011 | Your First Six Months as a CMO with Caroline Japic and Jeremy Middleton | Studio CMO - a podcast by Golden Spiral, Shaping Technology Marketing

The Episode in 60 Seconds

What can a brand new CMO do to grow a company in the first six months? Caroline Japic, CMO of Kenna Security, faced this challenge head-on with energy and drive.

This interview covers:

• How Kenna reduced the size of their MarTech stack and cut their annual cost in half
• How to build a team that works and works together
• The marketing efforts that have changed and those that have stayed steady
• Five pieces of advice to new CMOs

Our Guests

Caroline Japic brings 12 years of senior marketing executive experience to Kenna Security as CMO. Kenna is a vulnerability management scanner that searches for threats to your organization, infrastructure, applications then delivers it in a cloud platform by user reducing friction between security and IT. She has also served as CMO at Pramata and Tidemark and was a senior marketing executive for HP, Bunchball, Taleo, and Polycom.

Caroline has been commended throughout her career for building winning teams and moving marketing programs ahead quickly.

Jeremy Middleton is Caroline's trusted right hand. Their paths have crossed before at Pramata and HP. Jeremy understands how to uncover, use, and analyze data to support and tweak marketing efforts. He's a proven manager and marketing tactician. 

Show Notes

What does it take to transform and grow a marketing program?

Team Building

Caroline came in and analyzed the team, found the holes (and filled them), and realigned the team to be more efficient.

Listen at 5:00 minutes to discover the biggest changes she made and 7:00 for the qualities she looks for in marketing experts.

Message Building

What are we telling the world about Kenna? Does it make sense? Is it concise? - Caroline Japic

Overhauling the Marketing Stack

Jeremy cut the MarTech tools from twenty down to seven and cut their budget in half. Find out what tools they are using at 13:00.

We have a simpler set of tools which means less raw data which results in less noise. We can more easily make sense out of the information we have. - Jeremy Middleton

What is Old is New Again

Kenna Security developed a physical direct mail package and have received a 10% meeting schedule rate. Listen throughout the episode to find out how and why it works plus a measuring stick of how effective it really is.

Understanding Your Customer More Deeply than Ever

Caroline is passionate about knowing and learning more about Kenna's customers. Find out how she builds her empathetic understanding at 20:00.

The Fundamental Underpinnings

We explore what Caroline and Jeremy see as the basic building blocks for their marketing program. (23:00)

• Technology doesn't solve problems
• Do you really know who you're targeting?
• How accurate is your data?
• Can you stop what isn't helping?

Maintaining High Standards While Motivating the Team

Caroline has built a loyal and high-performing team. She breaks down some of her thought process of management at 30:00.

What has changed in marketing

Metrics are much more sophisticated and tell a greater story.

CMOs must feel like and act like they own the entire funnel from lead to close... and beyond.

Sometimes, it is "arts and crafts marketing." We say, "This would be fun. Let's do this thing." Afterward, we ask, "Well, did it work?" We don't know. We ask, "Did everyone like it?" - Caroline Japic

Advice for New CMOs

• You need a big win fast
• Build your dashboard first
• Talk to your sales leader every single day
• Put a framework in place. You need a written plan.
• Market the marketing
• Build relationships and maintain alignment

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