member: So you always talk about how, like for Clickfunnels you guys took like 6 tries to finally make it work, right. And how most of the time when you guys start something it doesn’t work the first time, that’s why you have audibles and all those things. So I was wondering as someone that, you know I’m starting and getting that, kind of like that lifts, what is the biggest thing that you see, versus like a flop funnel versus something that kind of takes off and explodes? What’s the audible or the change that you normally do that shift or the message change or whatever it is, that makes it finally take off? Russell: Traditionally the difference between a funnel that works and doesn’t work, I’d say it’s probably 50% offer. Like if the offer’s wrong it’s not gonna, that’s usually the first thing. But then if it’s actually a good offer, that people actually want, second then is usually copy. So like what’s the hook, those kind of things. And then design is probably 3rd. All that stuff that Theron and those guys didn’t like at first. The things that, because it’s not like we just made up this stuff, you saw 8000 funnels we tested and tried in the journey of 15 years of this, that now we know what things people convert on. So it’s just like looking at stuff that you know is working and modeling it because you this structure works, this kind of thing. But usually when something is broken it’s coming back and figuring out, this offer’s not right. People didn’t want it. And that was the problem with Clickfunnels. The offer, we took 4 or 5 times to get the offer right, and then as soon as the offer is right, you can tell when it’s right because people will buy, even if everything else is bad, if your offer is amazing people will give you money for it, you know. So that’s definitely the biggest part, and from there it’s copy, then design, then all the little things that stress some people out, like me. Andrew: So I’ve got, we’ll come back. I see there are a few people that have more questions; we’ll come back to them in a moment, including you. I promise I’ll do more. But you did tell me about all the different things you guys are working on now. Of all of them, what one is going to get you the closest to Sales Force level? Russell: That’s a good question, there’s so many things. So I would say, I’m going to ask you a question is that alright? Have you ever played bigger yet? Played bigger? Playing bigger?  Andrew: No, what do you mean by that? Russell: That’s the name of the book right? Play Bigger? Andrew: Oh Playing Bigger, the book. No. Russell: Yes. So that’s book’s been interesting, if you guys haven’t read it, it’s one of the biggest ones as a team that we’ve been reading. But it’s all about designing the category and becoming the king of that category. So I feel like we are the king of sales funnels, and that’s our category, the thing that’s going to be there. And then if you read through the book, the next phases are like, building out the ecosystem that supports you as the category. And the fascinating thing about sales force, if you look at it when, I probably shouldn’t say this on video because someday Mark Benioff’s going to watch this and be like, “I’ll never give you money.” But sales force isn’t great software, right. It’s this hub that things are tied into, but the reason why they did 13 billion this year, they’re trying to get to 20 billion is because they built this ecosystem. The ecosystem is what supports this thing and grows it up, and builds it. And that’s like the next phase. So I think for us, it’s like we have this, we have funnels which are the key. It’s like the CRM for them, it’s the central point. But it’s then bringing all the ecosystem, it’s building up all the things around it, right. Andrew: Letting other people create things on your platform, becoming a platform. Russell: Yes, becoming a true platform. Andrew: can you create a platform when what you want is the all in one solution when you’re saying, “you don’t have to plug in your chat bot to our software. We’re going to be chat bot software.” “You don’t have to plug in infusion soft, we’ve got email marketing in here or mail chimp.” Russell: It depends, because you look at Sales Force is similar too. They have their own things that they either acquire and bring them in, or they build their own, things like that. And I think it’s a hybrid of that. I think it’s, we allow people to integrate because some people have tools. We will, our goal is to always be the best sales funnel builder on planet earth. We may not be the best email auto responder in the world, we have one and that increases our revenue. And people who love us will use our email auto responder, but there may be some other one that’s better. But it’s not our big focal point. There may be a chat bot that’s got more features and more things, that’s not gonna be our focus to make it the best, but we’ve got one built in to make it. So theer will be, that’s kind of our thought, that we will have the things included, so if people want to go all in they can use it. But if they love yours because of these things, they can still bring that and still bring it in. You know, and then as we grow, who knows what the next phase is. Is it acquisitions, finding the best partners? People that most of our members are using, start acquiring companies and bringing them in, internally similar to what Sales Force does, growing the platform. Andrew: Just keep letting people build on your platform and then does that make the platform more valuable, or do you guys get a share of the money that people spend on these external tools? Russell: Both, I think. Stripe for example, Stripe, I think we process 1.7 billion dollars through Stripe. We make over a million bucks a year from Stripe referral fees, for just letting them connect with us. So there’s value on both sides because it makes the platform more valuable because people can use it easier, but we also make money that direction as well, and those type of things. Andrew: Okay, what is Actionlytics, Action… Russell: Actionetics. Andrew: Excuse me. Russell: So that was Todd’s name. He loved that name. So Actionetics is, it’s what we call internally, follow-up funnels. So we have sales funnels, which are page one, page two, page three, page four. Then a follow-up funnel is send this email, send this text message. “Here’s the retargeting pixels, here’s the thing.” So it’s the follow-up funnels. It’s all of the communication that’s happened after somebody leaves the page with your audience. Andrew: And that’s a new product that you guys are creating? Russell: Yeah, it’s been, actually we make more revenue from Actionetics than we do from Clickfunnels right now. We’ve never marketed it outside though. Andrew: I can’t get access to it, it asked me for my username and password. I said, I don’t have that, so how do I sign up for it? Russell: it’s only been in beta. So we opened up at Funnel Hacking Live, people signed up there. And then we kept it down for a year, then we opened it, so two Funnel Hacking Lives we opened it, and then my birthday we opened it. So that’s it. But we have, it’s over, 12-13 thousand members who have upgraded to that. And then we’re probably a couple weeks away from the actual public launch where people will be to get, everyone will be able to get access. Andrew: And already people are spending more money on that than Clickfunnels? Russell: Yeah, because it starts at $300 a month versus $100. So it’s the ascension up. So they go from $100 a month to $300 a month and then the new one, it scales with you. Because we’re sending emails and Facebook message, it gives us an ability to grow with the platform as well, and not just have a $200 a month limit. Someone might pay $1000 or $5000 depending on how big their lists are. Andrew: You’re really good at these upsells, you’re really good at these extra features. How do you think about what to add? How do the rest of us think about it, based on what’s worked for you? Russell: Okay, that’s a great question, and everyone thinks it’s a product, the question most people ask is, what price point should my upsells be? It has nothing to do with that. It has 100% to with the logical progression of events for your customer. So when someone comes to you and they buy something, let’s just say it’s weight loss. So they come to you and they buy a weight loss book right, and let’s say it’s about how to get abs. So they buy that, the second they put their credit card in and click the button, in their mind that problem has now been solved. I now have six pack abs, the second it’s done. And people don’t think that. So what people do wrong is the next page is like, “Cool, you bought my abs book. Do you want my abs video series?” it’s like, “No, I just solved that problem. I gave you money. It’s been solved.” So what we have to think through, for logical upsells is like, “okay, I just got abs, what’s the next logical thing I need?” So it’s like, “Cool you got abs now, but how would you like biceps? We can work it out. This is my training program to grow here.” For funnels it’s like, here’s this funnels software, or here’s this book teaching you how to build funnels, but after you have a funnel you need traffic. So traffic’s the next logical progression. So as soon as someone’s bought something, the customer’s mind, I believe, that problems been solved. And it’s like, what’s the new problem that’s been opened up, because that problem’s been solved. That’s the logical… Andrew: I got my email addresses because of Clickfunnels, the next problem I’m probably going to have is what do I send to people? And that’s what you’re solving. What about this, fill your funnel, it’s a new software. Russell: Yeah. Andrew: What is it? Russell: How do you know these things? That is good, you have been digging. So I’m writing my third book right now, it’s called Traffic Secrets, and then on the back of it we have software that’s called Fill Your Funnel, that matches how we do traffic with the book. So when someone reads the book, you login and the way we do traffic, we focus very heavily on influencers. We call it the Dream 100. So you come in and you login and you’re like, “Here’s the people in my market. There’s Tony Robbins, there’s Andrew..” you list all these people and it starts pulling all our data, scraping all their ads, their funnels, everything  and shows you everything that’s happening in their companies, so you can reverse engineer it for what you’re doing. Andrew: So if I admire what John is doing for you guys, I could put you in the software, you’ll show me what you guys are doing, and then I’ll be able to scrape it and do it myself. You’re nodding. And you’re okay with that? John: It’s awesome. I’m excited. Russell: Excited. Andrew: Have you been doing that? Is that part of what’s worked for you guys at Clickfunnels? John: Yeah, we like to, we call it funnel hacking. We like to look and see what other people are doing. Andrew: So you’re actively looking to see what other, man as an interviewer that would be so good for me to understand what people are doing to get traffic to their sites. Alright, so… Russell: We buy everyone’s product, everyone’s. I bought Drew’s like 6 times. Yeah, you’re welcome. Just because the process is fascinating to see. Andrew: And then the book. What’s the name of the book? Russell: Traffic Secrets. Andrew: Why is everything a secret? What is that? Russell: I don’t know. Andrew: No, I feel like you do. I remember I think it was… Russell: It all converts, 100% because it out converts. Andrew: Because the word, “secret” out converts? In everything? Russell: Everything. I used to onstage be like, “The top three myths, the top three strategies, the top three lies, the top three everything” and like “secrets” always out converted everything else, and then it just kind of stuck. Andrew: And then that’s the name of this book. I’m looking here to see…yeah, Melanie, she told me when you organized this event you said, “Secret project”. That’s it. Russell: If I just tell people what’s happening then they like, “Oh cool.” I need to have to build up the anticipation. Andrew: Even within your team? Russell: Especially within the team. Yes. Andrew: Especially. So secret is one big thing. What else do you do? Russell: Secrets, hacks… Andrew: No, within the team. So now you get them interested by saying it’s a secret. Russell: So I’ll tell them a story, I’ll tell them the beginning of a story. I’ll be like, “Oh my gosh you guys, I was listening, I was cleaning the wrestling room and I was going through this thing, and I was listening to Andrew and he was doing this campfire chat and it was amazing. And he’s telling this whole story, and I have this idea, it’s going to be amazing. But I’ll tell you guys about it tomorrow.” So what happens now, is they’ve got a whole night to like marinate on this and be like, “What in the world?” and get all excited. And then when they show up, they’re anticipating me telling them, and then when I tell them, then I get the response I want. If I tell them they’re like, “Oh cool.” I’m like, no, you missed it. I need that, in fact, I’ll share ideas all the time, I’ll pitch it out there just to see. I know it’s a good idea because Brent will be like, “I got chills.” Dave will start freaking out, and that’s when I know, “Okay, that was a good idea.” If they’re like, “Oh that’s cool.” I’m like, crap. Not doing that one. It’s the same thing. Andrew: I’ve heard one of the reasons that you guys hang out together is one, he’s an extrovert and you’re an introvert, but the other one is Dave will one up you. Russell: It starts the process. This is the bubble soccer event we did. Initially it was like we’re going to have influences, or we were launching the viral video and like we need, let’s bring some people into it. And then we were asking how someone could bring big influencers, like “you have to do something crazy. Like get a Ferrari and let them drive over it in a monster truck.” I was like, “That seems extreme.” I was like, “What if we played football on the Boise State Stadium?” And Dave’s like, “What if we did bubble soccer? What if we tried to set a Guinness book of world records…” and then next thing we know, we’re all Guinness book of world record champion bubble soccer players. It was amazing. Andrew: And that’s the thing that I’ve heard about your office environment. That it’s this kind of atmosphere where, see for me, look at me, I’ve got that New York tension. When I talk to my people and I talk to everyone it’s like, “You’ve gotta do something already.” And you guys like fun, there’s a ball pit or whatever in the office. Am I right? You go “we need a, we’re gonna create a new office. Let’s have a bowling alley in it and a place to shoot.” That’s the truth. Russell: It is the truth. It’s going to be amazing. Andrew: Does he also tell you, “We need to do something this weekend. Date night, it’s a secret.”? Russell: Maybe I need to do more than that, huh. Andrew: Yes, does he use persuasion techniques on you? Russell: It doesn’t work on her. Andrew: No. Russell: She’s the only person I can’t persuade. It’s amazing. My powers are useless against my wife. It’s unfortunate. Andrew: Do you actually use them, or when it comes to the house you go, “come on, I’m tired already, just…”? Russell: I tried to do something today and she was like, “That was the worst sales pitch ever.” I’m like, “Dang it. Alright, I’ll try again.” Andrew: Hey Siri, text my wife “I’ve got plans for tomorrow night. So good, Russell just told me about it. I’ll tell you later. Secret.” Period, send. Russell: That’s amazing. Andrew: Wowee. Does anybody know how I can get a babysitter here. {Audience speaking indistinctly} Andrew: They’re a little too eager to spend time with my kids. Thank you. Alright, I said I would take a few more questions. I know we’re almost out of time here. Who was it, it was someone on the right here that was especially, you looked, uh yeah you, who just pointed behind you. Audience Member: Hi, okay, Russell I’ve been in your world since about 2016.. Andrew: Hang on a second, who the, I’m sorry to curse, but who the f**k comes to a software event and goes, “I’ve been in your world.”? This is amazing about you. I’m in San Francisco, there’s nobody that goes, “I’m so glad I’ve been in the hubspot world.” It doesn’t work that way. I’m sorry, I had to interrupt. Okay. I’ve been in your world. He’s selling you software, you’re in his world. Sorry. Audience member: You have to listen to his podcast, it’s a.. Andrew: I’ve listened to his podcast. It’s just him talking. Audience Member: He talks about it, it’s a universe. He creates a universe. Andrew: You know what, here’s the thing that blew my mind. I thought it was him in a professional studio, I saw him in San Francisco, he’s talking into the voice recorder on his phone. Okay, yeah. I gotta feeling that Russell’s going to go, at some point, “Religion is just an info product. I think I could do a better job here.” Alright, yeah. Audience Member: okay, I entered the Clickfunnels universe in 2016 and since that time, I came in with a lot of hopes and a lot of, it was just a really exciting experience to have you break down the marketing, you really simplified it right. So I see that, I’m an ambassador for the one comma club challenge right now, and people are coming in with such high hopes and such tremendous faith and trust in you. And I have a friends that I brought into it and everything and they’re coming in, just like, they’re really staking a lot on how they’ve persuaded to join your universe. Sorry, universe is the wrong word. But from that, I guess the question is, there’s a few things. I think a lot of people are afraid of that type of responsibility in the products that they’re delivering, and of course there is a tremendous failure rate of people who don’t get what they’re persuaded in. So there’s a lot of magnification on the two comma club, and the people there that are the successes, but the question that I have is, the responsibility that you feel for that, I feel that you feel the responsibility because you’re constantly looking for new ways to simplify, bring in new coaches, bring in the new team, make products and offers that are completely irresistible. Truthfully, I went to Funnel Hacking Live, I’m not spending any money, 20 thousand dollars later. I mean it was truthfully so irresistible, but you’ve crafted such unique things in an effort to truly serve that client and really get them to the place that they’re looking to go. So I’m not sure if the question is coming out, but there’s a lot of responsibility that all these bright eyed, bushy tailed you know, wannabe marketers are coming in really truthfully feeling the genuine just truth that you’re telling them, but then there’s a big crash and burn rate too, which is normal in that space. I’m not sure what the question is. Andrew: Congratulations  to the people in the two comma club, what about the people in the no comma club. What do you feel is a sense of obligation to the people who aren’t yet there? What do you feel about that? Russell: Is that the question? Andrew: Is that right? Audience member: I guess the question is, there’s two parts, one is the responsibility that other people are feeling, the fear that they’re feeling to put something out there because they’re afraid of a failure rate. So just like, Whitney over there was talking about, she’s got those fears. So there’s normal fears that come along with that, so how you deal with that, in that it’s not because of lack of delivery on your end, but there’s still people who are spending tremendous amounts of money, or small amounts of money that just aren’t getting what it is. So it’s really about your internal feelings about that topic. Russell: It’s a good question. There’s a lot of different ways I could answer it. I’m trying to think, for me it’s a big reason I do have a con stripe, because I do feel like I have a huge obligation to people who sign up for our stuff. So I’m always thinking, how do we simplify this, how do we simplify it? What’s the best way to do it? What’s the thing? But that’s also what creates innovation right. It creates the ideas, it’s that, how do we serve these people better? How do we serve them better? Probably the best analogy, in fact, Brandon over here was working on a video that he sent me last night, that I had a chance to watch, it was really cool. We had Sean Stephenson speak at the second Funnel Hacking Live. Was anyone there for that one? A couple of you guys. Sean Stephenson, if you know him, is the 3 foot giant. He’s this little dude in a wheel chair, one of the coolest humans on earth. And he told this story, it was funny because man, I had another emotional connection watching it last night actually, watching it. And he talked about stories like, “How many of you guys here are upset because you got 17 followers on Facebook and you’ve got 13 likes on your YouTube video, and you’re pissed because of all this stuff.” And I think of a lot things that way. “I’m trying this thing, I’m not a millionaire yet, I’m not making any money, blah, blah, blah.” And they’re upset about that right. And what Sean said, he’s like, “Do you know how they choose who they’re going to save when a helicopter is flying into an ocean and there’s a boat that’s wrecked with all these people. Guess how they choose who they’re going to save?” and he said, “What happens is the helicopter drivers, they fly over there and go down to the people, going to save them, and guess who they save, they save the people who are swimming towards you.” He says, “That’s how you do it. If you try to save everyone, it will drown you, it’ll drown the boat, and everybody dies. But you save the people who are swimming toward you.” And then he came back and said, “Those 17 likes on your video, those are the 17 people who are swimming towards you. You have to understand that.” So for me it’s like, we talk about the money because that gets people inspired, but when it all comes down, the really internal belief, no one really cares about the money. They want the feeling of the connection and the help and they want to change the world. They have their thing, and so it’s like, we talk about the money because it gets people excited, but I don’t know anybody who that’s the real reason why they’re in business. They’re in because they want, they want to help those people that are coming towards them. So you notice when you get deeper into the culture, it’s not just money, money, money, money. It’s how do you serve, how do you impact, how do you change the world, how can you get your message clearer, how can you do those things? And when you shift from the money to that, then the money starts magically coming. So for me, it’s just like how do we get more people thinking that way more often. I don’t know if that’s the right answer or if that helps at all, but it is definitely something I feel a big obligation for but I also feel like I’m super grateful for the people who are willing, I’m grateful to Don Lepre, spent all that money doing the infomercial on that thing. And I didn’t implement it back then, when I was 14, right. I’m grateful to the next guy who re-inspired me and I bought the thing and didn’t do anything and then next person and all those things, because eventually it stuck. So for me, it’s like I’m going to keep creating offers and keep doing cool things, and trying to inspire people because it might not be the first or the second or the fifth, but eventually if I keep being consistent on my side, it’s going to keep getting it and eventually the right people, those who actually have something they want to share, something they actually care about what they’re doing will figure out the way. And we’re just going to keep trailblazing and trying to do our best to make a path that they can all follow. So that’s kind of how I look at it. Andrew: Great question. Let’s close it out with one more. Yes. Dave did you find someone, because I just found someone right here. Why don’t we do two more then? Since you found one and I found one. What’s your name? Sorry, Parker? Parker. Go next. There we go, let’s go to Parker next and we’ll close it out with him. Parker: Alright, so the biggest question I have for you Russell is, I’ve seen you guys’ amazing group you guys have at Clickfunnels, and every time I go in your guys’ office it’s nothing but excitement, energy, and not only you don’t have to inspire your workers to work for you. They come there excited and hearing your amazing stories that John and Brent had of, they stayed with you for all this time and you pushed them and they pushed you and there’s this amazing cycle. I’m curious as far as, because I want to have an amazing group like that one too so I can affect the world the same way that you have, and even do better than you did. And that’s a completely admiration thing, that’s I don’t know. Dave: Cut from the same cloth here. Russell: That’s his dad. Dave’s son. Andrew: Oh got it. That makes sense. Parker: The question I have for you is, how do you find those people? Is it nothing but like a whittling out process or do you see these characteristics already in the people that you have? Andrew: One sec, how old are you? Parker: I’m 20 years old. Andrew: 20 years old and you admire your dad and the guy that he works with so much that you want to not just be like him, but be more like him? Can you take of my kid tonight? Sorry, that’s amazing. Does your dad come home with this energy like this energy like, “We’re going to capture the world. This is what we’re going to do.” Parker: it is the funniest thing. Oh my gosh. Every way you see him online, social media, whatever the heck it is, it’s exactly the same way he is at home. When you see him on the tv talking about like, “Oh this is…” or when you interviewed him. Andrew: I’ve watched his podcast, I see that thing. {Crosstalk} Parker: you know as much as I do then. Andrew: What did he motivate you to, like to sell as a kid, or to upsell as a kid. Parker: So he would like talk to us like he was a sales person basically, in the aspect of he talks about things as far as, this person did a terrible job at selling. They could have done this, this, this and this.” And we’re like 10 years old, I think at the time, I think. I don’t know. It’s more of a recent change since he joined clickfunnels and he’s got this amazing excitement and energy. It’s an amazing thing and I wish to have to people like my dad when I become a, when I start to do my own thing. Andrew: It is contagious isn’t it? Parker: yeah, it totally is. Andrew: And I’ve been watching, what’s this new Vlog that you’ve got. It’s on Russell, it’s on Russell Brunson’s YouTube channel right? I’m at the end of it going, “Hell yeah, why am I taking a shower now. I gotta go, I got stuff to do.” Right. These guys are out there taking over San Francisco, that’s my city. So I guess you’re feeling the same way at home. Now, he’s there twice, he suddenly owns a place. So your question was…? Parker: My question was basically, how do you find these amazing people to work, not only for you, but with you and to help you accomplish your dream? Is it whittling out process or it you have innate ability to find people? Russell: So as you were saying that I started thinking, I’m thinking about the partners on our team, who none of them came through like a help wanted site. None of them came through like, Brent went to church with me and he showed up every single week, every single month, he was my home teacher and showed up every single month consistently and we became friends and we did stuff together. John married my cousin. We were on the boat in the middle of the lake and he pitched me on a network marketer opportunity and I was like, I love this guy. And then I pitched him back and we just, and it was amazing. And then Dave, we were at an event like this and we had a signup sheet if you wanted to take the speakers out to dinner and Dave ran back and signed up every single line under mine. So I went to every single meal with him for 3 days. I think it’s just, I think a big part of it, I think most entrepreneurs can’t build a team because they’re waiting to build the team. And I think for me, I didn’t know what I was doing so I just started running, and what happens when you’re moving forward and motion is happening, people get attracted to that. And some people will come for bad reasons and they’ll leave, and I’ve been taken advantage of multiple times, things like that will happen, but the right people will stick around. But it’s all about, it’s the motion right. That’s what people are attracted to. If something’s happening. I don’t know what’s happening, but I want to be on that train and they start coming. So I think it’s taking the initiative of “Okay, I’m going to start running and I have no idea if anyone’s going to follow me ever. But If I do this and I keep doing it consistently then people will.” And you know, it’s been a consistency thing. I’m 15 years into this business now, 8000 funnels deep. But it’s a consistency, and when you do that and you’re consistent, then the right people will just start coming into your life. But not waiting for them initially. If I would have waited to build my team initially, we wouldn’t have a team. Everyone we met was like in the, as we were having motion, the right people started showing up. Andrew: Alright. Thanks. Speaking of, thank you. How many people here are actually at Clickfunnels, if you work at Clickfunnels. Can you guys stand up if you work at Clickfunnels. There you go. I feel like at the end of this everyone’s going to want to go and meet Russell. Everyone’s going to want to go and mob him. And he’s not that social, number one. Number two, I feel like you’re going to pass up these fan-freaking-tastic conversations, I’ve gotten to know the people who work here a lot really well in preparation for this, I really urge you to see the guys, the people who are wearing these t-shirts. Get to know them. Push them into a corner, understand what’s working for them. And really, you’re fantastic people, thanks so much for helping me do this. And thank you for having me on here. I really appreciate you being open, being willing to let me take this anywhere. You said, “I understand what Andrew is trying to do. He’s trying to figure this out. I’m going to let him run with it and let him make the magic happen.” And I think we made a lot of magic happen. Thanks so much for having me here. Russell: Yeah man, it was amazing. Andrew: Thank you all for coming, I’m looking forward to meeting every one of you. Thanks.

Steve Johnson has led sales, partners, growth & revenue for a number of SaaS companies such as Constant Contact, Hootsuite, Vidyard & more Steve shares: Lessons from his first startup venture where he partnered with Salesforce & Microsoft The early days at Hootsuite and exponential growth from $500K ARR to $100M ARR in just a few years Advice from Mark Benioff on industry events to generate sales Strategies to make your product stick and difficult to replace How to evaluate business for viability What he looks for in leaders to help him scale His advice for anyone who wants a thriving career in a startup   I'd like your feedback: What topics should we cover? Send me an email Did you like the episode? Rate it or submit a short review. Connect with me: On LinkedIn On Twitter @marcbitanga On Instagram @marcbitanga

In the times in your life when you win, and the times in your life when you lose; the only real purpose is for you to capture a story to help more people. On this episode Russell talks about his experience at Entrepreneur of the Year, and why he is grateful he didn’t win. Here are some of the insightful things you will hear on today’s episode: How the Entrepreneur of the Year event is similar to a body building competition. How Russell plans to use the story of not winning the award in the future. And why you should look for every opportunity to add to your story, whether your winning or losing. So listen here to find out how The Entrepreneur of the Year Awards compares to body building competitions, and why Russell feels grateful to lose. ---Transcript--- Hey, good morning everybody. This is Russell Brunson and I want to welcome you to the Marketing Secrets podcast. I got so much good stuff to talk to you guys about today. Entrepreneur of the year event, something funny with my kids, and a whole bunch more. Hey everyone, man, I have like 12 podcasts in my head right now that I want to share with you guys, of lessons from this last week. Some of you guys know that this last weekend was the entrepreneur of the year, the EY Entrepreneur of the Year award ceremony. Earlier this year I submitted for the entrepreneur of our region and I won it, which was really cool. And then basically all the regions get together and do a national tournament. So I was all excited to go to this national thing and compete and see if we could win the national entrepreneur of the year award. So I thought, if we’re going to do this we should make an experience out of it right. That way we can do an episode of Funnel Hacker TV, that way it’s not just me going somewhere on an event because I go to a lot of events and it’s just like boring. So how to make this memorable for me and for my wife and for anyone else I want to bring. So I decided, hey, I’m going to bring my parents, because that would be fun to have them come to something like this. And then Dave and his wife Carrie wanted to come to, which was super cool. So the first thing was like, we can just fly there or what if we did it up right and just rented a private plane? So we rented a private plane, flew down, picked my parents up in Salt Lake, which my mom was certain she was going to die on the plane. She’d read a book about someone who got in a plane wreck one time. So because of that she was convinced that certain death was the only possible outcome for this vacation. It was really hard to convince her to go. But she agreed finally. So we flew down and picked them up and went to this event. That night we got there, and they did it right. They had this huge dinner with this amazing buffet. It was amazing. I’ve been to a lot of buffets and this was like four steps past anything I’d ever been to before. They had this dessert bar and they literally had a donut wall, a wall with these pegs coming out of it with thousands of donuts all over them. They had this thing that looked like an ice cream bar with tons of different kinds of ice cream flavors, but it wasn’t ice cream it was cookie dough. It was a cookie dough bar. It was insane. They scoop out tons of cookie dough into the thing and then they had chocolate covered bacon, and they had…the desserts alone were amazing. Anyway, it was amazing. Then there was the Kelly Clarkson concert. So we were like 5 rows away from Kelly Clarkson and she did this huge show for us, a private event for everyone who was at this thing, which was super cool. And that was the first night. The next morning we woke up and if you watched my instagram stories, I made some jokes, but we had a chance to see the winners of last year’s entrepreneur of the year award. And I’m going to kind of tease them, but also I’m grateful for them, so I’ll talk about both sides of it. But they are a venture backed company who’s trying to solve cancer, which is really, really cool and I’m grateful for people and entrepreneurs and companies like that. But the problem, the frustrating thing on my side is that they’ve raised $2 billion dollars in funding in this thing. So I’m like, that’s awesome. I’m grateful that they’ve done that, what they’re doing, that they’re trying to stop cancer. That’s so valuable and helpful. But it’s funny because I don’t know if I would consider that being an entrepreneur. It’s like, the entrepreneur in this business, their full time job is to go sell people on giving them more money. And then they have people they’ve hired to solve cancer. You’re more like a glorified sales person who’s just selling to VC’s. I don’t know, but I don’t think that’s entrepreneurship, but maybe I’m wrong. But I am grateful for what they’re doing. They raised $2 billion, and it’s interesting because most of the companies that were there had all raised money. I think there’s probably half a dozen of us who are boot strapped entrepreneurs and the rest were all like VC backed. And it was funny because I was talking with Dave ahead of time about this, I’m like, you know in the body building world there’s two competitions. There’s one that’s like the body building competition, everybody comes and there’s no rules. They never say, ‘oh yeah, go use steroids.” But they don’t test for it. So because of that, that’s when you get guys like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferigno and these dudes who are insane. When you look at them you’re like, that can’t be human. It’s because they’re not human, they’re on steroids. So there’s that term, then there’s the natural body building contest where you have to like not be on steroids to qualify. And those guys look way smaller. They look amazing, but standing next to each other you’re like, that dude’s on steroids, that’s the difference. I feel like it’s the same thing here. The entrepreneur of the year award was like all these dudes who are steroids who took venture capitalist…got $2 billion in funding, and then there’s people like me, who are the natural ones. Who showed up and if you look at us by ourselves we look good, but you look standing next to someone who received $2 billion in funding it’s like, how do you compete with that. It’s fascinating. In fact, for those who were, I don’t want to leave you in suspense. We did not win the entrepreneur of the year award. The guy who won it in our space is Thomas Siebold, which if you’ve ever heard of Siebold, he’s a billionaire. He started a new company because he’s a billionaire, he just funded it and had other people fund it. How do you compete with that guy? Come on now, that’s not fair. In fact, Siebold is the dude who Mark Benioff, who owns Sales Force used to work for. So he was Mark Benioff’s mentor. Anyway, so it’s like, that’s who I was competing against, billionaires. So I lost to the billionaire, but the billionaire was all roided out, so I don’t feel too bad. Anyway, and then the dude who won entrepreneur of year overall, of all the categories, was the guy who started Groupon, which actually was really cool. Groupon was his sixth business and then he took it public, and now this is his new business. Again, it was confusing, but they went from zero to $2 billion dollar valuation, excuse me a billion dollar valuation in 2 years. But again, they haven’t sold much stuff, but because of all the money they’ve gotten from funding their value there. So once again, they’re all roided out and they beat me. But it was still kind of fun to see. And again, I want to step back, well in the intro of this podcast I make fun of it. About companies who cheat and take on venture capital. And while I do feel that, I am at the same time grateful that there are companies out there who are trying to cure cancer. There’s companies out there who are trying to do these things, that probably couldn’t be done by a bootstrap entrepreneur, just because of the nature of what it is. It takes $1 billion apparently, in funding to cure cancer before you have the pill and start selling it. You can’t start selling it ahead of time. So I understand it and while I tease and I joke about it I am grateful for those entrepreneurs who are doing that direction. I just don’t believe in it. I think for us bootstrap entrepreneurs there should be an award as well. So we may or may not being working on the Bootstrap Entrepreneur of the Year Award, because I think it’s something that needs to happen. Just like in body building there’s the body building competition, then there’s the natural body building competition. I think that’s more interesting to me and I think to you guys as well, because most of you guys don’t have $2 billion in funding. So it’s like, okay how do we actually, in fact it’s funny, one of the panels, they were doing the interview and they asked the guy, “What’s it like as an entrepreneur taking on the risk?” and the guy was like, “Well, you know the nicest thing about risk, I just go back to my venture capitalists and get them to give us a couple more hundred million dollars, and then the risk fear goes away.” I’m like, what? That’s the worst answer ever. It’s like, what do you do when you hit plateaus? I just take more steroids. Come on. I wanted to be like, that’s when we freaking hustle. We recruit a team of people that believe in our vision. We work our butts off for free and we create something truly remarkable and then we sell it to our customers, and they love it so much they finance it. That’s the answer I wanted, but no. It’s like, we go back and take another hit of roids. Anyway, that’s kind of interesting. But I digress, there were so many other cool things that I wanted to share with you guys. So many cool stories I could share with you. In fact, I’m sure I’ll do separate episodes. Like for example, Jennifer Gardner came and spoke and she is funny, I teased my wife, I think everyone’s allowed to have one celebrity crush right, and she’s totally my celebrity crush. Ever since 13 Going on 30, I was like she is the coolest ever. So she’s been my celebrity crush, and she came and spoke. And she was so amazing, not just from the point that I have a crush on her, but just insanely amazing. I was so impressed with her. Anyway, I’ll tell you some stories about her in another episode. But blown away by her. Just so many cool things that happened. But the biggest thing I wanted to share with you guys, and this is kind of the purpose of this podcast, and then I’ll go deeper on other episodes about some of the specific things I learned. There’s some really cool lessons I learned from watching the Kelly Clarkson Concert. Specific things from Jennifer Gardner, specific things….but for this one, what I wanted to talk about, the natural vs the regular body building contest, how it relates to entrepreneurship. Because I think sometimes some of may look at those guys and be frustrated. And it’s like, no, just understand that they have a role in this world and we’re grateful for them, but it’s not who we are. We’re the natural body builders and it’s something to be proud of, I think, that you bootstrap your company. So that’s number one. But number two is like, I didn’t win the contest. It’s funny because so many people reached out to me, “Oh I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.” And it’s funny because I didn’t care. I didn’t go into to it to do it. I’m always going into things looking for the story. What’s the story I’m going to be able to tell because of this experience? I think that’s something that all of us should be looking at because we all go through tough times. And I’m not saying this was a tough time for me, it wasn’t. I was fine not winning. But when I’m going through something I’m looking for what’s the story that’s going to happen in this thing that I can use to inspire somebody or to sell something or to whatever. I’m always talking to you guys about you need to be building up your rolodex of stories. When I do a webinar, the reason I can do webinars so fast, and I can crank them out and I can sell well is because I’ve got this huge rolodex of stories that I’ve been building up for over a decade that I can pull out really quick in a moment’s notice. So I’m like, what are the stories that I can pull out of this experience that I can use in other things? Like when I spoke at the 10x event and I did 3.2 million dollars in sales. And everyone’s like, “Oh my gosh, you made 3.2 million dollars in sales.” I’m like, yeah, that was cool but I’ve got a story now, and that story will make me ten times that 3.2 million. To be able to tell that story about how I’m the highest paid public speaker in the world. How I netted a million dollars an hour. All those things, I will sell way more product from that than I ever did from the money I made at the event. I’m looking for the story. So for me, it’s like this whole thing happened. I didn’t win it, but like for me, the story is this whole thing I kind of shared with you guys today, this natural versus unnatural. And I promise you, we are going to building a Bootstrap Entrepreneur of the Year Award and a thing, and it’s going to be a movement and a big thing, based on this story. The fact that I lost, I’m so grateful that I lost because now I have this story about, “Hey I lost, but I was going up against people who were on steroids.” It’s not really, it’s like bringing a gun to a knife fight. Let’s come back and let’s build the natural body building contest for entrepreneurs. Now I have a story I can share, and a reason and a purpose and a thing that’s going to call to all of my people. It’s going to call out to the bootstrap entrepreneurs. The people I love serving are going to hear that message and be like, “Yes, that’s who I am.” And they’re going to hear my voice and they will come to me. So that’s the magic. In the experience I’m looking for the story because the story is the next phase of the thing. So for you, I want you guys to keep your eyes open more for the stories that are happening. Every day when you have success there’s a story there that’s more valuable than the success. When you fail there’s a story there that’s more valuable than the failure. And most of us just go through it and we’re upset or happy for the thing that just happened. It’s like, no, no, no. That thing that happened was good, but it was not the finish line. It was the story you need to inspire people to sell your next product, to do your next thing, to create your movement, to call a new segment of people into the marketplace. Whatever it is for you, the story is the key. So keep your eyes open for the stories that are happening around you. That’s the magic, that’s what I want to make sure you guys aren’t missing, because if you did, for me that whole weekend could have been a wasted weekend. “I lost, let’s not talk about it.” No, no, no. “I lost, let’s talk about it.” That’s more powerful. Alright, with that said, I’m home. I’m going to go get ready for the day. A lot of fun stuff happening this week. I’ll take you guys on some of the journeys but we are, my kids have….so today’s Monday morning, I’ve got a wrestling match Tuesday with the kids. Wrestling match Thursday and then Friday and Saturday there’s a wrestling tournament. So we got wrestling all week. And I was supposed to fly down Friday and Saturday to go be with the Harmon Brothers, to work on part two of our viral video campaign with them, the problem is that it was booked on Friday/Saturday and I found out later that my boys had a wrestling tournament Friday/Saturday. So I was like, okay my kids are more important than my company. I’m not missing the wrestling tournament. So I had to talk to them and move things around. So what’s happening is Tuesday’s wrestling match ends, after that I jump on a private plane and fly to Provo to get to Sundance, so I can be there for the writing retreat. So I’m there all day Wednesday at the writing retreat, half day Thursday, and then I jump in a plane and fly back and get back just in time for my kids’ wrestling match on Thursday night. So this whole detour is costing me like $16 grand in flights to be able to…. So anyway, someday I’m hoping my kids listen to this episode someday when their father is dead and they’re like, “I wonder if my dad loved me?” and be like, “Yes, he loves you a lot. He rearranged heaven and earth so he wouldn’t miss a wrestling match because that’s how much he loves you.” So I hope they listen to this someday and know how much I love them. They are the coolest little things in the whole world and I cannot wait to watch them wrestle. So that’s my week this week, plus we got a speaker training happening in Boise so Tuesday/Wednesday we are training a team of 20 speakers to go out and do my presentation on the road, which is exciting. So I’m working on presentations today to train them on my stage pitch. That’s happening today and then 10x secrets, we’re in the middle of launch right now, it’s doing really, really well. And I think I’m running a webinar because I think Monday I’m going to be doing a webinar to close out the whole thing. So I got that happening this week plus while I’m in Provo working with the Harmon Brothers, that night we’re all trying to get them all of our new Org Chart business development stuff with the company. It’s going to be an insane week. If I survive this week, then I’ll have earned Thanksgiving next week. So anyway, I appreciate you guys all, thanks for listening. If you learned anything from this, take on your phone, you can click on the buttons and take a screenshot of the screen of this podcast episode, do that and then go to Facebook or instagram, or pinterest, wherever you go and post the video and say, “I just listened to Russell’s story about ‘blah’, check out his podcast.” Tag me so I can see it and also hashtag Marketing Secrets, and let’s get some other people listening to this episode. Appreciate you guys, thanks so much for everything, and we’ll talk soon.

Above The Storm: 100 Thieves raised capital in its series A round from the likes of Drake, Scooter Braun, Sequoia Capital, Mark Benioff and more. Fortnite has raised $1.25 billion valuing Epic at $15 billion.

Voice search is getting a lot of buzz these days, but what types of companies is it right for and how should you use it as part of your marketing mix? This week on The Inbound Success Podcast, Yext CMO Jeff Rohrs breaks down the subject of voice-first search and explains what types of companies it is particularly well suited for. He also shares specific examples of how small and medium sized businesses can quickly and easily get set up to be found on voice search and translate that into more business. Listen to the podcast to hear Jeff's insights on the current - and future - potential of voice search and what your business should be doing right now to capitalize on it. Transcript Kathleen Booth (Host): Welcome back to The Inbound Success podcast. I'm Kathleen Booth, and I'm your host. Today my guest is Jeff Rohrs, the CMO of Yext. Jeff Rohrs (Guest): Thanks Kathleen. I'm excited to be here, thanks a lot. Kathleen: Yeah, I'm excited to talk to you because, as people have been listening to this podcast for the last several episodes, they now know that in the last month or so I was able to launch a new voice skill for Alexa that allows people to listen to the podcast on their smart home device. I'm not yet on Google Home but maybe that will be next. So voice is top of mind for me and you are someone who has done a lot of thinking around what it means to market in a voice-first world and what businesses need to do to get ready for this, so I am excited to pick your brain today. Meet Jeff Rohrs Kathleen: Before we start on that, can you tell our audience a little bit more about yourself and your background and what you do at Yext? Jeff: Sure. I'm Chief Marketing Officer of Yext. I run the global marketing department and we've got folks in the States, over in London and Berlin and Paris and Tokyo and support all of our sales, product marketing, and customer success teams with what we do. I joined Yext a little over three years ago after having been with Salesforce by way of their acquisition of ExactTarget. I had joined ExactTarget in the middle of 2007 and got to ride that wave as they went public, helped build the content marketing, thought leadership teams, their connections events, did a lot of programming and a lot of creative work around that before the acquisition by Salesforce in the middle of 2013, which also happened to be when I was writing my book, "Audience," so they kept me around because I was the guy who was publishing a book just in time for DreamForce that year and it was quite an education and quite an opportunity to join Salesforce as they were expanding. At that point, I think ExactTarget was their biggest acquisition to date and I got to see Mark Benioff in action at a couple of executive off-sites and really see why that company is so successful, just because of his leadership and just the overall teams' contribution to their success and their customers' success. Kathleen: Wow. I feel like we could do a whole other podcast episode just on how the world of content and inbound marketing has evolved over the last 10 or so years, because you've really been in this arena for that time span, as have I, but in a completely different way, and boy has it changed a lot. Jeff: It sure has. I was fortunate to be doing content marketing before it was called content marketing and in a small world story, Joe Pulizzi, the founder of the Content Marketing Institute, and I led kind of parallel lives in Cleveland for a while. We both lived in Cleveland. I've since moved to the New Jersey area, but it took Ann Handley of Marketing Profs to email us, I think back in 2008 or 2009, and say, "You guys really should get together." I vividly remember sitting down with Joe at a now-defunct Caribou Coffee for our first meeting and we were peas in a pod believing what that medium could do and he obviously built Content Marketing Institute into a great resource and then Content Marketing World into a tremendous event, which I'm honored to come back and speak at in a couple of weeks here. Kathleen: Oh, great. Yeah, those are two really key figures in this world, too. Joe Pulizzi has been a real source of inspiration for me personally and for IMPACT as a company, and we just had Ann Handley keynote our conference a few weeks ago. Jeff: Awesome. Kathleen: I love her. Jeff: Good people. Kathleen: She's fantastic. Jeff: She is. Kathleen: She's a ball of energy. Jeff: Indeed. Voice-First Marketing Kathleen: Well I could go on and on about all those people, but I think what we're here to talk about and what I'm so interested to learn about is voice-first. It's amazing how quickly it seems we've come to rely on voice searches and it's been fascinating to me ... it feels like the Wild West ... to observe all the different ways that brands and companies are starting to try and experiment with it. I feel like it's a massively untapped opportunity and I would just love to get your take on it. Where do you see it going? What do you think the opportunity is for the average company out there that isn't Pizza Hut or Coca-Cola? How do you think the small and medium sized business market is going to use voice search in the future? Jeff: Voice search is a UI so it is a user interface, a way that a human being is going to interact with some sort of intelligent service. When you put it into that perspective, you can begin to understand how it impacts your world. If you are in a space where perhaps taking customer questions and a lot of repeatable questions and you're already looking at chatbots and things like that, voice is just gonna be a natural evolution and way that people will interface with that chatbot expertise that you might be building up. Or, as you indicated, it could be skills-based and then there would be an app. I have an app on my phone. What is a skill? It's an app on a voice assistant to do something, add value in some way. Jeff: Voice-first as a hashtag is very catchy and is spreading like a virus, but in a good way, because it's getting people to think about, "Okay. Let me look at my day and let me look at the value I offer to my customers, and how is voice going to play into that?" If you are a company that is developing software products, SaaS products, things like that, you need to look at the product itself and say, "How am I going to develop a ... ", or "How is voice gonna impact it, to create greater usability, less friction, less experiences, and an overall better customer experience?" If you're more on the services side, you might take a different look, and as you have, go down a skills-based path or come up with other ideas that are marketing ideas to get your ... the value of your services out in the marketplace. I think voice is as varied as any user interface. It's just that it has been in our consciousness because of sci-fi for a very long time. I would encourage people to let their minds wander creatively, just like the authors of science fiction did a long time ago about how this applies, because we're in the very early innings of the applications here. But when you hear ... and you should absolutely follow Dave Isbitski of Amazon. He tweets a lot of great stuff and one of them ... he tweets some pretty inspirational things because people send them his way, but like the father with the child who's having spelling difficulties, and he's able to use the skill that is his kid's spelling list, and the child interacts with the voice assistant like a teacher and it gains confidence from that because it's less intimidating to interact with a speaker than with a human being. There are a lot of things like that that I think we'll see come to fruition and it's gonna take your creativity to figure out how it best applies to your business. Kathleen: Yeah. It's really interesting. One of the things that I've been thinking a lot about is, being a content marketer and being so focused on creating great content that's going to rank, what's interesting to me about voice search is it fundamentally changes the game because most content marketers historically have been focused on getting into the top of the search engine results pages. Jeff: Right. Kathleen: That objective assumes that there are going to be multiple results and you want to be in the top or at the top or near the top but when we talk about voice search, we're often talking about screenless search, and all of a sudden when you talk about screenless search, you're talking about one result. So it's almost like a zero sum game, you're either in the results or you're not. It's not only getting there, it's how your information is formatted to lend itself well to those kind of results. I guess it's kind of similar with where Google is going with featured snippets and all of that, but that's something that I've been thinking about so much. Like, how does the fundamental structure and format of our content need to change to lend itself well to being the one result, and not only to getting into that position but to delivering some value when somebody gets it? Jeff: Well, it's a great question and it's actually the very thing I'm sort of addressing at Content Marketing World in a couple of weeks. It requires you to shift your paradigm, because as you have rightfully noted, if you are in a voice-first world without a second screen or without a screen connected, you're getting an answer. You're not getting a multitude of results. I think we also need to acknowledge that as effective as SEO is and as much of a believer as I am in it, when you have a multitude of competition that's relevant, you're beholden to whatever the intelligent service is to dictate who's gonna be shown first. The constant chase to try and reverse engineer the black box that decides that can be a fool's errand. It can be mind-numbing. So when I say paradigm shift, what I believe you need to think about is your smallest content first. What are the facts about your business that you are the primary source of truth for? This is what Yext's entire business is built upon. It's a philosophy that consumers deserve perfect information everywhere and that businesses should be in control of the objective facts that appear on those services everywhere, because they have the greatest motivation to ensure that they are true. So if it is subjective, if it is reviews, well then you certainly want to be listening, responding, and then generating first party reviews from customers you know came through, but you're not gonna control what they say. However, if it is name, address, phone numbers, store hours, does this doctor have these certifications, does this marketer have these certifications, do you take this type of insurance? If you're an insurance agent, what insurance do you represent? If you're in food service, what is your menu? What's your special of the month? What are your prices? All of these are objective facts and because we've grown up with the Internet around a notion of search engine indexing, therefore based on search engine spidering, we have a paradigm that the world should work, that I should put my content out on a website that I own, and this spider should come along and grab that, pull it back and apply algorithms to it, it's intelligence, to then output a result in whatever the UI is the consumer is asking. I would challenge the audience to think about that and say, "Well, if the Internet started today and Google had the market cap it had, do you think it would begin by indexing?" My guess is it would not. My guess is it would begin by going to businesses, opening up APIs, just like it has, just like what we've integrated into our knowledge network and say, "Hey businesses, we want you to provide this information directly because we know you're the best source. The only reason we relied on third party data or indexing in the past is that was the only thing that was available to us." This is something we've seen as we have evolved is as those services open up the APIs and begin to recognize, "Gosh, when businesses are controlling that information through Yext, it's really, really reliable." It seems so self-evident, but it takes that recognition for the paradigm shift. Voice demands that paradigm shift, because you're not gonna be the answer on a lot of unbranded searches. You are going to be one of many and so what are you gonna be the answer for? Well, if somebody's asking for your hours of operation or if you're taking new clients or things that you should be objectively in control of, you better be in control of those. That's why we believe that we're shifting to a world of digital knowledge management, where you're controlling the facts in a centralized way and then outputting them to all of the endpoints where the consumer can engage with them. That is, I think, the fundamental underpinning of voice search as we see it today, and the effort to kind of reverse engineer how your white paper or your ebook is gonna be number one on an esoteric kind of question, I think is chasing your tail until and if such time, that there is greater clarity about how that portion of the brain behind the index is creating. Not to totally prolong the answer, but I'm gonna give you one more thought. As of right now, none of the voice assistants accept advertising. At the point at which they try and begin to do advertising, then there are gonna be people, just as in paid search, that buy their way to the top. Now whether the user will accept that remains to be seen. I remember when paid search ads came out, everybody said, "Oh, nobody's gonna click on these," and Google laughed their way all the way to the bank. So early stages, it's a new medium, but what I can tell you is that fundamentally your facts should be things you control, and if you focus your effort there, flip the paradigm, you're gonna be in the places when consumers are asking about you specifically. Kathleen: Yeah, I really love the approach that you took there, because I was actually talking with somebody about this yesterday. I'm involved in an accelerator program where I teach marketing to start ups and the person who was organizing it and I were talking about the marketing curriculum, and we were talking about how companies can get so wrapped up in certain tactics or channels, like pay-per-click marketing for example. They'll be like, "That's what I need to do. It's just gonna deliver my leads to me." The problem with that is that not only are there diminishing returns to scale at certain points, but you're not in control of that channel. If you put all of your eggs in a basket that you don't control, inevitably the rules of the game will change and the basket will fall apart, will crumble. I believe that it is important to make sure that everything that is within your control you have really got buttoned up and done well, and then if you've done that, sure, there's times you experiment with trying to optimize with other things, trying to use these platforms in new ways, and seeing what happens, but if you don't have the foundation built strongly, the house is gonna crumble. Jeff: Absolutely. In fact, that's kind of the premise of my book from a couple years back, "Audience, Marketing in the Age of Subscribers, Fans, and Followers." It's the idea that you should be building direct, proprietary audiences across a number of different platforms so that you are able to reduce or better optimize your paid media, because what is paid media? You are just buying eyeballs, you're renting them actually, you're not even buying them. So the price will fluctuate and your ability to reach a market becomes very, very compromised. One only needs to look at what has happened to Blue Apron's stock over ... as they went public and just got hammered because their cost of acquisition and retention is higher because they're so dependent on paid media. But if you focus on, "Okay, how do I build a Facebook audience, Twitter following, email?" If you analogize that as you were then to voice, your facts about your business are the things that are ... They're not immutable, because your store hours can change, you can move locations. There's a lot of things like that that can happen. But you are the best source of truth for them. Now, we have to take this sense of ownership, and to your listeners who perhaps are sole proprietors or only have a couple of business locations, this might not seem like a big deal. But the law of big numbers is as you increase locations, it gets exponentially more difficult to manage this at scale accurately. We will often have customers come in and dump 10 different sources of "truth" on the table about their various facts about the business. We've had retailers come to us and give us databases that they say are the current database of stores and 20-25% of the locations are closed, never existed or moved. The factual management of the things that consumers are engaging with is fundamental just as I still believe that proprietary audience development is fundamental to long-term success. Kathleen: Oh, absolutely. I think your audience is one of those things that you can own if you do it correctly. If you're building your audience on a platform that you control, whether that's collecting emails or starting a private Slack group or what have you. Your audience is not necessarily the people that follow you on social media. We've all seen what happens. Five, ten years ago you had a Facebook page. It was all about "I want to get likes for my page, so people will see my updates," and now, Facebook pages are like a ghost town, so nobody sees anything. Building it where you have that control is essential. You started talking about smaller businesses, and there's obviously this sliding scale of businesses that start small. They start to grow, they get more locations, but for some of these smaller businesses, when they hear voice search, it seems just like, "I don't even want to think about that. That's not something I can tackle or that's within the realm of possibility for me because I'm just a local restaurant." Or, "I'm just a local law firm." Or just a dentist office. Can you talk a little bit about what should a small business like that be trying to accomplish with voice? What is realistic given their time, their budget, and their level of expertise? How Small Businesses Can Take Advantage of Voice Search Jeff: I don't want to get commercial, but I want to tell you one of the reasons that I'm here at Yext that ties to that. I was contacted by a head hunter coming back from a speaking gig in Frankfurt that was frankly really depressing because I'd been given the bait and switch. Supposed to be a keynote, ended up being a breakout. I'm speaking english. The one against me is speaking german. Kathleen: Oh boy. Jeff: Spent time away from the family and not a lot of return. I get this call from a head hunter, talking about this exciting company in New York. He's building it up, building it up, and he does the big reveal that it's Yext. At the very moment I was pulling out a tin of mints from my bag, as I was cleaning my bag from the trip that said, "Yext, keep your geo data fresh," which was their motto at the time, and I had just happened and didn't even connect it that I had been given that at an SMX show that I had spoken at. I'm like, "That's funny. That must be a sign." Well then the next sign was when I pinged my friend, Jay Baer, and I said, "Hey, Jay. Do you have some time to talk?" He said, "Sure." I said, "Well, I've been approached about this opportunity with this company called Yext." He goes, "God, that's weird." I'm like, "Why?" He said, "Because I'm writing the portion of the chapter of my new book at the time, Hug Your Haters, in which this lawyer in San Diego discovered that there was this zero star rating on Yelp for his law firm, and he discovered it because he was a customer of Yext. It alerted him. He reached out to the individual, discovered it was a misunderstanding, was able to turn that hater into a fan and reverse it to a five star rating." Kathleen: Wow. Jeff: And it was such serendipity. He's a single attorney, but he was using a platform for review listing management or response. We obviously want folks to work with us, look at us, whatever. But whatever you do, and we hope you do think about working with us, but pick something that you're going to use to manage that base location information because you want to be found on search accurately. Let's set that aside. That's the fundamental of voice search -- discovery of your business in branded or informational ways. Jeff: Let's keep in mind "near me" search because near me search is up exponentially in part because Google now just assumes you have a near me search if you're on a mobile device. Kathleen: Yeah. Jeff: If you're not accurate and found on Google, and the other thing I've been waiting for, I've mentioned this in a couple places, a few years ago or a number of years ago now because I'm getting older as the gray in my goatee attests. I remember when the big thing that hit everybody's PowerPoints for a while was "Do You Know What the Second Biggest Search Engine is?" The answer was YouTube, and everybody's like, "Wow. That's amazing." I have this sneaking suspicion now because people are putting in searches into the map. They're using that as not just point A to point B, but navigation. If you look at all the rich information that Google and others are putting in their maps, it's transformed it. So get that right. That's the voice search piece. Then you've gotta make sure the rest of your website has got appropriate schema that'll work markups so that the information can be found, assessed, that is less factual or subjective or expertise or what have you. Then I think you have to do as you did. Really look at who your customers are, and this is true for any marketing. This isn't just a voice conversation. Who are your customers and where do they live? If they are interacting with voice assistance, in greater numbers in certain circumstance, I would focus on those circumstances to see if you can add value in that environment. If not, just doing a voice application or something, a skill to do it and say you did, might have a slight PR bump. It might have a first mover kind of bump, but it won't have the long, contributory value to your bottom line that you would like. Then look at other ways that you can get into "voice." Right? I don't have a podcast, but today I'm a guest on your podcast. This is voice in a way, right? I look at news and PR and other ways that you can be getting into that voice assist in interesting ways, but don't feel obligated that you have to have some sort of profound strategy out of the gate. I think especially as a small business you're worried about keeping the lights on and people's paychecks coming. Continue to focus on where your customers are and how you optimize for them, and what you're going to see is technologies that kind of help you future proof. One of the things that we do is we try to expand our knowledge network. Our customers didn't have to lift a finger when three weeks ago we announced we're integrated with Amazon Alexa. They're now in Amazon Alexa. They didn't have to do a thing. You need to be looking at the technologies that allow for distribution or access of voice audiences as just part of the way they evolve and help you. For SMBs, I think, right now, I don't want to say wait and see. I think it's more read and listen and participate in your own life, but listen to your customers first. They'll help you see where they can be value added. Kathleen: Yeah. So if I'm hearing you correctly, and tell me if I have this wrong, it sounds like what you're saying is if you are a small or medium sized business and if your market is somehow geographically specific or if you have multiple geographically specific markets, multiple locations, et cetera, that it is not only possible, but it is incredibly accessible to make sure that you're doing at least the basic things you need to do to enable the customers that are looking for you and trying to get information about you in your local market to find that via voice. Jeff: Yeah, we've got a great customer, Romeo's Pizza, in my old haunt of Cleveland and Medina, Ohio. Their CEO, Ryan Rose, is one of the smartest minds in any kind of business that I've run into. They're growing. They're, I think, at about, I don't know, 55 locations now with a pretty big growth plan. They came onboard earlier this year, or maybe it was last year, at a smaller base. What they see, once they got their digital knowledge management right and they began to not just get listings and local pages and reviews correct, they began to understand that they could operationalize this because the reviews were telling them where franchises were falling short of their customer experience. They could address that before it became a fire. The listings and the pages and the increased local discovery helped them see who was benefiting, where did they perhaps need to take a look at expansion, what kind of contributions from the franchises community should they be looking for? Because they were essentially ensuring accuracy at that local level like never before. What sort of excited me about joining Yext is there was a shoe for every foot. It didn't matter the size of your business. We also have great partners that we integrate with like DexYP and Hibu and others who integrate us into their solutions for super small business, single locations, et cetera. That's, I think, important in those situations where you're truly one or two location kind of business, and you don't want multiple logins and everything else. You want a solution. We always are looking for partners that we can work with, we can integrate with, or we also have reseller and preferred partner programs so that we can reach customers where they have preexisting relationships, let's say with agencies or digital marketers. For small businesses, like I said, you're worried about keeping the lights on. There's no CMO. There's usually an owner and owner's sibling, spouse or son or daughter. It's a family affair, and you're wearing 20 different hats. Kathleen: You're the chief cook and bottle washer, right? Jeff: You got it. You need some things that are going to work for you in that way, and that's certainly how we try to approach the business. Kathleen: Yeah, that's actually how I first came across Yext when I had my digital marketing agency. Especially in our earlier years, we worked a lot with smaller, more local clients, and it was exactly that point. They were like, "I know I need to be on all these platforms. I need to be on Yelp and Google Maps and yellowpages.com and what have you." Managing that was such a nightmare. For us, it was a great solution.  Jeff: Mm-hmm (affirmative). How Yext Is Using the Move To Voice-First to Grow Kathleen: You are producing a lot of thought leadership content around digital knowledge management, voice search. Can you talk a little bit about that and how you're tackling that and what that's doing for you as a company? Jeff: The way that we're tackling it is we're expanding internationally. We're expanding vertically. We have really defined the values that we provide. I look at our content marketing strategy as how does it align with that, and then also how does it align with our product roadmap. We just came out with Yext for Events, so the very thing we did with listings back in the day and creating this then called power listings network. It's now called our knowledge network because there's a lot of non-search partners in that, but when we created that it was that update once, publish everywhere mentality. Well events has the exact same problem. If I want to promote an event, how the heck do I promote an event? Ben and Jerry's has free ice cream cone day. They've had it since their founding, but it was taking them hundreds of hours to promote that. They were in our beta, and that hundreds of hours went down to two. They could apply that time savings elsewhere. So applying it back to your content plan, now our team is focused on, "Okay, how do we tell this story? What content do we need to produce?" We're not going whole hog with like a white paper or ebook because we're learning the space, we're talking to the practitioners, we're seeing how it works, so that then we can create really relevant content that helps our customers and prospects better understand and utilize that particular product. Now, on the other end of the spectrum, let's look at the five values. We believe that our platform offers brand control, local discoverability (which positively impacts the bottom line), customer experience (making sure it's consistent on your website, your app and all the third party systems), organizational efficiency (like in that Ben and Jerry's story), and then future proofing the business. When we produce content, I want my team to look at that, and say, "Okay, what content are we producing for which values?" Sometimes it can be two or three or four. But we just came out with something called To Rebrand or Refresh, That is the Question. One of my favorite conversations that I've moderated, spoken about, read about over the years is that conversation about when should you rebrand. Because I will tell you what, I don't know. I look at Taco Bell and Doritos, and they're constantly refreshing their brands every few years, and I know the cost that takes in terms of signage and packaging and everything else. That is a bold bag. Then you've got some companies that completely rebrand. We wanted to dig into that, but why? Because we discovered through seeing how our customers used us that they were using us a lot when they would rebrand because it wasn't just about physical rebranding, it was about making sure the digital universe was correct. Aha! Okay, so now I get it. You've got customers that rebrand like a Best Buy or a Crabtree & Evelyn or any of these types of customers. We're a part of that story, and I think that's important to recognize. We're not the whole story. Great content marketing on behalf of B2B businesses isn't just writing a sales pitch. It is telling a very relevant and hopefully evergreen story with context where you add value in that final chapter. That's kind of the punch line so that if anybody picked that up who was in marketing, it would be of value to them. So that's kind of the approach that we've taken. Then some things, like I co-authored an ebook called "The Everywhere Brand" with Jay Baer that was truly inspired, like literally that one is a funny story where we found a little bit of extra money in a quarter. I've worked with Jay many times before. We called him up on the phone. I said, "Jay, hey, I want to co-author something with you. We're just trying to figure out what it would be." Because at the time we were really trying to establish a better sense of who we are, the messaging, et cetera. As we were brainstorming, I said, "What if we wrote something called "The Everywhere Brand"?" Then from there Jay and I just riffed and it came together very, very quickly. The notion that your brand now needs to be correct everywhere, and there are these seven tenants of a great everywhere brand. Inspiration can sometimes strike, but often times it's that good planning and understanding who you are, what your customers value from you, and how your products fit into that, and then regionalizing, localizing it as appropriate. Kathleen: Yeah, something you just said really resonated with me because, I think I was just telling you, I've published my 52nd podcast recently- Jeff: That's awesome, congrats. Kathleen: Thank you. I've been seeing certain themes emerge over the course of the last year because I'm always trying to surface what are the things that really make certain content or inbound marketers effective. One of the most prominent themes that has come out of a large number of the interviews I've done has to do with being audience centric rather than product centric. So many marketers like to create content that does revolve around specifically what their product does, or how it works. Some of the most incredible stories I've heard where marketers have gotten the best results have occurred when those marketers have created content that has nothing to do with what they're selling, but everything to do with the pain point their audience is feeling. And really it's about just opening the conversation. And the conversation doesn't have to be around what you're selling, it's just establishing a line of communication with the audience. I think it was my third or fourth episode, I interviewed Stephanie Casstevens, who actually now works with me. She was not one of my coworkers at the time, she was at a different company, and she was working at a company that was marketing medical waste disposal, which, you know, it's not super sexy stuff. Jeff: Glamorous. Kathleen: Yeah. And they were really kind of thumping their heads up against the wall in their efforts to get traction, and it wasn't until they realized, "Well, we're selling this to doctor's offices, and the gatekeeper in the office is the office manager, and they already have this solution, to taking about medical waste disposal isn't going to get us anywhere." They actually found out that the biggest pain points that person had was no-shows, patient no-shows. That has nothing to do with medical waste. Jeff: Yeah. Kathleen: And they created all this content around how to reduce patient no-shows, and all of a sudden, their marketing took off, and then they could, later on down the line, talk about medical waste, but they had to establish that bond and that line of communication first. So that was all a very long way of saying- Jeff: I completely agree. Kathleen: What you talk about really hits home. Jeff: I completely agree. When you can strike upon that, it's magic. And isn't it funny that the content part of our conversation tied back to finding out what is your customer's pain, listening to your customers. Same thing with how should you approach voice, and how should you approach audience building, and how should you ... You can't go wrong by coming back and understanding where your customers live, and I think we fail to because we're so caught up in a checklist of, "Oh, we've got to launch this. I've got to do this, I've got to do this." And we get very me-centric about ourselves, the brand, the product, and magic can happen when you put yourself in the shoes of that customer. Kathleen: Yeah, I've always heard people say, and I think it's so true, that we as marketers are our own worst enemies because we know all this as customers, but as soon as we put our marketer hat on, we immediately forget all of it, right? Jeff: Yeah. Kathleen: And we do the opposite of what we should do. Kathleen's Two Questions Kathleen: So I feel like we could talk all day about voice search. There's so much interesting stuff here, and I'm fascinated to see where Yext is going. I'm definitely going to watch that more closely now, especially given some of the recent releases you had with Amazon Alexa integration, et cetera. Before we wrap up, though, two questions that I always ask everyone that I interview, I'm really curious to hear what you have to say. The first, and this one I'm really interested in because you have been in this world of content marketing for quite some time and you've seen a lot and you've worked for a lot of the companies that have been in the middle of all this. Company or individual, who do you think is doing inbound marketing really well right now? Jeff: So as I thought about my answer to this question, I realized that I am no longer the consumer of a lot of inbound marketing, even though I'm the CMO. Let me explain, and this is I think important for those of your audience who are trying to reach a CMO. We are of a scale that I have a great marketing core team of lieutenants who own marketing operations and demand, who own brand and marketing strategy, who own revenue marketing, including field, owned and sponsored events, creative, international, et cetera. So my inbox is inundated with all sorts of efforts to attract my attention, dangling on the end of the fishing pole, a piece of content that I could download. The best you can hope for from me, and I could be an anomaly, is I will just forward that along to one of my lieutenants and say, "For your consideration." I know they are busy, and I do not expect anything back from them, but if it piques their interest and they dig into it, they know to come back and say, "Hey, there could be an interesting solution here." So perhaps rather than answer who is the best at inbound, how do you perhaps penetrate the wall? And inevitably, the things that get through are the things that are able to succinctly and quickly convey value. So provocative research that's on point with what we're doing, people who are able to lead with the lead as opposed to burying the lead about ROI, around certain solutions. And also ... whatever ... who aren't guilt tripping you that you haven't responded to them, or you haven't done x, y, or z, and they've sent you ten emails. If you tell me you've sent me ten emails, I know I've ignored you nine times. Kathleen: Yeah. Jeff: I'm not going to respond to the tenth. So I know this ... I'm explaining an outbound marketing aspect, but those same resources are the same ones that are going on the inbound sites, this is just the outbound activity of that. I'm just not in a search and find part of my career because it's up to those lieutenants to say, "Oh, we've got this pain point. We need to go find a solution." They're going to be the ones that are looking for that inbound solution, unless it is something so big and so pressing that I'm going to enter into that conversation. Kathleen: What was the last company that was able to penetrate the wall for you? Jeff: Oh, how exciting. Let me go into the forwarded mail. Actually, I know right off hand, I don't know the company name, but I know there is a company that manages field events that had sent us something. I know that PFL, which is a printing and resource company, sent a really nice mail piece to me with several pieces of content in it as well as a mug and some caramels, and it was very funny because the BDR who had sent it emailed me and said, "Oh, I hope you got my gif," et cetera. "I'd love to schedule a follow-up call." I didn't respond to him because I didn't know what he was talking about, I hadn't gotten it yet. His email had beaten the package. So then, all of a sudden, literally five minutes later the package arrives, I'm like, "Oh, oh, this is really interesting." I had a good conversation with him at an event recently. I didn't respond, but I forwarded it along to the person who runs campaigns for us and gave him the package and the caramels and the coffee mug, I will note. I didn't hold onto it. Kathleen: Oh, you're so nice, you didn't eat the caramels. Jeff: I didn't eat the caramels. But that is how it can work, and it was because ... they didn't know that was a particularly good time to hit us. We were the ones who decided it was, and now there's an ongoing conversation because we're talking with multiple players, and assessing pricing and value and everything else. In an inbox, if I were to just let my inbox run today, I bet you I would get probably a hundred unsolicited emails. That's just untenable to respond to. Kathleen: Yeah. Jeff: So going back to your question, inbound marketing remains strong because it's my lieutenants who are going to go out and search, and that's where you want to be found for the types of solutions and speaking to the pain points that they're looking for. Kathleen: Yeah. Makes sense. So you've got to not only know your ultimate target audience, but you've got to know who the influencers are as well. Sometimes, they're the ones that you have to get first. Second question. The world of digital marketing is changing so quickly. Voice search is a great example of that. How do you personally stay educated and up to date on all these changes? Jeff: So my entire marketing career grew up around the internet. I've shared this on other podcasts, but I do not have a business class to my name. I've never taken a marketing class. I was a Mass Communication undergrad BS, an appropriate abbreviation for the degree, I guess. And I got a Master's as well, a law degree. I practiced law for a couple years before I wove my way back towards technology in the mid '90s as the internet was exploding. So one of the things I did is I just started going down what I call the rabbit hole, was following the links to stories that were of interest, and I discovered very early on that they were linking to sources that I liked, so then I'd subscribe to that source, and then I'd subscribe to that source, then unsubscribe to things as they became less and less valuable. What I can tell you today, is that one of the ones that I still subscribe to that I know were very early on, is SmartBrief. So for your audience, if they aren't aware, SmartBrief is a company that actually manages and produces I think over 200 newsletters for different industry associations or topical areas, and I love their synopsis. It is actually the model upon which, arguably, The Skimm and Inside are based. They have been summarizing the news around particular topics. So they have a leadership SmartBrief, they have a social media SmartBrief, they have a mobile SmartBrief, they have a franchise association SmartBrief. That is such a great summation because just skimming the headlines and skipping through can be a powerful way, especially on the train or commuting or what have you, to quickly digest. I also remain a big fan and loyal subscriber to eMarketer. So loyal, as I've told them in the past, that I remember their charts before they were black and red. And they rebranded them in ... that is one of the great untold branding stories, about how they branded the color of their charts. Kathleen: Yeah. Jeff: And now, you see red and black, you know it's eMarketer. Kathleen: So true. Jeff: And what I love there, it's always provocative to understand trends and how consumer behavior or other behaviors are working. So I really like that. I could go on and on with the subscriptions, but it really is about finding the ones you like and going down the rabbit hole to find others. Kathleen: I love those all. Those are all new ones, nobody has mentioned them before, so I'm going to definitely be checking them out. So much good stuff here. I learned a tremendous amount, and I'm sure that there are listeners who ... and also who are now realizing that they need to gain greater control over their own presence online. How to Reach Jeff Kathleen: So if someone listening has a question, wants to learn more, wants to check out Yext, what is the best way for them to find information about Yext online and also to find you online? Jeff: Sure. So Yext.com, Y-E-X-T.com has all the information about the company. You can sign up to get a demo if you are a small business. You can even go through the process and actually sign up and subscribe. We are on all the social channels, so you'll find us there. My personal Twitter is @JKRohrs, and if you ... you can DM me there with a question, always happy to ping you back and answer. But those are probably the two primary ways and the best ways to get ahold of me. Kathleen: Great. Thank you so much. Thanks for all the great information and the wonderful sources to check out for digital marketing knowledge. It's been fascinating to me. If you're listening and you liked what you heard, I would really appreciate it if you would give the podcast a review on iTunes or Stitcher, the platform of your choice, and if you're listening and you know somebody who is doing kick ass inbound marketing, like Jeff is, tweet me @WorkMommyWork because I would love to interview them. Thank you so much, Jeff. Jeff: Thank you. 

It’s one thing to have a dedicated sales team, but it’s the big leagues if you can turn your customers into their own sales team Hey, what's going on, everyone? This is Steve Larsen, and you're listening to Sales Funnel Radio.  Welcome to Sales Funnel Radio where you'll learn marketing strategies to grow your online business using today's best Internet sales funnels. And now, here's your host, Steve Larsen. What's up, guys? Hey, I hope you're doing great. It is a Monday morning, which frankly might be kind of weird, but it's actually my favorite day and time of the week. Call me workaholic, but it's true though. So, I wake up on Mondays just a-smiling, and I jump out of bed, and I'm so eager to get started on the week, and I know that's weird, but whatever. It's true, so I thought I'd just tell you. Anyways, it's Monday morning. In about an hour and a half here, my wife and I, along with our two little girls we are going to the doctor, and we're going to find out what the gender of our new little baby is, and we're very, very excited. We have two little girls already. I think it's gonna be another girl, and I think I'll be the only guy in the house here, which is fine by me. Anyway, we'll see what it is, and I'll let you guys know as soon as I do, but we're super excited about that. Anyway, I thought I'd just throw a quick podcast out to you guys because I wanted to quickly just let you know about something that I've been implementing lately that I'm real excited about, and honestly my customers are too. You guys know ... I mean, obviously ... This is starting my ... Let's see, what is this? One, two, three ... This is beginning my fourth week alone of self-employment, and things have gone very, very well. We've done almost 70,000 in sales, and we haven't really even optimized stuff yet. You know what I mean? I'm only selling once a week, really, and on my webinar, my live webinar, every single week, and I will plan to be doing the live webinar every single week for probably quite some time because it's been kind of interesting. The first few times I've done it, I haven't changed anything from one script to the next, but especially this last one, I felt it. I felt where I needed to make the changes. I felt where the lag was, so I'm excited. I'm excited to go and I'm going to start switching those things out, but it's been interesting to go through ... There's a billion things I got to get done still, I mean, obviously, who doesn't have a big to-do list? But I've got this huge whiteboard over here on the side, and it's just chock full of stuff. It's loaded, it's loaded with tons of things that I need to be getting done, and do, and I ... Anyway, the whole thing's been a lot of fun, but it's been neat to go through and prioritize stuff. So number one priority for me, obviously, has been just to sell. Sell, sell, sell, sell, sell, sell, sell. You guys know I am a huge advocate of the book, Ready Fire Aim, which talks about stage one, zero to one million, that's the only thing that matters. Just sell stuff. So, I've been selling things like crazy, been fulfilling on them like crazy, and I've been mostly just focusing on the actual course itself that I've been selling and all the little mini things in them. It's been a ton of fun to go through and do that. Lot of work. Holy smokes. When I created the Secret to Master Class Program inside of Russell's two comma coaching, it was from stuff that already existed and I was just organizing it. And that's how I made the first pass of content. And then what I did though, was I came back around as I was hearing people's feedback. Then I went back through and I created all the extra courses and extra things, and extra trainings that were needed to plug the holes inside people understandings, just to make sure all the bases were covered, you know what I mean? That's kind of what I've been doing this first time, is I've been going through and I've been building it from scratch, raw, just the very beginning. Zero to a hundred. But then I go back through after I see people going through it, and all their feedbacks, and all their questions, and all ... That's the reason I do live Q and A's with them every single week. It's so that I can get through and see, like, they're all still struggling with X. They're all still struggling with Y, or Z, you know what I mean? And then I go back through and I do a second round of filming. I do a second round of product creation. I go plug in all the holes, and I go plug in ... And that's exactly what's been going on here. So I've been ... it's been a lot of fun. It's been a lot of fun. It's a ton of work, but my gosh, it's a lot of ... I mean, I was on ... I think I told this to you guys, I can't remember if I did or not, but I was on stage speaking at two different events this last week, back to back, which was kind of nuts. And this guy walks up to me afterwards, and he goes, "That was fantastic, first of all." And I was, "Thank you." You know, I said, "Thanks. That's awesome." And then he goes, "I was sitting there though, and I was trying to figure out the word for you." I was like, "What did you mean?" He's like, "The word that describes you. There's something about you and I don't know what it is." And I was like, "Okay, what it is it?" And he goes, "It took me awhile, but I think I figured it out. You're giddy." I was like, "You think I'm giddy?" He said, "Yeah. You're 100% giddy. Are you kidding me? You're standing on ... you're doing the ... It is so easy to see that you love what you're doing. And it's refreshing. Thank you. It's so freaking awesome to watch that." And I was like, "That's nice of you. I appreciate that." And he's like, "I'm serious though. It's refreshing because most people get up and they're either sick of what they're doing, or they just got one trick or tip and that's kind of it. It's so clear and obvious that you love what you're doing." And I was like, that actually was some really cool feedback. I'm glad that he said that. That was nice of him. I never consider myself as giddy about what I do. Maybe I choose a different word. But I am having fun with it, and it's been great. Hey, so I've been getting a lot of requests lately about ... you know what, let me get ahead and I'm just going to read this thing first. And then I'll lead into that. So I'm holding a book. This book is fantastic. I would read this book if I was you. If I was trying to be a funnel builder. If I was trying to be an author, speaker, coach, consultant, if I was in the SaaS world, if I was definitely B2B, I would put this on your to do list. This book ... so it's a book called Behind the Cloud, by Mark Benioff and this is the story of how Salesforce pretty much went to a billion dollar company and changed the whole industry. That's what the tag line says anyway. And it's amazing. It's a great book. And what it is, it's a series of what they call plays. Play one, play two, play three ... but of the different plays that they made to be able to go and do what they did. And make no mistake, I am 100% trying to change the MLM industry, which is what I've been selling in. And I have, I don't know, call it a chip off the shoulder attitude, or chip off the shoulder thing. That industry, it's an amazing thing to go through if you're doing it correctly, if you're doing it right, and otherwise it's pretty easy to get categorized into the millions of people that just want to lose their family and friends, which is why they join one, I think. Anyway, so strong opinions there. Anyway, so I've been getting a lot of requests from people though, about an affiliate program for the course that I've been selling. And of course I'm going to have one. Of course, absolutely, in fact I think it's going to come out ... We technically already finished it. Technically it's already done. Yeah, anyway. Technically it's already done, but ... Anyway, sorry, I have like 13 thoughts going through my head and I'm trying to organize them in a way that it's going to go together. Anyway, I want to read a section from this book and then tie it back into what I was just saying and talking about. And here it is. Anyway, so this is on page 73 of the book Behind the Cloud. And what it says ... This section is called Play Number 40, Make Every Customer a Member of Your Sales Team. And I thought, this is awesome. I certainly agree with this 100%. Make every customer a member of your sales team. And this is what it says, "Just as we tapped into every employee as a marketing person ..." Okay, that's first of all a very powerful line, "Just as we tapped into every employee as a marketing person, we believe that every customer could also serve as a salesperson. Inside every customer there's unrealized potential that by offering training and support, we could build a sales army that is not limited to a finite number of salespeople, but could scale to hundreds of thousands and one day millions of customer salespeople." I thought that was fascinating. That's very interesting. Now that obviously the reason you do the affiliate stuff, but I was ... I'm never not thinking about what I do guys, I think it's the reason that guy saw me as giddy. But I was walking, I can't remember when it was, it was a few nights ago, I was pacing, and I was thinking, and I was pacing, and I started thinking through ... I helped create one of the original affiliate bootcamp courses that Russell uses to teach people how to do affiliate marketing. And he and I tag teamed back and forth along with John Parks, and the three of us went through and we taught this frankly, really awesome affiliate ... it's called Affiliate Bootcamp. And what it does is it teaches somebody how to be an affiliate if they've never been one before, from scratch with no lists. Or if you do have a list, it shows that as well. But the real thing that it's doing is it's showing people how to be an affiliate for ClickFunnels. That's really what it is. It's positioned as generic, but what it's really doing is it goes through and it shows people, "Yes, here's how you promote ClickFunnels for us." It's really to make customer salespeople. Customer salespeople where they love your stuff so much ... And it even goes through in the book, keeps talking about different training and support and stuff like that, enough assets a person needs so they can be a customer salesperson. And so what I've been thinking through, and actually voxed Russell about this, and I was chatting about it, but I think I'm going to make my own version of Affiliate Bootcamp where I can go through and dive deep and it's a daily thing for just two weeks, but what it does is it shows people how to be an affiliate in the best ways that we've ever seen, that I know how, that we've ever ... From scratch, or with a list. But really what it's doing is it's showing people how to promote my stuff. I'm creating an army of affiliates that know how to be an affiliate, you know what I mean? And I think that's what the next thing I'm going to do. And it might be weird that I'm telling you this strategy, because I know a lot of you guys will be the ones that go through it. But I'm just trying to be transparent and show you where my head is on this stuff. Now first and foremost right now, I need to finish actually building, finish building the actual course that I've been selling. And they know that it's been dripping out this first round. In the future it's not going to be a drip course or anything like that, but right now this first one, it is. And they all know that, and that's one of the reasons why some of them got a deal on it and stuff like that, you know what I mean? Because I'm going through and I'm building it as I'm selling it, at the same time. Which is nice, because it lets me go through and do the second round of course creation to plug in all the holes, because they're making it kind of with me ... Not so much on their side, they don't really know that's what's going on there. But that's what I've been doing. And then, so step one, then step two, then I want to go out and ... Man we just got offered huge lists from people to go promote the course to. I mean massive, massive people. I so bad want to tell you some of the names of some of these people. You guys all know them, they're on TV shows and stuff, which I'm super excited about. But I don't know if I'm allowed to, so I'm not going to yet. You'll all hear about it sometime, I'm sure, but it's not time yet, I don't think, so ... Anyway, that's the whole thing I'm trying to say with this thing, is understand that when somebody buys your course, there's really two things ... Or your program, or your product, whatever it is, whatever you're selling, your offer, there's really two things that still have to happen. Just because you collected cash does not mean the sale is over. There's two things that need to happen, and this first one, there's a PHAT event this week, it's the last FAT event ever, which I'm kind of sad about. I'm actually really sad about it. But anyway, I always cover this with them, and then there's a second piece as well, because of what Mark Benioff said. After a customer is acquired, the first thing you have to do with them is you need to help them consume it. I call it a consumption series. It's a consumption sequence, a consumption series, consumption guide. And what I do, and what I've been building out is as soon as ... Now let's think about this for a second. So this is a webinar, and there is ... If you guys don't know anything about webinars, webinars there's a headline, and then there's three secrets. So there's three secrets, and secret number one relates to the vehicle related false belief. Secret number two relates to the internal false belief. And then secret number three is the external false belief. A lot of you guys who are indoctrinated inside the ClickFunnels regime, you guys know the stuff, right. You know that. Well all I do is because ... Let's think about this, in the webinar, you're going through and you're talking about secret number one, secret number two, secret number three, right, which is false belief number one, false belief number two, false belief number three. And then you're going through and you're crafting a story, a sales message, a product in the offer that addresses those false beliefs. You're addressing a product that does that. Let's think about this though. If that's what's you're promising, secret number one, secret number two, secret number three, why not show exactly in your product where those answers also are. So the first thing that I do, the first of two things, the first thing I do in this consumption guide, is as soon as somebody buys my product, it doesn't matter if it's off of a webinar, it doesn't matter if it's off, like whatever ... I put out to them at least a three day series where the first email or piece of communication or whatever it is, goes and it actually shows where to get what was promised in secret number one, or the vehicle related false belief. They don't need to be called secrets, they don't need to ... you know what I mean? It doesn't need to be called that same vernacular. I've called them steps, I've called them ... I've called them steps a lot, actually. Tips, I've called ... you know what I mean? It doesn't need to be called those things. And you might sell a widget in a different way with different vernacular. But they're still vehicle, internal, and external related false beliefs. So the first thing after somebody buys it I send to them is first of all, a fulfillment email. But then what I'm really doing, is sending a consumption guide, where the first email is where to find what was promised and addressed for their vehicle related false belief. Secret number one. The second email that I send out is ... that's secret number two, and where to find that. So I'll take screenshots of the members area with arrows and put it in the email, and say, "Look, when I told you how I blank without blank, this is where that is. So go click right here and go watch this next part right there." And the reason that I'm doing it is ... there's many reasons. The first reason, is because I need them to consume that information. Number one, they must feel in their brain that I'm fulfilling on what I promised. Duh. That's what they bought. Of course I should do that. Okay, they bought that. Just out of the ethics of it, please fulfill on what you sell people. But what I'm also doing is I am indoctrinating them further into my culture. It gives me opportunity to train them to open my emails. It give me opportunity to train them when my stuff comes in that they should open it up, but also it helps me be able to figure out who the rock stars are, who's actually killing it, who the people are that are just doing amazing with my course or my product, whatever it is. And then I can go back and actually collect them as testimonials and use them in the sales message also for future people. That make sense? That was a lot. Just let me high level recap real quick. So all I'm doing is whatever secret number one, two, and three are, I create a consumption series, number one, two, and three that matches secret number one, two, and three. Does that make sense? And it's all auto, it's all dripped out. When somebody buys I call it my buyer sequence. They buy, first the fulfillment email goes out. Then we will remind them that they've got to get added to the group. Then we'll remind them, "Here's what we do culturally. Here's the different events that go on. Here's consumption number one, two, and three." I don't call it that in front of them, obviously. Does that make sense? So that's the first thing that I do. Number one I train them on how to consume my thing. That's the highest level of that. I train them to consume the product. But number two, and this is what ties in. I promise this is not just like a rabbit I'm following over the place. There's a whole point to this. And the point is that the second thing is that I'm trying to train them how to promote my thing also. So number one, here's how to consume it so you're successful with it. Number two, here's how to promote so that the course you just bought is free for you because you just go get a few people in, and suddenly all the training, all the material, all the follow up, everything is free for you. Does that make sense? Because what I've been doing and ... anyway, that's exactly what Mark Benioff was saying. I'm trying to create customer salespeople. It's not necessarily a huge focus of mine right now but I know it's step two and I know it's coming up, and people are asking for it. And so I was thinking to myself, what should I do to make this more accessible for people? And so I'm thinking through inside my affiliate area, I'm creating the guide, I'm creating the stuff that will walk them through how to be a generic affiliate, but so that they can go apply it to selling my course for me as well. Does that make sense? That was a lot of stuff, and I hope that made sense what I'm doing. It's important to train people how to consume your stuff. And then it's important to help them realize ... If you want to make real, true believers, people who've really drinkin' the Kool-Aid, you know what I mean? Those are the people who are out promoting your thing without you asking them to. And for those of them who aren't, sometimes they for need a few questions answered and so you go create an affiliate program. Go create something that helps people understand. I love Backpack. Backpack's awesome. That's what I'm using, of course. And it's been a ton of fun. And so to make it more accessible for people ... This is the last piece guys, this is like a deep strategy episode guys, hope this is okay. It's kind of a lot of stuff on this one. But what I've been doing is on the home page ... So it's a webinar, so on the registration page itself, the actual registration page, in the footer I always make sure that I put two things in there. Number one, you've got to make sure you have all the legal crap in there. You're supposed to have that stuff in there. I have a PO box that I declare as my business address so it's not my actual address. There has to be terms, privacy, contact, support, stuff like that. Specifically terms and privacy and support. Those are the three that should always be in there. I don't know what the current laws are on all those things, but I know that those should be in there. And then what I do though in the footer is I also always include, number one the login for their actual members area, or whatever they bought because people will always lose the link, so I put it down in the bottom. The second thing though that I always put down there is a link for affiliates. So what it does is it lets me tell people ... because some people just want to go promote the thing and not buy it. And I'm like, "All right, that's kind of ... I think that's a little weird." But if they scroll down to the bottom, they just click on affiliates, they can get their affiliate link and promote the course, or promote whatever ... you know what I mean? Anyway, those are the two things that ... And that's what helps close the loop. That registration page, it is a registration page, but to the person who's looking it's a little bit more than a registration page, and it opens up another loop, meaning the loop is, "Hey, you can go be an affiliate. Grab your affiliate link, and here's how to promote, and here's how to promote my stuff." But if then they go buy, it's like, "Hey, here's how to consume what you bought. By the way, here's also how you can promote what you ..." Anyway, so that's what I've been doing. I feel like I'm talking in circles now. I'm literally talking about loops. But I hope that makes sense what I'm talking about though. Find a way to make your customer also your salesperson and you're going to be able to expand a lot faster simply because you don't have to find salespeople, you know what I mean, as hard, as much. It's pretty interesting, I was talking to ... This is the last point, and then I'll get out of here. I was talking to the CFO of ClickFunnels. He's the man. And I asked him once, "What's the biggest expense?" And without any hesitation, he said, "Affiliates." Just straight up, "It's affiliates. Affiliates cost us a lot of money. We give a lot of money to affiliates." I was like, "That makes sense. That makes total sense." That's what he told me anyway about ClickFunnels that that would happen, you'd do that. Anyway, I hope that was helpful. I hope it makes sense what I was trying to say here. Well all I'm trying to say is figure out number one, sorry, number one understand that it's not enough to just sell stuff to people, you have to teach them to consume it. But number two, especially once they are consuming it, they're getting indoctrinated, they love promoting stuff, and there's going to be people who just want to promote your stuff anyway. They're looking for something to give to their audience and might as well make a sweet affiliate program. Or some kind of thing to help them so that you can arm your people, arm your customers with the correct assets that they need, the correct ... you know what I mean? So I'm tossing in all the ... a whole bunch of swipe files, tons of swipe images, tons of swipe email content and copy. Cool things that they can give away to help them lead gen. Anyway, that all I've got for you guys. And hopefully you can go out and start applying that. I've got to go get ready. We're leaving in about an hour here to go figure out the gender of our new little one. So fun stuff guys. Talk to you later. Bye.  Think for listening to Sales Funnel Radio. Please remember to subscribe and leave feedback. Want to get one of today's best internet sales funnel for free? Go to salesfunnelbroker.com/freefunnels to download your prebuilt sales funnel today.  

« La nouvelle monnaie, c’est la vitesse » Mark Benioff, Président Salesforce La vitesse ce n’est pas qu’augmenter la charge de travail ou la productivité, c’est surtout le rythme de l’organisation dans son ensemble. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/manuel-diaz-podcast/message

My guest for episode 62 of The Startup Playbook Podcast is Robert Wickham, Regional Vice President, Innovation and Digital Transformation at Salesforce. Robert has had an interesting career to date - he studied Aeronautical engineering at MIT, before taking up a role within Management consulting at the Boston Consulting Group. He then left that that line of work to take up an audacious project of  launching a Low cost European airline within 6 months, this project was called Go Fly which was later sold in 2001 for $400M. He has since taken on senior roles at organisations such as Oracle before taking on his current role as the Regional Vice President for Innovation and Digital Transformation at Salesforce. In this interview we talk about  the ingredients of good storytelling, how to hire for resilience, creating a culture of innovation and the need to have an ecosystem strategy. PLAYBOOK MEDIA LIVE PODCAST WITH KATE MORRIS (ADORE BEAUTY) Show notes: Go Fly Salesforce Brian Lara MIT Winston Churchill George Orwell British Airways MAP Mark Benioff Robert Wickham (Twitter) Robert Wickham (Email) Feedback/ connect/ say hello:  Rohit@startupplaybook.co @playbookstartup (Twitter) @rohitbhargava7 (Twitter – Rohit) Rohit Bhargava (LinkedIn) Credits: Intro music credit to Bensound Other channels: Don't have iTunes? The podcast is also available on Stitcher & Soundcloud The post Ep062 – Robert Wickham (Regional Vice President – Salesforce) on ecosystem strategy appeared first on Startup Playbook.

Look at most people that have achieved great success and you’ll probably find a great coach or a great mentor.  As a culture steeped in the ethos of success, its surprising really that we don't’ put more emphasis on and greater value for coaching and mentoring.  Think about some examples:  Dr. Martin Luther King, mentored by Benjamin E. Mays. Warren Buffett mentored by Benjamin Graham. Bill Gates who would later be mentored by Warren Buffett.  We marvel at the success of Steve Jobs, who had several mentors, including Robert Friedland and Andy Grove.  Jobs himself would become a mentor to Mark Benioff.These relationships were not about just teaching. They were about inspiring.  As the great poet Robert Frost said of his work, “I am not a teacher, I'm an awakener.”  Mentors are about awakening us to be, as the slogan goes, all that we can be.  Few do this job better than renowned mentor David C.M. Carter, who now shares some of his secrets in Breakthrough.My conversation with David Carter. 

Discuss this episode in the Muse community Follow @MuseAppHQ on Twitter Show notes 00:00:00 - Speaker 1: Because oftentimes when we launch startups, we are very keen to tell the world why we’re so different and so unique, but we often forget to tell them why we’re equally good as what what’s already there. 00:00:17 - Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to Meta Muse. Muse is software for your iPad that helps you with ideation and problem solving. This podcast isn’t about Muse the product, it’s about Muse the company and the small team behind it. I’m here today with my colleague Mark McGranaghan. Hey Adam, and our investor Lisa Ankle. Hey, this is quite an impressive use of internet technology, I think, because Lisa, you’re in Singapore. I believe it’s 9 p.m. for you. Mark, you’re in Seattle. It’s 6. a.m. for you, and I’m here in Berlin at 3 p.m. So this is truly a globe spanning call, but it works. Seems to be. So Lisa, welcome to the to the podcast, and can you tell us a little bit about yourself? 00:00:55 - Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you. So I’m Swedish person living here in uh in Singapore, have been here for a couple of years, have a background in working for startups, often as an early employee, and for the past 2.5 years I’ve been part of building out a VC firm. Called Antlers. So we actually run startup generator programs where we help individuals find their co-founders and then launch startups and then we invest in the best teams. On the side, privately, I also do a couple of angel investments, um, a few here and there, select ones, and then my background is in, in marketing and product primarily on the growth side. 00:01:29 - Speaker 2: One of the things that caught my attention about Antler, in addition to its, I guess from my point of view, uh, exotic location. Uh, is that it’s taking some of the, I guess, accelerator model pioneered by by combinator and others, and sort of bringing that to, uh, to this new place. But also I think it has just very nice branding marketing presentation. And I feel like that may even be more important for a for an accelerator who’s constantly recruiting companies, you’re a two sided marketplace in a way, right? You’re connecting companies with investors, right? And so being Uh, being something that presents itself in a way that’s interesting, attractive, appealing to both of those parties, uh, seems quite important. 00:02:09 - Speaker 1: It definitely is, and I think it’s, it’s hard because we want to convince entrepreneurs like yourselves that it’s better to to launch a company together with us than to do it, to do it alone and to to kind of convince entrepreneurs, it’s a very hard, I think, persona. To, to crack. So we try to work with kind of repeat entrepreneurs and very experienced founders. Yeah, and then also establish ourselves as a trustworthy investor. So it’s definitely those kind of two sides that you mentioned. 00:02:34 - Speaker 2: Great. Well, I think that the topic we want to do today is authentic marketing, and you sort of suggested this based on uh the couple episodes ago we talked with Max Schoening from GitHub. And I think we were talking more about product things, but that naturally drifted into this, uh, into this field. And um he talked a bit about the being close to product and even what it means to, you know, what is the marketing playbook in 2020. Uh, and in many ways, he felt like authentic marketing is one that that doesn’t have much of a playbook or you’re doing things that are new and special to you or speaking with your voice in a way that makes sense for The audience for your your product. But of course at the same time, while just saying there’s no playbook, obviously marketing is a skill. It is a whole career field. And in fact, I was reminded of a podcast I heard recently with Patrick McKenzie where he basically described his whole career as being built around taking concepts from the marketing world and bringing repackaging them for engineers who typically don’t appreciate the depth of that skill and then repackaging that in a way. That it’s comprehensible and makes sense to them. 00:03:40 - Speaker 1: I think the episode you had with Max was super interesting, especially around the product principles and kind of having them, having them in place, and it reminded me quite a bit of what you also talked about the company values and the importance of, of choosing what not to do because it’s so easy to say with this, this, this and that, and by choosing everything you don’t have any decision making in the company and I think that’s kind of ties into very much around the marketing and Positioning as well because you want to be for everyone and you want to be this wide, you know, very broad and wide thing and you don’t want to exclude anyone, but by doing so, you also don’t help, you know, the customers or the potential users to to navigate or or to understand you better. So I think that was a very good kind of similarity. 00:04:23 - Speaker 2: Yeah, if you’re everything for everyone, then you’re someone understand what you are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:04:29 - Speaker 2: Well, maybe that naturally leads to a conversation you and I have been having here as we are gearing up towards our product launch and thinking about how we want to explain news to a wider audience. We have our kind of our core group of people who’ve been following our story, maybe even back to the research lab days, and if they, I don’t know, read our 5000 word research article and listen to Mark and I talk on the podcast for 10 hours, they can understand the product, but we’re trying to find a way to package that a little bit more tightly so that more people can get access to that message. And and one of the things that has come up there in our conversations or as you’ve been, have been advising us is what category are we in? And this is honestly a real struggle because it’s important to put yourself in a category that’s an easy way for someone to understand what you are. Are you a car? Are you a kitchen knife? Are you a word processor? Are you a photo editing program? And of course, you can be new and different and better, but starting with, here’s what it is, you know, Google Docs maybe was quite different. In some ways than what came before, but ultimately, you could have described it as well. It’s Microsoft Word, but on the web. Um, but we’ve really struggled with this at Muse. What’s your take on the the sort of the category question and how it fits into the larger positioning topic? 00:05:41 - Speaker 1: Yeah, you’re not alone in feeling this way. It was the same when we started Antler. It’s been the same with multiple startups I worked with. It’s really hard to kind of choose because oftentimes you actually do something new. That’s why you’re a startup and you don’t want to be like someone else. It’s already out there, but I think the risk of not choosing is so high, so you kind of have to choose, even if you choose something that you’re not super happy with. I tried to compare it with like, if you walk around in a grocery store, you want to know what shelf you’re gonna go to, if you want to find the nuts or the dried fruits or going to the candy shelf or going to the fruit stand, and by positioning yourself next to the fresh fruits or next to the candy, it tells a lot about your brand and if you are kind of a healthy snack or if you are not a healthy snack, like the peanuts, the salted peanuts will be. Next to the chips and candy, right? But then if you have a whatever nature bar, they will be next to the fruits. So it does tell a story. I think it’s important to take, to have the discussion and to take it, and you may not land in something that feels completely right because it’s new, so you will feel a bit uncomfortable. But if you don’t choose, then others will choose for you. And that’s the big risk. Then you will have journalists, users and customers, and they will start calling you things and they will all start calling you different things, and that’s horrible for SEO and it’s really bad. Uh, because no one will remember you. So even if you choose something that’s not awesome, at least you have something and you can be consistent. 00:07:00 - Speaker 3: This reflects my experience talking with friends and family about Muse. Initially, I would try to describe the app from first principles in terms of all the novel things that we’re doing and the the unique interaction model and man, people had a really tough time understanding what it was. But once I started describing it in terms of things they were familiar with, note taking apps, personal. Information management, those are the two main ones. I really stuck better and then you could give them the deltas, you know, it’s that, but here are the deltas and the deaths. It’s Microsoft Word, but it’s on the web. People get excited about on the web and likewise, we have a series of deltas for use that was quite effective. Although I had never thought about the people start to pick names for you angle, which uh now that you mentioned it seems quite important. 00:07:36 - Speaker 2: And sometimes that’s good. You want to wait and see how people describe you and then maybe adopt that because in many cases, the target audience or The people who want what you’re offering are actually better able to find the right words. 00:07:50 - Speaker 1: The problem with doing that is that your very smart customers are not, they don’t have a big following, maybe some do, but some of them may not have a big following online and the people who do are the tech journalists, and they might not have time to think this through, and they take a concept they already know and they will just splash it onto the article and then there you are. 00:08:10 - Speaker 2: Yeah, when it comes to journalists and even reviewers that go relatively deep, you know, in the end, they need to crank through a lot of articles or reviews or whatever it is they’re doing in a relatively short period of time. They don’t have weeks and months to get deeply familiar with your product and your philosophies and your all the ideas you’re trying to to share. So of course, they’re going to look for the, the shorthand. So if you don’t, if you don’t give them that shorthand, then yeah, you risk a lot of just fragmented. Sort of description. Yeah, for me, this was the very point. Once we got into this discussion, I started working through this, uh, it, it really called back to me to my Hiroku experience. And so here when we were working on this platform for web deployment in the late, uh, sort of like 2008ish period, and we ran into the same problem because there was this clear, I guess you call it category which was hosting, but in many ways it had all these. Associations really led people in the wrong direction, particularly the historic kind of shared hosting FDP and PHP kind of stuff. Um, and cloud didn’t exist yet and cloud infrastructure didn’t exist. And eventually we did go along with an industry term which was platform as a service. In some ways I was never that great. I don’t think customers are like, I don’t know, industry analysts would use that, but customers didn’t really use it. They didn’t, they didn’t really think of it that way. Um, and, and we struggled with it for a long, long time, basically, as long as I was there, and many years later, I don’t know, 10 years after we started the company is when the industry settled on some terms. One was containerization, that’s for the Dockers and Cougarneti stuff, you know, at Hiroku we made up this weird word dino. Because there was, there was nothing that that behaved in this way. And so we needed a new word for it. And eventually the industry came up with a word which was container. And later on, there’s another cat there was a category or a name for this type of platform, which is serverless. Now that’s a well known space. And we even had like a no servers or forget about servers, that was part of our message, but it just, it wasn’t a category. We were just doing this weird thing that no one could understand and then yes, exactly that problem. Customers, journalists, colleagues, investors, whatever else they want to stick you into this, into a category that isn’t a good fit. And then yeah, I don’t know it was this, it was this constant struggle. In the end it worked out for us, I guess, because we’re doing something that I think was different and special and, and, and ultimately people. Enough people got it, uh, to make the business successful, but still, it was a constant source of pain for me personally, not only to just, I don’t know, write a good homepage or something, but also even what I usually call just the cocktail party experience, which is just what Mark, you just said, Mark, which is chatting with someone that you haven’t caught up with in a long time, whether or not they’re tech industry people are not around the dinner table at a family event, and they say, what are you doing? And you want to like sum it up in a couple of sentences and Just could never do it and just people were left scratching their head and they thought that I was being withholding or I didn’t want to tell them and that wasn’t it. It was like, well, no, you know, I need to sit you down and give you a 20 minute lecture on the history of web development so you can understand this product. And yeah, no, that was always pretty unsatisfying. 00:11:12 - Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think we had the fear of ending up in the wrong. That really drove my initiatives when we, when we launched and started answer. I did not want it to be in the bucket of incubators because in Singapore alone there are 53 different incubators, most of them, I mean, of course, some of them are great, but many of them belong to corporates and I mean, I’m gonna sound like a bitch, but nothing good has ever come out of them. And we didn’t want to be in that bucket because we wanted to build great companies and then we also didn’t want to be an accelerator because that’s a bit different because then you take in an existing team with an existing product and you help them accelerate their growth. We brought founders together, you know, in the first place and helped them navigate what product to build in the first place and then invest. So therefore we, we kind of landed after a lot of pain in the term startup generator that we were generating startups and we’ve been sticking to it for 2.5 years and now. We talk about ourselves more as a VC firm because we’re also now doing a little bit later stage investments as well that we are expanding. So now we have VC firms, and now I’m just a VC kind of boring, but that’s life. And I think, I think that was necessary for us to kind of stand out when we were launching that to tell the story that we were different from from these incubators you would know or the accelerators you would know. 00:12:24 - Speaker 2: That’s a and and maybe a good illustration of someone’s gonna, you know, pick words for you. I think I described you as an accelerator there just 5 minutes ago or something, something like that. So. It’s the, it’s the easy thing to reach for. I I know that. I know that term. I, I have a space for it in my mind, and that’s that positioning concept kind of calling back to the 1980 seminal seminal book just titled Positioning is it’s all about that space in a person’s mind and we all have busy lives and we have a lot of information coming to us all the time and you just you you always reach for that quick shorthand. Yeah. 00:12:59 - Speaker 3: So, I’m curious if you’re going to position a product or service and you want to be in a space like to stand out in that space. Um, we go back to the Google Docs example of you’re in the word processor space, but it has this unique aspect. Are there particular techniques for doing that so that you stand out effectively? 00:13:14 - Speaker 1: Yeah, so there is actually a framework that I often use. It’s called the points of parity and points of difference because oftentimes when we launch startups, we are very keen to tell the world why we’re so different and so unique, but we often forget to tell them why we’re equally good as what what’s already there. So let’s say I’m starting a neobank. I might want to share that actually the transactions are safe or your money. safe with me, sending some basic comfort to the end user that I’m not this crazy startup, we have, you know, whatever it might be encryption or it’s super safe or stable or something like that. FDIC insurance. Yeah, all those things that comfort the end user to like, OK, this is something I can trust. This is, this is, it might be new, but at least I can actually trust it. So that would be the points of parity. How am I as good as the others in this. Category. And then once you have a couple of points of parity, you would add on your points of difference. So, OK, this is stable, it’s safe, it’s secure. However, we’re also pink and purple and glitter. So we’re all these like startup sparkly difference, but you can still rely on us just as you can with your old bank. So that is called the points of parody and the points of difference, and I think it’s very useful, especially for very early startups who are just Starting up who have no trust and people are a little bit skeptical in the beginning. 00:14:34 - Speaker 2: Yeah, that certainly makes sense. I think in a way, entrepreneurs are people who maybe thrive on or have the personality to be different, stand out, be the purple cow, carve their own path, the rebels, what have you. And so then naturally, when it comes to talking about what you’re doing, or pitching it or trying to explain it, you get really going to focus on here’s what’s different. But here’s what’s the same is actually something that, you know, even now as we’re talking about it, I think we could probably do a lot more of that with Muse. 00:15:03 - Speaker 1: Because that’s why you’re building something new. Like that’s like that because that’s why you’re here and and so it should be that way, but I think for the regular user or potential customer, they need to be, you know, feel comfortable in starting using. Aha, it’s the same thing as, but with these new additions. 00:15:19 - Speaker 2: It just gives you a mental reference point, maybe the bank example uh company that I really love their product is N26, which is this Berlin-based bank. I think they’re starting to spread global now, but you know, it’s just a sort of a bank account you put money in and they give you a Mastercard or whatever that you can spend money with. But the thing that makes them different is they have a really nice user experience and a great mobile app and it’s 100% virtual. I really love the product. I also think the marketing is really good, but they do start with that place of, it’s a bank account, you can put money into it, and here’s a Mastercard so you can spend money. 00:15:52 - Speaker 1: Yeah, another example is on telco here in Singapore called Circles.life. They are very clear. We use them and they are very clear like, yes, you will have kind of reception like all over the country. We have good, yeah, you have good data if fast, whatever, but then in addition, we have no stores, so you don’t need to stand in line and hand in your documents. We have someone ship the SIM card to your home. And then you just show the ID as you accept the SIM card and we do everything in an app, which is different from standing, taking this like, you know, standing in line and waiting to get a SIM card, which is how you do it otherwise in Singapore. 00:16:25 - Speaker 2: Yeah, when it comes to the invented category or give a new name to something, you mentioned the startup generator, there’s the platforms of service, serverless thing. And I was just looking back at my notes for the positioning book and they, because it’s an older book, they talk about examples like say Xerox. which invented effectively what we now call a copier, but for a while, Xerox and copier were synonymous, and that’s the, that’s the reward to inventing a new category is your, your brand name actually becomes the generic name Kleenex, I think is often listed in that. They also mention Polaroid, for example, sort of instant instant photography, that if you can invent a new category and give it a name and maybe your your company name becomes the name of that category and you own. That category in a very impressive way. Um, but it’s very hard to do that. I think it takes a lot of time. I think it takes a lot of just money, basically to get the to get the reach, um, and that’s probably something that’s more suited to a company with big venture backing or a big corporate parent. Uh, to be able to push it over the long term. And we explored that a little bit with Muse, our, our very first web page had the your thinking canvas was kind of the description of it, but also we were trying to, I guess not quite invented category. I don’t think I would have thought of it that way then, but that that’s how I wanted to describe it. And pretty naturally that fits to other kinds of thinking canvases, which include digital products like Millanote and Figma and Miro, but also include real world products, which is I think a whiteboard is thinking canvas, a sketchbook is a thinking canvas, a chalkboard is a thinking canvas, post it, stuck to your wall as a thinking canvas. Um, so that was kind of, kind of the idea we wanted to go with that. But yeah, I think the conclusion I came to is that just a small team like ours just can’t. we can’t define a whole new, new category in that way. Uh, now, what we’ll do instead is still sort of TBD we’re still working through, I guess. So another topic in the space of authentic marketing is personal aspirations versus solving problems, and I think Mark, you had some thoughts on this. 00:18:22 - Speaker 3: I feel like every few months you see one of these Twitter threads where someone is arguing one of three positions. The first is that you should describe your product in terms of problems to be solved. You tell your customer you have problems X, Y, and Z, this tool will help you solve them. Sometimes you see people advocating for uh the aspirational model, which is the type of person you want to be. I go, I go back to the classic iPod ads, where you’re just kind of this dancing, energetic, brilliant silhouette, you know, you want to be like that, so you get an iPod. Um, or perhaps the more utilitarian approach where you just say what the product does, and that’s it. Pro X, Y, and Z, you figure out what it’s for and if it’s, if it’s right for you. And I feel like there’s always a tension between those three approaches in marketing. 00:18:59 - Speaker 2: I feel like it’s especially relevant to the prosumer class of of product, which, which we are in because it’s something you buy for yourself, but it’s expensive enough that it’s, you want to buy it because it helps you be better in your work life. Most likely, it helps you be more successful at how you earn your living, and so yeah, the the iPod is consumer so that quite naturally fits with, I think the kind of aspirational, who do you want to be or what, what kind of lifestyle do you want to live, which certainly I don’t know, even things like bottled water and so on are sold in that way, like the advertisements show the product very little and instead they show smiling happy people uh living lovely lives. And you think if I buy this product, they’ll be like that, and then maybe the utilitarian one you described that probably works pretty well for certain kinds of B2BA or just enterprise software where there’s just a person working in a business that has a very specific problem to solve. They have budget to solve it and if you can articulate their problem clearly and convince them that your product is trustable and a solution to their problem, then OK, great, there’s the fit. But when maybe when you get to the prosumer stuff, particularly in this current time, um, I’m thinking of this article signaling as a service like that in the show notes here, but I think there they talk about, for example, things like superhuman, and so the idea that it has this kind of elite thing to it because it’s invitation only and because of the price point and then you get the little, you know, you put the little tagline in your signature or similarly, I think a similar thing has happened with uh hey, hey.com email, brilliantly marketed, of course, those uh the base camp guys. They are always great at that, but I think there’s an element of this where you can’t use a custom domain and actually getting your hey.com domain name, and the people that even just tweet their I guess their their hey.com email, they tweet that out and it’s a way of saying, hey, I’m cool, I’m, yeah, it’s a kind of, it’s a kind of signaling. um, and there’s nothing. Let’s say there’s anything wrong with that exactly, but in theory, they are for helping you be more productive, creative, better at your work, more informed citizen, that sort of thing, rather than a handbag that, you know, is going to impress others. Uh, so yeah, there’s, there’s an interesting tension there. 00:21:05 - Speaker 3: So maybe there’s, there’s two variants of the aspirational side. There’s this, uh, more outwards facing uh status signaling type aspiration, which OK, has its place, I guess. To me, the more interesting variant is when you’re aspiring to something for yourself. So let me tell you a little story, Adam, you recall that we went to the Trinity Library in Dublin. Yeah, it’s this incredible. Like if you Google like amazing libraries, the first image that shows up, right? I don’t know that’s literally true, but you know what I mean. 00:21:31 - Speaker 2: I’ve seen it as a slide in a lot of presentations. Um, there’s actually I think a photo of me, you and you, Lea, because that was sort of our first real team summit. Uh, right there in that library. But yeah, now I recognize it all over the place. It’s very distinctive, this long hallway with the kind of the dark wood and what have you. 00:21:48 - Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, anyways, I remember very vividly when I was in that hall, I felt like, man, I should be writing a book, you know, isn’t that isn’t that what one should be doing with one’s life? And I feel like you get a smaller but still um visual sense of that when you’re holding a really nice leather notebook, you’re like, man, I should be, I feel like I should be taking notes or like doing a creative project, right? And I think that’s something that prosumer digital tools can tap into. It’s a sense that A tool just by virtue of its quality can make you aspire to do more creative work. 00:22:13 - Speaker 1: And I think a place we often fall into, especially if you have like software products, is that instead of talking about how this thing will help you, a lot of website actually describes different features, feature A, feature B, feature C, so or it will describe what goes into the product. So I had another comparison that I learned many years ago where she’s like, OK, if you describe a car, you can even describe it like, OK. It is this kind of metal thing. It has an engine for wheels, or you can describe it as this, this thing will take you from place A to place B, and there’s a huge difference there, and I think a lot of startups often because you’re so focused on your features and what you’re building, a lot of times we talk about, you know, feature A, B, and C, instead of talking about what these features, what, what kind of magic they will create for you and how they can be helpful for you. So I think there is kind of a 3 steps there. I think we can land in the middle because I agree like signaling and that is at the end that that’s also something and, and I think it’s, it’s a difference like you said between signaling and just inspiring, inspiring you to create something. But yeah, there is definitely a trap in describing features in a rather uh non-sexy way that doesn’t really make you feel anything. Right. 00:23:25 - Speaker 3: And we keep coming back to this theme on this podcast of Creativity being uh an incredibly emotional act. It’s very human, right? If you deny that, if you don’t recognize that in your product, your marketing, um, I think you’re leaving a lot on the table. 00:23:37 - Speaker 2: That reminds me of another influential book I read many years ago called The Substance of Style by Virginia Pastorrell. I reread it recently and it’s a little dated just because she spends a lot of time referencing the original iMac and I think the PT Cruiser and other current products. Of the early 2000s, whenever it was, the core idea is still just as valid today, which is that there’s a tendency to want to separate out the substance of something that is the the meat, the function, what it does from the surface. We even say beauty is skin deep. She makes the argument that especially when it comes to products or tools that we use in our life, these things, it actually matters because The the surface, the aesthetic will make you feel a particular way. And these products and tools are designed to be used by humans and our feelings matter a lot for motivation, for creativity, for being successful and whatever the thing is that we’re trying to do. And argues, you know, I think at the time that was when Apple’s was kind of ascendant with this new kind of design forward approach, and she spent a lot of time on that and saying why she thought that was really meaningful in the world. was going to set a trend and was quite right about that because you can sit there and say, OK, well, sure, the Apple product and the comparable products do basically the same thing. You can send an email just as easily from a Mac as you can from a say a Windows machine, but it just feels so much nicer. It feels so much more inspiring. It feels so much more creative to do that kind of task from the Macintosh, at least for many people. Absolutely. And so tapping into that is, I think, really important, something we go for with Muse, which is we feel like, OK, sitting down to think deeply about a problem, look up all the prior art, reference the source materials, pour through it all, recombine it in a way that helps you find your own understanding and meaning. That is really hard work and people often don’t want to do it even when it seems like it would be valuable. They think, well, let me just take the shortcut, let me just make a snap decision. Uh, but if we make it really fun and enjoyable and feels really nice to go in and use over something, well, hopefully you’ll want to do it more. I’d love to hear if you have examples of tools or products you use that have this aspirational quality or this inspirational quality in terms of helping you be more productive, creative, make you want to do the thing that it is designed to help you with more. 00:25:58 - Speaker 1: I think there’s so many different categories of this. One is a great pair of running shoes, uh, will help me run more or like I order now during the kind of lockdown we had in Singapore. I ordered lots of workout clothes and I started working out as much as I’ve ever done. Like I, I that’s, I just did it a lot and I think a lot of it is because I felt great wearing my workout clothes and I often wore them every day all the time anyway, because that’s the most convenient and comfortable clothes. But I think that is a great example of how things can just random things can actually. Inspire you to do things and and and run further and and run more often, even if that is a bit of an obstacle as well. And another example is, so Andreas and I, my partner, we have been moving around a lot and when we left San Francisco in 2014, we, we sold everything and we hated stuff that you had at home. We were like, we’re never going to buy stuff to our home, right? Because we’re gonna live in two suitcases and that’s it. And we did that for a couple of years, but then now we’re slowly building up a home again and we were like, we’re not gonna buy something just because it looks good, like who would do that? We don’t want to have stuff that don’t have a meaning or don’t feel a purpose in our home. So we have a lot of functional things. But then we kind of started like, oh, but maybe we buy this whatever nice little, uh, I can make my cold brew and it’s actually this Japanese cold brew thing, and it’s actually really nice. And it doesn’t really have much purpose in my life, but I’m, I’m happy and I get good coffee and now we’re just slowly filling up our lives with lots and lots of nice stuff that makes us happy. So we kind of go. 180 on that one. 00:27:26 - Speaker 2: Very much with you on that. I’m uh I don’t like stuff. I don’t like clutter. I’ve moved a lot. I moved multiple times in one, you know, most recently across continents, but other times in my life, for example, going from Los Angeles to San Francisco where my Living quarters were going to be a tiny fraction of the size and I basically had to get rid of everything. And yeah, every time I’m thinking, why do I have all this stuff? Why do we need this? It takes up space. It’s um and that’s uh I think this is the moment we have to do the obligatory Marie Kondo reference here, right, things that spark joy, it kind of sounds like that’s the direction you’re going with the, with the coffee. Maker there and I feel that as well, even though I don’t, I don’t like stuff that I don’t use or doesn’t really serve a serve a great purpose for me, but the things that I rely on every day, whether it’s something like, yeah, the right tools in the kitchen that I use to make healthy food, obviously my software products, or, or even something like say my bike. I got into cycling as a primary means of transit once I moved to the city where it’s such a nice place to ride, and it took me a while to find a bike that I really liked. But once I did, it’s just, yeah, it’s this, it’s this um virtuous cycle of I want to write it because I like it. And then when I write it, that it helps me be sort of better at cycling and, and then the other, the two kind of reinforce each other. And um, yeah, that’s uh that’s always a great feeling for objects in your particularly physical objects, at least software can be kind of mostly out of the way. It’s just a square on your home screen or some bits on your hard drive, the physical. Objects, I feel very sensitive to that kind of clutter. 00:29:01 - Speaker 1: But we had, I mean, as Zoom did it just works, right? And I think that’s their tagline, it just works better and we had an interaction with the new school our kids are going to and of course, as a school, kind of, of course, but they were having Microsoft Teams and I was gonna download Microsoft Teams and I was like, I told Andreas before they called, no worries. I would download it. I, I mean, you know, I’m kind of ahead of time. I, I prepared myself, and then the call starts and they were like another 8 steps and, and Andreas, he was like freaking out, he’s like, oh, we need to change school. What are we doing here? And there was just such pain. It was just so painful and why, right? And, and that’s just a good, I guess software example. 00:29:38 - Speaker 2: Yeah, well, obviously being tech industry people were probably much more sensitive to good software and good tools, but I think it would be hilarious if you submitted a resignation or, you know, we’re moving our kids to a different school because I’m sorry, you use Microsoft Teams. I think all we’re a slash family. Yeah, exactly. So another place where you’ve been helping us out here, Lisa and I thought it’d be interesting to talk here, especially because it’s timely is launches. So I think when, when I first, uh, or when, when I first brought up this topic with you, I basically led with, well, here’s some things we’re thinking about doing for a launch, but I think I started with even should we do a launch, the launches even make sense in this time period? And uh yeah, I’d love to love to hear your take on all that. 00:30:21 - Speaker 1: I think there’s so many, it’s it’s a super interesting question, and there are so many opinions about this because when you build a product, of course, you want to kind of slowly make Tends to like slowly on board users and then iterate and and don’t have this kind of big boom launch and and when you do those kind of things that often go wrong. So I think there are lots of reasons to not have this big launch, but I think what you guys are doing, you’ve been having a beta for a while, you have now, you know, started adding more users and being more out there. So I think it makes perfect sense to actually use the launch as an opportunity to announce it to the world, especially if you look at The news media and journalists, they need of a why is this news? What’s the news and why is this relevant and why now? And if you have, if you say, well, now is, now is the time when we announce this, this is, you know, this is our launch and announcement that is making it timely and relevant for journalists to actually write about it because it is news and that you are revealing a new product to the world, even though it has been seen by a few handful of people. Well, you may think that you have already told everyone about this and you, you’re so tired of telling the story. It’s just so few people, right, that have heard it and the rest are still waiting and I have no idea what this is and we’ll read it for the first time when you actually do your launch. 00:31:34 - Speaker 2: That was a lesson I learned from a little bit, I got a little bit of exposure to this fellow Mark Benioff of Salesforce when I was part of that organization for a little while, of course. Absolutely brilliant marketer in some ways maybe has a lot of the qualities that I shy away from personally being a more product and engineering minded person that I care about, you know, this kind of authenticity and down to earth and sort of no, no bull approach to explaining things and, and talking about things at the same time, just incredible skills there. And one of the things that he really embraced was you launch things over and over again. Because a launch is just when someone new is learning about it, some new audience is learning about it. There’s a lot of the world is very big. The internet is very big, and it’s when you’re, you’re going beyond your existing audience to a new, to a new audience. And I think that’s, that’s how we’re thinking about this upcoming launch. 00:32:26 - Speaker 1: No, and people also forget. If you hear about it once, people might think, oh, that sounds interesting, and then it’s gone. But then if you repeat the message, and that’s why traditional advertising will hate. Because you tend to you repeat the message and that’s when it actually sticks there. So when you go to the grocery store, you pick that is, you know, washing detergents instead of the other. And so I think like repeating yourself, it feels really annoying, but it actually it works and it can be helpful for people because they heard about it somewhere or they read about it and then wait wait, what was that again? And then they can’t remember. And then when they get reminded, oh, yeah, that’s right, then they might start doing their own research about it. 00:33:02 - Speaker 2: I like the old Paul Graham quote, people don’t notice when you’re there, they notice when you’re still there. 00:33:08 - Speaker 3: It’s a good one. I also think that for an early stage company, there’s something to the successive levels of publicness that you’re releasing into. So first you tell some friends, you’re starting a company, and then you have an alpha product and you have a beta product, and then you release it, and different people want to kind of jump on the train at different points. And so you announce each stop. We’ve had people who said, you know, you sounds awesome, but I don’t have time for like weird beta stuff. Just let me know when it’s ready. And so when we launch, they’ll know, OK, it’s ready for that. 00:33:33 - Speaker 1: I learned this when I was, uh, my first job was as a theater producer, which is super fun. But I was 18 and like part of the producer’s job is to do PR and and get people to buy the tickets for the show. And I remember we had, I did lots of PR announcements. I don’t know, but I just had that every month we had some kind of news like, you know, these are the actors or this is what we’re gonna do. And now we’ve done, we’re done with the clothes, come look at them, whatever. We just made up a lot of news. And what happened was first the local press started writing about it, and then after a while, after my 5th or 6th announcement, whatever, the TV called me and they said, well, they’ve been writing about you so much. You must be on to something. Can we come out and do a like a interview with You guys, and I was like, sure, you’re welcome. So then by just getting that niche local media first, and they wrote about it again and again and again, the bigger sharks read, you know, they eat the small fish, right? They read the smaller sharks to try to stay up on what’s going on and what’s happening. So while I didn’t really target the TV channel, they kept seeing those that the news in the local media and that’s why and how we got the big attention eventually, which that was just me being like new and lucky and naive and just doing this shit because I was stressed. 00:34:36 - Speaker 2: I think it counts for a lot in any business, right? Yeah, I think, um, I keep hearing about this is one of the best phrases to it’s not just you’re there and you’re still there. It’s something about I keep hearing about this. What, what is this? I need to look into it. I want to give it some of my attention because of that, yeah, repetition. 00:34:53 - Speaker 1: Yeah, and if you were, if you or kind of the PR people are the only ones nagging a journalist about something, they would never find it interesting. But when they start reading or hearing about it from different sources, that’s when they, wait a minute, I need to look into it. So, so that’s why if you cannot target lots of different things, then eventually the big fish will find you interesting as well. 00:35:11 - Speaker 3: We’ve alluded to it here, but I think it’s important to note that we’re somewhat disconnecting the product changes from the messaging and marketing that’s going out. There needs to be some coupling, of course, and you want some of that, but also they, they don’t need to be super hard coupled together so that the same day you launch on TechCrunch, you’re letting your first user sign up, right? Right. There’s some apps where you need to do that like maybe consumer apps or something, but mostly you want to have more control over these axes independently. 00:35:33 - Speaker 1: No, I think you definitely need to separate. To, because it’s simply too risky to onboard lots of new users, um, and you don’t really know how things will behave. You also want to have the freedom of iterate and and keep releasing new features and new ways of working, so you can’t be too, you can’t have the message too kind of literal, if that makes sense. Like it can’t be too descriptive of what the product actually does or describing all these features because those features you want to keep changing or iterating and the overall message needs to be repeated and repeated and repeated. When we worked with consumer apps, we had like these video. And then we did them, but then two weeks later they were outdated. I think you have a lot of videos, but you show very specific features in those videos and they’re extremely helpful. But if you kind of have telling the entire story with a lot of screenshots, it doesn’t make any sense because in a couple of months, you have to redo it. 00:36:20 - Speaker 3: Maybe the most extreme version of this is just to schedule a release, you know, for the same day every year, um, which is what, of course, they did at Salesforce. And I just, when that day happens, like, whatever you have, that’s what you launch. It actually works really well. As an engineering manager, I like that a lot because I think it’s best to limit. and that scope and so a calendar based marketing release does that for you. 00:36:37 - Speaker 2: This is Dreamforce you’re talking about their big convention and they basically tries to figure out what what are you going to have for Dreamforce it’s sort of the internal function of the company. Exactly. 00:36:46 - Speaker 1: But Google is the same, right? They always have a couple of news around Google I and a lot of these tech companies have actually copied that part, and it’s probably because it works and and people can have and then the press starting to get excited and and they know it’s coming they can plan it in the editorial planning, so they have space for it. 00:37:02 - Speaker 2: There’s some. Energy inside the team. I’m a big fan of continuous delivery to the point that I spent quite a lot of my life, uh, building a product to make that easier and sort of iteratively letting stuff out and not doing the big bang release and what have you. But on the perspective of getting folks excited both externally, potential customers and so on, but also internally on the team, there’s something very powerful about rolling stuff up and do a big release. I’m reminded of a classic post from uh Mark Shuttleworth, uh, the Ubuntu Linux project. And they had a, uh, they very famously brought in a 6 or famous to me. Maybe that reflects my interest in, but Uh, they brought in a 6 month release cycle where they would do a new release every 6 months and just if your stuff’s ready to go into the release, it does, and otherwise it’ll wait for the next one. And this was in contrast, you know, they were building on the Debian Linux project and Debian was famous for we release it when we’re ready, but that meant that their stuff was always felt pretty behind and out of date and they would go years between sort of major revs to the, to the system. And that was a bit of a problem in the fast moving technology world and creating this rhythm. We try to get stuff in, but don’t worry if you don’t make it. Hey, there’s another one coming up in 6 months, was a really powerful thing for them internally as well as the external factor of explaining it to the world or sharing it with the world. 00:38:21 - Speaker 1: I got to know this behavior quite a lot when we were at RAP at a previous startup, we worked with the biggest, some of the biggest retailers in the US and in other places and I worked then closely to their market. social media teams and retail, they have their retail calendar and they have a holiday or there’s something going on always. It’s back to school. It’s Halloween, it’s Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year, you know, starting of a new year, and I got crazy. I was like, oh my gosh, there’s so much going on. But then for them, that was how they planned everything. And that was a reason for the customers to get in back into the store. Oh, yeah, school is starting, so I need a pair of new pants and. Halloween is here, so I need whatever outfit and then there is always a reason to have a sale around a specific theme, but that retail calendar if you want to have like plan your marketing around calendar, that’s that’s somewhere to look because it’s fascinating. Maybe wouldn’t choose to do it myself, but just learning that and see how they were working with this calendar it was absolutely fascinating. 00:39:20 - Speaker 2: It taps into something that you hear in sales kind of skill development, which is you need to create urgency. There’s a reason not just buy generally. To buy right now and creating events for things like, yeah, you generally need new clothes in life, but do you need it now or do you need it in 3 months or do you need it next year? Creating an event is a reason whether it’s a sale, whether it’s a calendar holiday or something like that. Now, for me personally, a lot of what happens in the retail world around that kind of stuff is that’s where maybe I would almost say that’s the inauthentic parts of marketing and the parts that feel maybe manipulative is too strong, but this thing of there’s Always a sale. It’s always this made up reason why you need to buy right now, and it’s gonna expire in 2 days. And I’ve seen that creep a little bit into the software world as well, and it always kind of icks me out a little bit. And I understand that it works and people, you know, they have businesses and they need to sell their products so they can put food on their table at home. Fair enough. But that’s something that is a part of the sales and marketing world that I’m a little less fond of. 00:40:21 - Speaker 1: So we won’t see any Halloween specials coming up, bad news. 00:40:25 - Speaker 2: Yeah, but then maybe on the flip side, you know, I, I have ended up buying, I think I remember, um, 23andMe many years ago, they did like a DNA Day special where they sold sold the thing for much less, and it seemed like a good reason. Oh DNA Day and that that connects to my values, right? Like it’s a holiday celebrating an important breakthrough in science. Um, and so yeah, that totally worked on me. So, you know, I kind of understand where that, where that comes from. I don’t know, maybe there’s, yeah, if, if someday there’s a, there’s a holiday that somehow connects to thoughtfulness and deep work. 00:40:56 - Speaker 1: I think it’s a really hard balance and I agree with you, and I, I kind of hate it, but it kind of works, but I also don’t, I don’t really prefer doing marketing that way. But then sometimes there has to be a reason where the why now is actually pretty big. Why can’t I wait until tomorrow? And I think if it’s something that is very the messaging focusing on why this product makes you better or a better person, a better creator, then I think that is a really strong why now. Because I want to be a better creator today. I don’t want to wait until tomorrow, but I think the fundamentals are still similar, even if you don’t have Halloween, but you, you, you have something else that makes it relevant and a little bit urgent to actually download it or try it out now. 00:41:33 - Speaker 2: I like that coming back to your earlier example of the running shoes, you buy the running shoes because you want to run more. You want to be more fit, you want to do this thing that you know brings you both. Faction and health in your life. Maybe there’s an angle like that from M. Muse is sort of the running shoes equivalent for being thoughtful, for decision making, for being creative, for being productive. And so the urgency is more, I want, I want to start investing in myself, in my mind and my creative output today. 00:42:00 - Speaker 1: I definitely think so and I think you’ve been pondering that a little bit with a thinking tool and help you think and help you like this modern. better and I think also, yeah, just working, you know, working the creative sides of the mind is, I don’t have any tools for that. So like that sounds awesome. I, I know how to work, you know, I can, I can do some math. I can do some writing. I can read a book, but working that creative side is trickier. It’s harder. 00:42:24 - Speaker 2: Well, it sounds to me like we’ve got the muse marketing and positioning all figured out. It’s running shoes for your mind. Well, if any of our listeners out there have feedback, feel free to reach out to us at @museapphq on Twitter or hello at museapp.com via email. We’d love to hear your comments and ideas for future episodes. Lisa, thanks for coming on to talk with us here for being such a great advisor as we navigate this, how to explain what we’re doing here to the world and of course for otherwise supporting us on our journey. 00:42:55 - Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me.