June 3, 2025 • 46 mins
The world of product marketing is fascinating. Andy Lapteff, Senior Product Marketing Manager at Nokia and host of the Art of Network Engineering podcast joins us to dive in. Andy shares his journey from traditional network engineering to product marketing, revealing the crucial differences between what makes technical marketing and product marketing tick. We dive deep into the psychology of marketing, the power of storytelling in technical sales, and how companies like Apple have mastered the art of connecting with customers emotionally rather than just listing features. Andy also discusses Nokia's innovative approach to open source projects like Container Lab, the challenges of communicating complex technical solutions to different audiences (from network engineers to C-suite executives), and practical advice for technical professionals interested in transitioning to marketing roles. This episode is packed with valuable insights about bridging the gap between technical excellence and market success.
Show Links
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andylapteff/
- Twitter: https://x.com/andylapteff
- Website: https://www.permitipandyandy.com/
- Podcast: https://artofnetworkengineering.com/
- Container Lab: https://containerlab.dev/
- Nokia: https://www.nokia.com/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Andy (00:00):
my job, the way I see it, is to communicate the unique,
like the USP, the unique sellingproposition, the unique value,
the unique things that oursolutions do that the other 346
automation solutions don't do.
And really for me, as a networkoperator, what pain are you in
that this solution solves?
(00:20):
And if we can tie that to anarrative or a story?
Because if you just throw stuffat people, hey, here's a thing
and it does this and it's builton this and isn't this cool and
like.
Okay, like 7% of the nerds aregoing to get excited about
Kubernetes and Linux and Hi outthere, I'm William.
William (00:50):
I'm your friendly neighborhood tech host.
I'm ready to try to solve yourproblems, but with me with me is
my co-host, yvonne Sharp, whohas been trained on
approximately 500 trillionpackets of network data.
Her response latency isimpressively low, I must say.
(01:11):
But unlike your favorite AIthat you might use out there, we
actually know when we're makingthings up.
At least we try to think we do.
But how are you doing today,yvonne?
How's Kentucky?
Eyvonne (01:21):
I'm good, I'm good, things are good in my world.
Are you doing today, yvonne?
How's Kentucky?
I'm good, I'm good, things are.
Things are good in my world.
Always busy, always stuff goingon.
Summer's creeping in, and sowe're already filling up the
summer schedule with kidsactivities, but we've already
lost an entire month this summerso, and it's the beginning of
May, so yeah, so does that meanthe rain's gonna stop like
(01:41):
anytime soon?
William (01:43):
because I'm over it.
Eyvonne (01:45):
We have had a lot of rain.
But I will say, a few days agoI was like you know, we just
sowed some grass, we could usesome rain.
But now we've gotten some rainand of course it rained all
Derby weekend, so the track wassloppy.
If you don't follow horseracing, when it rains and
there's a lot of mud, the trackis sloppy and so now, yeah, but
(02:08):
it's green, so I'm notcomplaining like there's grass
and there are leaves in thetrees and I drive around and I
go yeah it's like a new shade ofgreen.
William (02:16):
I've never seen it's like a very deep I've been
rained on for like forever.
Green goodbye.
Eyvonne (02:22):
Goodbye seasonal depression.
Hello green trees, that's yeah.
William (02:27):
So on the show we talk about a ton of different
technology-related things.
You know we get into the bitsand the bytes sometimes.
Sometimes it's theinfrastructure, sometimes it's
the AIs.
But what about the bridgebetween the technology and the
people who buy it and championit or use it?
So joining us today is our goodfriend and product marketer
(02:51):
extraordinaire and host of theArt of Network Engineering
podcast, which anybody tuning inhas probably heard or listened
to it in the past.
And hello Andy, how's lifegoing for you?
Andy (03:07):
Hi William, Hi Yvonne, Thanks for having having me.
It's my first time on the cloudgamut podcast.
Eyvonne (03:10):
Yay, really that doesn't seem so, and yvonne is
here.
Yes, I try to always be here Iknow and and just for the record
, if I'm not, it has nothing todo with the guest.
Andy (03:28):
Well, my imposter syndrome has been quelled because Yvonne
is here for me and I might havebeen worried that is Yvonne
going to be here.
Eyvonne (03:36):
My 15 year old frequently says that's a you
problem mom.
So that's the voice in my headthat's a you problem mom.
William (03:46):
Okay got it.
It's always a classic I love it.
Andy (03:50):
It's it's raining here, but the pool's open and I'm
really looking forward to uh, tothe summer for sure I, so I
briefly saw one of your posts.
William (03:58):
It was like, uh, you're talking about a backyard
project and it was like apicture of your fence or
something I think, oh my god.
Or like the pool and the fenceor something, I think oh my God.
Or like the pool and the fence.
My other school wasn't rightfrom pressure washer.
Andy (04:08):
I spent seven hours pressure washing on Saturday.
I bought a pressure washer.
I bought a huge surface cleaner.
I put the pressure washertogether.
There's no oil in it.
One trip to the store I gethome.
I get that running.
I try to connect big surfacewasher.
They're like those circlethings that spin.
I don't know if you've everseen them.
I needed an adapter.
I didn't have back to the store.
So it was one of those typicalhome projects of you know.
(04:29):
I planned it all out,Everything was going to be great
, Deployment was going to beseamless.
And then I was running aroundall day and my wife was like,
why aren't you done yet?
William (04:38):
So pressure washing is a pain.
It really is.
I have gas-powered most things,especially leaf blower and
stuff like that, but thepressure washer I got is an
electric washer and it's reallyawesome.
I had an electric leaf blower afew years ago and it was just
(04:58):
like okay, I'm going to dividemy yard into chunks of 30
minutes here and 30 minutesthere, because that thing would
just run out of juice.
I bought extra batteries likehave a stack of batteries and I
still can't get through ourproperty, which isn't very big.
Um, so the the electric, umpressure washer has definitely
been a different experience, butwe we didn't actually come to
(05:21):
the, the podcast, to talk aboutyard work as much as, as much as
it excites me I was justwondering if your listeners have
fallen asleep yet hey, on anice summer day there's nothing
like mowing the grass, it'sbeautiful, you know, get a good
sweat in.
But so I guess, kind of just umgoing back to like in this
(05:42):
episode, kind of what I wantedto dig into and something we
haven't dug into before really,is what is product marketing?
What does it mean?
What are the impacts?
How does it compare to othertechnical marketing or developer
advocacy or tech evangelism,stuff like that?
(06:02):
So kind of going through it,just kind of getting your you
know, as a freshly minted nokiaproduct marketing genius, you
know we want to hear it straightfrom, straight from you.
What do you think.
So I guess we could start outlike what, what does product
marketing mean?
Like, how do you define it?
Andy (06:21):
I'll issue the caveat that I've been in this role four
months and it's my first formalproduct marketing role, so take
my answers with that context inmind.
My job, the way I see it, is tocommunicate the unique like the
USP, the unique sellingproposition, the unique value,
the unique things that oursolutions do that the other 346
(06:45):
automation solutions don't do.
And really, for me, as anetwork operator, what pain are
you in that this solution solves?
And if we can tie that to anarrative or a story?
Because if you just throw stuffat people, hey, here's a thing
and it does this and it's builton this and isn't this cool and
like.
Ok, like 7% of the nerds aregoing to get excited about
(07:06):
Kubernetes and Linux andcontainers.
Bless their hearts.
Eyvonne (07:10):
Well, and, by the way, they're the nerds who don't have
access to budget.
William (07:16):
Fair.
Eyvonne (07:16):
Right, like that it's what you know like you've got to
get people excited, but youalso have to get people excited
enough to be willing to spend anorganization's money.
Right, and that's a big part ofthe equation.
Not to turn all corporate here,no, that's a perfect segue.
Andy (07:36):
So there are multiple audiences too.
I'm glad you said that becauseI didn't want to forget that,
and this happens to me in myrole now I most identify with
the network engineer persona.
So in most of the content Icreate and just to circle back
to what would that content be?
Blogs, videos, white papers,data sheets, faqs, sales,
trainings, demos, you name it Ifthere's any content that needs
(08:00):
to be created that can helpcommunicate what we're doing and
the value that needs to becreated that can help
communicate what we're doing andthe value that it would fall
under that bucket.
But there are also multiplewhat they would call personas to
talk to.
So there's the networkengineers, like me.
So that's why I'm like, well,let me lab and let me get this
thing installed and let me showyou the cool things.
And here's the UI and ooh, ittells you when something's about
to break and you click it toauto-remediate it like, isn't
(08:22):
this great?
Because, again, the narrativethat I think good product
marketers are and this is suchan overused term, especially in
tech.
But, like storytellers, I havebeen actively studying
storytelling for a year.
I bought this book by MatthewDix called Storyworthy and
there's an entire Almost likeyou would learn cloud or Network
Plus or whatever Like this is acertification of sorts for
(08:46):
storytelling, with a processthat you can follow and a bunch
of work to do to try to becomebetter at telling a story.
And I think if we can tie whatwe're doing in Vendorland and
product solutions to a narrativebecause this guy, matthew Dix,
that wrote the book he says youknow, think of the last
presentation you went to, thelast PowerPoint someone
(09:07):
presented, or the last speakeryou saw.
Like when you get home an hourand a half later and pull in the
driveway, what do you remember?
If they weren't telling stories, typically you don't remember a
thing.
But if somebody talked about,you know the lunchbox they got
as a kid and how you know theirparents were broke but they
always made sure they had shoesand a lunch, and like you can
pull at heartstrings of people'sexperience, tie those real
(09:27):
stories from your life to what'shappening now and create that
connection with your audience.
So I think that that's whatmakes a really good product
marketer.
That's my gold, that's what I'maiming for Now you have to let
a company allow you to do thatright, because most corporations
want to be plain white breadand stay in the middle and not
(09:49):
get picked off by a predator.
The downside to that is yousound like everybody else and
nobody's going to listen to you.
So if you could tell a story,be unique and make someone feel
something, I think that that'scritical.
I know I'm going on and on, butI didn't want to miss Yvonne's
point about the differentpersonas.
So I talk to network engineerpersonas primarily.
(10:10):
I have to be reminded by peoplelike Yvonne and the folks I
work with.
Well, there are other people inorganizations we have to
communicate with CTOs and peoplewho sign purchase orders and
all those people that aren'tnetwork engineers that have
access to budget to a bondspoint.
So my technical content recentlyI am being pulled back and my
(10:31):
leaders and my team saying likelisten, you're not a technical
marketing engineer, william, youmentioned it earlier.
Like what's the difference?
So we have TMEs who go deeperinto the technologies, who are
in the weeds, who can createcompelling demos right, I feel
they're less story-driven, likehere's the tech, here's the
nerdery man, let's do it, let'shurt your brains and they're
(10:53):
very good at that where, as aproduct marketer, they keep
reeling me in saying listen,this is much more about the
story, the narrative, and if Idon't go as deep on the tech, I
can get much more broad and havemuch more impact at a higher
story level and a narrativelevel.
Then I spent six weeks in thelab fighting it.
(11:13):
Oh, isn't this great.
We found some gaps and we'reupdating documentation and I
made some videos.
But that may or may not be whatthe company is looking for from
me Not so deep, technical,because we have brilliant
technical people who do thatstuff.
So, yvonne, I'm trying to figureout how to talk to the purchase
order people in the C-suite,because what they care about is
different than what I care about.
Right, as a network engineeragain, personas, product
(11:35):
marketing I don't want to becalled every time I'm on call.
I don't want to be working fivemaintenance windows a week,
like when I think back to myproduction experience, like I
got hammered in a meat grinderfor a decade, and that's not
what I want.
So if your solution can give memore nights of uninterrupted
(11:56):
sleep, can give me more holidayswith my family, can give me
soccer games I'm not beingpulled away because something's
broken again If you can deliverto me maybe a reliable solution,
I'm listening, but a CTO, it'sa different message, right.
What do they care about?
William (12:10):
Yeah, you said so many things there that I want to like
just reply to you.
Want to go first of on well,there's a lot um sorry first no,
the no the whole
Eyvonne (12:21):
like what's the, what's the cto interested in?
Right, um, the the cto shouldbe not all of are but should be
interested in how does ourtechnology organization deliver
value to the business?
And some of that, and I thinkin technology we get caught up
(12:43):
in like cost savings, costoptimization.
You know, there's the FinOpsdiscipline and, yeah, we need to
mind our P's and Q's and besure that we are not spending
frivolously and that what we'respending on our infrastructure
is we're getting value for that.
But then the other thing thatyour CTO or CTO, any C-level
(13:14):
leader should be asking isreally about value to the
business.
And so if you can show up andsay, hey, not only is this
technology going to streamlineour operations, but it's going
to allow us to spend X and thendeliver Y, which is a multiple
of that, that's really whenyou've got a winning argument
and and and and you're a winningstory.
Um, but the other thing thatthat I kind of want to comment
(13:38):
comment on as it result, as itrelates to marketing, there's
this great tension that happensespecially when we're talking
about technical products,because your, your technical
builders, your product managers,your SWEs, your, all those
folks they are emotionallyattached to all of the amazing,
(14:01):
deeply cool technical things theproduct does and you want them
to be right, because if they'regoing to build great things,
they need to be emotionallyattached to that.
The thing is, most customersaren't emotionally attached to
those things, and so yourtechnical product people and
(14:23):
you'll end up in fights becausethey'll be like but there are
3,000 gigawatts per teraflop,right, you got to tell them.
There are 3, 3000 gigawatts perteraflop, right, you got to
tell them there are 3000gigawatts per teraflop.
And that's not how you connectwith customers and and the.
The best analogy of this I'veseen is you know that when, when
(14:45):
they went to market with the,the iPod, the, the I, not yet
the iPod, like the, the veryfirst um, you know, media player
from Apple, they didn't talkabout how much storage the
device had.
They said a thousand songs inyour pocket.
Right, they translated into and, and.
So marketing is either how do Isolve a problem for you or how
(15:10):
do I help you reach thisaspirational future that doesn't
yet exist.
Those are the two of thedifferent approaches that you
can take, but you have to do oneof those or you're just spewing
statistics that only a veryniche group of folks are going
(15:32):
to care about.
Now.
I've monologued a bit.
It's your turn, william.
William (15:38):
Let me respond to something you said.
First, apple is like anymarketing team out there.
I mean, I've heard it manytimes actually over the past
five to eight years.
Apple did this.
You look at how simple all of.
Look at Mike.
I think his name was MikeMurray.
I just talked about him,actually in a talk I gave back
(16:01):
at our home base last week.
He was one of Apple'squasi-marketing people in the
80s.
He reported directly to SteveJobs sort of marketing,
quasi-marketing people in the80s that did the.
He reported directly to SteveJobs and he really was like the
first effort in Apple to reallyhumanize the technology and take
like very technical things andjust make them, you know, bring
(16:25):
them down to earth.
And that was at a time wheretechnology wasn't everywhere.
We're looking and reading andthinking all the time.
It, you know, monopolizes ourlife.
You know that was back at adifferent time where it was much
harder to do that and, uh, youknow, apple just does a
fantastic job with it.
But one, one thing I wanted tosay like you've sort of uh went
(16:47):
back and forth on this line,andy, of technical and
non-technical, and just oneobservation I've made is, in a
very early stage, startup, youmight not have these defined
roles.
It's kind of like you're goingto wear many different hats.
So your product marketingperson or even if they're called
(17:07):
that, is probably going to betechnical.
They're going to be logginginto the product, they're going
to be taking screenshots,they're going to be doing
mock-ups, they're going to bebuilding demos, they're going to
be doing all the things.
But as you grow and as youscale and you become a bigger
company that's like you weresaying that's kind of like what
I guess technical marketing issupposed to be doing.
(17:28):
They're from like the productoutwards.
They're like the first stab atlike making really good
collateral.
You know that's going to becustomer facing perhaps, or
maybe even managing the wholeproducts documentation.
You know something like thatmaybe.
And that's one thing I realizedum, the last startup I worked
for is earlier on.
(17:50):
I was helping with like productmarketing stuff and it was very
technical because our productpeople were off building amazing
things and building goodcollateral.
Let's face it, it takes time.
You know writing takes timeWell, not as much time lately
with ChatGPT, but it's all timeconsuming.
If you want beautiful thingsfor customers and prospects to
(18:14):
consume, it takes time.
So you can either buy, leaseout an agency or you can build
that collateral yourself.
But as a company gets bigger,you're going to have product
marketing.
I guess and I want to get yourtake on this Is there a role
really to find that productmarketing fit to take these
beautiful things that theseproduct folks have built, that
(18:36):
they're emotionally attached to,and provide that buffer, or be
in that middle area and say, hey, this is great, but this is how
it can be received out to themarket.
And then I don't know if you'veever done like, if you have to
do like analyst calls or any ofthat type of marketing, or if
you're just collateral specific,but a lot of times product
(18:57):
marketers on that side of thefence will do like marketing.
You know positioning categoriesand talk to analysts to get
feedback as well.
But, yeah, any, any thoughts.
Andy (19:08):
Yeah, my colleague, Anthony, just spent six months
working with Gartner and we got,you know, on the in one of the
quadrants, I think, thevisionary or whatever.
So we got a guy for that,fortunately and it's not me, but
it was.
It was a ton of work.
I wanted to.
I love that Yvonne brought upApple.
I I think of Apple almost everyday in my job.
(19:29):
I think they're the goldstandard what they've done
around storytelling and they tapinto emotions and beliefs, not
features.
So Simon Sinek he's one of myfavorites, right, and I'm
actually going to read itbecause I'll screw it up if I
don't.
(19:49):
But it was Start With, wasstart with why.
It was his whole like Ted talkon on start with why and the
reason Apple was so successfulin his view.
So so here's because Applestarts with why they really tap
into your, to your emotions andyour beliefs and you're like, oh
yeah, and then you see yourselfin that narrative.
So he says Apple sayseverything we do, we believe in
(20:11):
challenging the status quo, webelieve in thinking differently.
That's the why, Right, theystart with why not what?
Like hey, we built a thing, youshould buy it.
Like Yvonne said, why we're nottalking about the storage on
the device.
You can have a thousand songs inyour pocket.
Which of those two sentencesmake you feel something?
Now it's hard because all theseyears later, all the music is
(20:32):
at our fingertips.
But back then I had a stack ofvinyl yes, I'm that old and then
I had a bunch of CDs that Iused to have to put in right,
and when I would move I wouldhave to move all of that crap
with me and it takes up spaceand you need cabinets and things
to.
I'm a music person, so I had alot of music.
And then when they come outwith a thing like a thousand
(20:54):
songs in your pocket, I feltsomething.
It hit me in the chest.
I'm like whoa, they didn't saywe built this thing with this
processor and this, you know,RAM and this battery life and a
thousand gigs of memory.
That means nothing to me.
A thousand songs in my pocket,holy crap.
So to finish the Simon Sinekthing, everything we do, we
believe in thinking differently.
The how is?
The way we challenge the statusquo is by making our products
(21:15):
beautifully designed, simple touse and user-friendly.
And then they hit you with thewhat, which most people start
with.
We just happen to make greatcomputers, you want to buy one.
(21:50):
So, because they flip, theystart with why not what?
So for me, in my role, if I saidwe have a network automation
platform and we think we'regoing to make your life easier
because of blah, blah, blah, sototally, and none of them have
solved our problem, we're stillwaiting for the one solution to
come along that's simple enoughand doesn't burn the whole world
down quickly.
Again, this is networkautomation for our model.
There's a lot of conversationaround this that we're not
having now, but there are a lotof.
Again, this is networkautomation for a model.
There's a lot of conversationaround this that we're not
having now, but there are a lotof tools and people are still
(22:10):
waiting, waiting for one.
But in my mind, where I am,we've done something different
and compelling, and what I wantto do is almost follow the apple
playbook.
Now, I don't know if they'regoing to let me, but we really
need to hit people.
Michael say win the hearts andminds of people.
We got to hit them in the heart.
(22:30):
We got to hit them with athousand songs in your pocket,
because if we're coming out witha 350 second network automation
tool, nobody's going to listen,Nobody's going to care, but if
we can give you again, I don'twant to do a product pitch here,
but I think the story and thenarrative is very important.
I don't think I answered yourquestion, William, that you
asked, but I got really excitedwhen Yvonne brought up Apple,
(22:52):
because I think they're the goldstandard and I think it's what
we should all be aiming for inproduct marketing and most
technical brands I don't thinkdo it well or even do it average
.
Nike doesn't sell sneakers.
They're not, you know, just doit right or like.
Again, this gets into likeadvertising and things like that
(23:12):
.
But if you can make people feelsomething like, oh wow, if I
get Jordans, I can fly likeJordan no, you're not going to,
but they're not selling thefeature.
We use this advanced rubberwhich gives you another inch of
lift and it's really good foryour ankles.
Like nobody cares.
It's advanced rubber whichgives you another inch of lift
and it's really good for yourankles.
Eyvonne (23:27):
Like nobody cares it's a sneaker, but if you can make
them feel something they don'tdo, all that right.
Andy (23:30):
It's not that they don't do all that but they're not
selling features right.
Eyvonne (23:33):
There's something else in how they show up in the world
and and it's that.
It's that aspirational thing Iwas talking about earlier.
Um, there's somebody that uhcomes across, my social, roy
Sutherland, and I don't know ifany of you out there are
familiar with him, but he talksa lot about the psychology of
product and of sales and ofmarketing and he he uses an
(23:57):
example about it's.
Really he talks a lot aboutcustomer satisfaction, things
like that.
He talks about folks waitingfor the train.
He says if you wait for a train, folks may be willing to wait
seven minutes for a train.
If there's a timer they'recounting down, show them when
the next train is coming.
But if they wait four minutesfor a train with no countdown
(24:20):
timer, there's a psychologicaldifference to that experience.
Another example that he's usedis the speed of elevators.
There was this entireengineering effort that went
into how do we make elevatorsfaster?
People don't like waiting, butwhat they discovered is when you
put mirrors in elevators andyou play music in them, the ride
is more enjoyable, and so itreduces the need for the
(24:43):
engineering effort.
Right, and so as technicalpeople, we're often quick to
discount the psychological sideof what it is to use an
experience or a product, and Ifind those things fascinating
have moved me in towardmanagement because ultimately,
(25:05):
work is done by people andpeople are unique and weird and
complex and they're and it's notalways a straight line to human
behavior.
And I think often we justcompletely ignore and discount
that stuff and we go at it likewell, rationally, this is better
and that would be great if youwere selling to a robot, but
(25:26):
you're selling to a person whodoesn't make decisions
rationally and we have to takethat into account as we're
frankly moving through the world, not just trying to pitch
technology.
William (25:40):
Yeah, totally agree with that.
There's so much.
I kind of want to keep theconversation moving, though, so
actually one of the questions.
I actually wrote down that.
I wanted to remember that.
I just think would beinteresting to hear your take on
, andy, is what are the actual?
(26:02):
Because in technology there'sdifferent roles that are fitting
to different types of peopleLike I know many good many very
amazing engineers that don'tever want to talk to a person
the rest of their life.
Nor should they If they're,like, locked in their house.
They're good as long as theyhave their computer and they can
write code.
But then you have some folksthat can't sit down and work on
(26:27):
a powerpoint for longer than 20minutes without talking to a
person.
Like these are things I mean.
This is just how we you knowhumans have different qualities
and what.
What do you think like as faras, like quality wise, would
make a good product marketer?
Are there any underrated softskills that matter maybe more
(26:48):
than people realize?
What does a day in the lifealso look like for Andy?
How does that look?
Andy (27:00):
I think what makes a great product marketer and again,
this is why one of the reasons Ilove Yvonne so much is she hit
on the psychology.
You need a laser focus on youraudience and you have to have so
much empathy that you're havingtheir experience and then
determining how to speak to themin a way that resonates, that's
(27:21):
compelling, that will get theirattention, that will bring them
in the funnel.
Marketing supports sales.
So what makes a great productmarketer?
I think was in there somewhere.
I think I know a lot ofengineers and I've had them on
my different shows.
They shouldn't talk tocustomers, right, they can't.
(27:44):
I have, and I used to listen toHoward Stern and he always he
said he always had this you know, whatever you think of this guy
, right, Like he's a much betterinterviewer today than 40 years
ago when he was doingridiculous stuff.
But he said he's always hadthis kind of meter in his head
of when his audience is tuningout and he knows when it gets
uninteresting.
And I feel like I have a littlebit of that and sometimes I'll
(28:06):
have an engineer on a show andI'm like, oh my God, like this
person has no idea that nobodycares, and they're going on and
on, and so you kind of need toconstantly be tuned in to the
people receiving your message onthe other side and like, is
this compelling, Is thisengaging?
Do they care?
Because, again, throwing afeature list at them or a data
sheet, it's good for some people, not all.
(28:32):
I think.
You asked me what a day in thelife looks like.
So it's kind of like networkingand tech.
Every day is kind of different,which I think is why I love
tech.
You never know what's going tocome day to day.
Uh, you know, I I started out,I wrote a blog.
I wrote a blog that got me thisjob.
It was kind of like a tryout.
I covered I've covered them atNFD and I wrote a blog about it
(28:54):
through the NFD agreement thingand I was told like this is your
audition, so you know, and, andthey liked it, which was great
and it helped kind of get methis position.
A few months later, I wroteanother blog Again not tooting
my own horn, but I think it'sone of the best performing blog
(29:15):
pieces they've had, at least inthe data center vertical.
So what was my day like?
It started out writing goodblogs.
Then I kind of came up withlike a six-month plan.
Like what can I do?
So I'm like I want to do ashort form video series, because
I love short form video.
We're all doom scrollinglooking at the 30 or 60 second
videos.
You and I do it with thepodcast.
(29:35):
We break it up into short formand people can, but again it
brings people in the quoteunquote funnel.
If you can get 15 seconds ofattention from someone oh who is
this?
William and Yvonne huh and thenmaybe they'll follow you and
maybe watch the show longer.
So I have been working on short.
I started out with blogs, I'mworking on short form video.
(29:55):
Now I have a stealth podcastthat I'm not supposed to or
allowed to talk about, but kindof a data center thought
leadership.
Where I work, there's a ton ofsmart people, much like you guys
.
The places we work, there'sreally smart people and I would
like to highlight all the coolstuff Not product, Never, ever,
(30:17):
ever going to mention hey, youshould buy this thing because
we're making it.
Holy crap, Look what thesepeople are doing.
Bell Labs created frickingtransistors.
Let's talk to one of them.
This is amazing, Whoa.
So that's kind of a thing.
But blogs, video I write a lot.
There's conferences William,I'm hoping to see you at Aldicon
(30:40):
in Denver, so there'll be alittle bit of evangelizing.
But, just like when I was inproduction, every day is kind of
different.
There's a plan, there's astrategy.
There's a plan.
Nobody knows Nokia is in datacenter Full stop, Unless you're
in service provider or you'rerunning mission critical
networks.
So I think the plan is like howcan we communicate out to the
(31:05):
world that we're not the phonecompany, which is what everybody
thinks, and what are we doing?
That's so compelling.
What have we been doing for 20years of mission critical that
can now line?
You know, do you think thatreliability would be well
(31:28):
applied in your data center?
Maybe right?
So the plan is to get the wordout, and there are a hundred
different ways to do that andthere's limited time.
So I haven't done my podcastbecause there's only so much
time.
Like, right now I'm doingrelease marketing, I have to get
a data sheet out and a new FAQ,and we got to get sales
trainings Some of it's internaltoo.
We have to help our salespeopleunderstand the value so that
they can talk to customers whenthey go out.
(31:50):
So it's a terrible answer toyour question.
Every day is different and,again, I'm new to the role, so
I'm kind of learning as I go andthey're plugging me in where
they think I can bring value.
I don't know if that's a greatanswer.
William (32:02):
No, it makes a lot of sense.
I mean, that's been kind of myI'd say my experience as well.
Every day is very different.
Andy (32:08):
I mean, you were an evangelist in your last role,
right Like there's a.
I don't want to say that's a's.
It's not a product marketingjob, but you're out in the
public telling people why theyshould care right, creating
awareness it's pretty.
William (32:23):
There's a little bit of overlap between I mean,
honestly, I think there's alittle overlap between tech
evangelism, product marketingand tech technical marketing.
Yep, especially the smallercompany that you, you work at.
But yeah, technical evangelismis more like starting at the
community and starting at thetechnology and not so much the
vendor, and just kind of reverseengineering your way back to
(32:45):
the product.
I wouldn't be able to sellsomething a day in my life, I'd
be a terrible salesperson.
But if you can come in withsome, just good, you know, meet
the individual where they're atand, you know, become some sort
of trusted something and then ifit, you know, ends up working
(33:09):
its way back to your product andyou make a sale, then awesome,
which that happened for me manytimes.
I didn't go in, I don't getpaid on commission, but I went
in and just had conversations,good conversations, and built
relationships.
And you know, as it were, whenyou build relationships with
people and you have goodconversations, you're gonna,
(33:30):
you're trending in the rightdirection, you're not going
backwards.
So yeah, what, what do you?
So one thing I wanted to getinto, I just wanted to get your
take on is like nokia um is acompany, is incubated.
I guess incubated I don't knowwhat the right word is for this
but so roman and folks havebuilt container lab and it's.
(33:53):
I'd have to go back, I actuallydon't remember.
I think it's a bsSD license ormaybe it's Apache, I can't
remember but it's a prettypermissive license.
It's essentially open source.
Paying for its employees to dothings has to be tied to like
(34:23):
some sort of revenue generatingexercise or like leads coming in
or pipeline specific stuff.
But every once in a while youhave a gym kind of like
container lab, which I use, likeit's an incredible, incredible
tool and it's got so muchtraction right now.
Um, but how, what you viewthose types of exercises where
maybe it's kind of a risk?
(34:43):
Because, again, when you have aconversation at Nokia with your
teams, or I have a conversationat Itential or Yvonne has a
conversation at Google, you'repaying for everybody to be on
that call to Google.
You're paying for everybody tobe on that call.
You have salaries to pay.
You have employees that couldbe doing other things.
(35:05):
How do you view that sort ofmarketing style exercise?
Andy (35:07):
if you would even call it that.
I think it's a brilliantstrategy.
I don't know how well thoughtout it was that that happened
well before I ever came on.
It's completely open source.
Every time I turn around,somebody else I know is using it
, loves it.
I've came on.
It's completely open source.
Every time I turn around,somebody else I know is using it
, loves it.
I've used it.
I think like networking vendors.
Well, here's, I guess, myperception, my bias, whatever I
(35:30):
feel like my experience withnetworking vendors is they're
trying to walk us in, squeezemoney.
It's never really felt like agreat relationship.
So when I see vendors and Nokiais not the only one but when I
see vendors doing things thatcontribute to the networking
(35:51):
community at large, doing opensource projects like Container
Lab as your example, it justsays a lot to me about the
culture, about how the companysees the world, and because,
you're right, resources werespent and time, and I mean
Roman's brilliant and he's stillworking on it.
Right, he's also responsiblefor other products, but he's
(36:13):
working on an open source, and Idon't have the list in front of
me, but they've worked on a lotof different open source
products, Like when I wanted tolearn their operating system.
Sr Linux Container Lab made thatso easy.
That was my introduction toContainer Lab.
I had never run a container.
I didn't know what ContainerLab did, and it did some virtual
wiring for me and then it gaveme a Yang.
(36:33):
What the hell was it Like?
It gave me a, a file with sixlines, and I loaded it up and I
hit a command in Linux and poof,it was all running and I'm in
the CLI.
And then I'm like, well, whatthe hell is this?
But I can grab an open AI key,put it in and then talk to it in
plain language and it talked methrough how to configure it.
For me, this is a differentexperience than I've had at
(36:55):
other unnamed vendors when I'mtrying to learn their operating
system or their syntax or labtheir things.
It was just so easy, so wellthought out and it gives me a
warm and fuzzy feeling when acompany who exists to extract,
generate profit and makeshareholders happy in a never
(37:15):
ending game of, you know,endless returns that's how it's
our economy works right.
For them to spend time, moneyand resources on something open
source, I think says a lot aboutabout how they see the world.
William, you and I have had thisconversation.
Like I don't really understandthe open source world.
I don't understand why peoplewould spend their time doing
(37:36):
something for free when theycould charge for it, and that's
probably a whole separateconversation.
But I agree with everythingyou're saying and I think it's
really cool.
I don't.
At another place I worked.
I don't recall us doing stufflike that, so it's just one more
feather in the cap of like huh,this place is like really like
(37:59):
they're doing smart things andit's not all about dollars.
Like here's a product we made,you should go buy it.
Like no, here's this cool freething, Isn't this cool?
You can spin up a containerizedNAS.
You can use container lab.
It'll do the virtual wiring foryou.
It'll give you the interfaceyou're in in a second.
A second like how are you usingcontainer lab?
Are you using it for a ton?
William (38:20):
yeah, yeah.
So one of the free productsthat we build I basically built
like I dockerized it.
It's on docker hub and I injectit into container lab
topologies for testing andversioning.
So I do a lot of um testing.
I put it all on github too,just for the heck of it, because
free stuff and hey, I mean ifyou can provide some sort of
(38:42):
ability for someone to get theirhook in with automation and
just have value out of it, evenif you can change their mind,
that automation is important andanybody can do it, as it were,
don't be scared, jump in and tryit.
You know the thousands andthousands of dollars of lab gear
you know isn't holding you backanymore, like it did for me
(39:03):
when I jumped into this spaceway, way back.
Like I guess I'd kind of turnthis dark a little bit and say,
look, there's no excuses, getout of your chair and go do it
because it doesn't cost youanything.
It just costs you time.
The technology's there andanybody can learn it.
We have to be good stewards ofthat technology by when it makes
(39:27):
sense.
I'm not saying go and post yourcompany's IP on the internet or
something stupid, but if youhave a free product and you have
a free tooling ecosystem.
Go and build cool things andshare it with people you know
it's.
That's the way forward, that'show we all get better.
But yeah, that's just my takelook at linux.
Andy (39:47):
You taught me about linux, torbold and linux and how linux
changed the world, and that wasall open source.
Again, I don't.
As a capitalist who wants abigger house, a bigger pool pool
and a faster car, I have a hardtime personally being like
let's do all this stuff for free.
I wanted to ask you, before wewrap up, what's the biggest
feature?
So I'm still learning thesethings and I'm not a Container
Lab expert.
Why are you using Container Lab?
(40:09):
Is it because it allows you todo lab as code?
It does the virtual wiringbetween containers.
Is that the big value there?
William (40:19):
Yeah, and I think some of the other solution.
I think the.
I like the idea.
So the stuff that I've builtwith container lab, with our
product, it's all ephemeral soyou basically, as long as you
have container lab or dockerinstalled, you can run all of it
.
It actually pulls the code downfrom a github repo through an
import thing that we do.
It tees everything up.
The lab files are already inthe Git repo, everything's there
(40:39):
.
All you have to do is type in acommand to run them and you
will back up configuration fromnetwork devices or configure BGP
.
It makes it easy.
I think the way that thisevolved is after physical
hardware, we all set up ES, esxiand just used ovas for
(41:01):
different network images maybe,or you know, qcal2s, whatever,
ran them directly on thehypervisor and then connected to
things and that isn't the mostresource friendly thing.
But the vendors that I thinkvendors like nokia, vendors like
Arista is another really goodone where they've actually built
purpose-based containerizedimages.
(41:22):
So you don't have to go throughsome wild conversion process
and do like all these specialthings.
It's not walled by licensingLike there's.
You know, there's a good,diligent, free tier with these
things Like unless you wantscale and capacity, obviously,
that you're going to have to payfor.
But you can do and test a lotof things out of the box and
(41:44):
it's just ephemeral, so I canhave this thing in code and then
rerun it when I need it, andthere's no going back and just
trying to remember what in theworld I was doing.
So it's just very ephemeral,it's resource friendly and
everything's you know can betreated as code.
I think that's the huge bit.
And they just released a RESTAPI, which is awesome.
(42:05):
I've imported the schema andI'm playing around with it a
little bit, but it's that's.
That was the one feature that Iwas hoping.
I mean, I think everybody washoping that they would do that
on the container lab side wasyou, was you know, get an API
out there?
And they've hit it.
I mean I really can't think ofmany more things they could
actually do with Container Labto make it easier or better at
(42:28):
this point, because they evenhave the topology editor, which
is like really cool, you canimport your own logos and stuff.
It's pretty wild.
But yeah, I think we werecoming up at the top of the hour
.
Andy (42:39):
but yeah, I want to say one more thing before we end,
and cause I realized that it'sthe same advice I give people
trying to get into networking.
Um, if you like to communicate.
So I tell people, like how canI get into networking?
It's so hard, right?
Uh, do some con like do thetechnical study, get the certs,
go to lab or free lab, whateverand try to communicate what
(43:01):
you're learning.
Right, show people yourcommunication skills, start a
blog, do videos, whatever.
Now there's TikTok, do whateverthat is.
But it's very similar to thistype of role too.
When I interviewed, I had a bodyof work that they could see.
I like to communicate.
I mean, I used to poo-poo mydegree.
I have a bachelor incommunication and I've joked
with all you technical peoplebecause you know, oh, it was,
(43:22):
you know it was the easiestmajor I could find at the time.
Well, as it turns out, I loveto communicate.
I was writing poetry at six,right, like I really like
communicating.
It's one of my strengths.
I love people, I love you knowall of it.
And and if you like tocommunicate with people and
you're technical, this is thekind of role that could really
again, this is the mostsatisfied.
(43:45):
It's the wrong word, but themost fulfilling role I've had in
tech in the 20 years I've beenin tech, and it's because it's
aligning with my strengths.
It's as technical as I want itto be.
I get to communicate, I get tocreate all this cool content and
if you're a technical personwho likes to communicate and
create content, this could bethe type of role you could look
(44:05):
at.
At a vendor, and it doesn't hurtthat it pays, usually more than
production, getting your headpounded into the change window,
change management world right, Imean, you have to pay your dues
.
But if you're out there doingthe job and you like to
communicate and you're thinkingabout vendor roles or maybe
you're not, maybe this is anintroduction.
It's a really cool.
I get to come on and talk tocool people like you.
All the time I've been onpacket pushers, like, come on,
(44:27):
it got me on packet pushers.
Hello, that's awesome.
William (44:30):
That's a dream, right?
Yeah, it's good advice, greatadvice.
Yeah, I know your strengths,know what the job role entails,
find the right match and, yeah,get out of.
I mean, some people like thatproduction craziness.
I I never.
I liked it at first, I liked itfor a few years and then it
started getting old pretty quick.
But, yeah, thank you, I mean,we're at the top of the hour.
(44:51):
I think both of you have hardstops.
I think I do too, um, thetrifecta of hard stops.
But, yeah, thank you so muchfor coming on like.
This has been a greatconversation and this is an area
that we haven't really divedinto before.
I think this will be really,really valuable.
Oh yeah, where can people findyou?
I forgot to um ask if somebodydoesn't know, for some reason,
(45:13):
um, where they can find youthank you for having me on.
Andy (45:16):
I enjoyed the conversation .
Hopefully your audience didn'tfall asleep because it's
marketing, right?
Where can you find me?
Go to my website,permitipandyandycom.
It has all the things there.
It's kind of like my link treethat I pay $300 a year for to
host, which doesn't make sensebut it has all my links to all
my things there.
I should probably just shutthat down into a link tree and
(45:37):
save money, butpermitipandyandycom.
You can find all the things Ido everywhere.
And if you're a networkengineer, check out the Art of
Network Engineering podcast.
It's a show I love to do and Ithink it's helping people.
my job, the way I see it, is to communicate the unique,
like the USP, the unique sellingproposition, the unique value,
the unique things that oursolutions do that the other 346
automation solutions don't do.
And really for me, as a networkoperator, what pain are you in
that this solution solves?
(00:20):
And if we can tie that to anarrative or a story?
Because if you just throw stuffat people, hey, here's a thing
and it does this and it's builton this and isn't this cool and
like.
Okay, like 7% of the nerds aregoing to get excited about
Kubernetes and Linux and Hi outthere, I'm William.
William (00:50):
I'm your friendly neighborhood tech host.
I'm ready to try to solve yourproblems, but with me with me is
my co-host, yvonne Sharp, whohas been trained on
approximately 500 trillionpackets of network data.
Her response latency isimpressively low, I must say.
(01:11):
But unlike your favorite AIthat you might use out there, we
actually know when we're makingthings up.
At least we try to think we do.
But how are you doing today,yvonne?
How's Kentucky?
Eyvonne (01:21):
I'm good, I'm good, things are good in my world.
Are you doing today, yvonne?
How's Kentucky?
I'm good, I'm good, things are.
Things are good in my world.
Always busy, always stuff goingon.
Summer's creeping in, and sowe're already filling up the
summer schedule with kidsactivities, but we've already
lost an entire month this summerso, and it's the beginning of
May, so yeah, so does that meanthe rain's gonna stop like
(01:41):
anytime soon?
William (01:43):
because I'm over it.
Eyvonne (01:45):
We have had a lot of rain.
But I will say, a few days agoI was like you know, we just
sowed some grass, we could usesome rain.
But now we've gotten some rainand of course it rained all
Derby weekend, so the track wassloppy.
If you don't follow horseracing, when it rains and
there's a lot of mud, the trackis sloppy and so now, yeah, but
(02:08):
it's green, so I'm notcomplaining like there's grass
and there are leaves in thetrees and I drive around and I
go yeah it's like a new shade ofgreen.
William (02:16):
I've never seen it's like a very deep I've been
rained on for like forever.
Green goodbye.
Eyvonne (02:22):
Goodbye seasonal depression.
Hello green trees, that's yeah.
William (02:27):
So on the show we talk about a ton of different
technology-related things.
You know we get into the bitsand the bytes sometimes.
Sometimes it's theinfrastructure, sometimes it's
the AIs.
But what about the bridgebetween the technology and the
people who buy it and championit or use it?
So joining us today is our goodfriend and product marketer
(02:51):
extraordinaire and host of theArt of Network Engineering
podcast, which anybody tuning inhas probably heard or listened
to it in the past.
And hello Andy, how's lifegoing for you?
Andy (03:07):
Hi William, Hi Yvonne, Thanks for having having me.
It's my first time on the cloudgamut podcast.
Eyvonne (03:10):
Yay, really that doesn't seem so, and yvonne is
here.
Yes, I try to always be here Iknow and and just for the record
, if I'm not, it has nothing todo with the guest.
Andy (03:28):
Well, my imposter syndrome has been quelled because Yvonne
is here for me and I might havebeen worried that is Yvonne
going to be here.
Eyvonne (03:36):
My 15 year old frequently says that's a you
problem mom.
So that's the voice in my headthat's a you problem mom.
William (03:46):
Okay got it.
It's always a classic I love it.
Andy (03:50):
It's it's raining here, but the pool's open and I'm
really looking forward to uh, tothe summer for sure I, so I
briefly saw one of your posts.
William (03:58):
It was like, uh, you're talking about a backyard
project and it was like apicture of your fence or
something I think, oh my god.
Or like the pool and the fenceor something, I think oh my God.
Or like the pool and the fence.
My other school wasn't rightfrom pressure washer.
Andy (04:08):
I spent seven hours pressure washing on Saturday.
I bought a pressure washer.
I bought a huge surface cleaner.
I put the pressure washertogether.
There's no oil in it.
One trip to the store I gethome.
I get that running.
I try to connect big surfacewasher.
They're like those circlethings that spin.
I don't know if you've everseen them.
I needed an adapter.
I didn't have back to the store.
So it was one of those typicalhome projects of you know.
(04:29):
I planned it all out,Everything was going to be great
, Deployment was going to beseamless.
And then I was running aroundall day and my wife was like,
why aren't you done yet?
William (04:38):
So pressure washing is a pain.
It really is.
I have gas-powered most things,especially leaf blower and
stuff like that, but thepressure washer I got is an
electric washer and it's reallyawesome.
I had an electric leaf blower afew years ago and it was just
(04:58):
like okay, I'm going to dividemy yard into chunks of 30
minutes here and 30 minutesthere, because that thing would
just run out of juice.
I bought extra batteries likehave a stack of batteries and I
still can't get through ourproperty, which isn't very big.
Um, so the the electric, umpressure washer has definitely
been a different experience, butwe we didn't actually come to
(05:21):
the, the podcast, to talk aboutyard work as much as, as much as
it excites me I was justwondering if your listeners have
fallen asleep yet hey, on anice summer day there's nothing
like mowing the grass, it'sbeautiful, you know, get a good
sweat in.
But so I guess, kind of just umgoing back to like in this
(05:42):
episode, kind of what I wantedto dig into and something we
haven't dug into before really,is what is product marketing?
What does it mean?
What are the impacts?
How does it compare to othertechnical marketing or developer
advocacy or tech evangelism,stuff like that?
(06:02):
So kind of going through it,just kind of getting your you
know, as a freshly minted nokiaproduct marketing genius, you
know we want to hear it straightfrom, straight from you.
What do you think.
So I guess we could start outlike what, what does product
marketing mean?
Like, how do you define it?
Andy (06:21):
I'll issue the caveat that I've been in this role four
months and it's my first formalproduct marketing role, so take
my answers with that context inmind.
My job, the way I see it, is tocommunicate the unique like the
USP, the unique sellingproposition, the unique value,
the unique things that oursolutions do that the other 346
(06:45):
automation solutions don't do.
And really, for me, as anetwork operator, what pain are
you in that this solution solves?
And if we can tie that to anarrative or a story?
Because if you just throw stuffat people, hey, here's a thing
and it does this and it's builton this and isn't this cool and
like.
Ok, like 7% of the nerds aregoing to get excited about
(07:06):
Kubernetes and Linux andcontainers.
Bless their hearts.
Eyvonne (07:10):
Well, and, by the way, they're the nerds who don't have
access to budget.
William (07:16):
Fair.
Eyvonne (07:16):
Right, like that it's what you know like you've got to
get people excited, but youalso have to get people excited
enough to be willing to spend anorganization's money.
Right, and that's a big part ofthe equation.
Not to turn all corporate here,no, that's a perfect segue.
Andy (07:36):
So there are multiple audiences too.
I'm glad you said that becauseI didn't want to forget that,
and this happens to me in myrole now I most identify with
the network engineer persona.
So in most of the content Icreate and just to circle back
to what would that content be?
Blogs, videos, white papers,data sheets, faqs, sales,
trainings, demos, you name it Ifthere's any content that needs
(08:00):
to be created that can helpcommunicate what we're doing and
the value that needs to becreated that can help
communicate what we're doing andthe value that it would fall
under that bucket.
But there are also multiplewhat they would call personas to
talk to.
So there's the networkengineers, like me.
So that's why I'm like, well,let me lab and let me get this
thing installed and let me showyou the cool things.
And here's the UI and ooh, ittells you when something's about
to break and you click it toauto-remediate it like, isn't
(08:22):
this great?
Because, again, the narrativethat I think good product
marketers are and this is suchan overused term, especially in
tech.
But, like storytellers, I havebeen actively studying
storytelling for a year.
I bought this book by MatthewDix called Storyworthy and
there's an entire Almost likeyou would learn cloud or Network
Plus or whatever Like this is acertification of sorts for
(08:46):
storytelling, with a processthat you can follow and a bunch
of work to do to try to becomebetter at telling a story.
And I think if we can tie whatwe're doing in Vendorland and
product solutions to a narrativebecause this guy, matthew Dix,
that wrote the book he says youknow, think of the last
presentation you went to, thelast PowerPoint someone
(09:07):
presented, or the last speakeryou saw.
Like when you get home an hourand a half later and pull in the
driveway, what do you remember?
If they weren't telling stories, typically you don't remember a
thing.
But if somebody talked about,you know the lunchbox they got
as a kid and how you know theirparents were broke but they
always made sure they had shoesand a lunch, and like you can
pull at heartstrings of people'sexperience, tie those real
(09:27):
stories from your life to what'shappening now and create that
connection with your audience.
So I think that that's whatmakes a really good product
marketer.
That's my gold, that's what I'maiming for Now you have to let
a company allow you to do thatright, because most corporations
want to be plain white breadand stay in the middle and not
(09:49):
get picked off by a predator.
The downside to that is yousound like everybody else and
nobody's going to listen to you.
So if you could tell a story,be unique and make someone feel
something, I think that that'scritical.
I know I'm going on and on, butI didn't want to miss Yvonne's
point about the differentpersonas.
So I talk to network engineerpersonas primarily.
(10:10):
I have to be reminded by peoplelike Yvonne and the folks I
work with.
Well, there are other people inorganizations we have to
communicate with CTOs and peoplewho sign purchase orders and
all those people that aren'tnetwork engineers that have
access to budget to a bondspoint.
So my technical content recentlyI am being pulled back and my
(10:31):
leaders and my team saying likelisten, you're not a technical
marketing engineer, william, youmentioned it earlier.
Like what's the difference?
So we have TMEs who go deeperinto the technologies, who are
in the weeds, who can createcompelling demos right, I feel
they're less story-driven, likehere's the tech, here's the
nerdery man, let's do it, let'shurt your brains and they're
(10:53):
very good at that where, as aproduct marketer, they keep
reeling me in saying listen,this is much more about the
story, the narrative, and if Idon't go as deep on the tech, I
can get much more broad and havemuch more impact at a higher
story level and a narrativelevel.
Then I spent six weeks in thelab fighting it.
(11:13):
Oh, isn't this great.
We found some gaps and we'reupdating documentation and I
made some videos.
But that may or may not be whatthe company is looking for from
me Not so deep, technical,because we have brilliant
technical people who do thatstuff.
So, yvonne, I'm trying to figureout how to talk to the purchase
order people in the C-suite,because what they care about is
different than what I care about.
Right, as a network engineeragain, personas, product
(11:35):
marketing I don't want to becalled every time I'm on call.
I don't want to be working fivemaintenance windows a week,
like when I think back to myproduction experience, like I
got hammered in a meat grinderfor a decade, and that's not
what I want.
So if your solution can give memore nights of uninterrupted
(11:56):
sleep, can give me more holidayswith my family, can give me
soccer games I'm not beingpulled away because something's
broken again If you can deliverto me maybe a reliable solution,
I'm listening, but a CTO, it'sa different message, right.
What do they care about?
William (12:10):
Yeah, you said so many things there that I want to like
just reply to you.
Want to go first of on well,there's a lot um sorry first no,
the no the whole
Eyvonne (12:21):
like what's the, what's the cto interested in?
Right, um, the the cto shouldbe not all of are but should be
interested in how does ourtechnology organization deliver
value to the business?
And some of that, and I thinkin technology we get caught up
(12:43):
in like cost savings, costoptimization.
You know, there's the FinOpsdiscipline and, yeah, we need to
mind our P's and Q's and besure that we are not spending
frivolously and that what we'respending on our infrastructure
is we're getting value for that.
But then the other thing thatyour CTO or CTO, any C-level
(13:14):
leader should be asking isreally about value to the
business.
And so if you can show up andsay, hey, not only is this
technology going to streamlineour operations, but it's going
to allow us to spend X and thendeliver Y, which is a multiple
of that, that's really whenyou've got a winning argument
and and and and you're a winningstory.
Um, but the other thing thatthat I kind of want to comment
(13:38):
comment on as it result, as itrelates to marketing, there's
this great tension that happensespecially when we're talking
about technical products,because your, your technical
builders, your product managers,your SWEs, your, all those
folks they are emotionallyattached to all of the amazing,
(14:01):
deeply cool technical things theproduct does and you want them
to be right, because if they'regoing to build great things,
they need to be emotionallyattached to that.
The thing is, most customersaren't emotionally attached to
those things, and so yourtechnical product people and
(14:23):
you'll end up in fights becausethey'll be like but there are
3,000 gigawatts per teraflop,right, you got to tell them.
There are 3, 3000 gigawatts perteraflop, right, you got to
tell them there are 3000gigawatts per teraflop.
And that's not how you connectwith customers and and the.
The best analogy of this I'veseen is you know that when, when
(14:45):
they went to market with the,the iPod, the, the I, not yet
the iPod, like the, the veryfirst um, you know, media player
from Apple, they didn't talkabout how much storage the
device had.
They said a thousand songs inyour pocket.
Right, they translated into and, and.
So marketing is either how do Isolve a problem for you or how
(15:10):
do I help you reach thisaspirational future that doesn't
yet exist.
Those are the two of thedifferent approaches that you
can take, but you have to do oneof those or you're just spewing
statistics that only a veryniche group of folks are going
(15:32):
to care about.
Now.
I've monologued a bit.
It's your turn, william.
William (15:38):
Let me respond to something you said.
First, apple is like anymarketing team out there.
I mean, I've heard it manytimes actually over the past
five to eight years.
Apple did this.
You look at how simple all of.
Look at Mike.
I think his name was MikeMurray.
I just talked about him,actually in a talk I gave back
(16:01):
at our home base last week.
He was one of Apple'squasi-marketing people in the
80s.
He reported directly to SteveJobs sort of marketing,
quasi-marketing people in the80s that did the.
He reported directly to SteveJobs and he really was like the
first effort in Apple to reallyhumanize the technology and take
like very technical things andjust make them, you know, bring
(16:25):
them down to earth.
And that was at a time wheretechnology wasn't everywhere.
We're looking and reading andthinking all the time.
It, you know, monopolizes ourlife.
You know that was back at adifferent time where it was much
harder to do that and, uh, youknow, apple just does a
fantastic job with it.
But one, one thing I wanted tosay like you've sort of uh went
(16:47):
back and forth on this line,andy, of technical and
non-technical, and just oneobservation I've made is, in a
very early stage, startup, youmight not have these defined
roles.
It's kind of like you're goingto wear many different hats.
So your product marketingperson or even if they're called
(17:07):
that, is probably going to betechnical.
They're going to be logginginto the product, they're going
to be taking screenshots,they're going to be doing
mock-ups, they're going to bebuilding demos, they're going to
be doing all the things.
But as you grow and as youscale and you become a bigger
company that's like you weresaying that's kind of like what
I guess technical marketing issupposed to be doing.
(17:28):
They're from like the productoutwards.
They're like the first stab atlike making really good
collateral.
You know that's going to becustomer facing perhaps, or
maybe even managing the wholeproducts documentation.
You know something like thatmaybe.
And that's one thing I realizedum, the last startup I worked
for is earlier on.
(17:50):
I was helping with like productmarketing stuff and it was very
technical because our productpeople were off building amazing
things and building goodcollateral.
Let's face it, it takes time.
You know writing takes timeWell, not as much time lately
with ChatGPT, but it's all timeconsuming.
If you want beautiful thingsfor customers and prospects to
(18:14):
consume, it takes time.
So you can either buy, leaseout an agency or you can build
that collateral yourself.
But as a company gets bigger,you're going to have product
marketing.
I guess and I want to get yourtake on this Is there a role
really to find that productmarketing fit to take these
beautiful things that theseproduct folks have built, that
(18:36):
they're emotionally attached to,and provide that buffer, or be
in that middle area and say, hey, this is great, but this is how
it can be received out to themarket.
And then I don't know if you'veever done like, if you have to
do like analyst calls or any ofthat type of marketing, or if
you're just collateral specific,but a lot of times product
(18:57):
marketers on that side of thefence will do like marketing.
You know positioning categoriesand talk to analysts to get
feedback as well.
But, yeah, any, any thoughts.
Andy (19:08):
Yeah, my colleague, Anthony, just spent six months
working with Gartner and we got,you know, on the in one of the
quadrants, I think, thevisionary or whatever.
So we got a guy for that,fortunately and it's not me, but
it was.
It was a ton of work.
I wanted to.
I love that Yvonne brought upApple.
I I think of Apple almost everyday in my job.
(19:29):
I think they're the goldstandard what they've done
around storytelling and they tapinto emotions and beliefs, not
features.
So Simon Sinek he's one of myfavorites, right, and I'm
actually going to read itbecause I'll screw it up if I
don't.
(19:49):
But it was Start With, wasstart with why.
It was his whole like Ted talkon on start with why and the
reason Apple was so successfulin his view.
So so here's because Applestarts with why they really tap
into your, to your emotions andyour beliefs and you're like, oh
yeah, and then you see yourselfin that narrative.
So he says Apple sayseverything we do, we believe in
(20:11):
challenging the status quo, webelieve in thinking differently.
That's the why, Right, theystart with why not what?
Like hey, we built a thing, youshould buy it.
Like Yvonne said, why we're nottalking about the storage on
the device.
You can have a thousand songs inyour pocket.
Which of those two sentencesmake you feel something?
Now it's hard because all theseyears later, all the music is
(20:32):
at our fingertips.
But back then I had a stack ofvinyl yes, I'm that old and then
I had a bunch of CDs that Iused to have to put in right,
and when I would move I wouldhave to move all of that crap
with me and it takes up spaceand you need cabinets and things
to.
I'm a music person, so I had alot of music.
And then when they come outwith a thing like a thousand
(20:54):
songs in your pocket, I feltsomething.
It hit me in the chest.
I'm like whoa, they didn't saywe built this thing with this
processor and this, you know,RAM and this battery life and a
thousand gigs of memory.
That means nothing to me.
A thousand songs in my pocket,holy crap.
So to finish the Simon Sinekthing, everything we do, we
believe in thinking differently.
The how is?
The way we challenge the statusquo is by making our products
(21:15):
beautifully designed, simple touse and user-friendly.
And then they hit you with thewhat, which most people start
with.
We just happen to make greatcomputers, you want to buy one.
(21:50):
So, because they flip, theystart with why not what?
So for me, in my role, if I saidwe have a network automation
platform and we think we'regoing to make your life easier
because of blah, blah, blah, sototally, and none of them have
solved our problem, we're stillwaiting for the one solution to
come along that's simple enoughand doesn't burn the whole world
down quickly.
Again, this is networkautomation for our model.
There's a lot of conversationaround this that we're not
having now, but there are a lotof.
Again, this is networkautomation for a model.
There's a lot of conversationaround this that we're not
having now, but there are a lotof tools and people are still
(22:10):
waiting, waiting for one.
But in my mind, where I am,we've done something different
and compelling, and what I wantto do is almost follow the apple
playbook.
Now, I don't know if they'regoing to let me, but we really
need to hit people.
Michael say win the hearts andminds of people.
We got to hit them in the heart.
(22:30):
We got to hit them with athousand songs in your pocket,
because if we're coming out witha 350 second network automation
tool, nobody's going to listen,Nobody's going to care, but if
we can give you again, I don'twant to do a product pitch here,
but I think the story and thenarrative is very important.
I don't think I answered yourquestion, William, that you
asked, but I got really excitedwhen Yvonne brought up Apple,
(22:52):
because I think they're the goldstandard and I think it's what
we should all be aiming for inproduct marketing and most
technical brands I don't thinkdo it well or even do it average
.
Nike doesn't sell sneakers.
They're not, you know, just doit right or like.
Again, this gets into likeadvertising and things like that
(23:12):
.
But if you can make people feelsomething like, oh wow, if I
get Jordans, I can fly likeJordan no, you're not going to,
but they're not selling thefeature.
We use this advanced rubberwhich gives you another inch of
lift and it's really good foryour ankles.
Like nobody cares.
It's advanced rubber whichgives you another inch of lift
and it's really good for yourankles.
Eyvonne (23:27):
Like nobody cares it's a sneaker, but if you can make
them feel something they don'tdo, all that right.
Andy (23:30):
It's not that they don't do all that but they're not
selling features right.
Eyvonne (23:33):
There's something else in how they show up in the world
and and it's that.
It's that aspirational thing Iwas talking about earlier.
Um, there's somebody that uhcomes across, my social, roy
Sutherland, and I don't know ifany of you out there are
familiar with him, but he talksa lot about the psychology of
product and of sales and ofmarketing and he he uses an
(23:57):
example about it's.
Really he talks a lot aboutcustomer satisfaction, things
like that.
He talks about folks waitingfor the train.
He says if you wait for a train, folks may be willing to wait
seven minutes for a train.
If there's a timer they'recounting down, show them when
the next train is coming.
But if they wait four minutesfor a train with no countdown
(24:20):
timer, there's a psychologicaldifference to that experience.
Another example that he's usedis the speed of elevators.
There was this entireengineering effort that went
into how do we make elevatorsfaster?
People don't like waiting, butwhat they discovered is when you
put mirrors in elevators andyou play music in them, the ride
is more enjoyable, and so itreduces the need for the
(24:43):
engineering effort.
Right, and so as technicalpeople, we're often quick to
discount the psychological sideof what it is to use an
experience or a product, and Ifind those things fascinating
have moved me in towardmanagement because ultimately,
(25:05):
work is done by people andpeople are unique and weird and
complex and they're and it's notalways a straight line to human
behavior.
And I think often we justcompletely ignore and discount
that stuff and we go at it likewell, rationally, this is better
and that would be great if youwere selling to a robot, but
(25:26):
you're selling to a person whodoesn't make decisions
rationally and we have to takethat into account as we're
frankly moving through the world, not just trying to pitch
technology.
William (25:40):
Yeah, totally agree with that.
There's so much.
I kind of want to keep theconversation moving, though, so
actually one of the questions.
I actually wrote down that.
I wanted to remember that.
I just think would beinteresting to hear your take on
, andy, is what are the actual?
(26:02):
Because in technology there'sdifferent roles that are fitting
to different types of peopleLike I know many good many very
amazing engineers that don'tever want to talk to a person
the rest of their life.
Nor should they If they're,like, locked in their house.
They're good as long as theyhave their computer and they can
write code.
But then you have some folksthat can't sit down and work on
(26:27):
a powerpoint for longer than 20minutes without talking to a
person.
Like these are things I mean.
This is just how we you knowhumans have different qualities
and what.
What do you think like as faras, like quality wise, would
make a good product marketer?
Are there any underrated softskills that matter maybe more
(26:48):
than people realize?
What does a day in the lifealso look like for Andy?
How does that look?
Andy (27:00):
I think what makes a great product marketer and again,
this is why one of the reasons Ilove Yvonne so much is she hit
on the psychology.
You need a laser focus on youraudience and you have to have so
much empathy that you're havingtheir experience and then
determining how to speak to themin a way that resonates, that's
(27:21):
compelling, that will get theirattention, that will bring them
in the funnel.
Marketing supports sales.
So what makes a great productmarketer?
I think was in there somewhere.
I think I know a lot ofengineers and I've had them on
my different shows.
They shouldn't talk tocustomers, right, they can't.
(27:44):
I have, and I used to listen toHoward Stern and he always he
said he always had this you know, whatever you think of this guy
, right, Like he's a much betterinterviewer today than 40 years
ago when he was doingridiculous stuff.
But he said he's always hadthis kind of meter in his head
of when his audience is tuningout and he knows when it gets
uninteresting.
And I feel like I have a littlebit of that and sometimes I'll
(28:06):
have an engineer on a show andI'm like, oh my God, like this
person has no idea that nobodycares, and they're going on and
on, and so you kind of need toconstantly be tuned in to the
people receiving your message onthe other side and like, is
this compelling, Is thisengaging?
Do they care?
Because, again, throwing afeature list at them or a data
sheet, it's good for some people, not all.
(28:32):
I think.
You asked me what a day in thelife looks like.
So it's kind of like networkingand tech.
Every day is kind of different,which I think is why I love
tech.
You never know what's going tocome day to day.
Uh, you know, I I started out,I wrote a blog.
I wrote a blog that got me thisjob.
It was kind of like a tryout.
I covered I've covered them atNFD and I wrote a blog about it
(28:54):
through the NFD agreement thingand I was told like this is your
audition, so you know, and, andthey liked it, which was great
and it helped kind of get methis position.
A few months later, I wroteanother blog Again not tooting
my own horn, but I think it'sone of the best performing blog
(29:15):
pieces they've had, at least inthe data center vertical.
So what was my day like?
It started out writing goodblogs.
Then I kind of came up withlike a six-month plan.
Like what can I do?
So I'm like I want to do ashort form video series, because
I love short form video.
We're all doom scrollinglooking at the 30 or 60 second
videos.
You and I do it with thepodcast.
(29:35):
We break it up into short formand people can, but again it
brings people in the quoteunquote funnel.
If you can get 15 seconds ofattention from someone oh who is
this?
William and Yvonne huh and thenmaybe they'll follow you and
maybe watch the show longer.
So I have been working on short.
I started out with blogs, I'mworking on short form video.
(29:55):
Now I have a stealth podcastthat I'm not supposed to or
allowed to talk about, but kindof a data center thought
leadership.
Where I work, there's a ton ofsmart people, much like you guys
.
The places we work, there'sreally smart people and I would
like to highlight all the coolstuff Not product, Never, ever,
(30:17):
ever going to mention hey, youshould buy this thing because
we're making it.
Holy crap, Look what thesepeople are doing.
Bell Labs created frickingtransistors.
Let's talk to one of them.
This is amazing, Whoa.
So that's kind of a thing.
But blogs, video I write a lot.
There's conferences William,I'm hoping to see you at Aldicon
(30:40):
in Denver, so there'll be alittle bit of evangelizing.
But, just like when I was inproduction, every day is kind of
different.
There's a plan, there's astrategy.
There's a plan.
Nobody knows Nokia is in datacenter Full stop, Unless you're
in service provider or you'rerunning mission critical
networks.
So I think the plan is like howcan we communicate out to the
(31:05):
world that we're not the phonecompany, which is what everybody
thinks, and what are we doing?
That's so compelling.
What have we been doing for 20years of mission critical that
can now line?
You know, do you think thatreliability would be well
(31:28):
applied in your data center?
Maybe right?
So the plan is to get the wordout, and there are a hundred
different ways to do that andthere's limited time.
So I haven't done my podcastbecause there's only so much
time.
Like, right now I'm doingrelease marketing, I have to get
a data sheet out and a new FAQ,and we got to get sales
trainings Some of it's internaltoo.
We have to help our salespeopleunderstand the value so that
they can talk to customers whenthey go out.
(31:50):
So it's a terrible answer toyour question.
Every day is different and,again, I'm new to the role, so
I'm kind of learning as I go andthey're plugging me in where
they think I can bring value.
I don't know if that's a greatanswer.
William (32:02):
No, it makes a lot of sense.
I mean, that's been kind of myI'd say my experience as well.
Every day is very different.
Andy (32:08):
I mean, you were an evangelist in your last role,
right Like there's a.
I don't want to say that's a's.
It's not a product marketingjob, but you're out in the
public telling people why theyshould care right, creating
awareness it's pretty.
William (32:23):
There's a little bit of overlap between I mean,
honestly, I think there's alittle overlap between tech
evangelism, product marketingand tech technical marketing.
Yep, especially the smallercompany that you, you work at.
But yeah, technical evangelismis more like starting at the
community and starting at thetechnology and not so much the
vendor, and just kind of reverseengineering your way back to
(32:45):
the product.
I wouldn't be able to sellsomething a day in my life, I'd
be a terrible salesperson.
But if you can come in withsome, just good, you know, meet
the individual where they're atand, you know, become some sort
of trusted something and then ifit, you know, ends up working
(33:09):
its way back to your product andyou make a sale, then awesome,
which that happened for me manytimes.
I didn't go in, I don't getpaid on commission, but I went
in and just had conversations,good conversations, and built
relationships.
And you know, as it were, whenyou build relationships with
people and you have goodconversations, you're gonna,
(33:30):
you're trending in the rightdirection, you're not going
backwards.
So yeah, what, what do you?
So one thing I wanted to getinto, I just wanted to get your
take on is like nokia um is acompany, is incubated.
I guess incubated I don't knowwhat the right word is for this
but so roman and folks havebuilt container lab and it's.
(33:53):
I'd have to go back, I actuallydon't remember.
I think it's a bsSD license ormaybe it's Apache, I can't
remember but it's a prettypermissive license.
It's essentially open source.
Paying for its employees to dothings has to be tied to like
(34:23):
some sort of revenue generatingexercise or like leads coming in
or pipeline specific stuff.
But every once in a while youhave a gym kind of like
container lab, which I use, likeit's an incredible, incredible
tool and it's got so muchtraction right now.
Um, but how, what you viewthose types of exercises where
maybe it's kind of a risk?
(34:43):
Because, again, when you have aconversation at Nokia with your
teams, or I have a conversationat Itential or Yvonne has a
conversation at Google, you'repaying for everybody to be on
that call to Google.
You're paying for everybody tobe on that call.
You have salaries to pay.
You have employees that couldbe doing other things.
(35:05):
How do you view that sort ofmarketing style exercise?
Andy (35:07):
if you would even call it that.
I think it's a brilliantstrategy.
I don't know how well thoughtout it was that that happened
well before I ever came on.
It's completely open source.
Every time I turn around,somebody else I know is using it
, loves it.
I've came on.
It's completely open source.
Every time I turn around,somebody else I know is using it
, loves it.
I've used it.
I think like networking vendors.
Well, here's, I guess, myperception, my bias, whatever I
(35:30):
feel like my experience withnetworking vendors is they're
trying to walk us in, squeezemoney.
It's never really felt like agreat relationship.
So when I see vendors and Nokiais not the only one but when I
see vendors doing things thatcontribute to the networking
(35:51):
community at large, doing opensource projects like Container
Lab as your example, it justsays a lot to me about the
culture, about how the companysees the world, and because,
you're right, resources werespent and time, and I mean
Roman's brilliant and he's stillworking on it.
Right, he's also responsiblefor other products, but he's
(36:13):
working on an open source, and Idon't have the list in front of
me, but they've worked on a lotof different open source
products, Like when I wanted tolearn their operating system.
Sr Linux Container Lab made thatso easy.
That was my introduction toContainer Lab.
I had never run a container.
I didn't know what ContainerLab did, and it did some virtual
wiring for me and then it gaveme a Yang.
(36:33):
What the hell was it Like?
It gave me a, a file with sixlines, and I loaded it up and I
hit a command in Linux and poof,it was all running and I'm in
the CLI.
And then I'm like, well, whatthe hell is this?
But I can grab an open AI key,put it in and then talk to it in
plain language and it talked methrough how to configure it.
For me, this is a differentexperience than I've had at
(36:55):
other unnamed vendors when I'mtrying to learn their operating
system or their syntax or labtheir things.
It was just so easy, so wellthought out and it gives me a
warm and fuzzy feeling when acompany who exists to extract,
generate profit and makeshareholders happy in a never
(37:15):
ending game of, you know,endless returns that's how it's
our economy works right.
For them to spend time, moneyand resources on something open
source, I think says a lot aboutabout how they see the world.
William, you and I have had thisconversation.
Like I don't really understandthe open source world.
I don't understand why peoplewould spend their time doing
(37:36):
something for free when theycould charge for it, and that's
probably a whole separateconversation.
But I agree with everythingyou're saying and I think it's
really cool.
I don't.
At another place I worked.
I don't recall us doing stufflike that, so it's just one more
feather in the cap of like huh,this place is like really like
(37:59):
they're doing smart things andit's not all about dollars.
Like here's a product we made,you should go buy it.
Like no, here's this cool freething, Isn't this cool?
You can spin up a containerizedNAS.
You can use container lab.
It'll do the virtual wiring foryou.
It'll give you the interfaceyou're in in a second.
A second like how are you usingcontainer lab?
Are you using it for a ton?
William (38:20):
yeah, yeah.
So one of the free productsthat we build I basically built
like I dockerized it.
It's on docker hub and I injectit into container lab
topologies for testing andversioning.
So I do a lot of um testing.
I put it all on github too,just for the heck of it, because
free stuff and hey, I mean ifyou can provide some sort of
(38:42):
ability for someone to get theirhook in with automation and
just have value out of it, evenif you can change their mind,
that automation is important andanybody can do it, as it were,
don't be scared, jump in and tryit.
You know the thousands andthousands of dollars of lab gear
you know isn't holding you backanymore, like it did for me
(39:03):
when I jumped into this spaceway, way back.
Like I guess I'd kind of turnthis dark a little bit and say,
look, there's no excuses, getout of your chair and go do it
because it doesn't cost youanything.
It just costs you time.
The technology's there andanybody can learn it.
We have to be good stewards ofthat technology by when it makes
(39:27):
sense.
I'm not saying go and post yourcompany's IP on the internet or
something stupid, but if youhave a free product and you have
a free tooling ecosystem.
Go and build cool things andshare it with people you know
it's.
That's the way forward, that'show we all get better.
But yeah, that's just my takelook at linux.
Andy (39:47):
You taught me about linux, torbold and linux and how linux
changed the world, and that wasall open source.
Again, I don't.
As a capitalist who wants abigger house, a bigger pool pool
and a faster car, I have a hardtime personally being like
let's do all this stuff for free.
I wanted to ask you, before wewrap up, what's the biggest
feature?
So I'm still learning thesethings and I'm not a Container
Lab expert.
Why are you using Container Lab?
(40:09):
Is it because it allows you todo lab as code?
It does the virtual wiringbetween containers.
Is that the big value there?
William (40:19):
Yeah, and I think some of the other solution.
I think the.
I like the idea.
So the stuff that I've builtwith container lab, with our
product, it's all ephemeral soyou basically, as long as you
have container lab or dockerinstalled, you can run all of it
.
It actually pulls the code downfrom a github repo through an
import thing that we do.
It tees everything up.
The lab files are already inthe Git repo, everything's there
(40:39):
.
All you have to do is type in acommand to run them and you
will back up configuration fromnetwork devices or configure BGP
.
It makes it easy.
I think the way that thisevolved is after physical
hardware, we all set up ES, esxiand just used ovas for
(41:01):
different network images maybe,or you know, qcal2s, whatever,
ran them directly on thehypervisor and then connected to
things and that isn't the mostresource friendly thing.
But the vendors that I thinkvendors like nokia, vendors like
Arista is another really goodone where they've actually built
purpose-based containerizedimages.
(41:22):
So you don't have to go throughsome wild conversion process
and do like all these specialthings.
It's not walled by licensingLike there's.
You know, there's a good,diligent, free tier with these
things Like unless you wantscale and capacity, obviously,
that you're going to have to payfor.
But you can do and test a lotof things out of the box and
(41:44):
it's just ephemeral, so I canhave this thing in code and then
rerun it when I need it, andthere's no going back and just
trying to remember what in theworld I was doing.
So it's just very ephemeral,it's resource friendly and
everything's you know can betreated as code.
I think that's the huge bit.
And they just released a RESTAPI, which is awesome.
(42:05):
I've imported the schema andI'm playing around with it a
little bit, but it's that's.
That was the one feature that Iwas hoping.
I mean, I think everybody washoping that they would do that
on the container lab side wasyou, was you know, get an API
out there?
And they've hit it.
I mean I really can't think ofmany more things they could
actually do with Container Labto make it easier or better at
(42:28):
this point, because they evenhave the topology editor, which
is like really cool, you canimport your own logos and stuff.
It's pretty wild.
But yeah, I think we werecoming up at the top of the hour
.
Andy (42:39):
but yeah, I want to say one more thing before we end,
and cause I realized that it'sthe same advice I give people
trying to get into networking.
Um, if you like to communicate.
So I tell people, like how canI get into networking?
It's so hard, right?
Uh, do some con like do thetechnical study, get the certs,
go to lab or free lab, whateverand try to communicate what
(43:01):
you're learning.
Right, show people yourcommunication skills, start a
blog, do videos, whatever.
Now there's TikTok, do whateverthat is.
But it's very similar to thistype of role too.
When I interviewed, I had a bodyof work that they could see.
I like to communicate.
I mean, I used to poo-poo mydegree.
I have a bachelor incommunication and I've joked
with all you technical peoplebecause you know, oh, it was,
(43:22):
you know it was the easiestmajor I could find at the time.
Well, as it turns out, I loveto communicate.
I was writing poetry at six,right, like I really like
communicating.
It's one of my strengths.
I love people, I love you knowall of it.
And and if you like tocommunicate with people and
you're technical, this is thekind of role that could really
again, this is the mostsatisfied.
(43:45):
It's the wrong word, but themost fulfilling role I've had in
tech in the 20 years I've beenin tech, and it's because it's
aligning with my strengths.
It's as technical as I want itto be.
I get to communicate, I get tocreate all this cool content and
if you're a technical personwho likes to communicate and
create content, this could bethe type of role you could look
(44:05):
at.
At a vendor, and it doesn't hurtthat it pays, usually more than
production, getting your headpounded into the change window,
change management world right, Imean, you have to pay your dues
.
But if you're out there doingthe job and you like to
communicate and you're thinkingabout vendor roles or maybe
you're not, maybe this is anintroduction.
It's a really cool.
I get to come on and talk tocool people like you.
All the time I've been onpacket pushers, like, come on,
(44:27):
it got me on packet pushers.
Hello, that's awesome.
William (44:30):
That's a dream, right?
Yeah, it's good advice, greatadvice.
Yeah, I know your strengths,know what the job role entails,
find the right match and, yeah,get out of.
I mean, some people like thatproduction craziness.
I I never.
I liked it at first, I liked itfor a few years and then it
started getting old pretty quick.
But, yeah, thank you, I mean,we're at the top of the hour.
(44:51):
I think both of you have hardstops.
I think I do too, um, thetrifecta of hard stops.
But, yeah, thank you so muchfor coming on like.
This has been a greatconversation and this is an area
that we haven't really divedinto before.
I think this will be really,really valuable.
Oh yeah, where can people findyou?
I forgot to um ask if somebodydoesn't know, for some reason,
(45:13):
um, where they can find youthank you for having me on.
Andy (45:16):
I enjoyed the conversation .
Hopefully your audience didn'tfall asleep because it's
marketing, right?
Where can you find me?
Go to my website,permitipandyandycom.
It has all the things there.
It's kind of like my link treethat I pay $300 a year for to
host, which doesn't make sensebut it has all my links to all
my things there.
I should probably just shutthat down into a link tree and
(45:37):
save money, butpermitipandyandycom.
You can find all the things Ido everywhere.
And if you're a networkengineer, check out the Art of
Network Engineering podcast.
It's a show I love to do and Ithink it's helping people.
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