On Marketing Technology

MTS: Tell us a little bit about your role and how you got here.

I began as CEO for Altify in February of this year. Before joining, I evaluated Altify for five months and examined all aspects of the operation. Over that period, I became was deeply impressed by the passion of the Altify people. I also fell in love with the company’s vision to create the best cloud based sales performance management solutions for our customers. With a team this dedicated and a product this strong, I felt sure this was the right place for me.

I’ve spent the past 18 years working professionally in enterprise software. I started as a product manager with Crystal Reports in Vancouver, Canada and then moved from Canada to San Jose, California to work for the CEO of Business Objects 11 years ago. The majority of my career has been focused on analytics, mobile and cloud applications, having spent six years at SAP after they acquired Business Objects in 2007. Since then, I’ve travelled all over globe in a number of different roles: general manager, operational and sales focused roles while at SAP. My last job was EVP Operations and Chief Customer Officer at Anaplan, where I helped the company grow  from 250 to over 600 people and up to $100M+ in revenues.

MTS: Given the massive proliferation of marketing technology, how do you see the martech market evolving over the next few years?

Altify recently published the Business Performance Benchmark Study 2017, which found that when sales and marketing are aligned, win rates increase by 26% and sales cycles decrease by 18%. The focus of the market in the coming years should be to continue to develop technology that furthers the alignment between these two critical parts of the revenue engine. This is a major area of concern for us at Altify.

Core to the Altify sales methodology and software platform is enabling salespeople to have meaningful business conversations with their customers, such that they are delivering real value to the customer, educating them on different perspectives as to how their business problems can be solved. Marketing plays a key role in enabling sales people to have the right messages for the right business problem at the right time, and we will continue to develop sophisticated technologies that allow marketing to land those messages into the field at the most impactful time.

MTS: What do you see as the single most important technology trend or development that’s going to impact us?

Augmented Intelligence is the single most important trend that will drive sales and marketing performance in the next decade. Here’s how it applies in sales: every sales organization has star performers, and every sales manager is constantly seeking ways to get every seller to perform at this same level. Augmented Intelligence can shift the bell curve by dynamically serving best practice knowledge and guidance in the context of each individual deal as they arise, so that every salesperson has the best chance of success working the right opportunities in their portfolio. With Augmented Intelligence, software and salespeople can evolve and grow in tandem.

MTS: What startups are you watching/keen on right now?

I spent a lot of time looking at other players in the sales performance management space when I was looking at Altify. I became a Board Advisor to OpsPanda, which I think is doing some interesting things around sales planning. Given my background in analytics and performance management, I’m always looking at new applications for combining company data with social and other external data sources.
Visier is a company that is focused on Workforce Analytics and has some of the brightest product minds in the business—I’m very interested to see where they go.

MTS: What tools does your marketing stack consist of in 2017?

Our marketing stack consists of Salesforce CRM, HubSpot for marketing automation, and then we leverage our own platform to deliver sales enablement and content management capabilities.

MTS: Could you tell us about a standout digital campaign? (Who was your target audience and how did you measure success)

Account Planning is a sales best practice that allows companies to maximize revenue in key accounts. In December 2015, Altify launched a 6-month focused campaign to deliver Account Planning education through an Account Planning email course, delivered every day for 7 days, to educate sellers on the key benefits and the steps required to implement Account Planning.

The campaign targeted sales, front line sales management, sales operations and sales enablement. Success was measured by engagement and achieved an overall open rate of 49%  and engagement of 17%. Although we aren’t able to attribute all opportunities directly to the campaign, overall our Account Planning sales for that fiscal year were a larger percentage of revenue than previous years. We were pretty happy with this outcome.

MTS: How do you prepare for an AI-centric world as a marketing leader?

I see AI as opportunity rather than a threat. AI will deliver more consistent and accurate data which will fuel marketing’s ability to hone campaigns and better target relevant and impactful content and messages, so that we can identify qualified opportunities more effectively.  For long complex B2B sales, AI is a welcome addition to the technology stacks of both marketing and sales.

This Is How I Work

MTS: One word that best describes how you work.

Quickly. I walk fast, talk fast and try to make decisions quickly.
I like the quote: “It is not the big that eat the small, but the fast that eat the slow” by Jason Jennings.

MTS: What apps/software/tools can’t you live without?

Here are the mobile apps on the home screen on my iPhone:Facebook, Sonos, Uber, LinkedIn, Evernote, Skype, Sharks Hockey, DoorDash, OpenTable, Expedia, Ring…my wife would probably have Amazon on there as well!

MTS: What’s your smartest work related shortcut or productivity hack?

Evernote is pretty nifty at keeping notes organized. I’m big on taking notes; it helps me remember things. I have it connected from my iPhone to my iPad to my Mac so I never let things slip.

MTS: What are you currently reading? (What do you read, and how do you consume information?)

The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds by Michael Lewis. I just cracked it and looking forward to the read. It’s generally about how the mind makes decisions.

I’m a big sponge for information and am enjoying learning everything there is to know about the Altify business.

MTS: What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?

Be Fearless. One of my mentors early in my career told me that I could tackle anything I set my mind to and that my perseverance would always win. I’ve found that to be very true.

MTS: Something you do better than others – the secret of your success?

Work harder. I know it’s a cliché being a Canadian in Silicon Valley, but I just maintain a feverish pace.

MTS: Tag the one person whose answers to these questions you would love to read:

@jeffbezos Amazon is changing so many industries. He is just a really smart guy.

MTS: Thank you Anthony! That was fun and hope to see you back on MarTech Series soon.