Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 1
What’s the best piece of
marketing advice you’ve
ever received?
At Marketo, our entire organization is
connect us with technology—it gives
focused on the solving the problems
us access to a whole network of
of marketers today. And that means
superhero marketers.
engaging with the superheroes of
marketing—not just the “experts,” but
the real, on the ground marketers.
To create this ebook, we asked our
ecosystem of marketing partners:
What’s the best piece of advice
That’s also why we created
you’ve ever received? On the pages
LaunchPoint, an ecosystem of
that follow, our superheroes share
marketing solutions that dives deep
that advice. We hope it’s as helpful
into every marketing channel, putting
to you as it was to them.
the best technology at your fingertips.
Because LaunchPoint doesn’t just
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 2
Evy Wilkins
Head of Marketing
Vidcaster
@mainwilk
Super Power:
Master
Story teller
you win by working
on passing, catching,
and running.
The score will take care of itself. Bill Walsh,
beloved coach of the San Francisco 49ers,
told this to his players and Derek Skaletsky,
CEO of Knowtify.io introduced the concept to
me. I live in a lead hungry, metrics-obsessed
world. Don’t get me wrong—the bottom line
matters. But you don’t win by practicing
touchdowns. You win by working on passing,
catching, and running. In marketing, I work
on telling a good story, creating a great
place to tell that story and building authentic
relationships to share our story. I focus on
what I can control and the results—the leads
and deals—follow.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 3
Super Power:
Marketing Mobilizer
Jim williams
VP of Marketing
Influitive
@jimwilliams
Shut up and let your
customers do your
marketing for you.
Buyers don’t trust anything coming from your
marketing team. Instead, they want genuine
insight from knowledgeable peers. That’s
why the collective voices of your happiest
customers are more powerful and effective
than any campaign, piece of content, or ad
you could run—even if you had an unlimited
budget. Once you’ve identified your biggest
fans, evangelists, and advocates, find ways
to mobilize them to help at every stage of
your sales and marketing funnel: social media
buzz, user reviews, referrals, references,
content and more.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 4
MICHAEL POWERS
Events and Buzz
Coordinator
NetProspex
Super Power:
Customer Sonar
@powers_m33
Always think from your
customer’s point of view.
My friend Ann Handley at MarketingProfs
recently said, ‘Develop a pathological
empathy for your buyer. Always think from
your customer’s point of view. Are you
answering questions for them? Are you
addressing their pain points?’ It’s a great
reminder that it should never be about your
company, but should always be about
your customer.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 5
Super Power:
daredevil
Vanessa porter
Marketing Manager
SnapApp
@NessieBessie
Never be afraid to
take risks!
My mentor once told me that if you want to
try something, just add the word ‘pilot’ to the
campaign or program name, and go for it.
The wonderful thing about marketing is that
it’s like throwing spaghetti—you never know
what will stick until you try.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 6
Matt wong
Senior Product
Marketing Manager
Hootsuite
Super Power:
Super Leadership Strength
@Mattyattack
Lead by effective
delegation.
In a marketing team, there are so many
key stakeholders who work on multiple
campaigns at a time. Most of the time, your
marketing campaign/project won’t be their
top priority. As a leader in the marketing
team, it is important to invest time with
your people and educate them fully on
your objectives, developing a culture of
accountability and ownership.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 7
Super Power:
Creative Mastermind
Hana abaza
Director of Marketing
Uberflip
@hanaabaza
The best marketing advice
i’ve ever received is to
create a culture where
failure is okay.
This really comes down to infusing a sense
of creativity and experimentation within your
marketing team. Implementing a process for
experimentation that gives yourself (and your
team) the leeway to try new things is the only
way you’ll discover new ways to drive to your
company’s growth, and to connect with your
audience. It’s okay to fail on a small scale, if
your goal is to win big.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 8
mari strom
Director of Marketing
ServiceSource
@itliongstrom
Super Power:
Super Marketing agility
Marketers must be
on guard, and willing to
quickly adapt their plans.
When plans fall apart, change can create
a domino effect of frustration and chaos.
Marketers invest a lot of time crafting the
right strategy, but everything can change at
a moment’s notice—that’s where agility and
adaptability come into play. Competition
can flank where your company is weak, the
market can change, your customer’s buying
behaviors can shift. Marketers must be on
guard, and willing to quickly adapt
their plans.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 9
Super Power:
Guru
of excellence
Tony yang
Director of Marketing
Mintigo
@tones810
Don’t settle for
‘good enough’ if excellence
is attainable.
A lot of us marketers, especially those who
work in startups or are part of lean marketing
teams, tend to live by the philosophy that if
it’s good enough, you can consider it done
and move on. While it’s important to get
things done, this can become an excuse
for mediocrity.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 10
Amanda nelson
Director of Marketing
RingLead
@amandalnelson
Super Power:
Brand X-Ray vision
put the brand’s best
interest before your own.
Before you make your next move, ask
yourself: ‘Is this what’s best for the brand?’
It will put every project, every conversation,
and every idea into perspective. Whether
it’s a conversation you should or shouldn’t
be having, a tweet you should or shouldn’t
post, or a blog that you should or shouldn’t
publish, put the brand’s best interest before
your own. No one can argue with your
decisions if they’re based on what’s best for
the company.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 11
Super Power:
teaching at the
speed of light
Dominique levin
CMO
AgilOne
@NextGenCMO
Always think about
what type of value you
can provide.
This applies to both in your product and in
your marketing. One of the most valuable
things you can give you audience is
education. Educate them, so that they can
make the best decision—sometimes, that
decision is you.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 12
Jon spenceley
Community
Marketing Manager
Vidyard
Super Power:
community Genius
@jonspenceley
Quality is infinitely more
important than quantity.
Saul Colt once told me that when it comes
to social media, quality is infinitely more
important than quantity. If you have a social
community of 100 people who are truly
passionate about what you do, that’s much
more valuable than a list of 10,000 followers
who never engage.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 13
Super Power:
Marketing
Funnel Machine
Jessica cross
Director of Marketing
Fliptop
@JFayeSF
Marketing’s job is to
help sales sell.
The best advice I’ve received as a marketer
was the reminder that ‘Marketing’s job is to
help sales sell.’ I can often get caught up in
perfecting a landing page or email copy, or
in running my campaigns perfectly. But at the
end of the day, what really matters is that your
activities are driving awareness, generating
demand, or helping to move deals along
the funnel.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 14
heidi lorenzen
CMO
Cloudwords
@hlorenzen
Super Power:
Ultimate inquisitor
ask—and answer—the
‘so what’ of everything
you do in marketing.
At the end of a product briefing years ago,
someone rather boldly blurted out, ‘So what?’
This savy marketer wanted everyone to think
about the ultimate benefit of each feature,
and ultimately the product. It sounded rude,
but it turned out to be the question that
helped us frame very strong positioning and
messaging that was the precursor to one of
our best launches yet. So ask—and answer—
the ‘so what’ of everything you do
in marketing.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 15
Super Power:
enhanced empathizer
Dayna rothman
Director of Content
Captora,
Author of Lead Generation
for Dummies
@dayroth
Even in b2b marketing, you
are still marketing to a
human on the other end.
The best piece of marketing advice I have ever
received was from digital strategist DJ Waldow!
When I worked with him at Marketo he
constantly talked about how marketers should
“always be human” in their messaging and
campaigns. Since then, I try hard to look at all of
my content and marketing programs through
the “always be human” lens. I ask myself, is my
copy conversational enough? Would I enjoy
reading this ebook if I downloaded it? Is this
funny, educational, or inspirational? And so on.
The worst #marketingfail is to create something
that sounds like it was meant for a robot AND
created by a robot. Even in B2B marketing, you
are still marketing to a human on the other end.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 16
Joe Lucas
Director of Demand
Generation & Marketing
Ops, InsideView
Super Power:
simplicity Savant
@joelucas
The best piece of
marketing advice I’ve
received was to keep
things simple.
It’s easy to make things complicated,
but simplicity takes effort and is usually
the best solution.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 17
Super Power:
Super human
listener
Jennifer Hawkins
Director of Marketing
DoubleDutch
@jenhawkn
Someone once told me
“marketers should
always listen more
than they speak”.
We are generally creative people with lots to
say, but I have found that if you spend some
time being quiet and still, there’s so much to
hear. Listening to what people say (and don’t
say) can lead to truly inspired ideas and help
you speak directly to your target audience. I
think this principle applies to marketers and
non-marketers alike.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 18
JOhn lozzi
VP of Business
Development
Wylei
Super Power:
Rapid Learning
@beWylei
if you’re not listening
to what your customers’
clicks are telling you,
you’re being left in
the dust.
The best customer experiences recognize
and leverage the context of brand
engagement and take into account a
customer’s specific situation, environment,
preferences, etc. Good, effective messaging
is crafted based on historical and real-time
data, and a genuine, empathetic perspective.
But ultimately, the only way to know for sure
if a message resonates with your customers is
to continuously test and improve. If you’re not
listening to what your customers’ clicks tell
you, you’re being left in the dust.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 19
Super Power:
Driving action
Robert Drew
Marketing Manager
Emedia
@emedialeadgen
For any campaign,
or for any piece of content,
first impressions
matter most.
If you don’t capture attention, clearly describe
your offer, and sell the reader/viewer right
away, your campaign will fail. Select and
develop a strong offer; craft a powerful,
even provocative title or subject line; and
tailor a call-to-action that compels audience
members to click through.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 20
Sara rohlfing
VP of Marketing
DataHero
@datahero
Super Power:
Dynamo data miner
Use data to
drive decisions.
So many online marketers today are still
making campaign and product decisions
based on your gut, or on outdated notions.
But it’s never been easier to split test and
make the most profitable decisions.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 21
Super Power:
thought leader
thunder
Kyle christensen
VP of Marketing
Invoca
@kylechristensen
Whatever your current
vision or strategy is,
chances are you’re not
thinking big enough.
The best piece of advice I’ve ever received
comes from the Marc Benioff school of
marketing. It’s pretty simple: ‘Think bigger.’
Whatever your current vision or strategy is,
chances are you’re not thinking big enough.
Always position yourself as the leader or
against the leader in your category. Market
leaders don’t worry about the smaller direct
competitors they see day-to-day. Instead,
they position themselves against the
kingpins, and become their peers. The rest
is history.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 22
Want
to
tell
us
your
Super Power:
MICHAEL POWERS
marketing stories? Ultra
Events and Buzz
Coordinator
NetProspex
@michaelpowers
regeneration
tweet to us @Marketo if you’d like
to be
part
of our next project.
Always think
from
your
customer’s point of view.
My friend Ann Handley at MarketingProfs
recently said, ‘Develop a pathological
empathy for your buyer. Always think from
your customer’s point of view. Are you
answering questions for them? Are you
addressing their pain points?’ It’s a great
reminder that is should never be about your
company, but should always be about
your customer.
Real Marketer Stories Volume 2 | 23
LaunchPoint is the most complete ecosystem of marketing solutions. LaunchPoint offers hundreds of applications
that complement and integrate into Marketo’s engagement platform. Whether you’re looking for analytics & big data
solutions, content marketing solutions or lead data providers, your search starts on LaunchPoint.
Marketo (NASDAQ: MKTO) provides the leading marketing software for companies of all sizes to build and sustain
engaging customer relationships. Spanning today’s digital, social, mobile and offline channels, Marketo’s® customer
engagement platform powers a set of breakthrough applications to help marketers tackle all aspects of digital
marketing from the planning and orchestration of marketing activities to the delivery of personalized interactions that
can be optimized in real-time. Marketo’s applications are known for their ease-of-use, and are complemented by the
Marketing Nation™, a thriving network of more than 250 third-party solutions through our LaunchPoint™ ecosystem
and over 40,000 marketers who share and learn from each other to grow their collective marketing expertise.
The result for modern marketers is unprecedented agility and superior results. Headquartered in San Mateo, CA
with offices in Europe, Australia and a joint-venture in Japan, Marketo serves as a strategic marketing partner to
more than 3,000 large enterprises and fast-growing small companies across a wide variety of industries. For more
information, visit marketo.com.
marketo.com
© 2014 Marketo, Inc. All Rights ReservedDesigned by SCORCH®