ProductLed Podcast

While the concept of a growth leader is new, it is something Andrew Capland knows like the back of his hand. Andrew is the head of growth at Postcript, the SMS marketing product for growing Shopify stores. In this episode, Andrew shared his thoughts on mentorship, the top skills growth people have, and the biggest challenge one experiences when making a transition. Show Notes [02:42] How he got into growth [06:36] Top skills growth people have [09:00] How he learns how to learn [12:42] Landmines people that are new in a company should look at [13:53] How to know when to move on to the next job or next opportunity [15:54] Impactful books he has taken to heart [17:25] Biggest challenge when making a transition [19:07] His thoughts on mentorship [22:38] How he started giving back [25:15] His advice to his younger self/others in terms of growth [27:05] How he gets over the fear of failing [28:15] Where people can find out more about him About Andrew Capland Andrew Capland is the head of Growth at Postsciript, an SMS marketing product for growing Shopify stores. He is also the founder of Delivering Value where he coaches growth marketers and product growth managers. Andrew has spent more than a decade working in the SaaS marketing tech. While he has handled many roles, he specializes in growth.  Links PostscriptWistiaHubspotDelivering Value Books Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your HumanityLeadership and Self Deception: Getting Out of the Box by the Arbinger InstituteEleven Rings: The Soul of Success by Phil Jackson Profile Andrew Capland on LinkedInAndrew Capland on Medium

If you are interested in the psychology behind good product marketing, consider this episode a must hear! Today’s guest is Phill Agnew, the director of product marketing at Brandwatch, the world’s leading social intelligence company. In this episode, Phill shares the importance of behavioral psychology, how brands can avoid the herd mentality, and his thoughts on the use of the scarcity method/principle in marketing.  Show Notes [02:15] What a lot of studies on consumer psychology suggest [02:57] What Brandwatch is and what he does as director of product marketing [03:50] How he fell into the role  [04:50] Why most product marketers don’t understand the customers very well [06:39] The importance of behavioral psychology [08:47] What he meant by distinctiveness [12:30] How brands can avoid the herd mentality [16:15] What being distinct really is all about [18:35] What anchoring is and a few examples of anchoring [23:36] How anchoring can be applied to online businesses [31:00] His thoughts on the use of the scarcity method in marketing [33:40] His one (or two) piece of advice for marketers [36:27] Where people can find him About Phill Agnew Phill Agnew is the director of product marketing at Brandwatch. Phill’s experience is in product marketing and he specializes in consumer behavior. Phill is also the host of Nudge Podcast, the only podcast dedicated to consumer psychology. Phill is also a keen writer and an avid public speaker with interests in brand development, product marketing, and entrepreneurialism. Links NikeUnileverJohnson & JohnsonFordCrystlerLand Rover Burger KingFour Seasons HotelHilton Hotels and Resorts SnickersSupremeKFCDriftNudge PodcastProduct Marketing SummitThe Ikea EffectFOMO (Fear of Missing Out)The Herd Mentality Scarcity Marketing Books Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen by Christopher McDougallThinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel KahnemanMessengers: Who We Listen To, Who We Don’t, and Why by Stephen Martin and Joseph Marks Profile BrandwatchPhill Agnew on LinkedInPhill Agnew on Twitter

Today’s guest is Gen Furukawa, the founder of Retainable. Retainable is an amazing platform designed to help businesses grow stronger by reducing employee turnover, increasing retention, and driving employee advocacy. In this episode, Gen shares his approach to marketing, how he started building products, and his thoughts on paid campaigns. Show Notes [02:28] How he started building products and what his journey has been like [05:53] His approach to marketing [07:49] How he prioritizes who to reach out to first [10:35] An example of a LinkedIn strategy that works [14:47] Strategies he has seen that does not work for early stage startup marketing [18:04] Few things that really worked in Jungle Scout in terms of traffic, leads, and customers [21:10] Marketing stuff that didn’t work [22:19] His thoughts on paid campaigns [25:12] His piece of advice for founders of product-led businesses [26:58] Groups he’s a part of [28:35] Where people can find him online About Gen Furukawa Gen Furukawa is the founder of Retainable, an innovative platform that helps businesses grow stronger by increasing retention, driving employee advocacy, and reducing employee turnover. He is also the co-founder of Prehook, the perfect customer experience and recommendation engine. Gen is also the co-host of the podcast CartOverflow.com where he interviews interesting guests like service providers, operators, agencies, and SaaS folks.  Links AmazonJungle ScoutShopifyChrome ExtensionLinkedInGrowth Marketing Today with Ramli JohnProduct-Led Growth CollectiveTrends Profile Gen Furukawa on LinkedInGen Furukawa on TwitterCartOverflow.com (Podcast)RetainablePrehook

Over the course of a few months, Wes Bush and Ramli John have been working on the Product-Led Certification Programs. In this episode, they discussed all you need to know about the programs. Wes is the author of the bestselling book “Product-Led Growth: How to Build a Product that Sells Itself.” Wes is best known for challenging how SaaS leaders approach growth. Wes is also the founder of the Product-Led Institute and one of the hosts of the Product-led Summit podcast. Ramli John is a Product-Led educator and consultant. He is also the host and founder of the “Growth Marketing Today” podcast, where he has interviewed experts like Hiten Shah, April Dunford, and Rand Fishkin. Ramli also helps SaaS companies optimize their retention rates and their user onboarding flow. In this special episode, Wes and Ramli tackled all there is to know about their Product-Led Certification Program—the reason they split it into two, quick overviews of each program, and the benefits of applying as a team, among many others. Show Notes [01:28] Why they split the program into two [03:59] A quick overview of the Product-Led Transformer Program [06:24] A quick overview of Product Onboarding [10:02] How they determine the right fit for the programs [11:34] How their calls and mastermind sessions are typically structured [11:59] Their program’s big differentiating factor [12:36] What their “Expert Series” is all about [14:00] The benefits of joining masterminds [15:20] Estimated time people will spend on the program [16:40] How the certification program is different from the book on Product-Led Growth [18:04] The benefits of applying as a team [23:39] Other things they want to touch on regarding the program [25:15] How people can reach out to them if they have questions Links Patrick Campbell, Founder and CEO at ProfitWellJaqueline Cook, Chief Strategy Officer at Vendasta Profile 6-Week Product-Led Certification Programs 

If you’re interested in product-led sales, you’ll definitely love this episode. Today’s guest is the founder and CEO of Dooly, hailed as the fastest way to update Salesforce, take sales notes, and effortlessly manage all deals so nothing slips through the cracks. Today's guest is no less than Dooly's founder and CEO, Kris Hartvigsen. In this episode, Kris shares how he transitioned from sales to founder of Dooly, how he sees product-led growth fuelling and helping enterprise sales, and what happens when a product qualified opportunity comes through. Show Notes [00:45] How his progression from sales to founder happened [03:58] What Dooly is all about [05:27] How he sees product-led growth fuelling and helping enterprise sales [07:10] How he defines product-led sales [08:55] What PQO stands for and what it’s all about [09:15] Why 5 is the sweet spot for them [11:58] Why they get sales involved relatively early [13:00] What happens when a product qualified opportunity comes through [15:51] What he’ll tell organizations that claim they are product-led [16:59] What the hand off to the sales team looks like [21:09] His advice to organizations that are transitioning to product-led [23:13] Where people can find him online About Kris Hartvigsen Kris Hartvigsen is the CEO and founder of Dooly, a computer software that captures and actions customer conversations, solves challenges that affect customer-facing teams, and analyzes and acts on them. From administrative work like Salesforce updates to deal supporting tools, Dooly automates the sales process by moving information to and from the customer in real-time. Dooly was built with the users in mind and its end goal is simple: provide users with the freedom to sell. Links Vision CriticalSlackZoomSalesforce Profile DoolyDooly on LinkedInDooly on TwitterKris Hartvigsen on LinkedInDooly's Email Address: info@dooly.ai

Vivek Balasubramanian, Director of growth at Wave, discusses the challenges of unifying product, growth, and marketing. He shares insights on FAE, determining the first activation event for users, and how the product team has changed since embracing the FAE framework. He also talks about experiments they've implemented and the importance of optimizing post-FAE drop-offs.

When it comes to optimizing the customer experience, today's guest is a pro. Shareil Nariman is Sprout Social’s program manager for customer onboarding and life cycle. Sprout Social is a software that helps organizations of all sizes become better marketers and create the world’s most beloved brands. In this episode, Shareil shared how the onboarding process at Sprout Social has evolved, what their onboarding experience looks like now, and his advice to marketers who want to improve their onboarding experience. Show Notes [00:41] What Sprout Social is [02:01] What the onboarding was like before they improved it [03:58] First few things they focused on when they improved the onboarding process [07:38] What a successful onboarding looks like [09:06] How they defined value for customer onboarding [11:36] What their onboarding experience looks like now [13:14] The evolution of their onboarding process [14:43] What their webinar looks like [16:17] Some of the things he optimized in the program [18:23] What qualifies a customer to be reached out to for those one-on-one calls [19:54] The mechanics of their onboarding guild  [21:15] Things he wished he knew about customer onboarding [23:04 His advice for marketers who are looking to improve their customer onboarding [24:34] Where people can find out more about him and Sprout Social About Shareil Nariman Shareil Nariman is Sprout Social’s program manager for customer onboading and customer lifecycle. He has spent the last 9 years exploring the customer experience to set people up for long-term success. He has also built programs, hired and managed teams, and worked closely with product organizations and marketing to ensure the customer experience is positive and consistent all throughout. Links InstagramFacebookTwitterPinterestBooking.comPendo Profile Sprout SocialSprout Social on LinkedInSprout Social on TwitterSprout Social on InstagramSprout Social on FacebookSprout Social on PinterestSprout Social YouTube ChannelShareil Nariman on TwitterShareil Nariman on LinkedIn 

Today’s accomplished guest is a self-taught entrepreneur who ran and grew a marketing agency for 10 years before starting Hull, a powerful customer data platform designed for high growth companies. Firms that use Hull orchestrate their marketing stacks and growth by collecting, enriching, and synchronizing customer data across all their services in real time. In this episode, Romain shared why they decided to offer free trial, the experiments they did and how it affected their marketing, and why they chose to offer free trial as opposed to other options. Show Notes [00:50] What Hull is and why he decided to start it in the first place [04:11] Why they decided to offer free trial [06:59] What the first attempt looked like for Hull [11:55] How he identified the end value [14:00] The main driver behind people not understanding their problems [17:59] How the experiments they did affected how they market their product [19:19] Why they opted to do free trial as opposed to freemium or some other hybrid model [23:19] How they help people get to a conclusion faster [27:46] What he’ll do differently if he’ll launch the free trial again [31:20] His thoughts on free trial and product-led growth [33:14] How he makes decisions [37:10] Where people can find out more about Hull and what he’s up to About Romain Dardour Romain Dardour is an entrepreneur, self-taught developer, designer, and problem-solver. He is also the co-founder and CEO of Hull, a customer data platform that helps brands create meaningful relationships with their customers by understanding who they are, what they do, and revealing novel insights that can help them personalize experiences at scale. Links HubSpotAmplitude Profile HullHull on LinkedInHull BlogRomain Dardour on LinkedInRomain Dardour on Twitter

The entrepreneurial journey of today’s brilliant guest has been an interesting one—from product manager to founder and chief strategist of ProductPlan. ProductPlan is a roadmap software used by thousands of product teams at the world’s leading companies to power their product roadmaps. In this episode, Jim Semick shared what the journey of starting and scaling a product-led company has been like. He also covered other engrossing topics like product-market fit, the role of pricing, and how product management has changed over the years. Show Notes [00:33] Why he founded ProductPlan [02:47] What his WHY was for starting the company [05:18] How has product management changed over the years [08:41] His market validation process [13:00] His definition of product-market fit [18:56] What the transition to self-service has been like  [21:18] The biggest challenge they have encountered [24:20] One thing he’ll do differently knowing what he knows now [27:07] The role of pricing in a product-led business [28:56] When they decided to have someone in sales [32:02] How they went about hiring their first sales person [34:31] How they are different compared to the traditional sales-led companies [36:50] How their compensation model has changed [38:29] Where people can go to learn more about him and ProductPlan About Jim Semick Jim Semick is a mentor, speaker, and entrepreneur. He has also written books on Product Roadmaps, Product Leadership, and Product-Market Fit. Jim is also the co-founder and chief strategist of ProductPlan, the world’s leading roadmap software. ProductPlan makes roadmapping collaborative, transparent, and easy. Today, leading companies like PBS, Nike, Intuit, and Alaska Airlines has been relying on ProductPlan to guide their product decisions daily.  Links GoToMyPCGoToMeetingGoToWebinarAppFolioHubSpot Profile Jim Semick on LinkedInProductPlanProductPlan BlogProductPlan ResourcesProductPlan on FacebookProductPlan on TwitterProductPlan on YouTube

Creating a great customer experience for Jungle Scout users has been challenging but Danny Villarreal makes it look easy! Danny is the director of customer success and experience at Jungle Scout, the all-in-one platform for selling on Amazon. Danny is responsible for the training, onboarding, adoption, and retention, among many others. In this episode, Danny shared how they addressed the challenges they encountered, the metrics they looked into, and his advice to other product-led companies to improve their onboarding and customer experience. Show Notes [00:42] What Jungle Scout is and what his role there is [01:36] Challenges his team encountered when new users logged in for the first time [03:26] How he figured out the aha moment for each of the segments that signed out [05:23] How they customised the experience for the different types of personas that were logging in for the first time [06:47] How they delivered the live instruction [07:46] How big the calls were [08:40] How they got hundreds of people to sign up [11:06] What the structures of the calls look like [13:46] Other aspects they’ve experimented to improve [16:27] Metrics they took into account [19:08] When their onboarding is completed [20:32] When they realised the need to translate the onboarding experience for the Chinese market [23:01] Results they got after they translated the onboarding for the Chinese market [24:57] How they tweaked the onboarding for the Chinese market [26:49] His advice for those product-led companies in terms of improving their customer experience and onboarding [28:13] Where people can find out more about his work and Jungle Scout About Danny Villarreal Danny Villarreal is the director of customer success and experience at Jungle Scout, the all-in-one platform for finding, launching, and selling Amazon products. Trusted by 400,000 Amazon sellers, the platform also offers step-by-step guides and exclusive tutorials that teach you the ins and outs of Amazon. Links AmazonPendoAlipayWeChat Profile Danny Villarreal on LinkedInJungle ScoutJungle Scout on Facebook