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Demand-Geniuses is the podcast for revenue-focused B2B Marketers. We bring you the latest insights and expert tips, interviewing geniuses of the B2B Marketing world to bring you actionable advice that you can implement to accelerate growth and progress you career. The role of Marketing in B2B go-to-market strategy has changed drastically. It's more important to revenue generation than ever as buyer engagement becomes more digital. We equip you with the information you need to thrive in this new, revenue-critical role.
Tom Rudnai (00:01.698)
Martin, hello, welcome to the podcast.
Martin (00:04.482)
Thanks for having me.
Tom Rudnai (00:06.31)
Thank you for joining. Look, before we get into it, I think maybe best place to start, do you want to just give the listeners a little bit of an introduction into you, Martin, and also into your role at Captify and kind of what led you to this point as well?
Martin (00:21.75)
Yeah, happy to. So, my name is Martin. I'm, I'm a B2B tech marketer have been for, for over 20 years now. I'm currently international marketing director at Captify. Captify is, a tech platform that, that plays in the ad tech sector. we, base a lot of our technology on, excuse me, search data, and search intelligence, from the, from the open web.
So my role is to cover the main markets outside of the US. So primarily the UK and Australia. I'm based in the UK, which is our longest serving market. We have the unique accolade of being a British born ad tech company. Though we have an increasing US and global presence these days. I've been at Captify about three and a half years, I think.
Tom Rudnai (01:17.726)
Well, and it's nice to hear a story of a company that was started in England and actually stayed in England. I feel like there's a lot of talk at the moment about how many, as soon as something starts to reach anything approaching to unicorn status or success, over it goes to Silicon Valley.
Martin (01:32.182)
Yeah, I think that's probably true and probably for good reason. And I wouldn't say we're totally apart from that. As I said, the UK is our oldest market, but the US is now our largest. Surpassed the UK a couple of years ago. So we've been growing in the US, which is almost a kind of prerequisite for any success that you want to have in this business. So it's a good thing, but it's just nice to be able to, from a personal standpoint, to be able to say that we were...
founded and started in the UK.
Tom Rudnai (02:04.172)
No, absolutely. then, help the listeners understand who may not be familiar with Captify. Sorry, start that again. What are the kind of unique challenges associated with marketing there in terms of how it sits within the broader go-to-market that will help us understand where a lot of the perspectives that you hold will come from?
Martin (02:24.992)
Yeah, I mean, that's that's quite a big, it's quite a big question. I did my best to, you know, to kick it off. mean, in terms of marketing at, you know, a tech business, is in which is in a growth stage or with growth aspirations, there are probably some less unique challenges, you know, around most of the businesses I've worked for. Marketing is often seen as quite a
a tactical play with very broad remits like getting the message out there and things like that and just, you know, sort of loosely contributing to momentum and building momentum towards growth. But we are quite a unique business, I suppose, around our position in market. So I mentioned we are a search intelligence platform. Search intelligence is a phrase that we have coined.
to explain our services which are based around search data collected from the open web across millions of websites on a daily basis. So we've got like the kind of data side of it and we've got the technology side of it which is our technology enables us to make sense of all of that, know, vast quantities of data to help us and to help our customers understand.
consumer behavior across their customer base. So what people are searching for and an indication of their intent. So I think trying to position, you know, a tech business and a data-based business, particularly to, or within a media landscape. So, you know, a lot of the use cases of our data and technology are around being able to activate, you know, marketing campaigns.
and measure the impact of them. I think that kind of data and media play is probably quite unique. And it's a fine balance to try and strike.
Tom Rudnai (04:31.438)
Yeah, no, if you noticed me wincing while you were talking there, by the way, I burnt my tongue. So that's, that's, that's, that's my day ruined.
Martin (04:36.446)
Ouch! Well, I hope your tongue's okay and I'm glad I didn't get anything wrong.
Tom Rudnai (04:43.224)
Thank you, no, that's right, we crack on. We made a stone's here, so we persevere. So there's a couple of things you said that are really interesting in terms of your kind marketing strategy specifically. One I want to get into before actually. So obviously you work in search intelligence and search and SEO and the changes going on there is something that's been getting a lot of bandwidth at the moment within the B2B space. Have there been anything interesting that you've seen kind of through your product and what CaptiFy do as a business that you've been able to apply?
to your own context as a B2B marketer trying to make sense of the current changes in SEO.
Martin (05:19.554)
Well, we don't really work with SEO. So I guess it comes back to the, you know, the sort of challenge around our positioning. So you can't really say the word search without people either, you know, sort of gravitating to Google or search engines. And we don't really play there. When we look at searches from the open web, we look at on-site search. So this can be around, you know, could be new sites, product sites, apps.
And what we do is we look at the searches, the individual searches that are taking place within those environments. And then we use that intelligence, if you like, or we use that data to build intelligence around, you know, the types of people who are searching for different types of things and what the intent is behind that. So, you know, if you think about a travel website, for instance, if people, what we often find is that people will start their search journey.
on a search engine. So they might just, they might type in, you know, sort of flights to Gdansk or whatever. But by the time you get into the travel site, you've got much more granular insights around maybe, you know, when they want to go or what they're particularly looking for. Whether it's a holiday, whether it's business trip, whether it's just a flight, whether it's a hotel. So you very quickly get more granular insights from the open web searching. And so, you know, there are some...
I guess, so what can you do with that, with that information and what we offer to our clients typically falls into one of three buckets either there to inform their marketing strategy. So what are my, where are my audiences? What are they interested in? How are my competitors doing? You know, we can look at searches for, you know, around competitor terms and the sentiment associated with that to inform your strategy. Activation.
Like where where am I best to meet these people? Where am I best to connect with them and their measurement, you know is did my campaign? Move or shift their their intent? You know simple simple example being after they saw my campaign Did they search for my brand or did they you know, did they did their search change? Did they search behavior? Sorry change And was it in favor of my brand so that strategy activation and measurement is what?
Martin (07:46.594)
we typically can help to inform. So in terms of what we can use for our own marketing, I think you'd be looking more around the sort of holistic industry insights and trends. If a particular vertical market, for instance, I'm riffing here, but maybe there's a particular uptick or a particular interest or trend that we can look at, then.
maybe that would inform our kind of tactical marketing play around that.
Tom Rudnai (08:20.556)
Yeah, okay. And one of the other things that you said that was quite interesting, thought about Captify specifically, was that you coined the term search intelligence. So it's very much a like category creation type play that you're going after, right? Which presumably has a knock on effect on a lot of things that you do, but it's where that kind of data and monitoring of specific search terms and things like that is probably gonna be quite a value add.
Martin (08:45.524)
It's a value add and again, it's the epitome of the challenge because when you create a category, you have to define it well enough that people can either relate to it or quickly understand it. So, again, trying to, and we're spending a lot of time on our messaging at the moment. We're redoing our website as an example.
And a lot of that work is around trying to recognise the natural association with the likes of Google and search engines, but at the same time explain where we don't cross over or where we do.
Tom Rudnai (09:29.816)
Yeah, okay, well my next question was gonna be what's the kind of driving force behind redoing the site, but it sounds like I've summed it up about five minutes ago, right?
Martin (09:37.866)
Yeah, I mean, there's that. There are a number of factors, to be honest, around that particular project that we probably don't necessarily need to go into. yeah, ultimately, a business's website is a tool to help it position itself and help it drive business for its sales team, in our case. That's what we intend it to do.
Tom Rudnai (10:02.67)
Yeah, okay. And when you think about positioning, potentially in the context of what you're doing at the moment, but if not, then just more broadly, do you think it's an advantage to, I'm also a sweat of phrases, how do you approach the notion of going after like a category creation? Because it's something I often think about with demand genius. I think there's the potential for us to follow that path. I think it kind of has benefits in the long term, but also throws up a lot of challenges in the short term.
Is that how you'd approach it? Or do you think it's a wise thing to follow or something to be avoided?
Martin (10:40.212)
I it's kind of an inevitability, right? Because you want, I think it's more about establishing your unique value proposition where you, depending on who your core customers are that you can best serve.
The best way that you kind of engage with them is probably the better place to start. So I talked for instance about one of the ways in which we do differ from Google data and search engine mechanics is the uniqueness of the data. It's naturally granular. Because people are searching, it's unprompted. If you search for something, it's not the same as answering
a survey on a panel, a question, on a panel. because you're naturally prompted and that has intrinsic bias. So there are a number of factors of the services and products that we offer that make them unique and it's really about how you frame that. If you're gonna...
We don't think too much about category creation and I don't actually know about any patents or copyrights anything like that. It's more of like how we refer to it. But it's kind of been similar to at least the last three businesses that I've worked for is you.
People are always going to pigeonhole you. You know, I worked for a tech business 10 years ago and we would go out and we would say we do this and they would say, okay, so you're an analytics platform or, okay, so you're a data platform. okay, so you're a DMP. Like they need something to sort of hold on to. So it's more how you tell the story within that.
Martin (12:32.564)
If you just say a word that no one's ever heard of, no one's going to go, cool, you know, tell me more. They have to relate to it first in some way.
Tom Rudnai (12:37.888)
new.
Yeah, and guess it's a bit of a, there's a bit of a kind of balance to be struck between making it easy to discover you and then making sure that you are differentiated once you're discovered, right? And I think that's where you need to kind of optimizing for differentiation is a good thing. But if you go too far with that, with trying to define everything in your own unique terms unnecessarily, then that's where you're kind of hamstringing yourself.
Martin (13:06.208)
Yeah, exactly. I agree with that. there's a place, that's why you, I suppose it's about the marketing funnel, if you think about it like that. There's ensuring that people can find you, can discover you, as you say, once they have, how do you pique their interest? How much education is needed? How complex is your product offering? How new is it? How much of a distant...
category have you created or is it closely aligned to something else, know, we're this but or we're this and. So yeah, it really depends on, as I say, your the unique sort of value of your service offering.
Tom Rudnai (13:48.654)
Yeah, okay, makes sense. I'm gonna switch up a little bit. So you just mentioned the of the bio journey in the funnel. Obviously, Captify very much like a sales led go to market from what I can see. And it looks like kind of generally trying to capture relatively large organizations. Is that right? And then partly linked to that. Like how do you look at marketing's role within the overall bio journey?
Martin (14:10.794)
Yeah, so yeah, I think you're right. To put you in the picture, we work with, we have very good relationships with, I guess, what are affectionately known as the big six. So we work with global marketing agencies across all of our markets and obviously vicariously through their clients. So agencies are our bread and butter.
We do also work with brands directly. We have some big global brands as clients. And in other areas of our business, we work with publishers and various data and tech partners as well. But I suppose like agencies would be the core focus of where the revenue comes and where the relationships are. So I think I've kind of said already so far in this conversation that
know, marketing can be seen very much as like the output, as like the sort of tactical play. And we're no different. There's lots of focus, understandably, on the promotional elements of marketing to support what you correctly describe as a predominantly sort of sales led business as our most, you know, B2B tech business is certainly my experience. So.
But I think it's widely accepted within the organization that we're the sort of brand custodians. And everything we do, I think falls into one or more of three buckets. So we're kind of staying front of mind. So that's the kind of high level, whether it's just kind of media relations or, you know, sort of newsletter strategies, just kind of staying top of mind.
staying in agencies and supporting the sellers in that respect. Generating one-to-one engagement for the sellers. So, you know, I have a phrase that marketing never opens or closes an opportunity. That's entirely down to the sellers, but we open doors and we support the process. So the one-to-one engagement would be about opening those doors, connecting our sellers with the people that they either
Martin (16:34.624)
want to talk to or know well, but in a way that frames the conversation properly for them. And then the third piece is arming sellers and equipping them with what they need to close that sale as well. And that can be around whether it's validation through proof points, through case studies, or whether it's just kind of telling our story, educating, providing.
you know, sort of sales enablement tools, sales training, competitor, analysis, sales collateral, one sheets, product walkthroughs, that kind of thing. But making sure that they've got what they need to, you know, to close the deal as well. So that kind of, see what we do as, and it's, I imagine quite widely applicable to businesses like ours is you're either, you know, staying front of mind, keeping the lights on, keeping the brand active as it were.
generating one-to-one opportunities through events and the like or making sure the sellers have got what they need to close the deal.
Tom Rudnai (17:42.092)
Yeah, I think that's a very good way of looking at it, because I don't think it's a kind of pejorative term at all to describe an organisation as sales led. A lot of B2B businesses are always going to have to be just by nature of the complexity of the product and therefore, and of the problem they're solving and therefore there needs to be a sales engagement somewhere. So it becomes how do you as a marketer provide the best possible support to the people who are opening and closing deals, as you say. I think it sounds like a pretty clear
clearly thought out way of thinking about your purpose and your role. How do you look at your kind of, from a KPI perspective, how are you measuring each of those things or are you?
Martin (18:24.642)
Yeah, so each one, I think, each channel, if you like, and each strategy comes with its own different ways of measuring. You can't measure the impact of an event the same way that you can measure the impact of a PR campaign or a piece of content. I think those in terms of measurement, we start by looking at the business objectives.
We plan our strategy according to what we can deliver, you know, in terms of assigning resources, people, budget, time, whatever that may be, opportunities. And then we look at what, you know, the best way that we can help get to, you know, get to support in those objectives. So figuring out how we can support them, because like I say, we don't bring in revenue directly, but we could certainly kind of...
we can certainly focus our resources and efforts in the right directions according to sales strategy and overall business goals. And then we set our own KPIs to deliver against them.
Tom Rudnai (19:35.736)
And you set them typically on a kind campaign by campaign basis rather than having like an overarching North Star say as a marketing team, which is we are always gonna be kind of headline focused on this.
Martin (19:48.7)
we, we've iterated in the time that I've been here, if I'm honest. usually I would say generally speaking, we have overarching goals for the year. we have quarterly targets that are loosely tied to, you know, that's probably like the kind of campaign based objectives. So if you're, launching a piece of content, running an event or a series of, of, of events and activations, then, you know, perhaps you'd have a lead goal.
download goals, then percentage conversions to MQLs with an indication of how many of those are likely to move to SQLs and opportunities. So a natural funnel on a quarterly basis and then overarching annual goals.
Tom Rudnai (20:40.192)
Okay, make sense. And I want to come back to one of the other things that you said specifically as well, which is in terms of like, you look at yourselves as brand custodians and some three jobs come with that, stay in front of mind, providing opportunities for one-to-one engagement and then arming sellers once that engagement is underway. One thing that's very interesting for me partly because of just by nature of what we do at Demand Genius, which is all about how we use content to influence the later stages of deal cycles more effectively. Like talk to me about how...
how you work with sales, how you kind of understand what it is that they need to close deals and then go about supporting them from that perspective.
Martin (21:18.274)
Yeah, I think, again, we've evolved based on how our business has changed, grown, how the personnel have changed, has changed our kind of our strategy. But I think the key word for me that we've certainly tried to adopt over the last, particularly over the last kind of 12 to 18 months is partnership.
So we want, say as marketers, we want to be partners to the sellers. You know, I think we're often seen perhaps as a sort of service house to, you know, to the business, to clients and to commercial teams. And I think it's most effective when marketing is seen as a partnership. what we try and do is certainly what I try and do is build the relationships with commercial stakeholders so that you...
so that you kind of afford yourself the ability to ask the question, what are you trying to achieve? Very often in my experience when you ask that, you kind of get back a list of ideas or, you know, kind of campaigns or tactics, right? And if we can maintain some agency over that, but truly understand what...
the seller needs to achieve, right? Whether that's doors to, in our case, with a certain agency or whether it's an education or whether it's changing the narrative or whether it's finding a new agency or grand brand direct, all of these things, to try and pinpoint the answer to that question. Then it helps you explain how you can help. And then you can set expectations and make realistic promises and deliver on them.
And I find that that is, that's kind of to me the best way to get that kind of sales and marketing alignment, if that makes sense.
Tom Rudnai (23:19.33)
Yeah, absolutely. It absolutely does. think it's... So from a tactical perspective though, I imagine a lot of our listeners are saying that that's exactly what we try our best to build, but I'm sure it's come up in your time that you don't get the level of engagement that you want from stakeholders that you know in order to do your role, you need to be able to have relationship and support with, support them better. Is there anything tactically that you've done in the past?
that you feel really helps to elicit all of that feedback from them that you need.
I guess how do you go about from where you sit building that relationship? What are the key things that you can do?
Martin (24:03.424)
Yeah, think, well, there's a big, there's a lot to be said for doing what you know works. And I suppose a lot of the time that drives the, you know, that drives a lot of kind of predetermined sort of ideas. know, let's do, you know, this is our annual sort of thing, or this worked well last time. are all good reasons to do things again, if we've proven that they've been favorable.
popular or have worked. So I think there's that, it's just kind of, I think being clear on, and we can all, I'm sure we can, myself especially can definitely be better at this, but finding stakeholders within the commercial teams where you can clearly kind of develop that partnership, explain your reasoning for choosing the plan and the strategy that you've chosen.
committing to the delivery and showing how that delivery is going to help the sellers because it's not always obvious and it's not always I think that's the sort of disconnect is the disconnect if you like. Why would we spend three months writing a strategic piece of content? If a seller might say I've got numbers to hit, that's not going to get me immediate revenue, maybe a one
slide on a deck will because they're in control. They're, you know, they're, they're in the moment. and that's what they need in the meeting. So I think it's, hard sometimes with a lot of the necessary marketing, initiatives and tactics, if you like, to tie it back to, to, ROI and value. And you can't sort of, you know, aim the ROI gun at absolutely everything. You can't like,
You can't determine how many sales you get from a blog piece. You can't determine how much revenue the press release drove. So I think it's having the conversations as to why you're doing something and ensuring that it's clear as to what is driving what where. And then there's some compromise that, you know, putting on putting on things, you know, for the sellers benefits and explaining how that's going to help them as well. If it's a, you know, we do.
Martin (26:27.254)
kind of high level dinners, we do an fringe, set of fringe events at Cannes Lion, which is taking up a lot of my head space at the moment as we plan to get out there. Where it feels a little bit more tangible for the commercial teams and therefore maybe a little bit more obvious as to where that value is gonna come from. So it's just having a conversation at each, around each channel, each initiative as to what the expectations are and most importantly why.
Tom Rudnai (26:56.376)
Yeah, it's a give and take, right. But I think what you're describing is, we've mentioned already, right, it's often very easy for marketing, particularly within a kind of B2B organization to be put into this kind of tactical pigeonhole. And I think that happens at every level, but it also is often one of the challenges in the working relationship with sales, right? Because your job, I think, is to sit back a little bit more and take a longer term strategic outlook.
You're both revenue focused, but probably the time horizon is a little bit different. If you're sales, you are by definition almost, you are tactical, right? You are about closing this deal, that deal, constantly trying to bring in money. Marketing, I think your job is to look at the brand positioning in a longer term sense and work out how you can optimize for that.
There's always gonna be some conflict that arises there, right? And that's where it comes down to a conversation and a willingness, I think, to understand what you can do tactically that's gonna maximise the benefit. And I think that's sometimes where it goes wrong is where the tactical stuff marketing are doing feels like the wrong tactical stuff from a sales perspective as well.
Martin (28:07.51)
Yeah, and that's bidirectional as well. You you get asked to do things, right? Endless kind of memes on LinkedIn as like, need to do, you know, like kind of, I guess it comes back to, you know,
less, well not less, but you don't need the ideas so much as you need the objectives. Like where are you trying to get to and then let's figure out whether that idea is a good use of time or is going to get us there or not. And there are some things that just, you know, just feel like they, you know, they probably will help.
But you can do endless numbers of those with and then it's frustrating for a marketer to not be able to point to any revenue. Ultimately, the reason that so many marketers want to measure and why there's so much scrutiny under measurement at the moment, always has been, guess, is there's a real opportunity to try and put some numbers behind what we do that is not only going to justify our existence, but actually help us secure more budget to do the things that the whole of the business wants us to be doing.
the fun stuff, the stuff in the background. And in terms of the short and long term, yes, sales teams are naturally shorter term because they don't have the luxury of time to sort of lean on, Their tasks and their remits are much more immediate, which you need to be sensitive to and understand as a marketer. But there's a long and short game that's been much talked about.
particularly over the last few years, that I think every marketer needs to try and play. I think it's marketer's responsibility, certainly in perhaps businesses like the one I'm in, but probably generally to ensure that long term initiative is still being paid attention to. It's that thing where if you, you you can always, it's like the big thing on the list that you.
Martin (30:10.986)
never quite get round to doing. You need to be able to chip away at it because ultimately that's brand. There's research that has shown if you continue to focus on the long term in particularly in difficult times, then you emerge stronger than competitors. And it's a really hard conversation to have when stuff's on fire and plates are falling over. But it's a necessary one to find time for. And I think that's marketers responsibility.
Tom Rudnai (30:35.276)
Yeah, I I thinking about that the other week actually. I think one of the hardest things to do when things are on fire is take a step back, right? Because you're internally, you're missing your revenue goals. No one wants to be the one that says, hey guys, let's take a step back and reevaluate the strategy. If you're the CEO or the board, you're like, fuck that, let's work out how we can hit these targets that I'm currently getting hammered for not hitting. It has a feel of evading problems sometimes, but it's exactly what you need to try and do, right? Get out of that kind of short term.
There's a natural desire when things aren't quite going to plan to look busy.
Martin (31:10.986)
Yeah, I think that's definitely true. I think related to that, I think that something popped up on LinkedIn a few days ago, which is quite sort of a similar vein, which is, you know, sometimes you just have to like stop. And like you say, when stuff's on fire and things are falling down, it's tempting not only to look busy, but to kind of...
keep hammering away at the thing that you committed to or the thing that you've paid for or the tactic that we've always done or whatever it is. It takes a lot of bravery as a business, as a marketer, as anyone to just say this isn't working, just stop, let's go back to basics. And I think every now and again it's necessary. That doesn't apply to...
to my immediate situation at Captify, like that's not something we're looking at. I can't give you a sort of anecdote on that, but it was a really interesting thing that I read just a few days ago that made me think, yeah, sometimes you, like you say, you sort of find yourself in a cycle where you, as a business, to look busy or feel busy or hoping that things might turn around or...
If you keep plugging away then something will happen kind of thing. Very few, I would say people, businesses, marketers would actually have that bravery to just say this is not working, let's just stop and think for a minute. And even if you do, getting people onside, like you say, getting the big boss in the room, getting the commercial stakeholders in the room, hard to just press stop on everything.
Tom Rudnai (32:50.51)
Yeah, and understandably, it's something I find quite a lot actually in starting a business. And I think LinkedIn does contribute so much to it because you get that kind of hustle culture and you're just overwhelmed with advice, but advice without context. So I can go onto LinkedIn every morning and I will see 10 people telling me that things that I'm doing or not doing are the reason why my business will inevitably fail. And that's a really tough environment to operate in. And I do notice it, it's something I have to check myself in.
that make sure that I don't follow each of those with a thread. So I've tried to kind of separate in my own brain advice with context from advice without context. Advice without context can give you ideas and it can be useful and interesting, but your job as someone with a strategic vision is always to weigh that against where you know that you need to go and how you've kind of communicated to people that you think you're going to get there.
Martin (33:46.774)
Yeah, that's I mean, advertising without context to probably my takeaway from this. I like that phrase. And it's so true because you that you have to have your say in that conversation that might take place between you and LinkedIn in that instance, right? You know, kind of, okay, that's that's great. That's inspirational or that's terrifying or whatever the advice is, like you say. Yeah.
Tom Rudnai (34:10.734)
Normally terrifying, that's what the algorithm likes.
Martin (34:14.208)
Mainly terrifying, it could be intimidating as well. You're like, my goodness, all of these marketers have done all of these things and I haven't done anything or whatever. Again, just taking a minute to process and sort of curate, I suppose, into your own environment. And take the bits that actually offer value and have the courage to ignore the bits that don't.
Tom Rudnai (34:38.126)
Yeah, I think it's something that comes along like you kind of touched on it before, right? There's a little bit more pressure and accountability in marketing at the moment. And I think that that's a good thing, right? I always think content and marketing more broadly has moved a lot closer to revenue in the last probably five, 10 years, but certainly I've noticed it in the last 24 months in particular because the way that people buy has changed, right? So it gives marketing a slightly different role. It isn't just capture some interest that sales can go on and close.
you've got much younger buyers who typically like to engage with marketing predominantly because it's what we're used to in our general life. So it's kind of moving us closer to the sharp pointy end of how revenue is generated. That's a fantastic thing. That's a great opportunity. It's where you see so many more kind of marketing CROs and I realized the listeners can't hear when I do inverted commas or can't see when I do inverted commas.
Martin (35:30.69)
you
Tom Rudnai (35:32.396)
with my hands in a non-visual medium. But I think you can see all of that filtering through. So it's a great opportunity for any marketers listening to this to kind of lean into that. It just brings moving closer to this point and brings with it noise.
Martin (35:47.222)
Yeah, no, I think that's right. And I think, you know, a big driver of, we touched on it again earlier, you know, the ability to measure or track or, you know, sort of infer connections with the marketing that you are doing is just getting better and better. There are more and more opportunities and therefore it is coming under scrutiny. And like you say, rightly so.
Tom Rudnai (36:11.406)
Yeah, awesome. Well, look, we're kind of approaching times. What I always like to do at the end of these, Martin, is move into a couple of quickfire questions. So first one, what's the biggest change that you've noticed in B2B marketing since you first started all those years ago? I won't put a number on it.
Martin (36:19.456)
Okay.
Martin (36:31.788)
biggest change? mean, there's been so much because feeling a little old when I think about that. Obviously, digital tech explosion to the point that we're now in AI territory firmly has been a massive sort of shift. I think the biggest one actually
in B2B marketing has been, know, events have always been a massive, a massive thing. And I think COVID was a real sort of shock to the system because, you know, suddenly everything changed, everything went digital. There was some real innovation around it. But what COVID also, I suppose, started or what our response to COVID started was what happens
as and when we come back again or emerge out of it. And what I have found across the gamut of events is, the whole sort of exhibition online thing died a death. There were some really interesting attempts to, you know, to preserve it. Some successful, some less so. There was some great online content. I think everybody was webinared out by 2022.
But the biggest thing was, you know, we needed, we realized we needed face to face and you know, that kind of in-person engagement is so important in most B2B circles, but it's how. And I think now with the bigger events, with trade shows, with CAN, with, even with like how marketers like me approach the concept of events.
The key is like deeper engagement and it's made us more selective, kind of, so, you know, can, as an example, parties are much more turned down. Um, engagements are much more senior, um, content there's, there's a lot more kind of, um, a lot more kind of deeper, you know, um, engagement. When I say content, I mean like at the events, much more interaction. It just feels like we've changed the whole, the whole expo model seems to have died from my perspective. So I think.
Martin (38:52.034)
Yeah, think the biggest change over the last 20 years is how events have moved on sort of largely, maybe kind of exacerbated by that spike in 2020.
Tom Rudnai (39:02.658)
Yeah, and so how's that filtered through for you then? You're focusing on kind of going bigger and deeper at fewer events, is that right?
Martin (39:12.474)
yeah, I think so. Yeah, more choiceful. and there have been other reasons for, for that, you know, sort of personally, sorry, in, my specific circle in terms of, you know, sort of economic, try, know, tribulations and things like that. But, but the whole concept of deeper engagement is more around, yeah, it could be kind of smaller, more niche events or better targeting rather than the kind of broad brush. And yeah, you're right. It might also be driven by.
tighter budgets, more measurement as we've talked about. But it's the thing I've noticed is there's a lot more kind of scrutiny on connecting with the right audience in the right way.
Tom Rudnai (39:58.412)
Yeah, no, I get that. I think it links, there's a bit of an emphasis now on community, right? Which I think comes from the fact that people want connection at these events. Also the content itself, I think has lost a little bit of its shine. I can go for a walk right now on my phone, plug my earphones in and listen to the CEOs of Salesforce, HubSpot, the best companies in the world talk to me for an hour from a podcast, right? So the content at an event isn't particularly unique anymore.
What is is the connection. So for me, it's rethinking the like format of the events. I love smaller communities. Part of, I actually find big conferences a nightmare. I think they're lonely. People don't actually talk to each other very much because there's just so many people there. Whereas you get these smaller, more intimate settings of a specific community that's relevant to you and kind of your people. And you get way deeper conversations, way more engagement going on there. So that's definitely something I've seen as well.
Martin (40:55.906)
Yeah, 100 % and more, you know, sort of more seniority, more focus on decision makers, which is why, you know, you've seen sort of intimate dinners or round tables, you know, sort of pop up a lot more, think, these days.
Tom Rudnai (41:09.218)
Yeah, it's giving people what they miss in their day jobs a little bit more as well as we're all a bit more kind of disparate. Anyway, I'm always really bad at doing quick fire questions, so I'm gonna move on now. For you personally, Martin, in your career, what skill or trait that you have has been the biggest needle mover for you?
Martin (41:20.802)
you
Martin (41:32.834)
Myself and a colleague talk about this a lot. think it's more of like a, it's something I've aspired to, I think. I think empathy is everything in marketing. I think like...
empaths make good marketers, marketers make good empaths, because we, you know, it's our job ultimately to understand customers, understand sellers, understand our team members, understand our bosses. And it's a gap. think that just the, guess that's every employee's, you know, or even human beings kind of job. But, but it feels like marketing is quite well placed to, know, to sort of achieve it and fill the gaps where, where they
where they present, particularly as you go kind of, you know, further up the organization. I think the CMO's role in having that, bringing that level of understanding of the market, of our customers, into the organizations that, you know, sort of the biggest game changer I think marketing can make. And it's one that I've, you know, I've always aspired to.
Tom Rudnai (42:40.654)
I like that a lot, you're not the first person to tell that to people who have done well in marketing who credit their success to that. Out of interest, this is another off-script one, is there a way that you can kind of test for that in an interview? Like can you hire for empathy and how do you identify it in 50 minutes?
Martin (42:59.298)
Yeah, that's a really good question. I don't know. don't think you can. it's something that is practiced and that is kind of as a consistent. It's hard to... Unless you can...
Unless you can ask specific questions around it or maybe empath radar, I've no idea, but it's a tough one to try and kind of recognise in an interview situation or put across in an interview situation. But I think if you can talk around it, you're cognisant of it, then that's probably a step in the right direction.
Tom Rudnai (43:39.278)
So think it's self-awareness, generally speaking, is a pretty good indicator, right? If you have awareness of the impact you're having on people, then you're kind of obviously understanding their own emotional state in that moment as well. Yeah, okay. Another question, this is a bit of a fun one. If I was to tomorrow approve your Plan A budget request, right, the way I think of it is the thing that no one would ever give you, ever be stupid enough to give you the money to do, but you'd love to do, what would you do?
Martin (43:49.376)
Yeah, that's right.
Martin (44:07.874)
That's a tough one. I'm just trying to think about my plan A. I think...
Tom Rudnai (44:17.752)
like a campaign or something that you've just always thought this would be fun.
Martin (44:23.382)
Yeah, no, I, if I was thinking, so I started thinking about it as a, as sort of a more, a more operational one, I suppose, and less kind of visionary one. I suppose I was based on our conversation earlier, you know, I could gravitate to like a big brand campaign. that's, that's, that wasn't in my plan a budget, because it's far beyond, you know, our level at the moment. and I don't have an idea to, to mind at the moment.
But I'd have to think about that. What I would do is ensure investment in the team. Marketing is widely documented that we're asked to do more and more with less and less. And I'd probably try and make a case to justify more investment in the team and the people that are tasked with executing.
Tom Rudnai (45:22.242)
Nice, I like that. Also, so from the big brand campaign, am I putting you down for a Super Bowl ad in the next couple of years? Gong did it, are we gonna see Captify? Cool, then probably last question before I just let you promote anything that you'd like to. In your career, what's the biggest fuck up that you ever made? Like a heart and mouth moment.
Martin (45:29.494)
you
Yeah, let's try. Yeah, why not?
Martin (45:47.17)
okay. Fuck up.
Tom Rudnai (45:53.806)
I'm not allowed to say joining this podcast.
Martin (45:55.842)
Yeah right, no I can't think of a heart in my mouth moment. I was going to say like I think I stayed in one place too long and I think jumping around is probably not just the way to you know it's the easiest way to get a pay rise but I think it's the quickest way to learn.
We in marketing in particular, we find ourselves in such a state of necessary agility that it probably, yeah, I probably stayed somewhere a little too long in my younger years and might've been good to move around a little bit. Might've accelerated a few things and helped me sort of fail faster. So yeah, no one like sort of, yeah, crawl into a whole moment that I can think of. I'm sure there have been a few, perhaps I'm less aware of, I don't know.
Tom Rudnai (46:51.409)
I'll ask some people in your network and I'll superimpose them into the episode instead. We've actually got five for you everyone. No, I like that answer though. It's something that I did a lot of job hopping kind of early in my career, just I didn't know what I wanted to do. Which to me is the 22 year old, if you grow up with 22 thinking, know I want to be in B2B marketing, there's something really sad about
Martin (46:53.738)
Yeah, it do.
You
Martin (47:00.886)
Yeah, probably.
Martin (47:09.121)
Yeah.
Tom Rudnai (47:16.558)
I had to kind of land here by going and jumping around a lot and doing stuff that you like bits of and you kind of trial and error your way towards what you're doing. I think it's one of the biggest things people probably forget when they're in decision-making positions about what it was like at that age where you're going to get these incredibly talented people doing that.
So yeah, I certainly wouldn't view it as a red flag. It's fantastic if you've seen that they're at that point where they have been landed somewhere and they can explain to you why this is the next point in their trial and error. But yeah, why should you know what you wanna do at 22?
Martin (47:55.042)
Well, think that's a good point. I do think it's more rewarded perhaps than it might have been like back then. do think kind of careers getting shorter and jumping around is more acceptable, particularly in marketing. I mean, you look at the tenure of a CMO versus a CFO, should tell you everything you need to know. So yeah, I think that's just a, yeah, I think.
Probably something that I'd, yeah, that's how I choose to answer that one anyway. Like I say, no, no, no particular moment. No.
Tom Rudnai (48:28.492)
No heart in mouth, no heart stopping moments. No, awesome. And then before we do go then just one, any recommendations for the listeners like a book or a podcast or a thought leader that you would recommend they go and check out?
Martin (48:43.276)
I mean, I always gravitate to Seth Godin. Anything by him is fabulous. It's marketing related and it goes beyond marketing. Mark Ritson's great for your kind of hands-on marketing strategy, but Seth Godin just brings concepts and ideas that just really open your mind, broaden your thinking. So I always recommend him. I did read...
I did read a book recently called The Jelly Effect, which I don't mind promoting. mate of mine lent it to me. I think it's really a book around sort of how to sell more, but sales is very much, I think from what we've talked about today, marketing, marketers are always having to sell themselves in some way, right? Whether it's getting the budget that's not approved or whether it's justifying the...
the campaigns or the existence and it really helped me. I probably looked like a a traveling sales rep, like reading it on the commute and that as if I was off to my next sort of sales job interview. But I think it really is broadly applicable. It's by Andy Bounds. He's a really good influencer on LinkedIn. And he just breaks things, sort of social situations almost, just breaks them down into really easy digestible chunks.
makes it really actionable so yeah I'd go with that one.
Tom Rudnai (50:16.366)
There are worse things than looking like a travelling sales rep. At least it wasn't how to win friends and influence people. That's always the funniest one. When you see someone on the train with that, you're like, this is a one.
Martin (50:22.658)
Yeah, exactly that. Yeah. No, definitely it wasn't quite as sort of stereotyped as that one, but definitely definitely those sort of vibes. But no, I recommend it. It's a really good book.
Tom Rudnai (50:35.042)
Yeah, awesome. then like third time I've said lastly, but anything you're doing a CaptiFile personally that you want to just quickly shout out.
Martin (50:44.002)
I said earlier we're at Cannes so if there are anyone that's heading out to the Cannes Lion fringe events this year, feel free to follow Captify on LinkedIn for what's going on. We've got a fairly packed schedule as every year. And if it's relevant, connect with me separately, either out there or beyond. Always happy for a coffee and a chat about B2B marketing.
Tom Rudnai (51:12.822)
Awesome. Well look, thank you very much Martin. This has been awesome. And yeah, enjoy the rest of your day.
Martin (51:18.294)
Yeah, thanks very much Tom. Loved it. Cheers.
Tom Rudnai (51:20.11)
Cheers mate.