The Kula Ring

Andy Jensen of Sunstone Engineering joins the show this week to talk about a really interesting marketing case study. Sunstone marketed to almost exclusively engineers in verticals like aerospace and electronics. Then, a couple of years ago, an unheard-of order for small light-duty welders came through from one of their dealers, then another, and another. Overnight Sunstone was thrust into an emerging market. Production and marketing at Sunstone had to pivot and pivot fast. Andy walks us through the changes that have taken place at Sunstone and how they have managed this rapid, unexpected growth.

Herbert Staten Jr. joins The Kula Ring this week to talk about highlighting the beauty of the product you manufacture. Herbert discusses how he considers emotion and personal engagement when developing marketing strategies in industrial manufacturing. We also discuss the potential for vertical differentiation in social media platforms. This fantastic chat offers a refreshing approach to industrial B2B marketing.

In this episode, we sit down with Zak Nelson. Zak talks with us about ArKco Sales’ move to having an in-house marketing asset. ArKco saw that the landscape for manufacturing sales rep companies is changing. Zak is ArKco’s answer to this evolving situation. He walks us through the changes they have implemented and how their sales reps have taken to having new branding and collateral. This is a great episode to see how you can utilize new marketing strategies in any field.

Kimberly Day is on our show this week talking about how she moved Finish Thompson, a family-run company, from advertising in trade publications to more of a brand focus, a decision that has fostered growth and recognition in just seven months. Kimberly brings insights from a broad career in many marketing and communication verticals. Finish Thompson is a highly technical, engineering-focused brand that Kimberly is making accessible to all who may need to employ their pumps and services.

Neelam Kumar joins The Kula Ring to discuss the strength in value selling. Neelam is an advocate and evangelist of value selling and brings a wealth of knowledge to this week's episode of The Kula Ring. We discuss the need for relationship building, both internally, between departments and externally, with our customers. We also look at asking the right questions, and discovering how to dig into what provides value to the customer or prospect.

John Patrin joins us to discuss innovation within your organization. For the last five years, John was the head of innovation at DuPont, where he oversaw continued innovation in a Fortune 100 company already known for innovating. We discuss the incremental product innovations that most companies pursue while also getting a glimpse at larger-scale innovations that can affect business models and service offerings.

Robby Berthume, Head of Marketing at Digitize Designs is on the show this week. Robby shares some of the expertise that he has honed throughout his varied career. We talk about the need for implementing good measurement through strong metrics to ensure your marketing efforts are effective. He also shares some good advice on staying excited and keeping some personality in your corporate brand.

So, you are a rockstar marketer (obviously) and you have increased incoming leads in a major way. What now? How do you manage that growth, that success? Brian Critchfield of Airgain is on the show this week giving us some insight into managing phenomenal growth (like 12x growth). We talk about helping the sales team with new leads at different stages of the funnel. Managing the huge uptick in data to sift through. And, how to keep everyone on the team engaged and driving the common goal forward.

Sherry Chapman the VP of Marketing at Fortera, joins The Kula Ring this week. Sherry illuminates what Fortera, a green cement start-up, is working on; Building partnerships with counterparts in the industry, and drawing new road maps for economic development, for products that are yet to hit the market. This is a fantastic chat about green industry.

Scott Vosburgh joins The Kula Ring this week to discuss how Sierra Olympia Technologies is facing down much larger competition. Through marketing products that the competition isn’t. Ensuring their online presence is as clean and high-performing as possible. While also keeping an eye on where the big guns in the space are ranking and finding success in online markets to capitalize for themselves.