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Friday Sep 02, 2022
Friday Sep 02, 2022
We tackle offline marketing best practices from the minds that led these campaigns at digital native companies across a number of different industries. We learned how to leverage offline marketing as a performance marketing channel to drive measurable growth and scale.
In this episode, we cover what steps to take when beginning an offline marketing channel, how to determine which channel will have the most impact on ROI, navigating offline marketing on a smaller budget, and more!
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:28] Our panel shares their background and experience
[04:40] The key to nailing attribution with offline marketing is to gather as many data points as possible to inform you in the right direction
[11:42] The attribution methods our experts found most reliable – Why you should be using surveys, and ‘How did you hear about us?’ questionnaires
[16:03] Measuring the ROAs of offline marketing efforts
[19:16] How does LTV (Life Time Value) differ between customers acquired through offline and paid search channels?
[23:37] Getting started in offline marketing with very little budget to allocate to offline channels
[29:42] How Covid has changed offline marketing
[31:19] Steps to take when determining whether an offline opportunity is worth investing in
[39:40] When you should add another channel into your marketing mix
[44:07] Local testing is a great way to look at incremental impact, but determining your audience is the first step when beginning a new offline marketing channel
[48:06] The differences and limitations of local versus international testing
[50:02] Our panel shares their marketing success and failure stories
About Our Speakers
Avital Caspi, Freshly, Wix, Adore Me – Avital Caspi is a performance marketing consultant with more than 10 years of experience driving growth and achieving scale through offline channels for $100M-$1B consumer-space startups. Before taking her consulting practice full-time, Avital led Offline Marketing at both Adore Me and Freshly. Today, she helps growth-minded brands like Harry’s tackle key offline issues like when to introduce a new offline channel, how to structure and execute test campaigns, identifying realistic CAC goals, and how to effectively measure the effectiveness of offline campaigns without the attribution brands have grown to rely on with digital channels.
Yousuf Bhaijee, VP of Growth at Eaze, Ex-Zynga, Ex-Disney ClassDojo – Yousuf is a growth executive with 13+ years of experience at Eaze, Zynga, Disney, Life360 (IPO), CSC Generation, and more. He spends his time as a contributing writer at Reforge where he publishes “word-of-mouth acquisition” research, and as a growth advisor for clients such as HP, Ergatta, Plushcare.
Molly Laufer, HomeLight, NatureBox – Molly is passionate about the inflection point when a company begins to diversify its acquisition portfolio outside of digital channels and is ready to dip its toes into emerging/offline marketing channels to achieve scale without compromising performance metrics. She has a decade of customer acquisition experience from early stage ecomm (first employee at NatureBox.com) to real estate tech (HomeLight.com) and scaling offline performance marketing channels for a range of consumer tech companies and startups in-house, as an agency strategist, and as an independent growth marketing consultant. She has directly managed 7-figure monthly media buys across a diverse set of offline channels with a focus on return on ad spend and marketing profitability. Her channel experience spans linear & connected TV, audio (including podcast, streaming, terrestrial, and satellite – both endorsement and produced audio), direct mail, and OOH with a holistic understanding of media strategy and buying, creative development, and analytics/attribution.
Gavin Carr, Honey, Ro, Candid – Gavin is an experienced Growth Marketer specializing in Traditional, offline, and endorsement media. He currently leads a performance marketing team at Honey dedicated to user growth encompassing these with some of the fastest growing startups in tech and commerce such as Dollar Shave Club, Candid Co, Ro and now Honey.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“The problem with offline marketing sometimes is that there is just no touch. So the idea is to try to combine as many different models as possible and hope this will lead you in the right direction, but you never get to accuracy.” – Avital Caspi
“I always say there is no one best attribution model and anyone who tells you that there is one hasn't seen them all. It's really about making sure that you're looking at your tools internally. ” – Molly Laufer
“Every method has its limitations. But what we’re trying to go for is to get enough data to make a business decision. If we can have that data, that's all that really matters.” – Gavin Carr
“When a channel is heavily dependant on promo codes and discounts, the LTV will be lower.” – Avital Caspi
“[Where to get started in offline channels] depends on the product and the audience. Who are you speaking to? It really does come down to your core audience for that product. I think it's really important to speak with your customers. And so put out a survey, and ask them what media types they use. Just asking them where they spend their time could give you a good sense as well of going into podcast, radio or some other channel.” – Gavin Carr
“If you have very little budget [to invest into offline marketing] get really scrappy.” – Yousuf Bhaijee
“If you invest too little [into offline marketing] or you don't actually have the ability to drive a response then it’s a waste of money.” – Molly Laufer
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Sep 02, 2022
Friday Sep 02, 2022
We sat down with Mike Schmidt, founder of Dovetale, the go-to platform for any company working with social media creators. We learned about his journey and got his advice on how to approach Influencer Marketing the right way.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:59] Mike’s accidental entrepreneurial journey, starting Listn, and why he founded Dovetale – Building everything that Google missed on social media
[04:52] Why publishers aren’t appropriately indexed; Social networks want to control the experience as much as they can
[07:14] Imagine a future where creators fully can provision their data from one system to the next, like some sort of data wallet or passport that can communicate between different types of applications
[10:04] Mike talks about where to get started with Influencer Marketing
[13:50 ] The differences in performance between Influencer Campaigns and Paid Social
[19:22] Brands that have done Influencer Marketing the right way – How Curology, Bravo Sierra, and KontrolFreek succeed by trusting their influencers, and having disciplined and organized marketing teams
[23:46] Mike talks about how most marketers fail because of their lack of discipline and lack of understanding what they’re measuring
[26:26] Final advice from Mike when starting in Influencer Marketing – You don’t need a platform to start reaching out to people
About Our Speakers
Mike Schmidt, Founder at Dovetale – Mike is the founder of Dovetale.com, an influencer marketing suite for brands of any size. Mike previously founded Listn, which was acquired by SFX Entertainment. Mike has also represented Canada at the G20 summit and graduated in Chemical Engineering.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“We imagine a future where creators can fully provide their data from one system to next. It's almost like a data wallet or passport that can communicate between different applications.” – Mike Schmidt
“If we can help creators get work and find brands to work with that's a win for us. We want to be the place where brands and agencies alike start their process. As the company is evolving much more into a suite of tools, we want to be a relationship management layer for all those relationships as well.” – Mike Schmidt
“if you're looking at influencer marketing to achieve scale in your sales or marketing org, not many teams ask themselves the fundamental questions: What am I measuring? What does success look like to me? Just being very organized and having that discipline… really helps you throughout pretty much anything that you're trying to do in problem-solving.” – Mike Schmidt
“Some advice when you're going into this influencer space is you don't need a platform to go out there and reach out to people. Tools like Dovetale are to help you scale, so once you figure it out, then you can go out and scale.” – Mike Schmidt
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Sep 02, 2022
Friday Sep 02, 2022
We sat down with Michael Yewdell, Co-Founder of Campus Protein and BEAM Be Amazing. We learn about his journey and best practices on how he created affiliate programs for both Campus Protein and BEAM, which offers its own line of health/ fitness supplements, controlling the process, from farm to shaker.
In this episode, we get the secret recipe to successful affiliate marketing; Pairing data with powerful branding and identity. Mike talks about the value of building community and connection into your affiliate program and shares the incredible backstory of BEAM Be Amazing.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:42] Mike shares how he started Campus Protein and why building BEAM Be Amazing has been one of the most interesting projects he’s been a part of
[02:16] The key ingredients of a successful affiliate program – Community, reason, connection, relationship
[03:33] Ways to evaluate affiliate models
[04:27] BEAM Be Amazing’s philanthropic mission – Righting the wrongs of the supplement industry
[07:07 ] Mike’s lessons and career takeaways – The key to winning at affiliate marketing is pairing data with understanding your brand
[07:38] Build your program brick by brick. Don’t expect to hit a home run on your first go at an affiliate program. You’ll be able to refine it along the way
About Michael
Michael Yewdell, Co-Founder of Campus Protein & BEAM Be Amazing – Michael has been an entrepreneur for the past 10 years building my legacy business Campus Protein along with his newest brand BEAM: Be Amazing.
The brand BEAM is based on Michael’s battle with a rare form of cancer back in 2017. He failed 4 chemotherapies and ended up having to switch hospitals to try a rare form of chemotherapy that ended up saving his life.
BEAM has an incredible story, but the products and their impact are where they truly differentiate themselves. BEAM controls 100% of the production process from sourcing the ingredients, to formulating, to flavoring, and manufacturing its product in-house. This allows them to put 100% of our resources into the product, but it does not stop there. Quality to them is of the utmost importance so they do in-house allergen, metal, and efficacy testing along with 3rd party testing.
BEAM has also been able to use its platform to raise close to $500,000 towards cancer research, plant 1000s of trees, gift 1000s of free hours of therapy, and contribute to so many other initiatives in just 2 years of business.
Quotes
“The key ingredient is community. There needs to be a personal touch to everything that you do. There needs to be a reason and a connection to everything you do, whether it's the story or the result.” – Michael Yewdell
“Building a family or a community with connection and with relationships needs to be in affiliate marketing.” – Michael Yewdell
“Whether it's a content creator or a sales superstar, you need to understand that relationship and nurture it to maximize and optimize.” – Michael Yewdell
“I thought that if I had the right data, I would be able to make the right decisions. Data helps make decisions, but it's not the ultimate deciding factor. Being able to pair data with your understanding of your brand will ultimately make your affiliate marketing program the most successful.” – Michael Yewdell
“Our products are set out to right the wrongs in the industry.” – Michael Yewdell
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Sep 02, 2022
Friday Sep 02, 2022
To a lot of startups, growth is just ads and emails—tactics that occur outside of a company’s digital products. But your product can also become one of the biggest drivers of acquisition, engagement, and retention if you’re utilizing it in the right way.
In order to dive deeper, we assembled a panel of Product-Driven Growth experts to speak about how you can unlock Growth by using your digital product as a driver. We discuss reframing your growth targets in the pandemic, the steps you need to take before hiring your growth team, product features that drive growth, and retention wins. All this and more!
Here’s What We Discussed:
[04:12] The first steps when building out a growth team – Growth is not just ‘doing marketing better,’ it is understanding your market-value proposition.
[08:22] Our panel shares how they gauge product-market fit in order to start growing.
[11:24] Which metrics growth teams can use in order to understand and define retention and user behavior.
[13:47] The best methods to measure incrementality of growth driven through your product.
[16:33] Growing in a global downturn – How to reframe your focus and goals in a pandemic.
[23:01] From SEO, machine learning, and curation to SMS alerts; Our panel shares the #1 product feature that has driven growth.
[28:53] Tip: Pick up the phone and speak to your clients to get insight into their experience with your product.
[30:41] How to strike a balance between building a creative-driven product growth and achieving growth metrics.
[35:05] Using documentation in order to define team mission and responsibilities.
[37:40] Our panel shares their biggest retention wins and setbacks
[46:39] How to clearly define the value and purview of your team to the rest of the company
About Our Speakers
Akshay Rathod, Founder of Usonia – Akshay is a self-titled nerd who spends his days obsessing over growth systems. In 2018, Akshay founded USONIA, his full-stack growth consultancy. In the years since, companies like Nike, AngelList, Goop, Dia & Co and Buffy have partnered with USONIA and seen the benefits of their data-driven, customer-obsessed and hypothesis-first growth process. Akshay serves as a Growth Advisor to Primary Venture Partners, providing go-to-market growth advice and guidance to the portfolio’s founders.
Sabrina Scandar, Director of Product at Better.com – Sabrina is Director of Product for the Growth Team at Better.com. Previously, she was a Lead Product Manager at Skillshare, where she worked on the core Experience team and then helped to build out the company’s first Growth team. She has 10+ years of Product Management experience in both consumer and B2B web.
Paul Ghio, VP Product at Shutterstock – Paul is a marketplace product leader at the convergence of craft, growth, and distribution. As the Director of Product at Yelp, he enjoys learning about the complexities of new markets, systems, strategies, and tactics. Before joining Yelp, Paul was the VP of Product at Creative Market, a marketplace for designers and creatives, overseeing a team of 17 across product management, analytics, research, and design, which increased Creative Market’s user base by 2077%.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“The way that I've always thought about [growth] is it's the process of defining, measuring, and improving what really matters to the growth metric, whatever that happens to be, for that company.” – Paul Ghio
“When you're starting a growth team at a company, it's really important that you don't start it too early. You need product-market fit before you can really do growth properly. Otherwise, you haven't figured out what your best growth levers are and what exactly the value that you're selling is.” – Sabrina Scandar
“The key misconception is that growth is just doing marketing better. But it's not. It's about delivering value to users. So it's about building product value, getting users to experience and understand that product value is as quickly as possible, and then making sure that they understand it over and over again.” – Sabrina Scandar
“It's really helpful and really necessary to understand product-market fit throughout the life cycle of the company or the journey of a product.” – Paul Ghio
“Talking to people is so important. Spending an entire day, just talking to customers will reap so many rewards.” – Akshay Rathod
“Core product teams are focused on creating the things that users derive value from. Growth product teams are focused on getting users to experience that value and understand that value as quickly and as often as possible.” – Sabrina Scandar
“I think growth product people are troublemakers. We're sitting nestled between marketing, distribution, sales, and the core product. Depending on the business, you're in everyone's business. So it is a very complicated thing and it can get messy, but I think it speaks to the intersectionality of this growth mindset; you have to be holistic.” – Akshay Rathod
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Join us for this edition of the Growth Leaders Circle. This week we will be learning from the minds that built and managed the Growth & Marketing teams at Buffy & Cornershop by Uber.
Yiota Avram and Matt Breuer discuss how to get started when building your team out, what roles you should prioritize as first hires, and how to improve performance and culture especially when there are new hires. We also discuss our favorite interview questions to assess candidates and how to bridge the gap of feeling like a family to a company when you scale from a small team to 50 employees.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:17] Our speakers introduce themselves and share their background
[02:33] Insight on processes for getting started with building a team early companies and start-ups
[08:38] Matt talks about Buffy and what it’s like for a startup to go from zero to reaching its first milestones
[12:42] Matt’s opinion on contractor/agency versus in-house teams
[14:36] Growth Person Vs. Brand Person: What makes a better first hire?
[18:57] How to maintain a positive culture while setting performance expectations when building out your team
[25:59] Yiota shares her thoughts on the downsides of channel specialization or channel isolation
[28:08] How to prepare a new hire for a blended role
[34:39] What attributes and identifiers make a growth team “world-class?”
[40:36] From family to company: Tips on bridging the gap when growing from a small team to 50+ employees
{44:30] Yiota and Matt share their favorite questions to ask during interviews to assess candidates
[48:00] Our speakers share their favorite recent growth stories and learnings
About Our Speakers
Yiota Avram, CMO at Cornershop by Uber – Yiota is the CMO of Cornershop by Uber. Cornershop by Uber is the app that connects your front door to your city’s top stores in as little as 60 minutes. Founded simultaneously in Santiago, Chile, and Mexico City in 2015, they now operate in eight countries across the Americas: Chile, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Costa Rica, Canada, and the US. In July 2020, Uber acquired a majority stake in the company, providing an important injection of capital that allowed us to access more resources to continue building and improving our service over the upcoming years.
Yiota manages a team of ~80 global marketers across LATAM & North America to build Cornershop/Uber Grocery on-demand grocery+ delivery business.
Matt Breuer, Former Chief Marketing Officer at Buffy – Matt is the former CMO at Buffy. Buffy is on a mission to help us live comfortably – without making our planet uncomfortable. That’s why they use earth-friendly fabrics and manufacturing methods to create more sustainable products, from the first sketch to the last stitch and beyond. They don’t just help you feel good today. They contribute real good for tomorrow.
At Buffy, Matt oversaw the revenue strategy marketing, creative storefront, and merchandising, while driving the company’s sustainability efforts and launching new products. In 2020, Buffy achieved profitability while revenue grew more than 30% year-over-year, and the company expects to surpass $100 million in revenue in the first quarter of 2021.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“What is your skillset as the leader and then who do you need first full time to compliment your skillset?” – Yiota Avram
“For me, it's important to have the skill set of both market evaluation, and ground positioning differentiation, in addition to the more typical quantitative growth marketing skills. Because you need both of those skills when you are figuring out the proposition.” – Yiota Avram
“What does it look like to go from zero to those first few milestones? When I look at what we did at Buffy in the early days, for me, it's a reflection of where we placed that early focus on, and what capacity we needed to build inside the work.” – Matt Breuer
“Your first full-time hire has to understand performance… They have to understand the performance implications to keep opening up runway for all of the teams and folks that'll end up reporting into that marketing structure.” – Matt Breuer
“Yes, there is specialization in new channels, but at the end of the day, it's similar principles. And from a career progression, I find that so many of my team members love the idea of learning the other channels and connecting the dots beyond their individual siloed channels.” – Yiota Avram
“I've always been really laser-focused on where we are eliminating any chance that we've created perverse incentives for people to pursue things that will make them or their work look really good yet be totally disconnected from whether the overall marketing program is succeeding.” – Matt Breuer
“What I'm learning is that, yes, you can still scale, but you don't necessarily need to incorporate bureaucracy. So what's the minimum of cadences that you need to organize the team, but at the same time, feel like a startup and a family.” – Yiota Avram
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Partnering with Voyantis, we learned from a powerful panel of growth experts how they use LTV predictions to scale and uplift ROI.
In today’s changing, iOS 14.5, cookieless world, marketers have to leverage internal data and predictive models to stay ahead of the curve. Our expert panelists shared some of their best practices and unexpected features they rely on for calculating, predicting, and improving Customer Lifetime Value.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:53] Our speakers introduce themselves and share their backgrounds and experience
[02:11] Eran shares what variables he recommends a company look at to define LTV
[08:03] Ori’s thoughts on calculating LTV in D2C business
[12:34] Isgav shares the data sets that he looks at to determine LTV and how to handle clients and advertisers that insist on their own models
[19:23] How to move from insights from LTV models to actions
[24:30] Orin shares concrete examples of how he’s been able to utilize LTV models as concrete efforts that affect daily operations
[28:09] How do you think about LTV alongside the other metrics you track?
[31:22] Isgav on his observations of industries overestimating and underestimating LTV
[33:41] What types of products or brands should or shouldn’t be implementing an LTV-based marketing strategy?
[36:07] Predicting LTV with limited attributed data across paid channels
[42:20] How to address declining return on ad spend due to cookie updates
About Our Speakers
Eran Friendinger, Co-Founder and CTO at Voyantis – Eran is the Co-Founder and Coo at Voyantis. Voyantis turns LTV prediction modeling into an end-to-end optimization solution. They enable growth and UA teams to shape and control the future, engineering free.
Isgav Davidowitz, Client Solutions Manager at Facebook– Isgav is the Client Solutions Manager at Facebook. He’s a Data scientist, specialized in statistical modeling and machine learning. At Facebook, working with Digital Health disruptors, start-ups and global companies on how to integrate predictive models and advanced data usage into their business while optimizing toward long term growth.
Ori Klein, VP and Digital Marketing & Product at Lennar – Ori is the VP of Digital Marketing & Product at Lennar. Prior to Lennar, he was the Senior VP of Growth at both Via and Eight. Before getting into Digital Marketing he was Senior Associate in McKinsey & Company and Venture Capital Associate at Amiti Ventures.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“What we care about, especially as we optimize media is thinking about how we know it's a meaningful interaction and there's meaningful interest partnering that session. So it's really understanding the depths of interaction with our content, and the level of interest. And then using that to try to predict what the likelihood is that they actually engage with the sales process.” – Eran Friendinger
“A lot of clients, advertisers, and people in the industry and in different industries talk about LTV. But to be honest most of them have either a very basic model to no model.” – Isgav Davidowitz
“The goal is not to be able to calculate or know the LTV, the goal is to be able to make impactful business decisions based on these numbers you calculate otherwise they're just numbers.” – Isgav Davidowitz
“There's also the question of how you use the LTV framework as a decision-making tool generally for your connect growth efforts and for your business. Obviously, we all would like to invest more in channels and campaigns that drive higher value LTV. But if you think about all your other efforts starting from which promotions you're sending out, customer service rewards, and thinking from an LTV lens, that can provide a lot of value.” – Ori Klein
“If you're overall declining, then you need to figure out how to evolve your strategies. Generally speaking, as digital marketers, we all need to become a bit more comfortable with not knowing as much as we did know over the past few years. Not being able to attribute every single purchase to a single source and being able to rely more on top-down approaches versus the bottom-up approaches.” – Ori Klein
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Spero Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm investing in the things that make life worth living. They partner with entrepreneurs to solve problems in three areas: well-being, work & purpose, and human connection. They invest in technology companies that are driven to deliver value to both shareholders and society, including Clarity, Mati, Core, Droneseed, Gencove, Roam Robotics, and Skillshare. They are high-conviction investors and we help companies scale to billions of customers. Their LP and partners are founders and early execs at eBay and Tesla.
VC Insights with Ruckus is a series of conversations with Venture Capitalists to learn about what they look for in companies to fund, how they spot the best talent, and what is their advice for startup founders looking to grow or get funding.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:35] Our speakers introduce themselves and share their backgrounds
[03:11] Sonny, Ha, and Anish discuss the Black Lives Matter events and the tragedy of George Floyd as well as implore those with a seat at the table to do more to support underrepresented communities
[10:11] What is an EIR (Entrepreneur In Residence) and how does it differ from being a VC?
[16:00] Ha talks about her transition from EIR into VC and how her startup background equipped her for success in the role
[23:52] Sonny and Ha discusses the skills and attributes needed to be successful as an EIR or VC
[26:30] How to get into VC – Is there a typical profile and path to follow?
[32:11] How introverts can thrive in a role that seems made for extroverts
[35:52] On the power of relationships – Opportunities come from people
[43:20] Our speakers share market opportunities they’re bullish about but that lack hype: Product led communities, AR and VR affecting the workforce,
[50:06] Tips on Managing conversations with your Limited Partners?
[51:15] Ha discusses the deal terms and compensation structure within Spero Ventures
[55:55] Ha and Sonny share their final thoughts
About Our Speakers
Ha Nguyen, was formerly a Founding Partner at Spero Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm investing in the things that make life worth living: our well-being, work & purpose, and human connection.
Her core drivers are the following: connecting people through community, building products that have a positive impact at scale, leading with empathy, and elevating women and underrepresented minorities in the technology industry.
She gives talks around the globe on design thinking and how to build products that customers love. She’s on the Board of Women In Product (non-profit organization of 20k female product builders) and co-founded the Product Leader Summit (invite-only conference bringing together founders and VP-level product leaders).
Sonny Mayugba, is a multi-time CEO and C-Level executive, who has gone from ‘napkin to Nasdaq,’ scrappy operator chops to SEC Compliance training, SPAC and De-SPAC first-hand experience, and many things in between. HE led Growth at Swimply (through $10M Series Seed and $40M Series A) over 3x’ing revenue in one season, founding CMO at Waitr (Nasdaq:WTRH) launching 700+ cities and over $1B in public company market cap, Managing Director at LAUNCH, EIR at Spero Ventures, Global Business Marketing at Facebook
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“You will actually do a very bad job in this role if your expectation is that you're gonna go into a company and fix their problems for them. That's not what the founders actually want from you. They're gonna understand their businesses much better than you, but they don't have the experience that you do. And so they do want you to be a coach to them.” – Ha Nguyen
“Venture sounds sexy and sometimes it is, but it's not always that way. And if you are a builder and you love building, it may or may not be the right role for you.” – Ha Nguyen
“[As an IER] you get to take your experience of being a founder and be a coach to those who haven't been down that road. That is just really powerful because you've done it. And when they hit you with their challenges or objectives, you actually know where it's gonna go. So you coach them on sales strategy, product strategy, marketing strategy, operational, tactical plans and help connect those dots.” – Sonny Mayugba
“If you're a founder or an operator, you tend to have your opinions and your biases. But you need to listen. It’s so important.” – Sonny Mayugba
“We do have to build that muscle and get out there into the world. We have to develop our thesis, but then also publish our thesis. You can be an introvert and learn how to build that muscle.” – HA
“The key is about starting to participate. If you stay invisible, how can anyone know about you? What I think is happening is people outside the bubble are starting to participate a little more. And that doesn't mean building a massive personal brand. It's about participating and building relationships.” – Sonny Mayugba
“Your relationships and the relationships you consistently go after, build, and grow will actually take you a lot farther in any career than expertise or knowledge.” – Anish Shah
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
We sat down with three industry leaders to learn how to best leverage marketing in the Crypto space, how to navigate the new and fast-changing nature of the industry, and what trends we can expect to see for blockchain and cryptocurrency in the future.
In this episode, Jay Kurahashi-Sofue, Nicole Tay, and Tony Pham discuss how marketers have been approaching messaging in a fast-changing space and effective marketing strategies for companies on a budget. We'll also talk about some of the most common challenges marketers face when trying to engage audiences about cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:18] Our speakers introduce themselves and share their backgrounds
[04:27] Jay explains what ICO is and how it functionally works
[07:25] What is your model for effective marketing in the Crypto space and how can successful marketing be gauged?
[13:47] Nicole shares her strategy for using education as a way to bridge the gap between the industry and her audience
[19:40] Our speakers share the most interesting trends their following at the moment
[27:39] The most common challenges to engage new crypto users
[37:49] What marketing strategies do you recommend for bootstrapped (or pre-seeded) startups?
[44:30] Tony shares how he approaches PR
[47:10] The panel shares their thoughts on E-Commerce opportunities, options, and wider acceptance of cryptocurrency
About Our Speakers
Jay Kurahashi-Sofue, VP of Marketing at Ava Labs – Jay is the VP of Marketing at Ava Labs, a blockchain organization building Avalanche. Prior to Ava Labs, he was the Head of Marketing at Fluidity and AirSwap and also was a strategist at Ogilvy, where he co-founded its first blockchain marketing group. Jay is also the co-founder of BlockMarketers, a virtual and in-person community for marketing executives in the blockchain industry. Outside of Ava Labs, Jay is a photographer and music producer.
Nicole Tay, Head of Marketing at Skynet Labs – Nicole is a storyteller with a passion for blockchain technology. As a guiding principle, she leads with diversity, equity, inclusion, and access in maximizing the potential of decentralized technology to decentralize power.
Nicole is a graduate of Wellesley College and received her MPH from Columbia University in Epidemiology and the Social Determinants of Health. In her spare time, she writes and directs short films.
Tony Pham, Head of Marketing at Kadena – Tony is the former Head of Marketing at Kadena, a blockchain technology company that came out of J.P. Morgan’s Blockchain center for Excellence. Tony’s responsibilities at Kadena included brand communications, product marketing, and engagement strategy. He started his career in Silicon Valley by managing community and product marketing at Slide (acquired by Google), followed by his role as the first VP of Marketing at Life360 (IPO on ASX). He has won a web award and spoken at industry-leading conferences including Mobile World Congress (Barcelona,) SxSW (Austin), and Marketing 2.0 (Paris.)
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“I think in the crypto space, they love to attach names and rebrand things. But at the end of the day, when you look really far down into what it is exactly is, it's just a simple mechanism with the only difference being the blockchain as the piece of technology underneath it all.” – Jay Kurahashi-Sofue
“The way that I try to stay really consistent when [marketing a decentralized internet] is using diversity, equity, and inclusion as my basis for how I approach marketing. At the end of the day, I fully believe that diversity, equity, inclusion, and access is exactly how we optimize the potential of decentralized tech to decentralized power.” – Nicole Tay
“The cool thing about DAOs is that it's the full embodiment of when communities have that level of self-determination to set the rules and the standards for how they wanna operate and also for that community to be running completely autonomously.” – Nicole Tay
“[The challenge with engaging new crypto users is] in addition to helping people understand, it's the helping them figure out for themselves why they should care at all.” – Tony Pham
“The foundations of an early stage company have to be laid out first. Regardless of how much money you have as an organization, I always like to come into a preseed company and make sure that all the organic channels are as optimized and as discoverable as possible.” – Jay Kurahashi-Sofue
“There are so many projects out there right now, that it's really important to be able to distinguish yourself as being credible, reputable, legitimate. One way of doing that is to pay attention to what teams are collaborating and cooperating with each other.” – Tony Pham
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
We sat down with Jonathan and Brendan who work on the platform team at Portage Ventures, a fin-tech-focused venture capital firm. We learned what it’s like to transition from heading up marketing & sales at an operating company to advising portfolio companies within a venture capital firm.
Join our conversation as we discuss how to build trust with your partners and create a long-lasting relationship by offering value first. We cover the nuances of working in venture capital, the skills needed for the role, and career advice for anyone looking to level up. All this and more!
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:27] Jonathan Metrick and Brendan Callaghan share their backgrounds
[03:06] Brendan and Jonathan share why they decided to transition from an operating role to VC and the differences between the roles
[11:18] How success is measured in a VC role
[16:09] Portage is looking to build a longer-term relationship with their investments, not just provide capital
[21:30] Brendan and Jonathan share what about the world of VC appealed to them
[25:15] How their roles as VCs have grown Brendan and Jonathan
[32:25] Career Advice: Schedule 3 coffees a week with people to have conversations and learn from them
[34:58] What skills in your previous roles provided you with an unfair advantage as a VC?
[37:05] How has COVID impacted the industry or your relationship with portfolio clients?
[40:11] Jonathan shares what he misses about being an operator and what he’s gained as a VC
[44:53] Trends in the VC space: What’s getting funded these days
About Our Speakers
Jonathan Metrick, Chief Growth Officer at Portage Ventures – Jonathan Metrick is the Chief Growth Officer at Portage Ventures, helping build some of the world’s leading fintechs. During this time, Jonathan has also been the Fractional CGO at Wealthsimple.
Prior to joining Portage, Jonathan served as the CMO of Policygenius, America’s leading online insurance marketplace. At Pg, Jonathan built a growth marketing division of +45 and helped 10x revenue and achieve positive LTV in 3 years. Previously, Jonathan has held marketing leadership positions working with Tiffany & Co, Live Nation Entertainment, Diesel, Hult and Procter & Gamble.
Jonathan has an MBA with distinction (top 10%) from Harvard Business School.
Brendan Callaghan, VP Sales at Portage Ventures – Brendan is VP Sales at Portage, helping build some of the world’s leading fintech companies. A key member of any start up’s Management Team charged with generating and maintaining year over year growth. While developing/coaching staff and creating a successful sales organization. He is a sales leader with substantial hands on sales team management experience and high attention to bottom line results.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“Building capability is another element of driving impact because the key thing you want to make sure you're doing is not about necessarily doing the work for them. But building capabilities so that they can internally do it themselves.” – Jonathan Metrick
“We [Portage] like to partner with our investment. We're not just capital. There are a lot of sources for entrepreneurs to get funding and we're aware of that. The reality is we come to the table with more than just capital. We're there to be used. We're there to support. And we do so freely across all of the investments.” – Brendan Callaghan
“Don't rely on blogs, on books, or on classroom learning. Don't think that your internal job is gonna help you level up to the next. Make sure to schedule a lot of external meetings within your career with people outside of your four walls, your organization. That's what's going to level you up.” – Anish Shah
“When I come in, I just try and add value. I'm willing to roll up my sleeves and do some of the work, and I think that helps build trust.” – Jonathan Metrick
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
With so much content competing for our attention, how can a brand stand out on its social platforms? Sarah McLoughlin says a great social post speaks to its audience, in a way that is relevant and genuine. Brands need to let their consumer direct their social strategy by placing themselves in the shoes of their audience.
We sat down with Sarah McLoughlin, Director of Digital Marketing at Power Digital to learn about her journey, insights, and best practices on how to best communicate with her creative team. In this episode, Sarah shares her key ingredients for a social media strategy, all her best tips and lessons from her career, and how she stays up to date with the latest trends.
Here’s What We Discussed:
[00:22] Sarah shares her background and how her career began in Paid Social
[01:33] A great influencer post requires keeping your audience in mind and being relevant and genuine
[02:33] Sarah shares the most memorable projects she’s worked on and lessons learned from her career highlights
[05:41] The key ingredients for a social media plan
[10:43] Best practices to communicate and collaborate with your creative team
[16:53] Have an open mind and don’t let your preconceived notion of what will work on the platform stop you from trying things – Let the data decide what will work
[19:37] Determining an effective social media posting structure depends on your budget, brand, and bandwidth
[23:06] Where Sarah gets her industry news and how she keeps up with social trends
About Sarah
Sarah McLoughlin, Director of Digital Marketing, Power Digital – Sarah works as a Vice President, Paid Social at Power Digital Marketing, which is an Advertising & Marketing company with an estimated 64 employees; and founded in 2012. They are part of the Social Media Marketing team within the Marketing Department and their management level is VP-Level. Sarah graduated from Rowan University in 2009 and is currently based in New York City, United States.
About Our Moderator
Anish Shah is the CEO & Founder of executive search agency Bring Ruckus. Anish has worked in-house in Growth roles at Snapfish and Getable. He started Bring Ruckus as a Growth consultancy 11 years ago working with 40+ clients, then re-focused his firm on executive recruiting for Growth leaders.
Quotes
“A great influencer post speaks to their audience. It speaks to the things that are relevant to them and does it in a way that feels like a recommendation from a friend. A lot of times in paid social, the most important thing you can do is really keep your audience in mind. What's important to them and how do we make sure that that's being the forefront of what we're putting in our ad?” – Sarah McLoughlin
“Consumers are very savvy nowadays. They know when something is fake and when it's contrived. What they’re looking for is that organic content that just speaks to them.” – Sarah McLoughlin
“The most important thing that you can do for your consumer is talk about problem solutions.” – Sarah McLoughlin
“Creative teams have great ideas, but it's the data from the platform that puts parameters around creativity.” – Sarah McLoughlin
ABOUT RUCKUS
We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!