FIR Podcast Network

A space where leaders can grow to leave a legacy. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert Teresa De Grosbois http://aha.pub/TeresaDeGrosbois, head of the Evolutionary Business Council (EBC), a global community of speakers and influencers dedicated to teaching the principles of success.

Teresa is the number-one international bestselling author of “Mass Influence — The Habits of the Highly Influential,” which is now a bestseller in seven countries. A four-time international bestselling author, Teresa teaches marketing courses around the globe to business leaders and entrepreneurs on how to create massively successful word-of-mouth campaigns.

To learn more about Teresa De Grosbois, go to http://aha.pub/TeresaDeGrosbois. To learn more about the EBC, visit http://ebcouncil.com/apply, where you can also connect with a senior member to discuss your situation.

Here are a couple of AHA messages from this episode:

* People join the EBC because they want to change the world. They want to leave a legacy in their life. They want to make sure their life means something. https://ebcouncil.com/ @TeresaDee

* The EBC is aimed at thought leaders and people who run Impact-based businesses. We teach them to use education as the primary way of driving word-of-mouth marketing. https://ebcouncil.com/ @TeresaDee

* The EBC creates a safe space for thought leaders to do their own work. It’s important for them to have a safe place where they can ask questions they can’t ask elsewhere. https://ebcouncil.com/ @TeresaDee

* As a leader, we have our own crap to deal with in order to be authentic, congruent, and powerful. The EBC is a place to go to deal with that crap. https://ebcouncil.com/ @TeresaDee

* As you grow as a leader, social proof becomes your credibility. The credentials you have no longer matter. https://ebcouncil.com/ @TeresaDee

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, visit https://thoughtleaderlife.com.

Accelerate your business growth by closing bigger deals with bigger companies through B2B marketing. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert, Barbara Weaver Smith (http://aha.pub/BarbaraWeaverSmith), Founder and CEO of The Whale Hunters, Vice President of Entrepreneurs in Education, LLC, business consultant and coach.

Barbara conducts B2B marketing consultation and coaching for business owners from small to midsized companies. She helps them learn how to effectively land bigger deals and transform their companies. Barbara is passionate about helping her clients gain explosive results in their sales.

To learn more about Barbara, go to (http://aha.pub/BarbaraWeaverSmith). To get in touch with her, visit https://thewhalehunters.com/.

Here are a few AHA messages from this episode:

* The pain point of many business owners is that they struggle to sell bigger deals to bigger companies. #B2BMarketing https://thewhalehunters.com/ @BWeaverSmith

* #B2B marketing is a great help for many business owners to sell bigger deals to bigger companies and, in turn, grow their businesses. http://aha.pub/BarbaraWeaverSmith

* Are you working with an expert who knows about #B2BMarketing? Knowledge about B2B marketing can give a person the expertise to help business owners grow on a fast track by learning how to make big sales to big companies. https://thewhalehunters.com/ @BWeaverSmith

* #B2BMarketingStrategies can help business owners learn how to scout and #CloseBiggerDeals. Choose to work with an expert who can equip you with effective B2B marketing strategies. https://thewhalehunters.com/ @BWeaverSmith

* Doing #B2B marketing can give someone the credibility to help business owners get their companies to make big sales and #CloseBiggerDeals. Are you getting help from someone who knows about B2B marketing? http://aha.pub/BarbaraWeaverSmith

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, subscribe to the channel: http://youtube.com/user/thoughtleaderlife.

Turn your team into self-motivated individuals in order to grow your organization. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert Kevin Wayne Johnson http://aha.pub/KevinJohnson, founder and CEO of the Johnson Leadership Group.

Kevin’s mission is to train, coach, and mentor the current and next generation of leaders. Through workshops and seminars, he teaches leaders to visualize, create, and execute a customized leadership strategy to best fit their organizations’ needs.

To learn more about Kevin Wayne Johnson, go to http://aha.pub/KevinJohnson. To get in touch with him, visit https://thejohnsonleadershipgroup.com/.

Here are a couple of AHAmessages from this episode:

* The pain point of leaders in organizations is that the people they hire are not always motivated and encouraged to do a phenomenal job. Is your team inspired to work? #MotivateYourTeam http://aha.pub/KevinJohnson

* Are the people in your team self-motivated? Or is it taking a number of times to give direction for them to be motivated to move forward? #MotivateYourTeam http://aha.pub/KevinJohnson

* Self-motivated people in an organization can create the right atmosphere that is conducive for building a great team. Are your employees fulfilled? #MotivateYourTeam https://thejohnsonleadershipgroup.com/ @Writing4theLord

* Influence and not authority may be the key to successful leadership today. #MotivateYourTeam http://aha.pub/KevinJohnson

* Improving your attitude and understanding how it affects you and those around you can be the key to your leadership success. #MotivateYourTeam https://thejohnsonleadershipgroup.com/ @Writing4theLord

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, subscribe to the channel: http://youtube.com/user/thoughtleaderlife.

We thought we’d end the year with a little twist – a new, abbreviated format which we hope you’ll find easy to fit into your busy day. With EE Voice Clip we aim to answer — in under 8 minutes – a question that employee comms pros have on their minds. Sort of like a Quora for Comms.

Our first question we answer is: How can I spice up my CEO’s end-of-year letter. Sharon and I offer some ideas to consider – some creative, some more traditional. And all in six minutes.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 12:22) | Embed

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During the month of December, we always host the 12 Days of Christmas—our take on the holiday tradition and song. Because we run it all month on the blog, we thought it’d be fun to do the second, 9th, and 16th days on the podcast. If you want the entire series, pop over to Spin Sucks and sing the song along in your head with us.

On the second day of Christmas, Spin Sucks gave to you two PR trends and one mindset shift (in a pear tree).

No matter where your communications role lies, you can go into the new decade strong if you embrace these two trends: creative storytelling and the PESO model.

PR TRENDS: CREATIVE STORYTELLING

Let’s start with creative storytelling. It’s not a new trend—we’ve been talking about storytelling for a few years now—and it’s not like sitting around a campfire trying to terrify the children in your life. No, this is about storytelling that allows your customers to imagine how miserable life would be without your product or service. 

In this episode, I talk you through what that means for your organization, no matter what it does, and how you can incorporate it into your marketing efforts in 2020.

Ignore the high school English class advice you received about how to craft a story and tell one instead that is relatable.

I discuss what that looks like, how you can ignore what you know, and where you’ll have the most success.

PR TRENDS: THE PESO MODEL

The PESO model, for those of you who are not familiar is the integration of paid, earned, shared, and owned media. Traditionally, PR falls under earned media—media relations, publicity, whatever you want to call it. 

AdAge recently published an a...

Imagine this – you have a market of potential clients in which your product or service can substantially streamline their day-to-day and make their jobs easier. I bet we’d all like to be a BRD selling these clients – they’re a slam dunk. But what if I told you these potential clients have a fiduciary responsibility to serve their business and client base, and not themselves, and certainly not by adding costs from a vendor. That changes your perspective on this market, doesn’t it?

This client base is accountants and while they are excellent corporate soldiers, their access to technology that can create efficiencies may go overlooked. But, they are still human and still interact only, which is where a lot of their journey starts in simply building awareness.

In this episode of AMP Up Your Digital Marketing, we meet Andres Botero, the Chief Marketing Officer at Blackline. He discusses building brand awareness and knowledge of his products by  working in concert with sales to achieve their goal of demand generation. This groundswell approach has allowed the team at Blackline to have a crystal clear and consistent message throughout the buyer’s journey, allowing them to tap into this difficult to sell client base.

Transcript: 

Glenn: Welcome back to the show. Today we’re speaking to Andres Botero. Andres, welcome to the show.

Andres: Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Glenn: Can you tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do?

Andres: Sure. I’m a Chief Marketing Officer at Blackline and we are the leader in software for accountants for financial closing. We help accountants close the books quarterly, monthly, yearly and at the same have a life, essentially. We automate a lot of the stuff they do manually. Things that they do in Excel and they improve the quality of life and the quality of the numbers.

Glenn: And so, accounts are kind of interesting, right, because you don’t necessarily think of accountants as spending a lot of time online, but maybe I’m wrong with that. So, how do you think about marketing to accountants and where are they hanging out? How are you getting a hold of them?

Andres: Good question. That’s a misconception that accountants are not online. They are people. They are online. They are really busy. And you got to find them where they read their news, where they buy their things. You gotta find them in their offices where they spend a lot of time and nights and to be really targeted geographically in where you advertise digitally.

Glenn: And so, I understand, one of the things that you are focused on right now is integrating various components of the marketing, whether it be physical, digital, people-wise and kind of bringing that all together. How did you get to the point where you said you needed to do that and then maybe you could walk us through how you’re approaching that?

Andres: Sure. I mean, we are finding that, you know, essentially connecting to our accountants from all – in an integrated way with all the channels, we’re talking about our message and putting them in front of our – what we can do for them is powerful. We have a solution that in many cases, they don’t know that exists. They’ve been doing this job for a long time. In the same way they use Excel, they use paper. And, you know, initially, years ago, there was very little volume online. And over time we’ve been investing in awareness, we’ve been finding where they are, where they read, where they shop. And the awareness has been rising. And now we have moved to a place where they might know who we are, now we just need to get them to consider adopting something like ours. And the accountants are a group of people that are not really used to b...

Effectively address diversity to create a positive change in your organization. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert Doug Harris http://aha.pub/DougHarris, CEO of Kaleidoscope Group.

Doug helps organizations create customized strategies that address their specific and unique diversity needs. In our changing world, where differences are normal in every organization, Doug does a visionary work assessment to get to the core of these differences and turn them into something positive.

To learn more about Doug Harris, go to http://aha.pub/DougHarris. To get in touch with him, visit https://kgdiversity.com/.

Here are a couple of AHAmessages from this episode:

* The pain point of some organizations is that they have a hard time navigating and maximizing the differences in their workplace. #DiversityAndInclusion https://kgdiversity.com/ @DougHarrisKG

* The world is changing, and differences are a normal part of all organizations. Are you handling the differences in your workplace well? #DiversityAndInclusion https://kgdiversity.com/ @DougHarrisKG

* Some people may make the most out of the differences in their organizations, while others may not. Are you turning the differences in your workplace into something positive? #DiversityAndInclusion http://aha.pub/DougHarris

* Through in-person meetings, surveys, and group conversations, the organization can assess and understand its current state around #DiversityAndInclusion. This may help you create a roadmap to your desired business outcomes. http://aha.pub/DougHarris

* When you have a holistic approach to addressing diversity in your corporate environment, you can impact the workforce culture positively. #DiversityAndInclusion http://aha.pub/DougHarris

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, subscribe to the channel: http://youtube.com/user/thoughtleaderlife.

Reach your sales target through an effective sales enablement system. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert, Bob Britton (http://aha.pub/BobBritton) who builds and leads teams and companies so that they have an effective sales enablement function within their organizations that will hit their revenue targets.

Bob helps sales organizations and teams with sales optimization, cross-functional knowledge of management systems, integration of organizational development, leadership development coaching, performance improvement and paradigm alignment.

To learn more about Bob Britton, go to http://aha.pub/BobBritton. To get in touch with him, visit https://sesherpas.com/.

Here are a few AHA messages from this episode:

* The pain point of sales teams and organizations is that they have trouble meeting their top line revenue because selling has become harder in today’s sales environment. #ReachYourSalesTarget http://aha.pub/BobBritton

* Many sales organizations look at selling as climbing a ladder, but it can be more like making an ascent up a rock face, and moving left, right, and sideways. How do you #ReachYourSalesTarget? http://aha.pub/BobBritton

* Being a salesman and being in sales leadership positions for many years can give one the credibility to help organizations reach their sales targets. Consider getting an expert to help you #ReachYourSalesTarget. https://sesherpas.com/ @SherpaBob

* Sales enablement is an organizational system that can take disparate functions and make them work together. Is your sales team working together to #ReachYourSalesTarget? http://aha.pub/BobBritton

* Sales enablement is the activity of reducing the friction which can impede sales. Recognizing and addressing these friction points in sales leader behavior and messaging can help you #ReachYourSalesTarget. http://aha.pub/BobBritton

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, subscribe to the channel: http://youtube.com/user/thoughtleaderlife.

Learn the brain science behind confidence so you can be happier and more productive. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert Alyssa Dver, (http://aha.pub/AlyssaDver), who teaches CEOs, leaders, entrepreneurs and professionals how to use brain science to pitch and be confident in front of investors, customers and employees.

Alyssa teaches tactical and practical tips that enable her clients to have sustainable confidence that allows them to deliver a compelling, persuasive and influential message.

To learn more about Alyssa Dver, go to http://aha.pub/AlyssaDver. To get in touch with her, visit http://www.americanconfidenceinstitute.com/.

Here are a few AHA messages from this episode:

* The pain point of many CEOs, leaders, entrepreneurs and professionals is that they worry about work because they feel that something’s not right with them or with the people around them. #BeConfident http://www.americanconfidenceinstitute.com/ @AlyssaDver

* When you are not confident, you may want to have a new job, or you may feel stuck in your current job, or you may worry that you will lose your job, which can cause stress and less productivity. How do you handle this challenge? #BeConfident http://aha.pub/AlyssaDver

* There can be a tendency for smart people to be horrible at pitching because they may have fear inside – fear of failure, regret and rejection. If you want to succeed, #BeConfident. http://aha.pub/AlyssaDver

* Learning the brain science behind what motivates people to do things can give one the credibility to teach others how to use confidence to succeed. Consider getting someone who knows brain science to help you. http://aha.pub/AlyssaDver

* When you are confident, people trust you more. This can contribute to you becoming a successful leader or professional. How confident are you? #BeConfident http://aha.pub/AlyssaDver

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, subscribe to the channel: http://youtube.com/user/thoughtleaderlife.

Empower your speaking career by mastering the 5 M’s to become a successful speaker. This episode features #ThoughtLeader and #Expert, Brian Olds (http://aha.pub/BrianOlds), who equips, connects and inspires the next generation of black professional speakers to achieve success in their speaking journeys.

Brian helps black professional speakers connect to their target audiences by providing access to training, speaking opportunities and resources that will help improve and grow their speaking businesses.

To learn more about Brian Olds, go to http://aha.pub/BrianOlds. To get in touch with him, visit https://www.blackspeakersnetwork.com/.

Here are a few AHA messages from this episode:

* The pain point of black professional speakers is that they have a passion to speak but they struggle to connect with the audiences they are called to serve. #SuccessfulSpeakers http://aha.pub/BrianOlds

* There may be no prerequisite to becoming a professional speaker, but you can miss out on a lot of knowledge, expertise and the resources needed to stay booked consistently. Are you having a hard time getting booked? #SuccessfulSpeakers http://aha.pub/BrianOlds

* Learning about a competency model that addresses the core areas needed to be a #SuccessfulSpeaker can help you rise up in your speaking journey. Are you learning to grow and succeed? http://aha.pub/BrianOlds

* You can have a better chance of becoming a #SuccessfulSpeaker if you get clarity on these 5 M’s – your mission, message, marketing, monetization and management of your speaking business. https://www.blackspeakersnetwork.com/ @BrianJOlds

* Engaging in constant speaking engagements for many years can give one the credibility to lead other speakers on their speaking journeys. Consider getting the help of an expert to help you become a #SuccessfulSpeaker. http://aha.pub/BrianOlds

To learn more about Thought Leadership and how it can help you be successful, subscribe to the channel: http://youtube.com/user/thoughtleaderlife.