This episode features an interview with Shafqat Islam, CMO at Optimizely, a leading digital experience platform (DXP) that equips teams with the tools and insights they need to create and optimize in new ways.

In this episode, Shafqat shares his core company beliefs around marketing, the journey of cutting Optimizely’s budget to zero and starting over, and how he and his team are getting scrappy and going back to the drawing board to start afresh with their marketing strategies. Shafqat also gets transparent about what it’s been like to be a first time CMO and the advantages that presents him in his new role.

Key Takeaways:

For long term business success, you have to have a solid digital presence, create awesome content that keep your customers coming back for me, and utilize creativity and science to provide unparalleled customer experiences.
Sometimes, you have to scratch it all and start over. By cutting their company budget to zero and starting afresh, Shafqat and his team now run a leaner and more scrappy marketing organization.
Anything measurable is uncuttable, anything unmeasurable is cuttable. Be ruthless about what your output is and how it affects your input.

Quote:

“We wanted to get a lot scrappier, a lot more entrepreneurial, a lot cheaper, like spend a lot less money, even though we have big budgets and it just requires a different type of person, right? And so, as I mentioned, sometimes some people opted out. Some were encouraged to find a better fit somewhere else. And the entire leadership team in our marketing org turned over very quickly…So they all left and all the people who were doing the job one level below got promoted into the new marketing leadership team, and they've absolutely crushed it. Like I'm so proud of them because they were just waiting in the wings to take on more responsibility. Get shit done, prove that we can run a very different type of scrappy marketing organization.”

Episode Timestamps:

*(03:43) - The Trust Tree: Cutting the budget to zero and starting over

*(23:37) - The Playbook: Getting scrappy and redefining the marketing game

*(33:39) - Quick Hits: Shafqat’s Quick Hits

Sponsor:

Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for Demand Gen pros. The world's leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.

Links:

Romans 15:1-7 - Jesus Builds Strong Churches