Fractional CMO Show

So much importance is placed on simply increasing the size of a company’s customer pool but this can’t be sustained forever. Casey is illuminating how you need to position the company for growth through gaining a deeper understanding of your customers’ problems beyond those you have already solved. You’ll learn the dangers of stagnation and how to avoid it, how to increase the lifetime value of a customer, and the core of the CMO’s role.   Takeaways: Your first step as a CMO should be to establish an efficient funnel that regularly converts people into customers. Once you do that, it’s not always clear what to do next. The next step is to innovate.  You must always be looking for ways to keep moving and innovating to stay ahead of the relentlessly encroaching competition. Other companies will be able to overtake your market share faster than it took you to carve it out. The deeper you’re in, the more the customer matters. Gaining a better understanding of the customer and their wants and motivations is what inspires innovation. Find all the problems that exist, even if you can’t solve them. Work with the product team to either develop or find a product that satisfies those other needs. Look for ways to increase the lifetime value of a customer. The cost of selling an existing customer another product is very low, there’s virtually no acquisition cost and they already have a relationship with the company or brand. You just need to find a way to leverage that relationship. The role of the CMO is to think through how to solve problems so that the business grows. ​​Ask yourself, “how do you get deeper with the customer to find additional products or services to extend the customer lifetime value?”   Quote of the Show: “The lack of innovation is the death of the company” - Casey Stanton   Shout Outs: Dan Sullivan   Links Twitter: https://twitter.com/CaseyStanton LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseystanton/ Website: https://cmox.co   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/meVx-1bubJU

Everyone has a marketing lineage and pedigree which shapes the way they view problems and the solutions to them. Casey Stanton reveals the importance of identifying your marketing lineage and pedigree and how to define them. You’ll learn how lineages and pedigrees play into client relationships and what happens when people from drastically opposing business backgrounds have issues working together if unmanaged.    Takeaways: Your marketing lineage refers to who you learned from and where they learned from going back generations of marketers. Your marketing pedigree deals with where you studied, be that at a university, on the job, etc. Your lineage and pedigree work in tandem to influence the way you see things. For example, someone from a sales background won’t look at things the same way as someone who came up focusing on branding.  Identify the one thing that got you into marketing and what you like to get out of doing marketing. Once you have identified this, focus on doing more that is related to that reason. Identify what your marketing lineage and pedigree are.  It’s important to find what your client’s pedigree and lineage are. This is how they will look to solve problems so it’s important to know how will approach things and be familiar with their go-to solutions.  Friction can arise when you and your client have radically different lineages and pedigree and you must be mindful of this and constantly manage it.   Quote of the Show: “What was that moment where you were like, wow, this marketing stuff is really fun” - Casey Stanton   Links Twitter: https://twitter.com/CaseyStanton LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseystanton/ Website: https://cmox.co/community   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/1Z_YOMCicb4

When you’re driving new business to your Fractional CMO practice it’s important to not rely too heavily on referrals. Casey Stanton is filling everyone in on why it’s more important to focus on filling up your pipeline than looking for more referrals and attain the Golden Ratio.    Takeaways: The Golden Ratio is the idea that referrals are coming in more frequently than customers churn. You can not build your Fractional CMO practice solely on referrals. If you try to rely entirely on referrals, you’re never in control of your pipeline and without a full pipeline, you won’t be able to predict your income for months at a time. Referrals come from word of mouth through people who trust you. When you talk to a prospect who has been referred to you, they are likely prequalified and more likely to say yes to you based on some degree of trust built on who referred them. It’s relatively easy to get to the Golden Ratio as a Fractional CMO. If you are serving 3-6 clients for 3-24 months you only really need to get 1 referral per quarter to maintain your pipeline.   Quote of the Show: “You want to get to that position where your pipeline's full, but what's better than a full pipeline is the referrals on top of it. It's kind of like the sprinkles. It's the magic.” - Casey Stanton   Links Twitter: https://twitter.com/CaseyStanton LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseystanton/ Website: https://cmox.co   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/Xfysoa5mb88

It can be hard to figure out what to do to actually help smaller local service companies, but it doesn’t have to be! Marketing agency owner and Fractional CMO, Robin Heppell, tells of the wonder and success that can be derived from working with specialized local companies, in particular, funeral homes. Learn about differentiating in a local area, managing your reputation with both long-standing customers and new prospects, and some ingenious ways to drive traffic to your website.   Takeaways:  It is crucial for businesses to be able to adapt to ever-evolving consumer demands. One good example of this is with fewer people going to church not, they are less likely to hold the funeral reception at a church, opening the door to funeral homes. As people have begun to move around more, there is less brand loyalty to long-established companies in many areas because many of the people living there are not originally from there.  When differentiating among local service companies, some of the biggest factors include the quality of service, the physical location of the business, and the price. It’s difficult to convey the quality and value your company provides through a price list on your website. For some companies, like funeral homes, a lot of the sales come from the emotional decisions of the customers which must be handled more tactfully. Being a Fractional CMO provides and structure and process that you don’t have as a consultant. As a Consultant, you have to work on whatever the client thinks the problem is. Whereas, as a Fractional CMO, you become the leader of their marketing efforts. Sometimes, it’s just as, if not more, important not to tell your client about certain tools than it is to introduce them to something new. As a Fractional CMO, you should tell them about things that will help them and keep them ignorant of things that won’t. At the outset of planning your marketing efforts, you must have a goal in mind such as increasing conversions, before you start thinking about channels and strategies. Find the strategies that best support the goal, once the goal is set.   Quote of the Show:   “I tell my clients, I'm going to tell you the latest things that you could be doing, but I'm also not going to tell you a ton of latest things that aren't going to apply, which could be a real time-waste on your end” - Robin Heppell     Links Twitter: https://twitter.com/funeralfuturist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heppell/ Funeral Boardroom Website: https://www.funeralboardroom.com/ Funeral Results Marketing Website: https://www.funeralresultsmarketing.com/ Funeral Gurus Website: https://www.funeralgurus.com/ Call Robin: https://funeralcmo.com/call   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/W2ing0HCIxY

Jeff McKay, CEO of Prudent Pedal and a Fractional CMO, shares insights on strategic marketing in professional services. He emphasizes the shift from a productivity mindset to one focused on growth, urging firms to adopt value-based pricing. McKay discusses the dangers of revenue-driven decisions that can harm brand integrity and highlights the importance of data analytics for market growth. He also underlines the pivotal role of marketing leadership in navigating this transition and nurturing a culture of trust and collaboration.

Don’t get caught up in how you’re going to message your prospects before you get them, the real priority is getting a comprehensive list of everyone that fits the description of your customer! Casey Stanton is back again to hammer home how imperative it is to obtain the list of potential clients through whatever ways get the job done, regardless of industry.   Takeaways: There are many ways to go about getting the list which include: purchasing databases, web scraping, joint ventures, public records, etc. Whatever the way, find how to get that list of your potential clients. Worry about how you will message your potential clients after you have gotten the list, this should be the priority.  There are ways to get the list of your potential customers regardless of what industry you may be in, it just relies on your ingenuity.   Quote of the Show: “When you think of the clients that you're currently working with or the ones that you're thinking about closing, I want you to ask, is there a definitive list that exists online?” - Casey Stanton   Links Twitter: https://twitter.com/CaseyStanton LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseystanton/ Website: https://cmox.co   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/m2w4Q81Ou60

So often, people oversell what the outcome of their work will be or don’t base goals on historical data. Casey Stanton has been there and he’s trying to help anyone else from going there and losing the trust of their coworkers because they couldn’t produce up to those faulty expectations. You’ll understand the dangers of overselling, how to set better goals and what to do if you start to see that you won’t be able to reach your goals.   Takeaways: Don’t overset any kind of quarterly outcomes, be very realistic and pragmatic with setting your goals.  Meet with everyone involved throughout the course of the project and make sure that everyone is on track with everything they need to do in order to hit the goal. If you see that you are not on track to achieve the goal let everyone know and get them all involved in resolving the problem so that you can reach that outcome. If you are faced with a situation and there is no historical data to base your decision on, do not make a “wild ass guess.” This is a super quick way to lose all credibility and trust. When you are planning out your goals, you have to really think about the worst-case scenario and extrapolate out what that means for the business.  Even if you make great improvements and progress, if you don’t accomplish the goal you laid out, those around you will disregard your work because it didn’t meet the expectation.   Quote of the Show:   “Don’t pick a number because it’s round, pick a number because it’s incrementally larger.” - Casey Stanton Links Twitter: @CaseyStanton LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/caseystanton Website: cmox.co   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/GhfcR_RFiUs

Whether you’re a full-time CMO for a company or a Fractional CMO for several companies, this truth remains the same, you can’t do everything yourself. In this episode, Casey Stanton discusses the importance of shifting your mentality from “I need to do this” to “this needs to get done.” Learn how having a team around you that you can delegate tasks to can help in your journey to solve bigger problems.   Takeaways: Both CMO’s and Fractional CMO’s must make the shift from “I need to do this” to “this needs to get done.” It is imperative to shift from task focus to outcome focus! The CMO can’t do everything by themselves, it’s impossible! The CMO has to hire a team of hardworking, intelligent, and committed people that they like working with. Once the CMO has created their team, they can delegate tasks to the team members. Avoid thinking that delegating is inefficient and is a waste of time because both the CMO and the team learn from each other through it. Don’t micromanage your team, people like to be assigned a task and then given the authority to accomplish that task. Each team member learns and develops from the tasks they are assigned and allowed to take some ownership of. Make sure to give your team enough to work with for a task, but don’t do the work for them.  By delegating tasks to the team, the CMO can become free to solve bigger problems! If you are a marketing department of one, you can either accept the work and move on, hire a team to delegate to, and or find a different client who can afford to hire a team for you.   Quote of the Show: “The CMO should never let the day pass where the work isn’t getting done.” - Casey Stanton   Links Twitter: @CaseyStanton LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/caseystanton Website: cmox.co Facebook Group: cmox.co/community   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/039bc2d6-c1b5-4ced-ac2a-437e69546e7c/fractional-cmo-show Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1HGwnjsXA4c4gYQvj4w53E?si=bd6e0908e25749ec Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mcmFjdGlvbmFsY21vLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjlpNDTveb0AhUXEFkFHaZcDtYQ9sEGegQIARAC YouTube: https://youtu.be/ehlt4IyllBQ

Many business owners and upper-level managers would say the most valuable asset to their business is something like their contacts, software, etc., but they’re way off. Casey Stanton is setting the record straight and explaining the best ways to protect, support, and nurture your business’ most valuable asset.    Takeaways: The most valuable asset in your business is YOU! You have to think about what you can do to protect yourself and make yourself more successful both at work and at home. Consider hiring people to help support you. For some this may mean an executive assistant, some may need more than just one person. It’s important to have times when you are “on and off” when it comes to your business. For example, only check your inbox during your work hours and stick to this. Think about what you are uniquely good at and interested in and set yourself up to work on those things that you find easy and interesting. Be very aware of your personal health and diet. Make sure you are hitting your health goals and eating well. What you eat is your fuel and try to only put the best fuel in, this will help you perform better in every aspect of life. Ask yourself, what is the one thing stopping your business from growing. What is one SMART decision that you can make to change that one thing and get your business growing? What are tasks that waste your time that you could just pay someone to do? For some this is laundry, for others, this is cleaning their car; what is it for you?   Quote of the Show: “What's one decision I can make today or this week, that's going to free me up; that's going to show me that I think I'm the most valuable asset in my business; that pulls you out of the day-to-day; that allows you to stay elevated so that you can go solve bigger problems so that you can go identify the clients that you want to work with and then go win them and work with them and serve them and deliver high impact marketing strategy and campaigns for them that other people execute through your leadership.” - Casey Stanton   Links Twitter: @CaseyStanton LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/caseystanton Website: cmox.co   Ways to Tune In Amazon Music Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://fractionalcmo.libsyn.com/spotify Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZnJhY3Rpb25hbGNtb3Nob3cuY29tL2ZlZWQueG1s Stitcher YouTube: https://youtu.be/SRfa5Ziwyh4

Many people try again and again to reinvent themselves or their careers whenever there may seem to be some clouds on the horizon or when they are faced with a little bit of failure. Casey Stanton is here to help you stop the endless cycle of wasted time and energy every time you reinvent yourself. Casey is offering you the roadmap to reinventing yourself for the very last time.   Takeaways: If you keep reinventing yourself or your career, you’re going to find that it’s tough to get any traction. The traditional CMO role is the shortest-lived of any role in the C-Suite, but as a Fractional CMO, you won’t be entirely dependent on just one company. Consider what you want to be the last reinvention of yourself and try to get there so you can then have as much time as possible to become great at that one thing. There are three steps to long-term success as a Fractional CMO: 1. Elevating to the top role in marketing (the CMO); 2. Serve multiple clients; 3. Focus on solving bigger problems. Solving bigger problems is how you make the biggest impact! Regardless of where the future of business goes, whether it be Mars or Uranus, there will always be a need for CMO’s and the best way to maintain your job security as a CMO is by becoming the Fractional CMO of several companies. As a Fractional CMO, you have so much room and freedom to move and explore different industries, non-profits, etc., even if your interests or priorities change.   Quote of the Show: “Solving bigger problems is how you make the biggest impact” - Casey Stanton   Links Twitter: @CaseyStanton LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/caseystanton Website: cmox.co/invite Personal Website: CaseyStanton.com     Ways to Tune In Amazon Music Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fractional-cmo-show/id1592740671 Spotify: https://fractionalcmo.libsyn.com/spotify Google Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZnJhY3Rpb25hbGNtb3Nob3cuY29tL2ZlZWQueG1s Stitcher YouTube: https://youtu.be/J3x1gURS7kQ