Ponderings from the Perch

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing along with Dan Leadbetter as they discuss her upcoming speaking engagement in London. As she heads out to speak to marketing researchers about the future of social media she focuses on what she continues to do to disrupt the market. 

She discusses how her book of business differs from most other agency owners she meets. Any given day the team could be working content about turbo engines, chiropractic care, sheet metal or autism solutions, just to name a few. This industry diversity requires her team to stay focused on process at all times. She also gets pretty vulnerable about how she has garnered a high rate of repeat customers. Priscilla believes this is because she has consistently respected client's marketing budgets and treated their money like her own. 

They also discuss some business development issues. She gets honest about how hard it is to strike a balance between dividing her time marketing her own company and completing work for clients. Every small agency should be living in the terror of that daily decision, in her humble opinion. This involves hard conversations and daily refocusing. These powerful conversations led the Little Bird Marketing team to assess their business by understanding where their talents, services and products fall into the following five buckets:

seedingsproutinggrowingmaturingmastering Her suggested travel reading list includes: 

McCarthy's Bar by Pete McCarthy

Pink Tanks and Velvet Hangovers by Douglas Lytle

To enter the official LONDON MUG CONTEST simply email us at [email protected] with those words in the subject line and we'll let you know who wins when we end the contest on 5/31/17. 

Just for morbid curiosity, here is the link to the story of the woman who died and went unnoticed in London. 

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing and Liz Van Patten, an accomplished qualitative researcher. Her experience discovering marketing insights for companies, advertising agencies, governments and industry groups for more than 25 years has honed her skills in marketing research. They discuss the difference between qualitative and qualitative research and how they fit into concept testing/development, understanding path-to-purchase and decision-making, new product development, positioning development, communications research, and social media listening. 

As an early adopter of online qualitative research methods, Liz is an acknowledged expert in the use of asynchronous approaches such as online discussion forums, insight communities, in-depth interviews, online diaries, mobile interviews, and as well as real-time methods including webcam and text based online focus groups.

Liz's journey has run the gamut from handling focus groups with six year olds, to examining the effectiveness of copy on national brand campaigns. They discuss some of the more interesting branding and packaging work. They discuss the role of marketing research to truly deliver to brands meaningful discoveries and even get nitty gritty into some tools such as projective techniques to truly find out what people think about brands, services, projects, logos and more. They also discuss the blocks small companies have with accessing qualitative research along with the dangers of DIY models for consumer surveys. 

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing and Michael Brenner, CEO of Marketing Insider Group. Michael is a sought-after keynote speaker on Leadership, Culture, and Marketing. He is the co-author of best selling book The Content Formula.

As a recognized Top CMO Influencer, B2B Marketer, Content Marketer, and Social Media Marketer, Michael delivers insight into the content marketing industry. They discuss what it means to truly start a conversation with your brand followers and bring authenticity to marketing efforts across the board. They go deeper into the disruption that can happen when agencies and clients walk away from a simplified attempt to "just sell more" and instead create something more meaningful for better marketing. But even for those who have moved into the content marketing spaces he keenly points out that "Marketing with content is not the same as content marketing." They discuss the role of empathy in marketing as Michael alludes to this reckoning that is coming for the marketing industry which will hopefully, cut the fluff and look for better alternatives to simply buying clicks. Follow Michael on Twitter @BrennerMichael.

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing and her special guest, David Reimherr, founder of Magnificent Marketing. These two have a lot in common and a lot to talk about. They both lead a team of creatives at full-service marketing agencies with specialized expertise in content marketing. He is also the host of the Magnificent Marketing Podcast. You'll enjoy his take on mixing old school techniques with the latest and greatest marketing tools and strategies for maximum results.

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing and her special guest, Bernie Borges, CEO of Find and Convert, a content marketing agency serving B2B clients across the U.S. He is the author of Marketing 2.0, one of the first 50 books written on social media strategy. He can be found pontificating on his expertise on his podcast called Social Business Engine which can be found at http://www.socialbusinessengine.com/podcasts/. In this episode they discuss the nuance and expertise that B2B marketing efforts require including technical integrations and closed loop sales reporting. Professional businesses need to establish that professional legitimacy from the first client interaction and yet strike a very personal and human balance in the mix. As experienced B2B marketers they discuss tips and tricks to do just that. As they both lead a HubSpot certified agency they also discuss the power of fully integrated marketing dashboards. Regardless of the sophistication of integration and automation, however, they both agree that curating content with the higher purpose of being helpful to people reaps the best rewards regardless of your choice of dashboard.

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Check out important links to upcoming events mentioned in this show here:

Upcoming Lithium Webinar

https://www.lithium.com/resources/webcasts?ga-link=nav

Social Media Strategies Summit 2017 in San Francisco 2/7 - 2/9

http://socialmediastrategiessummit.com/san-francisco-2017/

Social Media Marketing Words 2017 in San Diego 3/22 - 3/24

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/smmworld/

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird and all of the creative "peeps" at Little Bird Marketing for the EXTRAVAGANZA SPECTACULAR 1st ANNUAL SUPERFLUOUS TALENT AND CHRISTMAS VARIETY SHOW! You'll laugh, you'll cry and "You'll poke your eye out kid!" Enjoy cherished Christmas memories, dramatic readings, horrible holiday jokes and musical interludes featuring the ukulele, records and of course, the autoharp. This episode features Priscilla McKinney, Dan Leadbetter, Brad Jones, Beth Claybrook, Ryan Boydston, Kahlief Steele, Amelia Hill and Leighton Cordell. The best way to spread Christmas cheer is blaring this podcast for all to hear!

Original theme music by Leighton Cordell.

DISCLAIMER: Christmas cheer varies from listener to listener. No elves were harmed in the taping of this show.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing and her special guest, Tony Cheevers. With 20 plus years experience working in sales and marketing leadership roles with global brands like Virgin, KLM, Schlumberger and the U.S. Postal Service. They talk about the reality that with social media and more sophisticated marketing dashboards, companies are getting "insights" and data about their clients. But even with this access to what only large companies could see before many companies still don't know what to DO with this information. They discuss the real difference that can be made when companies, even small companies let a professional handle their business challenges like properly formatting a customer survey, finding the right people for a focus group and so much more. At Researchscape International, he collaborates with brands and their agencies, providing "Do It For You" survey research at DIY prices. Check out their amazing menu of services at http://www.researchscape.com/shop/.

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing along with Dan Leadbetter as they ponder the modern tragedy that is the ubiquitous TO-DO LIST. As the CEO of three companies, she has learned some ways to be freakishly productive. As her reality doesn't include simply not being interrupted on a normal basis, she offers some insights about how to calendarize tasks, understand what is your "genius work", effectively delegate and maintain clarity about how to use her time wisely. She reflects on what she learned from watching her office burn to the ground and how she relies on her team to help achieve their goals. In the end, she focuses on to-do items and actions which are directly tied to actual goals. Wouldn't it be an amazing life without decision fatigue? Call us and tell us all about it. Otherwise, listen to this episode. Also, they AGAIN discuss the Shoji Tabuchi Show, which is one of their favorite topics.

Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing along with Dan Leadbetter as they gaze into the marketing crystal ball. As a keynote and breakout session speaker, Priscilla has been traveling much lately, called upon to talk mostly about the FUTURE OF MARKETING. She gives highlights from the road along with answers to some of the most frequently ask questions. Mostly, people are just confused about what is NEXT in marketing. Whether she is speaking with market researchers, app builders, small business owners, or c-level executives, they all are feeling that traditional marketing is broken. For those who have ventured heavily into digital market they are also confused about what is really working and what will work in the future. While every marketing strategy needs to be nuanced, she sticks with 3 points she believes for sure about who will WIN in the brave and bold marketing future. Here's a sneak peek at what must be done, in her humble opinion: - Brands must pay attention to changing consumer behavior - Companies must understand the meaning behind their own data - Leaders must spend their very best resources developing epic content Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.

Join Priscilla McKinney, CEO and Momma Bird at Little Bird Marketing as she interviews Vivian Blade. She is a powerful woman of experience and recognized talent management expert, working with companies to build solid and sustainable bench strength in their leadership pipeline. In her work as a consultant, author, keynote speaker, trainer and executive coach, her passion in building leaders and developing excellence empowers companies to fuel incredible leadership, and professionals to fuel incredible careers. They discuss what do do when you're not in right seat at your company, what to do when your great work is not being recognized and how to move your career forward with purpose. Vivian teaches her four principles about career development which focus on EXECUTION, REPUTATION, REACH and RELATIONSHIPS. Vivian is a prolific writer whose articles, featured in a number of professional, industry, and business publications, and published books have helped thousands of professionals succeed. She is the author of two books that reveal the inside secrets of career success: "FuelForward: Discover Proven Practices to Fuel Your Career Forward" (http://vivianblade.com/books.html), and a contributor to "Find Your Fit", a book from the Association for Talent Development (https://www.td.org/Publications/Books/find-your-fit). When you realize you are ready to be responsible for your own career, you're ready for this episode! Original theme music by the illustrious Leighton Cordell.