📅 Events

maggiebutler
HubSpot Moderator
HubSpot Moderator

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Thanks for participating! The thread is now closed; Jon will be back soon for another AMA. If you would like to connect with subject matter experts in #opslife, please post a new question here.

 

We’re excited to host an exclusive ask-me-anything session right here in #OpsLife with @JonDick , VP Marketing. Jon leads the go-to-market & operations marketing strategy at HubSpot and has 10+ years of experience leading Marketing teams at companies like Klout and Trunk Club. 

 

On Tuesday 7/28 at 12pm ET, Jon will be answering your questions here on all things marketing strategy and operations, so be sure to leave your questions on this thread before then or UPVOTE questions you want more detail on.

 

Here are some examples of things to ask Jon about:

 

  • Data strategy
  • Cross-team alignment
  • System roadmaps
  • Annual Planning
  • Go-to-market for consumer & enterprise products
  • Positioning & thought leadership
  • Digital demand generation
  • Social & content strategies
  • Online & Offline Direct Response Advertising
  • Marketing attribution 
57 Replies 57
JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot


@KeyWestScott wrote:

Q1 - will this be hosted on this thread or Zoom or?????

 

Q2 - Real question....  We are a passenger ferry operation in the SW Florida area (yea, covid central!!)  How to best communicate and convince those to travel, Florida residents only since we don't have any tourists  Smiley Sad.   Purely B2C, no groups.

 

Scott

 


@KeyWestScott Hey Scott - it must be a really tough time for your company, I'm sorry the pandemic is hitting you so hard.

My advice when it comes to communicating about COVID is:
1) Shift from selling to educating - the hard sell just doesn't work during times of uncertainty. Educate your customers on how you're addressing operations during the pandemic.
2) Focus on empathy and understanding - express how you understand the concerns potential customers could have.
3) Ask to hear from people - try to start a dialoge with potential customers so you can learn more about what precautions you'd need to take to help them feel confident and safe on a tour.

0 Upvotes
maggiebutler
HubSpot Moderator
HubSpot Moderator

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

@KeyWestScott on this thread! Jon will be back on Tuesday. 'See' you then!

jennysowyrda
Community Manager
Community Manager

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Very excited to see this chat! 

 

@KeyWestScott@GuyTaylor@dianalcont@AdamLPW@Kim_HM, @toricook@Bryantworks, @Jaimee I thought you may be interested in participating in this conversation! 

 

toricook
Top Contributor

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Hi Jon,

 

Thanks for planning to share your experiences with us!

 

I'm the Director of Sales & Marketing for a B2B SaaS startup. We're currently in the process of implementing a product-led growth strategy at our company. I'm not sure if PLG is in your wheelhouse, but if so, I'd certainly love to hear your thoughts about best practices for implementing a strategy.

 

Here are some specific questions on my mind:

What types of in-app trigger events should we identify in order to send marketing campaigns to further the growth of our product (specifically as it relates to free trial users)? Examples: Visited checkout page but didn't upgrade, Signed up for a free trial but never revisited the app, x amount of days since last app visit, added x amount of users to free trial. I'd love to identify the most important trigger events that might warrant something like an email nurture or a remarketing campaign. 

 

Similarly, what types of in-app events should we be looking for when analyzing our customers' usage of the app to help us identify 1) which customers are at risk of churning and 2) which are likely evangelists?

 

We're planning to use the standard pirate metrics framework for PLG (Acquisition, Activation, Revenue, Retention, Referral) as well as tracking LTV, CAC, Time to Value TTV, PQLs, Net Churn, and Expansion Revenue. Are there other metrics that you would deem crucial for growth?

 

Any tips for aligning smarketing, operations, customer success, and product development teams around a growth strategy where everyone contributes, in part, to the growth of the company (not just sales/marketing)?

 

In general, I'm really looking for ways to better integrate our product usage with our marketing campaigns. I'm also looking to get buy-in from all departments on a growth strategy and to inspire them to contribute to that strategy.

JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot


@toricook wrote:

Hi Jon,

 

Thanks for planning to share your experiences with us!

 

I'm the Director of Sales & Marketing for a B2B SaaS startup. We're currently in the process of implementing a product-led growth strategy at our company. I'm not sure if PLG is in your wheelhouse, but if so, I'd certainly love to hear your thoughts about best practices for implementing a strategy.

 

Here are some specific questions on my mind:

What types of in-app trigger events should we identify in order to send marketing campaigns to further the growth of our product (specifically as it relates to free trial users)? Examples: Visited checkout page but didn't upgrade, Signed up for a free trial but never revisited the app, x amount of days since last app visit, added x amount of users to free trial. I'd love to identify the most important trigger events that might warrant something like an email nurture or a remarketing campaign. 

 

Similarly, what types of in-app events should we be looking for when analyzing our customers' usage of the app to help us identify 1) which customers are at risk of churning and 2) which are likely evangelists?

 

We're planning to use the standard pirate metrics framework for PLG (Acquisition, Activation, Revenue, Retention, Referral) as well as tracking LTV, CAC, Time to Value TTV, PQLs, Net Churn, and Expansion Revenue. Are there other metrics that you would deem crucial for growth?

 

Any tips for aligning smarketing, operations, customer success, and product development teams around a growth strategy where everyone contributes, in part, to the growth of the company (not just sales/marketing)?

 

In general, I'm really looking for ways to better integrate our product usage with our marketing campaigns. I'm also looking to get buy-in from all departments on a growth strategy and to inspire them to contribute to that strategy.


@toricook Thanks for the question! I'm happy you're leaning into product driven growth. It's been a huge part of how HubSpot has evolved our go-to-market over the last few years. That said, the traditional lead-gen model still works incredibly well for us. I always advocate for a blended strategy.

There's so many great questions in here, it will be tough to write out detailed responses on each. But a few thoughts for you:

In App Triggers:
My HubSpot collegue Kieran Flanagan wrote a great post about what we call Product Qualified Leads (PQLs). Check it out here (https://www.kieranflanagan.io/podcast/how-to-build-a-pql-model-for-your-company/). Generally speaking, we've found that giving users options is really key. In app, we let people chose whether to chat, call, book a meeting, or just notify a rep they want to talk. Increasing options for how people connect has resulted in much higher overall volume.

Customer Data:
Most companies in my experience start with nailing PLG for new business, and only start tackling churn / evangelism once they figure new biz out. That said, we've put a lot of effort into this. As a starting point, you can just have an analyst with a spreadsheet run regression models to find the biggest factors. I'd expect app usage to be highly correlated with both churn and evangalism.

Alignment:
I think the key to success here is a pod with shared goals. At HubSpot, the Product team has Growth PMs who manage the pod. Marketing takes their lead and manages all the automation / comms based on new product features.

JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

I'm personally really excited to talk with this community next week.

 

What do you want to discuss?

 

Alignment & Process?!?

Data & Systems?!?

Scaling marketing teams?!?

 

 

Sunshine1
Member

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Hi Jon

I am new to HubSpot and the look of the product is very appealing and easy to use

I am an Insurance Agent who needs a secure HIPPA compliant platform

Some has told me that this is not that and to get a BAA agreement signed

Is HubSpot OK with doing that and can someone explain what HubSpot does to ensure HIPPA comlpliance?

Thanks

Nat

 

JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot


@Sunshine1 wrote:

Hi Jon

I am new to HubSpot and the look of the product is very appealing and easy to use

I am an Insurance Agent who needs a secure HIPPA compliant platform

Some has told me that this is not that and to get a BAA agreement signed

Is HubSpot OK with doing that and can someone explain what HubSpot does to ensure HIPPA comlpliance?

Thanks

Nat

 


@Sunshine1 good question, and although I am not able to advise you about it specifically, there are a number of writeups from HubSpot certified partners available through Google that provide more details. 

0 Upvotes
J4tes
Member

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Do you see any potential for mobile texting coming down the road? The open rate exceeds email by far. 

JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

@J4tes 

Hey, yes 100%. We're testing it on our marketing team and I would encourage everyone to do the same. Although not natively built into the HubSpot Conversations product today, there are a number of HubSpot app partners who enable SMS through the platform. 

 

So far in our testing, the keys are:

1. Set the right expectations

2. Don't run afoul of compliance

3. Understand when SMS makes sense for your buyer

0 Upvotes
Lucila-Andimol
Thought Leader | Platinum Partner
Thought Leader | Platinum Partner

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Hi @JonDick 

Love this 3 topics..in that orden! =D

  • Alignment & Process
  • Data & Systems
  • Scaling marketing teams> inhouse vs. outsourced.

Of course if you have content about this, books, sites, though leaders to follow about this topics, please share your knowledge..

María Lucila Abal | COO Andimol
HubSpot Expert, Community Champion & Certified Trainer (12+ years)

Have questions? Get answers:

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JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot


@Lucila-Andimol wrote:

Hi @JonDick 

Love this 3 topics..in that orden! =D

  • Alignment & Process
  • Data & Systems
  • Scaling marketing teams> inhouse vs. outsourced.

Of course if you have content about this, books, sites, though leaders to follow about this topics, please share your knowledge..


@Lucila-Andimol Hi Lucila,

1. Alignment & Process:
There's so much to unpack here. We're going to be covering this extensively over the next 8 weeks as part of this #OpsLife campaign, so stay tuned.

That said, start with easy wins on the alignment front. Are you meeting with the other ops leaders in your company weekly? Do you have shared reporting? Do you have shared priorities? If yes, you're on a great path. If no, that's an easy way to get started.

2. Data & Systems:
Stay tuned for upcoming #OpsLife sessions. These are so crucial to success. We'll be covering them at length.

3. Marketing teams: insourced vs. outsourced:
It really depends on your marketing strategy and your core competancies. I would not outsource anything that is absolutely core to your ongoing success as a marketing team. For example, when I used to do direct mail at a high-end fashion brand, we would outsource list building and printing, but not the actual design. Design was a core competancy for our brand and mattered deply to us. At HubSpot, SEO and content are absolutely core since we run an inbound marketing strategy. We insource those roles almost exclusively.

0 Upvotes
grayton
Member

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

How often are you actually meeting with Sales and what is your process? 

 

-G

JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot


@grayton wrote:

How often are you actually meeting with Sales and what is your process? 

 

-G


@grayton Hello,

I oversee all of our global demand gen, and meet with sales leadership frequently (at least weekly). There are a mix of 1:1s and structured meetings. The structured meetings are:

1) I attend the bi-weekly sales forecast meeting to both understand how sales are trending and also present marketing progress to monthly goals
2) I attend a monthly sales performance review meeting to review the prior month's marketing and sales metrics in detail
3) We have (at least) monthly sales/marketing meetings in each region.

0 Upvotes
VanessaR
Participant

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot

Jon... hi! Since you're a VP how do you think about alignment across all of your teams? I don't know how many teams you manage but I assume they all do different things

JonDick
HubSpot Employee
HubSpot Employee

[Closed] Exclusive Conversation with Jon Dick, VP Marketing @ HubSpot


@VanessaR wrote:

Jon... hi! Since you're a VP how do you think about alignment across all of your teams? I don't know how many teams you manage but I assume they all do different things


@VanessaR Hey Vanessa - just have a million meetings! (j/k...great question). Alignment within my team (9 directors) is hard, and aligning across the other functions of the flywheel is even more difficult. A few ideas for you:

1) Write memos - Amazon made the 6-page memo famous, and we've been using the technique for a number of years. This is esp effective for alignment around future plans. It forces authors to fully articulate their approach, provides an opportunity for others to absorb the information deeply, and creates a powerful collaboration opportunity.

2) Leverage slack channels - I have various private and public slack channels that allow me and my leaders to collaborate and stay aligned. They're great because they enable more formal updates and more casual check-ins. They're also great during times of crisis (like when the pandemic was declared) as they provide more transparent and real time information flow.

3) Create and track only a few big projects - For aligning across flywheel teams, we leverage a process called Compass Planning. Our compass is a few big, cross-team projects that require close oversight. We'll be talking about this in more detail during an upcoming AMA.