0:00

Oh my goodness. Welcome

0:02

to stay ahead of the game marketing trends. I'm

0:05

your host, your second favorite hub spotter, Devin.

0:08

So here's one of you. Quick introduction for me. My

0:10

name is Devin. I'm the founder of Black and Inbound. I work in HubSpot.

0:13

So what I'm going to do is I'm going to start with

0:15

my favorite host, Troy. Say it is.

0:18

Let them know who you are, man.

0:19

I can't. I can't. What's up, everybody?

0:22

It's your favorite friendly neighborhood strategy. How

0:24

get here reporting for duty on today, setting

0:26

all the positive vibes in the world.

0:28

Yes, sir. For those who don't know me, I'm a growth

0:30

strategist. I'm a marketer. I'm a founder,

0:32

strategy hacker, CEO of NoMiddle. And

0:34

basically, I build strategy systems and solutions for

0:37

various businesses to be sustainable,

0:39

scalable, and more profitable. In short,

0:41

I help you grow fast and scale faster.

0:44

Awesome.

0:54

Have you ever wondered about the science of people?

0:58

hands and outs, nuances,

1:02

the traits and motivational factors.

1:04

There's an art to motivating

1:07

great people. Truth, lies

1:10

and workplace culture is brought

1:12

to you by the HubSpot Podcast

1:14

Network, the audio destination

1:16

for business professionals.

1:19

Join the husband and wife team, Al

1:21

and Leanne Elliott, as they dispel

1:23

myths, impart wisdom and answer

1:25

all your questions about finding, keeping,

1:28

and motivating great people. They

1:30

navigate topics like healthiest

1:33

workplaces, how to build

1:35

a killer employer brand, and

1:37

navigating burnout. Listen

1:40

to truth, lies, and workplace

1:42

culture wherever you get your

1:44

podcasts.

1:54

Community is the future. I'm telling you it's

1:56

even the name of the department I work in. I can talk about

1:58

community all day, but I'm not supposed to talk I'm

2:00

supposed to be listening. So what I'm going to

2:02

do is I'm going to listen to some

2:04

hot takes on some of these questions

2:06

that we have lined up the question that is

2:09

at the top of everybody's mind. And if not,

2:11

it should be is email

2:14

dead. You know, I'm going to

2:16

say this as mainland for some people, email

2:19

has the greatest plot armor ever. It

2:22

is never, ever.

2:23

I mean, we go through this every

2:26

year, every day. It is

2:28

never going away. It is ingrained in

2:30

just communication

2:32

in general at this point We don't

2:34

have to debate about if it's ever dead now,

2:36

is it more usable? Is it more

2:39

relevant? Is it trendy?

2:41

Look at the end of the day emails where you

2:44

gonna get your checks and confirm these contracts.

2:46

Okay, nothing else is gonna be email.

2:48

Am I right? Am I right? I'm right. I know.

2:50

What's up digital world? You're listening to the iDigress

2:53

audio experience with Troy Sandin. Social

2:55

media, marketing, storytelling, business, culture and

2:57

more. Coming to you in 3, 2, 1.

3:04

So it's not dead. I think,

3:06

you know, with the rise of social media and I see someone

3:09

asked about AI, email, and different things like that,

3:11

to Ty's point, it is about understanding

3:13

how to utilize email as

3:16

of now.

3:17

Mental health is a priority.

3:20

People through this pandemic are

3:22

wiser. We don't wanna open your

3:24

stuff if you don't got quality. We don't care.

3:27

Let's not play the volume game anymore

3:29

and y'all can be mad at me because I'm gonna say it and it's cool.

3:31

I do think though, when you're looking

3:34

at email now, we have to stop

3:36

hoarding. We praise how many

3:38

people are on our email list. Are they

3:40

opening? Are they engaging? Are

3:42

you converting? Those are the questions I

3:45

want to ask. Now how many people are in my newsletter email

3:47

list from 20 years ago? Come

3:49

on now. So let's make sure that we're optimizing

3:53

our deliverable and don't be triggered

3:55

or upset if you

3:57

know people are unsubscribe. I would rather people.

4:00

by their own free will unsubscribe

4:02

consistently. That tells me in Dowsdown

4:04

who my actual audience is, who I'm talking

4:06

to, what messaging work, what messaging isn't working. And

4:08

the last thing I'll say here is,

4:10

no matter what, email has always been the

4:12

best testing playground ever.

4:14

For those who know, I play Fortnite with my nephew and

4:17

you can go to creative mode and you can kind of test and figure

4:19

out all these things so you can get better in the game, right? Email allows

4:21

you to do that. You can run thousands

4:23

of campaigns to specific audiences or

4:25

things and get the data you need before

4:27

you pass the baton to full on

4:29

marketing, you know, marketing out things on

4:32

those ends. So

4:33

look at email a little bit differently. It ain't

4:35

never going away. So you might as well learn

4:37

how to work this relationship in and make it

4:39

work to make your money and do what you need to do for your business.

4:42

Indeed. Indeed. So

4:44

email, I love the way you're talking about the fact that

4:46

it's been kind of done to death, it's

4:49

not dead yet, but as far as

4:51

reevaluating how email is used

4:53

in subsequent possible solutions.

4:56

Tell me what is being done to death?

4:59

Just in marketing in general,

5:01

if it's a TikTok trend or anything,

5:04

what's being done to death right now? Troy,

5:06

what's on your mind?

5:07

I'm going to start some fire today. The copy and paste.

5:10

Copy and paste. I'm just going to say it. We

5:12

can search it. We can put it in the words on LinkedIn,

5:14

other channels, and it's verbatim. That

5:17

needs to end. That needs to stop trying

5:19

to game the systems for engagement

5:22

metrics. That

5:23

don't mean you get dollars in your pocket.

5:25

I think we really should challenge people, brands,

5:27

individuals to be more authentic and we

5:29

say these words, this ain't nothing

5:32

new. But

5:32

people will always try to gain the

5:35

system and then somehow it gets tied into a trend

5:37

and then gets everyone's trying to do it because they have

5:39

this pressure of certain metrics. And that comes to the point

5:42

of

5:42

let's get away from being

5:45

obsessed over metrics. Let's

5:47

pull a Weight Watchers and like, look at these

5:49

things. Just how are we feeling? How

5:52

is our audience feeling? How is our team feeling?

5:54

Do we feel things are moving in the right direction? I sure

5:56

understand it's a profitability goals, as revenue

5:59

goals, as all those.

6:00

I'm not discrediting that at all. I'm saying

6:02

we can refine this

6:03

in a more optimal way that

6:06

doesn't create this toxicity that

6:08

pushes us to use desperate tactics

6:10

or conversations or content

6:13

that

6:13

doesn't align with what we're trying to do or who we are. And

6:15

people remember, people care more now

6:17

than they did before. Gen Z 100% care.

6:20

If you're not aligned with their goals and visions, they're out. They're

6:23

out. And so we need to get away

6:25

from just what was done five, 10,

6:28

even 20 years ago, and reset

6:30

ourselves to what we're trying to do now, that marketing,

6:33

sales, and all the different nuances

6:35

can come together to flow in the right way of

6:37

moving things authentically and

6:39

making sure it's originally yours. Not

6:41

anyone else's. Give credit, get attributions, and

6:44

know that there's enough room for all of us in the sky to fly.

6:46

I'd rather you give credit and expand on

6:49

the horizon of the universe than trying

6:51

to take all the credit and look what I did,

6:53

and it's going to hurt you in three to six months from

6:55

now. one of the things that you

6:57

have heard you say it twice and it's basically.

7:00

Ignore vanity metrics, focus

7:02

on what's converting because

7:05

if you have a million visitors and

7:07

two conversions versus a hundred

7:09

visitors and 75 conversions, that's

7:12

like

7:12

night and day financially. And so

7:15

ignoring vanity metrics, focusing

7:18

on the moves that are making you money and not what's

7:20

just making it look popular. Those

7:22

are like the two different things. I'm

7:25

really glad you pointed that out. So what

7:27

am I next thing is how do you

7:29

measure success as a marketer?

7:32

I'm glad you're back, Troy. Cause I had that question

7:34

just for you.

7:35

Talked about vanity metrics, talked about conversion.

7:38

How does a successful marketer measure

7:40

success? First and foremost outcomes

7:43

and outputs a hundred percent. I

7:45

think like I said earlier, you can get lost in the metrics

7:48

and that can slow you down that

7:50

can, and we may do that out of formality.

7:53

But at the end of the day, what happened? What

7:55

are you doing? What's moving the needle forward?

7:58

And so let's not get lost in the me-

8:00

Let's be clear. And, you know, when you're really

8:02

good at what you do, you're going to be bold. You're going

8:04

to be fearless. So I ain't worried about

8:06

like, with my numbers, ain't, how

8:08

do we feel about it? How does this tie into revenue?

8:11

How does this impact our community? And I think

8:14

a good way to see it now is retention. Retention

8:16

is the easiest

8:18

way

8:19

to actually earn new business than

8:21

trying to spend all of your budget

8:23

on trying to acquire new business in areas that you

8:26

may not understand, to the audience who may not know you yet know

8:28

you yet or familiarize with you yet, and

8:30

it could just be a long process. And so I

8:32

think doubling down on retention

8:34

is a phenomenal way for marketers to

8:37

be successful now. That ties in the community.

8:40

You don't have to do all the initial work. We're already

8:42

in a relationship. I'm just trying to keep you

8:44

happy every day, 24-7.

8:46

That is all I am trying to do as a

8:48

marketer. Let the sales team go out and

8:51

do all the, let the marketing team

8:53

kind of make sure we just have a nice ecosystem, a

8:55

nice space to maintain. Because

8:58

even though we're coming out of this pandemic, there's

9:00

so many variables that we can't control,

9:03

that's literally out of our control, that can impact

9:05

the business. And so the longer we can retain

9:08

our ideal audience, those who won't pay us, those

9:10

who are just the perfect type of clientele

9:14

or customer base, that's really

9:16

what's gonna

9:16

help us in longevity in the long run. And

9:18

we can prove that in metrics in the same

9:20

way without the exhaustingness

9:23

of just every other year, new

9:26

platform, new changes, and

9:28

we're trying to make ambiguity

9:30

make sense. So I would say retention

9:32

is probably the best way for marketers now in 2023.

9:35

Yeah. I wish we had more emojis

9:37

in the reaction because there's none of them encapsulate

9:40

what I'm feeling right now. We've been talking

9:42

a lot about just corporate marketing in general.

9:45

Let's pivot a little bit.

9:46

Troy, how important is

9:49

building your personal brand in 2023? Personal

9:52

brand is job security, baby. Let's just call it

9:54

what it is. We can control all the way we

9:56

can control by the value that we are defined by

9:58

the perception people see it.

10:00

So the stronger our personal brand is, we

10:02

take that with us wherever we go. Now,

10:05

I can't speak for no one else on this panel or

10:07

for anyone who's watching or in the replay, but for me,

10:09

I've been through some things that we all know the struggle that we don't

10:11

gotta talk about, but we know the look, we know the look.

10:13

And when those things happen, what has gotten

10:16

me through is

10:16

that personal brand definitively

10:19

established. That gives me the networks,

10:21

that gives me the conversations. I mean, that is the reason

10:23

why I'm here, and I'm very grateful for it in

10:25

many ways because of that.

10:27

So I think we're in a situation now where

10:29

maybe I'll be very blunt, you know, people

10:32

of colors, personal brands, we maybe

10:34

hide sometimes in the shadows because we think

10:36

that's secure. We don't want to stand

10:38

out too much, but now things have

10:40

shifted. The pendulum have shifted. They

10:43

want you to be bold. They want you to be yourself because you

10:45

bring attribution and value just by being

10:48

associated with something else. Just

10:51

by you being present and people have that

10:53

connection, that relationship. I'm going

10:55

to buy that software. I'm going to buy that product.

10:57

I'm going to choose our service. It has nothing

10:59

to do with anything else, but because of your personal

11:02

brand, what you bring to the table separate from anything

11:04

else that isn't 100% owned by you.

11:07

And so I think that's a great thing to happen with so much

11:09

happening right now. And I'm not sure to trigger anything. You know,

11:11

there have been many unfortunate things that have happened

11:14

recently, recent news. The

11:16

personal brand is what's going to help elevate beyond

11:18

that noise to your next payday,

11:21

to your next opportunity, or to build

11:23

something of your own that you were meant to do

11:25

to scale yourself to different many ways.

11:27

And so I think the last thing I'd say with personal branding,

11:30

there is a line.

11:31

You just can't do anything haphazardly

11:34

and expect residuals because of

11:36

that. You have to put in that deep work and

11:38

it takes a long time to define

11:40

who you are. Or maybe you're in transition or who

11:42

you want to be, but be okay with

11:44

the time and the effort it takes to do that.

11:47

That's one of the most important things about personal brand

11:49

is that being a micro influencer

11:52

in a space that you're passionate about is a huge

11:54

opportunity.

11:55

There's everybody nerds out about something.

11:58

And if you nerd about it. out about it, chances

12:00

are there's going to be someone else who is equally,

12:03

if not more passionate about that subject.

12:05

And so you don't have to have tens of thousands of followers.

12:08

You can just be something to 12

12:11

some ones and you're already making an impact

12:14

in that space. That's huge.

12:23

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13:28

So how do you see AI or machine

13:30

learning supporting marketing activities

13:32

in 2023? You know,

13:35

I saw this recently, I believe it was on LinkedIn

13:38

that they were saying, Canva has been out for 10 years,

13:40

yet we still need designers, right? Not everyone is

13:43

five star top tier designing, right? So

13:46

see this as a utility to

13:48

spark the creative process, to

13:51

get away from some of the mundane work that we as

13:53

creators, let's be real, hate

13:56

immensely, but we know it's part

13:58

of the process. Don't.

14:00

let it think like it's going to replace

14:02

everything that we are as creators.

14:04

It's going to challenge us that if you're a good creator, you're

14:07

still going to be a good creator. You're going to learn

14:09

how to use these tools to expand

14:11

your output, your velocity, your

14:14

impact, your reach, maybe even

14:16

in areas that maybe you don't have the

14:18

full totality of knowledge in

14:20

ML AI can help you do that by

14:23

keeping your core existence

14:25

of content and vibes and

14:27

energy and impact, you know, viable

14:29

to your audiences and expanding universes. So

14:32

I really think we should look at it through a lens of this

14:34

is going to replace my job. What can I use

14:36

this tool for? What things do

14:39

I need to learn to do so? And think of it. And last thing

14:41

I'd say with this, you know, there was a time before

14:43

social media.

14:44

There was a time before Zoom. There was a time

14:46

before the Internet, you know, there was radio,

14:49

you

14:49

know, so we're seeing this evolve

14:51

where we're going through another, you know, level

14:54

up moment where it's like, oh, OK, I got

14:56

to learn new things. Let's not panic. We have

14:58

time, but let's embrace that this

15:00

is going to be a new tool for us to use a new shiny

15:02

tool versus like, Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness.

15:05

I don't know what to do. And so look at it from that lens. It's

15:07

going to take the ease off and you actually might

15:09

see how you can incorporate that in your business.

15:12

Excellent. Excellent. There's one question

15:14

that I would love to answer personal.

15:17

This question is how aggressive should marketers

15:19

be with unsubscribing, unengaged contacts

15:21

from their email database, especially

15:24

knowing that only is small percentage of buyers are currently

15:26

in the market for their products.

15:28

You should be aggressive,

15:31

be aggressive. You want

15:33

to have a clean database.

15:35

You want, that's just part of CRM housekeeping.

15:38

And there is a thing out

15:40

there called gray mail. And

15:42

what that is, is that when you have someone who's

15:44

opted in and you're sending them emails and you're

15:47

not opening it, those of you who signed up for newsletters

15:49

and never opened one, you know what I'm talking about. What

15:51

that does is that forms your email deliverability.

15:54

And so that takes away from you being in that inbox

15:57

and then you end up in one of those Gmail subfolders

15:59

or even worse, a spam folder or

16:02

God forbid your email doesn't even get delivered

16:04

at all. It just hits the floor and the servers don't even tell

16:06

you that your email wasn't delivered. So you got a hundred

16:08

percent deliverability rate, 0% open rate.

16:11

Have no idea why it's because you got a dirty

16:13

database. By the way, if you're buying

16:16

lists, stop it, stop buying lists to

16:18

email people with slightly related.

16:20

But

16:21

I have, I'm very passionate about email,

16:23

email deliverability. Keep your database

16:25

clean. Keep your unsubscribe links big

16:27

and send a breakup email to people who are unengaged.

16:30

Let them ask, Hey, do you really want

16:32

this? If not, click the button. If so, you know,

16:34

we'll keep going, but don't be afraid to

16:37

break up with people who are interested. All you're doing is

16:39

you're wasting your time and hurting your email deliverability.

16:42

Troy, y'all amazing.

16:45

Thank you so much for coming out. I

16:47

mean, the knowledge bombs that have been

16:49

dropped second to none, second

16:51

to none. You've changed people's lives today. Thank

16:54

you so much much for coming out.

17:15

Thanks

17:25

for listening!