Marketing & Sales Disconnected? These Tips Will Get You On the Same Page

Speaker A: Make sure you build real relationships with your sales and channel teams. Getting out from behind the screen, get in the field, go to events, attend their meetings, really understand their challenges and what they're up against when they're up against competitors and you know what pain points our customers and prospects are feeling and hearing. And then that can help ensure that not only will your reps know you personally if you're out in the field with them, but then, uh, you can show that you're there fighting to help them hit their goals and then you're really swimming together. Camille Arnold.

Speaker B: I'm Camille Arnold and this is checked in. When sales and marketing align, magic happens. By working together as one team, they can amplify the impact of events, drive more leads and close more deals. In this episode, we'll dive into how sales and marketing can collaborate seamlessly, set shared goals and create a unified strategy for success. You'll get actionable tips to streamline workflows, improve communication and fill your pipeline by working together. Let's get checked in.

Speaker C: Hi everyone, my name is Hailey Kaplan and I am on the experiential marketing team here at Ah Splash. Let me tell you we are in for quite a treat today folks because we have the amazingly brilliant Erin Bizonz. We have her here today and she is the senior director of North America Marketing at Arctic Wolf. And, and she will be joining us in just a little bit and I can't wait for you all to hear from her. And together we're going to really just dive deep into cracking one of the toughest yet one of the most rewarding relationships in business and more importantly in events, your sales and marketing alignment. We're going to dive into why this relationship is kind of strained and the challenge. Understand what alignment could look like from your workflows to your comms. We'll talk tech and what kind of tech makes it even easier. And then we're going to wrap it up with some quick actionable wins that you can hopefully take BRAC and bring to your org immediately. I want to bring up the amazing, amazing Erin from Arctic Wolf. So I'm going to brag about her quickly as she comes and joins us on stage. Aaron has built and scaled a high performing field marketing organization known for driving demand through innovative event led campaigns. With nearly two decades of marketing and leadership experience, Aaron is recognized for turning strategic vision into into memorable result driven programs that deepen engagement with prospects and partners. She is passionate about fostering creative collaborative cultures and mentoring the next generation of marketing leaders. And we folks are so, so lucky that we get to pick her brain today and chat with her all about how she is enabling and scaling and doing all the wonderful things for her sales and marketing alignment and how it ties back to events. So let's bring Ms. Erin onto the stage. Hey, Erin, how's it going?

Speaker A: That was quite the intro. Thank you.

Speaker C: You are quite quite the leader, and I'm so excited that you're here. Are you having a good day so far?

Speaker A: Oh, yeah, busy M. As always, thank

Speaker C: you for being here. I'm so excited. So let's get into the convo. So I want to kind of start by setting the stage and kind of grounding ourselves for a moment and reality for a sec. Many companies are struggling with that sales and marketing connection around events. So I would love to know, kind of why do you think this struggle is so apparent? And why do you think it's so hard to kind of establish this relationship and then ultimately, like, turn event engagement into pipeline? Like, why. Why do you think there's such a prominent issue when it comes to sales and marketing alignment?

Speaker A: Yeah, I think the root of the issue often comes down to misaligned goals. If marketing, sales, or channel partners, our channel team, aren't on the same page for why we're doing events and why we're trying to drive demand together, then we're all rowing in different directions. So it's just not going to work.

Speaker C: Yeah, that, like, could not be more true. And I know we'll dive into how to align, uh, around goals a little later, but I think you nailed it spot on. It's just this misalignment of, oh, like, I think that'd be a great idea for us to do this event. And you're like, great, but what. What are the goals? What are we trying to accomplish with that? And if you don't have that shared goal, that shared interest of, like, what is to come from that you're gonna have this mismatch of expectations of. Okay, well, this is what I was hoping for. This is what I was hoping for. And I think sales and marketing have just been developed in such different ways too, that there's just, like a, uh, very different mindset when it comes to the outcomes of an event. So I would love to know if, you know, some common signs, like, what signs do you kind of see? Um, and. And being in marketing for over two decades, you know, and. And leading teams and being on the leadership side, what are some of those signs that you kind of notice when sales and marketing aren't aligned around Events.

Speaker A: Yeah. One of the biggest signs I've seen is the event happens and nothing comes from it. So. So if we're not driving towards the intended outcome, that's obviously a very big red flag. I think another sign is when we hear from sales like, oh, we have to be at this event, it's for the relationship. But we're misaligned on like, are we actually going to drive pipeline with this event or not? So just making sure that we're all aligned, going back to that alignment is just key. And making sure, being intentional about where we're investing and why.

Speaker C: Oh my gosh. Literally, yeah. The event happens and then okay, well where'd they go? What happened to it? Why are we not following up? There's just, yeah, that like kind of gap in what's going on post event which I know we're kind of dive into solutions for. But then also the oh, I want to go to this event. Okay, why Is behind it? Like why? What's the goal that we're looking and driving after on. On both marketing and sales side? Like what is the joint outcome? Okay, I want to kind of double click on what you just said and understand kind of how we can build alignment from these problems and challenges that we've set the stage for and identified kind of what they are. I want to talk about that like red flag of misaligned goals or the distance between sales and marketing and those misaligned goals. I mean personally, like on a call with C level leaders that are like, oh, I want to do this event, kind of what you mentioned and you're like, okay, great, but what are the goals? And there's never a super definitive answer. It's just kind of like, oh, visibility. And you're like, okay, that's great. But I also want to make sure that I'm then being measured on success based on that metric or like, do I move forward? Do we not do it and kind of push back? So I would kind of love to understand how you're approaching kind of breaching that alignment on goals and how you would envision that to kind of look in practice.

Speaker A: Yeah. So I think of it kind of like a, ah, fact finding mission. Like if we're going to say yes to an event, we have to say like, okay, are we going there for net new acquisition? Okay, great. Which target accounts are going to be there? Are we going there to move and progress pipeline? Okay, which of our opportunities are planning to come to the event? And then if you have customer within your field marketing arm, then you Gotta make sure the right customers are attending. They're actually gonna be advocates at your event. So I think asking those questions upfront and getting super clear and crisp on what the goals are that we're trying to achieve and then making sure you have the right folks going to the event from your team to make sure that you're having the right conversations with those ideal customer.

Speaker C: Oh yeah, that. I mean you couldn't, I think have nailed that more spot on. Especially when it comes to like event led growth and understanding where the event fits into the buyer's life cycle. Like is this a more top of funnel event that is going to a trade show and you want to do an ancillary event and you're looking for that net new lead and that net new acquisition or is it a, uh, customer's conference and you're like, oh, we're just going to show up and be a good partner. Like not really searching for net new acquisitions. So aligning on where that event fits in the buyer's life cycle and then what kind of goals are associated with that and then you kind of prioritize. Okay, if we're really looking like we're missing, you know, option focusing on those like top of funnel, just like lead or like where do we focus to get the most option? Is it with existing customers and doing events or experiences there or is it we need new logos, we have to do something towards the top. So kind of aligning on that I think is really, really interesting and I totally agree with you. It like really comes down to focusing on that piece of it.

Speaker A: Yeah. Even just having rule of thumb available, like we typically try to have like 70% of our event audiences focus on net new and then the remaining, uh, 25% on open pipeline and then 5% for customer. So while our team is fully focused on acquisition, we obviously need to support all parts of the buyer journey and then everybody wins if we're, you know, upselling and stuff at events as well. So of course want to include our customers.

Speaker C: They're also your biggest sellers. Like anything involving customers are your biggest sellers. For sure.

Speaker A: Yeah. Use your advocates.

Speaker C: Oh yeah, use your advocates. They're the best people to pitch the case. Like you don't have to sell when customers are around. They'll do it for you. I would love to know, kind of how did you determine that rule of thumb for that makeup of your event? Real quick side tangent, you gotta back

Speaker A: in from your goals. So if you have a pipeline goal, then you gotta back in your splits between pipeline versus what Your pipeline velocity goals are and then finally the upsell goals. So that's kind of how we divvy it out. There is a huge like Beautiful mind spreadsheet that happens on the back end with our ops team that helps us build out those goals. But then we have to break it down for our team so that they know exactly who they should be inviting to event.

Speaker C: I love that focus and that working together with everyone. That's like uh, a shared rule of thumb that you kind of coordinated with other departments and areas to align on that, that goal of who you want to be there for that event. I love that. Okay, so I would love to kind of dive into what your revenue and your specific team looks like. So can you kind of share because you mentioned like focusing on acquisition, like new acquisitions, things like that. I would love to know what your current revenue team alignment looks like and kind of what have been your biggest challenges in setting these shared goals and kind of how have you overcome challenges?

Speaker A: Our team is set up where we have the field marketing arm, channel marketing and then demand gen. And within Demand gen is where our customer marketing team lives. So our field marketers are focused on net new acquisition all day. That's where we are targeting and we do primarily channel partner events and then like the regional third party events.

Speaker C: Okay.

Speaker A: Then our channel marketing team is our two partner arm. So they're making sure our channel partners are enabled, they're trained, we're top of mind, we're incentivizing to make sure that they want to sell more. Arctic Wolf and then demand gen is kind of the direct demand engine where they have website, digital, social content, syndication and then customer marketing is under them. I would say one of the biggest challenges which we have not cracked the code on this quite yet, but we're getting there is planning together. You know, I've been at Arctic wealth for seven years and the planning has always been kind of in our own little silos in different pockets. And now we have a new SVP of uh, revenue and growth. And he's amazing and he's kind of rethinking like how do we bring the teams together so that we're more efficient and effective. So it's exciting times.

Speaker C: That is exciting times. And I don't know if anyone has fully cracked the code. I think that the reason why everyone talks about it is because there's, there's a lot of work to be done there because there's just like it's been this way for so long and now there's a new way of doing things and a better way of doing things where we are as a, as a society. So, and as marketers, there's just better ways to do things today. And so no one has cracked the code. We're all slowly getting there. But having a leader who fully understands the importance of trying to seek alignment is really, really beneficial and helpful. And I think that's like the toughest part is just getting higher level buy in, which I think I'm gonna like ask you about in just a second because it is. If your leaders are having a hard time understanding the reason why you need to work together, that's a big problem. We should be working.

Speaker A: Exactly, yes, I would love to because

Speaker C: since you are said you're like working towards cracking that code and that accountability and visibility across teams. So kind of how as your, your department and with your rev leader, how are you looking at working to get in buy in from even more internal stakeholders in this like working together environment?

Speaker A: It's still TBD, it's still early. I think our USVP, uh, has been here like 90 days, so he's still

Speaker C: getting his feet, he's getting ramped up. Yeah.

Speaker A: Yes, yes. But I think we'll have a stronger leadership team that's planning together versus doing it in our silos, like I said. So I think just having the conversations and doing the conversations early enough is going to be really beneficial for field marketing since we typically plan six months out and so we're usually kind of like, hey, where's the content? We got to get going on this event. And all the other teams, you know, their timelines are a little bit different so we need to start to mesh together our timeline. So I think he'll help us with like the pre planning side of the house.

Speaker C: Oh my gosh, six months. I would love if we were planning six months in advance. I feel like I always have aspirations to do six months in advance and then next thing you know I'm like, oh my God, this is happening in two months, I need to start on it. Or like, oh, we need to do something now. You know, that's a feat in itself. So. So yeah, I think the part that stood out from what you said is just like that communication and that like forethought and that planning and really being proactive in your communication to loop everybody in six months out and be like, hey, where are we seeing the biggest places for opportunity growth? What regions are really standing out of new markets we want to tap into or ones that we could squeeze more juice out of or where are we looking? And then that gives that overlap in planning and that overlap and focus of where your energy should go to and to be and things like that. So want to keep kind of chatting through the next kind of part. And we've talked about a little bit about buy in and it really comes down to communication also kind of, uh, we talked buy in from like the top down. But I would love to know how you're getting buy in from more lower level down. Like when you're trying to communicate your counterparts that you guys work with or tap into to help promote events, how are you kind of looking at getting buy in from them when it comes to your events?

Speaker A: We've always had a really strong relationship with sales. Honestly the best relationship with sales I've ever seen at any org I've been at. And a lot of it came from the top down where they learned to trust us early. And the way we got them to trust us is proving kind of our worth and that, you know, our events really do drive pipeline. And so the reps see that and then we speak in their language. We're talking pipeline dollars, we're talking number of opportunities that our activities have driven in. They learn to trust us and then they want to do more events. So then they will prioritize our activities over other things.

Speaker C: I love that. I think it could not be more true of what you said with talking in their linko, their jargon, what they're looking at, because that's all they're concerned with. Like the sales mindset is like, okay, what deals can I close? How much money am I bringing in? What's my commission? What does that look like? Like they're worried about those numbers. So the more that you can talk about your events in their terms, they're gonna be bought in and they're gonna be like, oh yeah, I think it's so great that you have such a good relationship with sales because that, that's hard to foster at orgs, especially if your leadership isn't encouraging that type of relationship. And if they're not, I feel like take it upon yourself to like, oh, I'm gonna have a chat with like one or two sales reps and get to know what their day to day is like. So that you're coming off as, oh, I'm invested in learning what your day looks like. So hopefully you're invested in what I'm doing for you. That's the hardest part is like, you're like, oh yeah, no, I know the impact of this. This is going to be an impactful event or campaign or program, but they won't fully grasp it unless it's in terms that they use every day and that they seek every day. I would love to kind of know what specific kind of channels are you using when you communicate these numbers or these metrics or the pipeline influence or the velocity influence? What have you found? What channels work best to keep sales and marketing in sync, whether it's before, during or even after an event?

Speaker A: So we do a variety of things. We're kind of over communicators, which is a huge time suck for our team. And like I, I'm very impressed with what our team does, but what we're working towards is making our messages sticky and getting the important information to the top of our emails so that it's quick for the field reps because I mean they're on the road a lot and we need to make it easy for them. So we do a variety of things via, uh, email. One example is we send a weekly email to all of acquisition sales saying basically, here's the list of events happening this week. They can go through and filter through the spreadsheet. They can get a full view into this month, into next month. So like the district managers also know where their reps are at. And then within that email we also include what customer marketing is up to. Because our orgs are set up a little bit separate. The territory reps still want to know like, hey, are you talking to my customers? Like, I want to know what's happening in my territory. We're trying to bring together the messages across the full marketing org. In addition to that, we do territory team slack. So all the sales REPs, all the SES, the SDRs, uh, field marketers are all in the same slack. And our team carries, I would say, a lot of the communication where they're updating on like, here's what's happening in this event and you know, the number of registrants, all of that fun stuff. Then there's territory calls and like I said, we have not cracked the code. We over communicate, but it's mostly working okay.

Speaker C: It's funny you say over communicate because I was on a call a week or two ago and one of our sales leaders was like, shout out to marketing for constantly messaging because if you didn't do that, we wouldn't pay attention, we wouldn't know what was going on. And I was like, okay, so you enjoy the over communicating as like, hm, is it my favorite thing to do? No. But is it Effective and they're responding to it. Yes. Okay, I will over communicate if that's, you know what it takes. Because sometimes you're like, oh, just check the wiki page or just check the Slack channel or whatever it is. But they're not going to do that.

Speaker A: So you need to be on a silver platter.

Speaker C: Be on a silver platter. We love our sales counterparts. We do. I'm not trying to, to bash on them. They just, they love a silver platter and there's nothing wrong with that. I love your idea for the email that goes out at the beginning of every week because I think that's a really nice like, hey, this is here. And if you, uh, want to do it and you want to look into it and you want to invite your prospects to this event or we've got this coming up. I think just giving them that visibility on a weekly basis is super, super key and it just kind of keeps it. Hey, top of mind, this is happening. Hey, reminder, this is happening. Hey, this is what's going on in case you wanted to use it or get involved in it. And then having specific Slack channels I also think is really beneficial and helpful. I love tagging specific reps in a message that I'm like, anyone who I'm like, I m know you're going to this event. I need to make sure that you see this or like uh, emoji like once you read this message and then if no one's popped or favorite emoji, ping again. Hey, just want to make sure you saw this. Share your fave emoji. Like I love doing that in Slack. There's nothing wrong with being over communicative

Speaker A: because we're a bit of babysitters, aren't we?

Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. But then hopefully like at some point it becomes like, uh, oh, this is an event. Great. Like that relationship because they've worked with you when they've done it and they've seen how impactful a campaign and event program can be, then they see something and they're like, oh, cool. I'm gonna get started on inviting folks like, uh, the more that you can be sticky, I feel like it just helps with that relationship and kind of building the bridge to a partnership between sales and marketing. So I love what you're doing. I think it's great. I'm excited to see the results as you guys are figuring out how to crack the code because we all are. So I would love to kind of on the topic of like rolling out a campaign or an event or something that's going on. I would love to know if you have any like workflows that you swear by when you're like deploying an event. What are these like pre event comms, during event comms and even post event comms or even not comms, just like workflows to kind of ensure that your internal teams, your sales, your marketing, you're all kind of rowing in the same direction for a specific program.

Speaker A: The uh, before you go, email is my favorite pre event. I have a lot of affection for it for some reason. But we send these out typically a week before the event and then uh, the day before just you know, that last refresher. I'm like this is where you should be and when. And I think that these are key not only just to, to say like here's the event logistics, but also hey reminder, this is what we're trying to do with this event. We're trying to drive in this many net new like our opportunity goal is 7 ups and this much pipeline, making sure we are reiterating what the actual goal is. And then at the event we really encourage our reps to serve as a host, especially when it's like an intimate channel partner event. So we've hosted little mini trainings with our reps. We called it the art of hosting so that we could kind of teach them like this is how you host a party and how you make people feel comfortable because that's the sticky stuff that resonates with the prospect. They're going to remember how they felt at your event. So we want to make sure that you know, the reps are taking good care of them. And then post event of course is all about the follow up with SDRs. So I wouldn't say we've quite figured this out either. But making sure we're getting the best notes over to our SDR so that they have strong follow up and they can really tailor their outreach sequences. So those are kind of my three biggies.

Speaker C: Oh, I love that. I also have a uh, very near and dear feeling for a no before you go because you just like you've been working on it and you're so excited and it's just like they're just really, really impactful and so helpful and I also feel that and I think that is such a great way to get alignment across your teams. And we recently tried hosting like a kickoff call and then a know before you go right before the event. So the kickoff call is like a month before and it's uh, anyone involved in the program like hey, this is launching. This is what's happening just so it's on their radar. And then we have the Know before you go where it gets like a bit more meaty. And then the emails and slacks with all extra information. So I think I love that you love Know before youe Goes.

Speaker A: Um, tying a bow on the gift. You know, you gotta finish it.

Speaker C: Tying the bow on the gift. It's so nice. And then it just gets packaged and brought over, which is just so fun. I also absolutely love the follow up call with SDRs. I think the post event follow up is probably one of the hardest things to crack and it's slightly the most important of all of the three. Obviously the experience at the event. Love the art of hosting toots. Very, very cute. And I bet it's super, super helpful because it's not easy to host an event if you've never done it before. But the piece of taking what you've gathered from the event and putting it into the hands of someone to move it forward in pipeline or in whatever goal you're trying to reach is really, really challenging. And I have not tried a call with SDRs. We usually just kind of like push them over and then the SDRs will do the follow up. But I think having an alignment call where like, hey, this is what happened. Here are three or four talking points you can use to like gently ease into the conversation is brilliant. I love that. Uh, do your SDRS respond well to that? Like, are they. Have you seen a difference from doing that specific piece in the process?

Speaker A: Yeah, I think our conversions are definitely higher on our events versus, you know, other marketing efforts. But I think just getting those hot leads and those key things that they need to make sure they focus on just helps the conversation and helps them get meetings booked.

Speaker C: I love that. It's usually just like, make sure your notes are there. But I think hosting a call to be like, hey, these are a couple highlights. This is a great way to lean into what happened at the event. This is how to interpret the notes that you saw there to make it as smooth of a transition for the person on the receiving end and make them more inclined to be like, oh, okay, this isn't just a generic, hey, it was great meeting you, or like, my team had a good time meeting. Like, it feels a bit more personal. And that's such a big piece of winning business today. So I love that. That's a great, great idea. I think I will start implementing that. Okay, cool. Now I kind of want to, uh, switch just a little bit and think about obviously here, talk through like how to unlock event led growth success through alignment. And when it comes to event led growth, there is a lot of repeatability and scalability in your event programs. So that's really what makes it an effective motion. So I would love to know kind of what you've implemented to ensure that the playbooks for your sales and your marketing teams are really designed to scale and kind of be replicated successfully.

Speaker A: So our team really tries to be efficient. We're hosting 250 plus events per quarter across the team and so we. Yeah, it's, it's crazy.

Speaker C: Oh my God. Busy woman over here.

Speaker A: Well, it's the team, it's not me, it's definitely the team. But we really try to make it efficient. So we created an innovation committee probably like 4ish years ago. And this committee is like the field marketers that have stepped up to want to, to be on this committee. And they really sit and think about how do we make things scalable. So what they've done is they've taken like the best of the best of our events and they have housed up a landing page, copy all of like the registration links that we can just kind of copy the template over to make sure that the events are teed up. And like all of our events are kind of tried and true at this point where we know what works, what gifts work, those types of things and then all the other field marketers can go into this shared resource and kind of just steal each other's ideas and it works great.

Speaker C: I think that's awesome. And I love the idea of putting together a committee to tackle the highest performing programs and really align around. Okay, these are our biggest indicators of success. This is what it looks like. This is the best copy to use. These are the best email templates to drive things forward. I love that it's kind of a collective effort to identify those and that it makes it really easy. I kind of don't want to like maybe put you on the spot. You mentioned like high performing items or like the best performing ones. Do you have like a favorite campaign you've run?

Speaker A: Sneakers and security is one that we have seen great success with. So it's a virtual event and then we have like a uh, Nike expert come on and talk about kind of the history of the shoe and all this fun stuff. It's great content. It's really like enthralling content. And then at the end, obviously we talk about cyber security throughout that conversation as well. But then at the End the attendees, uh, get a gift card to Nike and then they can go create their own custom shoe.

Speaker C: Oh, I love that. Do you usually. Is it like, are you using ABM and, like, targeting high accounts? Or is it a more bottom funnel, like closing deals? Or is it like, these are our top accounts we're going after? Where does it kind of sit in your funnel? Because I love this event, and if I dealt with cybersecurity, I would love to go to it. That sounds so fun.

Speaker A: I know. We all want Nike kicks, don't we? Um, so we target kind of all ranges of the funnel, I would say, with this event, but we typically partner up with our channel partners, and so they're inviting their customers that have not yet purchased our services. So the partners know their customer base and know what our hot accounts, and so that's who we target.

Speaker C: I love that. I think that's such a cool event. Congrats. That's awesome. I could ask you about that event all day. I sidetracked just a little bit. So thank you for indulging me and sharing that. That is a very cool idea, and I love that it's been successful. Okay. I kind of want to talk through the tools and tech that makes alignment really, really easy. So I'd love to know if you could just kind of let our audience know what your current tech stack looks like for proving event ROI and also enabling that sales and marketing alignment.

Speaker A: I think ours is pretty standard to probably what most people are using, But Salesforce, Marketo on 24cvENT, Allocadia for budgeting, and then Tableau for reporting. So one thing that's really helped us in terms of, like, going back to the sales relationship is we attend all of the sales QBRs, and at those QBRs, we present last quarter's data, say what's working and what's not, and then a look into the future quarter. But all of those historicals are pulled from Salesforce and Tableau. So it's all integrated data that we can pull together into a couple of slides to make it easy for sales to understand our impact to their territories.

Speaker C: I love that you join in the territory QBRs. I think that's. That shows that your team revenue and it's not sales and marketing. It's like, this is team revenue. This is how we're contributing to, you know, the quarter and what's going on this business. I think that's just so helpful. Like, and as a marketer, I love going to sales meetings anytime that I can, because I just feel so Much more informed about what they're charging after or who they're targeting or what their top accounts are or what's top of mind for them. I love that that's like a priority of things that you've been doing at your org to kind of help build that relationship and showcase, hey, this is the impact that we're having on your pipeline, right? This is what our programs are doing for you, which I think is super, super great. And I love that having an integrated tech stack truly makes all the difference because having data to prove what you know, like intrinsically that you know, but having the numbers to back it up and show it is also really, really great. I would love to kind of know we talked on red flags, green flags, but what are some of the like non negotiables for your event tech to really enable the marketing and sales alignment?

Speaker A: Integration obviously is key, like you mentioned. And then security is top of mind. Like if the security protocols are not up to snuff, then we will not partner with that vendor. Marketo and Salesforce has been like a game changer for us and just ensuring that our marketing function is really rolling into Salesforce and that we're able to pull all of our data which then again feeds into Tableau. So that's been a great integration for us.

Speaker C: Also, big fan of the Marketo to Salesforce integration over here too. I love seeing dashboards of how the programs are performing and everything. And you think about security slightly more than I probably think. But that is such a good point. Like having a secure systems that integrate so there's no leaky data is like so so key and then integrations is just huge. I would love to kind of know if you can share an example of like a tech enabled workflow that you've been able to see directly resulted closed one or source pipeline through what does that workflow look like?

Speaker A: I think on 24 is a good example where we're hosting webinars, we're getting registrants at the event and then you can actually see those leads moving through the funnel and then all the way through to close one. And then not only like the funnel view you get, but also you can see if they're engaged during the event, which is just helpful to know like is our content resonating? Is this actually a right fit for this audience? So I know a lot of people will say like webinars are dead, but I do not think that is the case. It's still one of our highest converting activities, so we love them.

Speaker C: Oh yeah. Webinars I don't think will ever go out of style. I think that they are just will now and forever be relevant. And I think it's just people just consume them differently. So like, if they're ready or they want to learn about a subject, they're going to go to a webinar and they're going to be engaged in that. And I think that's even better because now you have the option to go to whatever kind of events you want or look things up when you want. It's all at your fingertips. So if someone is coming to your webinar to learn about content, they're probably really interested. And the data you get from webinars is also really key. If you use the data that you get from a webinar, it can be a game changer because that just is really good indicators. And so you kind of said you love how you can see certain, like content behavioring a certain way or if it's resonating. And when it comes to virtual events, kind of, what kind of metrics do you look at? Like, are you noting live interactions that take place? Are you looking at people who engage in polls? People who you say webinars aren't dead and they're still high performance performers? I agree, but I would love to know what your kind of data points that you look for are.

Speaker A: Yeah, so the mql, the SQL conversion is like the biggie that we of course look at, but then looking at registrants to attendees and seeing what that conversion rate is, and then, uh, just seeing when people are falling off, like, are they falling off when we're asking them to engage and show themselves on video? I think that's important to note. Like a lot of people want to kind of be behind the screen and then you can customize your events for that. And then, um, seeing when people fall off in terms of the content too. So you can kind of see what content is resonating.

Speaker C: Those are great ones. I love those. I MQL to SQL is huge. So that obviously is my favorite data metric from these as well. But I think they're the soft ones too that are just really interesting to help you build even better event programs for your audience. So I kind of would love to switch gears. We talked challenges, we talked about some, like building blocks for creating alignment and then we talked tech for alignment. So I kind of love to look at some like quick, actionable wins that people could kind of take with them and do today for their teams and for their sales and marketing. Alignment when it comes to events. So I would love to know, kind of in what ways are you motivating your different channel teams and your teams really to help promote and drive attendance to your events? Like your channel partners for the, the sneakers and security events, what ways are you motivating them to get involved in the promotion of an event?

Speaker A: A lot of the incentives for our uh, channel partners actually come from the channel, uh, marketing side of the house. So they offer pack points to our partners for basically selling arctic wealth and they can earn points for driving attendance. They can earn points for submitting dealer edges, closing dealer edges in certain timelines. So they kind of have the incentive built out and then we're just one of the levers of like hey, you can build pipeline, you can reach your bigger goals, get more points, more money in their pockets essentially if you drive attendees. So it's kind of a uh, two pronged approach to get them to drive attendees.

Speaker C: Incentive, you said it. I feel like that's.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: Any way you can incentivize your counterparts or partners to get involved is always going to go over well, I feel like. Because then they have more stake in wanting to drive registration and partner with you on certain activations and, and things I know we've tried. The rep who gets the most invites gets to actually go is also something we've tried too. Sometimes it works really well, sometimes it doesn't. So I don't know if I would suggest that to anyone but we've tried that and that was kind of interesting. So definitely different ways. I love the like point system and using that to uh, to help power that participation, which is really helpful. I think teens totally respond to just that incentive type promotion strategies. So I love that you've been, been doing that. Okay. We mentioned red and green flags quite a bit today because we're swiping right. So it all kind of ties together. But I would love to know what two red uh, flags are you looking at when it comes to building a scalable playbook for your event programs. You mentioned you have everything kind of from that committee and they, they pick and peel what works best and what works well. So I would love to know what your two red flags are when it comes to building that scalable playbook and then how you would kind of turn those red flags green or building out playbooks to maximize sales and marketing alignment for your event programs.

Speaker A: One of the red flags we've seen as channel partners just not being engaged from the start when it comes to pre planning. So you can typically Tell like with the amount of energy that they're bringing to the call and how excited they are about the event, if this event will actually come to fruition. So we spend a lot more time making sure that we're intentional about which channel partners we're asking to do co sponsored events with and then just making sure we're aligned on those goals and outcomes that we're seeking and making sure the content that we're going to present is really going to resonate with that audience. So that's kind of how we turn from red to green. Another one kind of going back to like sales saying we need to be there for the relationship is just really making sure. We're asking the question like is there actually pipeline potential here and getting aligned on goals? I mean I feel like uh, a broken record. I just keep saying align on goals. But that really has changed the conversation when we're all saying okay, this is what we're shooting rooting for now. How do we get there?

Speaker C: I truly think that is like unlocking sales and marketing alignment is unlocking aligned goals. Like that is what it comes down to. And I love that the first red flag that you said like your channel partners just like aren't engaged in the pre planning and you mentioned being kind of not choosy in what channel partners you're deciding to do events for. But the ones who show up engaged and excited are who you're more likely to want, uh, to partner with on an event. And I think that kind of makes me think of having your like counterpart MVPs. So your channel partner MVPs or your sales counterpart MVPs who have seen the success of your event and they're kind of your like partner on um, like hey, this person's vouching for it. They're really, they understand and you kind of have someone on the other side helping to say like no, this works, this is really good. So yeah, I love that red flag, green flag. And the other one is just the aligned goals. And yes, uh, always rallying around the same cause because that we just encountered that our sales team just came to us and we're like, hey, we'd love to do, we've got a lot of people here, we'd love to do roadshow for them towards the end of the year and we were like great. Why? What are the goals? What are you trying to accomplish? Is it just we just want to show up or is it no, we want to get a few more expansion deals in the book and this is how we're going to do it. And then you're like, awesome, let's partner. We're feeling aligned. We're in the same boat. So love those green flags, red flags to green flags so much. And then I think I just kind of want to wrap by asking, kind of what is your biggest piece of advice to get started on? Sales and marketing alignment for event, uh, led growth, success.

Speaker A: So of course, align on goals. But in addition to that, make sure you build real relationships with your sales and channel teams. I think getting out from behind the screen, get in the field, go to events, attend their meetings, really understand their challenges and what they're up against. When they're up against competitors and, uh, you know, what pain points our customers and prospects are feeling and hearing is just really important. And then that can help ensure that not only will your reps know you personally if you're out in the field with them, but then, uh, you can show that you're there fighting to help them hit their goals, and then you're really swimming together.

Speaker C: I love that. I would love to know what has something you personally have done, because that's such good advice. Like to really get to know your sales counterpart and build those relationships. Was there one instance where you were like, yeah, I did this, and then this person in sales became my best friend or something like that. I would love if you have, like, a specific example you can share.

Speaker A: In my early days, I was on the road a fair amount. Like, I would just make sure that I showed up and that I was consistent. And then that's really where I built trust. And then I, uh, always tried to eat a meal with either our sales reps or our channel partners. So my goal when I'm traveling is to never eat alone and making sure I'm inviting somebody who's in the field to come sit with me, no matter who it is, you know, at any, you know, whether it's channel partner or sales rep, just really building the relationships with everyone.

Speaker C: I love that. Oh, my gosh.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker C: Next time I'm in your area, I would love to not eat alone. So I'll have to get lunch somewhere. Um, but I. That could not be more true. And I love that that was your example. And the never eating alone when you are traveling for business, I think is really great because it just helps to build and bridge those relationships and, and start those connections. So I could just talk your ear off all day and listen to you talk all day. And I am just so grateful and appreciative that you have come and lent your time with us today Erin. So thank you so so much for speaking with us and I'm so excited to uh, hear your continued success of bridging the gap of sales and marketing and can't wait to follow the story of your like further top down marketing alignment and revenue team alignment. So thank you again. Erin. Could not appreciate you more. Truly such a gem and so, so grateful she came and shared her insights. So many nuggets and little pieces that I'm gonna definitely take back and I hope you also are as well. All right everyone, on behalf of the entire Splash team, thank you so much for joining us today. We uh, truly live for creating opportunities for marketing and events professionals like you to learn with us and with your fellow event marketing peers. And alrighty folks, it has been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for hanging out with us today and until next time, take care.

Speaker B: Thank you for listening to checked in. To get connected and learn more, visit splashthat.com and don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.