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The Fintech Marketing Lab is a podcast where Araminta Robertson, Managing Director at Mint Studios, explores, experiments, and breaks down how fintech marketing actually works in practice.
Intro: AI search is really confusing
right now, and there's pressure
kind of coming from all sides.
Maybe it's something like your CEO who
does a bit of research on chat, GPT and
your competitor comes up instead of your
product, and then you go to the tool that
you're paying for and, but it actually
says that your visibility is fine.
So what do you do then?
Someone on LinkedIn then keeps
telling you that the answer is Reddit.
Reddit, Reddit.
But it's apparently Reddit is no longer
a thing anymore since like two weeks ago.
So the past year we've spent a lot
of time, a lot of energy testing this
properly with our FinTech clients and
we're publishing everything that we
found with real case studies, real
examples on the 24th of September
with a webinar on the same day.
If you're interested, sign
up@mintcopywritingstudios.com,
stroke AI arch reports.
I'll also put the link in the show
notes and hopefully see you there.
Write onto the episode
every other month.
Someone I'm talking to, it could be a
client, someone at an event tells me
they wanna start focusing on enterprise.
That's the dream.
It's a plan for the next year to
get bigger deals, better logos,
and to grow the company really.
But then when you look at kind of what
they're doing marketing wise, they're just
following the same playbook as before.
It's still, you know, paid search sa,
same types of blog posts, same kind
of persona that they're targeting.
And that is a gap that I kind
of wanted to talk about today.
Like so many people wanna focus on
enterprise, but how do you actually
change your marketing to do that?
So I asked Pam Valencia to come on.
Pam is VP of marketing at Spreedly.
She spent more than 20 years doing
B2B marketing across payments
CPQ software and cybersecurity.
And she has a lot of experience
building both motions, SMB and
enterprise more than once, and she's
currently doing that at spreedly.
Spreedly is a payments
orchestration platform.
They give merchants one
integration into a whole network
of payment gateways and services.
And they currently have over
400 customers across more than
a hundred countries, including
companies like BMW adas, Priceline,
and processed over $60 billion
in merchant volume last year.
I really enjoyed this episode 'cause we
actually got into the specifics of how Pam
is navigating this shift to enterprise.
We talked about why going
up market means shifting the
messaging from developer to CFOs.
We also talked about where
the budget actually goes when
you're focusing on enterprise.
So for example, moving away from paid
search into more curated dinners,
events, pr, endless relations.
She also shared how she tracks
marketing influence or deals because
suddenly with enterprise, your sales
cycle is, you know, nine to 18 months.
It's a lot longer.
And then finally she talked to
me about why PR is what she has
found the most undervalued lever
she's pulled, and how she makes an
announcement so that the merchant is
the hero in all these press releases.
Anyway, this was a fantastic
episode, so let's get into it.
Generic intro: You are listening to
the FinTech Marketing Lab podcast.
I'm Arminta from Mint Studios, a
content marketing agency specialized
in the FinTech space, and this
podcast is where we experiment,
explore, and break down how FinTech
marketing actually works in practice.
Each episode I talk with top FinTech
marketers about what they're testing,
what they're learning, and how
they're pushing the boundaries of
brand strategy and team building.
With that, let's get into today's episode.
Araminta Robertson: So the topic I wanna
kind of focus on today is going up market.
It feels like every other month
that one of our clients or someone
I'm talking to is like, ah, we
wanna start focusing on enterprise.
I think everyone that's kind
of their focus eventually, but
I think easier said than done.
So that's kind of what I
wanted to talk about today.
So, when a FinTech company decides
to focus on enterprise, go more
upmarket, how would you say
their marketing should change?
And then we'll talk a bit more about
specifics, budgets and all that, but
like, how would you say generally
should their marketing change.
Pamela Velentzas: I think
it's a bit nuanced, right?
So if I look at just previous examples
of taking companies or going up
market, , with different organisations.
I think the biggest thing is,
your messaging needs to change.
I've always kind of been heavily focused
or our, my, I guess our TAM has always
been very heavily focused on, SMB when
we decide to go up market, it's a shift,
And what I mean by that is the motion
is very different from the sales side.
The motion is very different
from the marketing side.
And as a result of that, I
think the biggest thing about
your messaging needs to shift.
And I think before a company or an
organisation can really say they are going
up market, they need to really align,
go to market has to align, like all the
departments go to market has to align to
make sure that they're ready for that.
Like the synergy across teams.
I think enterprise selling works only when
go to market functions are in agreement.
And that the messaging is
consistent across all channels.
Otherwise, I've seen it fail very quickly.
And I think the main difference is
when you're going approaching an
enterprise type of account, it's not
a single threaded as an SMB account
is, there are you're pitching to a
buying committee less to one person.
And within that buying committee,
there's various personas that influence
the deal, that champion that deal.
And I think your messaging and your
marketing and sales efforts have to make
sure that you're meeting each of those
personas in within that opportunity.
Otherwise, it's really hard to
kind of put the SMV blueprint
onto an enterprise account motion.
Araminta Robertson: So a big change
is with SMB, you're typically
talking to one, two people.
Enterprise, you're talking to a whole
suite of decision makers on, on people
who are influencing the decision.
Could you share maybe an example
of how a messaging, maybe one at
Spreedly or anything that you've seen
in another company, like how maybe
they used to use these words and now
they use different words well, yeah.
What, what's something you've seen?
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah.
I think just in generally speaking
right, when I've done marketing for
SMB versus enterprise, the language
changes in a sense of again, this
is very audience specific to,
let's say, Spreedly as an example.
because we are an API heavy platform, our
audience on the SMB side is very much the
developer or the engineering team managing
a payment stack within an org, So our
messaging and language is a very targeted
and technical towards that dev audience.
Funny enough though, we are actually
seeing a really , like a pivot kind
of away from that as we kind of go
towards an enterprise type of sell or
selling activity where it ends to be
more of the business buyer and like less
depth product engineering, technical
more CFOD level VP level, right?
So your language ends to be more business
focus and more outcome led versus product
feature led, if that makes any sense.
Araminta Robertson: Yes.
Very interesting.
Pamela Velentzas: so it's more, I don't
wanna say general or high level, but it's
more related to bottom line and revenue
impact or how that business can improve
outcomes less than what the platform
delivers from a technical perspective.
Araminta Robertson: So would you
say then, if you're going up market,
stop doing the content that's like
more technical and focus more on CFO?
Or would you maybe, is it wise to
maybe keep doing both at the same time?
what would you say is a split?
Like maybe with SMB it's 90%
technical product focused 10% business
and maybe enterprise's like 40%.
Like 50 50?
I don't know.
Yeah, you tell me.
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah, I think it depends
on the accounts you're going after, right?
To the size of enterprise accounts.
I don't wanna say they're all great
equal 'cause they're very, they're not.
But I think, what we've seen is as more
and more enterprise opportunities are
coming through our inbound channel it
tends to be champions quite significantly
by a product or a technical persona.
But ultimately the decision
maker ends up being the C or
VP level in a buying committee.
in our example, If I had to split
out our content focus, I would say
for enterprise it would probably
still be about, 25% technicals.
'cause we are a payments platform,
so you can't get rid of that, right?
There is some value to having that,
especially if you're talking to a
champion who is at the technical level.
But we've noticed that we're shifting
more towards the enterprise or like that
CD level type of messaging, which again,
is more like outcome use, case driven,
less technical, and how do we solve the
pain point for your business right now?
Less on how do we solve a product
issue, So I think as we do go more up
market, our content is kinda shifting.
I would say probably about 60%
now is more focused on like the
business buyer, the economic buyer.
But I don't think you can separate the
two out, Because I think there is a
buying committee at the enterprise level.
It is not just one person.
So I think, you have to speak to
all the personas within that, group.
Who is influencing the deal.
And that could be not only just, C level,
BP level, D level, like payments people,
but it could be procurement, it could
be sales, it could be marketing, right?
So you have to kinda be able to speak to
all of those personas within that group.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
Yeah.
And we'll go into specifics of like types
of content and maybe an example of for
topics, I think that'd be really helpful.
But before we talk about specifically
content, if we go back to kind
of marketing, in general, when
you're going up market, how would
you say does the budget shift?
Say you're talking to someone who's trying
to go up market, where should they maybe
start, reducing their budget in a certain
activity and raising it somewhere else?
Or how does that strategy change there?
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah, I think again,
I think , it is really dependent on the
individual business, from my example,
you know, as you can look at it two
different streams, our outbound and
inbound marketing approach for SMB is
very heavily focused on like inbound
ads, paid search digital media buys,
which doesn't resonate or influence
enterprise deals but we tend to focus
more of our budget on the enterprise
side, on in-person events, PR analyst
relationships lunch and learns, like very
curated experiences where it's one to
few versus a one to many approach, right?
So, we pump a lot on the SMB side into
like our digital presence and very much
more on the in-person event curation of
experience side on the enterprise, right?
Because it's very much a more relationship
building on enterprise than it is,
but yeah, exactly.
Than a one to kind of many kind of
spray and pray approach receiving SMB.
Araminta Robertson:
Yeah, no, that's great.
So really, clearly if you wanna go
up market, 'cause sometimes we get
this like, it's like they wanna
go up market, but they wanna stick
to doing maybe SEO and paid ads.
It's yes, that will help because
people are still gonna do research,
but you also need to be doing PR and
events and all these kind of things.
What are some examples of events
that you've seen work here?
Well, are you hosting like happy hours?
Are you going to money 2020?
Like what are the kind of
events that you've seen
Pamela Velentzas: So money
2020 is a great event.
I mean, it's, probably the
biggest one in FinTech, right?
We've always had a presence
there, but more from like an ELT
perspective only because a lot of
our strategic partners are there.
So it's a great place for us
to kind of go back and meet our
partners and kind of develop out
those partnership relationships.
From a customer perspective, though,
we don't see very many merchants.
So our audience is really, is very
merchant heavy and like e-commerce
merchants, So money 2020 is great for
the thought leadership networking, but
we don't see a lot of activity from
the enterprise account side there.
So where we do focus kind of our
efforts really specific curated
like payment industry events.
For example, MRC is a big one, right?
They're probably the biggest So
we do a lot of those events, but
apart from that too, we work a lot
with our, so we rely heavily on
our partners, to drive business.
So really kind of aligning ourselves or
like joining efforts with partnerships
is a huge part of our strategy for
enterprise opportunity creation.
So we'll partner with, let's say PayPal
or Visa, we'll do a happy hour, we'll
do a lunch and learn, we'll do, an
experience like a baseball game and like
we're really kind of curating that list.
And typically we kind of follow the
A BM playbook around that, so we
have a named account list of like
top, let's say 50 accounts We're
doubling down on that, those accounts
for the next three to four quarters.
And we're really inviting those contacts
to specific, curated events, whether it's
joint or it's spreedly to really add value
to like that C level, D level audience and
to show where, how we can deliver the bits
and outcome we're trying to solve for.
so we also do very smaller meeting
setting, like speed dating events,
Araminta Robertson: like, FinTech
Pamela Velentzas: say yeah.
Type of FinTech is one of the
ones we do quite often actually.
So basically our payment leader summit
is another one that we do quite often.
Whereas, you'll select a list of
our, top 10 prospect accounts.
They'll match if they wanna meet with us,
and then we'll have one-on-one meetings
on the show floor, Which ends up being
more valuable than having a booth in some
cases where it's kind of just a lot of
noise or what we'll do is we'll host a
hospitality suite adjacent to an event, so
maybe not have presence on the show floor,
have a hospitality suite, and then have
like meetings set up throughout the day.
There where our reps will
kind of meet with merchants
they've identified as potential
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
Great.
Nice.
Amazing.
This is very it's clear how basically
with enterprise, it's just a lot more
experiences, a lot more in person.
It's less easy to track
in terms of digital.
You can't go into GA four and track
your kind of clicks and stuff.
It's a much more experiential
relationship driven kind of business.
I think this is the mindset shift, right?
That maybe marketers or just business
people running fintechs like need to
realise if you wanna go out market,
you need to shift the way you think
maybe about how sales works and how
you're talking to your customers,
Pamela Velentzas: a hundred percent.
I think COVID was a great example
of how we really, lost that
in-person connection, right?
But all the events stopped and I think
we saw that in terms of just like
what was coming in as opportunities.
We ended up getting a lot of more
inbound volume through like the SMB
segment, less so on the enterprise side.
And I think you just lost
that relationship building.
And I think now that it's come back, in
a post kind of COVID world, the appetite
for these enterprise accounts to actually
meet with their vendor, that they're
sourcing is becoming much more important.
A lot of our enterprise opportunities
were one on like kind of
multi-touch and influenced approach.
So it was not just one event, it was
multiple events throughout like a nine
month sales cycle that ended up closing
the deal, So yeah it's definitely a longer
sales cycle too, it's not in 30 to 60 days
you see an SMB but it's an investment.
It's an investment on
the sellers on our side.
And it's also investment on the enterprise
side as well, To make sure that their
relationship continues and builds and a
lot of trust also I think is involved.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
I mean, a big merchant or e-commerce,
picking a payment platform, that's
also a huge decision for them, right?
Because doing a migration or transferring
is a core part of their product, so
they need time and to do their research.
So it's a completely different
process, whereas maybe a startup
that has only a few clients or
something, that's much easier for them.
So I think it's a completely
different as well, kinda use case and
kind of process that they're going
through.
If we talk more about marketing
campaigns, SMB versus enterprise, you
said in another podcast that pain point
led campaigns worked better for SMB.
So I was quite interested in that
better for SMB rather than enterprise.
So why did you find that?
And what do you think maybe works
better for Enterprise if it's
not like pain point focused?
Pamela Velentzas: So I think maybe there's
a little bit of clarification to me.
So pain points in a said in a sense of
what from, so if I look at SMB, right?
And we're talking to, let's say a product
manager within a, within an org, right?
Who's selling with the payment stack.
They have very specific needs
that they want, or pains they
want to solve for, right?
It might be improving off rates, it
might be reducing declines, right?
So it's very specific to that.
On the enterprise side, we are
seeing it's much more about the
business outcome, less about a
specific need they need to solve for.
so I guess it's still pain point driven,
but I would say it's more outcome led,
Do they want to improve revenue, For
a certain stream, like whether it's
through a certain channel, So it's more,
it's at a higher level, let's say the
pain points at a higher level than it
would be at the yes and b, and that's
what I kind of meant by that, right?
So it's still pain point in a sense,
but we don't wanna address the
pain we wanna solve for the outcome
they're trying to achieve
from a business perspective.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
That's really interesting.
So it's more of a use case.
It's a different approach to how you'd
communicate with the target audience.
It's more like how are they gonna get,
what are they gonna get out of this?
Do you feel like there's other
proof points that enterprise buyers
are looking for as well that maybe
SMBs don't care so much about?
So, I don't know, like compliance,
security, what are some others that you've
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah.
Especially
for us.
PCI compliance always comes back.
SOC two compliance is big.
is funny because from what we're
seeing, compliance is always like
one of the second or third kind
of conversations our reps go into,
It's also the product itself.
Like for example, there's a lot
of like custom integration work
we wanna do for enterprise account
that we typically don't do for SMB.
And we're willing to invest that
engineering, time to make sure that they
feel that they're getting a more kind of
curated experience with us versus the SB.
It can be just out of our box
integrations, I think also our
enterprise accounts love having
referring customers to talk to, whereas
smb, it's not so much of a thing.
So big logos want to talk to three
other big logos that we have and know
how the experience went and how the
onboarding l how, tech support is handled.
What's the escalation like, right?
In terms of like from tier
one to tier two to tier three.
So it's a lot of that on
enterprise less so on SMB.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
And you've said yourself that, like the
thing with enterprises, the sales cycles
are super long, you're very enmeshed with
the sales team doing stuff in person.
It can be hard to track things, right?
And it can be hard to attribute things.
So how have you managed that as
you've shifted to enterprise?
How have you done the
tracking, the attribution?
How do you maybe keep marketing still
accountable and tracking to pipeline when
a deal takes nine, 12 months to close?
Like what have you found has worked there?
Pamela Velentzas: so where our attribution
model at Spreedly is based on the
first, it's first touch right across
the board where there's enterprise
or SMB, but there's a caveat there.
So we do track less so an S, so
less of an SB, but for enterprise
we do track influence, right?
On the attribution side.
So for example, because enterprise
accounts can come in through various
different touch points meaning
a sales person could outbound
to one contact of that account,
marketing can send a campaign, they
could have seen us at an event.
Partnerships could have
a play in that, right?
If a partner recommended,
it's really to that merchant.
So we do a multi-touch attribution
on the enterprise account side, where
we'll keep track whatever tech
stack you're using, we just happen
to use HubSpot, so we'll tag each
as an influence and then we'll do,
we'll we take a six month look back
window to say, okay, what's, no.
So from when the deal closes six months
prior, what are all the activities
that you could, what roughly like
attribute to influence to closing
the, or moving the deal along, right?
So that's how we kind of do it.
And then we'll wait it by channel, So
it's like an event, it's 10% of influence.
If it's, a form fill from a,
maybe a technical persona, it
could be 5% influence, right?
So I'll kind of wait it that way
and then kind of aggregate the
data and say, okay, well we can
assume that these three multiple
twitches influence this at the end.
So it's a little bit more
complicated, but you have to, right?
Because an enterprise deal
does not only come through one
channel, I don't think it does.
Araminta Robertson: No, definitely.
You're right.
I love how in depth that is because
there is a very interesting conversation
happening now in marketing where people
are like, it's so complicated and
it's never gonna be fully accurate.
Is there any point in even tracking it?
Should we just trust that it's working?
So I think there's always this debate
between marketers should we just trust it?
Just use, this is what we spent, this
is what we got, and keep it like that.
Or should we track as much as we can?
I'm usually in the track as much as
you can camp because I'm like, might as
well, and it gives you more information.
and you don't have to go into two
specifics, but what is something that you
have found or a piece of like a golden
nugget that you think is super interesting
because you've been able to track so
much that has allowed you to maybe
improve your marketing or improve how you
communicate to prospects, to customers?
Pamela Velentzas: I think.
Yeah.
You know what?
And we try our best.
I mean, it's always hard, right?
Attribution in general, marketing
is always really complicated.
There's never, it's, I don't
think it's linear either.
I think it kind of, depending, right?
But I think what's really undervalued
as of late has just been the influence,
especially for enterprise and like in
PR and I think that's kind of blurred
in 2026 versus it was like 10, 15 years
ago where PR was like, you sent out a
press release, you piss journalists.
But now that it's blended being like
there's like social involved, right?
There's like influencer marketing
that can be considered P pr, right?
So what we found, so a lot of our
PR activity, especially for the
enterprise accounts, we focus a very
much so on like our making sure that
our brand stories get to market.
And what I mean by that is like really
kind of putting our merchants as like
the highlight within a, in a, release
that we're pitching to journalists
and like using data to support that.
And what we found, which I think we've
never really done before, especially we
don't do it for SMB, is like we really
lean onto those brand stories to influence
other enterprise accounts, right?
Because they tend to be kind of copycats,
if one enterprise account sees another
one doing the same thing or whatever tech
stack they're on, they're going, well
maybe I should look at that vendor too.
Like what are they doing
that we're not doing?
So I think PR is Has been the most
undervalued lever we've pulled in
marketing that's showing a very
much like a significant influence
on enterprise opportunities
that we're seeing coming into
Araminta Robertson:
That's really interesting.
Yeah, because also, as you said, PR
can mean a lot of different things.
It could also mean getting your name
on a publication, all these things.
But what you're saying here is when
you start working with a new customer,
with a new merchant, and you make an
announcement, that is what you're seeing
has the biggest, like you can more clearly
connect and see a direct kind of response
to that where maybe someone will finally
respond an email or reach out to you.
Is that what you're
Pamela Velentzas: Exactly.
Yeah.
Well, exactly.
I think it's just at bar scale.
So for example, when we make an
announcement when it comes to a press
release or any type of like media
announcement, we don't wanna highlight
spreedly, we wanna highlight the merchant
and what we solve for that merchant.
So merchant X, Y, Z increased, author
rates by 20% or whatever they, or
expanded into like new geos because
of spreed leader integrations.
So we highlight their business outcome
and then we just kind of we're like
the supporting underneath and a lot
of enterprise accounts like, oh hey,
well if they did that for this logo,
well maybe they could do it for us.
So we've got a lot of traction
just on, highlighting our brand
stories from a market perspective.
I think there was just this notion
about PR just being, oh, it's
set on a press release and hope
it gets picked up for coverage.
I think it's a lot more than that.
Araminta Robertson: So it sounds
like these are case studies actually,
and then you treat them like a press
release in the sense that you're really
Pamela Velentzas: I don't wanna say
they're necessarily case studies per se.
I think it's more like, for example
like agenda commerce is a huge
trending topic right now in FinTech.
If we can, and I'm just, hypothetically
speaking, if we sent out a press review,
like we help, merchant X, YZ launch
an agenda commerce integration to open
AI and it's on built on Spreedly and
they were able to route X amount of
transactions and improved author rates
by 20%, by using this channel on the
tech we built, but showcasing their win
and us as like the supporting
infrastructure in the background, we've
seen kind of, a lot of, eyes on those
stories and a lot more interest from an
enterprise from look at like accounts
that have come to us as a result of that
pr And again it's influenced, right?
There's always like a halo.
They come to our site afterwards,
they'll fill out a form,
they'll see us at an event.
So that conversation continues.
But without that exposure in the market,
they would never would've known that
we could solve maybe a similar problem
that they're struggling with or they
don't even know they have that problem
until they read another enterprise
struggling with the problem and
solved it and then they'll come to us.
So I think it just in general,
there's such value to it in this
market and with all the noise it's
so hard to cut through all the noise.
and I think, there is definitely
some, some worth in making sure
that you know, any organisation
has a really strong kind of like PR
footprint or just media footprint.
'cause it's huge for brand exposure.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah, so just so
I understand, at what point you've
started working with a new, with
Merchant X, Y, Z, at what point in
that relationship or that engagement,
would you then do something like this?
Is this just when you start working
with them or one year after?
Like, when
Pamela Velentzas: I
think it depends, right?
So, there's two sides to this, right?
Either we go back to our instal base.
So our existing customers will
speak pretty readily with us, right?
On certain activity or certain initiatives
from a PR perspective, which is great.
So I think always leveraging your
existing enterprise account base
is great as a great place to start.
But typically new logos, they want to
have it deployed for at least six months
to see kind of the results of that.
And then they're pretty willing
to kind of do a joint kind of
announcement with us, right?
So,
We had, I'll take, give you one example
where we had a merchant to wanted
to expand into latam and start using
picks really hard to set up themselves.
So that's one of the reasons why
they came to us was like our picks
integration through our partner Ebanks.
And then, we ended up having a couple more
conversations with other merchants around
who wanted to also kind of expand, not
necessarily into latam, but just expand
like geographies that we were able and
they read, they saw our press release
on that and, came to us following that.
So, yeah,
Araminta Robertson:
Yeah, that's really cool.
I love how it's such a
specific use case as well.
'cause that really,
Pamela Velentzas: guess
it is kind of a good case.
Yeah.
Like you're trying to solve for a
pain point and they didn't even know
that there was something to solve
for that.
Until
Araminta Robertson: exactly.
But it's just like by using real
company names and actually showcasing
a problem that you sold, as you said,
you're standing out 'cause you're really
like, you're cutting through the noise.
'cause it's like if a competitor to that
merchant sees that, they're like, okay,
oh my God, I need to keep an eye on that.
Like maybe
Pamela Velentzas: Exactly.
Yeah.
And I think the, all the challenge,
it's not always that easy either.
Like the challenge obviously is like
a, I, I don't wanna say most, quite a
few enterprise accounts also don't like
being mentioned you know what I mean?
In the press
also, there's like, there's some, there's
obviously a challenge there, getting
them to be referenceable publicly and not
having to like anonymize the account name.
But if you can kind of overcome
that, there's like such great
value to going after your existing
accounts and like new logos.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah,
that is another challenge.
That's true actually.
If you can't use their name, I mean,
anonymous, it is better than nothing,
but like it doesn't, it won't have as big
Pamela Velentzas: It
is not the biggest impact.
But again, can you set the biggest,
I don't know, like retail cosmetic
brand who's based out of New York is
like, can you make the correlation?
Yes.
Most times you probably can, right?
If you know so.
Araminta Robertson: yeah.
No, I agree.
That's a good, that's a good approach.
If we go back to like tracking and how
you're using Multitouch attribution and
all that when it comes to like influence,
you've also said on another podcast you
use like an A BM platform and that you
like to target them on a contact level.
Can you tell me a little bit more
about that setup, maybe which
a BM platform do you use and
how do you integrate that into your
HubSpot and your tracking and all that?
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah, so I think
obviously the biggest a BM out
there is probably six sense, right?
or demand base it, those two, the probably
biggest ones for account based marketing.
So, and I've always struggled with
account based marketing in a sense,
using account level signals, which,
I mean, always question where those
intent signals are coming from.
And we've always, from a sales side of
it, we've always gone back to our reps
oh, this account is showing this signal.
And then, a rep has to a struggle
to find whatever contact they
think is showing that signal.
Or if they do find a contact and within
that account, it's on the right one.
And, or the con is like, I don't
know what you're talking about.
I've never was looking for that.
So it's really, it's a
struggle on account based.
So when we were exploring how to do
account based a little bit differently
and the platform is called Influ two
basically you upload, and it's very
similar to the Six Sense, right?
So instead of the account names,
you're actually uploading contacts
you have within your CRM and you serve
ads based on their email addresses
to that contact within an account.
And we've seen a significant uptick
in pipeline opportunity and influence
from just running basic ads and like
retargeting them at the contact level.
And the beauty of contact level
advertising is a, you know exactly who
it is you can track with a cookie, right?
It's like you're kind of
like tracking their journey.
You can attribute the influence right,
to an account specifically 'cause
that contact sits under that account.
And then you can also have different,
like swim lanes in terms of okay, well
we're gonna go after, let's say we're
launching, I don't know, agenda commerce.
And within that buying committee you
have the vp, you have the C-level, you
have, CFO, you have the technical buyer.
You can actually create ads for
each segment under that account
with very specific messaging.
And it kind of hit all those personas
within one kind of ad campaign based
on like job title and contact, which is
really a level deeper than just maybe
like the account level advertising, right?
Araminta Robertson: Yeah this is
a great case study for infl two.
I need to
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah, I know.
I'm gonna try that.
Because they're getting a shout
Araminta Robertson: Exactly.
What kind of ads are you talking about?
Is this Google, LinkedIn, and
it's amazing that you've seen
such an uptick in pipeline.
How are you able to
attribute that to Infl two?
Is it
Pamela Velentzas: so we have a
tracking, we use a UTM, so all
our ads, I mean, it's very similar
to any kinda retargeting, right?
It's like, whether it's Google Ads,
they actually advertise across the
meta network, and they don't compete
necessarily with the Google Ad network,
but they'll pull in certain channels.
So primarily it's like through LinkedIn,
our biggest audience is LinkedIn.
We'll do some Facebook,
we'll do some like Instagram.
And then we'll also couple that
with Reddit, with YouTube, with
all the face with the Google
kind of ad network as well.
But each of it has a tracking
code, so we have a UTM on it that
will track back to a landing page
and we can capture it that way.
There's also like a snippet you can
put on your pages to see like from
that ad referencing what page they hit.
And because it's contact level, we'll
know what contact that came from.
So they all get, kinda get tagged in the
backend, which is kind of cool because
and even our sales people, like once
we get a lead in from an info two ad
the conversion from like SAL to SQO,
it's almost like, you know, 60, 70%.
because they're coming directly
to us and it's very like
specific to their pain point.
it's smaller volume, but better quality.
Araminta Robertson: And is this,
are we talking about SMB enterprise?
What kind of
Pamela Velentzas: It's, I would
say it's probably, it's, yeah, it's
probably like 70% SMB in all honesty.
That being said, it helps be, it
helps on the enterprise side as well,
only because we're able to target
the VP and C level, which typically
might not see our ads on Google ads.
Because we have their context
specifically, they're getting
served ads over and over again.
So it kind of like influences that
champion as well because they're, they
already have the exposure to our brand,
whereas if it's only the technical
product manager seeing ads, it's
hard to get that up kinda the chain.
So like they're getting at
least exposed to their brand.
So when the champion comes to
them, Hey, we want event SP freely,
they're, oh yeah, I saw that.
ad.
So it's an easier conversation
Araminta Robertson: Really cool.
Pamela Velentzas: deal along.
Yeah.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah, Yeah.
No, this is great.
I wanted to just talking about this,
it makes sense to also talk about LLMs
I think especially for SMB, right?
They're doing a lot of research on LLMs.
What have you found there?
Have you done any testing, like
Chachi BT ads, for example?
Have you found that you're
getting like a decent amount of
acquisition through that channel?
What have you found there?
Pamela Velentzas: Very premature.
So we're trying two different channels
that we're exploring this year.
Obviously I'm gonna kinda maybe
ramping and going to next year too
or, or, so Reddit is a big channel
that we're trying out this year.
We've really primarily been focused
on Google ads, which are great,
I mean, the legacy kind of like
ad platform out there, right?
but you know, we've noticed, and I think
every company in some way is noting like
the displacement of SEO for a EO, right?
Like just traditional
search and paid search.
I think it's getting radically
disrupted by just the surge in LLMs.
And I think, your strategy has to
kinda pivot to align with that.
Otherwise we'll get left behind.
we've seen our Google ad spend decline
like organically, not because we're
cut budget, but because there's
not as many clicks getting through
because the research is being surfaced
in LMS before they even hit an ad,
So, and what we've noticed is I've done
a lot of research on this and I think,
Reddit for example, is a great, is one of
the probably most indexed or like source
or serviced site when it comes to LLM
ranking and indexation and authority.
So we've kind of doubled down
a little bit in our Reddit
strategy over the last few months.
And we haven't yet seen acquisition
from it specifically, but influence,
So we've seen a lot of like
clickthroughs come in and then maybe
two weeks later a form fill that
comes through direct through our site.
But can you attribute it
like, is there a halo?
Probably is in some way attribution's
little bit tricky on paid.
I think on paid advertising in general.
Attribution all is hard because you never
know if they've seen your ad, didn't click
on it, but then came back three days later
direct, but if they hadn't seen your ad
or they have come, so you never know.
But also, yeah, we also just, we
just started opening AI ads, it's too
soon to see anything lately like yet.
But we're trying it as a new channel,
so, and I think it's, my sense is it's
going definitely gonna be more like, I
would say SMB, although we're seeing a
lot more enterprise buyers come through
our website, having done a lot more
research via an LLM and are ready to
have a more kind of in depth conversation
with sales than we have before.
Araminta Robertson: So that's really
interesting and that's why I wanna talk
about content in a second and why, maybe
it used to, people used to say, oh, SEN
content, whereas only for SMB, but now
you'd need content for enterprise as well.
For sure, because, and not just
reports, but actually website
content because that's how you're
gonna appear on LLMs, right?
If they're doing so much research.
And I totally agree with our clients,
like definitely enterprise customers
are coming in through LLMs and 30 40%
of inbounds now are coming via LLM.
So it's like a huge channel now.
It's definitely one
that's, yeah, it's just
Pamela Velentzas: Yeah, you can't
ignore it, right?
I think there's a lot of apprehension
around lms, but we're seeing it too,
like we're tracking like AI chat as
like a lead source, even 12 months ago.
It was unheard of as a channel.
And it's grown like 70%
like year over year.
And just even turning from like, not only
just like leads, but like going like from
like a lead to like an SQO to closed one.
I think we closed our first,
chat, like AI chat lead.
I think last, quarter it was a small
deal size, but nonetheless it was
like the first one and it closed
within I wanna say 15 to 30 days.
I that quickly.
very much more s than be
focused, but I think it's just
going to gain momentum, right?
As like the months go by even more.
So.
And to your point, I think that's where
content, like I think, like 10, 15 years
ago, like when they said content was
king and like there was like keyword
stuffing and everybody wanted to have
like their SEO on their page and every
single page had to be like, optimised
for all the keywords they wanna rank for.
I think their content is even more
important, but in a different way in
2026, it's less about the keywords and
just more being more authoritative and
being able to be surfaced on those LLMs.
And that's why the backing is
ever so much more important.
obviously the analyst reports are
great, but like making sure that you're
really visible on those external third
party sites that have the credibility,
like at Forrester or Gartner or like a
Wall Street Journal or even Bloomberg.
Those get picked up so
quickly in LLMs, right?
And that's where you want to be.
Like that's what enterprise
buyers we've noticed are coming
through is an LLM search less a
Google click, if that makes sense.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
That's interesting.
I wanted to talk about Reddit,
but before, let's continue on
the content topic because okay.
So if more and more enterprise are coming
via LLMs content is even more important
because LLMs are crawling, right?
Your website and your content, what
kind of content do you think is key
now if you wanna target enterprise,
considering this whole LLM thing as well?
Pamela Velentzas: So we've really kind
of pivoted our content strategy to be
more like question based, So I guess one
of the biggest things l LMS look for is
like an FAQ style content format, right?
So we've really kind of pivoted, I
guess I don't wanna say we're not,
we're still doing long form content,
we're still doing the EGUs, but we've
kind of reformatted in a way where it's
answering a question less, kind of like
feeding you just this like really high
level thought leadership stuff, right?
So it's definitely more question based and
like, more like how what a customer would
be asking us in like a natural language.
And even just our, our, how our write
our writing style is kinda changed also.
It's definitely more like natural
conversational, informative.
I mean, the thought leadership stuff
is still there, but I think it's a,
like a level, it's a level further down
where you're asking, you're trying to
answer specific questions or you're
anticipating what the question is, and
then answering it as like a, like from
the point of view of, from the prospect.
So that's been a lot more kind
of beneficial to us because
that's what gets surfaced.
It's all the questions.
And that's when you type in
an lm like that's pretty much
what you're looking
for.
you're you're
them a question, and we
Araminta Robertson: Yeah.
Pamela Velentzas: have
our answers surfaced.
it's definitely a marathon, not a
sprint when it comes to outcomes.
Araminta Robertson: yeah.
And also we're all testing, right?
It's a bit of the wild west still.
I also, back in the day, content
marketers were like allergic to
talking about the product, right?
You would write about payment,
orchestration, whatever, and you
would just be like educate, add value.
Don't talk about the product.
But I feel like, and this is
what we always talk about,
bottom of the funnel content, you
need to talk about the product.
Not just because the person
who's at the bottom of the funnel
wants to learn about the product.
But I would say now it's even
more important because if LLMs are
quot your content, they're hungry
for that product information.
And so, especially if they're asking
a very bottom of the funnel question
should I pick Spreedly or a competitor?
If there's no product information
on your con on your website, it will
either make it up and that's bad,
could, it could be inaccurate, or
it will just say something wrong and
sell the other competitor better.
So do you, are you also testing with that?
Are you also doing more product
focused content and trying to
make sure LMS get the right info?
Pamela Velentzas: Yes.
So, funny enough, so we were
very, very thought leadership or
like very, like that fo like that
style of content driven last year.
I don't wanna say theoretical,
but kind of like theoretical,
right?
Like
educational informative.
Now that we've shifted just as an
organisation to more of like a product
led growth kinda strategy, our content
is kind of reflecting that too.
And we're definitely leading more
with how our product solves for a
solution, but not in an overly technical
way.
Um, but
yeah.
Exactly.
But it just, it's showing the
value of like what product a can
solve for as a business outcome.
And I think a lot of our content is
kind of driven by the features or
the product itself, unless on this
like, theoretical abstract use of it.
I think I just, how content is,
like being consumed by prospects
is very different as well.
so I'll give you an example, back
in the day your drip campaign would
start off with, oh, read a blog
post, watch this video, read this
article to me that no longer works.
They want to get right to the point.
They've already been so educated with
all the research they're doing in LLMs.
They want to get into a call with
sales or a demo like right away
and gone other days of dripping
out like 12 blog to a prospect.
they wanna see how it works and
get on a call and move it forward.
So we've kind of also pivoted
like our, just our content
email strategy as well, right?
To reflect that because you don't need to
educate them as much as you do anymore.
They've already educated themselves,
they're already further down
the funnel and I think the
content has to reflect that.
And that's where
the product comes in, right?
They're more interested in comparison.
So we're kind of doubling
down on comparison pages, RO
all calculators, right?
That's like huge for us now.
Araminta Robertson: Yeah you've
eloquently put what I've been saying
a lot as well is that basically it's
not as worth doing top of the funnel
thought leadership because the LLMs are
doing that for you already, basically.
And you also very rarely will they mention
a brand so early on in the journey.
If they're doing research on what
is payment orchestration or how does
a payment platform work, they're
not looking for a brand name.
And so no matter how much content
you put about that you're not
gonna appear on that alarm.
So what even is the point?
No one's gonna read it.
So now, it makes more sense now than
ever to just mainly do bottom of the
funnel content so that then when you
do, when they do reach that stage, your
brand is there at the right moment.
And so yeah.
Ready?
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, that's so interesting.
I need to ask about Reddit because I'm
very curious and I think this is just
a question that so many people have.
When you say you have a Reddit
marketing strategy, what does that mean?
Are you creating lots of accounts
and going after and answering
Pamela Velentzas: No.
Yeah, no.
Well, it's an ad strategy more
than anything else, right?
So we were struggling in terms of like
getting a, a listing, like a subreddit
under, like FinTech or payments, To
build that community takes a lot of time.
And what I mean by that is it's,
you need a, like a community, like
a, a dedicated resource to kind
of manage your Reddit channel.
So we decided not
to do a Reddit channel yet.
But what is interesting about
Reddit is I think, just their
ad kind of opportunities.
You can pick very specific subreddits
where you're like, where your users
are in these subreddit communities and
advertise them like contextually and
like whatever thread or chat you're in.
So that's been working really well.
And also you can host Ammas
with Reddit being a moderator
in different like subreddits.
We've yet to try that.
But that's on our schedule for this year.
So that's kinda what we're exploring
from our marketing strategy.
And it's really kind of touching our
technical persona because they're
still part of our deals and they kind
of, they are still their champion,
even on the enterprise side, right?
So it's a different audience we're
going after, but it seems to be
working and only because Reddit has
30 million users or visitors a day.
I think every Reddit a
stat, like they're huge.
Like you cannot ignore them.
And I think, what we've seen is
like the Reddit, like Reddit, chats
or threads get, surfaced pretty
readily in LLMs and regularly.
So we wanted to try to see, even if
we just, answered a chat or joined one
of the sub, even on our own subreddit,
one of the subreddits on payments, and
we could comment so we're trying to
get more involved in that community
and to see if that could have nuts.
Anything positive in
terms of like pipeline or
Araminta Robertson: That's really
interesting.
Maybe we should do another one,
another interview in a year.
'cause I'm curious to hear how
your Reddit strategy has worked.
'cause we get this question a lot
and I'm always a little, there's
these Reddit marketing agencies
and they do a lot of this spitting
up hundreds of accounts and doing
Pamela Velentzas: No.
Yeah, I don't like that.
That's, we don't wanna do that
only 'cause it's not authentic.
We want to be like, we wanna be
part of the conversation but in a
way and I think part of it's too,
it's like you don't want make the
opportunity to have a conversation.
And is it fair if we left a
prospect or red for three days?
'cause nobody was answering.
So that's why we weren't at the, we're
at the point right now where we can kind
of commit to like a full-time channel.
But I think just being involved
in the conversations around
payments is a start for us.
And having our product and our
technical tams in those conversations
and the kind of creating that
community that we do have, like
an authoritative voice on payments
is where we're gonna try to start.
I think just initially.
Araminta Robertson: No, that's great.
Alright, my last questions has been
such a fantastic conversation and I just
wanted to, for someone listening, maybe
they're a series A, series B FinTech
founder and they're saying, I wanna
go, we wanna go enterprise next year.
What is something that you
would tell them not to do?
Pamela Velentzas: Not to do, do
not use the same playbook that you
would use for SMB for enterprise.
Don't assume the sales cycle is nine
to 12 months, it can be 18 months,
and be prepared to commit to that
on the resource and investment side.
And don't focus primarily on one persona.
Make sure you are targeting multiple,
so multiple personas within an account
and are kinda structuring your motion
for a committee and making sure you
have the appropriate content per persona
Araminta Robertson: For each.
Yeah.
Makes total sense.
I totally agree.
Well, thanks so much, Pam.
This has been fantastic.
So in depth, , we've covered so much
ground and I think it's been really,
really helpful and really insightful.
So yeah, thank you so much for coming on.
Pamela Velentzas: Well,
thanks for having me on.
Appreciate it.
outro: Thanks for listening.
You can find show notes and
information about guests@www.mint
copywriting studios.com/podcast.
And finally, huge thanks to orama
TV for producing this podcast.
Thanks for listening, and
see you at the next episode.