2. Talk to customers, listen to Gong calls, become an expert on your buyer Having data is essential as a marketer, but knowing the customer as well as sales and success will accelerate your success. You’ll know the communities they hang out in, the events they attend, the problem your tool solves for them, what their goals are, etc. If you know what they actually care about, in their words, your messaging will land every time. You'll be a more successful marketer. You'll have a competitive edge on the marketers who are shooting from the hip, and it won't go unnoticed. 3. Manage up. The more of your boss’s job you can do the better. As a manager - the people that you want to invest time in… i.e. fight to give them raises, and work with again and again…are the ones who manage up and make your life easier. The bar for what good looks like here as an employee is incredibly straightforward:
- Do what you say you’re going to do, when you say you’re going to do it
- Ask yourself, how do my goals impact my boss’ goals, and how do I make sure I’m on top of those
- If your boss has to check in and ask what you’re working on, you’ve failed - they shouldn’t have to wonder. If you aren’t sure what you should be working on - initiate a convo to get on track
As a rule - if you feel like you’re being “micro-managed,” it means you’re not managing up well enough. The Motive by Patrick Lencioni is primarily about being a great CEO, but it taught me a lot about what a great employee-manager relationship should be like. It’s a healthy contact sport - an ongoing dialogue about what’s important, your progress toward your goals, and the ever-changing nature of these things. 4. Get good at internal marketing. If you can’t get the attention and respect of the people inside your company, you won’t be able to get it from customers. What I absolutely love about marketing is that itcanbe the hype center of the business, that gets everyone rallied around the company mission, goals, and success. New feature launch? Marketing can be the team that explains to the whole company why this feature is so sick and what it does for the end user. Same goes for customer case studies. Initiate celebrating those customer wins as a business. If your message falls flat internally, that’s a good sign it might need to be reworked. If you succeed here, the impact is immeasurable. Better employee evangelism on social, more buy-in to the mission, and pride in the results. LFG. 5. Figure out how to get things done. Doesn’t matter if it’s not your team, not your job, or there’s no budget. Excuses are like that eight letter word that rhymes with classhole. Everyone has one, and they’re never pretty. It’s easier to object than it is to get creative. Action and success in the face of imperfect circumstances is especially important today. But this doesn’t mean that perfection is required under all circumstances - managing expectations is part of this. No budget? All good. Here’s what we can do, and the outcomes we predict. Might not be as good as with the budget, but we can get 75% of the way there. Improving NRR as a marketer? Obviously I can’t own the end-to-end Customer Success function, but Icanbuild X program or campaign which will increase engagement across the user base, or improve onboarding, or surprise and delight. Don’t quit before you’ve tried. And don’t let the details get in the way of being creative, jumping in, and achieving something. |
