August 27, 2024 • 21 mins
James Carbary (founder of Sweet Fish Media) sits down with Lexi Croisdale, Tyler Lessard, and Kellie Davis to discuss Starbucks & Coke dipping their toes in the water of owned media, and much more!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's branded content, not brand content, and it's not necessarily
like they are trying to sell the product, but it
keeps the product top of mind.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Can Starbucks and Coca Cola do what Red Bull did
with media? I don't know. We're going to figure it
out in this episode of B to B Growth. All Right,
So Starbucks just launched Starbucks' studio. They announced it earlier
this month. Coca Cola, I think, also earlier this month,
(00:32):
announced Coca Cola lens to their media brand, specifically for
B to B. Seems like they're trying to get into
the owned media game. What are y'all's takes on that truth.
We'll start with you, Tyler.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
I think we're seeing this. I mean, there's this general
evolution happening of the content strategies and whether these companies
think about them as getting into the media game or
evolving how they're reaching their target audience in the modern
world of content consumption. You know, I think it's just
sort of an interesting starting point. Coca Cola is taking
(01:14):
what seems to be a very different approach from Starbucks,
largely because it's more of a B to B play
for them, and you know, I think they're putting it
through pun intended the lens of how do their audiences
want to consume information from an education perspective, right with
B to B tends to be more education, so they
(01:37):
you know, seem to be focusing more on how do
we create more consistent educational content, which is really an
evolution of their content strategy, and they're picking up a
lot of traditional B to B tactics On the Starbucks
side VENTI vision, which I'm really excited for. I sure
hope they call it that. You know, they're targeting a
very different audience. They're trying to expand their brain and
(02:00):
an engagement with more of a consumer constituent. And so
I think in both cases what's exciting to see is
they're taking what I think to be a very audience
first approach to their evolved content strategy, and it's leading
them to think and act more like media companies, but
in what I can see, very different ways, which I
think is something that again we're all learning about as
(02:22):
we go of When we say are they a media company?
Are they doing media? It can mean so many different
things to so many different businesses, and so how they
play out I expect are actually going to be very different.
And in the end, are they great evolved content strategies?
Are they media strategies. The end of the day, it's
about building an audience, and I think that's what they're
both trying to do.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
From what you've seen so far from both of them,
do you think they have a shot at replicating Red
Bull's success.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
It's interesting. I don't know that either are trying to
replicate what Red Bull did. I think red Bull obviously,
you know, a gold standard in terms of creating this
incredible brand experience. This like complete shift in how people
view the company, right like they their intention from what
(03:11):
I can see in hindsight, was like building this audience
of raving fans, so every time they walk into a store,
Red Bull's top of mind and they go, I need that.
And for them it was again timing was a little
bit different. Their approach was very unique. I think in
the case of you know, Coca Cola and Starbucks, I
don't feel like they're trying to be what Red Bull was.
(03:34):
They already have incredible brand awareness. If somebody walks into
a Starbucks, they have the captive audience. Coca Cola is
already top of mind with their consumers, and so it's
less about a brand awareness and remaining top of mind.
To me, it's more about how do they create an
(03:56):
association of their brand with the things that they think
their audience is ca about, And it's more about brand reputation.
It's more about appealing to folks today and ensuring that
as they think about different values they're looking for in
a business, what do they stand for, What narratives are
they a part of. Do I want to be a
part of the same things that they are, Do I
want to associate myself with this company? I think that's
(04:18):
more what those two are doing today, and there's a
number of reasons for that, but it's very different from
what Red Bull was trying to accomplish because again just
sort of the unique situations that they were in. So
I think it would be dangerous for us to try
to say we should all be trying to do what
Red Bull did, or are they going to be the
next Red Bull, because these media strategies are getting very
niche now and saying we're trying to fix this problem,
(04:41):
We're trying to grow this, we're trying to solve this.
How can we use a modern media strategy to do
it as opposed to how do we become a media company?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (04:49):
Right, which is I think the right way to approach it.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
You said something there that made me think of a
report that I just read, or wasn't a report. It
was a blog post from Velocity Partner or Doug Doug
Kessler Grade Agency from what I can tell, and they
were he was talking about this how we try to
bucket brand like brand and demand like brand feeds demand
(05:15):
demand feeds brand like that. We're we're talking about them
like they're separate things, but they they have to go together,
like have to go together. Demand, brand is demand. And
they were talking about what should your investment be in brand?
And I think they quoted, uh, the guy that started
(05:36):
in gay g O and what he was the co
founder of marketto and blanking on his name right now, but.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
John Miller, John Miller, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
I think they were saying that He actually he said
that brand should focus I I want to say, forty
percent of their marketing budget specifically on brand. And when
he was talking about what your brand contient content should
be focused on, it was what you alluded to there.
What are the values that you stand for and do
you have content that explicitly communicates that you care about
(06:06):
these values. It's not about a product feature, it's not
about a launch. It's not it is it is with
the express intent of communicating a value that your company
believes in, or to your point, you believe that your
customers believe in. And I thought that was really interesting
because it seems like we we avoid creating that kind
(06:31):
of content because it's like, well, this doesn't this isn't
attributable to revenue, and with marketers being held more and
more accountable to revenue, it's like, well, everything we do
has to tick this revenue box, and so we end
up completely avoiding brand content that allows you to do
what companies like HubSpot, we'll talk about them a little
(06:52):
later what they've done, Like people know what HubSpot stands
for because they create content that expressly communicates that. So
I love that you mentioned that.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
Yeah, and I think the brilliance behind red Bull. And
then if you look at like Nike how they launch
their apps and they have their fitness apps and stuff,
is that it's branded content, not brand content. So you
kind of think about, like last summer, it's been like
a year the Barbie movie was branded content. It totally
reshaped the market for Mattel. It reshaped our love for
(07:28):
Barbie across generations. It introduced new generations to Barbie where
perhaps that wasn't on the radar of every little girl's
wish list anymore. And that's the same thing with Red
Bull is it's like almost like this separate faction of
the company where it just taps into that extreme adventure
lifestyle and you know, they support a lot of adventure
(07:49):
sports and it's not necessarily like they are trying to
sell the product, but it keeps the product top of mind.
And I think the same thing with Nike. You don't
have to love Nike or wear Nike gear in order
to participate in their fitness programs on their apps. And
I think for Starbucks to do it right, they have
(08:09):
to detach the content from the consumption of their product
and think more about the end user and what is
what experience are we trying to offer them that is
completely separate from the brand, And that's I think that's
how you take ownership of that and really pull into
that like that owned media captivated audience.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Well, I've adopted this what I feel is like a
bit more of a mature and integrated view of brand
in today's world. And I think about this a lot
these days, actually, because in the old world, we focus
like brand really meant awareness, right, Like our brand programs
were like we do billboards, and we do newspaper ads,
(08:51):
and we do radio spots, and they were largely about
these fleeting moments of brand awareness and we'd hope later
on that they'd have brand recall, and the more brand
recall folks had, the better our brand team was doing.
I think in today's world, the way I think about
it is we have we're trying to accomplish brand awareness,
brand association, and brand engagement, and those are very different things,
(09:14):
and to me it becomes a bit of a funnel
into our demand programs. And that's kind of how I
think about my world of brand. Are we creating brand awareness,
which are typically again fleeting moments. Are we creating brand
association with the things we want to be known for
and that's different from awareness? And then are we creating
a consistent set or a consistent flow of brand engagement
(09:35):
so we're remaining top of mind. We are sort of
being a part of their ongoing you know, daily, weekly,
monthly lives, such that when they need a coffee or
a drink or a demand generation program, we're top of
mind to be a part of that, and then they
move into our demand funnel. But I think we need
(09:57):
to evolve that thinking of like the World of Where
was just about brand awareness that has to go away,
and we can call those things in the middle of
something a little bit different if we want. But I
think about it that as sort of a brand continuum
that flows into demand, and that's where a lot of
these media strategies bridge that gap from awareness to creating
brand engagement over time, which leads into the opportunity to
(10:18):
create demand.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Absolutely yeah, And I think that plays into what we
were talking about with Gary V's new book Day Trading
Attention is you're talking exactly about how do we capture
people's interests, And like Gary V says, people's who they
want to follow, the people that they have in their
lives changed over time, but a lot of times, like
their interests don't so. And that's when we talk about HubSpot.
(10:41):
Back when I was an entrepreneur, I learned so much
about how to run a business from HubSpot. I didn't
even know it was a software company, and it got
I mean, this was like, you know, ten fifteen years ago.
It got to the point where I would type in
like like email subject lines HubSpot right, And I had
no idea that it was a software company. Obviously that
(11:02):
I wasn't the end user because I was a solopreneur.
But they understood the interest in the audience interests and
had that captive audience outside of their potential customer, which
I think is brilliant.
Speaker 4 (11:14):
And I think that's going to be interesting for Coca
Cola and Starbucks because to me, like that authenticity around
the why of these media companies seems a little bit
still on them, right, Like we need to diversify what
we're investing in, We need to branch out beyond our
drinks or whatever that we're promoting. And when I was
reading through some of the content, specifically with Coca Cola lens,
(11:38):
it still felt very coke to me and very corporatety,
and I was like, where's the people behind this, Like
where's the face that I'm going to fall in love
with and kind of, you know, see as somebody that
I can trust, because right now I just see your
colors and some of your design imagery and I'm going
to quickly scroll on past that stuff. So I think
there's a lot of room where these brands are going
(11:59):
to you know, they're dipping their toes, they're kind of experimenting,
and they think, you know, we have that Starbucks name,
we have that Coca Cola name. It's going to bring everyone.
But if they're not authentic in it and actually really
trying to create a relationship with the audience, there's going
to be no audience there for them to pull.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
You touched on something there that Benji actually brought up
when we first talked about this on B to B
Growth a few weeks ago, this idea that Coke like,
I was really impressed. I was like, look, Coco Cola
lens is like getting into the media game and the
B to B media game, and I was really excited
about it, really hopeful that you know, hey, this is
(12:35):
they're just coming out of the starting box. They're going
to start small.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
This will build.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
And Benji's biggest critique was he was he was like,
they talk about how they're tapping the shoulders of subject
matter experts, internal subject matter experts inside of Coke to
communicate these insights, but when you actually look at the
I think they launched with sixteen articles. He's like, one,
there's no video embedded in in any of this. This
(13:01):
is all very static, boring, not not rich content. And
there's no names on this, there's no faces. I don't
know who said this. It's it's incredibly dry, to your point,
incredibly corporate. It has no personality. And I think when
you look at Red Bull and what what red Bull
(13:22):
and Starbucks are doing. I look at that and go, well,
there's not I mean red Bull. I don't think of
Red Bull and think about the personalities of people at
Red Bull. But it's a different to you, to your point, Tyler,
it's a different goal. Like they're they're trying to engage
a consumer audience and with brand association around uh, around
excitement and and that.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
But you do picture the guy jumping out of the plane, yes,
right with me, and and it's like that is the
connection point. Yes, And you're like, I want to be
a part of that.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (13:52):
And then you read Coca Cola lens and you're.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Like, Okay, we should we should we should sell yeah,
we should sell more snacks. And I didn't. I wasn't
as heavy in my criticism of because we looked at
some of the articles that they launched with and I
wasn't as heavy in my criticism as Benji was. I
thought some of the insights where I was like, this
(14:15):
could actually be helpful for somebody running like a small
convenience store like they're they're pooling. The obviously have access
to enormous amounts of data in terms of consumer spending habits,
and for them to be able to package up those
insights and share it with small business owners that are
running these convenience stores and even larger retailers, that has
(14:35):
the opportunity to be really, really good. But the way
you package those insights cannot be this dry, stuffy, personality
less blog post. It needs to come from a human
communicated with emotion in a way that relates to somebody
and uh and and that that's I think their biggest
(14:57):
opportunity for improvement. And again, they just launched this thing.
It's just hit the airwaves. I hope that they will
continue to evolve it and not just look at like, Okay,
how did these sixteen articles And if we don't hit
some arbitrary metric, we're going to stop doing it. They
also didn't seem to be very aggressive Coca Cola in
(15:18):
how like they talked about, hey, we're launching with sixteen
and then we're going to release like four new pieces
every quarter. And you look at it and it's like
somebody could have created this in an afternoon. Why are
you only releasing four of these in a quarter? So
it just communicated to me, this isn't as high of
a priority. I think they probably you wanted to make
(15:40):
the launch a big deal because it launched it some
big conference that everybody was at in the industry, But
who knows how much they invest in it. But I'm
really excited to follow along. Any other thoughts on companies
getting starting to dip their toe in the water with
this media game and really the application for B to B.
We're talking about consumer brands here. Coca Cola's B to B.
(16:04):
You know, lenses is the B to B part of
Coca Cola. But are there any takeaways for the B
to B companies watching this that they can apply to
what they're doing from what these large brands are doing.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Yeah, I think the owned media conversation has been going
on for quite a while and it's just a matter
like a lot of people have been talking for years
about building an in house media house and you know,
moving away from paid ads or not working anymore. But
it's just a matter of as we talked about, like
what is the intentionality behind that, as we can see
(16:37):
with Coca Cola, maybe that wasn't mapped out enough. But
then you know, you then do you want it attached
to the brand? Do you want it like you said,
maybe just capturing that interest and having the brand top
of mind. But this isn't necessarily a brand awareness play,
but it's definitely been on the lips of so many
different B to B brands and it's just a matter
(16:58):
of dialing that in and making that investment and understanding
like what is the long game that we're playing, and
like we can't see that play out with Coca Cola yet.
Speaker 4 (17:08):
I think my main takeaway from this would probably be
like for B to B brands to really think about
the authenticity that they're launching these new media brands with
because very much so, you know, you do have a
brand that you're trying to either build a reputation around
or build association with all of that awareness, but at
(17:28):
the bottom, like at the end of the line, it's
going to be about your brand. And if your brand
is the kind of clever child of this media brand,
like you're infusing it so much, then it's just a
sub brand, Like it's not owned media, it's not something
separate from your brand. So really trying, like I understand
the conversation of you want your brand to be infused
(17:48):
in it, but at the same time, like, don't just
create another mini brand, Like make it authentic and make
it purposeful on its own so it can live on
its own, but also be affiliated with your brand, and
there's research to do that. You've got You've got to
really think about that.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
You can't just go you can't phone that part in.
Speaker 4 (18:05):
Right, you can't just go launch it and you know
think like, oh, it's got our name attached to it,
so it'll do well. You've really got to hunker down
and think about what makes this authentic and unique and
worth investing in.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I was talking to somebody at lunch yesterday. Actually there's
he runs a pretty large fulfillment company that works with
a lot of creators, influencers, folks that sell merch online
and so he does the fulfillment for that, and you know,
has partnerships with China and all over the world to
like source these goods and shirts and all this stuff.
(18:36):
And he's like, you know, I'm finally, after whatever twenty
years of being in this business, I'm finally starting my
own apparel company with my wife because we want to
learn what it's like to be our customer. And I
was like, I love that. That's what we do with
B to B growth. But he was saying he was
he was telling me about the brand that he was
building and how they developed the name and why this
was important because of their their lived experience as parents
(19:01):
of two kids with type one diabetes and how there's
this very challenging things that parents that are raising kids
that are going through really challenging like mental health stuff,
physical things like And I was like, I think this
has a shot at working and a sea of you know,
everybody being able to start an apparel company. He's honing
(19:25):
in on the essence of like what is actually going
to make people want to buy from him? Which is
what connects me to the human on the other end
of the phone that I'm trying to engage. And if
you in so many B to B brands, I think
just skip right over that, like what makes us relatable.
What part of our POV, what part of our story,
what part of the narrative? You have to actually build
(19:45):
that narrative and be thoughtful about it. So I love
that you touched on that.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
But I think David Cancel did that brilliantly before he
started Drift Is. I mean, he was the mind behind
the company, and then he had his podcast and everything,
and it was just all about like distilling thirty years
of marketing brilliance onto an audience, a captive audience as
(20:10):
he was building Drifts, And then you had that direct
association with his wisdom, his knowledge, his experience, and how
they captured all of that with the launch of Drift.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
And we talk about co hosted commentary a lot at
Sweetfish because I really do think it's a format that
B to B brands can use and really win with.
But that with seeking wisdom. What I love about that
he platformed who is now arguably the largest B to
B marketing influencer, David Gearrett around in Dave Gearhart and
(20:43):
the way they positioned those two characters. I've heard them talk.
I forget where I heard them talk about this, but
they were intentional about David Cancel is this wise Sage,
proven entrepreneur with thirty years of marketing wisdom. Dave Gearhart
is this kind of young nephew since you know this,
this guy who is just a lot you know, wants
(21:05):
to learn from the wise sage, you know, Yoda character.
And they intentionally crafted that narrative, and they built out
segments of the show that elaborated that. And so the
thoughtfulness of injecting personality into your content obviously worked because
not only did Drift get acquired by sales Off for
(21:26):
a lot of money, Dave Gearhart's now built a business
for himself that has changed the trajectory of his like
his family line will be different because of what happened
went because they executed that so well. So that's a
great example. It's a great example.
It's branded content, not brand content, and it's not necessarily
like they are trying to sell the product, but it
keeps the product top of mind.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Can Starbucks and Coca Cola do what Red Bull did
with media? I don't know. We're going to figure it
out in this episode of B to B Growth. All Right,
So Starbucks just launched Starbucks' studio. They announced it earlier
this month. Coca Cola, I think, also earlier this month,
(00:32):
announced Coca Cola lens to their media brand, specifically for
B to B. Seems like they're trying to get into
the owned media game. What are y'all's takes on that truth.
We'll start with you, Tyler.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
I think we're seeing this. I mean, there's this general
evolution happening of the content strategies and whether these companies
think about them as getting into the media game or
evolving how they're reaching their target audience in the modern
world of content consumption. You know, I think it's just
sort of an interesting starting point. Coca Cola is taking
(01:14):
what seems to be a very different approach from Starbucks,
largely because it's more of a B to B play
for them, and you know, I think they're putting it
through pun intended the lens of how do their audiences
want to consume information from an education perspective, right with
B to B tends to be more education, so they
(01:37):
you know, seem to be focusing more on how do
we create more consistent educational content, which is really an
evolution of their content strategy, and they're picking up a
lot of traditional B to B tactics On the Starbucks
side VENTI vision, which I'm really excited for. I sure
hope they call it that. You know, they're targeting a
very different audience. They're trying to expand their brain and
(02:00):
an engagement with more of a consumer constituent. And so
I think in both cases what's exciting to see is
they're taking what I think to be a very audience
first approach to their evolved content strategy, and it's leading
them to think and act more like media companies, but
in what I can see, very different ways, which I
think is something that again we're all learning about as
(02:22):
we go of When we say are they a media company?
Are they doing media? It can mean so many different
things to so many different businesses, and so how they
play out I expect are actually going to be very different.
And in the end, are they great evolved content strategies?
Are they media strategies. The end of the day, it's
about building an audience, and I think that's what they're
both trying to do.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
From what you've seen so far from both of them,
do you think they have a shot at replicating Red
Bull's success.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
It's interesting. I don't know that either are trying to
replicate what Red Bull did. I think red Bull obviously,
you know, a gold standard in terms of creating this
incredible brand experience. This like complete shift in how people
view the company, right like they their intention from what
(03:11):
I can see in hindsight, was like building this audience
of raving fans, so every time they walk into a store,
Red Bull's top of mind and they go, I need that.
And for them it was again timing was a little
bit different. Their approach was very unique. I think in
the case of you know, Coca Cola and Starbucks, I
don't feel like they're trying to be what Red Bull was.
(03:34):
They already have incredible brand awareness. If somebody walks into
a Starbucks, they have the captive audience. Coca Cola is
already top of mind with their consumers, and so it's
less about a brand awareness and remaining top of mind.
To me, it's more about how do they create an
(03:56):
association of their brand with the things that they think
their audience is ca about, And it's more about brand reputation.
It's more about appealing to folks today and ensuring that
as they think about different values they're looking for in
a business, what do they stand for, What narratives are
they a part of. Do I want to be a
part of the same things that they are, Do I
want to associate myself with this company? I think that's
(04:18):
more what those two are doing today, and there's a
number of reasons for that, but it's very different from
what Red Bull was trying to accomplish because again just
sort of the unique situations that they were in. So
I think it would be dangerous for us to try
to say we should all be trying to do what
Red Bull did, or are they going to be the
next Red Bull, because these media strategies are getting very
niche now and saying we're trying to fix this problem,
(04:41):
We're trying to grow this, we're trying to solve this.
How can we use a modern media strategy to do
it as opposed to how do we become a media company?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (04:49):
Right, which is I think the right way to approach it.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
You said something there that made me think of a
report that I just read, or wasn't a report. It
was a blog post from Velocity Partner or Doug Doug
Kessler Grade Agency from what I can tell, and they
were he was talking about this how we try to
bucket brand like brand and demand like brand feeds demand
(05:15):
demand feeds brand like that. We're we're talking about them
like they're separate things, but they they have to go together,
like have to go together. Demand, brand is demand. And
they were talking about what should your investment be in brand?
And I think they quoted, uh, the guy that started
(05:36):
in gay g O and what he was the co
founder of marketto and blanking on his name right now, but.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
John Miller, John Miller, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
I think they were saying that He actually he said
that brand should focus I I want to say, forty
percent of their marketing budget specifically on brand. And when
he was talking about what your brand contient content should
be focused on, it was what you alluded to there.
What are the values that you stand for and do
you have content that explicitly communicates that you care about
(06:06):
these values. It's not about a product feature, it's not
about a launch. It's not it is it is with
the express intent of communicating a value that your company
believes in, or to your point, you believe that your
customers believe in. And I thought that was really interesting
because it seems like we we avoid creating that kind
(06:31):
of content because it's like, well, this doesn't this isn't
attributable to revenue, and with marketers being held more and
more accountable to revenue, it's like, well, everything we do
has to tick this revenue box, and so we end
up completely avoiding brand content that allows you to do
what companies like HubSpot, we'll talk about them a little
(06:52):
later what they've done, Like people know what HubSpot stands
for because they create content that expressly communicates that. So
I love that you mentioned that.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
Yeah, and I think the brilliance behind red Bull. And
then if you look at like Nike how they launch
their apps and they have their fitness apps and stuff,
is that it's branded content, not brand content. So you
kind of think about, like last summer, it's been like
a year the Barbie movie was branded content. It totally
reshaped the market for Mattel. It reshaped our love for
(07:28):
Barbie across generations. It introduced new generations to Barbie where
perhaps that wasn't on the radar of every little girl's
wish list anymore. And that's the same thing with Red
Bull is it's like almost like this separate faction of
the company where it just taps into that extreme adventure
lifestyle and you know, they support a lot of adventure
(07:49):
sports and it's not necessarily like they are trying to
sell the product, but it keeps the product top of mind.
And I think the same thing with Nike. You don't
have to love Nike or wear Nike gear in order
to participate in their fitness programs on their apps. And
I think for Starbucks to do it right, they have
(08:09):
to detach the content from the consumption of their product
and think more about the end user and what is
what experience are we trying to offer them that is
completely separate from the brand, And that's I think that's
how you take ownership of that and really pull into
that like that owned media captivated audience.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Well, I've adopted this what I feel is like a
bit more of a mature and integrated view of brand
in today's world. And I think about this a lot
these days, actually, because in the old world, we focus
like brand really meant awareness, right, Like our brand programs
were like we do billboards, and we do newspaper ads,
(08:51):
and we do radio spots, and they were largely about
these fleeting moments of brand awareness and we'd hope later
on that they'd have brand recall, and the more brand
recall folks had, the better our brand team was doing.
I think in today's world, the way I think about
it is we have we're trying to accomplish brand awareness,
brand association, and brand engagement, and those are very different things,
(09:14):
and to me it becomes a bit of a funnel
into our demand programs. And that's kind of how I
think about my world of brand. Are we creating brand awareness,
which are typically again fleeting moments. Are we creating brand
association with the things we want to be known for
and that's different from awareness? And then are we creating
a consistent set or a consistent flow of brand engagement
(09:35):
so we're remaining top of mind. We are sort of
being a part of their ongoing you know, daily, weekly,
monthly lives, such that when they need a coffee or
a drink or a demand generation program, we're top of
mind to be a part of that, and then they
move into our demand funnel. But I think we need
(09:57):
to evolve that thinking of like the World of Where
was just about brand awareness that has to go away,
and we can call those things in the middle of
something a little bit different if we want. But I
think about it that as sort of a brand continuum
that flows into demand, and that's where a lot of
these media strategies bridge that gap from awareness to creating
brand engagement over time, which leads into the opportunity to
(10:18):
create demand.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Absolutely yeah, And I think that plays into what we
were talking about with Gary V's new book Day Trading
Attention is you're talking exactly about how do we capture
people's interests, And like Gary V says, people's who they
want to follow, the people that they have in their
lives changed over time, but a lot of times, like
their interests don't so. And that's when we talk about HubSpot.
(10:41):
Back when I was an entrepreneur, I learned so much
about how to run a business from HubSpot. I didn't
even know it was a software company, and it got
I mean, this was like, you know, ten fifteen years ago.
It got to the point where I would type in
like like email subject lines HubSpot right, And I had
no idea that it was a software company. Obviously that
(11:02):
I wasn't the end user because I was a solopreneur.
But they understood the interest in the audience interests and
had that captive audience outside of their potential customer, which
I think is brilliant.
Speaker 4 (11:14):
And I think that's going to be interesting for Coca
Cola and Starbucks because to me, like that authenticity around
the why of these media companies seems a little bit
still on them, right, Like we need to diversify what
we're investing in, We need to branch out beyond our
drinks or whatever that we're promoting. And when I was
reading through some of the content, specifically with Coca Cola lens,
(11:38):
it still felt very coke to me and very corporatety,
and I was like, where's the people behind this, Like
where's the face that I'm going to fall in love
with and kind of, you know, see as somebody that
I can trust, because right now I just see your
colors and some of your design imagery and I'm going
to quickly scroll on past that stuff. So I think
there's a lot of room where these brands are going
(11:59):
to you know, they're dipping their toes, they're kind of experimenting,
and they think, you know, we have that Starbucks name,
we have that Coca Cola name. It's going to bring everyone.
But if they're not authentic in it and actually really
trying to create a relationship with the audience, there's going
to be no audience there for them to pull.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
You touched on something there that Benji actually brought up
when we first talked about this on B to B
Growth a few weeks ago, this idea that Coke like,
I was really impressed. I was like, look, Coco Cola
lens is like getting into the media game and the
B to B media game, and I was really excited
about it, really hopeful that you know, hey, this is
(12:35):
they're just coming out of the starting box. They're going
to start small.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
This will build.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
And Benji's biggest critique was he was he was like,
they talk about how they're tapping the shoulders of subject
matter experts, internal subject matter experts inside of Coke to
communicate these insights, but when you actually look at the
I think they launched with sixteen articles. He's like, one,
there's no video embedded in in any of this. This
(13:01):
is all very static, boring, not not rich content. And
there's no names on this, there's no faces. I don't
know who said this. It's it's incredibly dry, to your point,
incredibly corporate. It has no personality. And I think when
you look at Red Bull and what what red Bull
(13:22):
and Starbucks are doing. I look at that and go, well,
there's not I mean red Bull. I don't think of
Red Bull and think about the personalities of people at
Red Bull. But it's a different to you, to your point, Tyler,
it's a different goal. Like they're they're trying to engage
a consumer audience and with brand association around uh, around
excitement and and that.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
But you do picture the guy jumping out of the plane, yes,
right with me, and and it's like that is the
connection point. Yes, And you're like, I want to be
a part of that.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (13:52):
And then you read Coca Cola lens and you're.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Like, Okay, we should we should we should sell yeah,
we should sell more snacks. And I didn't. I wasn't
as heavy in my criticism of because we looked at
some of the articles that they launched with and I
wasn't as heavy in my criticism as Benji was. I
thought some of the insights where I was like, this
(14:15):
could actually be helpful for somebody running like a small
convenience store like they're they're pooling. The obviously have access
to enormous amounts of data in terms of consumer spending habits,
and for them to be able to package up those
insights and share it with small business owners that are
running these convenience stores and even larger retailers, that has
(14:35):
the opportunity to be really, really good. But the way
you package those insights cannot be this dry, stuffy, personality
less blog post. It needs to come from a human
communicated with emotion in a way that relates to somebody
and uh and and that that's I think their biggest
(14:57):
opportunity for improvement. And again, they just launched this thing.
It's just hit the airwaves. I hope that they will
continue to evolve it and not just look at like, Okay,
how did these sixteen articles And if we don't hit
some arbitrary metric, we're going to stop doing it. They
also didn't seem to be very aggressive Coca Cola in
(15:18):
how like they talked about, hey, we're launching with sixteen
and then we're going to release like four new pieces
every quarter. And you look at it and it's like
somebody could have created this in an afternoon. Why are
you only releasing four of these in a quarter? So
it just communicated to me, this isn't as high of
a priority. I think they probably you wanted to make
(15:40):
the launch a big deal because it launched it some
big conference that everybody was at in the industry, But
who knows how much they invest in it. But I'm
really excited to follow along. Any other thoughts on companies
getting starting to dip their toe in the water with
this media game and really the application for B to B.
We're talking about consumer brands here. Coca Cola's B to B.
(16:04):
You know, lenses is the B to B part of
Coca Cola. But are there any takeaways for the B
to B companies watching this that they can apply to
what they're doing from what these large brands are doing.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Yeah, I think the owned media conversation has been going
on for quite a while and it's just a matter
like a lot of people have been talking for years
about building an in house media house and you know,
moving away from paid ads or not working anymore. But
it's just a matter of as we talked about, like
what is the intentionality behind that, as we can see
(16:37):
with Coca Cola, maybe that wasn't mapped out enough. But
then you know, you then do you want it attached
to the brand? Do you want it like you said,
maybe just capturing that interest and having the brand top
of mind. But this isn't necessarily a brand awareness play,
but it's definitely been on the lips of so many
different B to B brands and it's just a matter
(16:58):
of dialing that in and making that investment and understanding
like what is the long game that we're playing, and
like we can't see that play out with Coca Cola yet.
Speaker 4 (17:08):
I think my main takeaway from this would probably be
like for B to B brands to really think about
the authenticity that they're launching these new media brands with
because very much so, you know, you do have a
brand that you're trying to either build a reputation around
or build association with all of that awareness, but at
(17:28):
the bottom, like at the end of the line, it's
going to be about your brand. And if your brand
is the kind of clever child of this media brand,
like you're infusing it so much, then it's just a
sub brand, Like it's not owned media, it's not something
separate from your brand. So really trying, like I understand
the conversation of you want your brand to be infused
(17:48):
in it, but at the same time, like, don't just
create another mini brand, Like make it authentic and make
it purposeful on its own so it can live on
its own, but also be affiliated with your brand, and
there's research to do that. You've got You've got to
really think about that.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
You can't just go you can't phone that part in.
Speaker 4 (18:05):
Right, you can't just go launch it and you know
think like, oh, it's got our name attached to it,
so it'll do well. You've really got to hunker down
and think about what makes this authentic and unique and
worth investing in.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I was talking to somebody at lunch yesterday. Actually there's
he runs a pretty large fulfillment company that works with
a lot of creators, influencers, folks that sell merch online
and so he does the fulfillment for that, and you know,
has partnerships with China and all over the world to
like source these goods and shirts and all this stuff.
(18:36):
And he's like, you know, I'm finally, after whatever twenty
years of being in this business, I'm finally starting my
own apparel company with my wife because we want to
learn what it's like to be our customer. And I
was like, I love that. That's what we do with
B to B growth. But he was saying he was
he was telling me about the brand that he was
building and how they developed the name and why this
was important because of their their lived experience as parents
(19:01):
of two kids with type one diabetes and how there's
this very challenging things that parents that are raising kids
that are going through really challenging like mental health stuff,
physical things like And I was like, I think this
has a shot at working and a sea of you know,
everybody being able to start an apparel company. He's honing
(19:25):
in on the essence of like what is actually going
to make people want to buy from him? Which is
what connects me to the human on the other end
of the phone that I'm trying to engage. And if
you in so many B to B brands, I think
just skip right over that, like what makes us relatable.
What part of our POV, what part of our story,
what part of the narrative? You have to actually build
(19:45):
that narrative and be thoughtful about it. So I love
that you touched on that.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
But I think David Cancel did that brilliantly before he
started Drift Is. I mean, he was the mind behind
the company, and then he had his podcast and everything,
and it was just all about like distilling thirty years
of marketing brilliance onto an audience, a captive audience as
(20:10):
he was building Drifts, And then you had that direct
association with his wisdom, his knowledge, his experience, and how
they captured all of that with the launch of Drift.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
And we talk about co hosted commentary a lot at
Sweetfish because I really do think it's a format that
B to B brands can use and really win with.
But that with seeking wisdom. What I love about that
he platformed who is now arguably the largest B to
B marketing influencer, David Gearrett around in Dave Gearhart and
(20:43):
the way they positioned those two characters. I've heard them talk.
I forget where I heard them talk about this, but
they were intentional about David Cancel is this wise Sage,
proven entrepreneur with thirty years of marketing wisdom. Dave Gearhart
is this kind of young nephew since you know this,
this guy who is just a lot you know, wants
(21:05):
to learn from the wise sage, you know, Yoda character.
And they intentionally crafted that narrative, and they built out
segments of the show that elaborated that. And so the
thoughtfulness of injecting personality into your content obviously worked because
not only did Drift get acquired by sales Off for
(21:26):
a lot of money, Dave Gearhart's now built a business
for himself that has changed the trajectory of his like
his family line will be different because of what happened
went because they executed that so well. So that's a
great example. It's a great example.
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