Erica Seidel, the host of The Get, provides an overview of the key themes from this season. Erica runs The Connective Good, the executive search practice that specializes in placing CMOs and VPs of Marketing for B2B SaaS companies. She is known for recruiting the ‘make money’ type of marketing leaders, not the ‘make it pretty’ ones. 

This episode serves as an executive summary of the learnings from our fifth season, which has focused on the CMO and Board relationship. 

We cover:

• What do Board members want in a SaaS CMO? And how can you ace your interview with a Board member?
• Board meetings: How can you land on your feet once you are inside the Boardroom? 
• How do you build a strong dialogue with the Board OUTSIDE of Board meetings? 
• Serving on Boards: How can you become the CMO who gets tapped for Board seats? 

I designed this season to be a guide for how to upgrade from one-way reporting to the Board to a two-way dialogue. With that ongoing dialogue and collaboration, both in and out of the Boardroom, both sides will learn more, and the business is more likely to be successful. 

A huge thank you to the guests this season, who ranged from B2B SaaS marketing leaders, CMOs who have become Board members, and Board members/investors who are involved in hiring CMOs:

• Elana Anderson
• Kelly Ford Buckley
• Allison Dancy
• Evan DeCorte
• Jennifer Pockell Dimas
• Chris Fountain
• Sandra Lopez
• Madeline O’Phelan

Please tune in to each of their episodes. And, check out the episodes from the previous four seasons. Last season, for instance, we covered ‘Solving for the Scale Journey in B2B SaaS.’ 

To stay in the know for our next season, please keep following the show in your preferred podcast listening app.

Key Links

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericaseidel/

https://theconnectivegood.com/

https://thegetpodcast.com/

-----

The Get is here to drive smart decisions around recruiting and leadership in B2B SaaS marketing. We explore the trends, tribulations, and triumphs of today’s top marketing leaders in B2B SaaS.

This season’s theme is the CMO and Board Relationship in B2B SaaS: How can that relationship go from fraught to functional and even to fantastic?

The Get’s host is Erica Seidel, who runs The Connective Good, an executive search practice with a hyper-focus on recruiting CMOs and VPs of Marketing, especially in B2B SaaS. 

If you are looking to hire a CMO or VP of Marketing of the ‘make money’ variety - rather than the ‘make it pretty’ variety, contact Erica at erica@theconnectivegood.com. You can also follow Erica on LinkedIn or sign up for her newsletter at TheConnectiveGood.com. 

The Get is produced by Evo Terra and Simpler Media Productions.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

Erica Seidel: 00:00:03

Hello, and welcome to The Get.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:05

I'm your host, Erica Seidel.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:07

This season, the fifth season of The Get, has been focused on the relationship

Erica Seidel: 00:00:11

between CMOs and Board members.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:13

For many CMOs, interacting with the Board is about as much

Erica Seidel: 00:00:17

fun as getting a root canal.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:19

But what if you could make your CMO and Board relationship go from fraught

Erica Seidel: 00:00:23

to functional, and even to fantastic?

Erica Seidel: 00:00:26

If we haven't met yet, a brief intro.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:28

I spend my days recruiting CMOs and VPs of Marketing in B2B SaaS.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:33

So I have this unique perch to explore the trends, tribulations,

Erica Seidel: 00:00:37

and triumphs of the best marketing leaders and their organizations.

Erica Seidel: 00:00:41

I've had a range of guests on my podcast this season - marketing leaders who are

Erica Seidel: 00:00:45

veterans at interacting with Boards, marketing leaders who are Board members

Erica Seidel: 00:00:50

themselves, and a couple of Board members without deep marketing expertise

Erica Seidel: 00:00:54

who have hired marketing leaders and have learned firsthand how valuable

Erica Seidel: 00:00:58

the right CMO can be for the Board.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:01

And speaking as a podcast host for just a moment, it's been great to hear from

Erica Seidel: 00:01:05

so many loyal listeners along the way who have found this podcast useful.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:09

One person actually told me that I was the Terry Gross of the CMO podcast space.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:14

I'm honored.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:15

In this executive summary episode, I'm going to recap some of the most

Erica Seidel: 00:01:20

compelling takeaways from this season.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:22

One.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:23

What do Board members want in a SaaS CMO and how can you ace your

Erica Seidel: 00:01:27

interview with a Board member?

Erica Seidel: 00:01:29

Two.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:30

Board meetings.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:31

How can you land on your feet once you are inside the Boardroom?

Erica Seidel: 00:01:35

Three.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:36

How do you build a strong dialogue with the Board outside of Board meetings?

Erica Seidel: 00:01:40

Finally, four.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:42

Serving on Boards.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:43

How can you become the CMO who gets tapped for Board seats?

Erica Seidel: 00:01:47

Ready?

Erica Seidel: 00:01:48

Here goes.

Erica Seidel: 00:01:56

First, what do Board members want from a CMO and how can you ace the Board

Erica Seidel: 00:02:00

interview when you are up for a CMO role?

Erica Seidel: 00:02:03

Some inside perspective from me before you hear from my guests.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:06

I do a lot of searches for private equity backed companies where

Erica Seidel: 00:02:09

investors are active on the Board.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:11

My searches that go the most smoothly have something in common.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:15

The right Board members are involved in the search process early on.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:18

By contrast, I've seen searches go not so smoothly when Board members only

Erica Seidel: 00:02:22

show up at the end and nix a candidate.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:25

I'd rather have a Board member or investor be like a cook in the kitchen as opposed

Erica Seidel: 00:02:29

to the restaurant critic who only judges what's on their plate without being

Erica Seidel: 00:02:32

involved with how the meal was made.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:35

So I personally have become a fan of Board members engaging throughout

Erica Seidel: 00:02:38

the search, both with the search process and with the candidates.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:42

After all, the way you start a relationship is often indicative

Erica Seidel: 00:02:45

of the way you continue it.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:47

My guests this season all agree that early engagement between the

Erica Seidel: 00:02:50

Board and the CMO makes sense.

Erica Seidel: 00:02:53

So what are Board members looking for?

Erica Seidel: 00:02:55

Chris Fountain, a veteran Board member and operating partner

Erica Seidel: 00:02:58

at private equity firm Frontier Growth, shares what's on his mind.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:02

I like to understand their operating cadence.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:04

The operating cadence just tells you how you run the business of

Chris Fountain: 00:03:07

marketing, and what metrics do you use to run the business of marketing.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:10

I find that to be super insightful.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:12

A marketing leader, I can't recall where she was from, but

Chris Fountain: 00:03:14

she said something very profound.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:15

She said she realized the best use of her marketing dollars were to give part of

Chris Fountain: 00:03:19

her budget to the product team so they could build a key product feature that

Chris Fountain: 00:03:23

she thought was going to drive demand better than any marketing program that

Chris Fountain: 00:03:26

she could invest in, in the timeframe that, in which they were evaluating

Chris Fountain: 00:03:30

that resource allocation question.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:31

And it was a brilliant perspective to me.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:33

So if that marketing leader or any executive is sitting around that

Chris Fountain: 00:03:36

table, if they zoom out far enough to be able to understand the business

Chris Fountain: 00:03:38

holistically, all researchers are scarce.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:40

Whether you're IBM or Wealthbox, you've gotta make trade-offs and trying to get a

Chris Fountain: 00:03:44

feel for that in the interviewing process.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:45

You know, there's not one question that gets to that, but it's

Chris Fountain: 00:03:47

something I'd try to get through the course of the conversations.

Erica Seidel: 00:03:49

Yeah.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:50

As a CEO, my dream was to have every executive

Chris Fountain: 00:03:53

first be a general manager and then be a functional executive.

Chris Fountain: 00:03:57

To the extent they could understand how to build enterprise value, how to think

Chris Fountain: 00:04:01

about the business from a financial perspective, how to think about the

Chris Fountain: 00:04:04

business from a go-to-market perspective.

Chris Fountain: 00:04:06

Cause business is a big balancing act at every level.

Chris Fountain: 00:04:09

And there's big questions about resource allocation that had to

Chris Fountain: 00:04:11

be made at the highest level.

Chris Fountain: 00:04:13

And ideally you have an executive team around the table that appreciates the

Chris Fountain: 00:04:16

fact that there are trade-offs across the entire company that need to be made.

Erica Seidel: 00:04:21

So in a nutshell, Chris's advice is business

Erica Seidel: 00:04:24

first, marketing second.

Erica Seidel: 00:04:26

How can you best prepare for a Board member interview when

Erica Seidel: 00:04:29

you are up for a CMO role?

Erica Seidel: 00:04:31

Have your numbers at the ready.

Erica Seidel: 00:04:32

It's great that you've contributed to increased revenue, market share,

Erica Seidel: 00:04:36

profitability, but by how much?

Erica Seidel: 00:04:38

Quantifying your business impact is where it's at.

Erica Seidel: 00:04:41

But focus on the metrics that mean the most to the overall business.

Erica Seidel: 00:04:45

Don't make the mistake of getting too far into the weeds and avoid marketing jargon.

Erica Seidel: 00:04:50

Elana Anderson, a multi-time CMO who has led marketing at Veracode and Demandware,

Erica Seidel: 00:04:55

among other places, shares what to expect.

Elana Anderson: 00:04:58

I don't expect to talk deep marketing, you know

Elana Anderson: 00:05:01

shop talk, with a Board member.

Elana Anderson: 00:05:03

I've yet to find many who are deeply interested, you know, in the details.

Elana Anderson: 00:05:08

So I tend to focus on talking about strategy, the company, the market,

Elana Anderson: 00:05:13

the market trends, the competitive trends, the competitive landscape.

Elana Anderson: 00:05:17

I talk about how I've moved the needle, you know, in, in other

Elana Anderson: 00:05:21

companies, how I've aligned teams.

Erica Seidel: 00:05:23

When you are interviewing with a Board,

Erica Seidel: 00:05:25

realize it's a two-way street.

Erica Seidel: 00:05:27

You'll be interviewing them, too.

Erica Seidel: 00:05:29

The best candidates see it as developing a relationship, not just in a kumbaya sense,

Erica Seidel: 00:05:34

but so you are aligned on expectations.

Erica Seidel: 00:05:36

Here's Elana again.

Elana Anderson: 00:05:38

I'm asking about their understanding of the market and

Elana Anderson: 00:05:42

the unique advantage of the company.

Elana Anderson: 00:05:44

Why is this company going to win?

Elana Anderson: 00:05:47

What makes them unique?

Elana Anderson: 00:05:48

What is the outlook for the company?

Elana Anderson: 00:05:51

Why is this company gonna win over competitor X, Y, Z?

Elana Anderson: 00:05:55

If competitor X, Y, Z might be a leader and the company is not a leader, you know,

Elana Anderson: 00:05:59

it gives me a sense of A, how much they believe, and also how strong the messaging

Elana Anderson: 00:06:04

for the company, for the business is.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:06

What if you are not asked to interview with a Board member?

Erica Seidel: 00:06:10

Ask for that meeting.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:11

Seriously.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:12

Don't be afraid to ask since there's so much you can learn.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:15

Like, what are the Board dynamics?

Erica Seidel: 00:06:17

What does the CEO struggle with?

Erica Seidel: 00:06:18

What prospects are ahead for the business?

Erica Seidel: 00:06:21

And when it comes to marketing, does the Board know what they know

Erica Seidel: 00:06:24

and know what they don't know?

Erica Seidel: 00:06:25

If you ask to meet a Board member and you are told no for some reason,

Erica Seidel: 00:06:29

think hard about what this says.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:31

Maybe it's not the right fit and you should look for a company that

Erica Seidel: 00:06:34

believes in open access to the Board.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:38

Let's move on to part two.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:40

We will assume that you've gotten the CMO job and now you are in the CMO seat.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:45

Huzzah!

Erica Seidel: 00:06:46

Now how can you rock it in the Boardroom?

Erica Seidel: 00:06:48

This is important because marketing leaders can succeed or fail based on

Erica Seidel: 00:06:52

their performance during Board meetings.

Erica Seidel: 00:06:55

Actually, a question I ask CEOs when I start a search for a CMO is,

Erica Seidel: 00:06:59

think of your last Board meeting, what marketing related challenges

Erica Seidel: 00:07:02

did you struggle to get answers to?

Erica Seidel: 00:07:05

Their answers tell me a lot about the CEO's view of marketing and also the

Erica Seidel: 00:07:09

core of the job for their next CMO.

Erica Seidel: 00:07:12

Going into this podcast series, one thing I wondered about was how

Erica Seidel: 00:07:15

marketers could spend less time and angst preparing for Board meetings?

Erica Seidel: 00:07:20

Many marketing leaders shudder at the time and second-guessing that goes

Erica Seidel: 00:07:24

into those Board meetings and it can seem like productivity really grinds

Erica Seidel: 00:07:27

to a halt in the run-up to the meeting.

Erica Seidel: 00:07:30

Evan DeCorte from Columbia Capital is a PE investor and Board member.

Erica Seidel: 00:07:34

He had a really useful perspective when I asked how Board

Erica Seidel: 00:07:37

meeting prep could be shorter.

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:39

I think Board meeting prep takes time because

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:42

it is, I think, for the business, like a moment of self-reflection.

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:45

What have we done?

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:46

What were the outcomes?

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:47

What are we gonna do differently?

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:48

How does this impact our view on strategy or the market?

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:51

Those are not always easy questions to answer, and if they are really easy,

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:55

like I, I might think it's time for a little more self-reflection, right?

Evan DeCorte: 00:07:58

Because very rarely are the things that we're doing, even in businesses

Evan DeCorte: 00:08:01

that are just really doing well, easy.

Evan DeCorte: 00:08:04

Then we face tough questions that take time to grapple with, right?

Evan DeCorte: 00:08:07

We are conducting a lot of activities and hiring people and running new

Evan DeCorte: 00:08:10

strategies and evaluating them and measuring them against the alternatives.

Evan DeCorte: 00:08:15

Like, those are complex questions.

Erica Seidel: 00:08:18

I found Evan's observation really interesting and it underlined what

Erica Seidel: 00:08:21

I've learned from these conversations about how you can be more successful

Erica Seidel: 00:08:25

and less stressed during Board meetings.

Erica Seidel: 00:08:27

It starts with having a plan for how you are looking to interact

Erica Seidel: 00:08:30

with the Board in general.

Erica Seidel: 00:08:31

The Board meeting itself is a sort of capstone, of course, but your interactions

Erica Seidel: 00:08:36

overall should be less about a quarterly performance and more about nurturing

Erica Seidel: 00:08:40

an ongoing symbiotic relationship.

Erica Seidel: 00:08:42

A great example of this comes again from Evan when he joined the podcast alongside

Erica Seidel: 00:08:46

Jen Pockell Dimas, the Chief Marketing and Experience Officer for Telarus.

Erica Seidel: 00:08:50

I collaborated with Evan and the Telarus CEO when I recruited Jen into her role.

Erica Seidel: 00:08:55

It was awesome to have both Evan and Jen talk, not just about each other,

Erica Seidel: 00:08:59

but with each other on the podcast.

Erica Seidel: 00:09:02

Here's a perspective that came to light.

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:05

I think what we don't want is hand waiving, a lot of vagaries

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:08

and big talk about what could be, or the things that are in motion and

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:13

what things maybe should look like in the future but it's hard to know.

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:17

Erica, you, you sort of pointed out, I say this all the time, but like

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:19

we have very simple reptile brains.

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:21

We are investors, right?

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:22

And our, our goal is to invest money in the company and then to

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:26

sell or to recapitalize a business some way and get money back out.

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:30

A lot of what we are focused on is what is the result of the actions

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:34

that you're taking as a CMO, how do they intersect with the strategy

Evan DeCorte: 00:09:38

of the overall business, and how do they correlate with value creation?

Erica Seidel: 00:09:44

That pairs nicely with Jen Pockell Dimas's thoughts.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:09:47

We have understandings about how we want this company

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:09:50

to be understood and valued and what new markets we want to open.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:09:54

We'll be able to see that we're having success there because we will begin

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:09:57

to create revenue in new directions.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:10:00

We will see consistency in bookings creation in directions we haven't

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:10:03

seen historically, maybe into a new geo, maybe in a new product offering,

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:10:07

maybe in a new revenue source that we hadn't considered historically.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:10:10

Those kinds of things would increase our value.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:10:12

The squishy ways that this would show up, and every marketer hates this,

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:10:16

is our own customers saying to us, "Oh, I didn't know you did that."

Erica Seidel: 00:10:21

Another way you can be more successful and less stressed during Board

Erica Seidel: 00:10:24

meetings is by getting alignment with the Board on what they're interested in

Erica Seidel: 00:10:28

seeing before you walk into the Boardroom.

Erica Seidel: 00:10:30

Befriend the Board member who has the deepest background in marketing.

Erica Seidel: 00:10:34

You can preview your Board meeting content in advance with that person to

Erica Seidel: 00:10:38

get help in anticipating the reactions.

Erica Seidel: 00:10:41

If it's your first meeting with the Board, make it count.

Erica Seidel: 00:10:44

Share why you have joined the company and your thesis for the impact you'll make.

Erica Seidel: 00:10:49

Kelly Ford Buckley has great advice here.

Erica Seidel: 00:10:51

She's a marketing leader who pivoted to the investment side and is now general

Erica Seidel: 00:10:55

partner and COO at Edison Partners.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:10:59

I think the Board will always wanna know what are you

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:03

doing for the next 30, 60, 90, right?

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:05

Or what do you think of the current plan?

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:08

So I think it's a real opportunity for a dialogue.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:10

I've always walked into those first meetings with an existing

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:13

Board with my rookie observations.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:16

And it's a great way to get a dialogue going.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:18

Here are the slides, and this is what went on last quarter and I was here for

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:22

part of it, but maybe not even all of it.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:24

Those are in the appendix.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:26

I want my 20 minutes sharing my rookie observations, why I took the job, what

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:31

I'm observing, here are the opportunities.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:33

What do you guys think?

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:34

Am I missing?

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:35

Am I off base?

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:36

What a great way to start a dialogue.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:38

And now you've set the tone for a dialogue that can continue to take

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:11:42

place in every other Board interaction.

Erica Seidel: 00:11:45

As you settle in and as the business evolves with its

Erica Seidel: 00:11:48

investment partners, your Board meeting content will evolve, too.

Erica Seidel: 00:11:51

Chris Fountain, who's a veteran Board member and a former CEO, discusses this.

Chris Fountain: 00:11:56

It should be very clear what marketing's role

Chris Fountain: 00:11:59

is in driving bookings growth.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:01

Lead flow's great, but if you can't translate that into won deals, people

Chris Fountain: 00:12:06

are gonna be scratching their head.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:07

What are we getting for our marketing spend?

Chris Fountain: 00:12:09

So in my view, every Board meeting, once you've got the instrumentation of flying

Chris Fountain: 00:12:13

the plane and that's gaining altitude, is important, and the really critical

Chris Fountain: 00:12:17

instrumentation is demand, lead flow, and conversions to closed/won deals.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:23

Along with that, I think, is ROI.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:26

Good marketers, I think, understand how investments pay off from intangible waste.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:31

Early in investment, for us, we wanna know that we have a very clear

Chris Fountain: 00:12:34

picture of the voice of the customer.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:36

Be able to understand that we know who our ICP is, our Ideal Customer

Chris Fountain: 00:12:39

Profile, we know the buyer personas.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:41

We know how we position ourselves relative to our competitors.

Chris Fountain: 00:12:44

That has a time and a place, but you don't need to revisit

Chris Fountain: 00:12:47

that at every Board meeting.

Erica Seidel: 00:12:49

Also, get over the impulse to talk about all the work you did and

Erica Seidel: 00:12:52

how you've been spending your time.

Erica Seidel: 00:12:54

You're in the job as CMO because the Board thought you could do the job.

Erica Seidel: 00:12:57

They trust you on the details.

Erica Seidel: 00:12:59

The Board may only be interested in about one of the ten things that you're doing.

Erica Seidel: 00:13:03

As Elana Anderson says-

Elana Anderson: 00:13:06

Regardless of the scale of the company, the CMO

Elana Anderson: 00:13:10

needs to focus on objectives, on outcomes, on critical metrics.

Elana Anderson: 00:13:14

You know, sometimes marketers are over enamored, you know, about what they do

Elana Anderson: 00:13:20

rather than the outcomes that they drive, you know, and I think particularly with

Elana Anderson: 00:13:24

the Board, it's about the destination.

Elana Anderson: 00:13:27

It's not about the journey.

Elana Anderson: 00:13:29

The journey really only matters when there's something that, significantly new

Elana Anderson: 00:13:34

lessons that you learned along the way.

Elana Anderson: 00:13:36

Whether those lessons were good lessons, lessons that you wanna

Elana Anderson: 00:13:38

repeat, or lessons that, you know, you tried something and it didn't work.

Erica Seidel: 00:13:45

Next, realize that your Board meeting is a great

Erica Seidel: 00:13:47

vehicle for improving the sales and marketing interlock, and for

Erica Seidel: 00:13:51

communicating that interlock.

Erica Seidel: 00:13:53

Madeline O'Phelan is VP of Marketing for fintech company Verity.

Erica Seidel: 00:13:57

She discusses the importance of Board posture.

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:01

I think in a Board meeting, it's also

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:03

really important to convey your collaboration amongst the teams.

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:06

And there are a couple key ways I think you do that really well.

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:09

One is reemphasizing points, right?

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:12

Each function has its fifteen minutes of fame in the Board meeting

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:16

and restating points over and over again across all teams I think

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:20

is a great way to do that, right?

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:22

Or kudos between the teams and Board meetings, I think

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:25

is also really important.

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:27

Being able to show that you have a good relationship with sales.

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:30

It might be a nuance, but it's an important nuance to be able to

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:33

show in front of the Board that you work well together, that you give

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:36

each other praise when it's due.

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:38

Reiterating key points that your peers are making, kudos when they're

Madeline O'Phelan: 00:14:42

deserved, I think is super important.

Erica Seidel: 00:14:45

And Kelly Ford Buckley discusses the benefits of marketing and

Erica Seidel: 00:14:48

sales co-presenting at a Board meeting and having a combined growth readout.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:14:54

I don't want the marketing department

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:14:55

readout and the sales readout.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:14:57

I want the growth plan readout, the growth initiatives.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:01

Listen, the Board deck goes out two, three days before the Board meeting.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:05

The slides don't need to be read to us.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:07

Like, we're reading, we're preparing, we're coming with questions.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:11

We want data and we want insights.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:14

We wanna know what you think is working based on the data and what's not working.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:19

What are you doing differently next quarter to improve upon what

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:15:23

the data's telling you right now?

Erica Seidel: 00:15:25

And there's one more common thread when it comes to

Erica Seidel: 00:15:29

avoiding anxiety and nailing your presence in Board meetings as CMO.

Erica Seidel: 00:15:33

Contrary to what you may think, there is a place for qualitative

Erica Seidel: 00:15:36

data, competitive insights, customer insights, and brand stuff.

Erica Seidel: 00:15:40

Yes, even brand stuff.

Erica Seidel: 00:15:42

Consider making it impactful by being interactive.

Erica Seidel: 00:15:45

Elana Anderson discussed this.

Elana Anderson: 00:15:48

You know that numbers are gonna engage the Board, but if you

Elana Anderson: 00:15:51

have a topic that's short on numbers, like a, a rebrand topic, how do you

Elana Anderson: 00:15:55

make that interesting and impactful?

Elana Anderson: 00:15:58

I chose to make it interactive and use brands that I knew they had opinions

Elana Anderson: 00:16:03

on or would be aware of to make a case for why we had to do something,

Elana Anderson: 00:16:07

you know, about our own brand.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:09

I mean, and recognize this isn't like an hour session.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:11

This is probably

Elana Anderson: 00:16:12

- Erica Seidel: Right.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:13

-twenty minutes, you know, twenty-five minutes

Elana Anderson: 00:16:15

at, at most that you have.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:16

So it has to be im- impactful and quick.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:19

And so I put up little brand elements, so a color or part of a tagline,

Elana Anderson: 00:16:26

about a particular brand and had them, well, who is this brand?

Elana Anderson: 00:16:31

And when you can immediately identify who that brand is, that tells you something.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:36

And, and then, and if I show you, well, who's this brand?

Elana Anderson: 00:16:39

And you have no idea who that is and it's us [laughs], um, you know, that,

Elana Anderson: 00:16:45

that starts to unveil, well, we have some opportunity or some work to do.

Erica Seidel: 00:16:49

I see.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:49

And then if you can compare and contrast, well,

Elana Anderson: 00:16:51

here's how we're doing it today, whether it's a color change.

Elana Anderson: 00:16:54

I mean, what is less interesting to a Board member than, hey, we're changing

Elana Anderson: 00:16:59

our colors from teal to purple?

Elana Anderson: 00:17:02

But sometimes that does make a difference, and so to make it impactful, you get to

Elana Anderson: 00:17:07

the opportunity and the whys behind that.

Erica Seidel: 00:17:13

Okay.

Erica Seidel: 00:17:14

Here's part three of our four-part recap of insights

Erica Seidel: 00:17:16

learned this season on The Get.

Erica Seidel: 00:17:18

How do you make sure you have a great ongoing dialogue with your Board, not just

Erica Seidel: 00:17:22

inside the Boardroom, but outside of it so that both you and the business succeed?

Erica Seidel: 00:17:28

When companies engage me for new CMO searches, one thing is so clear, their

Erica Seidel: 00:17:32

previous CMOs have not failed for lack of effort or even lack of talent.

Erica Seidel: 00:17:36

They have failed for lack of alignment and lack of shared expectations around

Erica Seidel: 00:17:40

responsibilities, timing, and resources.

Erica Seidel: 00:17:44

A good example of this alignment and action comes from Jen Pockell Dimas

Erica Seidel: 00:17:47

and Evan DeCorte, the CMO and Board member pair we heard from earlier.

Evan DeCorte: 00:17:52

Jen and I sat down and went through our deck, like,

Evan DeCorte: 00:17:55

how do we think value gets created?

Evan DeCorte: 00:17:57

How do we think that intersects with marketing?

Evan DeCorte: 00:17:59

And here's some example numbers.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:02

I do think it is important for me to be able to

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:04

speak to the value that I'm driving in the business in a way that

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:07

our investors would care about.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:08

One of the ways that Evan and I sometimes talk about this is

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:12

Big V Value and Little V Value.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:14

And I think the Little V Value that helps to drive pipeline and like

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:18

the things that I'm measuring on the daily, weekly, monthly to say I am

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:22

doing these activities and they're creating value in the business.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:25

What Evan cares about is Big V Value.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:27

I put some money in and three to five years from now, I want it to

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:30

be more money that I'm getting out.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:32

It has been hard in B2B marketing, historically, to draw a direct line

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:36

from the activities that you're making to the outcomes that they're driving.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:40

But now we're actually talking about Big V Value, the value of

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:43

this company, not just the value of these marketing activities that I'm

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:47

driving, this, this, my contribution to pipeline, whatever those things are.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:50

This is about how am I increasing the value of this company in market?

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:54

And that is not a conversation that is necessarily one that many

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:18:59

are comfortable or fluent in.

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:19:00

That's the code switching that needs to happen between the operational

Jen Pockell Dimas: 00:19:03

plan and how I'm executing today.

Erica Seidel: 00:19:06

Chris Fountain offers a useful analogy for what

Erica Seidel: 00:19:09

he and other Board members are looking for once a CMO is in place.

Chris Fountain: 00:19:13

The marketing domain should be able to give a heads up to

Chris Fountain: 00:19:16

the business around future growth.

Chris Fountain: 00:19:18

So the finance team does a rearview mirror view of the business, right?

Chris Fountain: 00:19:22

Marketing ideally can paint a picture of trial activity or demo activity

Chris Fountain: 00:19:26

or MQL activity - we can expect our bookings to trend as follows.

Chris Fountain: 00:19:31

If you can create a heads up display that allows you to predict

Chris Fountain: 00:19:34

with greater accuracy of the future, that's nirvana in my view.

Erica Seidel: 00:19:38

Another thing to navigate is how to respond when

Erica Seidel: 00:19:41

your Board member proposes something that you think is outlandish.

Erica Seidel: 00:19:44

I talked about this with Kelly Ford Buckley, whose advice is to

Erica Seidel: 00:19:47

try to understand the input and not just dismiss it out of hand.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:19:52

You really do need to think about the Board

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:19:54

like a member of your team.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:19:55

There's brilliance that lives inside the four walls of your business and certainly

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:00

brilliance that sits in your Board.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:02

And frankly, a lot of these investors are domain experts.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:05

They know your market really well.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:07

And even if they've invested in companies that don't compete with

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:10

yours, they're in adjacent spaces.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:13

So it's like getting a market perspective and a customer perspective.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:17

So why not take that in?

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:19

I think the Board needs to be viewed as just another audience, but an

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:22

audience that's actually on your team.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:25

And I think marketing leaders can often be stronger internally than externally,

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:30

and more exposure externally with customers, partners, investor helps

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:35

build the knowledge, the confidence, the credibility that they also

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:40

need to be building with the Board.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:41

So I think sometimes if you're too internally focused, relying on sales

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:46

for your outside perspective, or not getting enough direct customer or

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:50

outside perspective, you might not be as comfortable or as confident.

Kelly Ford Buckley: 00:20:54

I think it's some of those things that remove the intimidation.

Erica Seidel: 00:20:58

So, you'll wanna communicate well with your Board and

Erica Seidel: 00:21:01

provide that heads up display for the business and focus on Big V Value.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:05

To do all that, you will also have to master the subtle art of

Erica Seidel: 00:21:09

navigating a Board that may not know what good marketing looks like.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:13

After all, the number of Board members and investors with marketing

Erica Seidel: 00:21:16

backgrounds approaches zero, or their marketing experience may

Erica Seidel: 00:21:19

be from five or ten years ago.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:21

So you will do best if you understand, educate, and translate.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:25

You can offer an offline session to educate Board members on

Erica Seidel: 00:21:28

a particular marketing topic.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:30

It won't just benefit their understanding of what you're doing,

Erica Seidel: 00:21:33

but it will also help them in their Board service for other companies.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:36

There was general agreement amongst my guests that it is the job of the

Erica Seidel: 00:21:40

CMO to translate the language of marketing into vocabulary that the

Erica Seidel: 00:21:44

CEO and CFO and Board can get behind.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:47

As you translate and educate, beware that some marketing terms

Erica Seidel: 00:21:50

will fly and some terms will flop.

Erica Seidel: 00:21:53

Allison Dancy, a veteran CMO, who was most recently CMO at Kibo Commerce,

Erica Seidel: 00:21:58

talks about the marketing trigger words that are likely to fly with Boards.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:03

Sometimes it's around ICPs or sometimes it's calibrating

Allison Dancy: 00:22:06

around personas or sometimes it's, we need to go to ABM, cuz that's

Allison Dancy: 00:22:10

what everybody's talking about.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:11

And if you start to talk about brand, it really is the four letter word

Allison Dancy: 00:22:14

sometimes to Boards because to them it means spend that they can't track

Allison Dancy: 00:22:18

and therefore they don't wanna do it.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:20

But you know, your brand is what ultimately gets people to make

Allison Dancy: 00:22:24

the decision to buy from you, to stay with you, to buy more from

Allison Dancy: 00:22:27

you, to have confidence in you to be able to build a business case

Allison Dancy: 00:22:30

that they're gonna buy from you.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:31

So brand is, it is actually the secret weapon behind the scenes, but to a

Allison Dancy: 00:22:36

Board member, it just means cost.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:38

And so you have to be really careful.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:41

Often they'll even see the website as a brand thing and

Allison Dancy: 00:22:44

they don't wanna invest in that.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:45

I've had some Boards where I can call that awareness.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:48

It won't raise as many red flags.

Allison Dancy: 00:22:50

I can talk about awareness or I can talk about website technology, but sometimes

Allison Dancy: 00:22:54

you have to be a little bit careful about just using even the word brand I've found.

Erica Seidel: 00:23:00

While we're talking about marketing terms that fly and

Erica Seidel: 00:23:03

marketing terms that flop, I wanna underscore the elephant in the room

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:06

Brand.

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:09

As she said, brand can be a four letter word.

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:12

Boards wonder why a marketing leader is investing in brand since it feels

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:15

like something that is untrackable?

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:17

Sandra Lopez had a great perspective here.

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:20

She has been in marketing leadership and general manager roles in many

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:23

of the world's biggest and most influential tech companies like

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:26

Adobe and Intel and Microsoft.

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:28

And she's a Board member herself for Junior Achievement USA and PureRed.

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:33

She shared how she models out brand initiatives in financial terms to

that Allison mentioned before: 00:23:36

get buy-in from her Board members.

Sandra Lopez: 00:23:39

Oftentimes when you are looking at brand architecture

Sandra Lopez: 00:23:42

strategies, what will that impact look like in terms of lesser choice?

Sandra Lopez: 00:23:46

Is it gonna cannibalize one or the other products?

Sandra Lopez: 00:23:49

That's yet another opportunity to bring the CFO into the journey and talk

Sandra Lopez: 00:23:53

about, let's do some modeling together.

Sandra Lopez: 00:23:56

Oftentimes what I had seen is brand architecture strategies that

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:01

talk about the business rationale.

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:03

But there's no financial numbers.

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:05

They'll talk to you about what it's gonna cost, what it's gonna cost to

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:07

overhaul the entire thing, and all the collateral that needs to get

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:11

updated, both analog and digital.

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:13

Yet I never see, if we were to simplify the brand, what could this

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:18

look like from a financial standpoint?

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:20

Or if we're gonna do a massive brand transition and reposition

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:23

the brand in its totality from one point to another point, will it

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:28

alienate your existing customer base?

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:30

And if so, how?

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:32

Well, what, what could that be from a sales perspective?

Sandra Lopez: 00:24:34

So you can model all this.

Erica Seidel: 00:24:37

If there's one thing to remember when it comes to the

Erica Seidel: 00:24:39

CMO and Board relationship, it is to move from broadcasting to the

Erica Seidel: 00:24:43

Board to collaborating with them.

Erica Seidel: 00:24:45

And with collaboration, there's both a give and a get.

Erica Seidel: 00:24:48

Marketing leaders can be so focused on what they are giving

Erica Seidel: 00:24:51

to the Board that they miss the opportunity to get stuff in return.

Erica Seidel: 00:24:55

Realize the Board is there to be helpful.

Erica Seidel: 00:24:57

Interacting with them, it's an opportunity for free advice.

Erica Seidel: 00:25:00

They will likely be flattered to be asked, so don't be

Erica Seidel: 00:25:03

reluctant to make an ask of them.

Erica Seidel: 00:25:05

Elana Anderson discussed in detail how she has incorporated the Board

Erica Seidel: 00:25:09

into her marketing initiatives.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:12

I found that Board members are happy to participate and they've

Elana Anderson: 00:25:16

been actually flattered to be asked.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:19

At Demandware, uh, we had a Board member by the name of Len Schlesinger.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:25

Len is a Harvard Business School professor.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:28

He was formerly the COO of Limited Brands, which in his day

Elana Anderson: 00:25:32

owned, um, Victoria's Secret.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:34

We had a customer conference that was a very successful event, but one

Elana Anderson: 00:25:38

of the things that we were trying to do was get more attendance from

Elana Anderson: 00:25:42

an exec level audience, the true business buyer, the business sponsor.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:48

So I asked Len if he would co-chair or be the guest chair of an invite

Elana Anderson: 00:25:53

only executive track, and then host a half day workshop for me.

Elana Anderson: 00:25:58

And maybe that was a little gutsy, but he was thrilled.

Elana Anderson: 00:26:01

So we were then marketing an executive track with a well-known business professor

Elana Anderson: 00:26:09

to retail, you know, commerce executives.

Elana Anderson: 00:26:11

It sold out easily.

Elana Anderson: 00:26:14

We had our ideal profile customer at this event, and the

Elana Anderson: 00:26:19

actual event was incredible.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:23

The fourth and final part of our recap of season five of

Erica Seidel: 00:26:26

The Get, how can you become the CMO who gets tapped for Board seats?

Erica Seidel: 00:26:30

Many of the CMOs I interview wanna be on a Board someday.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:34

And the ones that are on Boards tend to love the experience.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:37

Not surprisingly, the supply of CMOs eager to serve on Boards

Erica Seidel: 00:26:41

exceeds the current demand.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:43

That means the competition is tough.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:45

How can you be prepared to step up into Board service?

Erica Seidel: 00:26:48

There are a few ways you can prepare.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:50

First, get P&L experience and general management experience under

Erica Seidel: 00:26:54

your belt, even if this is outside your obvious marketing swim lane.

Erica Seidel: 00:26:58

And, in a marketing leadership role, approach your work and the

Erica Seidel: 00:27:02

way you communicate your work with a business first, marketing second

Erica Seidel: 00:27:05

mindset, like we talked about before.

Erica Seidel: 00:27:08

Also, plan ahead and try to find a boss who will embrace Board service as a

Erica Seidel: 00:27:12

part of your professional development and help you manifest a Board seat.

Erica Seidel: 00:27:16

Next, clarify what your unique value prop is to a Board.

Erica Seidel: 00:27:20

What skill sets will you offer, and which types of companies are most

Erica Seidel: 00:27:23

likely to benefit from your knowledge?

Erica Seidel: 00:27:25

That way, when you get a call to interview with a Board, you can

Erica Seidel: 00:27:27

vet the opportunity correctly.

Erica Seidel: 00:27:30

This is true also for CMO roles, by the way.

Erica Seidel: 00:27:32

One of the best questions I've seen CMOs ask in interviews is, what's

Erica Seidel: 00:27:36

the value you see in my skillset?

Erica Seidel: 00:27:39

Here's Sandra Lopez with some additional perspective.

Sandra Lopez: 00:27:42

People reached out to me for various Board positions, and I

Sandra Lopez: 00:27:45

remember one, it was all about supply chain and it was about transportation.

Sandra Lopez: 00:27:50

And I was so honored that they considered me and they were considering me from a

Sandra Lopez: 00:27:53

digital transformation, but I was looking at the Board requirements and the skill

Sandra Lopez: 00:27:57

sets that they were looking for, the top three, and I'm like, I have none of that.

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:01

And I said to the, uh, individual that was recruiting for him,

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:04

I'm like, you know what?

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:05

Super honored, yet it's not gonna be the right fit because I will not

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:08

add value for what they're looking for from a talent perspective.

Erica Seidel: 00:28:13

Consider serving on nonprofit Boards as a practice

Erica Seidel: 00:28:16

ground, but prioritize the ones that are run like for-profit Boards.

Erica Seidel: 00:28:19

Also, advisory Boards, which can be quirky, can also be decent

Erica Seidel: 00:28:24

stepping stones to Board service.

Erica Seidel: 00:28:26

As you feel reasonably ready, ask people who are Boarded up, meaning

Erica Seidel: 00:28:29

at capacity with their Board service, to refer Board opportunities to you.

Erica Seidel: 00:28:33

Here's Sandra Lopez's advice.

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:36

Listen, I've had amazing mentors helping me, guide me through

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:40

the path to Board of directors.

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:42

And I started, I would, three years before I landed my first Board.

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:47

You wanna land a Board seat so then you're recommended by somebody

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:51

else for yet another Board seat.

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:53

And that's how the flywheel of that.

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:54

And so when you're looking for Board seats, you also, like, try

Sandra Lopez: 00:28:59

to find somebody, it's called, you know, over Boarded where

Sandra Lopez: 00:29:01

somebody has way too many Boards.

Sandra Lopez: 00:29:04

Look for those individuals that are Boarded up, that are

Sandra Lopez: 00:29:07

passing on opportunities cuz they have too many Boards.

Sandra Lopez: 00:29:10

That's a great way just to start to open up the doors.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:17

That's it.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:17

Your guide for how CMOs and Boards can promote their relationship from

Erica Seidel: 00:29:21

fraught to functional to fantastic.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:25

A huge thanks to all the guests from this season.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:28

And, of course, if you wanna talk with me about hiring a CMO or VP

Erica Seidel: 00:29:31

of Marketing for your SaaS company or your open Board seat, ping me.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:37

Thanks for listening to The Get.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:38

I'm your host, Erica Seidel.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:40

The Get is here to drive smart decisions around recruiting and

Erica Seidel: 00:29:44

leadership in B2B SaaS marketing.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:46

We explore the trends, tribulations, and triumphs of today's top

Erica Seidel: 00:29:50

marketing leaders in B2B SaaS.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:52

To stay in the know for our next season, please keep following the show in

Erica Seidel: 00:29:55

your preferred podcast listening app.

Erica Seidel: 00:29:58

If you liked this episode, please share it.

Erica Seidel: 00:30:00

For more about The Get, visit thegetpodcast.com.

Erica Seidel: 00:30:04

And to learn more about my executive search practice, which focuses on

Erica Seidel: 00:30:08

recruiting the make-money marketing leaders rather than the make-it-pretty

Erica Seidel: 00:30:11

ones, follow me on LinkedIn or visit theconnectivegood.com.

Erica Seidel: 00:30:16

The Get is produced by Evo Terra of Simpler Media Productions.