Amanda Natividad is VP of Marketing at SparkToro. She's also a contributor for Adweek, a Le Cordon Bleu-trained chef, and a former journalist. Dave and Amanda catch up after Amanda's return to work after having her second child, talk about trends they are seeing in B2B marketing today and what Amanda's seen work at SparkToro (including email strategy and LinkedIn). Plus they talk about the path to CMO - and why Amanda enjoys being a team of one.
00:00 - Webinar Promotion Without Links and Returning to Work After Maternity Leave.
06:04 - The Emotional Impact of Parental Leave.
08:40 - Navigating Career Paths in Marketing.
12:10 - SparkToro's Audience Research Tool and Growth Strategy.
14:31 - VP of Marketing at SparkToro: Managing Top-of-Funnel, Organics, and Events.
19:11 - Rethinking the pursuit of status in business.
22:10 - Contemplating financial gains and their true value.
23:10 - Prioritizing time over extra income for happiness.
29:26 -Transitioning from Consulting to Content Business: The Evolution of Exit Five.
32:01 - The challenges and potential rewards of solopreneurship.
34:16 - Navigating Hiring and Trust in a Small Team
38:05 - Strategic Email Marketing at Sparktoro: Balancing Frequency and Impact.
41:06 - Sparktoro's Email Strategy: Quality over Quantity and List Management Tactics.
43:08 - The challenge of balancing marketing strategies.
48:25 - Optimizing LinkedIn Strategy: Pinning Comments and Zero-Click Content.
50:32 - Embedding Webinar Links in Blog Posts for Engagement
52:53 - Closing Thoughts.
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 brought to you by Navattic.
B2B websites are filled with too much story, too much narrative these days. You visit a website and you have no idea what the product does and how it works.
This is why Navattic has become a popular product for B2B Marketers. They help you build interactive demos so you can give buyers a real look at the product before they ever talk to sales.
And guess what - it works. They found that companies using interactive demos with Navattic have seen up to a 25% lift in website conversion rates and a 10-20% increase in inbound leads.
They just released their 2025 State of the Interactive Product Demo report, and it proves just how much more control B2B buyers want over the buying process. Buyers have more access to information than ever, and companies are finally catching up by making their product front and center.
Their report breaks down the top-performing demos, why ungated demos drive higher engagement and the best use cases and strategies for making them work.
So if you want to learn more about using product demos on your site, go check out Navattic’s State of the Interactive Product Demo report now.
***
Thanks to my friends at hatch.fm for producing this episode and handling all of the Exit Five podcast production.
- They give you unlimited podcast editing and strategy for your B2B podcast.
- Get unlimited podcast editing and on-demand strategy for one low monthly cost. Just upload your episode, and they take care of the rest.
- Visit hatch.fm to learn more