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April 6, 2021

The Customer Journey: Expectation vs. Reality

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B2B Growth

In this installment of our deep dive into demand generation, Lesley Crews talks with Sam Kuehnle, Director of Demand Gen at Refine Labs. 

They discuss:

  • Lead gen vs. demand gen
  • Reality of the customer journey
  • The importance of case studies
  • Best demand gen practices
Transcript
WEBVTT 1 00:00:02.540 --> 00:00:02.740 Yeah. 2 00:00:05.540 --> 00:00:09.340 Welcome back to be to be growth. I'm Leslie Cruise with Sweet Fish Media. 3 00:00:09.350 --> 00:00:13.610 Today we will be continuing our deep dive into demand generation. And I'm 4 00:00:13.610 --> 00:00:17.620 here today with Sam Cooke, only the Director of demand generation over at 5 00:00:17.620 --> 00:00:21.300 refined Labs. Sam, thanks so much for joining me today. Yeah. Thanks for 6 00:00:21.300 --> 00:00:24.870 having me. I'm definitely looking forward to our conversation today. Yeah, 7 00:00:24.880 --> 00:00:29.540 me too. And so I actually connected with you on LinkedIn recently, And one 8 00:00:29.540 --> 00:00:32.520 of my favorite things that I found while doing some research into this 9 00:00:32.520 --> 00:00:38.210 topic is refined Labs Motto of demand generation and that make demand jin 10 00:00:38.210 --> 00:00:41.620 your competitive advantage. And can you share a little bit about what this 11 00:00:41.620 --> 00:00:47.440 means And also about your role over at refined laps? Yeah. So, making it your 12 00:00:47.450 --> 00:00:52.170 competitive advantage, I would say it kind of relates to everyone in B two b 13 00:00:52.180 --> 00:00:55.790 has been more or less following the same playbook for years and hasn't 14 00:00:55.790 --> 00:00:59.890 really adapted it to today's buying experience. So let me know something 15 00:00:59.890 --> 00:01:03.070 like this Sounds familiar. Create a piece of content. You're gonna stick it 16 00:01:03.070 --> 00:01:06.150 on a landing page and toss a form on it from there. You're gonna gather those 17 00:01:06.160 --> 00:01:09.470 email addresses, bombard them with emails asking, Hey, like, come sign up 18 00:01:09.470 --> 00:01:13.090 for our webinar. You're gonna have your SDRs follow up on that email us asking 19 00:01:13.090 --> 00:01:17.060 if they want a demo. That's kind of a traditional B to be experienced, that 20 00:01:17.070 --> 00:01:21.390 everyone's followed and yeah, worked like 10 years ago. But that's where we 21 00:01:21.390 --> 00:01:24.960 approach it much differently because how that worked then is not what we're 22 00:01:24.960 --> 00:01:28.290 seeing work now. So that's where we say, like we've got an updated playbook and 23 00:01:28.290 --> 00:01:30.550 that's going to be the competitive advantage that we like to bring in 24 00:01:30.550 --> 00:01:33.680 because, well, everyone's still playing this old game. We've got what's 25 00:01:33.680 --> 00:01:36.510 actually working with today's buyers journey and the psychology that they're 26 00:01:36.510 --> 00:01:40.700 following. Yeah, and can you kind of dive into what just kind of what a day 27 00:01:40.700 --> 00:01:45.810 to day and your role looks like as the director of Dimension? Yeah, so 28 00:01:45.810 --> 00:01:49.030 ultimately working with a couple of different clients to help them 29 00:01:49.030 --> 00:01:53.520 transform their overall demand marketing programs. So we're not your 30 00:01:53.520 --> 00:01:57.500 traditional agency in the sense that hey, come around paid search for us. We 31 00:01:57.500 --> 00:02:01.490 are brought on as an extension of your team. So when you hire your director of 32 00:02:01.490 --> 00:02:05.110 demand generation. That's what you're getting in terms of your organization. 33 00:02:05.110 --> 00:02:08.300 So you're getting a director of marketing who can help you understand? 34 00:02:08.300 --> 00:02:11.380 Like, what do we need to do to follow our marketing automation process? How 35 00:02:11.380 --> 00:02:14.760 is this going to tie in with our platforms and then also be able to 36 00:02:14.760 --> 00:02:17.460 navigate the different levels of the individuals that you're gonna be 37 00:02:17.460 --> 00:02:20.310 working with at your company? So we can say, Here's what we're seeing in 38 00:02:20.310 --> 00:02:24.430 platform And then how do we then communicate that message up to the C 39 00:02:24.430 --> 00:02:28.160 suite? So they understand is this good is as bad as this working because they 40 00:02:28.160 --> 00:02:32.000 don't understand or want to understand C T r C P m s all the other acronyms 41 00:02:32.000 --> 00:02:35.260 that we might have. They're just like, Great. Is it driving revenue for us? Or 42 00:02:35.260 --> 00:02:38.570 is it not? Because that's what we care about at the end of the day. So a lot 43 00:02:38.570 --> 00:02:41.950 of it's focused on that, and each client is so incredibly different with 44 00:02:41.950 --> 00:02:44.360 where they're at in terms of their companies, maturity, what they're 45 00:02:44.360 --> 00:02:48.990 trying to accomplish. So there's no standard day, I'd like to say and kind 46 00:02:48.990 --> 00:02:52.000 of what we do, but That's what I really enjoy about it, because you're not just 47 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:54.750 going through the same thing over and over from 9 to 5. But each day brings a 48 00:02:54.750 --> 00:02:57.190 new challenge, and you get to learn so many different things with the 49 00:02:57.190 --> 00:03:01.240 different industries and products that we help market. Yeah, it's always 50 00:03:01.240 --> 00:03:04.360 interesting to see what someone in a specific demand general does because I 51 00:03:04.360 --> 00:03:07.200 mean, I work for, you know, Swedish is a relatively small organization, so we 52 00:03:07.200 --> 00:03:10.720 just kind of have, like marketing, you know, tied in like a sales side. So 53 00:03:10.720 --> 00:03:15.090 it's interesting to see someone in that specific role, and you touched on this 54 00:03:15.090 --> 00:03:18.790 a little bit earlier, but I want to get more into specifics here and just kind 55 00:03:18.790 --> 00:03:23.540 of go back to the basics. I feel like demand. Gen. Is such a broad topic, and 56 00:03:23.540 --> 00:03:26.520 no one really knows how to define it. You know, I've heard it defined. It's 57 00:03:26.520 --> 00:03:30.900 just a fancy term for marketing and a subset of brand marketing. But how 58 00:03:30.900 --> 00:03:35.510 would you kind of, in your own words, define demand generation? Yeah, so 59 00:03:35.510 --> 00:03:39.880 we're often gets confused is, and people use these interchangeably is 60 00:03:39.890 --> 00:03:44.720 what's lead generation legion and what's demand Gen demand generation. So 61 00:03:44.720 --> 00:03:48.700 the way that I like to break it up in the simplest form is lead gen short 62 00:03:48.700 --> 00:03:53.740 term demand. Gen long term. So lead gen is typically focused on getting contact 63 00:03:53.740 --> 00:03:57.980 info or acquisition for follow up by an SDR. So this is going to be something 64 00:03:57.980 --> 00:04:00.850 like we mentioned earlier that send them to a gated e book or webinar 65 00:04:01.140 --> 00:04:04.310 capture the information. We're gonna spend a bunch of money promoting this 66 00:04:04.310 --> 00:04:09.010 specific event or asset, and then we're gonna say, Come check out this piece of 67 00:04:09.010 --> 00:04:11.250 content. We're baiting you with the form because that's what we're going to 68 00:04:11.250 --> 00:04:15.930 use to get leads for our sales reps to follow up on. But are those really 69 00:04:15.940 --> 00:04:18.980 leads in the sense of If you want to talk to your sales team, it's like, Is 70 00:04:18.980 --> 00:04:22.200 that something one that is high intent wants to purchase? Or is that just 71 00:04:22.200 --> 00:04:24.860 someone that is interested in the content and want to learn a little bit 72 00:04:24.860 --> 00:04:30.960 more? So that's and when we think about demand generation, that's the long term 73 00:04:30.960 --> 00:04:34.980 strategy of developing and retaining your customer. So it's a function of 74 00:04:34.980 --> 00:04:37.680 different things such as, you know, creating awareness in your in the 75 00:04:37.680 --> 00:04:41.110 market of the product that you're selling, How do you develop and build 76 00:04:41.110 --> 00:04:45.100 trust with those different individuals about your brand so separate from your 77 00:04:45.100 --> 00:04:48.550 product? How do you communicate that? You understand what those individuals 78 00:04:48.550 --> 00:04:51.670 are going through it every day and their job and how we feel that the 79 00:04:51.670 --> 00:04:55.200 market is heading. So do we know like, Hey, you might be feeling this pain or 80 00:04:55.200 --> 00:04:58.340 we think that you're going to see this type of growth. So just letting them 81 00:04:58.340 --> 00:05:00.550 know like, Hey, I'm empathetic. I understand what you're going through 82 00:05:00.550 --> 00:05:03.390 and we're not just trying to sell you something, but we see what your day to 83 00:05:03.390 --> 00:05:07.200 day looks like, and then capturing that detention through sharing free 84 00:05:07.200 --> 00:05:10.210 educational content. So that's the other big thing of Are we gonna get it? 85 00:05:10.210 --> 00:05:12.710 Are we gonna give it to them? Because if we want to generate brand awareness, 86 00:05:12.710 --> 00:05:15.470 if you're getting everything, they're gonna leave that conversation not 87 00:05:15.470 --> 00:05:20.160 having gained anything, not remembering you. So that leads to being top of mind 88 00:05:20.170 --> 00:05:23.520 once they are finally in market. Because what we're finding is that 1% 89 00:05:23.520 --> 00:05:28.550 of your total addressable market, your tam, is actively in market, 99% aren't 90 00:05:28.560 --> 00:05:32.500 so. At any given time, you're not going to have the majority of market that 91 00:05:32.500 --> 00:05:36.140 wants to get a demo at this. So we're treating all of our campaigns or you 92 00:05:36.140 --> 00:05:39.370 see in the old model a lot of people treating campaigns that everything is 93 00:05:39.370 --> 00:05:43.270 product featured. Get your demo now, when realistically, barely any of them 94 00:05:43.270 --> 00:05:46.360 are ready for that stage. So how do we continue to nurture that relationship 95 00:05:46.360 --> 00:05:50.640 and then become top of mind once they do enter that stage? So that's where it 96 00:05:50.640 --> 00:05:53.900 kind of shifts between the short term versus long term of legion verse 97 00:05:53.900 --> 00:05:57.980 Dimension. Yeah, and I like that idea of like nurturing that relationship 98 00:05:57.980 --> 00:06:03.320 from the beginning. And I kind of wanna kind of leading into that talk about 99 00:06:03.320 --> 00:06:07.850 the customer journey. And you and I previously talked about the expectation 100 00:06:07.850 --> 00:06:11.730 versus reality in this journey, and everyone tends to think of it as kind 101 00:06:11.730 --> 00:06:16.250 of like a linear path. But it's definitely not. So how would you 102 00:06:16.250 --> 00:06:20.130 describe that customer journey and kind of like, Where does that demand Jin fit 103 00:06:20.130 --> 00:06:24.570 in there? Yeah, I feel like every mark. It kind of goes to this aha moment as 104 00:06:24.570 --> 00:06:27.600 they come out and they finally get like, Hey, there's a customer journey We need 105 00:06:27.600 --> 00:06:31.320 to map our content to personas and everything else is people purchase this. 106 00:06:31.740 --> 00:06:35.010 And in theory, it all sounds great, like his expectation is, Hey, we've 107 00:06:35.010 --> 00:06:38.840 identified Jenny. She's in our I C p. So let's show her an ad about our 108 00:06:38.840 --> 00:06:41.870 product. Jenny's gonna click on the add. She's gonna love it. She's gonna 109 00:06:41.870 --> 00:06:44.890 request a demo. She's I'm going to talk to our sales team and become an 110 00:06:44.890 --> 00:06:48.650 opportunity. She'll sign the deal and become a customer. That's what it looks 111 00:06:48.650 --> 00:06:52.410 like in a lot of attribution platforms, because you see very hard coded steps 112 00:06:52.410 --> 00:06:58.050 that go from lead QL opportunity SQL so on and so forth. But the reality is a 113 00:06:58.050 --> 00:07:02.650 little bit more untracked. Kable by attribution, platforms. So it would be 114 00:07:02.650 --> 00:07:06.470 something like Jenny's got a boss named Tim. He hears about our company from a 115 00:07:06.470 --> 00:07:09.960 friend of his. So Tim goes and listens to the podcast for a couple of months 116 00:07:09.960 --> 00:07:13.080 whenever he has time driving to work, going to the gym, walking his dogs, 117 00:07:13.080 --> 00:07:18.170 whatever it may be. And then Tim is uninformed by their CEO Mary Pipelines, 118 00:07:18.170 --> 00:07:20.940 short this month. We need to increase our marketing efforts to help increase 119 00:07:20.940 --> 00:07:24.200 that. So Tim's like Okay, great. I'm gonna go to Jenny and tell her to check 120 00:07:24.200 --> 00:07:26.370 out this company that I've been listening to a podcast on and they've 121 00:07:26.370 --> 00:07:29.790 been really helpful. Jenny's gonna request the demo directly onto the site, 122 00:07:29.790 --> 00:07:33.590 fill out the form and then become an opportunity. So how do you How do you 123 00:07:33.590 --> 00:07:37.240 fit that in cleanly into a customer journey? Because there's no step by 124 00:07:37.240 --> 00:07:40.730 step process that you can follow. A lot of it is it has to do with that top. 125 00:07:40.730 --> 00:07:46.070 Just being aware of or having the awareness in your market of knowing 126 00:07:46.070 --> 00:07:48.680 like, Hey, we're in the space, we can help with this product. So when you're 127 00:07:48.680 --> 00:07:51.820 ready, we're here to help you. Instead of forcing it, saying like, you have to 128 00:07:51.830 --> 00:07:56.250 download this now you have to get a demo now, because things are so so many 129 00:07:56.250 --> 00:07:59.580 variables that play, whether it's timing of year, your budget season or 130 00:07:59.580 --> 00:08:03.510 specific business need comes up, so that's where the reality of it is. It's 131 00:08:03.510 --> 00:08:06.540 not a straight line, as we think, but a lot of zigzags with people moving in 132 00:08:06.540 --> 00:08:11.210 and out at different times. So it's a it's a tricky one to navigate. Yeah, 133 00:08:11.220 --> 00:08:16.900 for sure, for sure. And we talked about within that that journey case studies, 134 00:08:16.910 --> 00:08:20.620 and you kind of talked about how important they are within that sales 135 00:08:20.620 --> 00:08:23.840 cycle. So can you just share some benefits of case studies you've seen 136 00:08:23.840 --> 00:08:28.930 and kind of how how you would utilize those? Yeah, so this is This is an 137 00:08:28.940 --> 00:08:33.799 interesting one, and I've seen it work really well with companies that are 138 00:08:33.799 --> 00:08:38.780 launching a new product or are creating new category. So the concept of it is 139 00:08:38.780 --> 00:08:41.730 that you know, you're building a new category. People have never really 140 00:08:41.730 --> 00:08:45.930 heard of it. So if you go and promote features, increase your R O Y by X, or 141 00:08:45.930 --> 00:08:49.780 shorten your lead cycle by y, every product is ultimately saying that 142 00:08:49.780 --> 00:08:52.180 they're going to do that. So that's just blending in with the rest of the 143 00:08:52.180 --> 00:08:55.260 noise. People don't understand what is the category you're building or how are 144 00:08:55.260 --> 00:09:00.210 you going to help them? So where case studies come in is that it helps by 145 00:09:00.210 --> 00:09:04.270 providing the context that you need to see how are people solving the problems 146 00:09:04.270 --> 00:09:06.630 and then they're not dumb. They're going to figure out if you're promoting 147 00:09:06.630 --> 00:09:09.540 this case study, you've probably got a product that can help them reach these 148 00:09:09.540 --> 00:09:13.380 types of results. So that's where you can really lean into letting your 149 00:09:13.380 --> 00:09:16.280 customer let them be the hero of the story. Because that's what they're 150 00:09:16.280 --> 00:09:19.570 looking at. The end of day is how is a company similar to mind solving this 151 00:09:19.570 --> 00:09:22.480 similar challenge that we have and haven't been able to come up with a 152 00:09:22.480 --> 00:09:28.290 plan for. So in the past, we've seen a lot of sales reps. Use case studies at 153 00:09:28.290 --> 00:09:31.440 the very end of the customer journey is kind of like, Hey, here's proof that it 154 00:09:31.440 --> 00:09:34.160 does work, you know, read through it and it's going to confirm your decision 155 00:09:34.160 --> 00:09:37.610 and want to buy with us. What we found is that by showing that earlier in the 156 00:09:37.610 --> 00:09:41.660 journey, they were able to see and discover on their own instead of having 157 00:09:41.660 --> 00:09:44.110 a BDR. So you need this product, but they're going to read this case. That 158 00:09:44.110 --> 00:09:46.890 would be like, Hey, this could be a great fit for us and it's a completely 159 00:09:46.890 --> 00:09:50.750 different mindset when you're discovering something on your own 160 00:09:50.750 --> 00:09:53.820 versus you should do this. I think it's just human psychology. We don't like 161 00:09:53.830 --> 00:09:58.210 being told what to do, and we naturally kind of put up a defense to it. So by 162 00:09:58.210 --> 00:10:00.940 coming up with this idea on your own, that was kind of planet in front of you 163 00:10:00.940 --> 00:10:05.520 because we know you're in our I C p um, they're more interested to read about 164 00:10:05.520 --> 00:10:08.760 it, to learn about it, and then when a business problem comes up Hey, we're 165 00:10:08.760 --> 00:10:11.380 short on pipeline this month. That's where they're gonna trigger and be like, 166 00:10:11.380 --> 00:10:14.220 Hey, this company, remember reading a case study? They have that problem. 167 00:10:14.230 --> 00:10:18.480 They use this product and it helped solve that. So the biggest thing really 168 00:10:18.480 --> 00:10:22.450 is like, how do we provide context? And that's what case studies do a great 169 00:10:22.450 --> 00:10:26.950 great job of doing instead of Here's our temple points of product features. 170 00:10:26.950 --> 00:10:29.300 But the context of how did they accomplish this? Because they don't 171 00:10:29.300 --> 00:10:32.130 care if you have an A P I or an open integration or any of the seller junk 172 00:10:32.130 --> 00:10:35.360 that we like to promote and add, like at the end of the day, they want to say, 173 00:10:35.440 --> 00:10:38.480 Is this going to solve the problem that we have? And how did other people do it? 174 00:10:39.140 --> 00:10:42.510 Yeah. So you think inserting those earlier in the journey kind of 175 00:10:42.510 --> 00:10:46.620 comparing them to the product ads you have running is more beneficial than 176 00:10:46.620 --> 00:10:51.350 having them there at the end? Yeah. I mean, from a cold targeting perspective, 177 00:10:51.350 --> 00:10:54.930 we've done both. We've run product feature adds we've also in case. Study 178 00:10:54.930 --> 00:10:59.040 adds In recent months, I've seen more of the clients that I work with were 179 00:10:59.040 --> 00:11:03.310 starting to get an uptick in the people that read the case study. They hit the 180 00:11:03.310 --> 00:11:05.630 bottom. They say, Yeah, actually, is something that we're going through. I 181 00:11:05.630 --> 00:11:09.930 want to request a demo to learn more, whereas people that go to the product 182 00:11:09.930 --> 00:11:13.410 page like Okay, cool. That's features. Yeah, you're gonna capture that 1% that 183 00:11:13.410 --> 00:11:16.700 we mentioned earlier, and you're gonna have decent conversion rates. But we're 184 00:11:16.700 --> 00:11:19.780 getting a lot of growth from that case study side where people are connecting 185 00:11:19.780 --> 00:11:24.270 the dots and we're finding that not only are those converting, but once 186 00:11:24.270 --> 00:11:28.530 they hit that opportunity cycle, those are selling at higher velocities, 187 00:11:28.530 --> 00:11:31.590 higher ATVs. You know, the things that really matter to revenue at the end of 188 00:11:31.590 --> 00:11:34.450 the day because their understanding there really is value behind this 189 00:11:34.450 --> 00:11:38.190 instead of just another piece of their tech stack. Mm, that's really 190 00:11:38.190 --> 00:11:43.920 interesting. Let's talk about best demand in practice is a little bit. And, 191 00:11:43.920 --> 00:11:47.510 you know, as marketing is evolving so much, I think that people tend to over 192 00:11:47.510 --> 00:11:50.990 complicate it, make it a little bit too difficult. And you and I spoke about 193 00:11:50.990 --> 00:11:54.470 simplifying techniques. Can you just lean into that a little bit? Yes, And 194 00:11:54.470 --> 00:12:00.260 this was something that I know I did way too much of when I started up Was 195 00:12:00.440 --> 00:12:03.230 All of a sudden, you're thrown into this environment where you have to 196 00:12:03.230 --> 00:12:07.030 justify your value, that people are looking at you as the marketing expert. 197 00:12:07.030 --> 00:12:11.530 So naturally, we want to come across as very smart, well spoken, educated on 198 00:12:11.530 --> 00:12:15.800 these topics, and we make things overly complicated. Sure, you'll go into many 199 00:12:15.800 --> 00:12:19.250 meetings where you see 20 slide decks with a bunch of numbers and you walk 200 00:12:19.250 --> 00:12:22.040 away thinking like, What the hell does that mean? I don't really know what to 201 00:12:22.040 --> 00:12:27.480 do with it. So that's something that I learned was I'd start to call it the 202 00:12:27.490 --> 00:12:30.620 digital glaze. Once you start talking about digital marketing metrics, all of 203 00:12:30.620 --> 00:12:33.150 a sudden my audience, their eyes would just completely glass over is like all 204 00:12:33.150 --> 00:12:36.940 right, I've lost them. So how do you combat that? And that's where you 205 00:12:36.950 --> 00:12:39.790 you've just got to simplify the message and put it in terms of what are they 206 00:12:39.790 --> 00:12:42.890 going to understand? So if you're talking to sales, talk about pipeline 207 00:12:42.890 --> 00:12:47.400 opportunities. If you're talking to execs, talk about Act V s overall 208 00:12:47.400 --> 00:12:50.970 revenue. I mean, the things that they care about and then you don't need to 209 00:12:50.970 --> 00:12:54.400 get is in the weeds about those those digital platform metrics or others that 210 00:12:54.400 --> 00:12:57.100 we mentioned earlier. They don't care about open rates or what that means for 211 00:12:57.100 --> 00:13:00.520 us. They want to know what is that impacting for the items that they do 212 00:13:00.530 --> 00:13:05.350 care about at the end of the day. So figure out if you if you only had a 213 00:13:05.350 --> 00:13:08.160 couple minutes to get your entire message across, what would you be 214 00:13:08.160 --> 00:13:10.960 saying that? And how do you convince that down into a format where if they 215 00:13:10.960 --> 00:13:14.140 need to walk away and know what was the purpose of that meeting? That's what 216 00:13:14.140 --> 00:13:17.000 they're going to be able to understand and articulate and actually have it 217 00:13:17.010 --> 00:13:21.200 click in their head that they did grasp it instead of I don't know. It was a 218 00:13:21.200 --> 00:13:25.360 bunch of data and it sounds like we're doing well. So that's kind of how I how 219 00:13:25.540 --> 00:13:30.670 have tried to start moving forward with those types of conversations. Yeah, The 220 00:13:30.670 --> 00:13:34.500 last question I have is kind of a broad one, but I wanted to talk a little bit 221 00:13:34.500 --> 00:13:39.550 about how do you measure success here? You know what makes demand generation 222 00:13:39.550 --> 00:13:44.660 successful in your opinion? Yeah, And that's always been the depending on the 223 00:13:44.660 --> 00:13:47.480 company that you go to. What are you measured by? Because that's what 224 00:13:47.480 --> 00:13:51.600 everyone's going to orient, how they work towards So you can have 225 00:13:51.600 --> 00:13:56.170 organizations where marketing you're responsible for 30% of the 226 00:13:56.180 --> 00:13:59.620 opportunities generated this month sales report. You're responsible for 70. 227 00:14:00.140 --> 00:14:03.660 You then have marketers that are focused on hitting em que ele goals 228 00:14:03.660 --> 00:14:06.530 because hey, we have to generate 100 opportunities. We know that they 229 00:14:06.530 --> 00:14:10.210 converted 50% so we need 200 mgs this month. All they care about is hitting 230 00:14:10.210 --> 00:14:13.680 that SQL goal and depending on how you set that up in your organization. If 231 00:14:13.680 --> 00:14:17.670 it's with those gated e books that counts as an MQ, well, you can game the 232 00:14:17.670 --> 00:14:22.750 system. So where we like to come with this approach is you can run that you 233 00:14:22.750 --> 00:14:25.690 can get all the volume you want. But if they aren't converting and turning into 234 00:14:25.690 --> 00:14:29.890 revenue at the end of the day, then it's all for not, you know. So that's 235 00:14:29.890 --> 00:14:35.590 where success to me and demanded. Looks like How do we tie that into revenue 236 00:14:35.600 --> 00:14:38.330 and then working backwards from that? Because that's what's gonna keep the 237 00:14:38.330 --> 00:14:41.210 company going. At the end of the day, you can drive all the Mpls that you 238 00:14:41.210 --> 00:14:43.950 want, but if they're not converting, if they're not selling, it doesn't matter. 239 00:14:43.950 --> 00:14:47.980 So how do we get rid of this line that's been divided in the sand like, 240 00:14:47.980 --> 00:14:51.930 Hey, I generate the MPs for sales. It's up to them to go and sell them. How do 241 00:14:51.930 --> 00:14:55.770 we get them vested in? Yeah, they got those MPs. Are they good? Are they 242 00:14:55.770 --> 00:14:58.910 qualified? Are they the right people that they do want to sell to you? Are 243 00:14:58.910 --> 00:15:02.220 they actually interested? Are they pushing off for eight months? because 244 00:15:02.230 --> 00:15:06.370 they don't have the budget yet, but well next year. So being able to bridge 245 00:15:06.370 --> 00:15:10.440 that gap, I think, is what a lot of demand generation marketers will will 246 00:15:10.440 --> 00:15:14.600 be faced with over the coming years is things do start to change, become more 247 00:15:14.610 --> 00:15:20.830 of a buyer centric, digital centric purchase cycle. So that's what we what 248 00:15:20.830 --> 00:15:23.950 we ultimately lean towards is. How do we tie it to the bottom line? Those 249 00:15:23.950 --> 00:15:28.250 things that the C suite cares about? Because if anything comes up and they 250 00:15:28.250 --> 00:15:31.560 have to make cuts again, if you're not a revenue generating part of the 251 00:15:31.560 --> 00:15:35.250 company, you're probably one of the first on the list to be. Do we really 252 00:15:35.250 --> 00:15:39.270 need them? Or can we make do with a smaller organization until we're able 253 00:15:39.270 --> 00:15:43.260 to get back to where we need to be? It's so true. It's so good. Good stuff. 254 00:15:43.260 --> 00:15:46.900 Well, Sam, this has been so insightful. Thank you so much. And where can people 255 00:15:46.900 --> 00:15:50.800 find you online if they're interested in learning more? Yeah, So I frequently 256 00:15:50.800 --> 00:15:54.140 share thoughts on LinkedIn. I'd say that's probably the best place to find 257 00:15:54.140 --> 00:15:57.310 me, so I've got a pretty unique last name. If you just type in Sam. Keenly, 258 00:15:57.310 --> 00:16:00.940 you'll you'll be sure to find me refine labs. So luckily, I don't have to 259 00:16:00.940 --> 00:16:04.340 common of a name and make it hard to find me awesome. Well, fantastic. Thank 260 00:16:04.340 --> 00:16:07.980 you again. So much for joining me here on GDP growth. Yeah, absolutely. It was 261 00:16:07.980 --> 00:16:08.950 a lot of fun. Thanks again. 262 00:16:10.840 --> 00:16:16.470 Gary V says it all the time, and we agree. Every company should think of 263 00:16:16.470 --> 00:16:21.450 themselves as a media company first, then whatever it is they actually do, 264 00:16:21.940 --> 00:16:25.780 if you know this is true, but your team is already maxed out and you can't 265 00:16:25.780 --> 00:16:30.190 produce any more content and house, we can help. We produce podcasts for some 266 00:16:30.190 --> 00:16:34.110 of the most innovative BB brands in the world, and we also help them turn the 267 00:16:34.110 --> 00:16:39.140 content from the podcast and blog posts, micro videos and slide decks that work 268 00:16:39.140 --> 00:16:42.520 really well on. Linked in. If you want to learn more, go to sweet fish media 269 00:16:42.520 --> 00:16:47.070 dot com slash launch or email Logan at sweet fish media dot com. 270 00:16:49.840 --> 00:16:51.750 Yeah,