Anthony Kennada is a B2C marketer trapped in a B2B body. He is CMO of Gainsight and has been with the company since inception.On this episode of the Social Business Engine podcast, you’ll discover how Anthony applies a B2C mindset to B2B brand marketing with exceptional results to show for it.
Gainsight is a customer success company – they support the new profession of Customer Success Manager which helps to reduce churn, expand revenue, and assist with keeping renewals. Gainsight is also a platform that operationalizes the customer success world to protect revenue.
Benefits of B2B Brand Marketing
Anthony’s background lends well to a non-traditional marketing approach. With no incumbent in the space, they were ultimately creating a new category. Early stage content marketing helped to build the structure for new jobs in customer success and helped to fuel Gainsight’s pipeline too.
As they developed their community and disseminated content, a movement started to form around customer success. Live events also played a significant role in getting their name out and building their brand as a likable company – they estimate a whopping 5,000 guests attended their annual event this year.
Anthony says it’s their fundamental belief that it’s a new world and customers have the option to join your community or your competitors’ community. Building a likable brand involves authenticity to humanize it. Their YouTube channel includes Carpool Karaoke videos, one of which features Gainsight’s CEO singing a song from ABBA.
Brand marketing is often perceived as disconnected from growth, but Anthony disagrees. He says to create content that can be drivers of business growth.
Three Truths About Brand Marketing
In an article Anthony published on LinkedIn, he describes three truths about brand marketing.
He starts with the idea that brand marketing is core to this current era of business to human (B2H). We see more B2C brands acting in a B2B fashion, and B2B companies are connecting with more people. But more B2Bs need to adopt the B2C mindset.
Anthony says the unifying factor is that the world is digital and lines are blurred between work and personal. The two are converging to make B2H at the center of all that is the brand.
Anthony’s second truth is that brand marketing closes deals.
He says attribution from content marketing can drive obvious contribution. Gainsight uses unusual tactics to close deals – in one instance, they filmed a music video to reiterate their excitement to work with the customer. They’ve also shot personalized videos to portray their commitment to prospects.
Humanizing the brand with these personalized touches creates sales pipeline for Gainsight too. Their Sales Development Representative (SDR) team generates 80% of the pipeline. Anthony says all content assets feed into the pipeline creation.
The third truth is category leadership drives brand marketing. If a company creates a new category and then dominates that category, they’ll get a majority of the market share. The company is viewed as a trusted advisor, and people want to work with the market leader.
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