8 Ways to to pitch brand to your CEO (Newsletter #109)

Hello and welcome to the Exit Five weekly newsletter - read by 19,000 B2B marketing professionals around the world. Exit Five is a membership site designed to help you build a successful career in B2B marketing. Join 3,500 other members at exitfive.com.

Today’s Newsletter is Brought to You By Sendoso

I always assumed sending gifts to people can be effective marketing, but HOW does it actually work?

And is it more than bribing people with gift cards to take demos?

HockeyStack & Sendoso just did a study of 300+ B2B companies ($20M-$250M ARR) and their gifting programs:

• Increases meeting rates +308%.
• Increases win rates +184%
• Reduce the cost of MQLs by -43%
• SQLs result in larger deals that close 29% faster.
• In currently open deals, gifting after the first call leads to a massive improvement in second call rates +631%

Why aren’t more companies doing this?

Gifting can seem intimidating, so if you want a 59X ROI on your marketing and somebody to hold your hand through it, they’re giving away their exact playbook on August 6th.

Click here to save your spot and get the playbook.

How to Kill a Brand (and lose 28bn in a day) 

I am fascinated by brand – and, as my fiance likes to remind me, extremely susceptible to good branding… usually at the grocery store when I want to try some fancy new snack because the packaging caught my eye.

A good brand catches your eye. A great brand sticks in your mind. And there’s an elite few that shape culture:

Apple. Coca Cola. And until last month? Nike.

Okay, okay – I’m not saying Nike is dead, but after losing $24 BILLION (yes, billion with a B) in a single day after reporting their earnings last month… they’re in need of the kind of hail mary come back they used to feature in their commercials.

But how did they get here? Massimo Giunco, a 21-year veteran of Nike and former Senior Brand Director broke it down in a brilliant analysis on LinkedIn over the weekend.

Below is the TL;DR (but I highly recommend reading the original post):

In 2020, the new CEO of Nike implemented 3 key changes:

1. He eliminated their brand organization
2. Shifted to becoming a DTC-led company vs wholesale (i.e. appearing in other stores)
3. Changed their marketing model to be “data driven” and pumped billions into performance marketing and programmatic advertising

They reorganized their departments from expertise based categories like running, football, basketball – to gender-led (women, men, kids). In the process they fired hundreds of people with deep expertise in those key areas.

Their inability to manage the shift from wholesale to DTC created a massive amount of inventory they couldn't sell, which led to…

Discount-mania on Nike.com, further devaluing the Nike brand. Why would you pay $200 for a pair of sneakers anymore, when they were always offered at 50% off?

And that’s the very brief and over simplified recap of how they got here today.

Giunco sums it up in a brilliant (and scathing) quote:

We see this same mistake all the time in B2B Marketing.

It’s easier to measure conversion rates and leads generated than it is to measure brand – so we over index on it because we can prove it’s worth.

So how do you advocate for Brand as a Marketer? Let alone in B2B?

Bill Macaitis, former CMO at Slack, Zendesk, and SVP at Salesforce shared 8 ways to put brand front and center of your marketing strategy:

1. Make Brand a Team Goal: Brand isn’t just for the design team. Integrate brand goals across your entire marketing team. Every marketer should contribute to and be measured against these goals.
   
   
2. Every Interaction Counts: Brand is the sum of every interaction someone has with your company – from website visits to customer support chats. Make sure each touchpoint enhances the overall brand experience - put thought into the little things like chat and even your 404 pages!
   
   
3. Community Builds Brand: Engage with subject matter experts, influencers, and executives to expand your brand reach. Community engagement drives traffic, yes – but it also creates word of mouth (the most effective marketing out there).
   
   
4. Leverage Your Team’s Talents: Trust your teams’ unique skills. If someone is a great writer, let them create content. If another excels in video or audio, get them a mic or a webcam. Use your team's strengths to enhance your brand by getting to know the people behind it.
   
   
5. Visually Stand Out: Ensure your brand has a consistent and engaging visual identity. Personalize your website and social media profiles to resonate with your audience. Customize logos, banners, and other content.
   
   
6. Get People Talking: When people are using social channels, how often are they mentioning your company's name in relation to your category? Find a way to track this and encourage it to stay top of mind.
   
   
7. Treat Customers like Friends: Listen to their feedback and use it to improve their journey. Hype them up like they’re celebrities. Positive experiences drive loyalty and word-of-mouth marketing.
   
   
8. Keep an Eye on Brand Health: This is probably more advanced, but if you have the resources, track brand awareness and the effectiveness of your campaigns through aided and unaided recall metrics. Use surveys and analyze feedback to continuously refine your brand strategy. This data can be huge.

But above all, keep in mind that brand is fundamentally about how people feel about your company.

It’s not logos or color palettes, but if they trust you, see you as helpful. Aim for that, and you’ll be in a good place.

P.S. Let me know if you have trouble finding Massimo Giunco’s post about Nike – it’s really a fascinating breakdown on Nike’s brand woe’s since 2020. I’ll send over a link.

Fellow brand geeks: how do you focus on the importance of brand in a world that demands ROI for everything? Any tips? Just reply to this email – I read (and cherish) every single reply.

Podcast #161: Strategy | How to Enter New International Markets, Hiring Locally, and the Content Approval Trap with Max Van Den Ingh

Dave sits down with Max Van Den Ingh, founder and CEO of Unmuted, a B2B SaaS marketing agency based in Amsterdam. Max shares his insights from his background in Sales, sharing how his approach of building relationships has translated to a successful marketing agency.

Max and Dave Cover:

• His high-touch approach to entering new markets by focusing on understanding the landscape and building relationships
• Challenges and advice for hiring in international markets
• The shift towards scrappier, more authentic content in B2B Marketing and the case against multiple layers of content approval
  
  

Listen to the Episode Now on Spotify

Or find it everywhere you listen by searching "exitfive" podcast.

Podcast #162: Events | Using VIP Dinners to Drive Pipeline with Natalie Taylor

Dave is joined by Natalie Taylor, Head of Marketing at Capsule. Natalie shares her journey from getting laid off to finding her dream job through LinkedIn, and how she’s now building meaningful customer relationships through intimate in-person events at Capsule.

Natalie and Dave cover:

• The “intimate dinner strategy” Natalie is running and how it drives growth for Capsule
• Challenges to measuring influencer campaigns in B2B and her approach to 
  choosing who to work with
• Her step-by-step process to a successful product launch
  
  

Listen to the Episode Now on Spotify

Or find it everywhere you listen by searching "exitfive" podcast.

Upcoming Events

How long should it take to respond to inbound leads? How should you re-engage no-shows? Are you leaving valuable leads hanging?

If you want more demo requests, and more of those requests to turn into revenue, join us for this Exit Five Live session on August 7th at 3pm EST. We’re teaming up with Josh Garrison, VP of Content Marketing at Apollo to break down the ultimate demo request flow for inbound leads.

In this session:

• Our experts will look at real demo request flows from Exit Five members, and get live feedback on how to improve it to drive more revenue
• Learn the ideal inbound lead flow and exactly how to set it up yourself
• Get your burning questions answered by Exit Five Founder Dave Gerhardt and VP of Content Marketing at Apollo
• Engage in the chat and share your ideas with fellow B2B marketers. 

This session is open to anyone that works in B2B marketing, whether you’re an Exit Five member or not. We’ll record this session and share with everyone that registers, even if you can’t make it there live.

But Exit Five Live attendees know it’s better to come join if you can make it and participate in the chat, ask questions, and share your ideas with your peers in marketing.

RSVP Here

Open Roles

HOT JOB OF THE WEEK: Brainlabs is hiring a Global CMO / EVP of Social - this is a unique opportunity to work alongside a CEO who "gets" marketing. This is the ideal opportunity for an Exit Five member who's smart, obsessed with social, and has a track record of building audiences on LinkedIn.

Sound like you? Even if you're not sure you meet all the top criteria, check it out and apply here.

Other open roles on the Exit Five job board this week:

• Drivepoint is hiring a Demand Generation Manager.
• CLARA is hiring a Head of Product Marketing. Remote Role.
• OhMD is hiring a Demand Generation Marketer. $70-100k salary.
• Backbase B.V is hiring a Senior Director Demand Generation. Remote Role.
• HighByte is hiring a Demand Generation Manager.
  
  

See All Open Roles

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