"Being data-led is core to becoming product-led…” Arpit is a non-engineer who loves data and APIs and believes that everybody, irrespective of their technical chops, should gain data literacy to stay relevant. He likes to spend his days thinking, writing in simple terms, and answering questions about data. He also firmly believes in the power of delayed gratification. In this episode we talked about how Arpit refines his ideas through writing, the importance of product analytics tools for growth marketing, what is product-led growth, the four core elements of a “data stack,” his definition of “data spaghetti,” and much more! Here are four keywords to reflect on after listening to this episode: collect, store, analyze, and activate…That’s how marketers need to use data to make it worth something… You can say “Hello” to Arpit via Twitter, LinkedIn or visit his website.

“Digital marketing is a blessing and a curse…” Maurice Bretzfield has been a lifelong Dodger fan, a raconteur, traveler, and a connoisseur of matters of the tongue, ear, and eye. He's also a blue water sailor, dad, granddad, Digital Marketing geek, consultant, mentor, and teacher. Maurice has been practicing Digital Marketing since the release of the first Web browser, Netscape, in 1994. This episode is near and dear to my heart. I don’t know how my career would look like today if I didn’t meet him—good thing I did! We talked about how he got into digital marketing, how he became my mentor, common mistakes small business owners make when trying to transition into a digital-first business, why he loves Martech, why personal branding is important, and more! Want to say to Maurice? Google his name! Or you can visit MauriceBretzfield.com or say hi on LinkedIn. Resources Mentioned: https://www.SproutSocial.com https://SearchEngineLand.com https://www.SEMRush.com https://www.Ahrefs.com https://ChiefMartec.com https://www.Lately.ai 

"It has to be true to you—it has to be real." Heather H. Bennett is a marketing strategist and personal brand coach that lives and works in Chicago, Illinois. Drawing from over 20 years of experience in brand marketing, research & development, and personal branding, Heather brings a unique spin to understanding how a personal brand can impact business and personal goals. Her social media strategy expertise has been used by professionals and entrepreneurs in areas as diversified as financial wealth management and law to non-profit and professional speaking, education and consumer products to technology and start-ups. Heather's latest book is “Fun and Fulfilling Careers One Question at a Time: A Step-by-Step Guide to Thriving in Your Personal and Professional Life” In this episode we spoke about the hardest part of getting an MBA, how she defines personal branding, why all professionals (regardless of their industry) need to establish a personal brand, why a personal brand is important for doing the job you already have, common mistakes people make in the early days of personal brand development, how ageism affects a personal brand, and more! You can connect with Heather via her website or on LinkedIn!

“At the end of the day, your business is your database.” Tracy Sheen is recognized as a Certified Practicing Marketer by the Australian Marketing Institute. She is a speaker, small business digital coach, and the author of “The End of Technophobia: a practical guide to digitizing your business”. With over 30 years of experience in marketing, sales & small business technology, Tracy works with businesses to up-skill their digital understanding. She has facilitated over 2000 workshops and webinars and is one of a handful of federally approved small business advisors. Tracy is a regular on judging panels for various Australian industry awards including the Australian Marketing Awards and the Australian Podcasting Awards. In this episode, we talk about the challenges with hosting and growing a podcast, why CRMs are vital to small businesses, why your website is your true “digital real estate,” what digital overwhelm means to her, the challenges with marketing a book, how technophobia affects small business owners today and how it could potentially affect Millennials and Gen Z professionals 30-40 years from now, and more! You can connect with Tracy on LinkedIn or her website (just remember to tell her you are coming from this podcast)!

“No one on social follows a brand to be advertised to.” As Director of Public Relations and Enterprise Social Media, Jen is responsible for protecting and improving John Deere’s reputation by leading an enterprise social media and public relations strategy for the company. Jen has over 25 years of experience in public relations, communications, and marketing with 12 of those years at John Deere. In this episode of the podcast, we talked about John Deere’s 100+ year old content marketing history, why UGC is important to incorporate into a marketing strategy, defining a community and how UGC helps with community building, how she manages JD’s social media profiles in 54 countries, her advice to entry-level marketers who want to move up in an organization, and much more! You can say hello to Jennifer on Twitter (let her know you’re coming from this podcast).

“What we do is we start small and we start today…today, now is so much better than tomorrow.” Will is an operator, advisor, and investor for early-stage companies. He has spent a decade leading strategy and ops at start-ups in NYC across a wide variety of industries. He is currently the VP of product and strategy at Rhino (sayrhino.com) and an operating partner at Lakehouse (lakehouse.vc). In this episode we discussed why Will got into the world of startups, why he has stayed at Rhino for more than 4 years, the challenges with operating in a Business-to-Business-to-Consumer business model, how Rhino grew with no revenue for the first 2 years of operation, why CAC is the North Star for startups, how to network to find the right job opportunities, and more! If you want to say “Hello!” you can connect with Will on LinkedIn and on Twitter.

“If I feel like I am getting close to perfection, it’s almost too late…will it work even it is not perfect in my eyes?” Sarah Bedrick is a marketing advisor and former VP of Marketing. She's spent the last 13 years working in SaaS startups and scaleups. Her journey includes most recently co-founding Compt, an HR software company, and building the business and marketing engine from scratch. One of her biggest career wins was starting the HubSpot Academy team and growing it into a world-class educational institution for marketing, sales, and customer success professionals. Sarah is also a new mom, loves to explore by bike, and is a life coach to fellow people in tech. In this episode, we discuss inbound marketing, what makes HubSpot Academy a great resource for marketers to get new skills, how she built Compt and Compt’s marketing engine, why she left the company she co-founded, her marketing principles, universal challenges all marketers face when launching a campaign, and more! Connect with Sarah at LinkedIn or at https://www.sarahbedrick.com/

“Belief drives behavior.” Here’s a bonus episode where I interview Todd Wheeler for a second time. If you have not listened to episode #37, do that first and then listen to this one. Topics we covered are below: Tell us a story about your most difficult client, how did you navigate that situation? What would you do differently today? What makes someone a good leader/manager? Why is consistency an important leadership trait? What litmus test or criteria can someone use to know if they should even attempt to move up the corporate ladder? When is someone ready for that coveted leadership role? Why is executive coaching helpful? When is the right time to seek an executive coach? What is the difference between engagement and compliance? Say hi to Todd via email: todd@mangagementinsight.co

“No one’s talking about how more brands should be having more fun on social media.” Shana Bull is a best-selling children's book author, freelance writer, and digital marketing educator based in the Bay Area. She is passionate about low-alcohol wines, elaborate cheese boards, and traveling on food adventures with her husband and redheaded son (the co-author of their children’s book - Randall the Blue Spider Goes Surfing). With over 12 years of social media marketing under her belt, she had a lot to share on the pod! In this episode we talk about Shana’s writing process, how she created her first children’s book, the importance of finding a mentor, how to get into creating Instagram Reels and TikTok videos, why you need to outsource the tasks you don’t want to do, and more! You can connect with Shana on Instagram, Twitter, or at http://shanabull.com.

“Our job in content marketing is to show deep expertise on all the related topics…Our job in that case is to simply be active enough to be consistently visible…” For those of you who have listened to my episodes with Araminta Roberston and Dennis Shiao, you would have heard today’s guest mentioned in both episodes! My guest today is Andy Crestodina. Andy’s the co-founder of Orbit Media, an award-winning 40-person digital agency in Chicago. Over the past 20 years, Andy has provided digital marketing advice to 1000+ businesses and written 500+ articles on content strategy, SEO, visitor psychology and analytics. He’s also the author of Content Chemistry: The Illustrated Handbook for Content Marketing. In this episode we talk about why seeking projects leads to more work than seeking a job, his definition of content strategy, the importance of original research as the best form of content, how he has developed his personal brand, and much much more! You can connect with Andy on LinkedIn and on Twitter. Resources mentioned: The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help by Amanda Palmer If you want to support this podcast go here: https://anchor.fm/kennysoto/support