This episode is from Drive 2024, our first-ever in-person event for B2B marketers in Burlington, Vermont. Natalie Marcotullio, Head of Growth and Operations at Navattic, shared strategies on how to say “no” when faced with competing priorities in marketing.
Natalie covers:
- How to establish a marketing framework that simplifies decision-making and helps you say no effectively.
- A three-step process for communicating priorities with your CEO and leadership team.
- Quick-win productivity hacks that offer simple ways to say “no.”
Timestamps
- (00:00) - - Intro to Natalie
- (05:34) - - The “stress spiral” at work
- (07:26) - - How to stop the stress spiral and decide what’s most important to work on
- (09:23) - - Natalie’s marketing framework: Unique + Valuable
- (10:31) - - Examples of creating a unique and valuable marketing framework
- (12:21) - - Why having a framework works
- (15:08) - - Step #1 of saying “No”: Ask the Why
- (19:10) - - Step #2 of saying “No”: Swap it out
- (21:16) - - Step #3 of saying “No”: "Let’s experiment with it"
- (24:10) - - Small ways to say “No”
- (30:19) - - Natalie’s weirdest ask she’s received (and had to say no to)
- (31:21) - - How to know you need to get better at saying no
- (32:19) - - Giving context and rationale when saying yes
- (33:09) - - How to get your team to think with a marketing mindset and actively bring ideas to you
- (34:17) - - Teaching the “yes/no” framework: How does it play out when your team uses your own tricks on you?
Send guest pitches and ideas to hi@exitfive.com
Join the Exit Five Newsletter here: https://www.exitfive.com/newsletter
Check out the Exit Five job board: https://jobs.exitfive.com/
Become an Exit Five member: https://community.exitfive.com/checkout/exit-five-membership
***
Today’s episode is brought to you by Zuddl.
We’re halfway through 2025, and one thing’s clear: events continue to be one of the highest performing marketing channels. Niche meetups, conferences, curated dinners, networking - you name it. Everyone’s leaning in.
Events are a core part of our playbook this year at Exit Five. So far, we’ve hosted two virtual sessions each month, one large virtual event, one in-person meetup, and we’re deep in the weeds planning our Drive conference coming back to Vermont this September.
Zuddl helps us run a smarter event strategy - from driving registrations, managing invites, automating comms, reminders, analytics, tracking. Their Salesforce integration also makes it simple to report on pipeline and revenue from events without pulling in ops.
On top of that, the differentiator with Zuddl is how their team is insanely good at supporting us. They always go above and beyond for us - and that’s how we’ve been able to keep the momentum going with 12+ events already this year, with plenty more to come.
If events are part of your marketing strategy, you need to look at Zuddl to see how companies like Zillow, CrowdStrike, and Iterable are using the top event platform for Business events in 2025.
Head over to zuddl.com/exitfive to learn more.
