Unleash Possible: Recent Episodes
Samantha Stone
Unleash Possible: A Podcast for B2B Sales and Marketing Leaders is dedicated to sharing strategies and tactics that drive revenue for B2B companies. You’ll learn from the best sales and marketing leaders in the world as they share the revenue catalysts that create the biggest impact in their organizations.
Each episode features topics like: collaboration tools, go-to-market strategies, leadership principles, collaborative processes, building teams, improving communication, sales enablement, B2B sales and marketing alignment, marketing research, product marketing, buyer journey, account-based marketing (ABM), marketing attribution, and more.
Looking to add AI art generated images to your content strategy? Join Samantha and her guest, Frank Prendergast, Digital Strategist at Frank & Marci, as they discuss the latest AI technologies that can expand your image library.
A global pandemic has forced organizations to reimagine their traditional in-person events. Join Samantha and her guest, Belinda Joseph, Head of Events and Community at Goldcast, as they discuss how companies can reengineer their in-person events to accommodate both virtual and live events, providing each unique audience with engaging content along with a seamless shared experience.
The sales landscape has changed for both buyers and sellers. As sellers found themselves in a predominantly remote selling environment, they gained an exponential amount of data about their buyers in the process.
Join Samantha and her guest, Joel Stevenson, CEO of Yesware, as they talk about how the shift in sales processes, even before the pandemic, has had both positive and negative impacts and how both buying and selling teams can re-tool their strategies in this shifting landscape for maximum success.
An Unleash Possible return guest, David Merrman Scott, joins Samantha to talk about the latest edition of his best-selling book, New Rules of Marketing and PR. We discuss all the many things that have changed since the first edition of the book.
Whether you're in a workplace, dealing with clients and vendors, or simply meeting new people, addressing a person's pronouns are as important as saying their name correctly.
Join Samantha and her guest, Chris Whalen, Co-Chair of the Employee Advisory Group, called Superbia, which represents the LGBTQIA2S+ community within his organization, as they discuss the importance of personal pronouns and best practices for building an inclusive culture.
Becoming an author and publishing a book can be very fulfilling and it can be an excellent addition to your content strategy. But, it's important to identify why you're writing it; are you growing your business, leaving a legacy, or using it as a lead generation tool?
Join Samantha and her guest, Alinka Rutkowska, CEO of Leaders Press, as they discuss the process of book writing and the importance of identifying the right size, scope and market place for a book to be a successful marketing tool.
Your customers aren't product managers, but their feedback drives your product decisions. As you gather their valuable feedback and prioritize their requests, it's important to understand the “why” behind them.
Join Samantha and her guest, Matt Found, CEO of UserVoice, as they discuss the importance of gathering customer feedback from multiple sources for product management, and be able to answer the question of WHY customers ask for product enhancements, versus simply requesting feature upgrades.
Join Samantha and her guest, Deanna Ransom, President & Executive Director of Women in Revenue, as they discuss the current landscape of women in leadership roles, continuing the journey of diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace, and ultimately empowering women to advance their careers.
You have an idea. Now what? How do you operationalize your idea so that it resonates with your audience’s hearts and minds?
Join Samantha and her guest Tamsen Webster, Founder and Chief Message Strategist at Find the Red Thread, as they discuss her process for helping organizations find the connection that makes the invisible link between an audience's problem and the solution tangible, as well as actionable.
Hitting a brand plateau is not a failure, but an opportunity.
Join Samantha and her guest Evelyn Starr, author of Teenage Waste Brand, as they talk about adolescent growing pains brands experience over time, how to identify the symptoms, and practical ways to take your brand to the next level.
Join Samantha and her return guest, Sangram Vajre, Co-Founder at Terminus and author of his new book, MOVE: The 4-question Go-to-Market Framework, as they discuss the strategic, transformational and alignment questions companies need to ask to reveal next steps to propel their business forward and to build a go-to-market blueprint to level-up their organization for long-term success.
Employers have an ethical, legal and business obligation to address diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace. And, navigating these issues and legalities is extremely complicated, but necessary to fight exclusion and harassment in the workplace.
Join Samantha and her guest Rachel Gold, Attorney and Founder of Navigate Inclusion, as they tackle the legal aspects of inclusion and diversity in the workplace and the importance of putting processes in place before issues arise.
Is Artificial Intelligence a part of your content strategy? Can AI help improve your content and drive more qualified traffic?
Listen in with Samantha and her guest Jeffrey Coyle, Co-Founder and Chief Strategist at MarketMuse, as they talk about the intersection of content and AI.
Marketing content fuels multiple spaces in our customers' journey.
Join Samantha and her guest Erik Newton, VP of Marketing at Milestone, as they talk about the content conundrum, how to build better content that solves a problem and help grab a slice of the search pie.
Regardless of where your content marketing function lives within your organization, the success of that function is directly related to developing a solid narrative arc from which to develop multi-faceted marketing campaigns.
Join Samantha and her guest Tommy Walker, Founder at The Content Studio, as they discuss the pros and cons of content marketing as a silo within organizations, the challenges they face in defining their role within companies and the fundamental goal of creating a narrative arc from which to develop content.
Whether you're an MSP supporting clients, or an enterprise serving global users, product marketing is now, more than ever, a team sport.
Join Samantha and her guest William Toll, Head of Product Marketing at Acronis, as they discuss how marketing has shifted over the course of the past year and the importance of listening to our constituents as we help our customers and partners do better business.
As companies emerge from a work-from-home model, it's important to have a vision for what the future of work will look like, and how that vision will impact customer experiences.
Join Samantha and her guest Celia Fleischaker, CMO at Verint, as they discuss the importance of leveraging tools and technologies to improve and strengthen customer engagement.
Join Samantha and her guest Carla Johnson, Global Keynote Speaker and Author of her new book, RE: Think Innovation, as they talk about how to tie individual competence with innovation techniques to direct corporate outcomes and the framework she’s developed to look at the work that they do differently, and have a bigger impact on the people they serve.
Diversity and inclusion within organizations is not only important when hiring employees, but it's also important to embed into marketing processes, specifically in our writings and communications.
Join Samantha and her guest Taneasha White, Owner of TaneashaWhite.com, as they talk about the importance of implementing sensitivity reading into our marketing campaigns and communications and how to utilize appropriate language to reach target audiences.
People know people who look like them. So how do employers and potential employees navigate the recruiting process that is more diverse and inclusive to reach untapped networks?
Join Samantha and her guest Lucinda Duncalfe, Founder and CEO at Above Board, as they discuss the need to build a transparent marketplace for executive recruiting, building a diverse and inclusive workforce and ultimately changing the face of leadership within organizations.
The global pandemic and the resulting work-from-home model has allowed companies to extend their talent recruitment beyond traditional, often-times, regionalized boundaries, giving companies a bigger opportunity to recruit a more diversified workforce.
Join Samantha and her guest Natalie Gullatt, President and Founder of Black Marketers Association of America (BMAA), as they talk about the goal of her organization which is to bridge the socio-economic disparities African Americans face in the marketing space and to provide resources for companies to tap into the talent pool of black marketers.
The global pandemic stretched largely on-premise HR policies as office employees transitioned to a remote work environment. As companies transition back to a hybrid model, HR will play an instrumental role in adapting once again.
Join Samantha and her guest Kate Ferry, Talent Business Partner with Signant Health, as they discuss the HR lessons learned over the last year, how managers can sustain engagement in a hybrid work model, and what the landscape looks like recruiting new employees and developing the talents of existing employees moving forward.
The key to successful content creation is knowing your audience extremely well. Creating durable content is not about what you want to say, but about what your customers need.
Join Samantha and her guest Shondell Varcianna, Content Strategist, as they discuss the importance of having a clear definition of your target audience, developing content that resonates with that base and continually measuring the effectiveness of your message.
Join Samantha and her guest Mark Schaefer, author of his latest book Cumulative Advantage: How to Build Momentum for your Ideas, Business and Life Against All Odds, as they discuss new ideas to help us build the momentum needed to rise above competitive obstacles in business, in our careers and in our lives.
The pandemic has dramatically changed the way sales organizations operate and function in the marketplace. Traditionally thought of as an in-person, hand-to-hand sport, sales has now shifted to a virtual playing field.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest Jason Rushforth, SVP Americas for SugarCRM, as they discuss the shift in sales strategies caused by the pandemic, how to motivate your team virtually and how to be as flexible as possible with prospects and customers.
While companies focus on many different employee issues, such as diversity, inclusion and equality, one area that needs more attention, especially during these trying times of a pandemic, is the mental health of its employees.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest Lisa McLaughlin, who shares her personal experience with depression and bipolar disorder and how companies can build an environment that is more conscious and empathetic to the mental health of its employees.
Is your idea worthy of a book? Listen in with Samantha and her guest Anne Janzer, author of her latest book, Get the Word Out: Write a Book That Makes a Difference, as they discuss the art of book writing, how to crystallize your ideas, define the audience you want to serve with your message, and how to build confidence in your expertise and authority of the subject matter.
Exciting new research by Mathew Sweezey, Director of Market Strategy at Salesforce, explores the important question of what has changed in customer experience due to the global pandemic.
Listen in as Mathew shares his insights on how purchasing processes have shifted, causing marketers to shift GTM strategies from a broad focus to a much more narrow and deep mapping of our buyers' journey, and to clearly understand that customer experience is the method, and the outcome is the goal.
The pandemic has caused numerous changes within our organizations, as well as significant shifts in the stakeholders we serve. Changes in roles & responsibilities at the customer organizations we serve requires us to reevaluate our relationships and sometimes bring them back to the onboarding stage of their journey.
Join Samantha and her guest Rachel Krug, VP of Growth Operations at Business.com, as they discuss how the global pandemic has shifted business operations internally within our organizations and the importance of reevaluating customer relationships.
Businesses large and small have had to change and adapt their business models due to Covid. You may have found yourself with an all-remote workplace, experienced shifts in consumer expectations, or needed to market products online for the first time. Marketers have had to reprioritize in order to survive.
Join Samantha and her guest Rebecca Grimes, CMO at Ruby.com, as they discuss how a global pandemic has affected not only businesses, but the customers they serve and the importance of building empathy into decision-making.
Amidst COVID, the holidays present a challenge as we communicate and celebrate our customers and employees. Creating meaningful experiences that are authentic and relatable can foster genuine connections within the communities we serve.
Join Samantha and her guest MK Getler, Head of Marketing at Alyce, as they discuss how the context of community has shifted over the last several months and how to take advantage of opportunities to build connections that are personal and relatable.
The events industry was crippled by COVID-19. Fast forward six months, and we see companies getting back to work and finding new ways to engage audiences in live events that mimic face-to-face experiences.
Join Samantha and her guest Jon Ellms, EVP at Access TCA, as they discuss how companies are reimagining events, adding experiential components to entice and engage participants, and ultimately creating an event that will become an ongoing community experience.
Really great marketing ideas bloom from ad-hoc, in-person work environments we enjoyed before the pandemic. How do marketers continue to foster vibrant, spontaneous content creation remotely, while being sensitive to what's happening around the world?
Join Samantha and her guest Xenia Muntean, CEO & Co-Founder at Planable, as they discuss the challenges content marketers face working remotely and the importance of over-collaborating when developing content in the throws of a pandemic.
Marketers are storytellers. Successful messaging can be measured by how well the message aligns with the organization's core values and how well stakeholders can take those messages and make them their own.
Join Samantha and her guest Matthew Woodget, Founder & CEO at Go Narrative, as they discuss the importance storytelling plays in creating messaging success and practical storytelling techniques to apply to your brand, its value proposition and positioning.
Change introduces uncertainty. Now add in a global crisis to a corporate acquisition and you have uncertainty of seismic proportions.
Join Samantha and her guest Daniel Incandela, CMO at Conga, as they recap Conga's acquisition journey occurring right in the middle of a worldwide pandemic, and how they navigated these times of uncertainty with empathy and transparency for both their employees and customers.
In order to adapt our marketing strategies and messaging faster and more cleanly, the foundation of our world view needs to be solid. Marketing that's rooted in our strengths will deliver messages that will resonate for the long-term.
Join Samantha and her guest Tamsen Webster, Founder and Chief Message Strategist at Find the Red Thread, as they discuss the importance of defining your red thread and how it will allow you to put anything new thrown at your business and put it in context of your strengths.
There are many different types of intent data that provide insights into our customers’ buying journey.
Join Samantha and her guest David Crane, VP of Product Marketing at Intentsify.io, as they discuss the importance of intent data and how it can be used to find efficiencies within our sales organizations.
Re-engaging your customers after a temporary hiatus due to the pandemic is more than just adjusting your messaging. It must include a careful re-evaluation of customer needs in the context of big change.
Join Samantha and her guest Patrick Tripp, SVP of Product Marketing at Cheetah Digital, as they talk about fresh and interactive ways to develop content to better engage customers.
Operating remotely has forced us to reestablish the relationships we have with our co-workers, as well as our customers. One bright spot amidst the craziness is that, for the most part, people have become more empathetic towards each other.
Join Samantha and her guest Kyle Lacy, CMO at Lessonly, as they talk about rebuilding cultural connections and the importance of having empathy in marketing in general, not just during a crisis.
In-person collaboration tools we've come to know, such as white boards, small group discussions, even body language cues, tell us if our audience is engaged or not, but may not always available to us.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest Kristan Rodriguez, Author of "Universally Designed Leadership", as they discuss tips and techniques to successfully work collaboratively in a virtual setting and how to utilize technology to maximize participant engagement, all while taking into consideration different learning styles of our audiences.
Starting a small business and sustaining it is difficult for most. It takes grit, hard work, and a little bit of luck!
Join Samantha and her guest Myoshia Boykin-Anderson, Founder of AndTech Solutions, as they discuss Myoshia's journey as a self-made business woman, the lessons she has learned along the way, and how she fosters a diverse work environment for employees to thrive and succeed.
Marketing and social movements have collided like never before. How do we pivot our marketing strategies amongst these global narratives in a way that is genuine and authentic, and not be seen as pandering or offering empty promises?
Join Samantha and her guest Katie Martell, Author of “Trust Me, B2B”, and soon-to-be-released documentary, “Pandermonium”, as they dive into the risks of performative allyship and what organizations must do to successfully align with social movements.
Marketing ads and communications should always be designed to serve our audience. But how do we adjust the tone of our messaging with so many issues going on in our world today?
Join Samantha and her guest Kwame DeRoche, Executive Director of KwamWrites Creative, as they discuss the importance of honing our messaging to be more thoughtful, considerate, and empathetic to the needs of our customers in times of crisis, and to remember that our best work happens when we engage multiple kinds of thinkers within our organizations.
Rethinking our communications strategies is imperative in the current climate set by a world-wide pandemic and social injustices happening globally. What are the right and wrong ways to navigate these crucial times with our customers and how will our voice impact our relationships with them?
Join Samantha and her guest Abby Borden, Customer Experience Expert at Cordial, as they discuss the nuances of getting our marketing messages right in the midst of difficult days in our society, setting expectations with our customers, and over-indexing on empathy.
Direct mail marketing strategies are shifting as many customers and prospects are working from home due to COVID-19.
Join Samantha and her guest Greg Segall, CEO at Alyce, as they discuss in detail how personal gifting can shift your direct mail strategy to a personal and relatable marketing effort, and what are best practices to reach customers while respecting their privacy and personal data.
During our healthcare crisis, it doesn't matter what kind of business you have, everyone is being affected. In particular, small business owners are facing difficult challenges and are looking for guidance on how to adapt and survive in these uncertain times.
Join Samantha and her guest David Fionda, host of Biz Breakthrough Network, as they discuss how the network is providing expert solutions for COVID-19 business challenges and how they are providing a helpful forum for business owners to find answers to common questions.
In this continued time of crisis, companies large and small are faced with making difficult decisions about their employees, their brand, and their customers. Many of these decisions test their core beliefs and business ethics in a way never imagined.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest Paul Hargreaves, author of “Forces for Good”, as they discuss ways to embrace this disruption with empathy and how to be a better corporate citizen.
No amount of planning could fully prepare us for a global pandemic like we are experiencing right now. COVID-19 abruptly threw millions of workers into remote work environments. How should managers help their employees through the transition?
Join Samantha and her guest Mari Anne Snow, Founder & CEO of RemoteNation, as they discuss the challenges companies and employees are facing in a mandated work from home environment, some helpful tips for working remotely, and important considerations companies must take into account to thrive.
We are excited to be speaking with Mathew Sweezey, author of "The Context Marketing Revolution", which hits bookstores today! Listen in as Mathew describes our new world of infinite media created by consumers and ordinary people alike, and why conventional marketing models employed to reach these buyers have become obsolete.
Marketing Automation tools can have a significant impact on how we execute campaigns, but only a fraction of functionality is being utilized, what’s holding companies back?
Join Samantha and her guest Casey Cheshire, author of a new book called Marketing Automation Unleashed, as they discuss the importance of having a roadmap when it comes to marketing automation, and why testing and measuring our marketing efforts is critical in defining ROI.
Samantha is excited to be speaking with James Carbary, Founder of Sweetfish Media, a favorite repeat guest, and the author of a new book called Content-Based Networking. In his book, James tackles the question of 'How can I create life-changing relationships on demand?' and outlines his winning formula for personal collaboration that leads to impactful business relationships.
Communication is key, but distractions are a reality. How do we hone the soft skills of human interaction, psychology, and intention to stay focused on the tasks at hand and get the results we’re looking for?
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Martin Stellar, as they talk about Martin's intriguing journey from being a monk for 12 years, and how his introspection and life of solitude taught him valuable lessons about life, people, and sales that can be applied to all organizations.
There are two sides to the review coin. Buyers are relying more on reviews to fill the gaps in their data-gathering efforts when it comes to decision-making. On the flip-side, vendors are relying on reviews to build trust with their customers and influence future buyers.
Join Samantha and her guest, Emily Sue Tomac, Research Manager at TrustRadius, as they discuss the critical role reviews are playing for both buyers and vendors and how reviews help cement trust between the two.
Samantha is thrilled to be speaking with David Meerman Scott, leading business growth strategist and the author of a new book called Fanocracy, which launches today! A huge fan of the Grateful Dead and avid concert-goer, David's own fan experience gave life to his book which talks about the importance of building fans, influencers, and evangelists around your company brand, but more importantly, the real neuroscience behind why fandom works.
Listen in to hear about David's fascinating research, conducted with researcher and co-author Reiko Scott, as they apply fan strategies for all organizations, big and small, and talk about how to harness the force of fandom to revolutionize any business.
In this age of digital, it's imperative to continue to hone our people skills to build credibility, trust, and rapport with buyers.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Chad Sanderson, Managing Partner of ValueSelling Associates, as they talk about building a sales framework around trust, not activity.
Chat has been around a long time, but we're now seeing a greater adoption and use within B2B. Chat is evolving into a new form of search and a great way to deliver content to our customers.
Join Samantha and her guest, Ankesh Kumar, Founder of Let's Chat, as they discuss the role AI and ChatBots play in complex buying processes and how to integrate this technology to increase and sustain buyer engagement.
The intent data market is maturing at a fast pace and is an excellent source of customer intelligence. As the adoption and rollout of intent data becomes more prevalent, it's important for marketers to integrate these signals across other behavior channels to develop actionable marketing and sales strategies.
Join Samantha and her guest, Andrew Gaffney, Content Director for B2B MX and Demand Gen Report, as they discuss the findings of a new intent data research study, the role intent data plays in planning, budgeting, and in truly understanding our buyer’s journey.
Knowing exactly when someone is interested in buying your product or service, right then, right now, is important. But it's equally critical to understand where your buyers are in their purchasing journey, but who the buyer is, what role they play in their organization, and to create actionable marketing plans based on all buying signals.
Join Samantha and her guest, Tukan Das, CEO of LeadSift, as they dive into the topic of purchasing intent, the importance of combining buying signals with historical data, and how to plan strategically for future buyer engagement.
Join Samantha and her guest, Rich Brooks, Founder of Agents of Change, the podcast and annual digital marketing conference, as they talk about their experiences as founders, how they attract and retain customers, and the importance of understanding patterns and trends within their businesses to help plan for the future.
If your employees aren't brand advocates, how can we expect anyone else to amplify our messages.
Join Samantha and her guest, Charlie Riley, Director of Marketing at Curbell Plastics, as they discuss best practices for leveraging one of your biggest assets, your employees, to generate greater brand awareness.
Technology tools, such as marketing automation, are still very important to marketers, but they don't seem to be evolving into the human side of successful marketing strategies.
Join Samantha and her guest, Justin Keller, VP of Marketing at Sigstr, as they talk about how the role of technology in marketing is evolving and the importance of humanizing our customer experiences relative to technology.
The importance of having a fully aligned team cannot be overstated. Building and nurturing a team based on trust and transparency, with clear goals and objectives, will result in increased productivity, accountability, and greater visibility throughout the organization.
Join Samantha and her guest, Jasmine Martirossian, VP of Marketing at TUV SUD as they discuss best practices to functionally align teams and how trust leads to innovation.
A buyer's purchase intent is a critical signal for understanding where your customers are in their buying journey. These insights not only can tell you a buyer's propensity to purchase, but also they can accurately focus your marketing efforts where it will drive the most impact.
Join Samantha and her guest, John Steinert, CMO at TechTarget, as they discuss the importance of using purchase intent data to build long-term relationships with your customers and how to operationalize buyer's purchasing signals into targetable and actionable marketing plans.
Bridging the communication gap between your data analytics team and your marketing team will get you closer to making sound business decisions and help determine the best places to invest your marketing dollars. Serious data analysis, like multi-variant regression testing, can provide impactful, long-term decision making opportunities, but for many companies, it would take a roomful of Phd's to understand it.
Samantha and her guest, Christopher Engman, CRO and CMO of Proof Analytics explore the complexities of data, regression testing, marketing mixed modeling and discuss what best practices can be implemented to make solid marketing decisions.
Corporate sales cultures have well-defined stereotypes of what they believe make up a good sales person, and train them accordingly. But one quality most left out is emotional intelligence the ability to know yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and to adapt to the communication styles of others.
Samantha and her guest, Liz Simpson, Founder of Stimulyst, discuss how to break the barriers to traditional sales training and to teach salespeople to embrace what makes them strong instead of adhering to textbook sales tactics that sometimes fail.
Like the old saying, "If you don’t know where you're going, any road will get you there." Same is true for marketing strategies. It's not about the to-do lists, tactics, or execution, but tying those activities back to the fundamental strategy that paves the road to success.
Samantha and her guest, Mike Mooney, Senior Marketing Director at Thrive TRM, discuss marketing strategies at multiple levels of a company's business lifecycle and what really matters for growth and success.
In B2B, it's critical to understand how buyers consume information digitally, and how we must align our sales and marketing strategies accordingly. Building a sales strategy, with a marketing mindset, that helps customers solve their problems is critical for long-term growth and success.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Todd Hockenberry, Author and Founder of Top Line Results, as they discuss the importance of being attuned to your customers' entire buying experience and how customers buy online directly impacts your sales and marketing strategy.
Over-scripting our conversations is definitely not the way to go if we want to generate a dialogue that's authentic and real. Genuine, human conversations that can get to the soft knowledge of the person we're speaking with will open up the dialogue to real quality thinking and application.
Join Samantha and her guest, Kerry Gorgone, host of the Marketing Smarts and Punch Out with Katie and Kerry podcasts, as they talk about the importance of getting to the human side of conversations.
Fundamentally, what your customers say about you is your brand. Therefore, it's imperative to build your product strategy with an integrated product & content marketing team who are directly aligned with sales, your eyes and ears on what your customers are saying about you.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Alex Kevork, Global Vice President, Integrated Segment and Product Marketing Strategy at Monster, as they discuss the importance of having strategic product strategies, especially in environments with diverse audience expectations.
Content and product marketing play critical roles in attracting and retaining the right type of buyer for your products and services. But, as content marketing has grown as a marketing discipline, many aren't sure where the line should be drawn between the two.
Listen in as Samantha and her guest, Karo Sadowicz, Director of Customer and Product Marketing at SnapApp, as they discuss the importance both marketing roles play in building lifetime value for your customers and how each touches so many facets of your organization.
ABM has come a long way in a few short years. When it began, some considered it a customer acquisition-only strategy. Organizations are now seeing the real value of AMB, applying it to key accounts in their pipelines and growing their businesses through product expansion. All in the spirit of transparency and building customer trust.
Samantha welcomes back, Sangram Vajre, Founder of Terminus and author of a new book, ABM is B2B, as they discuss the shifts and transitions that have happened in ABM.
Win/loss analysis provides a rich understanding of your product, your market, and your buyer's processes. Building a win/loss program that produces honest and actionable data on a regular basis is key to adjusting your sales and marketing strategies.
Join Samantha and her guest, Ryan Sorley, Founder of DoubleCheck Research, as they discuss best practices to build a strong win/loss program for your organization. It just might improve the relationship between sales and marketing along the way.
Join Samantha and her guest, James Carbary, Founder of Sweetfish Media, as they discuss practical ways to include audio content into your marketing portfolio and how podcasting may be the right fit to grow your business. You might be surprised how effective it can be at initiating a business relationship.
Quantitative data about our buyers gives us attributable metrics for our sales and marketing plans, but beyond those demographics is the human side of the buyer that defines their desires and motivations which affect the buyer's journey.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Claudine Bianchi, Chief Marketing Officer at Zoovu, as they discuss the importance of getting to know the human side of your customers, the role AI will play in building personas, and the importance of building lifetime customer value.
Marketers spend most of their time compiling quantitative data needed to make all kinds of marketing decisions. But what is increasingly overlooked is the value and importance that qualitative research plays in the way we market our products & services, and the role it plays in building emotional, lasting relationships with buyers.
Join Samantha and her guest, Deb Biggar, Founder of Boston Human Factors, as they discuss truly valuable qualitative research processes to improve customer experience.
There seems to be a missing "P" in our sales mentality. We have a firm grip on our product, its features and price, but closing deals requires building trust and a more personal approach. Adjusting our sales training to incorporate an authentic personal experience for our clients is the key to successful salespeople.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Dale Dupree, Founder of The Sales Rebellion, as they put "the personal" back into sales.
The key to engaging customers in this crowded, noisy world, is reaching them with meaningful marketing. Customers are more likely to engage with your product or service if the marketing you’re delivering is relevant and valuable.
Join Samantha and her guest, Jon Miller, CEO & Co-Founder of Engagio, as they connect the dots between meaningful marketing and ABM.
It doesn’t seem to matter what business you are in, there’s often an underlying tension between sales and marketing. The disconnect is often fostered by the different ways each is compensated, measured and perceived.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Mark Servati, VP of Sales at Bluecore, as they discuss ways to bridge the gap between sales and marketing for the greater good of the company - and your buyer.
You don't have to look far to find evidence of hustle culture pressure. In his new book, the author of "The UnAmerican Dream", proposes a better path. Join Carlos Hidalgo and Samantha as they talk about the challenges of growing a business without sacrificing it all.
How do we build, structure, and organize SDR teams to be most successful? Should SDR's report to sales, or should they report to marketing? We answer these and more questions in our quest to cultivate sales and marketing acting as one cohesive team.
Listen in with Samantha and her guest, Tracy Eiler, author of "Align to Achieve", and CMO at InsideView Technologies, as they discuss sales and marketing alignment and how to make the SDR function successful for the long term.
With the (over) abundance of tools, resources, and technologies available to salespeople today, it seems that sales is becoming more science, than art. But, no matter how many tools and technologies we throw at sales, it's still about quality engagement with the buyer.
Listen in with Samantha and Max Altschuler, author of Sales Engagement: How The World's Fastest Growing Companies are Modernizing Sales Through Humanization at Scale,and Marketing Director at Outreach.io, as they discuss and analyze the importance of modernizing sales through humanization, and equipping sales people with the people skills necessary to engage, connect, and grab the attention of their buyers.
It's unclear when and how the disconnect between sales and marketing happened, but it is almost ubiquitous in every organization. One common thread is clear, not nearly enough time is spent between the two organizations.
Join Samantha and Scott Ingram, Account Director at Relationship One, as they sift through the falsehoods and misperceptions that plague sales and marketing teams and find ways to bridge the gap between the two.
A goal most sales and marketing executives share is to get face-to-face earlier and more often with their prospects and customers. One way to achieve that when you can't be in the same room is to add video to your communications.
Listen in with Samantha and Ethan Beute, Vice President of Marketing at BombBomb, as they discuss how video can help build trusted relationships with people we market and sell to.
Do sleek and sexy marketing campaigns ensure success at reaching your target audience? Not unless those campaigns are rooted in a true and honest assessment of the target customer, their buying behaviors, and the fundamental “why” of your product and business.
Join Meghan VanSpriell, Managing Director of Nytro Marketing, and our host Samantha, as they translate the equation of internal customer data to external marketing campaigns.
Leaders are not only responsible for improvement of a company's bottom line and business performance, but they are also responsible for bringing teams together that have diverse opinions and experiences. Successful leaders navigate diversity to bring their team to consensus and better decision making.
Join Lucinda Duncalfe, and our host Samantha, as they discuss the role leaders play and the importance of team-building and driving consensus.
With buyer trust at an all-time low, it is imperative that vendors embrace customer reviews that are true, authentic, and transparent. However, that means vendors must come to grips with all review types; the good, the bad and yes, even the ugly. Buyers want to understand the pros, as well as the cons, of your product or service, so the more honest your reviews, the greater the trust.
Join Vinay Bhagat, Founder & CEO of TrustRadius, and our host Samantha as they discuss the importance of customer reviews, not only for your company’s reputation, but how they can be used as an asset for your sales and marketing efforts.
Account based marketing approaches can have massive impact on your sales efforts, but there can also be a number of missteps along the way. What can you expect from ABM in the short term and how do you avoid missing early expectations?
Join Derek Slayton, Chief Marketing Officer at Terminus, and our host Samantha as they discuss ABM practices that ensure long term success for both sales and marketing.
As your new business takes off and you're in the weeds of startup mode, the next thing you know 10 years has gone by, and you're not a startup anymore. What makes your startup different from others that have not been so fortunate? What's the secret to building a durable, sustainable business?
Listen in as Jay Tokosch, Founder and CEO of Core-apps, talks about why his company is thriving and how his vision for the company has changed over time.
Canned call scripts and email templates may make your B2B sales & marketing teams more efficient, but what gets lost and overlooked is their ability to personalize and humanize interactions. Companies lose sight of the fact that they are marketing and selling to individuals, who make decisions based on human interactions.
Join Carlos Hidalgo and Samantha as they dissect the challenges surrounding this age-old dilemma and how to manage the changes necessary to make B2B more human.
Deciding to build a channel partner program is not the easy way out when it comes to selling your product. Channel programs need as much "tender loving marketing" as your own salesforce, if not more!
Join Louis Gudema, author of "Bulleseye Marketing", as we explore what it takes to make a channel partner program a success, and when it's the right time to scale it within your sales efforts.
Successful brands need to be authentic, genuine, and true to the purpose behind the brand.
In this episode, Greg Perotto, VP of Brand & Communications at HootSuite, discusses the importance of having a compelling purpose combined with a compelling point of view that aligns your brand with your company culture, its employees, and your customers.
Building a successful Account Based Marketing (ABM) strategy requires an honest, true view of customer data.
Eric Newell, VP ABM & Demand Generation at MeritDirect, describes his experiences aligning his company's and his client's ABM strategy to build a solid ABM roadmap.
With ABM in his job title, Eric's got the answers when it comes to better ABM in 2019.
Doing more with less has been a budgetary issue since the beginning of budgets. Nowhere is this more true than corporate travel.
Tahnee Perry, Vice President of Marketing at Deem, Inc., enjoys conversations about travel, a field she has been deeply involved in for many years.
Marketing Deem sometimes means Tahnee finds answers even before potential customers and clients are asking the questions.
In marketing we need to care what works for us and our clients. It is easy to find something that works well enough and put everything on auto-pilot, but it could cost us our ability to excel.
Jay Acunzo, Author of Break the Wheel and Founder of Unthinkable Media, encourages us to break the cycle of best practices. There is a difference between good and great that starts with a level of self-awareness most people are prone to ignore.
As marketers, we are no longer tasked with acquiring attention, but have a new mandate: Holding it.
The future of marketing present amazing opportunities. As an industry, we waste a lot of interactions, but AI represents an opportunity to change that!
On this episode, Mark Floisand, CMO at Coveo, tells us about how data can be our ally in an attempt to complete the work that can no longer successfully done by hand.
What would it look like if we could develop meaningful interaction virtually and save precious time to dedicate to other endeavors?
The 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer indicates that the U.S. has seen the largest decline in trust across every major institution since its inception 18 years ago.
In this episode, Katie Martell, Executive Director at Boston Content and on-demand marketing strategist, addresses the implications of a declining trust amongst everyday Americans and the role of marketers in fixing the problem.
Our customer base does not know who to trust. The notion of responsibility notwithstanding, we have a great opportunity set before us if we dedicate resources to rebuilding trust.
The education system presents its own unique and important challenges for marketers who hope to succeed in a closed market.
Marc Rubner is the Vice President, Product Management and Marketing, Community Engagement and Campus Enablement at Blackboard, the largest technology education company in the world.
With over 6,500 clients, Marc and Blackboard have a proven track record of smart investment and fantastic timing!
In this episode, Marc covers some critical strategies for the success of SAS and Cloud based systems in the EdTech world.
At the center of every product marketing strategy is a core set of principles, pillars that guide the way we organize and innovate within the framework of our product launches.
In this episode, Diego Lomanto, Vice President, Product Marketing at UiPath, talks about the exponential growth in his company since transitioning to a product driven business.
Diego outlines the seven pillars he uses to guide team development that address some of the biggest challenges in product marketing.
Marketing begins with the outcome. Collecting and using data properly is at the core of achieving client goals.
In this episode, Judd Marcello, CMO of Cheetah Digital, talks about building a brand that inspires trust, not just from customers but from company employees.
The path to this new kind of loyalty comes through understanding what customers hope to achieve and making their business outcomes your business outcomes.
Account Based Marketing is a strategy, not a tool or technique.
Sangram Vajre, Chief Evangelist and Co-Founder of Terminus and Host of the daily #FlipMyFunnel podcast, likes to think about ABM as a symphony where marketers create beautiful music by directing the musicians.
Why is it important? And what conversations are marketers having now about the implementation and use of ABM?
What is it about you that is distinct; that stand out?
How do you incorporate this into your brand?
On this episode Tsufit, Author of Step Into The Spotlight and keynote speaker, singer, songwriter, lawyer, and coach to name a few, speaks with me about the necessity of creating collaborative spaces and a distinct marketing personality.
She says that many people feel there is nothing about them that other find interesting, but every time she interviews someone new there is always something!
Email continues to be an important and strategic form of communication. There are more and more people coming online every day, and these people are going to have emails. The number of emails being sent each year is growing. In this episode, Daniel Incandela, CMO at Return Path, tells us about how email still remains a high performing ROI channel for marketers to use if they will use it in a smart way. Hitting the inbox instead of the spam folder and having success with your email marketing campaign is all about providing value to your potential client.
Delivering quality content is an endless cycle. Content engines must be able to consistently produce actionable and relevant content. Refining and organizing the data into easily consumable presentations is a time intensive and difficult task.
Jessie Coan, VP of marketing at Aberdeen, is an editorial content machine and was integral in helping the company navigate a very interesting and important brand transformation over the past several months.
In this episode we talk with Jessie about the role she played in the transition, how she manages to get everything finished, and some ways she and her team at have shifted their focus within the marketsphere.
When trying to market a product or service that is new, there are unique challenges that must be addressed, including the burden of helping others understand the need for this new approach.
Joe Vacca, CMO and EVP of Strategy Innovation at Revature, heads up a unique model in the marketplace that has prompted tens of thousands of recent IT college graduates to seek training in their system. However, even in a market with great need for the software developers Revature trains, businesses can remain risk averse when it comes to hiring new talent.
In this episode, Joe tells us about some of the issues his team has faced in implementing this new model and how they work through the issues to benefit everyone.
In this episode Samantha talks with Len Herstein, CEO of Managecamp and volunteer Sheriff Deputy, about how he blends his worlds of professional marketing and law enforcement passion work. Even though our worlds can often seem unrelated, our experiences teach us lessons and skills that are integral for our overall success.
Knowledge is not power. Alone, it just is not enough.
Instead it should be said - if knowledge does not come to you, then your company will be powerless.
In this episode Samantha speaks with Sunny Manivanna, VP of Marketing at Guru, about how the last mile of content delivery and knowledge transfer will either make or break your marketing and sales team.
In other words, If knowledge does not come to where your company is, (if enterprise knowledge has to be searched for on the web), then you will not be able to effectively and consistently deliver great experiences for your customers.
If you leave it up to the client, they will just underutilize your product.
Why? Their unexpressed interests keep them from knowing what to do with what you are selling—especially in cloud software.
In this episode Samantha speaks with Brian Gilman, VP of Product Marketing at Vonage, about how to find the differentiation in our project, to really dig deep in these use cases, and discover ways to build strategic stickiness and adoption of the product—not just sales of the product.
It all boils down to storytelling, to asking your client whether they have thought about what the full implementation of your product will do for their unexpressed interests.
There are a lot of different puzzle pieces involved in a go to market strategy.
One of the most important ones is building excitement for your team!
Mike Kaplan is the VP of Marketing at ENGIE Insight and he has spent years helping companies unite around common goals they can be excited about when bringing a new product or service to market. This starts with planning well ahead of time - Mike is already thinking about 2019!
In this episode of Unleash Possible, we sit down with Mike to hear about ENGIE, nurturing relationships and excitement, and learning from failure.
Selling is simple, in concept.
Just understand your buyer, and you should be well on your way.
But how do you really understand what makes potential customers tick? What influencing factors will play into them making financial decisions that happen to include what you offer? How do you determine if your product or service is even the best for this client?
Shane Lennon—the Chief Marketing Officer at Digital CMO—has faced these tough questions before and has come up with some methods for mapping the factors that influence customer decisions.
In this one Samantha chats with Christine Rimer, VP of Product Marketing and Voice of Customer, Survey Monkey to talk about how the customer experience and securing their trust instilled directly relates to product marketing.
Sales and marketing teams often run each other ragged.
They can clash on even the simplest things, from the physical proximity of different team members to the definition of metrics. They can even disagree on what defines a lead. If you do not address the issue, even the smallest disputes open large divides that prevent a business from succeeding at this basic level.
Connie Stack—Chief Marketing Officer at Digital Guardian—has some experience addressing these conflicts and aligning the goals of sales and marketing organizations. We were fortunate enough to have her on the Unleash Possible show to discuss some of her methods.
It is easy to see the benefits of Account Based Marketing once it is up and running, but starting from scratch is a difficult task.
Brian Kardon, the CMO at Fuze, has seen his team improve their win and increase their average deal size by 40% through utilizing ABM, but these successes did not happen overnight.
In this episode of Unleash Possible, Brian explains getting sales & marketing on the same page, how his team narrowed down their list of target accounts, and the overall strategic importance of Account Based Marketing.
ABM is modern B2B marketing - multiple people selling, multiple people buying over a long period of time. Successful marketing requires both a great strategy and exceptional patience.
In this episode, Sarah DeRocher Moore, VP of Brand and Revenue Marketing at Spredfast talks with us about account based marketing. Spredfast itself is an enterprise software company that makes social media solutions for global enterprises, helping them use social as the channel where they connect with their consumers.
With over two decades of experience and a leader at one of the top companies in their space, Sarah is perfectly suited to talk to us about the challenges involved in a constantly changing marketing reality and how to prepare your team for ongoing success.
Pulling off a big event for your company is far from easy. Just ask Morgan Santapaola who heads up the Growth Acceleration Summit for Zoominfo.
Morgan and her team put in a ton of work behind the scenes to book the right speakers, satisfy the attendees, provide their salespeople with the tools to sell the event, and bring in revenue for the company.
Sound like a lot? It is! But there is a reason this is a successful event.
In this episode of Unleash Possible, Morgan lets us in on how she deals with the challenges and reaps the rewards of hosting a large event.
To learn more about the summit, visit events.zoominfo.com and use STONE18 promo code for 50% off the conference!
Content marketing is a strategic and commercial activity in businesses, not just something reserved for marketers. It is potentially the thing that can light the fire under sales.
On this episode, Chris Marr, the founder of Content Marketing Academy, a membership organization for marketing pros and entrepreneurs who want to better understand and utilize content marketing, breaks down some content marketing key components and misconceptions.
Content marketing plays an ever increasing role in the way people make educated buying decisions.
Samantha Stone is the author of Unleash Possible and the Founder of the Marketing Advisory Network. And as if she didn’t have enough on her plate already, along with being a mother of four children, she is starting a podcast!
Samantha loves to learn and is insatiably curious. She is constantly attending events, taking classes, and talking to thought leaders in her industry all in the name of learning more and more. What better way to structure her education and share what she’s learning with others than by starting the Unleash Possible Podcast?
You can expect two things in every episode of the show: 1) honest conversations 2) practical application on how to put these principles you learn into action.
Stay tuned for more; it’s just getting started!