June 11, 2020 • 49 mins
This month's Revenue Rebel joining the podcast is Shannon Dougall, Head of Marketing at DevFacto and she's giving listeners insights on revenue marketing, organizational alignment, and more. Listen in as Shannon shares:
- How she defines revenue marketing
- Why organizational alignment to customer experience is key
- Barriers to companies becoming revenue-centered and focused
- The tools and tech marketers should have in their toolkit to lead this transformation
To learn from more Revenue Rebels like Shannon Dougall, listen to previous episodes here.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Rhoan Morgan (00:01):
Hey everyone.
Welcome to another episode ofRevenue Rebels, the podcast that
brings marketing and salesrebels together to share their
stories and thinking on alltopics related to accelerating
revenue, generating activitiesin the B to B world.
On this show, we talk about thestrategic vision of
marketing-led customerexperience that unleashes the
(00:24):
combined power of technology,content and data.
Are you ready to rebel?
Let's get into the show.
Hi everyone.
And welcome back to anotherepisode of revenue rebels.
I am really excited to betalking with our guest today who
has been called a marketer ofthe future.
(00:47):
She has been described as anadventurer, scientist, and an
artist in the field ofmarketing, where she's been
using her experiences andlearning towards a sort of all
in one type of revenuemarketing.
Very excited to have ShannonDougall on the show.
She is the head of marketing atDevFacto right now, and she's
(01:07):
also held similar roles atUberflip and Shift CRM.
Welcome Shannon.
I'm really happy to have you onthe show.
Shannon Dougall (01:14):
Thank you.
I am so excited for being here.
Um, I'm honored, I have to say,to be included with some of
today's most amazing RevenueRebels: it's so humbling and I'm
also super excited to be talkingto you because I think kindred
spirits need to get together andtalk about the possibilities
(01:34):
that marketing can have in thefuture.
Rhoan Morgan (01:36):
So, cool.
Thank you.
Glad to hear that.
And I absolutely agree.
Couldn't agree more.
And especially now, we do needto be talking about the future,
looking forward, and what I'dlove to be able to do, though,
quickly, as a tiny step back isI'd love to take a little look
at your history.
You know, a lot of our listenersknow this, you may already know,
(02:00):
we really do focus onhighlighting marketing and sales
leaders who are, I would sayrebels in their field for a
variety of reasons.
So before we get into sort ofthe meat of what we're going to
talk about today, I would loveto know what sort of defines you
as a rebel o r, or what in yourpast has, has shaped you into
(02:20):
the marketing person that youare today.
Shannon Dougall (02:22):
Yeah, sure.
I guess I've always been a bitof a marketing change agent.
I've always been a hand-raisermuch to my parents' and
professors' chagrin.
I'm always wondering why thingsare the way they are, if there's
a better way to do it, and ifI'm not satisfied with the
(02:42):
answer, I begin to look foralternatives.
When I was in university, I hadlanded a fantastic job for the
summer at the Department ofNational Defence.
This was many years ago.
So I was working in the techdepartment and my role was to
come in and do an inventory ofall the hardware throughout
national defence.
(03:03):
And I had a pad of paper, aclipboard, and a pen, and I went
around and crawled underneathdesks and collected numbers.
And then I'd go back and putthat into a spreadsheet.
And I thought to myself, thisseems like such an archaic way
to do things.
There's gotta be an easier way.
So they brought me back thefollowing summer, because they
were very happy with my writingability and data entry.
(03:27):
They brought me back and I hadsaid during the interview
process (03:30):
is there a way that we could look at maybe putting this
into a system, like automatingthis a little bit more?
And they were very happy to sendme on some coding programs.
And so I spent a month of mysummer learning how to code and
the next month building out aninventory management database
(03:51):
using C++, and I thought, thisis the coolest thing.
Like this is life-changing.
It is taking technology andcutting my work in half.
And so as the years progressed,my job was to come in, do this
inventory, but also to improveon the way that we use
technology to help withefficiency within the Department
(04:14):
of National Defence.
And I thought this was thecoolest thing ever now.
I wasn't studying technology.
I wasn't studying business.
I was actually studying politicsand law.
And I quickly realized afterthose summers that I had a
passion for technology and thepossibilities that can come out
of it.
And so I actually decided to notpursue my career in law, but to
(04:39):
move into the world of tech.
And that's when I entered thespace and I was amazed by the
way that technology companiesand thought leaders in the space
approached the world.
They were always looking forinnovative ways to do something
different, to do somethingbetter.
And that was so exciting to me.
(05:03):
That's kind of what carved outmy path to working in the tech
space and software in it.
Having said that though, I wouldsay that when I started
marketing in tech, marketingitself was not very innovative.
It was product slicks and pressreleases and events, and it was
anything but innovative.
(05:24):
But having said that, I do thinkthat there was opportunity to
change the way that we had haddone things in marketing.
And it wasn't until probably2005, 2006, where my entire
world changed.
So I wasn't just a marketerinside a tech industry.
Now I became an innovativemarketer within the tech space.
(05:51):
I was working at a startupcompany called Watchfire at the
time in Ottawa.
And they were very progressive.
They had a very strongdemand-gen program in place.
It was quite successful.
They were primed for innovation,not just from a company
perspective, but from amarketing perspective.
And I could see that we wereonly held back by the human
(06:18):
capital within the organization.
So we couldn't do anything morebecause we had a strong
marketing team, but there areonly so many people that could
do so many things within thetimeframe of a day.
And I started to look intodifferent possibilities and I
came across another startupcompany called Eloqua and they
had promised me that I couldsolve my exact problem.
(06:39):
I could scale and automate mymarketing so that it could grow
and become a bit morepredictable.
And I was very intrigued by thispossibility and because
Watchfire, was an innovativecompany, they were super happy
to let me adopt this technologyand implement it at Watchfire.
And this was a game changer.
(07:00):
Marketing automation was a gamechanger, as far as I could see
it.
And I mean, this gave me theopportunity to have a seat at
the table.
I was no longer considered acost center within the
organization.
I can demonstrate that marketingcan have an impact on pipeline.
It can have an impact on thebottom line and that we can
scale our programs and grow ourleads.
(07:22):
And it was super successful.
We did see revenue growth and wealso were acquired at the same
time by IBM.
So there was a lot happening atthat time.
The thing that I had learned,working for over 20 years, I
learned quickly that I lovetechnology.
(07:42):
I love the innovative ways thatcompanies approach the future
when you're looking at atechnology space, I loved
marketing.
And now I was seeing that therewas an opportunity, a potential
for marketing to become aninnovative organization within a
company.
(08:03):
And that's what I guess pavedthe way for me in my career.
I wanted to work for companiesthat were like-minded.
I wanted to share with the worldthis new potential for
marketing.
This became my passion and mademe even more of a Revenue Rebel,
I guess.
(08:24):
can't imagine organizations notadopting a revenue marketing
model where you look at revenuefrom a holistic perspective.
That's sort of what drove methrough to where I am today.
I'm at DevFacto now.
(08:45):
I thought this was such aninteresting company.
The first thing that attractedme to the organization was the
tagline that"we make softwarethat humans love to use." And I
thought, whoa, humanizingtechnology's so amazing.
T his demonstrates empathy, butalso the ability of digital and,
even more so than that, youknow, their co mpany's b uilt on
(09:06):
it, innovative nature.
They've even designed theiroffice space around having an
innovative mindset, everybusiness problem that they
approach.
They look at it from an ideationperspective: what can we do?
Where are the opportunities andhow can we fix it with digital?
So that's ki nd o f m y careernutshell.
Rhoan Morgan (09:28):
You said earlier speaking with kindred spirits
and I can completely relate tothat myself, having a different
background heading intomarketing, but falling in love
with it actually, honestly, whenI was in high school, in a
marketing class.
I was 16 years old and I wasjust like, this is incredible.
(09:49):
And I can tell you, there waszero technology related to it
when I was 16 years old.
And now, though, it's just beena fantastic journey to watch it
go from those early days ofmarketing automation.
My first connection withmarketing automation was Marketo
(10:10):
.
I deployed that in 2008, Ithink.
And just seeing, kind of feelinglike there's got to be a better
way and also really seeing thoseimmediate benefits.
And then also seeing the growthand expansion since then of what
(10:31):
is possible.
It's getting more and moretechnical.
It's getting more and moredemanding, but also we're really
able to prove the revenue impactwith that.
How do you think about or definerevenue marketing?
Shannon Dougall (10:49):
Yeah, that's a great question.
It's interesting because I feellike the term has been around
for quite some time.
The definition has evolved astime has gone on, but I'm really
thrilled to see that it'sstarting to gain traction.
But having said that, I I've hadmany conversations with
(11:09):
marketers around what they feelrevenue marketing means to them.
And I hear things like, it's arepeatable program to help drive
revenue into the funnel, or it'smeasuring marketing based on
revenue influence.
And yes, I completely agree thatthose are aspects of revenue
marketing, but the way that Iapproach revenue marketing and
(11:32):
how I define it is that I thinkit's a holistic approach.
And I think it starts withaligning your entire
organization to the customerexperience from the very first
touch to ongoing, delightedcustomers and everything in
between.
So how do align your marketing,your sales, your customer
(11:55):
success, your product team tothe customer experience?
I think that it goes beyondthis.
However, I think that it'simportant to note that it's not
just about improving thecustomer experience.
You also have to think about howit contributes to a mutually
beneficial outcome.
So when I'm looking at revenuemarketing, I connect the dots
(12:17):
between the customer experienceor the buyer experience and what
they have with the organizationto revenue and to customer
lifetime value.
And I think if I was to even geta little bit more granular,
because that does seem a bithigh-level, I think that you
look at it from three areas.
I think it needs to bebuyer-centric, it needs to be
revenue-centric, and it needs tobe integrated and orchestrated,
(12:40):
and I'll just quickly touch onwhat I think each of those mean.
I think when I'm talking aboutlike buyer-centric, it's about
aligning all of our activities,marketing and sales to the buyer
and their buying process, whichmakes sense qne has always been
like that.
But I think it's aboutdeveloping the right content and
programs and systems that doalign across the entire buying
(13:01):
process.
So we're no longer just lookingat marketing is responsible for
the top of the funnel.
And then we punt over leads tosales and they're responsible in
their own way for the bottom ofthe funnel.
I think that it's more aboutmaking sure that we work
together as a cohesive revenueunit to map out this buyer
(13:22):
journey and to align all ourinteractions across the entire
buyer journey.
It's crazy that we're stilltalking about this today, but it
is still happening.
It means eliminating one-offmarketing campaigns that revolve
around it, like a particularasset or event.
So, you know, here's my ebook,here's my campaign.
And here are the leads that camefrom it.
(13:43):
Everything has to be integrated.
We have to map out that journeyso that we understand what the
inflection points are.
Why would a customer come to us?
What are their pain points atthe beginning of their
experience with ourorganization?
What type of information arethey looking for?
How can we help them get to thenext stage at that next stage?
What are the questions thatthey're asking of us?
(14:04):
How are we helping them?
And I think that if you look atit from a buyer-centered
perspective, you have the earlystages of a revenue marketing
organization, but revenue is inthe title.
And I think it should also beoriented towards revenue.
So when I say that, I mean thateverything marketing does has to
deliver revenue and maximize thecustomer lifetime value, not
(14:27):
just focus on leads andconversion rates.
It has to go beyond that.
I think that, it requires astrategic and an
outcome-oriented perspective forall aligned to the same
objectives within theorganization.
We will all work towards thoseobjectives together.
I think that from looking at it,from identifying and qualifying
(14:49):
and converting buyers in arepeatable and pragmatic fashion
across the entire buyer journeyis what would get you to a
revenue-oriented organization.
No siloed approach to X numberof MQLs, X number of sales
accepted leads or whatever thecase is.
You need to look at itholistically.
Although those numbers areimportant, they don't dictate
(15:10):
the complete outcome.
The last thing I would say wasthat integrated and
orchestrated, I think this justmeans that you need to have a
sequence of engagement.
I talked about mapping out thebuyer journey and aligning
content to each buyer persona atevery stage of the buyer
journey.
But I think that you need toactually build out these
sequences of engagement, ofnurturing, of conversion paths,
(15:31):
and create a series of stepsthat's closely managed and
optimized and ultimately leadsto revenue.
I think the ultimate goal hereis to ensure that the buyers
have a seamless, cohesive buying experience, that as an
organization, you're achievingyour revenue goals and that the
ultimate end is that you areconstantly delivering value to
(15:53):
your customers.
That's the way I look at revenuemarketing.
Rhoan Morgan (15:57):
I mean, I do feel like you and I have a sort of
certainly been living in thesame place in, the same sort of
head, and working through thisin tandem in a way.
So I would absolutely agree withyou.
And a lot of that actually comesin.
It's funny because some of thiseven reminds me a little bit of
(16:19):
what we wrote in Change Agents,a book that Eric and I wrote a
couple of years ago.
What I would like to know now,Shannon, as you've taken on this
role at DevFacto (16:30):
how are you rolling this out?
You don't need to sort of gointo the deep details and air
all of the dirty laundry of yourcompany, because I'm sure all of
our listeners are like, Oh yeah,I'd love to see that happen at
my company.
But we know that it's possible.
I've seen it happen.
(16:51):
It can take time.
It's not something that canhappen overnight.
It depends a lot on the cultureof a company.
It depends a lot on the visionof the leadership, the CEO, the
COO, the CFO, the CRO, right?
I mean, all of these folks haveto come together and really
believe in something like this.
So tell me a little bit aboutyour experience at DevFacto and
(17:14):
how you're rolling somethinglike this out.
Shannon Dougall (17:18):
It's like I said before, DevFacto is
certainly open to innovation andchange.
So they are well positioned toadopt a transformation in
marketing like this over to arevenue perspective.
They've done quite well.
They're well-branded and acrossCanada and they have all the
(17:42):
right marketing elements inplace.
So it felt like the right timeto move towards a revenue
marketing transformation forthem.
And when we were having theconversations, it was very
exciting.
Now you get into an organizationand you look behind the closet
(18:04):
doors to find out what'sactually happening and every
organization is different.
Every organization has adifferent level of marketing
literacy and they have adifferent level of marketing
maturity.
I think most marketers do that.
We understand the crawl, thecrawl walk, run approach.
And I think that it's important.
(18:26):
When you map out where anorganization is in terms of
their infrastructure, theirmarketing resource knowledge,
the way that they approachinbound marketing, how they
approach content marketing.
I think it'll help map out thetransformational stages that you
(18:48):
can run to and those that youneed to walk to within an
organization.
What we did is we performed amarketing audit to really assess
the risk aversion state that theorganization was in from a
marketing perspective and whatthe pace of change could be.
(19:08):
And then also had to demonstratewhere I think the impact could
be made and at what inflectionpoint would say: okay, now we're
switching over to marketingcontributing X number of dollars
to the pipeline and X number ofdollars in revenue.
And they were very excited aboutthat possibility.
(19:29):
But there was so much work thatneeded to be done.
And I think that this is commonamongst most organizations:
there are a few areas that arecritical in order to adopt a
marketing transformation.
And I think that the first onewas go beyond your typical buyer
(19:50):
persona.
I think every marketing groupout there has their buyer
persona, whether it's an entireslide deck or one slide per
persona where you talk about whothey are, you personify them,
and you talk about theirimperatives and their
day-to-days, and what universitythey went to, salary range they
make, and all those awesomethings that are super important.
(20:13):
But I don't think that we takeit far enough, and that was the
case here.
We needed to expand on our buyerpersona and the journey that
they're taking.
We had to really do a deep diveinto what it was that our
customers needed from us and howwe can map that out across the
entire buying experience and howwe could align sales and
(20:34):
marketing to that buyingexperience.
Because prior to that, it wasvery much marketing is
contributing amazing stuff atthe top of the funnel, and we're
helping support the brand and wedo sales enablement, but it
wasn't a cohesive program acrossthe entire buyer journey.
So we took the time and I satdown with the sales team and I
spoke to them.
I sat in on prospect calls.
(20:55):
I met with clients and hadconversations with them.
I met our delivery team andasked them: what are the biggest
pain points you're seeing after?
A client completed a project andwe took three days to sit down
and really deep-dive into whatour customers are experiencing
(21:17):
and how they go through eachstage and how it can help
progress them through eachstage.
So I think that if you don'thave the right content assets,
or even just the engagementpath, it's a disjointed and
often super-frustratingexperience for the buyer.
And I think that there's a levelof education that is required
(21:37):
within the organization tounderstand that this is how
we're going to achieve greatness, by aligning to their
experiences.
And this is actually interestingbecause it eads me into another
kind of barrier that a lot ofpeople experience.
I did mention that myorganization is super-open to
(21:58):
change and to adoptingmarketing.
And I don't think they wouldhave hired me if they weren't,
but something that is socritical is making sure that
there is transformationalleadership at the top, that the
executives, including CEO or thefounders or whoever it is, they
need to buy in that this isimportant.
And the reason why I say that isbecause I think revenue
(22:21):
marketing is a strategicorganizational decision.
It is not just changing acampaign or putting in
particular metrics in order tomeasure pipeline.
It is something that needs to beadopted across the entire
organization in order for it towork.
And in addition to that, I alsothink that the executives need
(22:43):
to understand that there aregoing to be barriers and they
have to help us break thosebarriers down.
And so I think having the rightpeople in the executive
supporting it, I'm not talkingabout the CMO, the CMO is often
the one who is encouraging thechange.
If you don't have thattransformational leadership
across the executive at the top,you will have an only
(23:05):
half-implemented revenuemarketing transformation, and it
just will not work.
I have so many of them, and Icould stop talking at any point,
but there are two other thingsthat I think, at DevFacto, and
across most organizations thatare key to having a revenue
(23:28):
marketing transformation occur.
One is making sure that you'reusing the data to connect all
the diverse data points.
And I say that because I thinkyou need a complete picture of
the current state of business.
You know, I was saying that wewant a complete picture of our
customer's experience as theybuy with us.
I also think that any trends orbehavior changes, particularly
(23:52):
now in this new world that we'refacing, we need to understand
what our buyers are goingthrough.
And this data that we use andanalyze can be drawn in real
time.
It'll enable faster, betterdecision-making capabilities.
And it will help marketing andsales assess the trends and
(24:15):
deliver that relevant, engagingexperience.It'll drive the
desired outcomes that we'relooking for.
So I think setting up as youmean to go by collecting the
right information.
And then the last thing I willsay, because there are a million
other things I could say, butthe last thing I'll say is that
I think you need to have theright marketing team in place.
I think you have to have amodern marketing organization,
(24:39):
one that is operationalizedaround the idea of revenue
marketing.
And what I mean by that is youneed to have people in place who
understand the entire revenueoperations model.
I think my best example, becausewe were talking about marketing
automation before, and both ofus had early experiences with
(25:01):
marketing automation, I wassurprised at the actual
trajectory of takeoff formarketing automation.
I don't know about you, but whenI first started using Eloqua, I
thought this is game-changing.
The entire world's going to beusing marketing automation, and
this is going to be amazing.
And I still find companies whoaren't using it to this day.
(25:22):
And I'm so surprised.
And I tried to understand whatit was that held it back.
It had so much potential andwhat I quickly realized is that
if you don't have the right teamsupporting this type of platform
and marketing muscle, then youwill not be able to execute in a
(25:44):
way that makes sense, and youwill not get the value from it.
And you have to almost become anew type of marketer, one that
understands, as an example,content marketing.
You need to have someone thatcan produce content that
understands the experience thatyou have to deliver with
content.
And they also have to understandhow you can deliver content
(26:06):
using the technology platformsthat are there.
If you don't have that holisticperspective, then you are going
to have a program that's onlyhalf executed.
It's time for your marketingteam to become more Revenue
Rebels in an organization.
(26:28):
So I think that if you havethose four areas, if you
understand your buyer, if youhave the transformational
leadership in place, or if youcan get them there, if you are
using your data to make betterrealtime decisions, and if you
have a really strong revenuemarketing focused team, I think
that you could start to see howthis transformation could take
place.
And you can, you can see theliving DNA of revenue marketing
(26:54):
within an organization.
Rhoan Morgan (26:56):
It's no small undertaking to get there.
And I will say, as you describeit, and our listeners are all
sort of listening with envy, ifthey are imagining that this e
xists at some other company, itdoes take a lot of work and
we've seen that and we see a lotof fantastic intentions and then
(27:19):
we'll see, yes, I have to getthis done, but my K PIs t elling
me I need to do X and so that iswhere it's working with the
executive and making sure thatthere's a full buy-in with the
CFO, t hat all of thoserelationships have been very
(27:42):
well formed and everybody's sortof moving in the same direction.
Then also, when you come into acompany to have a sort of modern
marketing team, what we've seenreally successful is pulling in
people from different groupswithin the company that can
bring in some fresh ideas andfresh thinking.
(28:04):
Because sometimes, and this ismaybe earlier days, I don't see
a resistance anymore, butearlier days, it might've been
like, well, wait a second.
That's not how we do it.
And that change is hard.
I really haven't seen much ofthat anymore.
That definitely did happen inthe early days, but having that
(28:25):
team of people that can cometogether and complement each
other's talents and skills isstill sometimes I think one of
the biggest challenges.
So what you said earlier, whenyou were talking about when you
started working at DevFacto,really getting real about where
(28:49):
you're at now, what's thecurrent picture?
What's an acceptable pace ofchange?
I like how you thought about itthat way.
Then you can get realistic interms of: it's not going to
happen in 30 days.
It may, but this is what we cando in 30 days.
And then this is what we can doin 90 days.
And in one year, this is what weshould be seeing by actually
(29:12):
identifying what the impactwould be of the change that
you're suggesting.
Great stuff.
Then, again, as you were talkingabout the personas, I think as
we talk with folks aroundcustomer experience, because we
talk a lot about this as themarketing-led customer
experience (29:33):
this has been around forever.
We've all seen marketingautomation turn into lead
management, turn into thecustomer journey.
There have been so many namesand I think now everybody's
talking about the customerexperience and truly, truly
getting it and it's taken a longtime, but it's very exciting.
(29:55):
One of the things that I think alot of people forget to do, and
this is an important part ofwhat you just talked about, is
you actually expanded thosepersonas by talking to the
customer.
No assumptions there, right?
It's sitting there listening tocalls, talking to product,
(30:17):
talking to the customers, andpulling all of that together and
synthesizing and developing.
What does that real customerexperience look like?
Because in the early days therewere millions of assumptions.
I think it was just sort oflike, they're going to click
this and then they're going toclick that.
And then they're going to getthis email and this email.
So there was a very linear wayof thinking, and sometimes that
(30:39):
that's all the technology couldgive you, but now with the
technology that we have inplace, it can be the spaghetti
bowl sort of idea, right?
It's just sort of thisinterwoven web of activity and
engagement.
And it's very exciting, butstill it does require a lot of
(31:00):
effort and time and thinking andcreativity.
So what would you say, of all ofthese that you were just talking
about, what would you say is thesingle most challenging barrier
to getting a company into aplace where they could call
themselves those Revenue Rebels,a revenue marketing company?
Shannon Dougall (31:24):
I think that, actually, it's a pretty easy
answer.
In my opinion, of the four Imentioned, three are very much
in the hands of a marketer.
We can look at data, we couldbuild out the persona.
We buy in, we get this.
All smart marketers understandthat this is the type of thing
we need to do in order to seesuccess.
(31:46):
The part that I think is mostchallenging is getting the
leaders' buy-in.
You mentioned this earlier.
They're excited.
They understand.
They see the value.
You wouldn't be there if theydidn't, they wouldn't be
supporting a martech budget ifthey didn't think that there was
(32:09):
potential.
The problem is, is that thereare other competing priorities
and it's when you start to losethe momentum, because it does
take time.
A revenue marketingtransformation takes time.
For some, more time than others,and you need to maintain that
(32:30):
momentum.
You need to get through.
In my mind, there are fivestages of marketing
transformation and you need todo your best to leapfrog through
all of them, but do it well ateach stage.
And sometimes this could take ayear or it could take more, and
to continue that momentum, youneed to always be present and
(32:55):
demonstrating the wins anddemonstrating a value to change
to your executives because theydo have competing priorities.
They do have other areas thatthey need to focus on.
And so I think that if you startlosing that transformational
leadership, it becomes a verymuch an uphill battle to get you
through to this.
I would say that's the singlemost difficult thing.
Rhoan Morgan (33:15):
I absolutely agree with that.
I think that the other work isthat there are models,
methodologies, processes that wecan go through and be really,
really successful, but if youdon't have the buy-in at the
(33:35):
leadership level, that's goingto be really tough.
And I think what's reallycritical is to be very
empathetic to what your internalcustomers are going through as
well.
And what's their experience?
As you're designing the customerexperience and the trunk is
(33:58):
marketing transformation, alsothinking about the internal
customers, thinking about theexecutives, thinking about your
sales teams, thinking about thedifferent teams within the sales
organization, but with theexecutives there are times when
we're working with a company andthey're, they're set on one
path, but there's a newopportunity.
(34:20):
Or there is a shift in themarket and they have to
completely pivot into anotherway of operating or make massive
changes.
Frankly, that's what we'reseeing a lot right now.
That's happened to a lot ofcompanies over the last couple
of months and is likely tocontinue.
(34:40):
And we have to really beempathetic, I think because
they're also answering to theboard and other stakeholders and
shareholders, and they're alsolooking at it from a very, very
different lens.
And so I think patience andunderstanding.
So I totally agree.
You always have to bedemonstrating the value and the
wins.
So bringing that out in frontconstantly, but then also
looking at it from (35:04):
okay, what matters right now to the CEO?
Because us marketers, we wouldjust love to transform every
business we touch into a revenuemarketing organization, and
we've got that roadmap and we'reready to go.
And it can be very exciting.
(35:26):
I just wonder sometimes if, asmarketers, we're so excited
about the opportunity that mightbecome a little impatient as
we're trying to get this going.
Shannon Dougall (35:45):
I agree.
I can see that.
I know I've been there.
I've been there:"if you juststay committed, we could have
this done in no time!" But it'snot like that.
We do have to be patient.
Rhoan Morgan (35:58):
It does take patience.
And then, also, when some of theclients that we work with are
international, you're changingcompanies that are on different
continents, that have differentcultures, different languages,
even sometimes different ways ofoperating if they're in another
(36:20):
business unit or a subsidiary.
It can become so tremendouslycomplex that it's important to,
as you were talking about at thebeginning, get real, write it
down, put it on paper, getreally clear.
Because having that plan iswhat's going to help you be
(36:42):
successful.
I think having something earlydays will also enable you to be
very agile.
You're very plugged into themarketing space in terms of
knowing a lot of people andbeing connected with a lot of
folks.
Have you been talking with folksabout how they're having to
shift what they're doing and howthat's impacting their world
(37:06):
right now?
Shannon Dougall (37:07):
Oh, absolutely.
As the rest of the world isbeing flipped upside down, so is
marketing and it's scary times alittle bit.
Sometimes, when there's adownturn in economy, you can see
that marketing is one of thefirst budgets to be cut because
of fear.
I am seeing that from thatperspective, it's interesting
(37:32):
times.
We need to demonstrate the valueof marketing during times like
this.
Those that continue to build outmarketing efficiencies and
continue to look for innovativeways to go to market without
becoming a cost center to theorganization will be the ones
that come out of thissuccessfully.
But we're in a new world rightnow.
(37:53):
We don't know what's going tohappen.
This is new to every singlebusiness out there, every
industry, every marketer andassumptions we used to have
about marketing are changingnow.
A perfect example is (38:07):
we wanted to run a webinar over the next
couple of weeks.
And usually we would take fourto six weeks to promote our
webinar.
And now we're a week inpromoting it and seeing the same
success.
It's a different world.
And so we are having to adjust,one, to the realities of the
(38:31):
economy and, two, to the newrealities of our customers, how
they are experiencing us in ourbrands and our business and how
we need to approach them.
There's a lot of changehappening and we're having to be
agile and adjust plans.
I had proposed my 2020 marketingplan to the DevFacto team.
And then, like most have, I'msure, shortly after this
(39:00):
pandemic hit, everything that wehad planned has been adjusted or
postponed, and now we're justfinally getting back to setting
the marketing infrastructure inplace.
That'll help us build out ourrevenue marketing platform, but
it took us time to get throughthat.
We needed to show our marketthat we cared and that we were
(39:24):
offering value and not beingopportunistic at all, but that
we're here and we can help forreal.
And that, that took a pivot inwhat our plans were for
marketing and our contentstrategy, and it was pretty
amazing to see.
Agility is key when you'retrying to do a complete
(39:47):
marketing transformation.
You do need to be agile forsure.
Rhoan Morgan (39:50):
We're going to wrap up here in just a couple of
minutes.
I would love it if you couldtell us about some of the
technologies you use.
You've been in this space for along time, as we've talked
about, we both have.
In addition to marketingautomation, I would love it if
you could walk us through orpaint the picture of what else
(40:12):
you're using within yourmarketing stack that really
helps an organization move intobeing that revenue marketing
company.
Shannon Dougall (40:21):
Yeah, absolutely.
So we talked about marketingautomation.
If you're looking at thefoundational tech stack, I would
say that you need to have a CRMand CRM that is actively used by
the sales department, and youwould have to integrate your
(40:41):
marketing automation platform,two-way communication between
the CRM and the marketingautomation platform.
You do have to use one source oftruth, which, in my opinion, is
the CRM.
We want to make sure you'remeasuring all metrics from the
same data, so use your CRM forthat, use the marketing
(41:03):
automation platform.
And then I think that there'sanother core layer, which is the
content experience platform,which is maybe new to some
people.
It's been around in my world forquite some time.
But it is key.
I think those are the threefoundational pieces that you
need to have.
And from there now, I've been intwo worlds.
(41:25):
I've been in the world where I'mscrambling to try to convince an
organization that we do need amarketing automation platform.
Right now, we are implementing amarketing automation platform at
DevFacto.
The next stage I want to do isimplement that content
experience platform.
And then what I would suggestfor organizations, because, like
(41:49):
I said, I've been on the otherside as well, where we've had
200 elements of our martechstack and we didn't even use
half of them.
How I like to run my martechstack is, once you've mapped out
your buyer journey, you start tolook for areas of opportunity,
or you start to look for gaps inthe buyer journey.
(42:11):
And you have to determine if youcan fill those gaps using
technology, or if it's a processchange or whatever the case is.
You don't want to just be buyingmartech for the sake of buying
martech.
Now, I was talking about dataearlier.
If you need to get deepermetrics and business
intelligence and dive deeperinto the analytics and you can't
(42:32):
get that data between your CRM,your marketing automation
platform, and your contentexperience platform, then yes,
you might have to turn tosomething like a power BI or a
Looker or Tableau, or you arerunning a community or you have
customer advocacy as part ofyour program.
You might have to look for aplatform that would support
that, but I think it needs to bemapped out to your particular
(42:55):
customer experience and yourneeds internally.
It's interesting because, like Isaid, I have used many, many
marketing technologies and havefound that most are
exceptionally valuable.
We had a lead routing issue nottoo long ago.
And we found that we needed toadopt something in order to make
(43:19):
it work.
And so we adopted a companycalled LeanData to help us
remove the manual process ofassigning leads to our sales
reps.
And it made sense for us, and itwas a valued asset.
Every six months, we would do amartech audit to make sure that
we were actually using thetechnologies the way we should.
(43:40):
And we wanted to understand ifour people needed a further
education on the tool in orderto get the benefits out of it.
I think that there's afoundational element.
I think every smart marketingorganization has the CRM with
the marketing automationplatform that's integrated into
your CMS and you have a contentexperience platform outside of
(44:00):
that.
I think you need to find yourunique needs and determine what
those are in terms of yourmarketing maturity, what your
customer experience looks like,and then identify areas for, for
growth and for filling any gapsthat you might have.
Rhoan Morgan (44:20):
And layering into that, making sure that the CRM
is actually used.
I'll never forget.
I was at a client, that had tohave been eight years ago.
I mean, it was quite awhile ago.
We were at their sales kickoff.
And one of the things that wewere wondering about was really
how used was their CRM.
(44:41):
So we were in this very big roomwith probably 75 account
executives traveled in fromacross the U S and the VP of
sales asked if you use the CRMevery day, stand up.
One person—one person stood up.
(45:03):
And it was really telling, butwe knew that it was going to be
a pretty low number.
Is there additional training, isthere more that we can do to
make it easier?
Are there processes that can beput in place or other
technologies that can automatesome of these things?
And sometimes it's just beenimplemented in a really
(45:25):
technical way orover-architected.
Um, but I like your thinking interms of content experience
platform as well.
Definitely an importantfoundation.
This has been really fantasticconversation.
I hope that our listeners willhave learned quite a lot.
I think there's so much ineverything that you shared
(45:48):
today.
As we wrap up, we sometimes liketo ask our guest to tell us
either about a rebelinspiration, something that was
from your very early years, itinfluenced your professional
life, that kind of helped youbecome the rebel you are today.
(46:08):
Or is there a hero, is there arebel that you look o ut for
inspiration or motivation thatcould be real or fictional, and
who is that?
So I'd love you to just sharewith us a little bit.
Shannon Dougall (46:21):
Yeah.
I had to say, I think I wasn'tmuch of a rebel as a teenager.
My parents raised me to staywithin the lines and I did.
I didn't become a rebel tilllater, so I don't have any
exciting, rebellious teenagestories to share, but I do have
a rebel hero that I mostrecently become familiar with,
(46:44):
as his role is the globalinnovation evangelist at
Salesforce.
And it's Brian Solis.
Now, he's not a marketer per se.
He calls himself a digitalanthropologist and futurist.
And I, first of all, love thosetitles, but what he does is he
focuses on the research andthought leadership that explores
all the things that I find superfascinating, like digital
(47:07):
transformation or innovation anddisruption or customer
experience.
And he's looking into thecognitive enterprise, and I'm
fascinated with cognitivemarketing.
So he, to me is a complete rebelhero.
Brian Solis.
He's amazing.
I think everybody should checkhim out.
I actually really like hisperspectives right now on what
our new world's going to looklike: the"novel economy." He's
(47:32):
definitely my hero right now.
And I've got many heroes, buthe's the one who stands out
right now.
Rhoan Morgan (47:37):
Oh, that's fantastic.
I love it.
And by the way, for ourlisteners, Brian's last name is
spelled S-O-L-I-S.
Definitely do check out what heis up to.
I agree, lots of very, veryinteresting reading and learning
there.
Well, Shannon, I am so glad thatyou were able to join us on the
show.
Thank you so much for taking thetime.
(47:59):
It was really an absolutepleasure to hear your story, to
learn about your thinking, andto really talk about how to
transform a company into a realrevenue marketing organization.
Tell me what is the best way forour listeners to reach you if
they have any questions?
Shannon Dougall (48:15):
I think LinkedIn is probably the best.
I'm on there almost all day.
Connect with me on LinkedIn.
That would be the best.
Rhoan Morgan (48:22):
Fantastic.
Good.
And for everybody that'slistening, Shannon's first name
is spelled with two" n's." Well,and then the third at the end.
And Dougall is D-O-U-G-A-L-L, asyou can see on our website or on
the show notes, but I hope youguys can connect with her.
Thanks again, Shannon.
And I'm looking forward to beingable to stay in touch.
(48:44):
Thank you so much.
Big thank you to our listenersfor tuning into Revenue Rebels.
Remember, you can get our shownotes, links, and other content
related to today's topic atdemandlab.com slash revenue
rebels.
While you're there, let us knowif there's a leader you want to
hear from or a topic you'd liketo hear more about on this show.
(49:05):
I'm your host Rhoan Morgan, andyou can find me on Twitter at
Rhoan Morgan.
It's R-H-O-A-N Morgan.
And of course, look us up onLinkedIn and look up DemandLab
or search for R-H-O-A-N Morgan.
And finally, only if you thinkwe've earned it, please head
over to Apple podcast, Spotifyor wherever you're listening to
(49:28):
us right now, and subscribe,rate and review the show.
Until next time, Rebels.
Thank you.
Hey everyone.
Welcome to another episode ofRevenue Rebels, the podcast that
brings marketing and salesrebels together to share their
stories and thinking on alltopics related to accelerating
revenue, generating activitiesin the B to B world.
On this show, we talk about thestrategic vision of
marketing-led customerexperience that unleashes the
(00:24):
combined power of technology,content and data.
Are you ready to rebel?
Let's get into the show.
Hi everyone.
And welcome back to anotherepisode of revenue rebels.
I am really excited to betalking with our guest today who
has been called a marketer ofthe future.
(00:47):
She has been described as anadventurer, scientist, and an
artist in the field ofmarketing, where she's been
using her experiences andlearning towards a sort of all
in one type of revenuemarketing.
Very excited to have ShannonDougall on the show.
She is the head of marketing atDevFacto right now, and she's
(01:07):
also held similar roles atUberflip and Shift CRM.
Welcome Shannon.
I'm really happy to have you onthe show.
Shannon Dougall (01:14):
Thank you.
I am so excited for being here.
Um, I'm honored, I have to say,to be included with some of
today's most amazing RevenueRebels: it's so humbling and I'm
also super excited to be talkingto you because I think kindred
spirits need to get together andtalk about the possibilities
(01:34):
that marketing can have in thefuture.
Rhoan Morgan (01:36):
So, cool.
Thank you.
Glad to hear that.
And I absolutely agree.
Couldn't agree more.
And especially now, we do needto be talking about the future,
looking forward, and what I'dlove to be able to do, though,
quickly, as a tiny step back isI'd love to take a little look
at your history.
You know, a lot of our listenersknow this, you may already know,
(02:00):
we really do focus onhighlighting marketing and sales
leaders who are, I would sayrebels in their field for a
variety of reasons.
So before we get into sort ofthe meat of what we're going to
talk about today, I would loveto know what sort of defines you
as a rebel o r, or what in yourpast has, has shaped you into
(02:20):
the marketing person that youare today.
Shannon Dougall (02:22):
Yeah, sure.
I guess I've always been a bitof a marketing change agent.
I've always been a hand-raisermuch to my parents' and
professors' chagrin.
I'm always wondering why thingsare the way they are, if there's
a better way to do it, and ifI'm not satisfied with the
(02:42):
answer, I begin to look foralternatives.
When I was in university, I hadlanded a fantastic job for the
summer at the Department ofNational Defence.
This was many years ago.
So I was working in the techdepartment and my role was to
come in and do an inventory ofall the hardware throughout
national defence.
(03:03):
And I had a pad of paper, aclipboard, and a pen, and I went
around and crawled underneathdesks and collected numbers.
And then I'd go back and putthat into a spreadsheet.
And I thought to myself, thisseems like such an archaic way
to do things.
There's gotta be an easier way.
So they brought me back thefollowing summer, because they
were very happy with my writingability and data entry.
(03:27):
They brought me back and I hadsaid during the interview
process (03:30):
is there a way that we could look at maybe putting this
into a system, like automatingthis a little bit more?
And they were very happy to sendme on some coding programs.
And so I spent a month of mysummer learning how to code and
the next month building out aninventory management database
(03:51):
using C++, and I thought, thisis the coolest thing.
Like this is life-changing.
It is taking technology andcutting my work in half.
And so as the years progressed,my job was to come in, do this
inventory, but also to improveon the way that we use
technology to help withefficiency within the Department
(04:14):
of National Defence.
And I thought this was thecoolest thing ever now.
I wasn't studying technology.
I wasn't studying business.
I was actually studying politicsand law.
And I quickly realized afterthose summers that I had a
passion for technology and thepossibilities that can come out
of it.
And so I actually decided to notpursue my career in law, but to
(04:39):
move into the world of tech.
And that's when I entered thespace and I was amazed by the
way that technology companiesand thought leaders in the space
approached the world.
They were always looking forinnovative ways to do something
different, to do somethingbetter.
And that was so exciting to me.
(05:03):
That's kind of what carved outmy path to working in the tech
space and software in it.
Having said that though, I wouldsay that when I started
marketing in tech, marketingitself was not very innovative.
It was product slicks and pressreleases and events, and it was
anything but innovative.
(05:24):
But having said that, I do thinkthat there was opportunity to
change the way that we had haddone things in marketing.
And it wasn't until probably2005, 2006, where my entire
world changed.
So I wasn't just a marketerinside a tech industry.
Now I became an innovativemarketer within the tech space.
(05:51):
I was working at a startupcompany called Watchfire at the
time in Ottawa.
And they were very progressive.
They had a very strongdemand-gen program in place.
It was quite successful.
They were primed for innovation,not just from a company
perspective, but from amarketing perspective.
And I could see that we wereonly held back by the human
(06:18):
capital within the organization.
So we couldn't do anything morebecause we had a strong
marketing team, but there areonly so many people that could
do so many things within thetimeframe of a day.
And I started to look intodifferent possibilities and I
came across another startupcompany called Eloqua and they
had promised me that I couldsolve my exact problem.
(06:39):
I could scale and automate mymarketing so that it could grow
and become a bit morepredictable.
And I was very intrigued by thispossibility and because
Watchfire, was an innovativecompany, they were super happy
to let me adopt this technologyand implement it at Watchfire.
And this was a game changer.
(07:00):
Marketing automation was a gamechanger, as far as I could see
it.
And I mean, this gave me theopportunity to have a seat at
the table.
I was no longer considered acost center within the
organization.
I can demonstrate that marketingcan have an impact on pipeline.
It can have an impact on thebottom line and that we can
scale our programs and grow ourleads.
(07:22):
And it was super successful.
We did see revenue growth and wealso were acquired at the same
time by IBM.
So there was a lot happening atthat time.
The thing that I had learned,working for over 20 years, I
learned quickly that I lovetechnology.
(07:42):
I love the innovative ways thatcompanies approach the future
when you're looking at atechnology space, I loved
marketing.
And now I was seeing that therewas an opportunity, a potential
for marketing to become aninnovative organization within a
company.
(08:03):
And that's what I guess pavedthe way for me in my career.
I wanted to work for companiesthat were like-minded.
I wanted to share with the worldthis new potential for
marketing.
This became my passion and mademe even more of a Revenue Rebel,
I guess.
(08:24):
can't imagine organizations notadopting a revenue marketing
model where you look at revenuefrom a holistic perspective.
That's sort of what drove methrough to where I am today.
I'm at DevFacto now.
(08:45):
I thought this was such aninteresting company.
The first thing that attractedme to the organization was the
tagline that"we make softwarethat humans love to use." And I
thought, whoa, humanizingtechnology's so amazing.
T his demonstrates empathy, butalso the ability of digital and,
even more so than that, youknow, their co mpany's b uilt on
(09:06):
it, innovative nature.
They've even designed theiroffice space around having an
innovative mindset, everybusiness problem that they
approach.
They look at it from an ideationperspective: what can we do?
Where are the opportunities andhow can we fix it with digital?
So that's ki nd o f m y careernutshell.
Rhoan Morgan (09:28):
You said earlier speaking with kindred spirits
and I can completely relate tothat myself, having a different
background heading intomarketing, but falling in love
with it actually, honestly, whenI was in high school, in a
marketing class.
I was 16 years old and I wasjust like, this is incredible.
(09:49):
And I can tell you, there waszero technology related to it
when I was 16 years old.
And now, though, it's just beena fantastic journey to watch it
go from those early days ofmarketing automation.
My first connection withmarketing automation was Marketo
(10:10):
.
I deployed that in 2008, Ithink.
And just seeing, kind of feelinglike there's got to be a better
way and also really seeing thoseimmediate benefits.
And then also seeing the growthand expansion since then of what
(10:31):
is possible.
It's getting more and moretechnical.
It's getting more and moredemanding, but also we're really
able to prove the revenue impactwith that.
How do you think about or definerevenue marketing?
Shannon Dougall (10:49):
Yeah, that's a great question.
It's interesting because I feellike the term has been around
for quite some time.
The definition has evolved astime has gone on, but I'm really
thrilled to see that it'sstarting to gain traction.
But having said that, I I've hadmany conversations with
(11:09):
marketers around what they feelrevenue marketing means to them.
And I hear things like, it's arepeatable program to help drive
revenue into the funnel, or it'smeasuring marketing based on
revenue influence.
And yes, I completely agree thatthose are aspects of revenue
marketing, but the way that Iapproach revenue marketing and
(11:32):
how I define it is that I thinkit's a holistic approach.
And I think it starts withaligning your entire
organization to the customerexperience from the very first
touch to ongoing, delightedcustomers and everything in
between.
So how do align your marketing,your sales, your customer
(11:55):
success, your product team tothe customer experience?
I think that it goes beyondthis.
However, I think that it'simportant to note that it's not
just about improving thecustomer experience.
You also have to think about howit contributes to a mutually
beneficial outcome.
So when I'm looking at revenuemarketing, I connect the dots
(12:17):
between the customer experienceor the buyer experience and what
they have with the organizationto revenue and to customer
lifetime value.
And I think if I was to even geta little bit more granular,
because that does seem a bithigh-level, I think that you
look at it from three areas.
I think it needs to bebuyer-centric, it needs to be
revenue-centric, and it needs tobe integrated and orchestrated,
(12:40):
and I'll just quickly touch onwhat I think each of those mean.
I think when I'm talking aboutlike buyer-centric, it's about
aligning all of our activities,marketing and sales to the buyer
and their buying process, whichmakes sense qne has always been
like that.
But I think it's aboutdeveloping the right content and
programs and systems that doalign across the entire buying
(13:01):
process.
So we're no longer just lookingat marketing is responsible for
the top of the funnel.
And then we punt over leads tosales and they're responsible in
their own way for the bottom ofthe funnel.
I think that it's more aboutmaking sure that we work
together as a cohesive revenueunit to map out this buyer
(13:22):
journey and to align all ourinteractions across the entire
buyer journey.
It's crazy that we're stilltalking about this today, but it
is still happening.
It means eliminating one-offmarketing campaigns that revolve
around it, like a particularasset or event.
So, you know, here's my ebook,here's my campaign.
And here are the leads that camefrom it.
(13:43):
Everything has to be integrated.
We have to map out that journeyso that we understand what the
inflection points are.
Why would a customer come to us?
What are their pain points atthe beginning of their
experience with ourorganization?
What type of information arethey looking for?
How can we help them get to thenext stage at that next stage?
What are the questions thatthey're asking of us?
(14:04):
How are we helping them?
And I think that if you look atit from a buyer-centered
perspective, you have the earlystages of a revenue marketing
organization, but revenue is inthe title.
And I think it should also beoriented towards revenue.
So when I say that, I mean thateverything marketing does has to
deliver revenue and maximize thecustomer lifetime value, not
(14:27):
just focus on leads andconversion rates.
It has to go beyond that.
I think that, it requires astrategic and an
outcome-oriented perspective forall aligned to the same
objectives within theorganization.
We will all work towards thoseobjectives together.
I think that from looking at it,from identifying and qualifying
(14:49):
and converting buyers in arepeatable and pragmatic fashion
across the entire buyer journeyis what would get you to a
revenue-oriented organization.
No siloed approach to X numberof MQLs, X number of sales
accepted leads or whatever thecase is.
You need to look at itholistically.
Although those numbers areimportant, they don't dictate
(15:10):
the complete outcome.
The last thing I would say wasthat integrated and
orchestrated, I think this justmeans that you need to have a
sequence of engagement.
I talked about mapping out thebuyer journey and aligning
content to each buyer persona atevery stage of the buyer
journey.
But I think that you need toactually build out these
sequences of engagement, ofnurturing, of conversion paths,
(15:31):
and create a series of stepsthat's closely managed and
optimized and ultimately leadsto revenue.
I think the ultimate goal hereis to ensure that the buyers
have a seamless, cohesive buying experience, that as an
organization, you're achievingyour revenue goals and that the
ultimate end is that you areconstantly delivering value to
(15:53):
your customers.
That's the way I look at revenuemarketing.
Rhoan Morgan (15:57):
I mean, I do feel like you and I have a sort of
certainly been living in thesame place in, the same sort of
head, and working through thisin tandem in a way.
So I would absolutely agree withyou.
And a lot of that actually comesin.
It's funny because some of thiseven reminds me a little bit of
(16:19):
what we wrote in Change Agents,a book that Eric and I wrote a
couple of years ago.
What I would like to know now,Shannon, as you've taken on this
role at DevFacto (16:30):
how are you rolling this out?
You don't need to sort of gointo the deep details and air
all of the dirty laundry of yourcompany, because I'm sure all of
our listeners are like, Oh yeah,I'd love to see that happen at
my company.
But we know that it's possible.
I've seen it happen.
(16:51):
It can take time.
It's not something that canhappen overnight.
It depends a lot on the cultureof a company.
It depends a lot on the visionof the leadership, the CEO, the
COO, the CFO, the CRO, right?
I mean, all of these folks haveto come together and really
believe in something like this.
So tell me a little bit aboutyour experience at DevFacto and
(17:14):
how you're rolling somethinglike this out.
Shannon Dougall (17:18):
It's like I said before, DevFacto is
certainly open to innovation andchange.
So they are well positioned toadopt a transformation in
marketing like this over to arevenue perspective.
They've done quite well.
They're well-branded and acrossCanada and they have all the
(17:42):
right marketing elements inplace.
So it felt like the right timeto move towards a revenue
marketing transformation forthem.
And when we were having theconversations, it was very
exciting.
Now you get into an organizationand you look behind the closet
(18:04):
doors to find out what'sactually happening and every
organization is different.
Every organization has adifferent level of marketing
literacy and they have adifferent level of marketing
maturity.
I think most marketers do that.
We understand the crawl, thecrawl walk, run approach.
And I think that it's important.
(18:26):
When you map out where anorganization is in terms of
their infrastructure, theirmarketing resource knowledge,
the way that they approachinbound marketing, how they
approach content marketing.
I think it'll help map out thetransformational stages that you
(18:48):
can run to and those that youneed to walk to within an
organization.
What we did is we performed amarketing audit to really assess
the risk aversion state that theorganization was in from a
marketing perspective and whatthe pace of change could be.
(19:08):
And then also had to demonstratewhere I think the impact could
be made and at what inflectionpoint would say: okay, now we're
switching over to marketingcontributing X number of dollars
to the pipeline and X number ofdollars in revenue.
And they were very excited aboutthat possibility.
(19:29):
But there was so much work thatneeded to be done.
And I think that this is commonamongst most organizations:
there are a few areas that arecritical in order to adopt a
marketing transformation.
And I think that the first onewas go beyond your typical buyer
(19:50):
persona.
I think every marketing groupout there has their buyer
persona, whether it's an entireslide deck or one slide per
persona where you talk about whothey are, you personify them,
and you talk about theirimperatives and their
day-to-days, and what universitythey went to, salary range they
make, and all those awesomethings that are super important.
(20:13):
But I don't think that we takeit far enough, and that was the
case here.
We needed to expand on our buyerpersona and the journey that
they're taking.
We had to really do a deep diveinto what it was that our
customers needed from us and howwe can map that out across the
entire buying experience and howwe could align sales and
(20:34):
marketing to that buyingexperience.
Because prior to that, it wasvery much marketing is
contributing amazing stuff atthe top of the funnel, and we're
helping support the brand and wedo sales enablement, but it
wasn't a cohesive program acrossthe entire buyer journey.
So we took the time and I satdown with the sales team and I
spoke to them.
I sat in on prospect calls.
(20:55):
I met with clients and hadconversations with them.
I met our delivery team andasked them: what are the biggest
pain points you're seeing after?
A client completed a project andwe took three days to sit down
and really deep-dive into whatour customers are experiencing
(21:17):
and how they go through eachstage and how it can help
progress them through eachstage.
So I think that if you don'thave the right content assets,
or even just the engagementpath, it's a disjointed and
often super-frustratingexperience for the buyer.
And I think that there's a levelof education that is required
(21:37):
within the organization tounderstand that this is how
we're going to achieve greatness, by aligning to their
experiences.
And this is actually interestingbecause it eads me into another
kind of barrier that a lot ofpeople experience.
I did mention that myorganization is super-open to
(21:58):
change and to adoptingmarketing.
And I don't think they wouldhave hired me if they weren't,
but something that is socritical is making sure that
there is transformationalleadership at the top, that the
executives, including CEO or thefounders or whoever it is, they
need to buy in that this isimportant.
And the reason why I say that isbecause I think revenue
(22:21):
marketing is a strategicorganizational decision.
It is not just changing acampaign or putting in
particular metrics in order tomeasure pipeline.
It is something that needs to beadopted across the entire
organization in order for it towork.
And in addition to that, I alsothink that the executives need
(22:43):
to understand that there aregoing to be barriers and they
have to help us break thosebarriers down.
And so I think having the rightpeople in the executive
supporting it, I'm not talkingabout the CMO, the CMO is often
the one who is encouraging thechange.
If you don't have thattransformational leadership
across the executive at the top,you will have an only
(23:05):
half-implemented revenuemarketing transformation, and it
just will not work.
I have so many of them, and Icould stop talking at any point,
but there are two other thingsthat I think, at DevFacto, and
across most organizations thatare key to having a revenue
(23:28):
marketing transformation occur.
One is making sure that you'reusing the data to connect all
the diverse data points.
And I say that because I thinkyou need a complete picture of
the current state of business.
You know, I was saying that wewant a complete picture of our
customer's experience as theybuy with us.
I also think that any trends orbehavior changes, particularly
(23:52):
now in this new world that we'refacing, we need to understand
what our buyers are goingthrough.
And this data that we use andanalyze can be drawn in real
time.
It'll enable faster, betterdecision-making capabilities.
And it will help marketing andsales assess the trends and
(24:15):
deliver that relevant, engagingexperience.It'll drive the
desired outcomes that we'relooking for.
So I think setting up as youmean to go by collecting the
right information.
And then the last thing I willsay, because there are a million
other things I could say, butthe last thing I'll say is that
I think you need to have theright marketing team in place.
I think you have to have amodern marketing organization,
(24:39):
one that is operationalizedaround the idea of revenue
marketing.
And what I mean by that is youneed to have people in place who
understand the entire revenueoperations model.
I think my best example, becausewe were talking about marketing
automation before, and both ofus had early experiences with
(25:01):
marketing automation, I wassurprised at the actual
trajectory of takeoff formarketing automation.
I don't know about you, but whenI first started using Eloqua, I
thought this is game-changing.
The entire world's going to beusing marketing automation, and
this is going to be amazing.
And I still find companies whoaren't using it to this day.
(25:22):
And I'm so surprised.
And I tried to understand whatit was that held it back.
It had so much potential andwhat I quickly realized is that
if you don't have the right teamsupporting this type of platform
and marketing muscle, then youwill not be able to execute in a
(25:44):
way that makes sense, and youwill not get the value from it.
And you have to almost become anew type of marketer, one that
understands, as an example,content marketing.
You need to have someone thatcan produce content that
understands the experience thatyou have to deliver with
content.
And they also have to understandhow you can deliver content
(26:06):
using the technology platformsthat are there.
If you don't have that holisticperspective, then you are going
to have a program that's onlyhalf executed.
It's time for your marketingteam to become more Revenue
Rebels in an organization.
(26:28):
So I think that if you havethose four areas, if you
understand your buyer, if youhave the transformational
leadership in place, or if youcan get them there, if you are
using your data to make betterrealtime decisions, and if you
have a really strong revenuemarketing focused team, I think
that you could start to see howthis transformation could take
place.
And you can, you can see theliving DNA of revenue marketing
(26:54):
within an organization.
Rhoan Morgan (26:56):
It's no small undertaking to get there.
And I will say, as you describeit, and our listeners are all
sort of listening with envy, ifthey are imagining that this e
xists at some other company, itdoes take a lot of work and
we've seen that and we see a lotof fantastic intentions and then
(27:19):
we'll see, yes, I have to getthis done, but my K PIs t elling
me I need to do X and so that iswhere it's working with the
executive and making sure thatthere's a full buy-in with the
CFO, t hat all of thoserelationships have been very
(27:42):
well formed and everybody's sortof moving in the same direction.
Then also, when you come into acompany to have a sort of modern
marketing team, what we've seenreally successful is pulling in
people from different groupswithin the company that can
bring in some fresh ideas andfresh thinking.
(28:04):
Because sometimes, and this ismaybe earlier days, I don't see
a resistance anymore, butearlier days, it might've been
like, well, wait a second.
That's not how we do it.
And that change is hard.
I really haven't seen much ofthat anymore.
That definitely did happen inthe early days, but having that
(28:25):
team of people that can cometogether and complement each
other's talents and skills isstill sometimes I think one of
the biggest challenges.
So what you said earlier, whenyou were talking about when you
started working at DevFacto,really getting real about where
(28:49):
you're at now, what's thecurrent picture?
What's an acceptable pace ofchange?
I like how you thought about itthat way.
Then you can get realistic interms of: it's not going to
happen in 30 days.
It may, but this is what we cando in 30 days.
And then this is what we can doin 90 days.
And in one year, this is what weshould be seeing by actually
(29:12):
identifying what the impactwould be of the change that
you're suggesting.
Great stuff.
Then, again, as you were talkingabout the personas, I think as
we talk with folks aroundcustomer experience, because we
talk a lot about this as themarketing-led customer
experience (29:33):
this has been around forever.
We've all seen marketingautomation turn into lead
management, turn into thecustomer journey.
There have been so many namesand I think now everybody's
talking about the customerexperience and truly, truly
getting it and it's taken a longtime, but it's very exciting.
(29:55):
One of the things that I think alot of people forget to do, and
this is an important part ofwhat you just talked about, is
you actually expanded thosepersonas by talking to the
customer.
No assumptions there, right?
It's sitting there listening tocalls, talking to product,
(30:17):
talking to the customers, andpulling all of that together and
synthesizing and developing.
What does that real customerexperience look like?
Because in the early days therewere millions of assumptions.
I think it was just sort oflike, they're going to click
this and then they're going toclick that.
And then they're going to getthis email and this email.
So there was a very linear wayof thinking, and sometimes that
(30:39):
that's all the technology couldgive you, but now with the
technology that we have inplace, it can be the spaghetti
bowl sort of idea, right?
It's just sort of thisinterwoven web of activity and
engagement.
And it's very exciting, butstill it does require a lot of
(31:00):
effort and time and thinking andcreativity.
So what would you say, of all ofthese that you were just talking
about, what would you say is thesingle most challenging barrier
to getting a company into aplace where they could call
themselves those Revenue Rebels,a revenue marketing company?
Shannon Dougall (31:24):
I think that, actually, it's a pretty easy
answer.
In my opinion, of the four Imentioned, three are very much
in the hands of a marketer.
We can look at data, we couldbuild out the persona.
We buy in, we get this.
All smart marketers understandthat this is the type of thing
we need to do in order to seesuccess.
(31:46):
The part that I think is mostchallenging is getting the
leaders' buy-in.
You mentioned this earlier.
They're excited.
They understand.
They see the value.
You wouldn't be there if theydidn't, they wouldn't be
supporting a martech budget ifthey didn't think that there was
(32:09):
potential.
The problem is, is that thereare other competing priorities
and it's when you start to losethe momentum, because it does
take time.
A revenue marketingtransformation takes time.
For some, more time than others,and you need to maintain that
(32:30):
momentum.
You need to get through.
In my mind, there are fivestages of marketing
transformation and you need todo your best to leapfrog through
all of them, but do it well ateach stage.
And sometimes this could take ayear or it could take more, and
to continue that momentum, youneed to always be present and
(32:55):
demonstrating the wins anddemonstrating a value to change
to your executives because theydo have competing priorities.
They do have other areas thatthey need to focus on.
And so I think that if you startlosing that transformational
leadership, it becomes a verymuch an uphill battle to get you
through to this.
I would say that's the singlemost difficult thing.
Rhoan Morgan (33:15):
I absolutely agree with that.
I think that the other work isthat there are models,
methodologies, processes that wecan go through and be really,
really successful, but if youdon't have the buy-in at the
(33:35):
leadership level, that's goingto be really tough.
And I think what's reallycritical is to be very
empathetic to what your internalcustomers are going through as
well.
And what's their experience?
As you're designing the customerexperience and the trunk is
(33:58):
marketing transformation, alsothinking about the internal
customers, thinking about theexecutives, thinking about your
sales teams, thinking about thedifferent teams within the sales
organization, but with theexecutives there are times when
we're working with a company andthey're, they're set on one
path, but there's a newopportunity.
(34:20):
Or there is a shift in themarket and they have to
completely pivot into anotherway of operating or make massive
changes.
Frankly, that's what we'reseeing a lot right now.
That's happened to a lot ofcompanies over the last couple
of months and is likely tocontinue.
(34:40):
And we have to really beempathetic, I think because
they're also answering to theboard and other stakeholders and
shareholders, and they're alsolooking at it from a very, very
different lens.
And so I think patience andunderstanding.
So I totally agree.
You always have to bedemonstrating the value and the
wins.
So bringing that out in frontconstantly, but then also
looking at it from (35:04):
okay, what matters right now to the CEO?
Because us marketers, we wouldjust love to transform every
business we touch into a revenuemarketing organization, and
we've got that roadmap and we'reready to go.
And it can be very exciting.
(35:26):
I just wonder sometimes if, asmarketers, we're so excited
about the opportunity that mightbecome a little impatient as
we're trying to get this going.
Shannon Dougall (35:45):
I agree.
I can see that.
I know I've been there.
I've been there:"if you juststay committed, we could have
this done in no time!" But it'snot like that.
We do have to be patient.
Rhoan Morgan (35:58):
It does take patience.
And then, also, when some of theclients that we work with are
international, you're changingcompanies that are on different
continents, that have differentcultures, different languages,
even sometimes different ways ofoperating if they're in another
(36:20):
business unit or a subsidiary.
It can become so tremendouslycomplex that it's important to,
as you were talking about at thebeginning, get real, write it
down, put it on paper, getreally clear.
Because having that plan iswhat's going to help you be
(36:42):
successful.
I think having something earlydays will also enable you to be
very agile.
You're very plugged into themarketing space in terms of
knowing a lot of people andbeing connected with a lot of
folks.
Have you been talking with folksabout how they're having to
shift what they're doing and howthat's impacting their world
(37:06):
right now?
Shannon Dougall (37:07):
Oh, absolutely.
As the rest of the world isbeing flipped upside down, so is
marketing and it's scary times alittle bit.
Sometimes, when there's adownturn in economy, you can see
that marketing is one of thefirst budgets to be cut because
of fear.
I am seeing that from thatperspective, it's interesting
(37:32):
times.
We need to demonstrate the valueof marketing during times like
this.
Those that continue to build outmarketing efficiencies and
continue to look for innovativeways to go to market without
becoming a cost center to theorganization will be the ones
that come out of thissuccessfully.
But we're in a new world rightnow.
(37:53):
We don't know what's going tohappen.
This is new to every singlebusiness out there, every
industry, every marketer andassumptions we used to have
about marketing are changingnow.
A perfect example is (38:07):
we wanted to run a webinar over the next
couple of weeks.
And usually we would take fourto six weeks to promote our
webinar.
And now we're a week inpromoting it and seeing the same
success.
It's a different world.
And so we are having to adjust,one, to the realities of the
(38:31):
economy and, two, to the newrealities of our customers, how
they are experiencing us in ourbrands and our business and how
we need to approach them.
There's a lot of changehappening and we're having to be
agile and adjust plans.
I had proposed my 2020 marketingplan to the DevFacto team.
And then, like most have, I'msure, shortly after this
(39:00):
pandemic hit, everything that wehad planned has been adjusted or
postponed, and now we're justfinally getting back to setting
the marketing infrastructure inplace.
That'll help us build out ourrevenue marketing platform, but
it took us time to get throughthat.
We needed to show our marketthat we cared and that we were
(39:24):
offering value and not beingopportunistic at all, but that
we're here and we can help forreal.
And that, that took a pivot inwhat our plans were for
marketing and our contentstrategy, and it was pretty
amazing to see.
Agility is key when you'retrying to do a complete
(39:47):
marketing transformation.
You do need to be agile forsure.
Rhoan Morgan (39:50):
We're going to wrap up here in just a couple of
minutes.
I would love it if you couldtell us about some of the
technologies you use.
You've been in this space for along time, as we've talked
about, we both have.
In addition to marketingautomation, I would love it if
you could walk us through orpaint the picture of what else
(40:12):
you're using within yourmarketing stack that really
helps an organization move intobeing that revenue marketing
company.
Shannon Dougall (40:21):
Yeah, absolutely.
So we talked about marketingautomation.
If you're looking at thefoundational tech stack, I would
say that you need to have a CRMand CRM that is actively used by
the sales department, and youwould have to integrate your
(40:41):
marketing automation platform,two-way communication between
the CRM and the marketingautomation platform.
You do have to use one source oftruth, which, in my opinion, is
the CRM.
We want to make sure you'remeasuring all metrics from the
same data, so use your CRM forthat, use the marketing
(41:03):
automation platform.
And then I think that there'sanother core layer, which is the
content experience platform,which is maybe new to some
people.
It's been around in my world forquite some time.
But it is key.
I think those are the threefoundational pieces that you
need to have.
And from there now, I've been intwo worlds.
(41:25):
I've been in the world where I'mscrambling to try to convince an
organization that we do need amarketing automation platform.
Right now, we are implementing amarketing automation platform at
DevFacto.
The next stage I want to do isimplement that content
experience platform.
And then what I would suggestfor organizations, because, like
(41:49):
I said, I've been on the otherside as well, where we've had
200 elements of our martechstack and we didn't even use
half of them.
How I like to run my martechstack is, once you've mapped out
your buyer journey, you start tolook for areas of opportunity,
or you start to look for gaps inthe buyer journey.
(42:11):
And you have to determine if youcan fill those gaps using
technology, or if it's a processchange or whatever the case is.
You don't want to just be buyingmartech for the sake of buying
martech.
Now, I was talking about dataearlier.
If you need to get deepermetrics and business
intelligence and dive deeperinto the analytics and you can't
(42:32):
get that data between your CRM,your marketing automation
platform, and your contentexperience platform, then yes,
you might have to turn tosomething like a power BI or a
Looker or Tableau, or you arerunning a community or you have
customer advocacy as part ofyour program.
You might have to look for aplatform that would support
that, but I think it needs to bemapped out to your particular
(42:55):
customer experience and yourneeds internally.
It's interesting because, like Isaid, I have used many, many
marketing technologies and havefound that most are
exceptionally valuable.
We had a lead routing issue nottoo long ago.
And we found that we needed toadopt something in order to make
(43:19):
it work.
And so we adopted a companycalled LeanData to help us
remove the manual process ofassigning leads to our sales
reps.
And it made sense for us, and itwas a valued asset.
Every six months, we would do amartech audit to make sure that
we were actually using thetechnologies the way we should.
(43:40):
And we wanted to understand ifour people needed a further
education on the tool in orderto get the benefits out of it.
I think that there's afoundational element.
I think every smart marketingorganization has the CRM with
the marketing automationplatform that's integrated into
your CMS and you have a contentexperience platform outside of
(44:00):
that.
I think you need to find yourunique needs and determine what
those are in terms of yourmarketing maturity, what your
customer experience looks like,and then identify areas for, for
growth and for filling any gapsthat you might have.
Rhoan Morgan (44:20):
And layering into that, making sure that the CRM
is actually used.
I'll never forget.
I was at a client, that had tohave been eight years ago.
I mean, it was quite awhile ago.
We were at their sales kickoff.
And one of the things that wewere wondering about was really
how used was their CRM.
(44:41):
So we were in this very big roomwith probably 75 account
executives traveled in fromacross the U S and the VP of
sales asked if you use the CRMevery day, stand up.
One person—one person stood up.
(45:03):
And it was really telling, butwe knew that it was going to be
a pretty low number.
Is there additional training, isthere more that we can do to
make it easier?
Are there processes that can beput in place or other
technologies that can automatesome of these things?
And sometimes it's just beenimplemented in a really
(45:25):
technical way orover-architected.
Um, but I like your thinking interms of content experience
platform as well.
Definitely an importantfoundation.
This has been really fantasticconversation.
I hope that our listeners willhave learned quite a lot.
I think there's so much ineverything that you shared
(45:48):
today.
As we wrap up, we sometimes liketo ask our guest to tell us
either about a rebelinspiration, something that was
from your very early years, itinfluenced your professional
life, that kind of helped youbecome the rebel you are today.
(46:08):
Or is there a hero, is there arebel that you look o ut for
inspiration or motivation thatcould be real or fictional, and
who is that?
So I'd love you to just sharewith us a little bit.
Shannon Dougall (46:21):
Yeah.
I had to say, I think I wasn'tmuch of a rebel as a teenager.
My parents raised me to staywithin the lines and I did.
I didn't become a rebel tilllater, so I don't have any
exciting, rebellious teenagestories to share, but I do have
a rebel hero that I mostrecently become familiar with,
(46:44):
as his role is the globalinnovation evangelist at
Salesforce.
And it's Brian Solis.
Now, he's not a marketer per se.
He calls himself a digitalanthropologist and futurist.
And I, first of all, love thosetitles, but what he does is he
focuses on the research andthought leadership that explores
all the things that I find superfascinating, like digital
(47:07):
transformation or innovation anddisruption or customer
experience.
And he's looking into thecognitive enterprise, and I'm
fascinated with cognitivemarketing.
So he, to me is a complete rebelhero.
Brian Solis.
He's amazing.
I think everybody should checkhim out.
I actually really like hisperspectives right now on what
our new world's going to looklike: the"novel economy." He's
(47:32):
definitely my hero right now.
And I've got many heroes, buthe's the one who stands out
right now.
Rhoan Morgan (47:37):
Oh, that's fantastic.
I love it.
And by the way, for ourlisteners, Brian's last name is
spelled S-O-L-I-S.
Definitely do check out what heis up to.
I agree, lots of very, veryinteresting reading and learning
there.
Well, Shannon, I am so glad thatyou were able to join us on the
show.
Thank you so much for taking thetime.
(47:59):
It was really an absolutepleasure to hear your story, to
learn about your thinking, andto really talk about how to
transform a company into a realrevenue marketing organization.
Tell me what is the best way forour listeners to reach you if
they have any questions?
Shannon Dougall (48:15):
I think LinkedIn is probably the best.
I'm on there almost all day.
Connect with me on LinkedIn.
That would be the best.
Rhoan Morgan (48:22):
Fantastic.
Good.
And for everybody that'slistening, Shannon's first name
is spelled with two" n's." Well,and then the third at the end.
And Dougall is D-O-U-G-A-L-L, asyou can see on our website or on
the show notes, but I hope youguys can connect with her.
Thanks again, Shannon.
And I'm looking forward to beingable to stay in touch.
(48:44):
Thank you so much.
Big thank you to our listenersfor tuning into Revenue Rebels.
Remember, you can get our shownotes, links, and other content
related to today's topic atdemandlab.com slash revenue
rebels.
While you're there, let us knowif there's a leader you want to
hear from or a topic you'd liketo hear more about on this show.
(49:05):
I'm your host Rhoan Morgan, andyou can find me on Twitter at
Rhoan Morgan.
It's R-H-O-A-N Morgan.
And of course, look us up onLinkedIn and look up DemandLab
or search for R-H-O-A-N Morgan.
And finally, only if you thinkwe've earned it, please head
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(49:28):
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Until next time, Rebels.
Thank you.
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