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Digital Banter

Author: Andy Groller and James Kravic

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It’s time to cut through the bullshit. Don’t be another marketer hyper-focused on fulfilling vanity metrics, in turn losing sight of your bottom line. Join co-hosts Andy Groller & James Kravic as they dive into the latest trends across digital marketing & paid media. Join weekly to find out what marketing strategies & tactics are driving REAL results and revenue.
62 Episodes
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In this week's episode of Digital Banter' we engage in an eye-opening conversation with the award-winning creative director, Kevin Rapp. Together, we explore the world of B2B creative and how it often falls into the trap of being dull and overly logical, focusing more on selling to companies than connecting with people. We'll challenge the notion of treating B2B audiences as robotic LinkedIn users and delve deep into the emotional side of B2B advertising.But that's not all. We understand that creative development can be costly, which is why Kevin Rapp shares his winning strategy for crafting cost-effective content systems. These systems are built around the concept of creating content that's not just a one-time use but can be repurposed and reimagined repeatedly. 
In a rapidly evolving B2B landscape where skepticism toward traditional marketing tactics is at an all-time high, a powerful shift is taking place. In this week's episode, we dive into how marketers are winning by adopting a people-first approach.The buyer's journey is changing. Trust in corporate brands is waning, but people still trust people. Nick and Mark, seasoned experts in people-first strategies, unravel the secrets behind building authentic, trust-driven connections.Additionally, in this week's episode, we are thrilled to announce our new partnership with Nick & Mark. We're embarking on an exciting content series together called "The People-First Playbook." In this live show, we'll assist brands in constructing people-first integrated marketing campaigns from the ground up!If you have a campaign in the pipeline, whether it's a product launch or a new piece of pillar content, don't hesitate to reach out to us! We'd be thrilled to feature your campaign on the show and help you transform your strategy into a people-first approach.Tune in and be part of this dynamic journey toward crafting marketing strategies that prioritize people above all else!
In this week's episode of Digital Banter, top digital marketing voice Tas Bober joins us as we discuss her transition from in-house roles to the agency dark side. Having experienced both perspectives, Tas shares a plethora of insights on how to build effective agency partnerships that drive actual business results.
Building brand trust is one of the most difficult things to do in marketing.  The reality is, customers know where and when they are trying to be sold to.  People trust people, not brands.So how do brands create messaging that is believable & not bias.  Well it comes down to delivering actual value without asking for anything in return.Check out this week's podcast as we dive deep into how to build trust and what makes someone trust a brand.
Brand is the intangible sum of a businesses attributes. Its not just your colors or logo. Its about the human to human connection that you create with all those you come in contact with. Once you have built that connection, you have something special and your brand then becomes owned by the people.In this week's episode we invited Kyle Duford, the President and Executive Creative Director of The Brand Leader, to talk about the importance of Brand. We dive into topics such as:Building an emotional connection with your customersThe foundation behind the logos & colorsMaintenance &  evolution over timeTune in! This was a great one.
In this episode, we tackle a major challenge faced by companies: the narrow focus on revenue-based metrics like CAC/LTV ratios and pipeline. While these metrics are important, they don't tell the whole story of a company's demand generation efforts. The real story lies in the leading indicators that drive these bottom-line results.Join us as we explore the key metrics that can give you a better understanding of the impact of your demand gen efforts and help set your brand on a path to long-term growth. From measuring the quality of reach and traffic to tracking up-funnel conversions, we'll break down what metrics really matter and how to apply them in your own strategy.
It grinds our gears that brands are always looking to cut costs and force as much of their budget into media dollars as possible.  We see them cutting tech, creative & agencies.  But cutting from the wrong area can be detrimental to the efficiency of your media budget. Its ok to pull from media spend and keep the tools you need. Here is some food for thought as you are looking at being more efficient with your spending: Don't cut creative: Regular creative testing and refreshes is super important!  You cannot scale campaigns without scaling creative.  Creative fatigue leads to less efficiency.  Its worth spending less on media to have adequate creative3rd Party Data providers are helpful:  In B2B its almost impossible to reach your customers outside of LinkedIn & paid search without a data provider/audience tool.  The separate line item for data is important. Trust me.  Also, Dear Finance Folks... you can either pay for good data... or have those data fees hidden within google & Facebook where you can pay 3x for the audience and then 100x for the poor performance.  You choose.Measurement tech drives efficiency:  If you are running on more than 3 channels, its time to graduate from Google Analytics.  GA4 sucks anyways.  If you or your agency can't improve results by the 3% of media you are spending on tech.. well that's a bigger problem.  Being informed, helps drive efficiency.You get what you pay for with agencies: If you want to run performance max campaigns on autopilot and not give a crap about lead quality... /rant.
Yearly planning is hopefully over at this point for most companies.  Now what do you have to to do turn that plan into action?  Most companies really struggle and things don't seem to get moving until Q2 or sometimes even later. This weeks episode we talk through how to get shit moving, and its easier than you may think. At least on paper.  It come down to alignment & ownership.  Here are 4 things you need to know:1) Create team alignment on goals +KPIs. (Duh).. but the reality is this should be done already.  Drive revenue.. lets go!2) Understand the trickle down of measurement and how to report up to a larger goal.  Revenue is the goal -> what is your contribution?3) Prioritize Effort vs Impact.  Place your bets, and lets get the show on the road.4) Work in parallel paths.  In order to do this you need to have trust and ownership. This is why unmotivated team members and micromanagers simply don't work.
B2B is known for creative that is literally the worst.  Stunning pictures of Digital E-Books, that you can be so lucky to have if you would just provide your business email address.B2B companies will spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a few pieces of creative that simply don't get your message across, drive crappy MQLs and don't make an impact.Here are 3 takeaways for better b2b creative.1) Every good story has a hero.  Build a hero into your story and show off how they win.2) B2B buyers are people.  People buy with emotions & justify with logic.  Your messaging should first trigger an emotional response, then you can support with data.3) Fail Fast + Test & Learn.  Hard truth in this is that you need to invest more in creative.  Don't be afraid to pull back media dollars to invest more in creative.
Historically, our good friends in sales have believed that the purpose of marketing is for us to provide materials for them so that they an be better at sales.  As marketers, we have actually relied on sales to do marketing.In recent years, B2B buying has fundamentally changed.  B2B buyers want to buy on their own terms in the same way they would purchase any other product.  Aka.. they will reach out when they are ready.This means that we as marketers need to make resources more regularly available to buyers before they come in contact with sales.In this podcast we jump into the specifics of how to repurpose common content pieces typically used by sales to drive demand.
Well, we often talk about how we are tired of seeing marketers boil their efforts down to "high yield" demand capture activities.  Its time to talk about the worst of them all, Branded Search.Agencies for years have come up with 50 different excuses to show the value of branded search, and while most are somewhat valid, it has led to a massive over investment.  As marketers we need to be more focused on what drove a branded search, rather than capturing it.Unfortunately, branded search will almost always be a necessity because as marketers we respect our executives wishes to "run a competitive campaign".  Join us this week as we discuss how to get the most out of this necessary evil. We talk through insights that can be gathered from branded search to help inform other marketing activities that actually drive those searches.  We also will teach you a few ways to save some money that you can throw back at some prospecting efforts.
There have been a lot of debate recently if creating demand &  driving brand awareness are the same thing.  In all honestly, when I first started really studying demand gen, I saw it as the first logical reasoning for brands to move up funnel into more "branding" activities... Well truthfully, they really are not the same thing at all.  Join Zach and James this week as we talk about the key differences between brand & demand and how both are necessary for an effective forward thinking marketing strategy.
Lead quality is probably the number one beef that sales teams have with marketing.  Most lead gen strategies are focused on capturing as many leads or "MQLs" as possible.  This leads to driving leads that simply aren't ready for sales.This week's episode we discuss how marketing can help dive better leads through a demand gen strategy rather than lead gen.Additionally we discuss how marketing can solve for the top 5 reasons sales says leads are not qualified:1) Problem Awareness - Ahh we don't need that.2) Buy In - Your solution isn't the right one3) Authority to Purchase - My boss has to approve this4) Budget - We don't have the budget or don't see the value.5) Timeline - Now isn't the time
How do you decide whether or not it makes more sense to work with an agency or hire in house?  Well, a big part of it comes down to how your team is structured.  While agencies are most used for specific subject matter expertise, the ability to see trends across brands, & access to tools, the makeup of an internal team is the biggest factor you should consider when looking at an agency.The agency world has shifted a lot in the last 10 years, we want a seat at the table and to be viewed as a partner and not a vendor. Agencies heavily rely on brands for customer insights, pinpoints, common objections, unique selling props, etc.  We need the tools to to inform the strategy.  The reality is that the way a team is built plays a lot into being able to provide those insights. Join Zach & James as they discuss how different organizational structures can have an impact on an agency partnership.
Google Ads,  our favorite demand capture tool.  Unfortunately we feel like it may be falling off the rails.  After the pandemic killed any form of customer service we had with Google, the ad platform is pushing us harder and harder to fully adopt new AI that just isn't a fit for everyone.In a world where tracking is becoming more and more difficult, how are we supposed to let an algorithm optimize towards metrics we can barely track?The future is certainly going to be interesting, but also presents us an opportunity to go back to being marketers and not a bunch of tech people.Resist Performance Max and lets keep control over our media strategy! Join us this week as we discuss the future of google with a couple of certified google wizzard/gurus who have been through it all.
The 2022 State of Marketing Budget & Strategy report by Gartner released a stat that saying 25.4% of marketing budgets is spent on technology.  After reading this stat, it has become pretty evident that tech is taking over.Join Zach and James as they discuss the pros & cons of marketing technology and the future looks like for humans in marketing.
We always complain about bad content.. Boring content, gated content, salesy content, etc.. But what we haven’t talked about much is what is good content? What works?  Join Andy and James this week as we dive into a very simple content strategy framework that will help you join results.There are 3 types of content that you need to create:Short form branded content that focuses on customer education, unique selling points & market positioning.  Let's end the logo tagline messaging in ads.Entertaining or controversial content (Go Viral)... more like having a point of view worth listening to.Bring me back content.  Episodic content that keeps people coming back for more.These 3 content types distributed through the right channels will help build brand growth, community & ultimately revenue. 
Join Zach & James as they provide advice on how to overcome the top 5 biggest challenges for B2B marketers.1) Using customer intelligence to overcome the markets resistance to change.2) Balancing quick wins vs long term growth.3) Developing unique market positioning4) Creating a testing framework that allows for innovation5) Measurement & attribution
Creating demand is the most difficult part of marketing.  Our goal when creating demand is to focus on educating potential customers about a problem and driving them to the point where they are ready to act.  The easy part then becomes capturing that demand.Join Zach and James as they talk through how to develop creative and messaging across all the different stages of demand creation.
In a time of diminishing demand,  we are being asked frequently, "How can we steal from the competition"..."Lets run some competitor campaigns"...  Well, This almost never works unless it is very carefully thought out.Join Zach and James as they discuss the Do's and Don'ts of competitive campaigns as well as how to properly develop a competitive conquesting strategy.
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