Marketing Powerups

Most buyer personas are useless. They often have a quirky name like “Mark the Marketer,” and some info like:

• 37 years old
• Married for 8 years, 2 kids
• A mid-level manager at a tech company

The problem with this? Mark isn’t real!

Adrienne is on a mission to help businesses create actionable, data-backed, and needle-moving buyer personas that win more business.

In this Marketing Powerups episode, you’ll learn:

1. What’s wrong with how most marketers create buyer personas
2. The 4 R’s to the best buyer persona
3. Adrienne’s advice to young marketers about building confidence

🏆 Free powerups cheatsheet

Download a free powerups cheatsheet you can fill in and apply Adrienne's best buyer persona template to your business right away. https://marketingpowerups.com/007

🎉 About Adrienne Barnes

Adrienne Barnes is the Principal Researcher and Founder of http://Bestbuyerpersona.com, founded in 2018 to help SaaS companies define their best buyers using the Jobs to be Done framework. And help companies push past growth stalls. She’s recently spoken at Harvard University and the Business of Software Conference.

💪 The sponsor

I want to thank the sponsor of this episode, 42/Agency.

When you're in scale-up mode, and you have KPIs to hit, the pressure is on to deliver demos and signups.

And it's a lot to handle: demand gen, email sequences, revenue ops, and more! That’s where 42/Agency, founded by my friend Kamil Rextin, can help you.

They’re a strategic partner that’s helped B2B SaaS companies like ProfitWell, Teamwork, Sprout Social and Hubdoc build a predictable revenue engine.

If you’re looking for performance experts and creatives to solve your marketing problems at a fraction of the cost of in-house, look no further.

Go to https://www.42agency.com/ to talk to a strategist to learn how you can build a high-efficiency revenue engine now.

🕰️ Timestamps and transcript

• 02:20 - The reasons why most buyer personas lead to bias
• 07:44 - Adrienne's process for creating useful buyer personas
• 11:32 - My number one recommended demand gen agency
• 12:43 - The 4 R's of useful buyer personas
• 17:20 - How many buyer personas should B2B companies have?
• 19:40 - A career powerup that's helped Adrienne transition from teaching to marketing
• 24:13 - What advice would Adrienne give her younger self?

✨ Useful links

• 👨🏽‍💻 Best Buyer Persona website
• 🪄 Adrienne's personal website
• ✉ Growth insights️
• 🐦 Twitter
• 🔗 LinkedIn

Community” has become a buzzword in the tech world. Like most things, it’s easier said than done.

Much like a gardener taking care of an orchard of juicy vegetables and fruits, building, nurturing, and growing a thriving community takes a special skill.

One of those community-building experts is Jay Clouse, he started working at Startup Weekend as an organizer. Then the community he created got acquired by Pat Flynn’s Smart Passive Income. Now he’s the founder of Creator Science, a thriving community of professional creators (full disclosure: I'm a member of his community!).

Today, Jay will be sharing the three elements of world-class community experiences.

In this Marketing Powerups episode, you’ll learn:

1. Why community is not a broadcast channel.
2. The three main primary reasons why people join communities.
3. How to create a welcoming experience for new community members.
4. The one thing that’s helped Jay excel as a professional creator.

🏆 Free powerups cheatsheet

Download a free powerups cheatsheet you can fill in and apply Jay Clouse's 3 elements of world-class community experiences to your business right away: https://marketingpowerups.com/006

🎉 About Jay Clouse

Jay Clouse is the founder of Creator Science and the host of Creative Elements, a narrative-interview podcast going behind the scenes of today’s top creators. He previously led the Community Experience team for Pat Flynn and Smart Passive Income, designing their paid membership community and cohort-based course programs.

💪 The sponsor

I want to thank the sponsor of this episode, 42/Agency.

When you're in scale-up mode, and you have KPIs to hit, the pressure is on to deliver demos and signups.

And it's a lot to handle: demand gen, email sequences, revenue ops, and more! That’s where 42/Agency, founded by my friend Kamil Rextin, can help you.

They’re a strategic partner that’s helped B2B SaaS companies like ProfitWell, Teamwork, Sprout Social and Hubdoc build a predictable revenue engine.

If you’re looking for performance experts and creatives to solve your marketing problems at a fraction of the cost of in-house, look no further.

Go to https://www.42agency.com/ to talk to a strategist to learn how you can build a high-efficiency revenue engine now.

🕰️ Timestamps and transcript

• 02:33 - Jay's journey as a community builder
• 07:24 - Peer-to-peer community experiences
• 09:21 - The three elements of world-class community experiences
• 11:05 - The three reasons why people join communities
• 14:02 - Why connecting like-minded people is table stakes for communities
• 17:33 - How to onboard new community members
• 22:55 - The most important question when onboarding new community members
• 24:01 - How to measure community happiness
• 27:27 - Why tracking community engagement metrics doesn't always work
• 29:06 - How the power of belief accelerated Jay's career
• 33:16 - The two pieces of advice Jay would give his younger self
• 37:35 - Wrapping up

Did you know your thumbs travel two marathons a year scrolling through social media, news articles, and shopping sites on your phone? 👍

Katelyn Bourgoin, CEO of Customer Camp, explains why creating thumb-stopping content is tricky:

It’s why Katelyn came up with the 5 F’s of creating un-ignorable content to help you grab your target buyer’s attention and get them to pay attention to your marketing.

In this Marketing Powerups episode, you’ll learn:

1. The 5 F's of attention.
2. Real-world examples of each of those F's.
3. One piece of tip that helped accelerate Katelyn's career.

🎉 About Katelyn Bourgoin

Katelyn Bourgoin is the CEO and Lead Trainer at Customer Camp, a company dedicated to helping its clients better understand buyer psychology. Her wealth of experience in marketing and customer research has earned her the nickname of ‘Customer Whisperer.’ She’s the creator of the Why We Buy newsletter, one of the top newsletters for marketers, according to Forbes.

🏆 Free powerups cheatsheet

Download a free powerups cheatsheet of Katelyn's 5 F's of un-ignorable content that you can fill in and apply the framework to your business right away.

💪 The sponsor

I want to thank the sponsor of this episode, 42/Agency.

When you're in scale-up mode, and you have KPIs to hit, the pressure is on to deliver demos and signups.

And it's a lot to handle: demand gen, email sequences, revenue ops, and more! That’s where 42/Agency, founded by my friend Kamil Rextin, can help you.

They’re a strategic partner that’s helped B2B SaaS companies like ProfitWell, Teamwork, Sprout Social and Hubdoc build a predictable revenue engine.

If you’re looking for performance experts and creatives to solve your marketing problems at a fraction of the cost of in-house, look no further.

Go to https://www.42agency.com/ to talk to a strategist to learn how you can build a high-efficiency revenue engine now.

🕰️ Timestamps and transcript

• 01:35 - Why creating thumb-stopping content is hard
• 05:22 - Fears: how to capture attention with fear
• 08:37 - FOBO: fear of being outdone
• 10:52 - Future me: helping people see what they become
• 12:56 - Nike’s ad that shows your true possibility
• 14:30 - How 42/Agency can help scale your growth
• 15:30 - Fables: telling stories that capture the attention
• 18:05 - Foreign: The Von Restroff Effect
• 22:30 - Faces: how to grab attention with faces
• 28:39 - A career power-up that’s helped Katelyn’s career

If you’re trying to solve a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle, you can just try jamming pieces together. That could take you days or weeks. But, if you approach it with a framework or mental model (like starting off with the edges), you can increase your chances of success sooner rather than later.

That’s true for marketing too.

Marketing mental models and frameworks give you the shortcut to success.

That’s where Corey Haines comes in. He’s the Co-Founder of SwipeWell and has consulted and worked with dozens of startups, including SavvyCal, Riverside.fm, and Baremetrics.

And he’s a huge fan of mental models for marketers. He’s even created a whole course about it!

Today, we’ll dig into one of his favorite mental models, Second Order Thinking, which will help you create more bulletproof Marketing plans… like New from the movie The Matrix.

In this Marketing Powerups episode, you’ll learn:

• What is the Second Order Thinking mental model
• Three ways marketers can apply second-order thinking to their weekly and quarterly planning
• How Corey applied the second order thinking to SwipeWell’s embed feature
• Why starting more side projects can help accelerate your marketing career

🏆 Free powerups cheatsheet

Download a free powerups cheatsheet of the marketing-led SEO strategy that you can fill in and apply the framework to your business right away.

🎉 About Corey Haines

Corey Haines is the founder of the Swipe Files community and SwipeWell app. Previously, Corey was the Head of Growth at Baremetrics and is the current Marketing Lead at SavvyCal. He’s consulted with dozens of startups on marketing and growth, including SavvyCal, Evercast, Riverside.fm, Holloway, Beamer, and Timetastic.

🕰️ Timestamps and transcript

• 01:45 - How the Second-Order Thinking Model could have helped Baremetrics release a better freemium plan
• 05:58 - What is the “Second-Order Thinking” mental model for marketers?
• 11:42 - How Corey applied the Second-Order Thinking Mental model to SwipeWell
• 18:56 - What are practical ways marketers can start using the Second-Order Thinking mental model in their day-to-day work?
• 24:05 - Side projects helped accelerate Corey’s marketing career
• 26:30 - Doing more projects increases your luck surface area
• 28:20 - One piece of advice Corey would give his younger self: Do more stuff outside of marketing
• 30:50 - The importance of building a “personal moat”

💪 The sponsor

I want to thank the sponsor of this episode, 42/Agency.

When you're in scale-up mode, and you have KPIs to hit... the pressure is on to deliver demos and signups.

And it's a lot to handle: demand gen, email sequences, revenue ops, and more! That’s where 42/Agency, founded by my friend Kamil Rextin, can help you.

They’re a strategic partner that’s helped B2B SaaS companies like ProfitWell, Teamwork, Sprout Social and Hubdoc build a predictable revenue engine.

If you’re looking for performance experts and creatives to solve your marketing problems at a fraction of the cost of in-house, look no further.

Go to https://www.42agency.com/ to talk to a strategist to learn how you can build a high-efficiency revenue engine now.

✨ Useful links

• 👨🏽‍💻 SwipeWell's website
• ✉️ Swipe File community
• 🐦 Corey on Twitter
• 🔗 Corey on LinkedIn

Leading marketing at a growing startup feels like a chicken running around with its head cut off. That’s exactly what Georgiana (or Gia) Laudi felt like when she was hired as the marketing hire at Unbounce:

I was in a similar situation when I joined to lead marketing at a startup many years ago. It often felt like throwing spaghetti at the wall—paid ads, social, content, blog posts, and SEO… There ws a LOT!

Luckily Gia and Claire Suellentrope (the co-founders of Forget the Funnel) came up with a solution.

After helping startups like Sprout Social, FullStory, Wistia, Appcues, SparkToro, and many dozens more, they came up with the 3-phase Customer-Led Growth framework, which gives marketing teams a systematic, repeatable method to hit ambitious revenue targets.

In this Marketing Powerups episode, you’ll learn:

1. How a trip to Airbnbs’ San Francisco office gave Gia the “Aha!” moment to develop the Customer-Led Growth Framework.
2. The three phases of the Customer-Led Growth Framework.
3. How she helped MeetEdgar’s team increase their free-to-paid conversion rate by 40% using the Customer-Led Growth Framework.
4. The one thing Gia wished she had done more early in her marketing career.

🎉 About Georgiana Laudi

Georgiana (Gia) Laudi is the co-founder and CEO of a consultancy called Forget The Funnel, where she helps SaaS companies scale and improve conversion rates through customer-led growth. She’s also a marketing and growth advisor to companies like MarketerHire, SparkToro, and Sprout Social. Previously, she was the VP of Marketing at Unbounce and has worked in growth marketing for over 20 years.

🕰️ Timestamps

• 02:32 - Why leading marketing in a startup feels like running around like a chicken with its head cutoff
• 06:15 - Why do startup marketers feel like they have to throw spaghetti at the wall?
• 11:12 - How a trip to Airbnb's San Francisco office gave Gia an “Aha!” moment about the customer-led growth framework
• 16:15 - What does an MQL even mean?
• 19:45 - The valuable things marketers can gain by getting inside their best customer’s heads
• 25:35 - How Gia and Claire applied the Customer-Led Growth framework to SparkToro and MeetEdgar
• 30:05 - A review of the MeetEdgar homepage’s messaging
• 32:15 - The Forget the Funnel book
• 33:10 - A career power-up that’s helped accelerate Gia’s marketing career
• 35:25 - Gia’s one piece of advice to her younger self

💪 The sponsor

I want to thank the sponsor of this episode, 42/Agency.

When you're in scale-up mode, and you have KPIs to hit... the pressure is on to deliver demos and signups.

And it's a lot to handle: demand gen, email sequences, revenue ops, and more! That’s where 42/Agency, founded by my friend Kamil Rextin, can help you.

They’re a strategic partner that’s helped B2B SaaS companies like ProfitWell, Teamwork, Sprout Social and Hubdoc build a predictable revenue engine.

If you’re looking for performance experts and creatives to solve your marketing problems at a fraction of the cost of in-house, look no further.

Go to https://www.42agency.com/ to talk to a strategist to learn how you can build a high-efficiency revenue engine now.

✨ Useful links

• 👨🏽‍💻 Forget the Funnel website
• ✉️ Forget the Funnel book
• 🤔 What is Customer-Led Growth?
• 🐦 Gia on Twitter
• 🔗 Gia on LinkedIn

A few decades ago, you’d go to the library to research a topic. Now, you just have to open up your browser, go to Google.com, and go through the search results.

As a business, ranking higher on the search results page could drive hundreds, thousands, or even millions of visitors a month to your website—which could be worth big money with the right conversion strategy.

So, the question is, how do you rank higher on search engines?

Well, no one really knows because Google doesn’t explicitly share its algorithm.

But there are people who have cracked the code and have figured out strategies to rank number one on Google consistently.

One of those people is Kevin Indig. He’s worked with Dailymotion, Atlassian, G2, Snapchat, and Shopify as a search engine optimizer.

Today, Kevin shares the marketing-led SEO strategy that Adobe used to double its organic traffic in 12 months.

In this Marketing Powerups episode, you'll learn:

1. The difference between product-led and marketing-led SEO.
2. The top marketing-led SEO growth levers.
3. Adobe’s winning organic growth strategy.
4. Two things that have helped accelerate Kevin’s career.

🎉 About Kevin Indig

Kevin Indig is a strategic Growth Advisor, creator of the Growth Memo newsletter and host of the Tech Bound podcast. He ran SEO organizations for companies like Shopify, G2 and Atlassian, advises big brands like Snapchat, Ramp, Riverside, and Finder and is an active angel investor.

🕰️ Timestamps

• 02:01 - What’s the difference between product-led and marketing-led SEO?
• 03:50 - What are common marketing-led SEO levers?
• 08:50 - Timely vs. evergreen SEO content and low-frequency vs. high-frequency content
• 10:31 - Why coining terms can be an unfair SEO advantage
• 13:53 - How amplifying trust is important
• 18:27 - How Adobe doubled its traffic using marketing-led SEO levers
• 22:01 - How Adobe uses product-led SEO strategies to grow its organic traffic
• 24:40 - How Adobe is distributing its content effectively
• 28:47 - Two things that have helped accelerate Kevin’s career
• 31:29 - One piece of advice Kevin would give his younger self

💪 The sponsor

I want to thank the sponsor of this episode, 42/Agency.

When you're in scale-up mode, and you have KPIs to hit... the pressure is on to deliver demos and signups.

And it's a lot to handle: demand gen, email sequences, revenue ops, and more! That’s where 42/Agency, founded by my friend Kamil Rextin, can help you.

They’re a strategic partner that’s helped B2B SaaS companies like ProfitWell, Teamwork, Sprout Social and Hubdoc build a predictable revenue engine.

If you’re looking for performance experts and creatives to solve your marketing problems at a fraction of the cost of in-house, look no further.

Go to https://www.42agency.com/ to talk to a strategist to learn how you can build a high-efficiency revenue engine now.

✨ Useful links

• 👨🏽‍💻 Kevin Indig's website
• ✉️ Growth Memo newsletter
• 🛠 An introduction to Integrator SEO strategies️
• 📈 How Adobe unlocked new SEO Growth
• 🐦 Kevin on Twitter
• 🔗 Kevin on LinkedIn

Marketing a product without a clear positioning and messaging is like building a house on soft sand... during the hurricane season! It’ll eventually all come tumbling down.

And THE book on product positioning is April Dunford’s Obviously Awesome! If you’re a marketer and you haven’t read it yet, stop right now and buy it.

But did you know she may be working on a new book, a sequel to Obviously Awesome?

I'm excited to dig into April’s four-part product storytelling framework that sells. 

In this episode of Marketing Powerups, you’ll learn:

• Why “The Hero’s Journey” story framework isn’t effective at closing deals.
• April’s 4-part product story framework.
• How HelpScout pitches its product using this framework.
• April’s one piece of advice to help marketers accelerate their careers.

If you’re trying to solve a Rubik’s cube, you can just try and guess. But that could take days or even weeks to figure out. 

But having a proven framework is like having a cheatcode to get to success faster.

That’s true for marketing as well.

Marketing frameworks, techniques, and mental models can give you the shortcut to success sooner rather than later.

And that’s what this Show is all about.

Marketing Powerups is a show for marketers looking to power up their marketing and career to the next level. 

Each week, I interview world-class marketers to uncover three things:

1. A marketing framework, strategy, or technique behind their wins
2. An practical example of that powerup in action
3. A career powerup or tip that’s helped them take their marketing career to the next level

Some of the marketing powerups that I’ll cover in this show include

• April Dunford’s 4-part product storytelling framework
• Kevin Indig’s marketing-led SEO approach
• Gia Laudi’s 3-phase customer-led growth framework
• Corey Haines’ Second-Order Thinking mental model for marketers

Here’s my promise to you with this show:

Marketing Powerups is a zero-fluff, value-packed show that will help you step up your marketing game, level up your career, and become the best you can be.

For each episode, I create a powerups cheatsheet so you can download, fill in, and apply the marketing concepts to your business right away!

Go to marketingpowerups.com to get those right now.

Follow and subscribe now on Apple Podcast, Spotify, and YouTube.

Are you ready?

Let’s go!