Remarkable Content with Ian Faison

Marketing is already pretty difficult. But when you can’t get buy-in from your boss, it becomes near-impossible. 

So what happens when you have a bad boss who doesn’t understand what you’re doing? Well, you have to learn to communicate with them. You have to learn to market to them.

This week, we’re looking at HBO’s “Succession.” Its main character, Logan Roy, is about as bad of a boss as it gets. His toxic leadership drives a cruel culture of power, hunger, and cold-blooded backstabbing. But whether his employees – who are also his children – achieve their goals is another thing altogether. 

Here to talk us through the marketing lessons from “Succession” is Tom Butta. Tom is a nine-time CMO and current Chief Strategy and Marketing Officer of Airship, a mobile app experience company. Aside from being a fan of “Succession,” Butta is an experienced executive who has worked to create billions of dollars of enterprise value for companies like SignalFx, Sprinklr, and RedHat. He’s also had his fair share of bad bosses.

With his help, we’re showing you how to put your message in terms your boss will understand, paint a picture of the future state, and choose the right person to pitch the idea to your boss.

About “Succession”

“Succession” is an HBO drama/comedy series that premiered in 2018. Its fourth and final season premieres March 26.The show stars Brian Cox as Logan Roy, with Jeremy Strong, Kieran Culkin, Alan Ruck and Sarah Snook playing his children, Kendall, Roman, Connor, and Siobhan, respectively. Matthew Macfadyen and Nicholas Braun also star in the show as fan favorites, Tom Wambsgans, Siobhan’s husband, and Greg Hirsch (lovingly known as “Cousin Greg”). 

“Succession” follows the story of Logan Roy, who is the head of the media conglomerate Waystar Royco. As he surpasses his eightieth birthday, he’s considering who will take over for him. The obvious choice is his eldest son, Kendall, who struggles to solidify his place as heir. But the remaining children also vie for the top place at Waystar Royco, pitting them against each other.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From “Succession”:

• Put your message in terms your boss will understand. You can rattle off whatever marketing jargon you want to your boss, but all the acronyms in the world may not be enough. Instead, you need to tailor your messaging to your boss. Learn what’s important to them, familiarize yourself with their priorities, and put things in terms your boss will understand. In “Succession,” each of the Roy children struggle to convince their father they’re the best heir for Waystar Royco – because they don’t know how to relate to him. The same thing happened to Butta: when his former employer was in danger of going out of business, Butta knew he needed to appeal to his boss with an idea to save the company. Butta did some reconnaissance to learn just what made his boss tick. Butta says he figured out that his former boss was a competitive salesman at heart – and that his boss was frustrated because his company didn’t have “a seat at the table” with big companies like Salesforce and Oracle. When he spent time talking to his boss to understand where he was coming from, Butta could then appeal to this desire in order to get him on board with the idea that ultimately saved the company from going under.

“When you visualize what a future state can look like, sometimes you can feel very alone in that. And so you have to figure out a way to get others to actually not just accept the idea, but in many ways make it their own. And so that means that the way in which you approach the work is to do a couple things. One is to appeal to what matters to them, and then secondly to actually use their own vocabulary and their language as you are presenting this sort of change path.” - Tom Butta, CMO, Airship

• Paint a picture of the future state for them. Don’t tell your boss what your idea looks like in practice – show them. Make it come to life. Butta had a vision for how to save his former company, but he needed to get his boss to agree. So he  mocked up two articles to look like they were from The Wall Street Journal. One said the company had gone bankrupt, and the other said the company rebounded. He showed the articles to his boss, presenting them as two paths forward. By painting the picture of two future states, he got his boss to change the company playbook. Butta pointed out that in “Succession,” “Nobody is pointing to an outcome. Nobody in ‘Succession’ has a path or a playbook. They’re just trying to advocate for themselves. And that’s why it fails.”
• Bring on a trusted partner to pitch your idea with. Behind every successful pitch is a great communicator – or two! In fact, it’s best not to do it alone. Find a partner who is whole-heartedly onboard with your pitch can confidently back you up when questions are asked. It’s also important that they’re a great public speaker – and hopefully even better than you are. Need an example? Look at Kendall Roy in “Succession.” Kendall struggles to solidify his place as successor to CEO of Waystar Royco because he’s insecure, lacks the charisma required to take on the role, and most importantly, he doesn’t have anyone to advocate for him either. Butta says, “It's not just about the idea, the logic, and the compelling evidence. It takes a certain type of an individual who can actually make it work.”

Quotes

*”When you visualize what a future state can look like, sometimes you can feel very alone in that. And so you have to figure out a way to get others to actually not just accept the idea, but in many ways make it their own. And so that means that the way in which you approach the work is to do a couple things. One is to appeal to what matters to them, and then secondly to actually use their own vocabulary and their language as you are presenting this sort of change path.”

*”You can't present the idea of doing something. You actually have to present it. Like, you just have to show it. People don't have any imagination. And so you need to tell the story.”

*”It's not just about the idea and the logic and the compelling evidence and all of that. It takes a certain type of an individual who can actually make it work.” 

Time Stamps

[1:35] Introducing Tom Butta, CMO at Airship

[2:14] Learn more about Airship

[8:02] What’s “Succession” about? 

[11:01] The making of “Succession”

[15:05] The keys to pitching an idea to your boss

[15:59] How do you effectively use change vocabulary?

[18:04] How to speak your boss’ language

[28:07] How do you choose the right people for your change agenda?

[30:09] How do you paint a picture of your idea for your boss?

[38:19] Why you should rethink the slide deck as your go-to presentation tool

Links

Watch “Succession”

Connect with Tom on LinkedIn

Listen to Marketing Strategies that Led to Billion-Dollar Acquisitions with Tom Butta on the Demand Gen Visionaries Podcast

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Humanizing your brand is one of the most difficult challenges in marketing.

But there’s a proven solution to getting people to associate your business with more than just its logo: a spokesperson.

A spokesperson is the voice and face of your company. It can’t just be anybody. You need someone with a trusted voice. Someone who can speak about your product with authenticity. Someone who can talk to your customers in the language they use. And it doesn’t have if that someone is a little charming, too.

This week, we’re taking lessons from comedic actor and entrepreneur Ryan Reynolds, who has become the face of his own brands like Aviation Gin and Mint Mobile. 

Here to help us is SaaS SEO thought leader Liam Barnes, Head of Demand Generation and Programs at Bionic, an application security posture management platform. With Ryan and Liam by our side, we’re showing you how to choose an effective spokesperson, why hiring a celebrity isn’t so far out of reach, and why you shouldn’t gatekeep your content.

About Ryan Reynolds

Ryan Reynolds is a Canadian-American actor, producer, and entrepreneur whose career took off after he starred in National Lampoon’s Van Wilder. He’s also starred in Waiting, Adventureland, Free Guy, and the Deadpool franchise.

Ryan’s track record as an entrepreneur may be even more impressive than his work in film. Three businesses he has either invested in or owns have sold for incredibly impressive figures: Aviation Gin ($610 million), Mint Mobile ($1.35 billion), and film production and digital advertising agency Maximum Effort (undisclosed). He also has financial interests in the Wrexham Association Football Club, 1password, and Wealthsimple.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Ryan Reynolds:

• Choose an in-house evangelist for your brand. There’s no one who knows your product better than someone who lives and breathes it on a daily basis. Your ideal evangelist is someone who can vouch for your product and speak the language of your customers – and has a stake in the business's success. Ryan Reynolds is not only the owner of Mint Mobile, but also the company’s in-house evangelist. He has the authority, investment, and understanding of the product to share the benefits of becoming a customer. And because one of Mint Mobile’s values is that they’re cheap, he highlights it by, for example, featuring his family in the ads as “barely paid spokespeople.” Chances are that you already have some great brand evangelists in your B2B company. This could be a CXO with a strong social media presence who’s established as a thought leader in your industry, someone on your product team who is consistently engaging with your community in popular forums, or even the new hire who’s documenting their journey at your company.
• Hire a celebrity to be your company spokesperson. We love internal brand evangelists. But we also love influencer marketing, and what’s hot right now? Getting a celebrity to be the face of your brand. They’re more accessible than you think. Partnerships come at a range of price points, and you don’t need a mega A-lister to make a big impact. According to an article in the Journal of Advertising Research, celebrity endorsements can increase a company’s sales by an average of 4%. Ping Identity hired actor and athlete Terry Crews to be their “chief identity champion” for a brand awareness campaign that launched in October 2020. According to Ping Identity CMO Kevin Sellers, the company’s website traffic increased 1000 percent after the launch of the campaign. So dig deep into your brand’s voice and mission and find a celebrity or influencer who can embody your brand. The results speak for themselves! Bonus points if they bring a little humor into it!
• Make your content accessible. Distribution is key! There is a lot of great B2B content out there – but too often, companies limit their audience by gatekeeping their content. With his businesses, Reynolds takes a different approach. His businesses don’t spend heavily on advertising, but the ads they do create are funny, engaging, and accessible to everyone. The ads often go viral, further expanding their reach. (If you want to see a textbook example of what we’re talking about, check out this Mint Mobile ad!) And while we understand that not all B2B content can be a quirky one-minute advertisement, the key here is simple: unlock the gate. Don’t keep your best ideas in an email newsletter or in a hotel conference room. You’re limiting your audience when you do.

Key Quotes

*“He has this sense of ownership and everything is tongue in cheek. When we're buying his stuff, we're buying a little bit of Ryan. He vouched for it. And it's just really novel, how he productizes himself. A gin is just a gin. But when Ryan Reynolds is behind it, now it means something more.” - Ian Faison

*”It’s important to surround yourself with good people who are very good at their job. And with Ryan Reynolds, he has George Dewey as his business partner, who is that creative genius, that ad genius. He understands marketing, he understands culture, he understands people.” - Ian Faison

*”It’s important to have someone who is likable, charismatic and engaging as the spokesperson. Someone who's very close and tied and invested into the company driving the story and driving the thought leadership of the company. Especially in security, we have a really hard time getting founders, getting evangelists, getting technical people to want to push the story forward. And it's because they just don't have that advertising expertise, the marketing expertise. They’re engineers, they're not writers. And if they were writers, they were like research-based writers, so the creativity side of it was lost. And so it's important to do both things. Partner the front running technical people in your company with solid marketers, and help them push the narrative forward. - Liam Barnes 

*”Something that Ryan Reynolds understands is the distribution of the content that he's creating. He could definitely go and headline user conferences or go and do features where he goes and shows up at certain places where people ask him questions and pay attention to him for an hour. But then there's nothing after that. And something that companies get really wrong is they put all this time and energy into a user conference and then they gate it. They put it behind this paywall, or they make you give your information to them and then nobody sees it after the conference…Honestly, what most people would react more positively to is, go ahead and have the user conference, then go spend time distributing the content correctly. It's just something that's a completely missed opportunity. It's an interesting kind of dynamic that you see a lot in b2b, where everything's gated and nobody has access, and they're wondering why they're not getting the returns from it. It's because nobody ends up actually seeing it.” - Liam Barnes

“To make your ads better, make the creative more memorable and funnier. And then just put a little bit of that marketing engine behind it, retargeting and AB testing, and all the stuff that we have at our disposal to supercharge that really good creative. Because at the end of the day, if you're just promoting bad creative and boring creative, it's never going to get legs.” - Ian Faison

“It's less about trying to make your chosen spokesperson charismatic. It's more about trying to make that person relatable to who we're selling to. So our CEO and CTO are engineers and security folks. And we're selling to engineering and security folks. So I don't have to make them the most charismatic people. I just have to make them relatable. They have shared experiences with those people. They've been in security before, they've been through writing code and building systems and doing DevOps and running security teams, and doing the security research. And so just talking about those personal experiences and relating it to what those teams are going through. That's all you really need.” - Liam Barnes

Time Stamps

[1:31] Introducing Liam Barnes, Head of Demand Generation and Programs at Bionic

[2:13] What’s Bionic?

[4:05] Who’s Ryan Reynolds?

[5:55] What makes Ryan Reynolds an effective spokesperson?

[12:14] How did Ryan Reynolds become a marketing powerhouse?

[18:50] What can we learn about B2B marketing from Ryan Reynolds?

[23:54] How can B2B companies use celebrity spokespeople?

[36:22] How can companies make their CEO an effective spokesperson?

Links

Listen to Demand Gen Visionaries with Liam Barnes

Tune in to Everyday Demand Gen with Liam Barnes

See the Axonius x Simone Biles ad

Check out IBM Watson’s collaboration with fashion designer Gaurav Gupta

Take a look at Microsoft’s collab with National Geographic in their “Make What’s Next” initiative 

Create your own business thriller starring an A-list celebrity

See Coinbase’s $7M Superbowl ad that got people talking

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What do the best marketers and coaches have in common? It’s not an emphasis on wins and losses.

They’re good listeners.

If you want to make an impact on your audience, you’ve got to get to know them and engage with them. And today, we’re taking hints from one of the best listeners out there: Ted Lasso himself. We’re coaching you on social listening and incorporating creative details into your UX. 

Forget about trying to sell to your audience for a minute. We realize this is counterintuitive for marketers. But marketing isn’t only about selling — we’re going to show you why it’s worthwhile to get to know your audience as more than just customers. To engage with and entertain them on their favorite platforms, and to show them appreciation through little moments of surprise and delight.

This week, we’re reining in “Ted Lasso.” So don’t bring an umbrella to the brainstorm. Because we’re coaching you on social listening, incorporating creative details in your UX, and building in elements of edu-taining in your B2B marketing.

About “Ted Lasso”

“Ted Lasso” is a comedy series about an unwaveringly positive and wholesome American football coach played by Jason Sudeikis who gets hired to coach a British soccer team, fictional team AFC Richmond. The series has run for two seasons which aired in 2021 and 2022, and its third season will air this spring. It also stars Brendan Hunt as Coach Beard and Hannah Waddingham as Rebecca Welton.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From “Ted Lasso”: 

• Use social listening to learn about your customers as people. Learn what matters to your customers by tuning into their Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and other social platforms. Then, use that information to personalize their customer experience. A little surprise and delight goes a long way! Here’s an example: at Brandweek 2019, experience management company Qualtrics asked conference attendees to tweet them a wish that the company’s Dream Team would deliver in real time. And deliver they did. Whether it was a fishbowl margarita, a Popeyes chicken sandwich, a comfy pillow, or a fresh pair of Nikes, guests were surprised and delighted to see their wishes come true at the conference. By doing so, Qualtrics catered to their guests, got them talking, and created a lasting impression that would inspire diehard customer loyalty. Internet provider Spectrum also monitors Twitter for messages by customers, responding to tweets about outages and offering to help restore services. As for Ted Lasso, listening is like his superpower. Players mentioned that the water pressure in the locker room showers was “rubbish”, so Lasso repaired it. A seemingly simple gesture reminded players that he was listening and cared about their experience.
• Build small details into your UX to bring your customers joy.
  In the first season of “Ted Lasso,” Ted bakes shortbread cookies for his boss Rebecca. It’s a small gesture that gives the two a chance to connect – and it’s a powerful lesson for your UX. Baking in these little moments to build connection is essential. When you complete a task on Asana, a unicorn flies across the screen – and that simple animation gives a straightforward project management tool a sense of personality and whimsy that isn’t easily replicated. In your B2B marketing, incorporate personalized touches into your website that speak to your brand and values. 

Key Quotes

“Everyone loves random acts of kindness. And when it comes to marketing, it's the same thing. Like if a brand is able to show that they understand the wants and needs of their customers, they can gain that customer loyalty. And that's where surprise and delight come in. Like if they execute a surprise and delight idea really well, customers are more likely to be brand advocates and stick with the brand, especially on social media. So using surprise and delight helps increase brand awareness but also companies can use it as a retention strategy.” - Anagha Das

“Companies now are using the power of social listening to really understand where their customers are, what they're super interested in, what they're listening to, what they're watching, what trends they're really into that are not related to the company at all. It's literally just like, what are your customers into? And like, how can you play into that to show that you're listening and that you understand your audience and show that you care and want to do something that makes them feel good about whatever they're passionate about.” - Anagha Das

“It's really just becoming a little bit more human and thoughtful about your audience, and realizing that everyone doesn't wanna be sold to 24/7. And I think surprising and delighting your audience, even for a B2B audience, it can be as easy as, ‘All right, today, we're not gonna post promotional stuff on LinkedIn. We're gonna just send out like a have a great day post.’ Like it's something as simple as that. Just to show that there's people behind the brand and they're acknowledging their audience as people as well.“ - Colin Stamps

Time Stamps

[5:13] Tell me more about “Ted Lasso”

[6:20] Learn about the marketing behind “Ted Lasso”

[8:44] How does Ted Lasso use surprise and delight?

[15:28] What can B2B marketers learn about using surprise and delight in their marketing?

[17:00] What’s social listening? And how are companies using it to tune into trends in their customer base?

[22:38] What are simple ways you can use surprise and delight in your B2B marketing?

[27:58] What can we learn about marketing from the “dart scene” in “Ted Lasso”?

Links

Watch Ted Lasso

Check out how the Qualtrics Dream Team delivered Popeyes, a dog, a margarita, and more to their event attendees

See Asana’s Celebration Critters that emerge when a task is completed

Read tales (pun intended) of Chewy’s epic customer service

Learn more about Custom Ink’s unusual money back guarantee on customized goods  

Find out more about social listening and how it could benefit your business

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

It’s easy to think of the people in your ad as characters that exist in those 15 seconds alone. But you can create a stronger bond with your brand by focusing on what those characters are like outside those fifteen seconds. But creating multi-dimensional characters is easier said than done. 

This week, we’re taking a page out of “Schitt’s Creek.” We’re exploring the roles of relationships, flaws, and real-life experiences in relatable character building for your B2B marketing.

About “Schitt’s Creek”

“Schitt’s Creek” is a Canadian TV sitcom created, written and executive produced by Dan Levy and his father Eugene Levy. The show aired from 2015 - 2020 and starred Eugene Levy, Catherine O’Hara, Annie Murphy and Dan Levy.

The story follows the wealthy and privileged Rose family, who suddenly find themselves broke after their business manager was convicted of fraud. The IRS stripped the Rose family of all of their assets, except one: the small town of Schitt’s Creek, which they had only purchased as a joke years earlier.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From “Schitt’s Creek”: 

• Find inspiration from real-life experiences. “Relatability” is a subjective term – some people might relate to certain things, while others might shudder at them. But there’s no better shortcut to capturing your audience’s attention than drawing from actual experiences. Schitt’s Creek was inspired by the lives of the ultra rich, particularly families like the Kardashians. They even drew inspiration from actress Kim Basinger, who once bought a small town in Georgia – only to go bankrupt. But the emotional core of “Schitt’s Creek” was something very personal to Dan Levy: his own personal experience of coming out. When describing writing the show, Dan puts it better than we ever could: “I just wanted to write something that I had experienced, and that people could relate to.”
• Reveal your characters’ flaws. Don’t make them too perfect. Exposing the full spectrum of human traits makes it that much easier for your audience to say, “Oh, I’ve done that before,” or “I’ve felt that way before.” Like how self-absorbed the Roses are, the sibling bickering between David and Alexis, and Moira’s detachment from those around her. But it’s also balanced by authentic emotional journeys for each one of them through the six seasons. So by the end of the show, they’re all much closer, much more likable human beings. A complex, real person includes the good, the bad, and the ugly. 
• Develop relationships between characters. Give them depth by exploring the dynamics with other cast members. Close characters may have nicknames for each other while others may have unsettled drama. By giving them a past and a future, you’re extending their believability past the ad itself. From David and Stevie being frenemies to Alexis and Mutt’s romance, the ever-shifting interpersonal ties explore universal themes like love and friendship that anyone can relate to. Look at how Zendesk highlighted their customer relationships  through this ad styled like the couples interviews in When Harry Met Sally. Or at how Adobe showed the relationships among people in their supply chain. By doing so, the characters and world they exist in feel a lot more realistic and multi-dimensional.

Key Quotes

*”[The Roses] exaggerate and accentuate some of the traits that we can find in ourselves. Like some of the things they say are the things we do. We're like, ‘Ooh, I've done this before.’ In a way they're very human. And I think you see all their flaws and how they interact with each other, like the brother-sister relationship, the mom-son relationship. I think we can relate a lot to those moments and it makes it funny.” - Gwen Lafage

*”When David Rose becomes friends with Stevie and they have this frenemy relationship, you're just like, ‘We have all been there,’ where you're a stranger in a new place and you need to make a friend, and there's one other person who, it turns out, is kind of like you, and maybe you don't like him at first, and then you grow to be friends together. And I feel like it's just such a part of the human condition to be an outsider. And they've never been outsiders in their entire life. And so when you are an outsider and you just get that first friend, it matters so much. You can see those friendships matter more to them than all the money that they used to have.” - Ian Faison

Time Stamps

[1:32] Tell me more about Schitt’s Creek

[3:06] How did Dan Levy come up with the idea for Schitt’s Creek?

[5:37] What makes Schitt’s Creek characters relatable?

[9:35] How does the planning behind the six seasons set up the characters for an authentic emotional journey?

[15:58] How do you make B2B content relatable through your characters

[20:34] Examples of relatable characters in B2B marketing campaigns

[28:06] How to build out a character’s story to make them feel real

[30:58] What have we learned about using relatable characters in B2B marketing?

Links

Watch Schitt’s Creek

Look at how Zendesk highlighted their customer relationships

Check out how Adobe showed the relationships among people in their supply chain

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Marketers are always focused on what’s next. We’re constantly planning the next campaign, predicting trends, and conducting research. Always onward! 

But there’s a critical piece of content from the past that you’re probably overlooking: your company’s origin story. It’s a powerful tool you can leverage to detail your company’s mission and align customers with your values to get deeper buy-in and drive sales.

This week, we’re taking inspiration from the origin story that launched an entire cinematic universe: the origin story of Marvel’s Iron Man. We’re showing you how to apply the structure of the hero’s journey to your company’s origin story so that your customers become superfans.

About Marvel’s “Iron Man”

Iron Man is a 2008 superhero movie based on the Marvel comic book character created by Stan Lee. The film stars Robert Downey, Jr., as Tony Stark, Gweneth Paltrow as his personal assistant Pepper Potts, Terrence Howard as James Rhodes, and Jeff Bridges as Obadiah Stane. 

The storyline follows rich businessman and inventor Tony Stark after he’s kidnapped and forced to build a deadly weapon. Instead, he builds himself a high-tech suit and escapes – only to uncover an evil plot to cause devastation around the world. He then vows to fight evil as Iron Man.

The Hero’s Journey

The hero’s journey is a narrative structure in which a character goes on an adventure, faces a crisis, comes away victorious, and returns having undergone a transformation. Author Joseph Campbell analyzed the hero’s journey in his seminal 1949 book, “The Hero with a Thousand Faces.” He defined a hero as “someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself.” This structure is one as old as storytelling itself; it has been used from The Odyssey to Star War to Harry Potter – and Iron Man, of course!

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Marvel’s “Iron Man”: 

• Share your company’s origin story. Attract your ideal customers by showcasing your company’s journey. Telling your story demonstrates your company’s mission and fundamental values, and most importantly, it helps you distinguish yourself from your competition. This is especially important as consumers trend towards aligning their values with their spending. How does this apply to Iron Man? We wouldn’t appreciate his character without seeing his growth from self-absorbed jerk to the selfless hero he becomes. Even though Iron Man is a billionaire genius living in a Malibu mansion, we are invested in his compelling emotional arc.
• Show both the successes and the struggles. Let’s be real. Starting a company isn’t easy. It’s a journey – and dare we say it, a Hero’s Journey! But part of the Hero’s Journey is that you will make mistakes – and no one is immune from this. For example, back in 2015, Apple got negative publicity – notably from Taylor Swift – for offering a free one-month trial of streaming in which artists wouldn’t receive royalties. Apple’s SVP of Internet Software and Services tweeted an apology: “#AppleMusic will pay artists for streaming, even during customer’s free trial period,” and, “We hear you @taylorswift13 and indie artists. Love, Apple.” Not long after, Taylor Swift struck a deal with Apple to stream her latest tour exclusively on the platform. Apple owned up to their mistakes quickly and transparently, allowing them to be on the public’s (and Taylor Swift’s) good side again. But being transparent about your values also means living up to them as well. The founders of tech company Basecamp have made improving work culture an integral component of their brand. They have published five books related to the topic and make resources like their company handbook publicly available. “Treating people right is fundamental to how we do business,” they write on their website. However, their actions didn’t line up with their values. A third of their employees resigned after Basecamp put in place a policy banning “societal and political discussions.” The takeaway? Posting your values on your website is only one step. Living up to them is even more important. And if you fall short of your standards? Apologize and make it right. That’s what Basecamp did.
• Keep telling your story. Every time you make a big decision, make sure it aligns with the values embedded in your origin story. Communicate your reasoning with your audience. Your transparency will strengthen your audience’s trust in you – and help you continue to build a loyal group of sidekicks!

Key Quotes

*”With business storytelling, we focus on the timeline of accomplishments and not the thought and the rigor, the difficulties and the struggles that go into those middle pieces because we don't want to air dirty laundry. But if you illuminate the process a little bit more, you'd get a richer story.” - Ian Faison

*”Another element to explaining what your mission is and bringing people on that mission is bringing them on the journey with you and continuously giving them updates on things from a business perspective. I like when there's an emotional connection between me and the brand. And a lot of times a good way to do that is through social media, for example. So, like I use Canva, as an example. And I follow them on LinkedIn. It's the only business account that I follow on LinkedIn. And I actually care what they post because I feel like I'm going on a journey with them. You feel like you're a part of it. And I think that's a really key element to building a relationship with your audience.” - Colin Stamps

“If you anchor back to your origin, it shows the reason for your mission. This is why we have these values as a company. This is why we believe in the vision that we're trying to achieve, is having this foundational element of a company that we set out to solve. It feeds into a future looking assessment of where you want to be. And that's why the origin story is so important.“ - Ian Faison

Time Stamps

[1:30] Tell me more about Iron Man

[4:14] The backstory behind the creation of the 2008 movie

[7:28] What can I learn about telling my origin story from Marvel?

[11:31] Why is it important to share my company’s origin story?

[14:39] Do I need to share the messier side of the origin story? Why?

[16:37] I already have a timeline sharing my company’s story. That’s enough, right?

[19:54] So what framework should I use?

[21:41] How does the origin story apply to marketing?

[22:47] What are some examples of the origin story in marketing?

Links

Watch Marvel’s Iron Man

What’s the Hero’s Journey?

See how Canva connects with customers on LinkedIn

Read Dick’s Sporting Goods origin story

See how an ice axe inspired the founding of REI

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

So many marketers use dialogue as a crutch. They spell out what their product is, how their audience could benefit from it, and wrap things up with a run-of-the-mill CTA.

But you don’t need dialogue to make a powerful B2B marketing campaign. In fact, you might not need words at all.

This week, we’re looking at the iconic opening montage from Pixar’s “Up.” The “Married Life” scene tells the story of the film’s main character, Carl’s marriage to his childhood sweetheart, Ellie. We follow them from youth to old age – and Ellie’s death. These moments have no dialogue, instead letting the music, color, and shape tell Carl’s backstory. The animators didn’t tell us about Carl’s life – they showed it to us. The result? Perhaps the most iconic scene in Pixar’s storied history – and that’s no easy feat.

And we think your B2B marketing can leverage these same techniques to communicate your message so much more effectively than a voiceover ever could.

About Pixar’s “Up”

“Up” is a 2009 animated movie by Pixar. It was directed by Pete Docter and co-director Bob Peterson, who also wrote the story along with Tom McCarthy. The original score is by Michael Giacchino.

“Up” follows 78-year-old Carl Fredricksen as he rigs up his house with balloons in an attempt to fly to Paradise Falls and fulfill a promise to his late wife. He is joined by Russell, an 8-year-old Junior Wilderness Explorer, who has stowed away by clinging to the porch as the house lifted off its foundation. Together, they navigate the treacherous journey to the falls.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Pixar’s “Up”: 

• Let music do the emotional heavy lifting. The “Married Life” montage tells the story of Carl’s marriage to Ellie. Though the two tragically discover they can’t have children, they find hope in their childhood promise of trekking across the world to Paradise falls. The scene ends with Ellie’s funeral – and the promise left unfulfilled. These emotional moments are even more powerful because of composer Michael Giacchino’s score. In an interview, Giacchino said that the “Married Life” montage was the most difficult scene to write for. In order to make the scenes most effective, he wrote simple music for the scenes – or even opted not to score some of the most emotional moments. This restraint gave the scenes a gentle, melancholic feel, rather than a melodramatic one.
• Tell a story with color and shape. Whether they know it or not, viewers use basic visual cues to put together and understand a scene nearly instantaneously. So much of a scene can be told through these basic visual cues like color, and shape. In “Up”, each character is designed around a shape and color that conveys something about their personalities. Carl is blue and a square, Ellie is pink and a circle, and Russell is yellow and egg-shaped. The animators also adjusted the color palettes for scenes based on their emotional content: they used saturated colors in joyful scenes and drab colors in sad scenes. These visual cues may seem basic, but the connotations of specific colors and shapes will create instant context for your ad’s viewers.
• Focus on facial expressions and body language. We don’t just communicate with our words. The “Married Life” montage uses body language to show Carl and Ellie’s feelings towards each other. When Ellie points at a cloud, we see Carl’s blissful expression. We watch Ellie flinch as Carl smashes their savings jar again, telling us everything we need to know about how Ellie feels at that moment. Through intentional camera composition, editing, and directing, you can communicate a story with no words at all.

Key Quotes

*”By showing, not telling, especially in this example, it forces you to fill in the blanks with words that you understand or emotions that you can connect with.” - Dane Eckerle

*”When you show a story without any V.O., we have no idea where we're going. So each thing happens sequentially and it builds on itself. You don't know where it’s going. But by the end of it, you totally get it.” - Ian Faison

*”If you go on TikTok, they're telling, not showing at all. There's someone speaking to you, there's captions, there's big text on the screen and you're seeing and hearing everything [being] spoon fed to the point where now, moments like this land that much harder, because I'm not used to using my imagination as much. This technique will work better now than it would've 15 years ago because people are so used to being spoon fed stuff. So it's all the more relevant today.” - Dane Eckerle

*”It comes down to B2B companies seeing their audience as people first and not just other businesses. You are talking to people who have real needs and different personas and different target audiences.” - Anagha Das

*”You’re marketing a journey. So as a marketer, take a snapshot of your target customer at the midpoint of their journey, and then show the story of their journey.” - Ian Faison

Time Stamps

[2:12] Tell me more about Pixar's "Up"

[5:35] How did Pixar get audience buy-in within the first few minutes?

[10:37] How did composer Michael Giacchino craft music to tell a story?

[13:07] How did the storyboard artists use color and composition to convey meaning?

[14:55] Why is showing-not-telling more powerful today than ever?

[16:45] Examples of show-don't-tell in marketing

[19:27] How do I market a customer journey?

Links

Watch Pixar’s Up

Learn more about how Michael Giacchino wrote the score

How did Pixar design the characters?

See how Apple used show-don’t-tell in their accessibility campaign

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Your audience doesn’t have time to read a novel. Say more with less. 

You want the text in your campaign to impact viewers, so that it stays with them. So that they think about it later. So that they’re sure to talk about it with their team. So that they’ll buy what you’re selling.

And what better Man-of-Few-Words to learn from than Ernest Hemingway. He is the master of the short, impactful phrase. Today, we’re talking about the legendary six-word story that Hemingway supposedly wrote: “For sale, baby shoes, never worn.” And how you, too, can pack a punch in a few words – but maybe make it a touch less sad.

In this episode we’re keeping it short and sweet. (Sort of. Depends on your definition of “short” and “sweet.”) And showing you how to use the economy of words in your B2B marketing.

About the 6-Word Story

Legend has it that American writer Ernest Hemingway was having lunch at The Algonquin hotel sometime in the 1920s with his writer friends when he made a ten-dollar bet that he could write a short story in just six words. On a napkin, he wrote, “For sale, baby shoes, never worn.” He then collected his earnings from his incredulous friends. 

It’s a great story, but it’s likely apocryphal. According to an investigation published in The Journal of Popular Culture, there’s no proof Hemingway actually wrote those six words. 

There are a few places the legend likely originated. One possibility is literary agent Peter Miller, who wrote about it in his 1974 book, Get Published! Get Produced!: A Literary Agent’s Tips on How to Sell Your Writing. The tall tale may have been inspired by a newspaper urban legend: the story of a classified ad from 1906 that read: “For sale, baby carriage, never been used. Apply at this office.” A 1917 essay by William R. Kane profiled a woman who lost her baby, and it was entitled “Little Shoes, Never Worn.” 

But it doesn’t actually matter where this story came from. What matters is what we can learn from it.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Ernest Hemingway: 

• Be intentional about word choice. Embrace the economy of words – use fewer words to say more. It’s a technique that likely came from journalism, where there was limited space on a newspaper page. In marketing, it’s a means to stand out from your competition.
• Trust your audience to fill in the blanks. Don’t spoon feed your audience the message. Make them think and engage their critical thinking skills (Sound familiar? We’ve talked about this before). Trust that they’ll make the necessary inferences, associations, and assumptions to get the message. Hemingway doesn’t say, “A baby passes away, selling shoes.” He says, “For sale, baby shoes, never worn.” This version is more emotionally compelling, because the audience has to make their own deductions about why the shoes are for sale.
• Tug at your audience’s heartstrings. Use words that evoke an emotional response. They make your readers feel something and/or push them to take action. It’s a common technique, especially in the B2C world. Think De Beers’ “A Diamond is Forever” campaign, reflecting the idea of everlasting love. Allstate’s “You’re in Good Hands” evokes a sense of comfort and security. Without saying much, these brands made us feel something in just a few words. And you can, too, in your marketing.

Key Quotes

*”Words on a page and words spoken to you are the ways that you can paint an extremely vivid picture in your audience or customer base's mind.” - Ian Faison

*”In a day and age where people's attention spans are limited and there's constantly a million things going on, like a million ads being sent your way, emails in your inbox every second, the fewer words you use to get your point across, the more valuable.“ - Anagha Das

*”It's a testament to the human imagination. The human mind is a lot stronger and smarter than people give it credit for. It takes so little to inspire someone's imagination to fill in the blanks or to latch onto the essence of what you're trying to say. To now cut through the noise almost involves saying less to be different than everybody else.” - Dane Eckerle

Time Stamps

[1:49] Tell me about Ernest Hemingway’s 6-Word Story

[4:07] How is brevity used across all forms of media?

[5:03] The history of the 6-word story, “For sale, baby shoes, never worn.”

[8:20] Why is it important for marketers to be able to tell a 6-word story?

[12:55] How do you optimize character count in social media marketing?

[15:33] Examples of the economy of words in B2C and B2B marketing

[21:44] What are character limits across social media platforms?

[24:39] Caspian 6-Word Stories

Links

Demystifying Hemingway’s 6-Word Story

Hemingway’s 6-Word Sequels

Learn More About Power Words in Marketing

Examples of Economy of Words in Marketing Campaigns:

De Beers

Jared

Kay Jewelers

Snickers

M&Ms

Dunkin Donuts

Allstate

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

If your marketing team keeps talking in circles about what to do next with your B2B marketing initiatives, then we have an idea for you. Stop talking in circles and start telling stories in circles. That’s right – circles. Stick with us here. 

Hollywood has a tried-and-true method for hooking your audience from the first frame: circular storytelling. If you can leverage this technique effectively, your marketing content can stand out from the crowd – no matter if it’s a case study, a white paper, or a social video.

In this episode, we break down the use of circular storytelling in Slumdog Millionaire and discuss how to apply this technique to your B2B marketing.

About Slumdog Millionaire

Slumdog Millionaire is a 2008 British drama directed by Danny Boyle, co-directed by Loveleen Tandan, and starring Dev Patel and Freida Pinto. Simon Beaufoy wrote the screenplay, which is based on Vikas Swarup’s novel, Q & A. The story follows orphan Jamal Malik, who is selected to be a contestant on the Indian version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire – only to be accused of cheating when he’s one question away from winning the grand prize of 20M Rupees. The movie has won numerous awards, including Academy Award for Best Picture, Music, Writing, Directing, and Sound Mixing (2009) and many, many others.

What’s Circular Storytelling?

Circular storytelling is a mechanism in which the story literally ends where it began – with the same exact scene. This device hooks the audience at a point of high tension and personal crisis for the main character. Then, the movie flashes back to the opening of the narrative.

Slumdog Millionaire opens with Jamal Malik being interrogated and tortured after being accused of cheating on the game show. Through the use of flashbacks, we discover exactly how he knew the answers to each question.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Slumdog Millionaire: 

• Start your customer journey at the end. Document customer stories from the very beginning. By doing this, you can show prospective customers real results you’ve achieved with current ones, and how you could benefit their business. Give them customer success stories, so that they can envision their future as your customer. In Slumdog Millionaire, we know that Jamal will get to the penultimate question on Who Wants to be a Millionaire – because that’s where the story begins. By spelling out the many benefits your company has to offer, you are providing your new customers proof that your organization creates results.
• Hook ad viewers with a high-intensity intro. Bring them in the middle of the action to grab their attention. For example, you can highlight a common pain point your business can solve – and then use circular storytelling. Slumdog Millionaire starts with Jamal being brutally interrogated on how he knew the game show answers. From this moment, the central mystery of the film is established: if Jamal did not cheat, then how did he know all the answers? Similarly, highlighting a pain point Just like viewers wondered how a slumdog could know the answers, you’ll have them wondering how you can solve all their pain points for them.

Key Quotes

*”That's always a plus point in any movie, TV show, story or ad that you're reading or watching. If you're thrown right in the middle of it, chances are you’re going to be engaged from the start. - Anagha Das

*”Everything has to start on a bang. And whether that takes you back to where you started or whether it's more just a great hook, jumping in on a bang is just something that works. If you don't have [a hook,] you're hard pressed to actually keep people along for the ride.” - Dane Eckerle

*”I've seen this in case studies where they have the results at the beginning. And then it unfolds as to how they got those results. There is a huge opportunity to do this kind of storytelling in B2B marketing.” - Colin Stamps

*”You should be doing circular storytelling with your case studies, with your customer stories, with your demos, with your prospect journey.” - Ian Faison

Time Stamps

[3:19] Tell me more about Slumdog Millionaire

[7:05] What is circular storytelling?

[10:13] Are there any drawbacks to using circular storytelling?

[11:46] How do you apply mystery to your marketing campaign?

[16:31] What are examples of circular storytelling in B2B?

[18:30] How can you apply this to your B2B marketing? 

[22:12] Other examples in B2C marketing

Links

Watch Slumdog Millionaire

See how Mr. Beast hooks viewers

Look at how Gary Vee uses flashbacks on his predictions

Check out how we’ve used circular storytelling ourselves in The Hacker Chronicles podcast

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Do you think of your customers as simple consumers of your brand? If so, you’re missing out on the opportunity to turn them into diehard brand ambassadors. 

The key to inspiring impassioned brand loyalty is simple: engage your customers more deeply. Get them talking about your brand. Get them asking questions. And what better way to get your customers engaged than to instill a little mystery in your content?

In this episode, we’re looking at the award-winning hit series Only Murders in the Building for lessons on incorporating some mystery into your marketing. We’ll show you how to use interactive marketing, engage your audience’s critical thinking skills, and get people talking about your brand.

About Only Murders in the Building

Only Murders in the Building is a mystery-comedy series released in 2021. Created by Steve Martin and John Hoffman, the show is about three residents who live in a luxury apartment building in New York City. The trio becomes unlikely friends after they team up to solve the mystery around the death of one of their neighbors – and start a podcast to document it. The award-winning series stars Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez. Only Murders in the Building is the most watched comedy premiere on Hulu to date, ranked in Nielsen’s top 10 for weeks following its release, and the first season is rated 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. If you're looking to add a little mystery in your marketing, there's no better example to follow.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Only Murders in the Building: 

• Create an interactive experience for customers. Offer them access points across different platforms or mediums to engage with your brand. Only Murders in the Building gives viewers several opportunities to become detectives themselves. The Emmy award-winning series hid clues relating back to the series across multiple platforms — including at an in-person pop-up event. To promote the show, Hulu also created “ambient rooms,” or video scenescapes of each character’s apartment where viewers could spend time looking for clues to the murder mystery. Clues were hidden in the music, ambient noise, fleeting images, or were even items within the room! It’s this level of audience engagement, suspense, and storytelling that led to the show’s incredible success. 
• Don’t reinvent the wheel…entirely. Martin Short and Steve Martin are a well-known comedy duo and have an amazing on-screen chemistry. Only Murders in the Building took their existing relationship and created something entirely new with it. The addition of pop icon Selena Gomez to the cast as the show’s final detective adds to the promise that viewers will be watching something new. If you’ve created ads, or marketing campaigns that have been successful in the past, take elements of what’s worked well and spin them to create something new. No need to completely reinvent what has already resonated with your audience! 
• Intrigue your audience with mystery. Engage your audience’s critical thinking skills by leaving room to the imagination. Only Murders in the Building builds layers of intrigue with the mysterious death of Tim Kono. But as the show goes on, the mysteries only deepen, and the series slowly reveals that each of the three main characters have dark secrets of their own. In your B2B marketing, create storylines that are playful, suspenseful, and leave some room for your audience to fill in the gaps themselves. Everyone loves a good challenge and piecing together clues to get to the bigger picture.

Key Quotes

*”Fans are really into mysteries and theories. They like little surprises that involve them and make people feel like they can be a part of the show, a part of solving these mysteries.” - Anagha Das

*”Having the show turn into like a bit of a puzzle just creates for a more activating, interactive experience where you're not just sitting there passively consuming content. You actually have to turn your brain on and activate, becoming essentially a part of the show. Your own detective.” - Dane Eckerle

*”Every company is presenting some kind of solution that's solving a problem. I wonder if there's some opportunity to make some content around solving that problem, in making that into some kind of mystery.” - Colin Stamps

*”One huge benefit and advantage of utilizing mystery is just getting people to discuss things and have a conversation, to talk about what they're seeing or what they're feeling.” - Dane Eckerle

Time Stamps

[1:23] Tell me more about Only Murders in the Building

[5:26] Why should you use mystery in your marketing?

[8:05] How do you get deeper audience engagement?

[11:46] How do you apply mystery to your marketing campaign?

[17:32] What other companies have used mystery in their marketing?

[21:04] What's the key to a great mystery? 

[23:01] How can comedy and mystery be used together for greater impact?

Links

Watch Only Murders in the Building

See how Dove used a sense of mystery in their Real Beauty campaign

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

[Cue Latin jazz music] It is the content that sells itself. It ranks #1 – no matter what you Google. It is the most interesting B2B marketing content in the world. And it’s yours.

Or at least it could be, after listening to this episode. Because we’re showing you branding tricks from the Dos Equis Most Interesting Man in the World campaign.

In this episode, we break down the slogan that helped triple sales for Dos Equis. According to PRNewswire, about fifty percent of customers rely on your slogan when considering doing business with you. Few things are more important for B2B marketing, so we’re here to help you ensure your slogan is as amazing as your product is.

Why Dos Equis?

The brand’s slogan was a key part of the Most Interesting Man in the World campaign that nearly tripled business for Dos Equis. During the campaign, the number of cases of Dos Equis shipped increased by nearly 35%, and Heineken estimated that around 25% of its growth in the future would come from the Dos Equis brand. The ad also became a part of the cultural zeitgeist, inspiring countless memes, spoofs, and Halloween costumes. So the Most Interesting Man in the World campaign has paid off for Dos Equis. Could a similarly bold campaign pay off for your B2B marketing?

About Dos Equis

Dos Equis is a Mexican lager-style beer made by the Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma Brewery, based in Monterrey, Mexico. The brewery was founded by German immigrant Wilhelm Hasse in 1890 and  is currently owned by Heineken. The same brewery also produces Tecate and Sol. 

The Most Interesting Man in the World ads were created by Karl Lieberman and Brandon Henderson for an agency called EuroRSCG, New York. They aired in the U.S. from 2007 to 2015. Jonathan Goldsmith played the titular character, and the spots were narrated by William Lyman. The campaign features the Most Interesting Man in the World, Hemingway-esque character whose worldly larger-than-life exploits include bench-pressing women, sewing his own stitches, and swan diving from cliffs. The Most Interesting Man would end the commercials by saying the brand’s two-part slogan: “Because of the campaign, the two-part slogan, “I don’t always drink beer, but when I do I prefer Dos Equis,” and “Stay thirsty, my friends,” the Dos Equis brand decidedly set itself apart. It wasn’t just for the leisurely beach-going dude – it was for the dudes who aspired to be something more…interesting.

What B2B Companies Can Learn From Dos Equis:

• Your slogan should speak to your customer’s aspirations. Do consumer research to get to know your customers. Whether it’s your current or target customers, find out what motivates them. Is it wealth? A desire to belong? Getting a thrill? The team behind the Dos Equis slogan got wind that their male customers wanted to feel like they were more sophisticated. Working from this, they devised The Most Interesting Man in the World campaign.
• Would I wear the t-shirt? This is self-explanatory. But let's dig deeper into what that means. If someone wants to wear your brand's T-shirt, then they also feel an emotional investment in your brand. So remember, a catchy slogan isn't enough. You've also got to figure out how to create brand ambassadors through your campaigns.
• Make it a CTA. Call your customers to action with your slogan. Many of the greats do this: Nike tells its customers to “just do it," Subway challenges theirs to “eat fresh,” and Toyota extends an invitation by simply saying, “Let’s go places.” These CTA’s are incredibly simple, and that’s also why audiences respond to them. An effective CTA gets potential customers’ attention and deepens engagement with current customers. Ultimately, it guides them to your marketing funnel and leads them to conversion.

Key Quotes

*”The slogan is, ‘Stay thirsty, my friends.’ And like that's a key differentiator, right? Is like the aspirational part of your slogan, which is, you want your community or your fans or whatever, or the people who purchase your product, uh, to do X, Y, and Z, to live a great life, to explore, to, you know, innovate, to do whatever it is that you want them to do. Like that is aspirational. Talking about your company is very different. And like, this is what I call the wear the t-shirt moment is like, would you wear a t-shirt that says, I prefer Dos Equis?” - Ian Faison

*”When you talk about creating an iconic character to deliver the slogan and the message, it's like people dress up like this guy for Halloween, the actor, the actor slash in in character was invited to the White House to sit with Obama. I mean, that's insane.” - Dane Eckerle

*”Here always has to be something that you're telling your audience to go look at, to go read, to go watch, to go like follow up on or talk to someone. And I feel like this is probably the most like natural, like funny, relatable cTA that's been part of a brand's slogan, like, just stay thirsty, my friends like go out like, like Ian said, like go out, like have adventures, like do all these cool things.” - Anagha Das

Time Stamps

[2:51] Tell me more about Dos Equis

[5:30] How successful was the campaign?

[6:56] How did Dos Equis differentiate their brand with the slogan?

[14:48] What makes a great slogan?

[16:39] How could a good slogan affect your bottom line?

[19:48] Why should you make your slogan a CTA? 

[27:18] How do you apply the takeaways to B2B Marketing?

Links

Get nostalgic! Watch the Most Interesting Man in the World ads

Learn more about Dos Equis

Take a look at Liquid Death’s Not a Water Boy campaign

Other slogan ideas: 

Coca Cola “Open Happiness”

Apple “Think Different”

Slack “Where Work Happens”

About Remarkable!

Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both non-fiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. 

In today’s episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios), Dane Eckerle (Head of Development), Colin Stamps (Podcast Launch Manager), Anagha Das (B2B Content Marketing Manager), and Meredith O’Neil (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith O’Neil, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. 

Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

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