The Casted Podcast

We talk a lot about authentic conversations. They're the lifeblood of relationships, which means they're the foundation really great marketing. And now, more than ever before, at least in most of our careers, authenticity and relationships and connections, they really matter. Which is why we're so excited about this episode of The Casted Podcast. In the final episode of Season 3, we talk to Andy Culligan, CMO at Leadfeeder about his life as a CMO in the midst of a pandemic. He and his team have been working to bring brand awareness and demand generation together since he joined the company. When the pandemic hit, Andy knew his team needed to stay the course but become a helping hand to Leadfeeder's audience. Listen in to hear how his team has continued executing their original strategy... but faster. And how their team managed to drive 7500 webinar registrants in just six weeks. This is an episode you don't want to miss!

Key Takeaways:

🏎 Driving 7500 webinar registrants in six weeks

🚀 Focusing on doing the original plan... but faster

🌉 Bridging the gap between brand and demand gen

🚫 The best pitch right now is no pitch at all

👥 Being understanding of your team's personal situations

🙋 Advice for marketers right now

When the world gives you a pandemic, make messaging that is still relevant and meaningful to your audience. That's right. We're a few weeks into this quarantine and one thing remains the same today as it did when the pandemic hit, as well as long, long, long before that. Empathy. Know your audience and what is important to them and empathize with them. That's always been important, but now more than ever, it's critical. I'm Lindsay Tjepkema, CEO and co- founder of Casted, the first and only marketing platform built around branded podcasts. And this is our podcast. Here in season three of the Casted podcast, we're talking with CMOs and marketing leaders to see how they're rethinking their marketing strategies in light of the COVID- 19 crisis. I'm hearing inspiring stories from leaders and teams around the world who are taking this as an opportunity to explore new ways to serve and connect with their audiences. And today we're hearing from James Kessinger, the CMO of Hushly, the company that helps you leverage your content to strengthen your relationships with your audiences all the way through to that critical conversion point. He and his team have looked for ways to serve their audiences today in ways that will serve the Hushly brand longterm. So listen in to James, as he explains how a company that is built around conversions has managed to maintain connection in the time of COVID- 19.

Key Takeaways:

🧑‍💻 Putting focus on helping the customer

✍️ Keep messaging real and empathetic

👥 How to market marketing to marketers

⚙️ Building relationships right now

🧠 What James wants marketers to know

When your content strategy isn't what your audience wants to hear from you, when the topics you planned to cover no longer resonate, when a global pandemic changes everything, not only for you, but also, obviously, for your audience, what exactly do you do? And perhaps more fittingly here, what exactly do you say? When your job, or maybe even your business is content, what does that pivot look like? Today, we're hearing from Joe Lazauskas who heads up marketing at Contently, a company many of you know and love, and they serve both marketing leaders, inside companies, and also freelance content creators. Although his audiences are closely related, they're very different, which Joe knows, and strategically works accordingly as you'll hear. Listen and learn from Joe as he shares an interesting behind-the-scenes look at the content strategy of Contently, as well as incredibly tactical and helpful advice on how to stay nimble with your own content marketing efforts amidst, well, this uncertain time we're all navigating right now.

Key Takeaways:

🎨 The art of silent brainstorms

❓ Answering the big questions with content

🖼 Framing up Contently in a way that resonated

♟ Being a strategic partner, not just a clever marketer

🗣 Advice for marketers right now

💭 Always be thoughtful, always be helpful

In the midst of any crisis many of us have been given the same advice: Look for the good. Seek out the silver lining. And while it can really feel impossible to see the positives in all that is happening right now, when we are speaking specifically about business and even more specifically about marketing, there are some glass-half-full things that can come from this time of crisis and uncertainty. Things we might even be able to carry with us after the crisis has passed. Today, we’ll hear from Ellie Mirman, CMO of Crayon. Ellie shares how she and her team are rethinking their marketing strategy, working together in this crazy time, and finding the silver lining in it all.

Key Takeaways:

📝 Shifting messaging and outreach to focus on engagement

🤿 Seeing the opportunity to dive deeper into content production

🧰 Content is the Swiss Army knife of marketing

🤝 Engaging and supporting customers

👀 Seeing the silver lining as a team

🧑‍🏫 Advice for marketers

Today we’re hearing from Heather Zynczak, the CMO of Pluralsight, a company that offers a variety of video training courses for software developers, IT administrators, and creative professionals. Heather’s energy and enthusiasm is so refreshing and motivating right now, as you’ll soon hear. She eagerly shares a couple of initiatives that Pluralsight quickly launched as this crisis started to emerge to really serve its audience.

Listen and learn from Heather as she shares the massive projects - including one called #FreeApril - she and her team jumped into without a whole lot of hesitation - simply because they knew it was the right thing to do - both for the audience and for the company.

Key Takeaways

🎫 Turning a live event into a virtual one

👨‍💻 Doubling down on virtual experiences

📚 Start preparing for the future of marketing now

🔗 How Pluralsight is putting connection first with #FreeApril

🥇 Focus on helping first and experimenting second

🏃 Advice for marketers moving forward

👁 Seek to connect as humans first