Many companies have some form of customer education—whether onboarding or knowledge bases—but not many are truly going all in. Mark Kilens (CMO of Airmeet) believes that’s a big miss.

In this episode, Mark shares his experiences building HubSpot academy, thoughts on why more companies aren’t investing in customer education, and some aspirational examples of companies who are nailing it. 

Advocacy is often thought of as just a marketing responsibility—but it doesn't have to. In this episode, Julie Norquist Roy outlines why advocacy can truly impact every part of the organization, gives ideas for how to align sales and CS to this more customer-centric view, and shares why we lose focus on our customers.

According to Jeff Pedowitz (author of F the Funnel), the traditional funnel is outdated. It simply doesn't reflect the way modern consumers want to buy. Luckily, he believes there's a better way. In this episode, Jeff shares why the funnel isn't living up to expectations, walks us through his customer-centric replacement, and outlines how to put the customer at the center of your universe.

Looking to start a customer marketing program but don’t have the budget? No problem. Michelle Randall, CMO at Playvox, shares 10 ways to start a customer marketing program with just a little elbow grease. 

Looking to give gifts to your customers but don't have the budget of Oprah? Reputation's Cassie Sneed has you covered. In this episode, Cassie shares insights on the perfect times in the customer journey to give gifts, the types of gifts that are most impactful for different customer groups, and how to think about gift giving on tight budgets.

When you find a customer willing to be an advocate, how often do you overuse that relationship? Probably way too often. HubSpot’s Natalie Gullatt has seen it throughout her career and has found ways to avoid advocacy fatigue.

In this episode, we chat about how to build meaningful reciprocal relationships with customers, how to ensure we aren’t burning out relationships with too many one-sided asks, and even how to get around PR and legal department roadblocks. 

Your approach to B2B sales and marketing is becoming obsolete. But best-selling author Brent Adamson thinks the better way involves customer confidence. In this episode, we discuss how marketing and sales teams can operate differently to better serve prospects, how organizations can potentially completely rework their go-to-market strategy by reorganizing teams, and how to improve the likelihood that your customers feel great about their purchasing decisions.

GitHub’s The ReadME Project takes a unique approach to brand-based marketing and is perhaps the next evolution in customer marketing: giving your customers incredibly valuable resources without expecting anything back. In this episode, we sit down with GitHub’s Virginia Bryant and Robb Mapp to discuss this content initiative, how to create content that’s valuable to your customers, and how to make your customers want to provide you with user-generated content.

Read more about The ReadME Project here: https://github.com/readme/

Sam Shepler, CEO of Testimonial Hero, believes the B2B buyer journey has changed. More than ever, prospects want to self-serve, not be led by a salesperson. So how can our content adapt?

In this episode, Sam dives into this new buyer’s journey, how snackable and candid content can serve our prospects, and the power of video testimonials.

Customers give you feedback—and then what? To get ahead, Airbnb’s Raj Sivasubramanian believes you need to close the loop on customer feedback. In this episode, Raj shares why so many companies fail to close the loop, how closing the loop can mean different things, and shares a video feedback program he spearheaded at Airbnb to help bring more empathy to customer feedback. 

How valuable are customer marketing programs, and how do you get started? This episode’s guest, Steve George, Global Director of Customer Marketing and Community at Insider, shares advice on choosing the right person to lead an advocacy program, on different job types you might need to hire as you grow, and his three-step framework for building a program.

Most of us in customer marketing claim to want more diversity in our organizations, but are we doing enough to make it happen?

In this week’s episode, Pascale Royal, Director of Executive Customer Programs at Coupa Software, talks about the impact of this lack of diversity on our customers, how featuring different groups of people can unlock more powerful stories, and how diverse teams can lead to better products—and businesses.

Metrics matter in a community program, but what matters most is what and when you measure.

In this episode, Jae Washington, Senior Community Manager at Headspace, talks about long-term thinking, the fundamentals of community building, and how a customer community can impact every part of your business. 

Everyone knows customer onboarding is important. But did you know poor onboarding is the cause of massive amounts of churn? In this episode, customer onboarding expert Donna Weber shares why customer-facing teams are so siloed, why onboarding happens before you close the sale, and her Orchestrated Onboarding™ framework to nail onboarding every time.

You might think you need to approach B2B and B2C communities differently. Asana’s Joshua Zerkel rejects this, calling it a “false distinction.” He believes B2B communities can have the same fun, engagement, and feel of B2C communities. In this episode, Joshua shares how any B2B brand can cultivate a B2C-style community, how their Asana Together community helps drive meaningful impact, and some fun things they’ve built in their community that have resonated with their audience.

NPS surveys can sometimes work, but what if you asked your customer directly: how happy are you? Colin Burns, Global VP of Professional Services at Brandwatch, spends a ton of his time on customer calls. In a world where we have better customer data than ever, he feels there’s little substitution for a customer conversation.

Mapping the customer journey is an important exercise for customer experience or product teams—but what about marketing? And once you understand the customer journey, how can you fuse advocacy asks throughout? Jane Menyo, Head of Customer Marketing at Gong, shares her thoughts on the advocacy ladder, how marketing can help with retention, and low-calorie versus high-calorie advocacy asks of your customers.

Customer-centricity needs to be company-wide for it to truly impact your customers. But how can you instill these values in everyone? Annette Franz, Founder and CEO of CX Journey Inc, gives her playbook for developing a customer-centric culture at your organization. Her new book, Built to Win, dives deep into this topic and is out now.

When providing customer support for highly-technical solutions, how do you ensure customers are getting the service they need? 

Manuel Harnisch, VP of Customer Success at People Data Labs, shares how to increase your CS team’s technical muscle to better service your customers.

The Chief Customer Officer can be a singular role that unites your organization around your customers. But what does this role entail? And does it always need to be just one person—or exist at all? In this episode, best-selling author Jeanne Bliss shares her insights into the CCO position and how to unite decision-makers for a cohesive approach to customer experience.