High Performing Marketing Teams plus What's Next

Speaker A: You're listening to the All Systems Go podcast, the show that teaches you everything you need to know to put your business on autopilot. Learn how to deploy automated marketing and sales systems in your business the right way. With your host, the professor of Automation himself and founder of Automation Bridge, Chris Davis.

Speaker B: Hey everyone. Welcome to a special episode of the, uh, All Systems Go podcast. This is a little different than usual, uh, but just as good and exciting nonetheless. And what I wanted to share with you all is an update, especially for some of my die hard podcast listeners, uh, who have been with me for the last 200 episodes or more. And I say or more because this all began when I was the Director of education, uh, at activecampaign and started that podcast. So some of you have been with me for 300 plus episodes. So I just want to first acknowledge you who have been, uh, just really supporting me from day one and tuning in, allowing me to be in your trucks, in your earbuds and AirPods and your phones and computer screens and everything. And I hope that it has been nothing, uh, but value that you have received along the ride. And as, as we know, it's not all things, all things are. Change is imminent. Let me say, let me say that right? And the one constant that you can count on in life is change. And we have been experiencing a lot of change in the marketplace collectively as small business owners and entrepreneurs. And I have been experiencing a lot of change internal to the business, external things of that nature. And one of the things that, uh, as an entrepreneur that you have to be willing and ready to do is make the appropriate pivot, appropriate pivots and shifts. And that's what we're doing, um, with this episode here. Uh, you all know I've been very consistent, uh, with publishing. You can count on a new, uh, episode every Thursday, right? Unless we come and say, hey, we're ending one season, taking a break, we'll be back the next season and more. So recently we've had a little bit of a, uh, impromptu hiatus, right? And I acknowledge that and what it's allowed me to do, unintentional and unplanned, is really step back for a little bit and reassess the business. Reassess, reassess the direction, look at some of the performance, uh, and results that, that I've been generating and make an educated decision and say, okay, do we continue to move forward or not? So some of you are like, chris, get to it. Are you ending the podcast? I am going to be honest with you all. I have had thoughts in the past of doing it right, because it's just so hard, it's so hard to quantify the impact. The metrics to measure just aren't there. At least I don't have them to the level that I could confidently say this is the impact. And that's the only thing that makes me want to say, you know what, uh, let me just pack up my bags because do I love speaking and displaying providing wisdom and knowledge and insight? Absolutely. That's, that's just one of my, my, my core, uh, competences and the thing that allows me to add massive value. Uh, so no, I would, I would never. I don't think you ever catch me without a podcast. So let me rest. You assure. No. However, we are making a shift, everyone. And this shift, you would, you would have thought that perhaps I would have seen this sooner, done this sooner. Um, and sometimes we're just too close. So I've had the privilege in the last few years, um, I've lost count of the years because I wasn't keeping track. But when I look back, there's a few things that I have really been energized by. And the state of the market now is in a huge need of. And, and it took a few, it took a little bit of a hiatus. It took for things to change in the marketplace. It took for a certain shifts to happen for me to say, wait a minute, there's a bigger problem to solve, there's a bigger solution to provide. And historically, if you're new to the podcast and you just so happen to be on this episode, I have created a program called the Automation Service Provider. My background is in building automated marketing systems that scale for SaaS companies. That is where my background is. However, I've taken that and applied it to a variety of different types of companies where uh, you can be in a more traditional industry like construction all the way to high database volume. E commerce companies, the same principles apply, whether it's B2C, B2B, um, things of that nature. But when I take a step back and say, okay, who am I? Let's get rid of all the cans and coulds and shoulds and maybes and just definitively speak, I have produced the biggest results. DTC direct to customer, B2C business to consumer. However you want to, ah, whatever acronym you want to use. That has been my sweet spot. Going direct to the consumer and, and using hyper personalized marketing and ensuring that the software that is built, the software that is used creates a system that can be automated and create high, for high efficiency to create high profitability. So that's been it. Um, I'm somewhat of the uh, found part of the founding fathers of marketing automation. If you are within the last decade at least and you know marketing automation and you're doing it at some capacity. I'm pretty sure you have come across my name or my work and didn't realize it. Right. So not trying to hype myself up. What I'm trying to do is lay some foundations so you, so the people who are new to me understand. And with that came a ability that I did not set out to learn and to really master. And it first started with being part of marketing teams to, and it migrated and transitioned and evolved to helping founders and CEOs build marketing teams. And I've been doing this for years. Everyone, let me just explain um, because I'm going to tell you I'm kind of going backwards. Right. Tell you the thing. I'm going to describe the thing before I tell you what the thing is. Right. So just follow me, bear with me. Um, here's some things that have been very common. It's not either way, it's not uncommon for a founder to hit me up personally and ask me about if I, if I know a marketer. So that's one. Um, two, it's not uncommon for a founder to send me a ah, Google Drive with a variety of videos that marketers have, have created because they're in a hiring process and asked me to help with guiding them to hire the best marketer. Right alongside of that I've also been tasked to help founders understand what a marketing team looks like. Sometimes they just don't even know who they're supposed to be hiring outside of a digital marketer with a job description that is pretty much a digital marketer, social media manager, a business, a uh, biz developer, graphic designer and advertiser all in one. And that's just unrealistic. You're not getting all of those competencies in one. It's just not the case. But that's from their not lack of knowledge of understanding what does the marketing team look like and then two, how do I build it? So believe it or not, I have this skill set that's, that's not to believe it or not, but I've never viewed it as a skill set. I've just viewed it as something to help whenever I'm called on. And my focus has been on hey, let me equip the digital marketer with all of the skills and community to make them to replicate myself essentially in the marketplace. I want to become. I want them to become who I was for LeadPages and ActiveCampaign and all these other startups. I wanted to replicate myself and great, great, grand, grand, uh, vision and heart behind it. However, it has proven over time that the opportunity for that is really waning a bit. Right. Um, I can. People can go and learn on YouTube, they can go and get hired off upwork just out the gate. They don't need credentials in a day and age where you're teaching credentials, they're not required to do the work. So why would I invest when I can just learn on the client's dime? And while that is true, uh, my heart goes out to the client because a lot of times they just don't know. They think they're hiring a bona fide marketer that knows automation and AI and things of this nature. And they're learning on the job. And what happens is the founder stops dreaming, they stop thinking big and they start thinking limited to the competency or the acumen of the team that they have. And I've been seeing this dynamic and it's just so frustrating. In my initial way to solve it was let me educate the marketplace more with, let me equip them with skills, the people being hired. But again, that's circumvented with nobody on the hiring side. You're not doing your due diligence to even know how to assess who to hire. So in this process, everyone, um, I've, I've got assessments that will, that you can, that I've sent to founders. When they say, hey, um, do I have the right marketer? I'll send them the assessment. They'll, they'll fill out the assessment. I'll be able to look at the answers and tell them within five minutes or less, this is a hire, this is a hire that you should make. And, and here's what's very interesting. The placement of the marketers that I've recommended. Because it's not limited to marketers, it's also agencies I've recommended, agencies that I've never worked with, just gone talk to them on the phone or on Zoom, looked at their website, asked the correct questions, recommended agencies. I very rarely in marketing do we have 100% rate of success. And I'm not saying I will be a hundred percent forever, but as of right now, haven't gone wrong. Every single startup that I have advised, every single agency that I have recommended has worked out great. Now when I say, uh, Let me, let me add some context to it. I'm not talking about hiring, uh, or like freelance work. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about freelance or hiring a contractor. I'm talking about employment. You're looking to hire someone, bring them onto your team, pay them a check, ongoing, that placement. You could argue everybody should be taking the same level of precaution, but I haven't missed. And the reason why is not because I'm, um, some mastermind, right? It's because I've been on high performing marketing teams. I know what's required. I've built high performing marketing teams. I know what's required. I understand software and I'm a strategic thinker and I know how to speak technically to the devs and the data engineers and I know how to speak top level to the executives and the CEOs to be that liaison to translate at times what he or she is saying as the leader and what she needs from the team shaping those expectations. And everyone. The market is void of it. And I didn't even see it, y'. All. It was, it was right here on my nose. And I just needed to look in the mirror and say, oh, that's. It's been there the whole time. Why didn't somebody say something? Right? I have talked to countless marketers on marketing teams and talk them off the ledge, literally talk them off the ledge to say, hey, no, no, no, no, that's not your responsibility. That ro that what they're doing. They're really signing you up for three roles. And here are the three roles. So you need to go back, explain to them, dah, dah, dah, dah, whatever the case may be, right? Because I'm trying to save businesses from building incorrectly without guidance to the point where the system that you've created, no marketer can perform great in it. And now you're frustrated, wondering why it's so hard to hire. And let me say this, since it's my podcast, let me go ahead and take my clothes off and get naked and expose myself. That was me, everyone. When I first started out, I came from the startup space building these teams and hiring and firing and understanding how high performing marketing teams work with respect to automation. Right? So when I started my business, I took that same approach. Fast moving, we do this move, doo doo, doo doo, right? Burnt out everyone. I was, I was going through freelancers like it was nothing. I mean, you would have thought it was a buy one, get one free sale. It was like, all right, Next one up, uh, next one like that. That's how fast people were moving, um, through my, through my business. And I'm thinking, man, you guys just aren't ready. You, you guys need to get your skills up. No, no, no, no, no. That was my fault. I had built an over complicated system because I understood technology at a very high level and the only one that could run it was me. And I didn't realize that the environment that I created was not one of easy success for those who I would bring on to help me achieve success. And though that was my journey, a lot of people end up in that same space, just a different path. Some don't know what to do. So their ignorance is really capping and limiting their marketers. Some people hire a marketer and they come up with these job descriptions and sometimes they'll create a, ah, job title, sometimes they'll just copy what someone else did. They'll bring somebody in and just because it's movement, they think that it's progression. Just because things are happening and documents are being sent and Google sheets are being populated, they're like, yes, we're doing it, but no results are being produced. And that's what brings me to the main thing for today, is that moving forward I would be doing the space a disservice everyone if I did not intentionally aggressively attack this problem with the solution that I have. What is that? Training Founders executive. How do you build a high performing marketing team that can properly leverage automation and AI? How do you do it? What, what are the roles? What are the traits? How do I, how do I know when I have one? How do I know when I don't? If I don't have one, what are the steps to get one right? Who am I missing on my team? Let me know. Chris. Of course you're saying I've got three, three needs and one person. Are you saying that I need to hire two more people? Uh, is this an agency play? Wait a minute, Chris. Is my agency doing what I need them to do for me? I know it may sound like I'm signing up to be the whistleblower. It's not that. Because the other side of it is, hey, how do you read a job description and understand, oh, this is for me and this is not. How do you know as a marketer, how do you know what skill sets you need and what software skills you need to be able to perform on that job for a prolonged period of time or contract? Right. Both sides need help making the match work. It's not all about going to a VA company and allowing them or trusting them to do the training for you. I've tried that too. It doesn't work. There, there is a hole, a uh, gapping hole missing of someone to stand right in the middle. Help the founder get the marketer. Help the marketer perform for the founder. That's what's missing. And it has nothing to do with technology and technical skills. It has everything to do with vision, mission, people, culture, strategy. Once you get that now, now you got the right people in play. You have, you understand the people. You have the right people and you have the right system, which is you need help getting there. Now we can start to focus on the technology. Okay, so, so moving forward for the podcast. What does this mean? It's not just the podcast. Everyone. Excuse me. Moving forward. Just. Sorry about that. Um, across automation bridge you will see a shift to speak to this need. A shift in enabling you all. I don't care if you're a marketing team of one or 10, it does not matter. You need the resources, you need, you need the knowledge, you need the tutelage on how do you build a high performing marketing team, A lean, high performing marketing team. We want to keep it as small as possible. If you're going direct to consumer. Right. How do I do that? I may be using Shopify, Klaviyo, I may be using keep, uh, activecampaign. I've got WooCommerce, I've got WordPress, I got Webflow. Oh, uh, how do. But I want to, I need to achieve this. What does that marketing team look like? How do I prevent myself from overpaying an agency for the basics? And again, no shots at agencies. But you can easily find yourself paying upwards to multiple thousands of dollars a month for a spreadsheet that you can't use for, for updates to your website and things like that that you could hire out for a, a tenth of the cost. And what you're paying is what I call ignorant tax. Right? You're, you're being taxed because you don't know and, and, and too easy and too common are people just focusing on the tactics and the strategies and the software that is important. This is why on um, ah, my YouTube page, you'll see me review various software and things of that nature. Because you also need to make the right software selection. Don't get me wrong, but you're putting the cart before the horse. You need to, you need to understand how to build the marketing team for your business to allow you to perform at A high level, high efficiency, leveraging automation and AI. Uh, all right, so I'm excited about that, everyone. And this is just, I'm just updating my podcast listeners. Everyone else will be updated later. But, but I just wanted to make sure you all are in the know because I appreciate you and I do not know when the episodes will resume or if it will be the All Systems Go podcast. Everyone, I'm okay and open to. This may be an entirely different podcast. Right? And perhaps 200. That's where we are with All Systems Go. Or I could just say, look, uh, I don't want to split the audiences. People are used to All Systems Go podcast. We just, we've got this episode. Here's the shift now. Here's the new content, right? So either one, I'll figure it out. I've got connections with smart people. Um, I've got a team of support that allows me to make these decisions. Not alone. And you all have a voice as well. You can always, at any time, reach out to me via email. If you've subscribed to the podcast, you should be getting email announcements. If not, you can always go to automationbridge.com and opt in, watch the latest webinar, uh, masterclass, and send an email based, uh, response to any of the emails that you receive. Right. So I'm definitely accessible, but I wanted to keep you all up to date. I didn't want you to be anticipating every Thursday and nothing's just like, oh, what's happening is, listen, I am making a well needed shift, not just for me, but for the marketplace. And the thing is, I'm excited about it. For those of you that have gone through any of my trainings or have been in the community in any capacity, you, you've seen how I come alive with mentoring and teaching and just really given all I got. Uh, when people have questions and they're trying to figure something out and to be able to provide that in a way that I believe will solve some of these marketing woes that have been plaguing not just startups, not just small businesses, but corporations. How do I build a high performing marketing team that can properly and accurately utilize automation and AI? Uh, who are the people? Who are the players? What should they do? How do I know they're doing what they should be doing without micromanaging them? What metrics should I be fed? Uh, I just put this tool in. Is it the right one? And if so, who should be, who should be implementing, who should be managing? And then what should I expect as an output. Where is this data for the what the performance gonna lie for me as the executive, I don't. I just need to look at a dashboard and see how we're doing. What's our revenue for the week, for the month, for the year? What I just need. And you can't get it because you don't ne. You don't have the right system because you don't, you don't have the right team and you don't have the right system. Therefore you can't produce the right result even if you have the right tech. Uh, ooh, that's tough. That's tough. So all of these things have to be aligned, everyone. And here I am sitting with the knowledge that aligns it all, brings it all together and the willingness, acumen, intelligence, wisdom, desire to teach. So why would I leave? Why would I keep that to myself? Why would I not give freely? So, um, that's what we're up to, everyone. That's what we're up to. So uh, forgive our digital dust as we make these shifts. I don't know. I cannot tell you. I can't tell you. It's going to be under automation M Bridge. I can't tell you if it's going to be another, uh, just an entirely different business. But I just wanted to ensure that you all are in the know and in that. If I have said something in this episode and you're like, oh my goodness, I needed that yesterday. Okay, I needed that like two years ago. You don't understand how much money I've lost, how much money I've wasted. I've been so frustrated with my marketer. I don't know if it's me or them. I'm just, ah, uh, I'm just so done. Well, I would invite you to go to automationbridge.com teams, fill out that brief form there and we can start the conversation around exactly what area may be failing you in terms of marketing team building and assessing the marketers or the people that you have in place that are responsible for your automation and your operations of your marketing, sales and onboarding. Right. We can have that conversation for you if you're a listener, if you're a subscriber, everyone else will get access later. But if you want to go to automationbridge, uh,.com teams you will be able to get uh, first access. And perhaps this is more timely than I realize. You're like, oh my goodness, I needed to talk to you yesterday. I just hired somebody. It's never too late. Let me say that. And for my marketers. I want you to know that there's not gonna be mass firing taking place. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. My track record has been great with working with the team that you have in place. And here's what sometimes you need to understand. Sometimes you need to just build a different system. You need to enable them differently based on their skill set. Well, I need to know. I need to assess them. I need to figure out what their skill set is. Match it with your vision. So look at the system, and then we've got to find that. That blend. Right? But because you. You may have the right people. I had the right people and was scaring them away. If I knew this back then, oh, man, I can't imagine what my output could have been. Right. And what my stress level could have lowered to. And my results could have increased too. So, um, I want to thank you again, everybody, for your ongoing support. I'm excited about this next chapter, uh, and I'm looking forward to serving. Always, always, everyone, always. I'm always looking forward to serving, uh, the industry in a deeper capacity and to provide more value for your business success, for your peace at night and ultimately your profitability without time constraints that allows you to do with your time what you truly want to do. Connect with your family, your friends, Detox. Get away. That's the goal, everyone. All right, so thank you for tuning in to this episode and letting me explain that. Explain it all to you. Uh, as soon as I know what this thing looks like officially, you all will know, because you'll see it. You all will know because you'll see it. But I wanted to put that language out there in front of you, let you know exactly what to look forward to. Give you first. First access. And again, thank you all for your support. So until next time I see you online, Automate, uh, responsibly, my friends.