Please tell us about your current role and the team you handle. How did you arrive at the company?

I’m the CEO and co-founder of Influ2. When I started my first IT outsourcing business, which is now called GlobalLogic, I tried to apply everything that I had learned from being a consumer marketer, but I soon realized that B2B marketing is fundamentally different. A lot of what works for B2C doesn’t work for B2B, and this was what inspired me to found Influ2. It answered the question that I had been contemplating for almost a decade, ‘how can I make advertising work well for B2B companies?’

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What have been the greatest challenges for you in the pandemic times with respect to your work? How did technology come to your rescue?

Like many, not being able to meet and collaborate in person was very challenging. New ideas or connections are often born out of organic, in-person conversations or attending trade shows, and neither were possible last year. However, I encouraged my employees to turn on their videos when using Zoom, and to connect with one another outside of meetings via Slack.

Also, I made an effort to lead by example and reach out to employees when I had the availability. Though, I do think we are moving into a post-pandemic world, and that people are craving personal connection, and this will fuel continued innovation within the technology space.

Marketing analytics and Customer intelligence platforms have grown astronomically in the last 5 years. Where do you see Influ2 racing ahead of others in this explosive galaxy of Martech solutions?

We offer something that no one else does and are currently creating a new category – person-based marketing. And, implementing this approach allows marketers to create multi-touch, individualized programs that speak to the actual target across all channels besides just ‘spray and pray’ advertising.

Marketing Insights

What is the most contemporary definition of Person-based Marketing? How is it different from ABM and Intent-based Marketing?

Person-based marketing is an evolution of ABM concept to make it even more precise, and aligned with sales. With a person-based marketing platform, markers can target actual, verified people and create campaigns that connect directly to them at a time when they would be open to hearing the message – and not just target a broad-based account or cookie. This approach drives more relevant and meaningful digital engagement. And as a result, PBM improves conversion rates by actually connecting with decision-makers.

Why CMOs need a person-based advertising in 2021? How does it work for B2B companies? 

What’s happening in B2B marketing is that people confuse accounts and buying teams, and they feel like it’s the same thing. But, the foundational idea behind our product is that, as a marketer,  you want to go after specific accounts based on a Sirius Decisions’ buying group manifesto  idea that helps you find the easiest way to enable your salespeople. So, a person-based advertising approach allows marketers to put forth engaging content that they already know a target customer will be interested in at a time when they’re open to receiving the ad. This method finds the most relevant targets and opens a communication channel to truly connect with the person marketers are aiming for. And, this drives engagement, sales and action from the target customer.

Tell us more about your recent collaboration with NVIDIA. How does Person-based Marketing generate more sales-ready prospects for customers that are as big as NVIDIA?

Nvidia reached out to us to help overhaul its siloed databases and processes and build an interconnected system that improved account targeting and revenue generation. So, our solution helped Nvidia’s sales and marketing teams create a decision-making model that narrows down which accounts they should target based on insights from both teams’ databases. Additionally, we helped Nvidia determine engagement opportunities to boost ROI.

This resulted in an increase in account engagement, campaign ROI and revenue generation, and in one of their recent campaigns they experienced the following: 

• An 89% account match rate
• 28,845 target accounts reached
• 273 total engaged accounts
• Engagement with accounts with $64.66B in revenue

How does AI and Machine Learning capability further improve your platform? 

Our platform is powered by machine learning and is designed to help marketers and advertisers better communicate with their potential leads. The platform can capture behavior, understand intent and measure engagement at the individual person level for each marketing and advertising campaign.

Additionally, we have processed and analyzed years worth of user data which helped to build a model that translates buying intent signals from advertising into a behavioral score. We call this behavioral scoring in advertising, and it helps to reveal missed sales opportunities. Behavioral scoring uncovers 5x-10x more opportunities as compared to a regular lead-form based approach.

Tell us how Person-based marketing makes it easy to unify Marketing, advertising and sales? Does AI capability of your platform make it easy for marketing to pass MQLs that convert into sales?

In an old-school marketing approach the funnel is split horizontally – marketing sits at the top and sales is responsible for the middle. However, the challenge with that is that sales development is empowered by sales enablement software, which is taking over the top of the funnel from marketing’s demand generation activities. And,  sales reps are now often the first contact in a conversation. Additionally, this often stops marketing from continuing to talk to a prospect after an MQL is handed over to a sales team. But, sales teams are craving for more marketing support with their prospects, especially in a WFH environment.

With person-based marketing, marketing supports sales at each stage of the funnel, and allows companies to adopt a new, account orchestration approach to drive automated qualified leads to sales to ultimately increase revenue. And, as mentioned earlier, this is possible because of our platform’s unique ability to capture behavior, intent and engagement at the target level for every campaign.

This means that marketing and sales can talk to the same people at every step of the funnel, in alignment with one another. Also, sales can create campaigns for every context and persona, and marketing can continue to pass on engagement signals with data-driven behavioral scores captured at the target level.

Forecasts and Advice

Your prediction on the future of Customer intelligence and how it will shape marketing campaigns in the omnichannel ecosystem?

Customer intelligence is essential to marketing now. Without a full and holistic view and understanding of prospects and customers, marketers are unable to meet the increasing expectations of their buyers for relevant and timely engagement. While a few early adopters are building these datasets and platforms on their own, by combining first-party data with third-party datasets and functionality, I predict that these Customer Intelligence or Data Platforms (CDPs) functionality will be increasingly integrated into marketing automation and ABM platforms. This will make this more accessible to the broader marketing community and the additional layer of data and insight will allow marketers to deliver a truly customized experience.

Your advice to young Marketing professionals who are planning to work for a data-driven company:

My biggest advice is to be curious and to continuously learn. Marketing is changing very quickly, and new tools and approaches frequently emerge. It’s impossible to master marketing because at the moment you master it, the next moment your knowledge is already outdated. Our industry, business and the world itself is quickly evolving, so it is essential for young marketing professionals to stay on top of industry trends and be willing to embrace new approaches and technologies.

Also, I’ve noticed that many young marketers often use stiff, professional language in their communication that isn’t engaging, so be personable – and always remember you’re communicating with a person and not a target. That will help you stand out from your peers and allow your campaigns to be more successful.

Your favorite marketing podcast that you recommend to every CMO: [Could be a YouTube channel too]

I am a big fan of Forrester’s content. Their analysts are strong and cover the ABM space from both the inside, and from their recent Sirius Decision acquisition. Kerry Cunnigham and John Arnold are the best analysts to follow for anyone interested in ABM.

Tag a person from the industry whose answers you would like to read here:

Jon Miller, I admire his point of view on ABM evolution. Would love to hear more from him.

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