Top tips from Angela Pointon.
1. Stop Blending In Book.
I would say start get hold of that book. So stop blending in seven steps in there about how you can become sort of a thought leader in your in your marketplace.
2. Know who our competitors.
We know who our competitors are oftentimes, oftentimes, so we don’t do a good job as evaluating them from a prospects standpoint. And so if if anybody’s kind of sitting here and thinking about marketing for themselves or for their company, and they’re thinking about, I don’t really know where to start, there’s no reason why you can’t Secret Shop, your competitors, nobody in the world is going to arrest you for secret shopping your competitors. And why don’t feel like strange thing to do, right? I’m pretending to be one of their prospects. But we can learn a lot by visiting their website, filling out their forms, giving them a call acting like a prospect, we’ve learned very quickly what that experience is, and how to make ours better, and resonate for prospects who might be vetting them and us.
3. Keep this marketing focus is really, you know, looking at that brand for your website, looking at what that marketing and thought leadership platform.
I’ll keep this marketing focus is really, you know, looking at that brand for your website, looking at what that marketing and thought leadership platform is, and trying to evaluate yourself on how well you are doing at getting across that you are the expert in that thing that you say you’re the expert in, is that hitting people over the head through the content on your website, email campaigns, social media, you know, how you show up at events and trade shows and networking? If it’s not, you know, there’s different ways to go about fixing that. But really understanding from the gecko where you’re strong, and where you need to do some improvement is a good way to start a new year.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
marketing, hubspot, companies, people, eos, content, database, clients, customer, working, prospect, 1000s, organization, angela, thought, focus, building, goals, b2b, business
Debra Chantry-Taylor 00:02
Good morning and welcome to another edition of better business better life. i Today I am joined by Angela Poynton, who is the president and CEO of 11 out of 11. Agency. And that’s an agency who specializes in marketing for companies running on EOS. And Angela shared with me that she’s actually a wee bit of an iOS fangirl as well. So looking forward talking about that. But first of all, welcome to the show, Angela.
Angela Pointon 00:24
Thank you so much, Debra. Glad to be here.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 00:27
It’s lovely to have you. Now I always like my guests just to introduce themselves and tell them about your history, like how did you get to where you are now? So from when we’ve just been chatting, you’ve been going for about seven years, with a marketing agency with about 20 staff in total? How did you even get to that point?
Angela Pointon 00:43
Yeah, good question. So a little background on me, I went to school for photography, so not marketing, I decided through that experience, in my degree to never make a living doing photography, it was just not something I could see myself doing. I thought that would suck the joy out of it for me. But what I did do during my degree was find out that I really love the intersection of creativity and marketing and business, through some internships and working for companies and photographers that were soliciting advertising agencies. And so I decided marketing was where it was at and went back to school right away for my MBA in marketing, and then started with a job right out of that school, working in a marketing department for a fast growth startup company. From there jumped to a marketing agency, I spent the bulk of my career working for another marketing agency before, like you said, deciding about roughly seven years ago to go out on my own and start my own. And so that’s what I did here at 11 out of 11. And you’re right, we primarily serve small to medium sized businesses in the states here. We do have some international clients in Canada as well, but primarily in the States. And we love serving companies running on EOS. Why do we love serving companies running on EOS probably for obvious reasons for yourself and your listeners. But those organizations have have shown or demonstrated by, you know, their adoption of that methodology that they want to organize themselves, get, you know, accountability in line, right people right seats, and really get organized around goals and rocks, which, as you can imagine, for a marketing agency is really important. When you’re aligning with a strategic partner, like an marketing agency, you want to make sure that you’re clear on what your goals are. They shouldn’t be changing week by week, they should be very clear from the get go for both parties so that they know what the beacon is that we’re working toward. And so that clarity is something that I appreciate, and I think is relatively rare in business, surprisingly, but pretty common within us run companies. And so that’s really been our niche for, I would say five out of the seven years really focusing on working with visionaries and integrators that are running on us.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 03:17
I completely understand I mean, I’ve got a marketing background as well, actually. So I used to run worth in work in an agency and I run an agency for a while as well. And you’re right, it’s really difficult to with clients when they’re not clear about what success looks like. Because then you really feel like you’re shooting in the dark, you don’t know what you’re trying to actually achieve. And how do you celebrate success as well, if you don’t know what success looks like? And I guess you’re right, EOS certainly gives that focus. And it keeps people focused for a period of time rather than flip flopping as well, doesn’t it? So you’ve got that 90 Day sprint, you know, that’s what’s gonna be happening in the 90 days. And real good really gives that clarity.
Angela Pointon 03:54
For sure. Yeah, and I’m, I know, some individuals listening may be chuckling because that all sounds rosy. But realistically, we know that goals change organizations change. And sometimes there are differing and opinions of what the goals are within organizations, right. And so I don’t mean to say that companies are in the IANA us are perfect. And companies working with us are perfect. And we’re perfect when working with the companies. Of course, there is always room for growth and improvement. But we do love that alignment from the gecko, that clarity is really, really important. And sometimes companies come to us because they’re not sure what the goals should be. They don’t know what’s achievable, right? So we want to grow revenue by x. But as it boils down into marketing goals, you know, how does that translate what’s achievable? Within a quarter, a half a year, a whole year? And we help coach and advise on that topic as well. Perfect.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 04:55
Okay, so I’m going to ask a very basic question, and it’s only because it’s little bit of a passion of mine. And how would you describe marketing? What do you say marketing?
Angela Pointon 05:05
Well, I can’t there’s global marketing. And then there’s what 11 out of 11? Does. So I will answer that in both. So marketing, and you know, branding, if you will, is more than just what people think of website logo messaging, right, it’s today becomes so much broader and involved than those basic elements. Those are considered table stakes in the marketing arena. And we’ve become more sophisticated within a specialty, I’m going to speak from my level of expertise, which is in b2b organizations, so businesses focused on selling to other businesses. There’s so much to go in with nurture emails, you know, how do you automate some of your marketing? What’s the user experience of somebody working with your company before they get involved? And then while there are clients, how do you market them to them continuously to keep them sticky or grow the account. So there’s quite a bit that we’ve all added to marketing, and it’s capacity these days of 11 out of 11, we really thrive in that b2b world. And we really help companies focus on the content creation and automation of content generation. Meaning, you know, somebody comes to your website and fills out a form, they’re not ready to buy yet, but they’ve shown some level of interest, how do we nurture those individuals through content, to get them closer to the company building trust and, and keeping top of mind so that when their pain becomes acute, they’re ready to reach out to that company and not really think about any other competitors? And so what are the marketing components that we need to build to help companies get there? That’s really what we focus on is that level of thought leadership and expertise through content. And also automation factors. As I mentioned, we work a lot within HubSpot on behalf of organizations that particular tool in helping them develop, you know, automation campaigns, things to help build and left the sales team.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 07:21
Thank you. That’s really cool. The reason I actually asked is I think a lot of people tend to think of marketing as being advertising as being the logo as being and it’s so much more than that. It’s actually about the way that we actually nurture a customer throughout the entire customer experience. That’s my viewpoint. And I don’t even believe it’s a it’s a separate function per se, it actually should be absolutely integrated into everything that we do, putting that customer at the forefront and working through what that customer wants and needs. Obviously, online has changed so much about the way that we can do things. One of my real bugbears is a lot of this sort of automation, which is obviously not even tailored automation. It’s just that whole blast stuff out there with no consideration for the person at hand. HubSpot has got some amazing features that allow you to get very, very deep, deeply customized. So it’s not just a shotgun approach. ketose. A bit more about that.
Angela Pointon 08:13
Yeah, I’ll give two examples just to help people think their teeth. And so HubSpot offers something called Smart Content. And that’s going to be primarily web based. So if we think about what a user experience should be for a client coming onto a website versus somebody who’s never worked with the business before, it’s different, right? Different messaging, different experience, a existing customer one bite one information about add ons, upsells additional services, if you will, a new prospect is just trying to get to know the company and what it stands for and does right. What can I buy from this organization? Who are they? So two different types of visitors. If the contact is in HubSpot, and so therefore HubSpot knows because of a cookie, that, hey, this is Debra, she’s a customer, here’s what should appear on this page for Debra. And customers like her versus Angela, she’s a prospect content for Angeles should be very introductory trust building credibility building, etc. It can display different content content, excuse me in real time on a page depending on who the person is. If somebody does not have a cookie, which listeners may be wondering, Okay, what if it’s somebody brand new that is not in the database, it will just present standard content, right, presumably prospect content because you likely have all of your customers in your database. That’s one example. Another example would be an email experience. So let’s say I’m the prospect. You’re the customer of this company and we’re both have download get something from their website. And so, you know, the company’s nurturing us through HubSpot, you click on one link in that email, I do not. So it might be an important link, like booking a call or some next step with the organization, right? You’re going to buy more I’m buying for the first time. And so the email behavior, once you click that link, or don’t can be customized, you can get an email preparing you for the call. Because you’ve clicked the link, you showed intent of having the call and then have that email convince you to book it, my content might be, Hey, we love to talk with people, here’s how we’re going to help you. And it’s trying more to convince me to book the call in the first place. So it can be tailored in that way. And there’s tons of different trees and if then statements we could explore. But hopefully people get the idea of how that can be customized truly, to really make it not feel like this is a robot sending me a one size fits all message.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 11:04
Yeah. And it also has the ability to kind of alert your sales teams to doesn’t it when the person really has a huge interest. So you can then hand it over to a human being and a human being can actually take that to the next step. Yes,
Angela Pointon 11:16
What you’re talking about HubSpot calls, lead scoring. And so you know, every person, if you set it up, or have an agency set it up for you. Every person has a point value that they’re building based on their activity. So somebody who doesn’t care about the company isn’t visiting the website might have a point value of five or zero even. But somebody who’s really might be accumulating points and building their point value from there. And whenever the point value reaches a threshold, the sales team gets alerted of you know, you should reach out to this prospect.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 12:01
Sorry about that barking that was my dog. I’m actually working from home today except a little bit ill. So he decided it was a great time, though. But But yeah, okay, great. So it’s giving you the ability to, I mean, it really is about helping state of mind with the customer. But then when they get to a point where they’re really quite warm, you can then take some action outside of traditional kind of marketing if you like, you got it. Okay, cool. So the next question I have is around, you know, what size does your database have to be before you want to start thinking about some of these things? Because I know some people think, Oh, you got to have 1000s of people a database to actually make it worthwhile. But that’s not true, is it?
Angela Pointon 12:39
Is that true? A lot of companies if we think about b2b, you know, a customer for them might represent $100,000, year $50,000, a year, a million dollars a year, right? We’re not talking about somebody purchasing a $5 product where you need 1000s and 1000s of customers in order to make significant revenue. That’s more b2c. So in a b2b model, we’re already typically talking about smaller numbers to begin with. And if anybody listening feels like, Oh, my database is small, or haven’t really paid attention to it, it’s deficient, it takes a while to build some of this stuff. And therefore, if we’re focused on getting ready to launch some of this automation and custom content, while the organization is really focused on building it, and cleaning up that database, that can be a beautiful pairing, because it creates accountability for we want to get ready for this launch, right? And so if we think about a goal, let’s add one hot prospect to the database a day. Yeah, 365 by the end of the year that weren’t in there before. And maybe that’s too small, maybe it needs to be five hot prospects a day, whatever the case may be for the organization, that real focus puts a lot of intention on getting what we believe and I think many marketers believe is the most critical asset for any organization is its database, right? That’s its opportunity to sell right and build relationships within that database. And far too many organizations don’t take it as seriously as they should. The good ones really understand how precious that is. But when focus is paid there, it will pay off even if we are starting small, because you’re going to be paying attention to it and building it through this work together.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 14:39
And I think you’re absolutely right. I mean, for b2b, often customers are worth quite a large value. And so you don’t need huge numbers of customers but you do want to, I used to in traditional marketing, I’d say top of mind was just making sure that when they finally get around to making the decision, you’re on the list of choices that they actually are via we’ll choose from. And so often it’s easy to have a conversation with a potential client, and not do anything with them. And you know, I’ve had clients who’ve gone away for two or three years, and then come back and gone, hey, I’m ready to do iOS. Now, it’s like, I haven’t heard from you in two years, but they’ve obviously been consuming content, seeing what’s going on. And so at the time, when they’re actually reading, you’re there, you’re in their mind, you’re one of their considerations. And I think it’s all too easy to let people drop off and not not keep in contact with them. So even if you use a database for, you know, obviously, the content generation and keeping them engaged, but also to remind you to be in contact with that person on a regular basis to, I used to use it when I was I used to sell drugs as in pharmaceutical drugs. And I used to use my my CRM back in those days to keep track of things like you know, what coffee the receptionist had. So when I turned up to the surgery, I’d bring the right coffee, I’d use it to note what their kids names were, what their dog’s names were, what interests they had. And to remind myself just to keep in contact on a regular basis, there’s so much more than just online content that CRM is useful. Is that right?
Angela Pointon 16:05
Now thoroughly, right? Yeah, I mean, the sky’s the limit. As far as what kind of custom properties you want to build. We’ve seen some crazy ones, but really share some crazy ones. I mean, I can say show that we used to collect when we brought on a new client. Speaking of dogs, we would we’re in pet lovers here. So we would ask people to put in their pets names, and any, you know, was a dog cat, what was it? And that really came from a client themselves, because we used to have on the forum to ask about children and one client put no kids, but really, these are my kids and put their animals in there. And so it becomes just a fun topic, a conversation. It’s a way that, you know, after you sell something, the implementation team can carry something personal into their kickoff conversation and say, Hey, how’s Sparky doing? And tell us about them? Or whatever the case may be? So yeah, but we’ve seen other ones that clients have used right around birthdays, anniversaries, you know, smart things related to the business, like client has told us that XYZ is a q1 2025 goal, just as far as reminders to the sales team to reach out, right. So there’s all sorts of great uses for that kind of Intel being stored. Sure. And
Debra Chantry-Taylor 17:28
So then, what about AI? Does AI play a part in? What’s happening these days, you know, in terms of in terms of CRM, in terms the way that you communicate? How has it been used in the marketing world?
Angela Pointon 17:41
Yeah, so HubSpot has used AI for a long time, in very simple ways. Of course, just like any other tech organization, there are looking at use cases of worries to lean into it to take things and make them even more advanced. As far as the marketing agency ourselves, we look at AI as a wonderful creative partner. And that’s really today, what it’s good at, it’s not quite good enough yet to, you know, draft somebody’s marketing plan for them, or create a content calendar for them or create a really robust piece of content for them. But if we want a brainstorming partner when we’re staring at a blank cursor, or we want to just get some ideas down on paper as a way to start something, it’s awesome for that. It’s an awesome creative buddy to be used in that way. But it’s still it desperately still needs human editorial and refinement before anything goes out into the world.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 18:47
Yeah, I completely agree. I mean, I’m, I’m all for using it. But often, it’s just a great, it’s a great thought starter. It’s a great way to start with something. And I must admit that, you know, I put something into chat GBT as an example of what comes out. I kind of go, Oh, my goodness, I would never say it like that. But it gives me something to start with. And I can I can actually reword it, and it makes you Yeah, it makes you think at least get thinking about what you can do. Absolutely. Okay, um, I want people who are listening to this. And so for you, we don’t really do much with our database. At the moment, we’re not really doing much in terms of nurturing clients, we don’t have much in the way of what we have now described as being marketing, how would you say they can get started? What’s the first kind of step they should take?
Angela Pointon 19:26
So a couple of ways to think about getting started with any kind of even if you have a bunch of marketing, but you’ve neglected one area or you really want to focus on an area and this year, whatever the case may be, I always think it’s good to create even just a draft plan can be a one pager but getting some thoughts on paper. EOS offers offer some tools for write strategic planning, so maybe some of those tools would be appropriate. But thinking through what possible next steps are what are going to Be the roadblock or is what is going to help us be successful. People who are quickstarts don’t want to do that work, and I get it. Even I am not a quickstart person, I don’t score high there. But even I don’t want to really work on that plan. But when I do, I’m always grateful. And so putting those thoughts on paper, one is going to create clarity for you on what the goals and road blockers are going to be, too for any people you are working with, whether it’s an agency, internal team members, new people you hire, it’s going to create that clarity for vision for them as well. And then really looking at right people right seats, right, who is going to help execute this, it’s not the how, but the who, who is going to be the right person, to really bring this to fruition for you is a critical point that we all know as EOS believers, right? We know that if an idea doesn’t have the right, people with the right capacity assigned to it, it’s going to struggle. And so thinking through that, initially, I have written a book, you know about this topic for people who are specifically looking for content and thought leadership, the name of the book, it’s available on Amazon has stopped blending in. So, you know, it tackles a particular facet of marketing, which is how do we as individuals, and companies create a brand identity for ourself and become known as the thought leaders for that that particular thing? So that might be another useful tool for people who are looking to establish that?
Debra Chantry-Taylor 21:42
I love it, I’ll have a look at that. I think you’re absolutely right there, first of all, get really, really clear on what success really looks like. And as you know, within the video, we talk about the the core values and the core focus, but then also, who is your absolute ideal target market as well, I think one of the biggest things I always struggle with when I first started working with companies with EOS is that they, they kind of want to be everything to everybody. And that makes it really hard. Because when you’re trying to be everything to everybody, you’re nothing to nobody. So getting really clear on what the ideal target client is, and people go, but we can serve so many people. But I think if you can get clear on the ideal, you’re not saying that you’re going to say no to other people, but it means you can really focus your effort and that that obviously improves the the marketing in terms of being really clear around what problem you’re solving for that particular audience to know.
Angela Pointon 22:31
Absolutely. So true.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 22:34
Okay, so first, let’s stop blending in Tell me a little bit bit about where that idea to write the book came from? And what it what it covers in the book.
Angela Pointon 22:41
Yeah, so stop blending in was a passion project in 2019. It launched November of 2019. Right before, of course, COVID. The idea originally was to really speak on that topic, that kind of got thrown into the chaos of the world becoming different. Yeah, but it’s still a love and a passion of mine. So the the book and the reason why I wrote the book is because for anybody else who’s listening who’s written a book, you can probably relate to this. The idea behind, we are in control, we own the control of what people know us for and what people know our companies for, when we really think about it. And we have the ability to design that to be whatever we want it to be. So if you Debra, or anybody listening wanted to be the thought leader for XY and Z, you’re in the driver’s seat of that. And it’s just a matter of establishing yourself as that thought leadership position. And so the book goes through seven steps of how to get there, right? I don’t know it’d be known for oh, wait, last thought leader or a thought leader in marketing, right? Whatever it might be. For the people listening, whatever that area of expertise is that you want to stand out from the competition? It does walk you through, like how do you identify that? How do you recognize what pillars you have to bolster you as that authority leader? So what intelligence and education and you know, your team and your team’s intelligence, what do you have to lean on there? And then how do you get that out in the world? So what types of content are you creating? What sorts of marketing messages are you putting out there in order for people to start to identify you as that thing, the best at XYZ, whatever that is for you. That’s what the book is about. You know, I really feel incredibly passionate that it’s not up to other people to identify that for you. Which I think is what a lot of people believe. You know, our customers know our brand is being blocked. and putting the customers in the driver’s seat or the audience in the driver’s seat, it’s really up to you, as the company owner, or the individual working at the organization to define that for yourself. And so that was just kind of burning in me and needed to get out into the world. And so I hired a writing coach, and we got it done. And it was a super fun project. And I love the book, it’s got a lot of good teachings in it.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 25:27
Fantastic. So I think we’re gonna use that as we always ask for three top tips. That’s tip number one, I would say start get hold of that book. So stop blending in seven steps in there about how you can become sort of a thought leader in your in your marketplace. And that’s available from Amazon. What were the other two top things you would recommend to people that they could do after listening to this podcast,
Angela Pointon 25:46
I would say, you know, we know who our competitors are oftentimes, oftentimes, so we don’t do a good job as evaluating them from a prospects standpoint. And so if if anybody’s kind of sitting here and thinking about marketing for themselves or for their company, and they’re thinking about, I don’t really know where to start, there’s no reason why you can’t Secret Shop, your competitors, nobody in the world is going to arrest you for secret shopping your competitors. And why don’t feel like strange thing to do, right? I’m pretending to be one of their prospects. But we can learn a lot by visiting their website, filling out their forms, giving them a call acting like a prospect, we’ve learned very quickly what that experience is, and how to make ours better, and resonate for prospects who might be vetting them and us. So that’s another just quick tip, anybody can do it any day of the week, no one’s going to come and put handcuffs on you for doing it. It’s a great exploratory. And you could save yourself 1000s of dollars of hiring market research firms who are just going to do that same thing for you. No reason to do it, not do it yourself. And I think the last tip, and I’ll keep this marketing focus is really, you know, looking at that brand for your website, looking at what that marketing and thought leadership platform is, and trying to evaluate yourself on how well you are doing at getting across that you are the expert in that thing that you say you’re the expert in, is that hitting people over the head through the content on your website, email campaigns, social media, you know, how you show up at events and trade shows and networking? If it’s not, you know, there’s different ways to go about fixing that. But really understanding from the gecko where you’re strong, and where you need to do some improvement is a good way to start a new year.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 27:48
Fantastic. Hey, that’s been really, really helpful. I’m sure we could talk forever, but we’ve all got lives to get on with. So just very quickly, tell us a little bit about you know, who is your absolute ideal client? I know we’ve talked a little bit about, you know, obviously Eos, but they don’t have to be EOS users. It’s what is the ideal client look like for you? Yeah.
Angela Pointon 28:04
So we love people running on EOS. But you’re correct. Debra can be similar operating system or that they’re just learners, right? They’re members of Vistage or other groups where they’re trying to improve their company and their growth. I would say for us, it’s a b2b company, who is small to medium size, right in that kind of 2 million to $100 million revenue range US dollar musing here. We tend to work with people in the States, but we do have some international clients as well, as I mentioned earlier, and definitely that b2b focus that is going to be where we shine.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 28:40
Yeah, absolutely. Okay. How do they get in contact with you, Angela? Yeah. So this way,
Angela Pointon 28:45
I’m very active on LinkedIn. So if you want to learn different marketing tips, or read our blogs connect with me on LinkedIn, it’s just Angela pointing. My web address is www dot 11 out of eleven.com, using the digits, so one, one out of one one.com.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 29:05
Nice. So that is fantastic. I look. Thank you so much. It’s been really, really lovely to finally get to meet you. And I’m sure we’ll keep in contact. I’m definitely going to get hold of that book, stop lending in and get that from Amazon. And then also I have just requested to follow you on LinkedIn. So looking forward to contact. Thank you very much for your time.
Angela Pointon 29:22
Thank you, Debra.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 29:24
Thanks for listening to the podcast show better business better life. My name is Debra Chantry-Taylor. I’m an EOS implementer family business adviser, business and leadership coach podcaster and speaker. However, I’m also a business owner with several current business interests. I’m fortunate to have lived the high life with all the lifestyle, the toys, you name it, and then I’ve lost it all. Not only once but twice in two spectacular train wrecks. I know what it’s like to experience the highs and lows. I came across EOS when they launched into New Zealand using my entrepreneurs playground and Event Center in Parnell Auckland. I love The simplicity of the tools and their philosophies fitted my personal brand statement perfectly. The brilliance is in the simplicity. I’ve always been passionate about seeing entrepreneurs live the life they love. And now I help them live that EOS life, doing what they love with people they love making a huge difference in the world being compensated appropriately and with time to pursue other passions. If you want more information or want to get in contact about using aos and your business, you can visit my website at Deb Debra dot coach that’s dub dub dub Debra D B ra dot coach. Thanks for listening.
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Debra Chantry-Taylor
Certified EOS Implementer | Entrepreneurial Leadership & Business Coach | Business Owner
#betterbusinessbetterlife #entrepreneur #leadership #eosimplementer #professionaleosimplementer #entrepreneurialbusinesscoach
Certified EOS Implementer New Zealand
Certified EOS Implementer Australia
Certified EOS Implementer UK
Certified EOS Implementer NZ
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
marketing, hubspot, companies, people, eos, content, database, clients, customer, working, prospect, 1000s, organization, angela, thought, focus, building, goals, b2b, business
Debra Chantry-Taylor 00:02
Good morning and welcome to another edition of better business better life. i Today I am joined by Angela Poynton, who is the president and CEO of 11 out of 11. Agency. And that’s an agency who specializes in marketing for companies running on EOS. And Angela shared with me that she’s actually a wee bit of an iOS fangirl as well. So looking forward talking about that. But first of all, welcome to the show, Angela.
Angela Pointon 00:24
Thank you so much, Debra. Glad to be here.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 00:27
It’s lovely to have you. Now I always like my guests just to introduce themselves and tell them about your history, like how did you get to where you are now? So from when we’ve just been chatting, you’ve been going for about seven years, with a marketing agency with about 20 staff in total? How did you even get to that point?
Angela Pointon 00:43
Yeah, good question. So a little background on me, I went to school for photography, so not marketing, I decided through that experience, in my degree to never make a living doing photography, it was just not something I could see myself doing. I thought that would suck the joy out of it for me. But what I did do during my degree was find out that I really love the intersection of creativity and marketing and business, through some internships and working for companies and photographers that were soliciting advertising agencies. And so I decided marketing was where it was at and went back to school right away for my MBA in marketing, and then started with a job right out of that school, working in a marketing department for a fast growth startup company. From there jumped to a marketing agency, I spent the bulk of my career working for another marketing agency before, like you said, deciding about roughly seven years ago to go out on my own and start my own. And so that’s what I did here at 11 out of 11. And you’re right, we primarily serve small to medium sized businesses in the states here. We do have some international clients in Canada as well, but primarily in the States. And we love serving companies running on EOS. Why do we love serving companies running on EOS probably for obvious reasons for yourself and your listeners. But those organizations have have shown or demonstrated by, you know, their adoption of that methodology that they want to organize themselves, get, you know, accountability in line, right people right seats, and really get organized around goals and rocks, which, as you can imagine, for a marketing agency is really important. When you’re aligning with a strategic partner, like an marketing agency, you want to make sure that you’re clear on what your goals are. They shouldn’t be changing week by week, they should be very clear from the get go for both parties so that they know what the beacon is that we’re working toward. And so that clarity is something that I appreciate, and I think is relatively rare in business, surprisingly, but pretty common within us run companies. And so that’s really been our niche for, I would say five out of the seven years really focusing on working with visionaries and integrators that are running on us.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 03:17
I completely understand I mean, I’ve got a marketing background as well, actually. So I used to run worth in work in an agency and I run an agency for a while as well. And you’re right, it’s really difficult to with clients when they’re not clear about what success looks like. Because then you really feel like you’re shooting in the dark, you don’t know what you’re trying to actually achieve. And how do you celebrate success as well, if you don’t know what success looks like? And I guess you’re right, EOS certainly gives that focus. And it keeps people focused for a period of time rather than flip flopping as well, doesn’t it? So you’ve got that 90 Day sprint, you know, that’s what’s gonna be happening in the 90 days. And real good really gives that clarity.
Angela Pointon 03:54
For sure. Yeah, and I’m, I know, some individuals listening may be chuckling because that all sounds rosy. But realistically, we know that goals change organizations change. And sometimes there are differing and opinions of what the goals are within organizations, right. And so I don’t mean to say that companies are in the IANA us are perfect. And companies working with us are perfect. And we’re perfect when working with the companies. Of course, there is always room for growth and improvement. But we do love that alignment from the gecko, that clarity is really, really important. And sometimes companies come to us because they’re not sure what the goals should be. They don’t know what’s achievable, right? So we want to grow revenue by x. But as it boils down into marketing goals, you know, how does that translate what’s achievable? Within a quarter, a half a year, a whole year? And we help coach and advise on that topic as well. Perfect.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 04:55
Okay, so I’m going to ask a very basic question, and it’s only because it’s little bit of a passion of mine. And how would you describe marketing? What do you say marketing?
Angela Pointon 05:05
Well, I can’t there’s global marketing. And then there’s what 11 out of 11? Does. So I will answer that in both. So marketing, and you know, branding, if you will, is more than just what people think of website logo messaging, right, it’s today becomes so much broader and involved than those basic elements. Those are considered table stakes in the marketing arena. And we’ve become more sophisticated within a specialty, I’m going to speak from my level of expertise, which is in b2b organizations, so businesses focused on selling to other businesses. There’s so much to go in with nurture emails, you know, how do you automate some of your marketing? What’s the user experience of somebody working with your company before they get involved? And then while there are clients, how do you market them to them continuously to keep them sticky or grow the account. So there’s quite a bit that we’ve all added to marketing, and it’s capacity these days of 11 out of 11, we really thrive in that b2b world. And we really help companies focus on the content creation and automation of content generation. Meaning, you know, somebody comes to your website and fills out a form, they’re not ready to buy yet, but they’ve shown some level of interest, how do we nurture those individuals through content, to get them closer to the company building trust and, and keeping top of mind so that when their pain becomes acute, they’re ready to reach out to that company and not really think about any other competitors? And so what are the marketing components that we need to build to help companies get there? That’s really what we focus on is that level of thought leadership and expertise through content. And also automation factors. As I mentioned, we work a lot within HubSpot on behalf of organizations that particular tool in helping them develop, you know, automation campaigns, things to help build and left the sales team.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 07:21
Thank you. That’s really cool. The reason I actually asked is I think a lot of people tend to think of marketing as being advertising as being the logo as being and it’s so much more than that. It’s actually about the way that we actually nurture a customer throughout the entire customer experience. That’s my viewpoint. And I don’t even believe it’s a it’s a separate function per se, it actually should be absolutely integrated into everything that we do, putting that customer at the forefront and working through what that customer wants and needs. Obviously, online has changed so much about the way that we can do things. One of my real bugbears is a lot of this sort of automation, which is obviously not even tailored automation. It’s just that whole blast stuff out there with no consideration for the person at hand. HubSpot has got some amazing features that allow you to get very, very deep, deeply customized. So it’s not just a shotgun approach. ketose. A bit more about that.
Angela Pointon 08:13
Yeah, I’ll give two examples just to help people think their teeth. And so HubSpot offers something called Smart Content. And that’s going to be primarily web based. So if we think about what a user experience should be for a client coming onto a website versus somebody who’s never worked with the business before, it’s different, right? Different messaging, different experience, a existing customer one bite one information about add ons, upsells additional services, if you will, a new prospect is just trying to get to know the company and what it stands for and does right. What can I buy from this organization? Who are they? So two different types of visitors. If the contact is in HubSpot, and so therefore HubSpot knows because of a cookie, that, hey, this is Debra, she’s a customer, here’s what should appear on this page for Debra. And customers like her versus Angela, she’s a prospect content for Angeles should be very introductory trust building credibility building, etc. It can display different content content, excuse me in real time on a page depending on who the person is. If somebody does not have a cookie, which listeners may be wondering, Okay, what if it’s somebody brand new that is not in the database, it will just present standard content, right, presumably prospect content because you likely have all of your customers in your database. That’s one example. Another example would be an email experience. So let’s say I’m the prospect. You’re the customer of this company and we’re both have download get something from their website. And so, you know, the company’s nurturing us through HubSpot, you click on one link in that email, I do not. So it might be an important link, like booking a call or some next step with the organization, right? You’re going to buy more I’m buying for the first time. And so the email behavior, once you click that link, or don’t can be customized, you can get an email preparing you for the call. Because you’ve clicked the link, you showed intent of having the call and then have that email convince you to book it, my content might be, Hey, we love to talk with people, here’s how we’re going to help you. And it’s trying more to convince me to book the call in the first place. So it can be tailored in that way. And there’s tons of different trees and if then statements we could explore. But hopefully people get the idea of how that can be customized truly, to really make it not feel like this is a robot sending me a one size fits all message.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 11:04
Yeah. And it also has the ability to kind of alert your sales teams to doesn’t it when the person really has a huge interest. So you can then hand it over to a human being and a human being can actually take that to the next step. Yes,
Angela Pointon 11:16
What you’re talking about HubSpot calls, lead scoring. And so you know, every person, if you set it up, or have an agency set it up for you. Every person has a point value that they’re building based on their activity. So somebody who doesn’t care about the company isn’t visiting the website might have a point value of five or zero even. But somebody who’s really might be accumulating points and building their point value from there. And whenever the point value reaches a threshold, the sales team gets alerted of you know, you should reach out to this prospect.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 12:01
Sorry about that barking that was my dog. I’m actually working from home today except a little bit ill. So he decided it was a great time, though. But But yeah, okay, great. So it’s giving you the ability to, I mean, it really is about helping state of mind with the customer. But then when they get to a point where they’re really quite warm, you can then take some action outside of traditional kind of marketing if you like, you got it. Okay, cool. So the next question I have is around, you know, what size does your database have to be before you want to start thinking about some of these things? Because I know some people think, Oh, you got to have 1000s of people a database to actually make it worthwhile. But that’s not true, is it?
Angela Pointon 12:39
Is that true? A lot of companies if we think about b2b, you know, a customer for them might represent $100,000, year $50,000, a year, a million dollars a year, right? We’re not talking about somebody purchasing a $5 product where you need 1000s and 1000s of customers in order to make significant revenue. That’s more b2c. So in a b2b model, we’re already typically talking about smaller numbers to begin with. And if anybody listening feels like, Oh, my database is small, or haven’t really paid attention to it, it’s deficient, it takes a while to build some of this stuff. And therefore, if we’re focused on getting ready to launch some of this automation and custom content, while the organization is really focused on building it, and cleaning up that database, that can be a beautiful pairing, because it creates accountability for we want to get ready for this launch, right? And so if we think about a goal, let’s add one hot prospect to the database a day. Yeah, 365 by the end of the year that weren’t in there before. And maybe that’s too small, maybe it needs to be five hot prospects a day, whatever the case may be for the organization, that real focus puts a lot of intention on getting what we believe and I think many marketers believe is the most critical asset for any organization is its database, right? That’s its opportunity to sell right and build relationships within that database. And far too many organizations don’t take it as seriously as they should. The good ones really understand how precious that is. But when focus is paid there, it will pay off even if we are starting small, because you’re going to be paying attention to it and building it through this work together.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 14:39
And I think you’re absolutely right. I mean, for b2b, often customers are worth quite a large value. And so you don’t need huge numbers of customers but you do want to, I used to in traditional marketing, I’d say top of mind was just making sure that when they finally get around to making the decision, you’re on the list of choices that they actually are via we’ll choose from. And so often it’s easy to have a conversation with a potential client, and not do anything with them. And you know, I’ve had clients who’ve gone away for two or three years, and then come back and gone, hey, I’m ready to do iOS. Now, it’s like, I haven’t heard from you in two years, but they’ve obviously been consuming content, seeing what’s going on. And so at the time, when they’re actually reading, you’re there, you’re in their mind, you’re one of their considerations. And I think it’s all too easy to let people drop off and not not keep in contact with them. So even if you use a database for, you know, obviously, the content generation and keeping them engaged, but also to remind you to be in contact with that person on a regular basis to, I used to use it when I was I used to sell drugs as in pharmaceutical drugs. And I used to use my my CRM back in those days to keep track of things like you know, what coffee the receptionist had. So when I turned up to the surgery, I’d bring the right coffee, I’d use it to note what their kids names were, what their dog’s names were, what interests they had. And to remind myself just to keep in contact on a regular basis, there’s so much more than just online content that CRM is useful. Is that right?
Angela Pointon 16:05
Now thoroughly, right? Yeah, I mean, the sky’s the limit. As far as what kind of custom properties you want to build. We’ve seen some crazy ones, but really share some crazy ones. I mean, I can say show that we used to collect when we brought on a new client. Speaking of dogs, we would we’re in pet lovers here. So we would ask people to put in their pets names, and any, you know, was a dog cat, what was it? And that really came from a client themselves, because we used to have on the forum to ask about children and one client put no kids, but really, these are my kids and put their animals in there. And so it becomes just a fun topic, a conversation. It’s a way that, you know, after you sell something, the implementation team can carry something personal into their kickoff conversation and say, Hey, how’s Sparky doing? And tell us about them? Or whatever the case may be? So yeah, but we’ve seen other ones that clients have used right around birthdays, anniversaries, you know, smart things related to the business, like client has told us that XYZ is a q1 2025 goal, just as far as reminders to the sales team to reach out, right. So there’s all sorts of great uses for that kind of Intel being stored. Sure. And
Debra Chantry-Taylor 17:28
So then, what about AI? Does AI play a part in? What’s happening these days, you know, in terms of in terms of CRM, in terms the way that you communicate? How has it been used in the marketing world?
Angela Pointon 17:41
Yeah, so HubSpot has used AI for a long time, in very simple ways. Of course, just like any other tech organization, there are looking at use cases of worries to lean into it to take things and make them even more advanced. As far as the marketing agency ourselves, we look at AI as a wonderful creative partner. And that’s really today, what it’s good at, it’s not quite good enough yet to, you know, draft somebody’s marketing plan for them, or create a content calendar for them or create a really robust piece of content for them. But if we want a brainstorming partner when we’re staring at a blank cursor, or we want to just get some ideas down on paper as a way to start something, it’s awesome for that. It’s an awesome creative buddy to be used in that way. But it’s still it desperately still needs human editorial and refinement before anything goes out into the world.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 18:47
Yeah, I completely agree. I mean, I’m, I’m all for using it. But often, it’s just a great, it’s a great thought starter. It’s a great way to start with something. And I must admit that, you know, I put something into chat GBT as an example of what comes out. I kind of go, Oh, my goodness, I would never say it like that. But it gives me something to start with. And I can I can actually reword it, and it makes you Yeah, it makes you think at least get thinking about what you can do. Absolutely. Okay, um, I want people who are listening to this. And so for you, we don’t really do much with our database. At the moment, we’re not really doing much in terms of nurturing clients, we don’t have much in the way of what we have now described as being marketing, how would you say they can get started? What’s the first kind of step they should take?
Angela Pointon 19:26
So a couple of ways to think about getting started with any kind of even if you have a bunch of marketing, but you’ve neglected one area or you really want to focus on an area and this year, whatever the case may be, I always think it’s good to create even just a draft plan can be a one pager but getting some thoughts on paper. EOS offers offer some tools for write strategic planning, so maybe some of those tools would be appropriate. But thinking through what possible next steps are what are going to Be the roadblock or is what is going to help us be successful. People who are quickstarts don’t want to do that work, and I get it. Even I am not a quickstart person, I don’t score high there. But even I don’t want to really work on that plan. But when I do, I’m always grateful. And so putting those thoughts on paper, one is going to create clarity for you on what the goals and road blockers are going to be, too for any people you are working with, whether it’s an agency, internal team members, new people you hire, it’s going to create that clarity for vision for them as well. And then really looking at right people right seats, right, who is going to help execute this, it’s not the how, but the who, who is going to be the right person, to really bring this to fruition for you is a critical point that we all know as EOS believers, right? We know that if an idea doesn’t have the right, people with the right capacity assigned to it, it’s going to struggle. And so thinking through that, initially, I have written a book, you know about this topic for people who are specifically looking for content and thought leadership, the name of the book, it’s available on Amazon has stopped blending in. So, you know, it tackles a particular facet of marketing, which is how do we as individuals, and companies create a brand identity for ourself and become known as the thought leaders for that that particular thing? So that might be another useful tool for people who are looking to establish that?
Debra Chantry-Taylor 21:42
I love it, I’ll have a look at that. I think you’re absolutely right there, first of all, get really, really clear on what success really looks like. And as you know, within the video, we talk about the the core values and the core focus, but then also, who is your absolute ideal target market as well, I think one of the biggest things I always struggle with when I first started working with companies with EOS is that they, they kind of want to be everything to everybody. And that makes it really hard. Because when you’re trying to be everything to everybody, you’re nothing to nobody. So getting really clear on what the ideal target client is, and people go, but we can serve so many people. But I think if you can get clear on the ideal, you’re not saying that you’re going to say no to other people, but it means you can really focus your effort and that that obviously improves the the marketing in terms of being really clear around what problem you’re solving for that particular audience to know.
Angela Pointon 22:31
Absolutely. So true.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 22:34
Okay, so first, let’s stop blending in Tell me a little bit bit about where that idea to write the book came from? And what it what it covers in the book.
Angela Pointon 22:41
Yeah, so stop blending in was a passion project in 2019. It launched November of 2019. Right before, of course, COVID. The idea originally was to really speak on that topic, that kind of got thrown into the chaos of the world becoming different. Yeah, but it’s still a love and a passion of mine. So the the book and the reason why I wrote the book is because for anybody else who’s listening who’s written a book, you can probably relate to this. The idea behind, we are in control, we own the control of what people know us for and what people know our companies for, when we really think about it. And we have the ability to design that to be whatever we want it to be. So if you Debra, or anybody listening wanted to be the thought leader for XY and Z, you’re in the driver’s seat of that. And it’s just a matter of establishing yourself as that thought leadership position. And so the book goes through seven steps of how to get there, right? I don’t know it’d be known for oh, wait, last thought leader or a thought leader in marketing, right? Whatever it might be. For the people listening, whatever that area of expertise is that you want to stand out from the competition? It does walk you through, like how do you identify that? How do you recognize what pillars you have to bolster you as that authority leader? So what intelligence and education and you know, your team and your team’s intelligence, what do you have to lean on there? And then how do you get that out in the world? So what types of content are you creating? What sorts of marketing messages are you putting out there in order for people to start to identify you as that thing, the best at XYZ, whatever that is for you. That’s what the book is about. You know, I really feel incredibly passionate that it’s not up to other people to identify that for you. Which I think is what a lot of people believe. You know, our customers know our brand is being blocked. and putting the customers in the driver’s seat or the audience in the driver’s seat, it’s really up to you, as the company owner, or the individual working at the organization to define that for yourself. And so that was just kind of burning in me and needed to get out into the world. And so I hired a writing coach, and we got it done. And it was a super fun project. And I love the book, it’s got a lot of good teachings in it.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 25:27
Fantastic. So I think we’re gonna use that as we always ask for three top tips. That’s tip number one, I would say start get hold of that book. So stop blending in seven steps in there about how you can become sort of a thought leader in your in your marketplace. And that’s available from Amazon. What were the other two top things you would recommend to people that they could do after listening to this podcast,
Angela Pointon 25:46
I would say, you know, we know who our competitors are oftentimes, oftentimes, so we don’t do a good job as evaluating them from a prospects standpoint. And so if if anybody’s kind of sitting here and thinking about marketing for themselves or for their company, and they’re thinking about, I don’t really know where to start, there’s no reason why you can’t Secret Shop, your competitors, nobody in the world is going to arrest you for secret shopping your competitors. And why don’t feel like strange thing to do, right? I’m pretending to be one of their prospects. But we can learn a lot by visiting their website, filling out their forms, giving them a call acting like a prospect, we’ve learned very quickly what that experience is, and how to make ours better, and resonate for prospects who might be vetting them and us. So that’s another just quick tip, anybody can do it any day of the week, no one’s going to come and put handcuffs on you for doing it. It’s a great exploratory. And you could save yourself 1000s of dollars of hiring market research firms who are just going to do that same thing for you. No reason to do it, not do it yourself. And I think the last tip, and I’ll keep this marketing focus is really, you know, looking at that brand for your website, looking at what that marketing and thought leadership platform is, and trying to evaluate yourself on how well you are doing at getting across that you are the expert in that thing that you say you’re the expert in, is that hitting people over the head through the content on your website, email campaigns, social media, you know, how you show up at events and trade shows and networking? If it’s not, you know, there’s different ways to go about fixing that. But really understanding from the gecko where you’re strong, and where you need to do some improvement is a good way to start a new year.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 27:48
Fantastic. Hey, that’s been really, really helpful. I’m sure we could talk forever, but we’ve all got lives to get on with. So just very quickly, tell us a little bit about you know, who is your absolute ideal client? I know we’ve talked a little bit about, you know, obviously Eos, but they don’t have to be EOS users. It’s what is the ideal client look like for you? Yeah.
Angela Pointon 28:04
So we love people running on EOS. But you’re correct. Debra can be similar operating system or that they’re just learners, right? They’re members of Vistage or other groups where they’re trying to improve their company and their growth. I would say for us, it’s a b2b company, who is small to medium size, right in that kind of 2 million to $100 million revenue range US dollar musing here. We tend to work with people in the States, but we do have some international clients as well, as I mentioned earlier, and definitely that b2b focus that is going to be where we shine.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 28:40
Yeah, absolutely. Okay. How do they get in contact with you, Angela? Yeah. So this way,
Angela Pointon 28:45
I’m very active on LinkedIn. So if you want to learn different marketing tips, or read our blogs connect with me on LinkedIn, it’s just Angela pointing. My web address is www dot 11 out of eleven.com, using the digits, so one, one out of one one.com.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 29:05
Nice. So that is fantastic. I look. Thank you so much. It’s been really, really lovely to finally get to meet you. And I’m sure we’ll keep in contact. I’m definitely going to get hold of that book, stop lending in and get that from Amazon. And then also I have just requested to follow you on LinkedIn. So looking forward to contact. Thank you very much for your time.
Angela Pointon 29:22
Thank you, Debra.
Debra Chantry-Taylor 29:24
Thanks for listening to the podcast show better business better life. My name is Debra Chantry-Taylor. I’m an EOS implementer family business adviser, business and leadership coach podcaster and speaker. However, I’m also a business owner with several current business interests. I’m fortunate to have lived the high life with all the lifestyle, the toys, you name it, and then I’ve lost it all. Not only once but twice in two spectacular train wrecks. I know what it’s like to experience the highs and lows. I came across EOS when they launched into New Zealand using my entrepreneurs playground and Event Center in Parnell Auckland. I love The simplicity of the tools and their philosophies fitted my personal brand statement perfectly. The brilliance is in the simplicity. I’ve always been passionate about seeing entrepreneurs live the life they love. And now I help them live that EOS life, doing what they love with people they love making a huge difference in the world being compensated appropriately and with time to pursue other passions. If you want more information or want to get in contact about using aos and your business, you can visit my website at Deb Debra dot coach that’s dub dub dub Debra D B ra dot coach. Thanks for listening.
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Debra Chantry-Taylor
Certified EOS Implementer | Entrepreneurial Leadership & Business Coach | Business Owner
#betterbusinessbetterlife #entrepreneur #leadership #eosimplementer #professionaleosimplementer #entrepreneurialbusinesscoach
Certified EOS Implementer New Zealand
Certified EOS Implementer Australia
Certified EOS Implementer UK
Certified EOS Implementer NZ
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