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Welcome to The B2B CMO Podcast, a show for marketing executives who are redefining what it means to be a strategic leader. Join Jon Miller and Sydney Sloan every week as they talk with the very best Chief Marketing Officers who are navigating the modern marketing playbook and positioning themselves as strategic leaders.
Each episode, we unpack what it really takes to lead through complexity, earn trust at the strategy table, and shape the future of growth.
We’re building the community, research, and frameworks CMOs need to reclaim their strategic role and drive sustainable growth.
For more marketing leadership resources, visit [b2bcmoproject.com](http://b2bcmoproject.com/).
B2B CMO - 001 - Tricia Gellman - Full Episode 1.1
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Sydney Sloan: Alright, welcome. [00:00:25] We are excited to have Tricia Gelman on the podcast today. She [00:00:30] leads, uh, marketing at Box, the intelligent content platform, which has been pioneering [00:00:35] intelligent content management and made this shift.
Sydney Sloan: AI powered [00:00:40] collaboration, workflow automation, and security for enterprise content. I've been following box for a long time. I'm a big fan [00:00:45] of Aaron and was very excited to see you land there. Uh, but previously [00:00:50] Tricia has built and scaled growth engines at Adobe where we originally met years [00:00:55] ago, and also at, uh, Salesforce, where she ascended to the CMO of [00:01:00] Canada role.
Sydney Sloan: So that, I think technically was your first CMO role. And then you went on to. [00:01:05] Technically. Yeah. Um, and then you went to hold CMO roles at [00:01:10] Drift and Checker and um, where I think you're just like superpowers [00:01:15] are in category creation and how to align Go-To-Market that [00:01:20] makes the enterprise value of marketing and your partnership with sales and like, how do [00:01:25] you build that relationship?
Sydney Sloan: So I'm,
Tricia's origin story of becoming an exceptional marketing leader
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Sydney Sloan: I know we're gonna go into all those points today, [00:01:30] um, but I think it's always great not to just talk about the professional accolades, but to [00:01:35] get to know you a little bit as well. So, outside of your work bio, [00:01:40] tell me like your origin story. Where did you come from? Tricia Gelman.
Tricia Gellman: [00:01:45] Yeah, I mean I have been in California and in the same house in California for like [00:01:50] over 20 years, which is just crazy 'cause most people do not stay in one place that long. [00:01:55] Um, but you know, the Bay Area, there's a lot to do here. Um, I. Came [00:02:00] from the East Coast. And I like to say that I came from Cape Cod, 'cause I came from a small beach [00:02:05] town that is not technically Cape Cod, but right before you go across the bridge.
Tricia Gellman: And um, [00:02:10] you know, it tripled in size in the summer because like everybody came from all over the world to go to their summer [00:02:15] houses. Um, and you know, we just lived there all year. Whether it was dumping snow or [00:02:20] whether it was like a great time on the water, you know, going to the beach. And um, I think, you know, that's.[00:02:25]
Tricia Gellman: That's sort of like who I am is just, I love that idea of being [00:02:30] outside the idea of the seasons. I live in California where we don't have the seasons, but I [00:02:35] really do, like in my heart of hearts, when I was the CMO of Salesforce Canada, I like my body just [00:02:40] fell right back into it. It's like you get hot and then you get cooler and then it's really cold [00:02:45] and you know, like your body just knows.
Tricia Gellman: It's like this is a natural evolution. Um, [00:02:50] and I grew up. Really like a massive tomboy. I remember driving on 95 [00:02:55] corridor and you know, there were all these toll booths at the time, which don't exist now. [00:03:00] And I remember I would always wanna throw the coins into the toll booth and or give the money to the [00:03:05] people and people would say to my mom, oh, your son is so cute.[00:03:10]
Tricia Gellman: And I tell that story because I think like between the sort of [00:03:15] like be natural, be authentic, that you get from Cape Cod and the [00:03:20] tomboy upbringing, it kind of says a lot for how I've carved this path of [00:03:25] weaving between marketing and sales and bringing everything together.
Jon Miller: how, how did you become a [00:03:30] marketer in the first place, though? Like what, what brought you into the function?
Tricia Gellman: Yeah, it was a [00:03:35] mistake. So, um, so I started as a graphic designer and I was a graphic designer in the time, [00:03:40] um, when, uh, the Mac was just becoming a thing and people were, um, be [00:03:45] beginning to digitize. So I was in DC I went to school in DC to do international communications and [00:03:50] graphic design in a small program.
Tricia Gellman: I graduated and my professor was starting a design studio [00:03:55] on the Mac, which was unheard of at the time. My head of the design department was working on the [00:04:00] next and was actually working with Steve Jobs and the team at next, and so like [00:04:05] very limited people, but super forward looking and I decided to go like all [00:04:10] deep, you know, whole body experience into like the digital component of [00:04:15] design, in which case I ended up working with the leaders of Adobe and Apple and all of these great [00:04:20] companies, but from DC.
Tricia Gellman: And so I had the opportunity to go work for Apple in [00:04:25] California, and I thought, I can always be a designer, but I don't know where this tech thing will take me. [00:04:30] I'm gonna go check out California. And I went to be an evangelist at [00:04:35] Apple in the Guy Kawasaki era. In the time before Steve Jobs came back to [00:04:40] Apple and when they were reorging every three months, and I got there and in my sixth week [00:04:45] they told me I was no longer an evangelist.
Tricia Gellman: I was marketing. I went home. I cried [00:04:50] because I thought marketing was not measurable, useless, and made no sense, and, [00:04:55] and I quickly realized. Oh yeah, actually, if you tell the right story and you partner with the right [00:05:00] groups and you bring the right, you know, consortium together, you can make a big difference in what your company [00:05:05] does.
Tricia Gellman: Um, that is however, how I went to Adobe because Adobe actually understood that and [00:05:10] had an organizational structure around it that didn't reorganize every six to eight weeks. And so [00:05:15] I jumped chip from Apple to Adobe.
Sydney Sloan: And you're on the creative suite, uh, team too, [00:05:20] right? On the,
Sydney Sloan: on the,
Tricia Gellman: I started in the postscript division. I mean, I think that's actually another foundational [00:05:25] component of my tech experience is that I started in the postscript division at Adobe when they [00:05:30] already had Illustrator, Photoshop, et cetera. Um, but because it was, um, the, [00:05:35] you know, the founding origin story for Adobe, when.
Tricia Gellman: We launched anything [00:05:40] in the postscript division. I got to write the press releases and the speeches and [00:05:45] everything for Chuck and John and I got to work directly with Chuck and John on every single launch that we did. [00:05:50] And, um, was very impressed by how they led the company, how they engaged, [00:05:55] and really were able to look around the corner of where they were going.
Tricia Gellman: And when I was there, they decided [00:06:00] they wanted to retire and they started handing the business off to, um, other people. And they [00:06:05] even brought in. Nobody was pre Bruce. They brought in an entire C-suite [00:06:10] that they thought had the experience and the knowledge and scale and all of these things that [00:06:15] would basically take Adobe to the next level.
Tricia Gellman: And within six months they saw that [00:06:20] it was falling apart and it was not headed on the right path, and they fired the entire [00:06:25] team.
Jon Miller: Crazy.
Tricia Gellman: it was crazy, but it was so bold and it made me [00:06:30] realize like, you have to stand up for the right thing. You have to do the right thing. You have to understand at an [00:06:35] instinctual level, like where things are going and what you're doing in your job.
Tricia Gellman: And it's not just about [00:06:40] following the OKRs, but it's literally about understanding like what is right for your company. And I [00:06:45] think, you know, that comes down to Go-To-Market and marketing and sales too. It's like you can't [00:06:50] just say, stay in your lane and say like, no, no, no, sorry, I'm doing my little thing.
Sydney Sloan: [00:06:55] Yeah, I think, um, it, I'm, I'm just going to advance right into like the topical [00:07:00] questions and we'll come back to some of the fun questions towards the end. 'cause we're, we're headed down this direction [00:07:05] and, um, one of the things that I feel that. That Adobe taught [00:07:10] me was this idea of being strategic. And I think you were product marketing as well.
Sydney Sloan: I was product [00:07:15] marketing and
Tricia Gellman: wasn't the strategic role like product marketing and Adobe owned the p and [00:07:20] l.
Sydney Sloan: it, it's, exactly, and, and so that was my, I mean, like I started events so [00:07:25] like I was a hundred percent, you know, marketing fluff, but somehow I ended up in product [00:07:30] marketing. 'cause I like talking to customers and, and listen to them. And so they suggested I do [00:07:35] that.
Sydney Sloan: And so how do you think. That, that experience and, and even [00:07:40] at Salesforce, 'cause I think it was similar at Salesforce, like influenced you in [00:07:45] the way that you think about being a strategic CMO and what, what does that look like? [00:07:50] How would you define like, strategic, that's one of this parts of the CMO project is, you know, [00:07:55] how do we remain, you know, an influence and, and not just be the [00:08:00] pipeline pushers, right?
Sydney Sloan: Like, how do, how do we expand our remit?
Tricia Gellman: Yeah. Which I think [00:08:05] is really important, especially with the influence of AI in marketing, is like, what is it that you stand for [00:08:10] and, and where does it go? And the strategic component I think is something that you can always stand on 'cause you have [00:08:15] to drive the AI and, and have a strategy around it. Um, so.
Tricia Gellman: I [00:08:20] think, you know, to me, I started out as a graphic designer and went to Apple to [00:08:25] help build the graphic design platform for Apple, like the people who are building software and [00:08:30] things like that. And, um, really to me, graphic design is about problem solving. And [00:08:35] so in the end of the day, it's like, what is the problem?
Tricia Gellman: How are you trying to solve it? How, what are the [00:08:40] pieces? How's it all come together? And I think at Adobe in the product marketing role, [00:08:45] that was one of the key things that we had to do. Like, what is this story? How does it translate [00:08:50] globally? How do you bring the pieces together? At the time, we're selling shrink wrap boxes, so you [00:08:55] know, how do you get the channel bought in?
Tricia Gellman: How do you enable all those people? Um, you know, and I [00:09:00] was there for the birth of creative suite and helped to. Be the head of product marketing for a creative suite, [00:09:05] um, that was on the heels of building out the InDesign business. And what, [00:09:10] you know, I really learned there is one that conviction to do the right thing, but two, like [00:09:15] you can really build whatever business you want, if you think strategically about the end game.[00:09:20]
Tricia Gellman: So, you know, InDesign was not gonna be successful. You didn't have printers who [00:09:25] wanted to print the files that came out of InDesign. And when the engineers built the product, [00:09:30] they never spoke to a printer. They just assumed that creative people were gonna wanna lay out in a [00:09:35] product that worked with Illustrator and Photoshop.
Tricia Gellman: And within the first six months, the product had the largest [00:09:40] amount of returns that you've ever seen in the history of software. And so we had to rebuild the whole [00:09:45] thing, and it was predicated on the problem that they hadn't talked to the ecosystem of players that would [00:09:50] make the role successful, make the software successful.
Tricia Gellman: And I think that's where [00:09:55] marketing has one of the biggest opportunities is. You're on the front line, you're telling [00:10:00] that story. How do you understand who needs to hear the story? How do you understand how that [00:10:05] story then gets told through your business? I think at at Adobe, I learned that you have to [00:10:10] figure out who the players are in this ecosystem of the story.
Tricia Gellman: At Salesforce, I learned that you have to [00:10:15] understand your own Go-To-Market operation and how that story goes out the [00:10:20] door. Because you know, when I was at Salesforce, we bought Jigsaw, turned it into [00:10:25] data.com. We decided that, you know, this is the first brand we're gonna keep. We're gonna bring to [00:10:30] market.
Tricia Gellman: We're gonna give its own sort of p and l, but we're gonna sell it to the same people that we sold [00:10:35] CRM. It turned out that we didn't have the right incentives because salespeople could make [00:10:40] five x on selling CRM versus selling data.com. They had like much more, you know, [00:10:45] stickiness on CRM because the story was bigger, broader, and people understood it.
Tricia Gellman: It was easier, all these [00:10:50] things. So it didn't matter what story we had for data.com, the sellers were not motivated. [00:10:55] That's the operational rigor of sort of like how does your message then [00:11:00] translate into the end revenue and the goal for your company. You have to put all [00:11:05] those pieces together, otherwise it will fail miserably.
Jon Miller: I, I totally [00:11:10] agree about the, you know, how effectively we need to own, own and understand the market. You know, one [00:11:15] of the challenges I see is that other, not every other executive sees it that way, you know? Was [00:11:20] there ever a time where you joined as a, you were a CMO at a company where you felt [00:11:25] like marketing was not saved as strategic, or you were not seen as strategic and what'd you do, how'd you [00:11:30] handle it?
Tricia Gellman: I mean, I would say that when I was a CMO of Salesforce Canada, it was not [00:11:35] viewed as strategic. It was actually not viewed as necessary at all. Um, so as [00:11:40] Salesforce, yeah, it was very interesting. So at Salesforce, you know, when I got there, uh, it was [00:11:45] $1.2 billion company. It was CRM only. We bought data.com and then we, you know, went to [00:11:50] platforms, uh, service Cloud, et cetera, and, you know, on and on.
Tricia Gellman: But, um. [00:11:55] As the company grew, they went from global sales to like [00:12:00] regional eye sales, emea, Asia-Pac, Japan, north America. By the [00:12:05] time they did that, the company was easily 12 years old, if not more. I can't remember the year. [00:12:10] And, um. The growth in the United States was already huge. So now that [00:12:15] you've assigned a sales team to have specific growth metrics that get reported out to the [00:12:20] street by like a regional geo environment, they had to figure out how they were gonna fuel [00:12:25] additional growth and they realized, oh, there's this perceived small country called Canada that's a part of [00:12:30] this North America number, and we don't have the penetration similar to the United States.
Tricia Gellman: We [00:12:35] should assign a sales team that is a sales team for Canada and a marketing team that's a [00:12:40] marketing team for Canada. Of course then the marketing and sales leaders can work together. [00:12:45] We can all be in the Toronto office, et cetera. Well, six months in at the global [00:12:50] level, they decided from the marketing side, they thought they could handle everything globally and that they didn't need [00:12:55] to invest.
Tricia Gellman: And at the same time, they were gonna triple. The number of salespeople, [00:13:00] and so what'd you do? So I convinced them that we should spend part of our variable [00:13:05] marketing dollars to staff a team to demonstrate what the impact could be [00:13:10] of doing regionalized programs that were done locally and wait for like the budgeting [00:13:15] cycle to see what would happen for the following year.
Tricia Gellman: And they decided for the following year, they also [00:13:20] were not gonna dedicate headcount and added dollars. And so I'd left. That's how I ended up [00:13:25] at Checker and on my own little CMO path.
Jon Miller: That is advice I give [00:13:30] to some CMOs today. It's like you. To try to convince your fellow peers about how to think of [00:13:35] marketing as strategic, but if you can't, life's too short to keep banging your head against the wall.
Tricia Gellman: [00:13:40] Well, and I think it's important when you're interviewing, right? You have to keep in mind that when you are interviewing, it's not [00:13:45] them interviewing you, it's you interviewing them. And I think especially at the C-suite, that's really important. [00:13:50] And so, you know, that's what I'm looking for is somebody that believes that [00:13:55] marketing has a strategic seat.
Sydney Sloan: Are you also matching kind of [00:14:00] your superpowers, like category creation, reformation? Like when when you're doing that [00:14:05] analysis and you build your rubric, like how much of it is the fit for your [00:14:10] role and your motivated ability versus the pers people you're working with versus the reputation [00:14:15] of the company and potential E like.
Sydney Sloan: You know,
Tricia Gellman: It's all those things. But I mean, [00:14:20] I am at Box right now because of the superpower component. I mean, I was doing advising, [00:14:25] as you know, and. I was fine to not work, you know, a million hours a week and be in [00:14:30] control of my calendar, but I knew that I did eventually wanna go back to a full-time role because I [00:14:35] like building and mentoring and things that you don't get as an advisor.
Tricia Gellman: And the [00:14:40] box opportunity was a hundred percent my superpowers. It was how can you redefine the [00:14:45] category? How can you build a new story and how can you com connect marketing and sales? [00:14:50] And these are the things I love to do. And I basically realized, hey, I'm not looking for a job right now, but. [00:14:55] In two years, when I am looking for a job, am I gonna find a company that literally [00:15:00] wants a CMO to do these superpowers that I have?
Tricia Gellman: It's probably unlikely. And [00:15:05] so that's literally why I
Sydney Sloan: Can you double click on those three steps? Like how, okay, [00:15:10] so those are your superpowers, uh, category recreation, and you've got the back [00:15:15] A, the momentum of Ai B Aaron's like. You know, [00:15:20] deep enthusiasm and transparency of how he's leading that change, which is really [00:15:25] hard in these large companies to now compete in an AI first world.
Sydney Sloan: You guys have been doing it for more than a year. [00:15:30] Like take us through your playbook. Like how did you apply it at Box? What's worked
Tricia Gellman: Yeah. [00:15:35] Yeah. So, um, so.
Tricia Gellman: When I talk to Aaron, I mean the other thing, so back to like, why [00:15:40] take a job? What is it that you wanna do as a leader? I mean, those are my superpowers, but also, [00:15:45] um, I work best when I'm in a collaborative environment and a [00:15:50] lot of times with a founder, you have, this is my way and this is what we're gonna do.
Tricia Gellman: Like, please go do it. [00:15:55] And you know, that might be a different thing
Sydney Sloan: You get, please use.
Tricia Gellman: Yeah. [00:16:00] Yeah, exactly. And so, I mean, I think that's the reality of, you know, founder [00:16:05] led company sometimes. But Aaron is a very human founder and a very logical founder. [00:16:10] And he is, he has his convictions, but he is willing to listen to you if you can talk [00:16:15] him through logically what it is that you're thinking.
Tricia Gellman: And he's one of those people that's happy to go sit in the [00:16:20] whiteboard and agree that like one plus one can equal three. Essentially if you like [00:16:25] spitball and challenge each other and kind of go at it. And it might not be in that meeting that you agree, [00:16:30] it might be, oh yeah, okay, we've talked about something new.
Tricia Gellman: We even covered it. Let's put this aside [00:16:35] and we'll go on with some other things and come back to it later. But, um, he's willing to do that. And [00:16:40] so that was the other reason why I thought it was worth it to take the job. Because if we're gonna [00:16:45] define something new, like we don't really even know exactly what it is.
Tricia Gellman: Especially with ai. I [00:16:50] mean, when I joined. Everybody knew that generative AI was gonna be a big [00:16:55] thing and it had already been launched, but like, it really hadn't gotten to the fact [00:17:00] where like every model's launching a new model every month and all of the things that we're seeing today. [00:17:05] And so, um, so I think, you know, looking at what was going on there, they [00:17:10] had not.
Tricia Gellman: Announced that they were doing AI product yet when I got there. Um, [00:17:15] and yet in three months or two months, they were gonna have their biggest customer conference. [00:17:20] And they had already kind of moved forward on some messaging where they pretty much j just added [00:17:25] intelligent to the front of their story. And, and that was it.
Tricia Gellman: Like, they're like, [00:17:30] oh, now we're intelligent and so that means we have ai. And it felt really like. [00:17:35] We can do this, I guess, but I don't see us really like growing fast on this AI train with [00:17:40] this very minor tweak to the story. But I mean, in two months I wasn't [00:17:45] able to pick up on what a different story should be.
Tricia Gellman: And then by listening to the story [00:17:50] being told, by looking at how people were reacting to it, I realized [00:17:55] there's no one in the company who wakes up and says, I need intelligent content management. [00:18:00] Like it just, it's not a remit. Right. And so you can't. Drive [00:18:05] high velocity sales and really hockey stick a company on a story [00:18:10] that you're having to like push up a hill.
Tricia Gellman: And so I started to listen to [00:18:15] what people did care about and who, who was it that cared about it, and was it our existing [00:18:20] buyer or was it someone else in the organization? And from that, I assessed that if we [00:18:25] really wanted to be successful with this new story. We basically had to run a new, a [00:18:30] new selling motion.
Tricia Gellman: Even though we were driving a lot of our revenue from our existing customers we're $1.2 [00:18:35] billion business. We have over 120,000 customers. Um, we needed to go [00:18:40] find new buyers, and that could be new companies or it could be new people within the company. [00:18:45] And so when I looked at that, I realized, one, we need a bigger story.
Tricia Gellman: Two, [00:18:50] we need a new way to Go-To-Market, and we move 30% of our budget into [00:18:55] awareness. And really identifying how can we bring that story out into the [00:19:00] market because we knew the AI space was gonna move fast. We had no idea how fast really it was. [00:19:05] I mean, like, I think we're all floored about how fast it's now moving.
Tricia Gellman: But um, we knew it was gonna move [00:19:10] faster than Box had been moving for the past 10 years and. We had to [00:19:15] get the air cover. We weren't gonna reach the new buyers by going to all of our customers and saying, can you help [00:19:20] us go meet your, you know, head of business architecture and, you know, the [00:19:25] developer team within your IT org and the CIO.
Tricia Gellman: Like, it just was too slow. It wasn't gonna work.
Sydney Sloan: [00:19:30] I have two questions like where I wanna go from here, but I, the, the first one is, [00:19:35] you know, I, I on the market side and, you know, when there's momentum in the market, you [00:19:40] wanna attach yourself to it. So you get the, the benefit of that. And, and you [00:19:45] box was early on in the partnership, like you were deep with OpenAI and.
Sydney Sloan: So [00:19:50] you had to change your models to like match their models of innovation. [00:19:55] Talk a little bit about that because I'm sure there's people out there that wanna like, how do I partner [00:20:00] with these LLMs and how, how can I leverage what's happening with them [00:20:05] to benefit my company? Hmm.
Tricia Gellman: Yeah, so I think the other thing about like telling a [00:20:10] story, it kind of goes back to that sort of operational like differentiation that I was [00:20:15] talking about in terms of like data.com being sold and what would it be successful or not because of the way the sales [00:20:20] team was motivated. Aaron made two really foundational decisions before I got to [00:20:25] box, and I think they're a hundred percent the foundation of what we are building off of and seeing success [00:20:30] from.
Tricia Gellman: One was they're not gonna build their own LLM. They're not gonna build their own LLM, they're [00:20:35] not gonna partner with one partner. They basically that this was gonna change so fast [00:20:40] that they just needed to build a platform where they could basically offer, well, we could offer [00:20:45] at any platform. Any LLM that anybody wanted.
Tricia Gellman: And so we have [00:20:50] pre-negotiated deals that go out two and three years with OpenAI, [00:20:55] with Google and Gemini, with Anthropic and and with others. And we [00:21:00] also have a platform that allows you to bring your own. So for example, IBM is a huge customer. They wanna have Watson, [00:21:05] bring. Watson is super easy for us to plug it in.
Tricia Gellman: Um, and so that, I think. [00:21:10] It's really critical because it's changing so fast that maybe [00:21:15] today somebody thinks that OpenAI is like the leader for what they wanna do, but maybe in three months, [00:21:20] Gemini would be the leader in terms of what we wanna do. And because the platform has all [00:21:25] of these models all the time.
Tricia Gellman: You can basically use each one for what it's best for [00:21:30] or standardize your company and what you're doing in Box on one. Like it's really up to the admins [00:21:35] within the company. The other was that even though Aaron was a real thought leader on [00:21:40] ai and it wasn't like, oh, generative AI came and he started to think like, what can I do with this?
Tricia Gellman: Like [00:21:45] he was the head of that because he's very ahead on product and technology. Um. [00:21:50] He basically realized that the price for tokens in AI was [00:21:55] always gonna basically be going down as long as there were multiple models competing to get business. [00:22:00] And so, and the, and you know, and that the models would evolve and so [00:22:05] he didn't say, oh, you know, we have our traditional business and then we're gonna [00:22:10] add in like a massive cost for you to add ai.
Tricia Gellman: He basically said [00:22:15] like, AI's gonna be new and probably scary for people, so let's just try and get [00:22:20] people to use it. Do that in a way where maybe in some cases [00:22:25] we are gonna lose money, but at the end of the day, it's not like the hockey stick of our revenue [00:22:30] growth is gonna be because of tokens and people paying for tokens.
Tricia Gellman: It's gonna be because of [00:22:35] capabilities and outcomes that we're gonna deliver based on what the AI now [00:22:40] brings to content. That makes it possible to tell a really great [00:22:45] story, I think because you're not worried about describing the specific back end of a [00:22:50] model, and you're not worried about telling people, like, now you have to triple, you know, [00:22:55] the cost in this other way.
Sydney Sloan: on the partnership front, just tactically, I mean, I, I, [00:23:00] I've partnered with you before, you know, where, where you can create moats you, like, [00:23:05] for you guys, you're not, I guess the moat you're creating is that interoperability, which is really smart for [00:23:10] enterprise. 'cause you know, the enterprise prefers bespoke solutions always.
Sydney Sloan: Um, but, [00:23:15] but is there something in the partnership itself that you feel, it, it, in the way that you've gone to market with [00:23:20] these partners? Who may not know how to partner because they're growing super fast too. Like, [00:23:25] so what? What's that relationship been like? Have you gotten leverage there? And again, like I'm asking it from the [00:23:30] question of being strategic, like CMOs that can think at the market level, not just the [00:23:35] tactical execution level.
Tricia Gellman: Yeah, I think, um, what we've been able to do [00:23:40] is because we have all the models, we are able to be a launch partner for [00:23:45] every single model. And the momentum in what people are following right now is around the [00:23:50] changes that are happening in the models. And so it's super exhausting for the marketing team [00:23:55] and the product team, but.
Tricia Gellman: Every time there's a new model, we spin up an eval and the [00:24:00] eval has become more complex based on the models becoming more complex. So we used [00:24:05] to just say, Hey, you know, the model can search across these, you know, massive amounts [00:24:10] of files in our system in X amount of time. And now it's like, yeah, of course they can.
Tricia Gellman: So [00:24:15] like, what else are you doing in your email? So now we have evals that are around workflows and [00:24:20] use cases that are in, at an industry level, for example. So we've evolved that. [00:24:25] At the time the model goes live, we basically post the eval. We post and we [00:24:30] like cross promote with the LLM. They sometimes mention [00:24:35] us.
Tricia Gellman: They, um, like that's the goal is like, how can they mention us? How do we mention them? How do we [00:24:40] get this like oversized visibility for our AI story by being a [00:24:45] part of the AI Go-To-Market motion, which is exhausting and it's [00:24:50] not what the buyers are checking the box about. But it is an awareness tactic.[00:24:55]
Sydney Sloan: Yes. awareness and an innovation tactic, and I think that's really key. You can't [00:25:00] only Go-To-Market with that, but it is like a really big helper and driver in [00:25:05] terms of how much reach we can get. And then everybody else in the ISV space [00:25:10] is trying to. Tell a story around this too. And so beyond just the [00:25:15] LLMs, like we partner with Salesforce and ServiceNow and Snowflake and like we really just [00:25:20] have this open ecosystem that we've been promoting.
Tricia Gellman: And now with [00:25:25] MCP, like, I think in the last week we did an MCP launch with [00:25:30] Figma, with Atlassian, with like, you know, three other providers. [00:25:35] And like today, I think we even launched a blog post about the momentum around [00:25:40] MCP. And like the importance of having a way to use [00:25:45] AI in whatever tool you want, but then to have your content and the context out of your [00:25:50] content in that tool.
Tricia Gellman: And because we can then do that, we have this huge [00:25:55] open ecosystem. So now when Salesforce has their huge Dreamforce conference. [00:26:00] We basically can parlay into that event, get in front of those buyers when [00:26:05] Okta has their event, we can get in front. It's just like there's so many different avenues for us [00:26:10] to tell our story, which is really cool.
Jon Miller: I, I want to kind of connect this dot to you, you're, [00:26:15] you're really talking about using partners for awareness. Earlier you talked about you move 30% of your [00:26:20] budget into awareness. I think a lot of CMOs really struggle with [00:26:25] awareness as a marketing thing because it's harder to [00:26:30] measure. Other people don't get it.
Jon Miller: It feels fluffy. Like how did you, like, did [00:26:35] you have any tension convincing the CFO to say, we're gonna put all this money [00:26:40] into awareness? Like, like how did you manage that?
Tricia Gellman: Yeah, I think it is always tension and [00:26:45] also I think it's super hard to measure, right? Which is why when I was at Apple and they told me that I was in [00:26:50] marketing. I at the time, you know, what you did in marketing was billboards and things like that, and you couldn't [00:26:55] measure it all. And so, um, so it's really a difficult thing, but I [00:27:00] think.
Tricia Gellman: Back to Aaron being logical. One of the reasons that I thought we could be [00:27:05] successful with this shift in our Go-To-Market is 'cause Aaron has over 2 million followers on [00:27:10] Twitter, and he as a persona is like a great person that people wanna hear [00:27:15] from and he's. Deep into this technology. So it's not that he just showed up [00:27:20] as some like Series A founder and I have a great idea, like he literally has a [00:27:25] following.
Tricia Gellman: He has a point of view and people respect him. But what I saw immediately when I got [00:27:30] to box is that the majority of box marketing was about features, functions, and [00:27:35] widgets. And then you had Aaron out. Like telling a story to 2 [00:27:40] million people and there was no connection between the two. And so for [00:27:45] us to be successful, we had to connect these two pieces and it [00:27:50] couldn't just be Aaron's voice.
Tricia Gellman: And so that's the story I basically created was about the [00:27:55] funnel and how we could create the funnel and how we could connect that reach. Down [00:28:00] into what we were doing. And because it's hard to measure like the, you can measure impressions [00:28:05] obviously, but who cares? So what we started to look at was how do we [00:28:10] start to connect the story and how do we look at the success of our funnel and the velocity of the funnel.[00:28:15]
Tricia Gellman: I pitched to Aaron that we work with the agency who could help us get [00:28:20] added awareness. And very quickly, therefore also have a measurement [00:28:25] platform because that's part of their, you know, um, mode of operation and it's harder at an [00:28:30] enterprise to bring on new software in the time I wanted. And he basically said that [00:28:35] it was a waste of money to pay for any platform that would measure awareness, [00:28:40] because we would know if we had awareness based on the vibe.
Jon Miller: [00:28:45] That's, that's a,
Tricia Gellman: So this was the conviction,
Sydney Sloan: you.
Tricia Gellman: I'm
Jon Miller: maybe all, work for
Tricia Gellman: of my [00:28:50] budget, I'm gonna move 30% of my budget. And I was like, that sounds like I, you know, I basically [00:28:55] pitched that I'm gonna move 30% of my budget, we're gonna connect, we're gonna create this funnel. But I would really like to be able to tell the [00:29:00] board, like, are we being successful?
Tricia Gellman: And he said, we will know. It will be a vibe.
Tricia Gellman: [00:29:05] four months later. So the next quarter. All of a sudden the sales team started proactively [00:29:10] coming forward with stories about how they've been calling into people for six [00:29:15] months, a year, nine months, whatever, like really long periods of time, never to receive [00:29:20] a call back.
Tricia Gellman: And that now they were getting calls back instantly and they were quoting that they [00:29:25] had seen Aaron in a podcast or you know, some other platform where they [00:29:30] hung out. So, you know, our strategy with the budget was. Aaron already has these [00:29:35] followers in Twitter, but everybody's not on Twitter or X or whatever you wanna call it.
Tricia Gellman: Um, let's [00:29:40] put him out through a very specific, like new [00:29:45] media communications program and get his story out where people [00:29:50] are. And then part partner with influencers. And we pivoted our [00:29:55] comms team to, um, you know, still do very traditional media, but to then [00:30:00] grow and do non-traditional.
Jon Miller: If I can follow up like so as, [00:30:05] as I said ago, may we all have the pleasure of working for CEOs who get
Jon Miller: it and [00:30:10] think, think it, and have massive followings. You know, if you think about your other [00:30:15] CMO jobs, like just what advice would you have for you in that role or another CMO [00:30:20] if you're working for A CFO or a board who just [00:30:25] doesn't get it as well, other than what we said earlier, which is like maybe you have to just leave.
Tricia Gellman: [00:30:30] Yeah, I mean, I think that in some cases you have to leave, but I think you first have to test the [00:30:35] waters to see if it's like really that broken. I think, you know, one of the things that I've [00:30:40] always done, you know, starting back at Adobe is like. [00:30:45] Create the moment. That is a proof point now, but have the story [00:30:50] of where you're trying to go later.
Tricia Gellman: So like you can't just sit out and say, Hey, I [00:30:55] need like two years to go build some Ferrari or whatever. Like nobody cares, nobody's gonna let you do [00:31:00] it. No one's gonna give you money for some X long period of time, which in today's day and age may just be [00:31:05] like six to nine months. So what can you do to say, Hey, I think we need to move.
Tricia Gellman: 30% of our [00:31:10] budget to awareness, but like, let me just take, you know, some small amount of my [00:31:15] budget and put it into an awareness test to then see if we hit this group of [00:31:20] people, how do we carry them down? How do we connect it and what does it do? So then you have that [00:31:25] ROI that you can use to advocate for the thing that everyone else doesn't believe [00:31:30] in.
Tricia Gellman: I think if you do enough of those things and you show like, Hey, this is the [00:31:35] progress we're gonna do starting here and then building, and then building and then building, like that's how [00:31:40] you get to the bigger thing. If people are slower and more reticent.
Jon Miller: I think it does [00:31:45] depend a little bit on your business. And do you have just a buying cycle that's [00:31:50] fast enough to kind of show the results of a pilot in the time that you have?
Tricia Gellman: [00:31:55] Yeah, but I think also it's about identifying what the metrics are, right? So, um, [00:32:00] I. With Tech Stack today and with the way that you can kind [00:32:05] of listen across ai, I think that you can test different things [00:32:10] that maybe before would've been harder. So like, you know, we don't have an awareness platform [00:32:15] for measurement, but you can start to see.
Tricia Gellman: Like, okay, the [00:32:20] people and the types of people that listen to X, Y, Z podcast, do we hear mentions [00:32:25] from that persona in our like gong or, you know, zoom AI recording and things like that. [00:32:30] You can ask the AEs to ask questions and, and to sort of prosecute against [00:32:35] various areas. And I think you just have to identify like what is the metric that is a super [00:32:40] early lead indicator that things are working versus waiting for the a [00:32:45] RR or even the pipeline potentially if you have long deal cycle.
Jon Miller: Great. Yeah.
Sydney Sloan: I was [00:32:50] just talking to somebody that I advised yesterday and I'm like, I'm still old school. Put the question on [00:32:55] the form. How did you hear about us? You, I mean, like it's, you know, like. To use all these [00:33:00] other fancy attribution. Like all I wanna know is what was the trigger in that person's mind [00:33:05] that made them think to come to us?
Sydney Sloan: And it can be a dropdown question on the [00:33:10] form. I'm, you know, if, if you still have forms. Um, I wanna pivot on this last section. [00:33:15] Um, uh, 'cause. You know, we've, uh, covered a lot of ground and I wanna thank you for [00:33:20] that. So we've talked about being strategic in category creation, thought leadership, how to get your brand out [00:33:25] there.
Sydney Sloan: But one of your other superpowers is developing that operating rhythm with [00:33:30] marketing and sales. To be able to execute from that story that you [00:33:35] talked about all the way through the customer conversation. And so for you, like, [00:33:40] what is that at a, at a scale company, 'cause you're a, you know, big time CMO and big [00:33:45] companies, what is that operating c.
Sydney Sloan: Uh, like system look like? Is [00:33:50] it pipeline, co councils, partnership strategies, data height? Like how do you wanna set [00:33:55] up that relationship and rigor with the sales organization to make [00:34:00] sure that you can pull that thread all the way through and that it's working?
Tricia Gellman: Yeah, I mean, I think [00:34:05] that it has to start with data. Um, so if you don't have clean data in terms of [00:34:10] how you're measuring your awareness through to close deal. You. You have [00:34:15] to be able to have that. So like you have to start at the data, but you also then have to have the [00:34:20] same reports and the same places that you look for the data.
Tricia Gellman: When I got to box [00:34:25] marketing had their reports, sales had their reports, we had great data, but no one was [00:34:30] using it collectively. And if you're gonna talk off of different. Points of [00:34:35] view, then you're never gonna have that rapport that you need to really unpack [00:34:40] what's working, what's not working, and how can we go faster.
Tricia Gellman: Um, I think the other thing [00:34:45] is that cadence, but, so you have to have the data on the backend. You have to have the relationship [00:34:50] between the head of sales and the head of marketing on the front end. Like you have to agree that it's not [00:34:55] one or the other, but it's like we're in this boat together and we sink, we swim together, [00:35:00] um, because otherwise.
Tricia Gellman: You spend a lot of wasted time just pointing fingers. [00:35:05] I mean, it's always, even with good data, a little bit muddy. Like, did marketing bring these [00:35:10] people in or are we saying they came from the website? But that's because there were 10 conversations that happened with the [00:35:15] sales team, et cetera. Like you have to just not worry about that and say, Hey, like in the end of the day, [00:35:20] we have to make revenue.
Tricia Gellman: We have to identify how we're gonna make the revenue. We have to assign out a [00:35:25] quota to everybody for how we're gonna get there, and we have to have accountability. And so if you [00:35:30] can't have that based off the same shared dashboards, and then divide up who has to do [00:35:35] what, and then agree based on, you know, your motion, whether it's more enterprise, mid-market, small business, [00:35:40] PLG, whatever, then you know, then also set up that cadence of how you hold [00:35:45] people accountable.
Tricia Gellman: Which I would say is a pipe council. Um, and depending on your [00:35:50] deal cycle, maybe like you don't wanna have pipe council every week if you're not gonna see a measurable [00:35:55] difference. 'cause then it's just a waste of time. Like none of these conversations should be a waste of time for [00:36:00] people.
Sydney Sloan: Yeah. Do you do it biweekly or monthly? Like how often do you do pipe cancel?
Tricia Gellman: I [00:36:05] think doing it biweekly when you're like, our main goal at Box right now, like we have a business [00:36:10] that's a, you know, decent sized PLG business. We have SMB, we have mid-market, we have enterprise, but the [00:36:15] real, like, we're gonna make it long term, like go drive a difference with ai, [00:36:20] workflow, et cetera, is gonna happen in high volume, you know, consumption of data [00:36:25] and, and activations, which mostly is in enterprise.
Tricia Gellman: And so. Like [00:36:30] doing a pipe council more than every other week is not gonna be worthwhile because there's just not [00:36:35] enough change.
Sydney Sloan: Alright, well then let's have some fun as we like to end it. [00:36:40] Um, 'cause you know, it's not fun, we shouldn't do it as my, as my motto as I, I think you kind of [00:36:45] know. Um, so gonna go back to a, a little bit to the beginning. [00:36:50] Um, and you told, you know, your origin story of, um, you know, growing [00:36:55] up in, in the Cape Cod area and so.
Sydney Sloan: I'm curious if there [00:37:00] was a biopic of your life, what three scenes would [00:37:05] need to be included? And I know you were an amazing Iron Man, so I'm gonna just toss that one in there. [00:37:10] Um, 'cause that puts me in awe. I don't know how you do that and be a CMO at the same time, but I know you've done it many [00:37:15] times. So what, what are, what are the three for you?
Tricia Gellman: Yeah, so I think, I mean, the first [00:37:20] would be just like swimming, sailing, like having fun in the sun, the water, like being around [00:37:25] water is just a key, core part of who I am, um, and being outdoors. So you [00:37:30] have to start with that. Then I think that translates into sports, um, you [00:37:35] know, which over time becomes like the Ironman, the Boston Marathon, like, I mean, I [00:37:40] think you're impressed with them.
Tricia Gellman: Ironman I grew up and like the Boston Marathon was the biggest, [00:37:45] the best thing. Like I didn't even know what a triathlon was, but like the Boston Marathon, it happened [00:37:50] every year. They shut down the whole city. I mean, it was just insane. And so like the fact that I was able [00:37:55] to do that and qualify to do that and do it multiple times, like to me, like I would love for that [00:38:00] to be in my biopic 'cause I'm just so proud of it.
Tricia Gellman: Um, and then I think also, I [00:38:05] mean. I've been really fortunate that I've been presented on the front end of [00:38:10] technology. So when I was in seventh grade, um, the school decided that computers were a big [00:38:15] thing and they, uh, decided that the AP students [00:38:20] would not take history and instead they would take computers.
Tricia Gellman: So, [00:38:25] small fact, I've never taken American history. I've never taken American history in my whole life [00:38:30] because instead I learned how to do, uh, you know, uh. Really basic [00:38:35] coding on, um, on one of the original like Mac twos. [00:38:40] and and so that was really interesting and, you know, really introduced me to [00:38:45] the computer and like, why, you know, what's going on?
Tricia Gellman: And this is like the way the world is going. [00:38:50] And my dad had a Commodore and he wrote programs so that he could do payroll for his [00:38:55] office and things like that. Um, you know, just really interesting and I think when I was. The [00:39:00] designer who had the opportunity to then embrace the computer. Like it wasn't scary to me [00:39:05] because I had already kind of seen what the front end of technology looked like.
Tricia Gellman: Um, [00:39:10] and, and so I think these things, like all of the newness and test and try and [00:39:15] learn, sort of is a part of my DNA. And then the last thing is just the birth of [00:39:20] my daughter. I'm fortunate that after eight years of trying to have a kid, like [00:39:25] we finally had a kid, which again is back to test, learn, grow, like that fortitude [00:39:30] of resilience.
Tricia Gellman: Um, and. Fortunate for me, um, I [00:39:35] was the CMO at Drift when my daughter turned one. I was able to, you know, have a little bit of [00:39:40] payout there to then go spend time with her. Um, then, you know, Aaron came along and asked me to do [00:39:45] this job. So, you know, now I'm balancing the two. But it gives you a whole different per [00:39:50] perspective.
Tricia Gellman: I mean, you could be a manager of people who have children and I think until you're a mom, you [00:39:55] don't really understand what in the world these people are going through. It's insane. Um, but [00:40:00] yeah,
Sydney Sloan: Yeah. And the, uh, the, the, the question, can you have it all used to be like, yes. [00:40:05] Now I'm like, I don't know. Um, who would play, who would play you in the movie of your [00:40:10] life?
Tricia Gellman: Um, I think it would either be Nicole Kidman, 'cause she has the, [00:40:15] like curly hair, like sort of gutsy of what I have. Um, or Reese [00:40:20] Witherspoon. I love her story in terms of how she kind of. Said, Hey, like, you know, I'm [00:40:25] successful in this business, but it's not for me. And I just have the fortitude to go and [00:40:30] do my own thing and become a director and, you know, a very male dominated area.[00:40:35]
Tricia Gellman: Um, so one of those two, I
Tricia Gellman: think. so basically Big Little Lies in Cape Cod.
Tricia Gellman: [00:40:40] Yeah, exactly.
Sydney Sloan: Awesome. Okay. And the last one, um, [00:40:45] we'd love, uh, you know, I'm a big fan of gratitude. Um, and you know, we [00:40:50] know we don't get here without the support of many. So, uh, who [00:40:55] would you like to share your gratitude for and give a shout out to?
Tricia Gellman: [00:41:00] Um, I think it's a very. I don't know why, but like just today when you [00:41:05] asked me that question, I look across like three people and they're like massive [00:41:10] competitors in the market right now, which is very interesting. But when I was at Salesforce, I think. [00:41:15] Yeah, I did great product marketing when I was at Adobe and like learned a lot from Chuck and John.
Tricia Gellman: But, [00:41:20] um, you know, Craig is one of the best product marketers on the planet [00:41:25] and what he's done with qualified and telling that story and competing against Drift and, and building the category. It's [00:41:30] just really world class. But then on a personal level, Amanda's been one of the [00:41:35] biggest investors in my career, A great friend, and what she did with Six Sense really [00:41:40] about embracing the community with, um, you know, the empowered CMO.
Tricia Gellman: [00:41:45] Network and, and group of people. It's like, it really resonates with me in terms of what I was saying, of [00:41:50] how you identify your ecosystem. You give and you connect into that. Um, and [00:41:55] she's like, you know, just done that tenfold for me. Um, and of course [00:42:00] now she's driving one mind and super successful. So, And you, and you see each other at drop [00:42:05] offs. And remind your my,
Sydney Sloan: remind
Sydney Sloan: each other that it's PJ Day at school.
Tricia Gellman: yeah, her [00:42:10] daughter's
Sydney Sloan: moms like at as. It's crazy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we [00:42:15] wanna thank you so much. Um, so here are my kind of quick key takeaways in terms of what I learned [00:42:20] from our conversation and, and really is, you know, to be a strategic and [00:42:25] impactful CMO, you have to know the story and own the story [00:42:30] and how to tell and sell that story within the ecosystem.
Sydney Sloan: Connecting [00:42:35] it from thought leadership all the way down to customer conversation, and then how to [00:42:40] operationally get traction from that. And, and then proving that by like [00:42:45] John's questions around, you know, how do we, you know, get [00:42:50] the C-suite to buy into building that awareness building is part of the [00:42:55] equation, which I really do believe in.
Sydney Sloan: What you shared was you have to create that [00:43:00] moment for the proof point that connects to the vision that you've [00:43:05] built in terms of why we need to make this investment and what it's gonna do for the company. And I think [00:43:10] people really are challenged with that because. The world has become so metric driven.
Sydney Sloan: [00:43:15] And you and I, and I think it still goes back to that story in selling the story of what's possible. And [00:43:20] you clearly have done that. And we thank you so much for sharing your, your journey and your [00:43:25] stories with us. Tricia. Um, congratulations on being one of the top 100 [00:43:30] B2B CMOs. Um, we're excited to recognize you as well.
Sydney Sloan: And with [00:43:35] that, John, what do we say? off, right?
Sydney Sloan: Be safe out
Tricia Gellman: Be safe out [00:43:40] there. Thank you so much for having me. I think, um, this concept of being strategic as a CMO, it's [00:43:45] critical. It's very easy to get pushed into the corner, and so really, uh. Thinking [00:43:50] about what it is you bring to the table and how you can offer that business value is just, it's really [00:43:55] important in in our role.
Sydney Sloan: Awesome. Thanks all. Have a great
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