A Dude Named Rand

To me, this calls to mind the story of Rand Fishkin from Seattle-based search marketing company Moz. Rand began as a 20-something CEO in the search space and has become one of the leading experts in that area even though he turned over day-to-day leadership of the company to a colleague in 2014. His Whiteboard Friday series is the type of educational, value-added brilliant self-promotion that keeps his personal brand top-of-mind and moving forward.

What makes Rand different from any other entry-level marketer, and how did he manage his rise to prominence? Although I don't know him personally, I've been a professional fan of his for years, so I'll give you the abridged “from the outside” version.

Rand originally began working for a digital-marketing-services business his mother owned. They worked together as peers for years, and then Rand stepped in as CEO. From the outside, this move seemed to generally correlate with Moz's efforts to double down on building a scalable product as opposed to running a consulting firm. From there, he created a product that automated the mystical-for-most-people process of great search marketing and built an incredibly strong bootstrap-funded SaaS business. He raised millions of dollars from one of the smartest VCs on the block (Brad Feld of the Foundry Group) and continued to build the business.

Things started to get hairy at that point, and Rand has been amazingly transparent about the challenges he faced. As an entrepreneur by DNA, his posts were incredibly helpful and inspiring as I was going through my own start-up craziness. If you want the full picture, you can read his blog at http://moz.com/rand; but suffice to say they hit a product bump, and delaying new versions was having a rough effect on revenue and morale.

The most interesting aspect of Rand's story is how he came to be such a recognized expert so early, how he brilliantly managed the transition both into and out of the CEO role, and how he's maintained his brand and teachings since then. His story can serve as a blueprint for any marketer.

So if it's hard to get into a great marketing gig, even tougher to keep one, and you normally have to change companies to get promoted, then how do we mitigate all this mess? One of the easiest ways is to dedicate yourself equally to both the art and the science of marketing. If you can predictably drive revenue and your track record for the last two to three years is rock solid, then you're going to get that next great job. It doesn't matter how many people show up with slick presentations and highly designed resumes. Hang your hat on data-driven marketing, and understand the critical role that behaviors play in accurately predicting your customers' purchase behaviors.

Your job is to separate your skills and business results from your peers, and that's true whether you're the specialist or the CMO. The interview committee just looks different. I've seen plenty of incredibly forward-looking VPs become CMOs, and too often they have to go hire an external agency to execute on their amazing vision because the internal staff is two years behind in execution skills. At the same time, I've seen specialists hired straight out of college who are the managers 10 months later and starting to build their personal brand at industry meetings and speaking events.

So what makes behavioral marketing such an effective strategy for propelling this kind of differentiation? The easiest answer is virtually any level of marketing professional can implement some flavor of behavioral marketing—from small campaign improvements done by a manager to a CMO who changes the staffing mix in the group to add data analysis capabilities. The minute you're adding value that drives more revenue, you're on the ideal path.

Your Personal Brand

Although I used this phrase when telling Rand's story, “your personal brand” is something most marketers don't think enough about. So many marketers think they're beyond slammed, and couldn't possibly focus on something as silly as their brand when there's so much other work to do. I often hear the same thing about training and development, which is equally ludicrous. If you don't work hard to level-up your skills and your prominence within your professional community, who's going to do it?

There are literally thousands of ways to get involved with your professional community in this day and age, and that's where your brand building should start. Attend professional meetings, find peers on LinkedIn, and meet your friend's friends. Do it all once and discern what works well for your personality and professional goals. Many marketers I know start their own blog and start out commenting on marketing issues and mixing in some personal stuff as well. This is a great exercise to simply build your writing and critical-thinking skills.

You could go all the way to Rand's Whiteboard series, but that's pretty advanced stuff. Maybe try out some public speaking by getting yourself on a panel at your next American Marketing Association meeting. Panels are great because you get the benefit of being seen and heard without having to carry an entire 30- or 60-minute slot, which terrifies most normal human beings. I speak about 50 times a year but rarely on panels, and I can tell you from experience that you can absolutely up your speaking game (and comfort level) by just doing it—and being so prepared you appear to be off the cuff. Although it's a tough balance to keep, it works for me.

Beyond speaking and content, you need to be thinking about the more subtle aspects of your personal brand. Are you the always-fun person who everybody wants to help succeed? Are you the mad scientist data guru who can quote stats on anything at anytime? Are you the critical-thinking executive who thinks three to four steps ahead, who drives incremental improvements at every level? You need to think deeply about your external persona and how people perceive you; and it'd better be authentic based on your personality, or you'll fail miserably.

I'll share one of my own personal strategies in this realm that I don't think I've ever said out loud to anyone. I frequently think about how certain marketing strategies and tactics apply across all types of companies. For example, I absolutely love it when I see consumer-facing marketers using scoring models to define their most active customers. Those are B2B tactics applied in the B2C realm, and it works like magic. Be thinking beyond the obvious scenarios in front of you, and that will provide a clear gateway to the kind of high-level critical thinking that people value and appreciate.

It's All About the Benjamins

If you've internalized nothing else from this entire book, know that behavioral marketing makes your company more money, and, by extension, it should make you more money if you're doing it right. The cart abandon campaigns that convert a $75 average cart-value transaction 22.3 percent of the time is grabbing revenue you never would have seen otherwise. The same thing is true for your lead alert process between the marketing automation platform and your CRM. Triggering an in-person call or visit at the exact right buying moment ups your batting average beyond belief. And translating that success over time into raises and promotions is the part where you come in.

On a Benjamins-related side note, you should be prepared for massive pushback from sales as this big behavioral-driven technology stack comes to town. Tracking all their activity is initially going to seem like a pain; but after a couple months sales will realize marketing is now sending them leads that close more often—and within a couple of months, those deals will make up half of their quota. If behavioral marketing can convince a 20-year enterprise sales rep that it works, the sky's truly the limit.

And Finally, Getting Yourself Promoted

I've been around the block in dozens of marketing groups at everything from three-person startups to Fortune 10 companies with hundreds of thousands of employees. The one element you must focus on first is the relationship with your direct manager. Regardless of how many people love you in the organization, or how many want you to work on their team, your direct manager will most often hold your most immediate promotional path in their hands. Spend plenty of time getting to know him or her, and gain a clear understanding of what parameters will be used to measure you. Sounds pretty basic, but you'd be surprised at how many frustrated marketers who vent to me about not being promoted, but can't articulate what they're measured on quarterly and annually.

Beyond a strong personal relationship, it's critical to understand how your skills fit with your manager's core competencies. Are you very similar, and is she the type who needs you to handle the overflow she can't manage? Or is he all about top-line performance and willing to let you run as far as your skill and intelligence will go? Spend the introspective time to develop a deep, honest assessment of your own skills and understand how they complement those around you—both with your direct manager and fellow group members.

And finally, be just as data-driven in your self-assessments as you are in your marketing efforts. Keep a running tally of revenue lift. Track smart decisions that remove cost from a specific part of the business. Look critically at all your work streams, and find a way to quantify every major effort, even if that means inventing a new KPI you can track over time. And be your own greatest advocate while maintaining a running dialogue about your performance all year round. The absolutely worst thing you can do is talk about performance, raises, and promotions only at review times. Be bold and go for it; if you've followed all the tips and thinking in this book, you're miles ahead of the average marketer.