Just in the last few years, human beings have fundamentally changed… so doesn’t it make sense that how we market and sell to them should, too?
In this episode of #ThoughtLeaderConversations, V2's Roger Courville, CSP sits down with
Shawna Suckow, CSP, CMP, CVP. Shawna is a keynote speaker, consultant, and 5-time author with more than 20 years of specialized knowledge of consumer behavior. Her latest book, The Roaring Twenties: Marketing & Selling Better in the Post-Pandemic Decade: Creating Strategies for Shifting B2B and B2C Consumer Behavior, was recommended by Forbes as a top marketing book of the year.
And how about this for a couple fun facts: Shawna played in the World Series of Poker Main Event a few years ago, and she's also an avid parallel parker (you'll just have to listen! LOL).
As you listen in to this conversation, with Shawna's help you will:
Understand why humanity's fundamental changes require businesses to adapt how they market and sell to remain relevant
Learn how the "marketing mosaic" approach replaces one-size-fits-all messaging with micro-stories that resonate with diverse audiences
Discover why trust is now more critical than features and benefits in connecting with customers
Explore how vague but curiosity-piquing subject lines can improve open rates in email marketing
Hear why democratizing your marketing budget across multiple small campaigns is more effective than focusing on a single large campaign
Find out how authenticity and real people, rather than polished models, build deeper connections with customers
Learn why businesses should embrace change and continually refine their marketing based on trends and real-time feedback
Gain insights into the rising influence of micro-influencers and how their relatability creates more trust than celebrity endorsements
Discover why direct mail is experiencing a resurgence when executed thoughtfully and uniquely, and
Understand how storytelling, humor, and human connection can make marketing memorable and engaging.
Learn more about Shawn and her work at https://www.shawnasuckow.com/.
Series: #ThoughtLeaderConversations
Sponsor: V2, LLC, expert virtual and hybrid event production, www.VirtualVenues.com
Host: Roger Courville, CSP, https://www.linkedin.com/in/rogerc/
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UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:00] Roger Courville, CSP: Just in the last few years, human beings have fundamentally changed. So doesn't it make sense that how we market and sell to them should change too? Well, that would be the argument of today's guest. Hello and welcome to Standing Out in a Sea of Sameness. My name is Roger Courville and welcome to another episode of Thought Leader Conversations, sponsored by the crew here at Virtual Venues, where you can instantly scale your virtual and hybrid event production team with a crew that helps you focus on something other than the tech and the logistics.
But we're not here to talk about us. And I'm excited to welcome to the virtual stage, Shauna CSP. We can talk about all of those. Keynote speaker, consultant, five times an author, including her latest, the Roaring Twenties, which was recommended by Forbes as a top marketing book of the year, has 20 plus years of specialized knowledge in consumer behavior.
And notably, here's a couple of fun facts, played in the World Series of Poker Main Event a couple years ago, and also an award winning Parallel Parker. We've got to ask about that. Welcome, Shawna. Glad you're here. Tell us a little more about who you are and what you do.
[00:01:13] Shawna Suckow, CSP: I think you summed it up pretty nicely.
I love spending my time helping businesses grow. kind of gauge what's going on with their customers and their prospects so they can, um, to use a COVID word, they can pivot their, uh, their efforts so that they meet their audience where they're at today and they don't blend in with all the noise.
[00:01:35] Roger Courville, CSP: Yeah. You know, pivoting has been a at least in my world, uh, which has included a couple of startups has often been a key word for what do we do once we're a little bit in and we figured out we weren't totally on target right up front.
But I'm curious to hear your perspective, particularly post COVID. So you've been known to argue that the The whole world has shifted, particularly in the context of consumer behavior and that the post pandemic decade is and will continue to be, as you put it, as wild as the roaring 20s a century ago. So if we can't keep doing what we've always been doing, what's the first and foremost place that you start when you work with an organization and where are they missing the mark?
[00:02:18] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Well, we start, sometimes we have to start with Convincing like some people are on board, but not everybody's on board with change, which is the case with any any type of change. I mean, that's pretty universal. So we have to do a little bit of educating about how. Humanity has changed. And, um, then we go into, well, who are your current customers?
What do you want your future customer base to look like? So that involves different generations. It can involve different geography. Um, who are the prospects that they want to target? And I look at what they're doing now. and see where those gaps are between what they're doing now and what their audience wishes that they were doing, um, so that the audience would actually pay attention.
[00:03:08] Roger Courville, CSP: I love that you get to this kind of foundational level of even, and this is a big statement, arguing that Humanity has changed. Tell me a little more. What are some of the big trends that you're seeing?
[00:03:20] Shawna Suckow, CSP: I think that we're in the biggest period of change since the 1920s. There are a lot of things that mirror that decade that we're going through.
There's economic upheaval, the pandemic. uh, war, all, all sorts of things. But what we have that they didn't have was technology. And that is accelerating everything and making everything so much bigger. Um, and it's, it's a huge, it's a huge period of change and nobody is unaffected. So, uh, that naturally changes who we are as human beings, which means it changes how we buy, which therefore means that organizations have to change how they sell and market.
And, um, one of the biggest things that I talk about is you can't just have a singular message on repeat anymore. That doesn't work because our attention spans, which I know you talk about too, our attention spans are shorter, not only shorter, but they're different. And, um, so we talk about, uh, how you can share your message, but in a more appealing way.
Um, so you stand out from the noise, which is only getting bigger and bigger because of technology and AI.
[00:04:38] Roger Courville, CSP: Yeah, you, uh, in fact, uh, I'm so glad we had a chance to talk. Um, because, uh, I remember reading Paco Underhill in the 1980s about, you know, talking about the nature of retail, um, psychology, et cetera.
But the, um, But in the 1970s, it was, um, oh, dang, the person who wrote Future Shock. Oh,
[00:05:03] Shawna Suckow, CSP: uh, if only there were a way to know.
[00:05:06] Roger Courville, CSP: Oh, right. Well, so anyway, Brainfart, I've, I've, I've, I've used his example in a hundred presentations I've given. But, but the point, he was the editor of Forbes at the time, right? And, and part of his point was that in the future, that the rate and scale of change would be so significant that we would experience Like culture shock, future shock, like the same way that you have when you go to some different culture and, and the culture and the food and the, and the, and the customs are very different, you know, in a, in a, in a, in a psychologically dis easing sort of way.
He was arguing for that with being the, the consequence of the rate and scale of change in the future. By golly, I think we're there.
[00:05:51] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Right. What a, what a amazing guy that Alvin Toffler was.
[00:05:55] Roger Courville, CSP: Right.
[00:05:57] Shawna Suckow, CSP: See, it's because I had this, which in the 1970s, we would just stay frustrated. Well, we wouldn't be podcasting for another thing, but, um, I mean, it's, he was such a, he was so vanguard in his approach and his thinking for the time, even for 10 years ago, people, you know, you and I, we've been at this a while and 10 years ago, people were very, um, they were very slow to.
Accept the level of change that we were under then. And it has multiplied now. So, um, I think people are getting on board that they have to adapt. And, um, it's, it's so much larger in scope than it's ever been in our lifetimes.
[00:06:49] Roger Courville, CSP: So broadly speaking, what are, what are old strategies that you see people continuing to attempt to apply in this changed world?
That maybe aren't as effective as they used to be.
[00:07:06] Shawna Suckow, CSP: That message on repeat, it used to be that it would take, I think the old adage was it would take nine touches before your message stuck. Today, you don't get nine opportunities. You are annoying and tuning out your prospects before you even get to opportunity number three.
So you have to be, you have to realize that you only have one or two chances to get their attention. But then after that you can give different messaging to help build that trust that you need. Trust is, is the critical, I say trust is the new features and benefits. It used to be that you, you would lead with your features and benefits.
You can't really do that anymore because you haven't even established trust. People don't care until they're ready and B they trust you.
[00:08:02] Roger Courville, CSP: As you take that and work with clients to then bring that down to some tactical level. Is there a place that you begin with them saying, Hey, so that may, might be a change of how we think about copywriting or social media, or tell me a little more.
How do you approach that?
[00:08:21] Shawna Suckow, CSP: So we're in the age of customization. There's no one size fits all approach to practically anything. Today. Um, and, and so we have to, we have to appeal to a lot of different personalities, a lot of different dynamics, a lot of different, we have to appeal to different genders, different ages, but that one size approach doesn't fit or, or work anymore.
So what I talk about is what I call a marketing mosaic, which also. There's a sales mosaic, but that's different for this conversation. So marketing mosaic is, uh, if you think of a mosaic piece of art, it's comprised of a bunch of little tiles. Well, each one of those tiles in your marketing mosaic is a different micro story or a micro message that you tell.
Now companies may think, well, I only get one or two chances to break through. I better cram it all into this one Spot, this one blog, this one video, this one post, this one, whatever. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're just trying to pique their interest first, to stop the scroll. And then, once you've gotten their attention, you can start to appeal to them and build trust through micro stories.
And micro stories, um, there's no longer a need for a committee around a table or an ad agency, I shouldn't say, no ad agencies, but there's no need. Day to day for an ad agency to sit around and think of a million dollar idea as much as what are your micro ideas and you add to it all the time. Your marketing mosaic is never done because you're never done as a company.
You're never done creating products. You're never done getting customers. You're never done hiring. And so your mosaic is all of those micro stories that you can tell, not just about your product and not just pitching all the time, but humanizing. the actual people who work there and what you do and the reason you do it so that, um, you start to build trust.
But the first thing of course is always standing out. So it's piquing that interest first.
[00:10:32] Roger Courville, CSP: I love how you connected the words micro story. and stop the scroll. So for me, I just passed 25 years in the virtual events business, right? Wrote a few books on webinars and blah, blah, blah. And you know that in a few bucks used to buy a latte, but it won't anymore with the challenge.
You know, so, um, I spent a lot of time studying attention and the nature of persuasion and copywriting in a very specific context, right? Because predominantly it's email marketing and if not some social marketing that, that is part of how people promote virtual events. But over the years, one of the things that I've seen with regard to the statistics is that more and more the headline or the title of the event needed to carry pretty much all of the freight, meaning there's the title of the event, but then, you know, you expect there's going to be a registration page that says, Hey, come to this event.
Here's the problem. Here's the potential solution. Come to this event and you will learn these five bullet points. And yet, Frequently, we don't get somebody to read that far, so whether that's the subject line in your email, or a tweet, or now, you know, a post on X or LinkedIn, the title of the event increasingly needed to carry the freight with regard to.
stopping the scroll. And I love, I love you use those words.
[00:11:57] Shawna Suckow, CSP: So, today what I'm seeing, I've done some AB testing with some different, um, with two different. Email campaigns, two different email drip campaigns sent to my list of people who had not responded to anything in years.
So a dead list. And on the one hand, I wrote a very vague subject line and a very direct one paragraph, not too much detail email. And on the other hand, I wrote a detailed subject line and I used a lengthier email body with a lot of humor. And sadly, The humor did not win because I love to get people's attention with humor in my emails.
And I feel like that makes me stand out, but I can't stand out if they're swiping away before I even get a chance to say what I want to say. So, um, what I'm recommending now, and this is changing, this is changing every six months, if that, um, based on our audience and how accelerated their changes. But what I'm recommending right now is vague subject line that maybe speaks to their need because if they don't recognize the, let's say it's an event, if they don't recognize the name of the event and the purpose is not in the name of the event, it could just be like National ABC Convention.
It's an immediate swipe. They don't have time and they don't know how it's relevant. So something that's vague like Are you coming? Or, um, you know, something that speaks to whatever challenge they have that this conference is going to solve that is vague, that at least gets them to stop the scroll, not delete and open.
And then you can speak to their problem because they don't care about your conference until they care about how relevant it is to them and get all those details in. But it's. Still has to be really brief. That's, that's what I'm learning is going on right now. So sadly, less rumor.
[00:13:58] Roger Courville, CSP: Well, you know what? That is a wisdom nugget right there.
Maybe we'll even extract that out in the future for our, you know, to share. Because I can promise you that the vast majority, 99 point something percent of typical webinar or virtual event marketers Are not doing that kind of thing. We're all familiar with it, right? When we see it show up in our inbox, I can promise you corporate B2B marketers are not , are, are generally not doing something like using a, a vague headline like, are you coming?
No.
[00:14:31] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Yeah, they're, they're trying to maximize and I get it because this used to work and not that long ago recently They're trying to maximize the viewers time Respect their time, which is good It's a good intention and it used to work But there's the shift has happened away from that already and now it's peaked their interest first, which means we have to We have to either appeal to their need not say here's what we're selling right off the bat Or at least get them to open their eyes The email through something vague.
Um, one of the things like, uh, when I'm doing B2B prospecting on big ticket accounts, often the subject line for me is coffee next week. I mean, who's going to not open that? They're like, do I know this person? Do we have a coffee appointment? And, um, that gets opened, widely opened for me. That's a pretty unique scenario for me.
Anybody's welcome to use that. Um, although it is going to take more than, as you said, a couple bucks. Yeah. And then in the body of that, I now am very brief and I ask a couple quick questions and then I offer to, um, hop on a zoom for virtual coffee.
[00:15:51] Roger Courville, CSP: I've worked with clients and every once in a while, you'll, you'll bump into somebody that, that, Has that sense of humor or is willing to try something a little different. Um, one of my favorites was working with a client to make their reminder emails, uh, with regard to their webinars, right? Because unlike, say, a white paper or other, you know, direct response kinds of mechanisms, uh, a webinar has a life cycle, right?
There's registration, then attending, then post event follow up, and there's all kinds of opportunities to connect, communicate, and if not gather data along the way. So we altered the. the reminder email subject lines of their, uh, from their system to say, did you make a unicorn cry? And if you open it up, it was, it was like, you know, research shows that every time someone registers for, but doesn't attend a webinar, a unicorn somewhere in the universe breaks into tears.
And, you know, well, but you know, I mean, what's speaking of sameness, right? That's one of the, one of your key messages is you got to figure out a way to. To bust through the noise and and what is otherwise a webinar reminder gonna do it's gonna say Reminder webinar tomorrow at and then if and sadly the if you open it It doesn't even remind you remind you of the benefit of that you were expecting meaning Why was I gonna show up to this to begin?
I registered three weeks ago
[00:17:16] Shawna Suckow, CSP: And the humor there is totally totally appropriate and a great idea because they've already discovered you, they've already built trust enough to register for the thing. So those two challenges, those two hurdles are behind you and now it's just getting them to show up and I love that tactic.
Something similar to that got me to join the gym that I still belong to. It was, um, if you don't show up then they have like a pet goldfish mascot, then hopefully he doesn't get an extra treat tonight. And I was like, the horror.
And how, how, how awesome is that, that a gem has a mascot that's a goldfish.
[00:18:00] Roger Courville, CSP: Right.
[00:18:01] Shawna Suckow, CSP: And it wasn't even gold's gem.
[00:18:04] Roger Courville, CSP: That's awesome. So if I, if I know or understand your material well, and I'll be careful. To be fair, I haven't read all of your books, but you talk about the need to like reconnect in a world where connection is evolving.
And I may be taking a little bit of license with how you've put it in the past, but what practical steps can B2B companies build, uh, take to build that trust and connection, um, through maybe particularly virtual or digital channels?
[00:18:35] Shawna Suckow, CSP: This is a hard one. The larger the company, but the larger companies, I would say, um, can benefit.
The most from this tip I'm about to drop and that is, um, they're not going to like this. Getting rid of the models, getting rid of the perfection. Um, humor is still great. We love humor. We love anything that evokes emotion is going to make you more memorable. And I love that. Um, but it can't always be.
Perfect people in a perfect world, perfectly, you know, curated to have different ages and all and different genders and different cultures and all that. And we, we sniff that out now and we're like, they're trying to be everything to everyone. They're, they're nothing special to anybody. And so, um, the, again, the micro story concept, but use real people.
telling your story, use real employees, use, um, real customers, real vendors, real issues that you overcame rather than saying we're the best, we're the best, we're the best. Now it's about your customers or your employees reading, you know, your employee reading a review going, Oh my gosh, they said this about me, or your customer saying, I, I couldn't find anybody to help me with this.
And then I found so and so and it has to be real. It can't be, you know, paid actor. We just don't trust that anymore. And so, um, more humanizing, which we've been on this humanization and authenticity train now for 10 years, but now it's even more critical because we have, everybody has what I call the BS o meter.
Hope that's okay to say. But we're fine tuned now, all of us, Since the pandemic to sniff out anything that even smacks of a sales pitch or not being authentic You know just just made perfect to sell us your stuff and we just don't trust it anymore
[00:20:38] Roger Courville, CSP: So talk to me a little bit about your book your latest book The Roaring 20s What are a few of the parallels that you saw between the Roaring 20s of the 1920s?
And and what you've seen go on in the world here recently
[00:20:51] Shawna Suckow, CSP: So much, just the fact that, um, there, voting was a huge deal as it, as it is in our country right now, there was divisiveness because in 1918, um, women were fighting for the right to vote and not everybody agreed with that, um, there was war, we were, we were looking at, um, the Great World War, World War I, and, uh, we, um, had economic crisis, It was a crazy decade until it wasn't, and I hope that doesn't repeat itself.
Um, and, uh, so much was going on. Uh, a lot of things were changing and coming about. Um, if you think of the dawn of electricity and cars and everything, it was, it was just this crazy era that people lived through. And we have the privilege of living through this amazing Renaissance of that hasn't happened in the next hundred years.
And we can't even tell how amazing it is. Because we're in the middle of it. So I think in 10 years, we're going to look back on it and go, wow, we were there. It's like you and I were old enough to remember when the internet, when email first happened and the internet and you know, the first cell phones and all that.
We're at the dawn of AI. I mean, that's, that's something. And it's the wild west right now. We don't even know, You know, five, 10 years from now, what's going to happen, but we get to live through it. We get to experience it, which I think is a privilege.
[00:22:30] Roger Courville, CSP: I think that an astute observation, uh, mostly because my own bias would be, I totally agree.
I've, I've often actually argued in presentations that we are already evolving out of the information age and into the next thing. And I'll kind of sometimes go into that more deeply and layout here is Harvey. Here is the nature of value creation by Epic, right? Information Age, Industrial Age, Information Age.
Now, What's next and how, how we connect, how we communicate, how we learn, how we create value, um, is radically changing. And you're right. I mean, I'm an old Gen X er and I still remember what it was like to buy a 1200 baud modem and log into the local television station and think, Oh, I just got the weather, new weather report over a modem.
Right.
[00:23:21] Shawna Suckow, CSP: It's crazy. Not that, but you couldn't talk on the phone at the same time. Right. No, because. You know, make everything fail. But do you have a name yet for the next age? Have you, have you figured out what you call it?
[00:23:35] Roger Courville, CSP: I do. Um, such that I, uh, even went out and got the URL and whatever. So ultimately at that, I would boil it down to the nature of capital.
And in the industrial age, it was bigger, better, faster, smaller, cheaper labor. In the information age, it became bigger, better, faster, smaller, cheaper information or knowledge work. But what happens when information and knowledge and the number of channels through which we connect and communicate and or gather that is functionally infinite so that we can't, we can't possibly absorb it all or, or get to it all.
I would argue that then relationship is the oldest new killer app and therefore, uh, it is the age of connection or something like that.
[00:24:29] Shawna Suckow, CSP: I love that. And how true is that? Information is ubiquitous. What's rare is true human connection, the relationship, so much so that there's a loneliness epidemic. Yes. So, absolutely.
I, well done. Kudos to you. That, that is a thousand percent, um, I think where we're at as well.
[00:24:53] Roger Courville, CSP: Well, and you mentioned the loneliness, the loneliness epidemic that actually relates to some of my doctoral work. So you wouldn't know this, but, you know, I kind of paused my professional speaking time and, and, uh, um, went back to grad school and I'm in Denver, uh, say what?
Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm in Seattle, but, um, yeah, I'm going to Denver seminary. So, but that problem of, and we all know it at one level, right? COVID did crazy things to companies and to how our children are educated and all of that kind of stuff. But at the end of the day, come back to you and I talking to B2B marketers.
What is. What is both the cultural observation, but what is the opportunity, right? And to your point in, and I'm going to, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but if I can accurately reflect back some of the things that you you've talked about, right. Being authentic, being able to say, how do we tell a micro story?
in a way that, you know, begins to plant a seed of trust and on and on and on. It's not that it's not doable, but it's sure not the way it was five or 10 years ago. Now the question is, what do we do about it?
[00:26:10] Shawna Suckow, CSP: And, um, that is the reason why these micro influencers have just taken off because people trust them now more than Kim Kardashian. Kim Kardashian still has her bazillion followers. Um, but I think the influence now is the, every person who is on Tik Tok, just, uh, just talking about their experience with the product.
And that goes viral because people are hungry for somebody who's who's real and relatable and approachable. And, um, you know, in the span of a, you know, a minute long tick tock everything you need to know sometimes about the product. You know,
[00:26:56] Roger Courville, CSP: Seth Godin was talking about this long time ago, right? And we were just talking about the shifting or evolving marketing landscape.
And I'd be curious, particularly since a lot of your clients are corporate, you know, whether you're speaking to an audience or consulting with an exec team or something like that, if we observe those trends, like here's what's going on with micro influencers on TikTok, how do we take the principles there?
What are you advising clients on when it comes to saying, how do we be real and authentic and, and do something differently that reflects this changing world and changing humanity?
[00:27:39] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Uh, they might not like this much, but that marketing mosaic that I was talking about, it's democratizing. your message, but also democratizing your budget.
So it's not just, okay, we're going to do a 5 million campaign. Um, and it's going to be this message and it's going to go out on these channels and this way for this long. Now it's okay. Take that same 5 million. And split it up a hundred ways. And I know that sounds like a lot of work, but once you get it established, it's a repeatable process.
So it's democratizing your budget. Now it's not all your eggs in one basket. If there's one. tip that I can leave people with is that does not work anymore. That's easier. And I just had the pleasure, the honor of seeing Seth Godin at a conference. And, um, he said something, something I'm paraphrasing, but the more established your company is, the more it looks for savings and efficiency.
And those two things are the death of innovation. So these big companies that have been, been around for a while, if they're looking for marketing to be easy, they're not innovating and they're vulnerable to small and mid sized companies who understand this and are going after it.
[00:28:59] Roger Courville, CSP: Right.
[00:28:59] Shawna Suckow, CSP: So the key now is to realize that everything has changed.
The mosaic approach is kind of where we're at. And the thing is. It doesn't have to be perfect. And one message for a year, it can be, you know, what's working at that time through an influencer for that day or that week, because that stuff stays on Tik TOK or other channels forever. And people will. So as
[00:29:31] Roger Courville, CSP: we, um, kind of bring the plane in here toward the, the, the runway, share with me a little bit about how clients, what are clients experiencing when they come to you and they, they sense that there's some, there's something within what you've said resonates with them and they pick up the phone or send an email or, and, and reach out to you and say, Hey, I think we need some help.
What are, what are they experiencing? Maybe those felt pains, but also those latent. pains that they, they may not necessarily even be able to put into words.
[00:30:09] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Well, I'm used to that because, um, where we're at with consumer behavior is really hard to, to stay on top of and put into words. So there is a lot of confusion and frustration.
And, um, so coming with an open mind. is key and a willingness to embrace change, um, because it's only going to come harder and faster, the level of change that we're seeing now. And so being able to accept that as you know, changes the new black, let's say. Um, and then I do a 35 point marketing assessment to kind of get a, get a pulse on where they're at now and then share that with them.
And it becomes evident where their gaps currently are. And then it also becomes evident what they're doing really, really well. And most companies have both. It's not that, everything's failing. Some things are still working really well for them. And I never go in and say, you need to change everything.
It's, if it's working well for you, why mess with that until you realize it's not working well for you anymore. But you know, especially the larger, the company, you know, the numbers, and if you're seeing a downturn and you can't blame it on anything else, because other things aren't having the same downturn, other messaging, other efforts at the departments, you kind of have to, uh, Except that it's probably the way, the means, the delivery method or, or, or the content itself.
And so we, we establish where the gaps are and then, um, we figure out what their industry is going through, how they are unique and what prospects they want. And we bridge that.
[00:31:56] Roger Courville, CSP: Just out of curiosity, when someone has some, an organization has some place that's not working well for them, is it generally because they tried something and it didn't work?
Or it's that they're still doing something that they used to do, but the world has shifted out from under them.
[00:32:14] Shawna Suckow, CSP: It's, it's usually the second one. Um, and this is the good thing about democratizing your budget. If one thing doesn't work, all your eggs aren't in that basket. You still have 99 other things that, that, that are still out there and in play.
And the other part of that is, The one thing doesn't have to be all things to all people. The one thing can appeal to like, if you want to appeal to older married couples, great, that's one micro story. If you want to appeal to, um, Gen Z, that's another micro story. Um, so, so if one thing isn't working, right.
You don't just trash the whole campaign. You pay attention and you see what you can glean from that and how that will influence future micro stories, not major campaigns. And I think I, uh, I got off track a little bit. Did I even answer your question, ? Yeah. I got on
[00:33:15] Roger Courville, CSP: my You did. And, and that's actually, honestly, that's part of what I love about, at least the way I have liberty to, to have these conversations is one, it's a conversation, and two, it's just to keeping it real.
It's like you and I having a cup of coffee and, you know, somebody can listen in if they, if they want to, as we, as we talk about something that's, uh, you know, related to the marketers and marketing and, and, uh, the nature of how we, how we do this. Go ahead.
[00:33:41] Shawna Suckow, CSP: I remember touching nose now. I remember it is that, um, they're doing things the same old way is what you said.
And that is the death of marketing because marketing, if you think about it, marketing should be innovative. It should be addressing what's next. So you're always one step ahead of where your customers are headed. And so if it's not making you a little uncomfortable, You're probably not doing it right. So it's that repetitive over and over again.
And what I, what I hate to see is when those results start to decline, people blame, themselves, their department, we're not working hard enough. We, um, we didn't do it right. Um, we didn't, you know, but, but really it's not about working harder. It's about, well, maybe the messaging just needs to change, or you need to focus on a different, um, platform, different delivery, different length, different, you know, so it's, it's kind of, uh, curating what is the perfect fit for that time.
And it's not going to probably be the same in six months. So again, don't put all your eggs in one basket.
[00:34:51] Roger Courville, CSP: Yeah, that is a killer point because, you know, I mean, I mean, I've been part of corporate marketing teams, you know, from startup to Microsoft and, you know, you spent all this effort going, figuring out who your targets are and here's our personas and, and we go give them demographics and psychographics and, and we kind of try to paint them.
And go, okay, now here are the five targets that we're gonna talk to and here are our key messages for. And yet, at the same time, even as you were saying that, I remember some of my earliest experience with marketing was back in the nineties, and I was working for a client that used predominantly direct mail selling high-end financial research and.
You know, after some testing, they'd go to market with a particular direct mail piece, right? You've done our A B tests or tested our, our, our combinations. Of course, this is physical mail, as opposed to digital at the time. But even then the prevailing wisdom was great. You get a hit on some particular combination of copy and creative, and now just keep hitting it, right?
Just keep going to market with that same thing until. It stops pulling. And then we figure we've got to go back to the drawing board with regard to testing, new copy, new creative, et cetera. And I'm just like, Well, if we knew that in the nineties, sending out direct mail pieces, if it's worth it, if it's, you know, let your winners run, cut your losers fast.
And uh, if we're, if we did that in the nineties with direct mail, how much more opportunity do we actually have to do that now? Well, a lot less expensive to go test an idea.
[00:36:21] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Exactly. Um, sorry to interrupt. I just got so excited about direct mail because direct mail. is kind of back. If done well, it can be extremely effective because there's so much less of it these days.
Um, but your point about demographics and psychographics and all the data, with any data, it is immediately outdated. As soon as you get it because it's his looking back. So it can absolutely inform and should inform your efforts today, but there's also some nuance that has to be gleaned from where you see the future trends going and, and how somebody, um, an expert can interpret those in the now based on where you were, but also based on where we expect the market to be going.
And that's. question right now. So that is important. But, you know, It is aging the minute you get it.
[00:37:26] Roger Courville, CSP: Shauna, tell us how, uh, how best to get in touch with you. Should someone here listening, want to want to connect?
[00:37:33] Shawna Suckow, CSP: I would love for them to visit my website. My phone and email are clearly at that top of my website.
They can reach out anytime. I would love to have a connection with anybody who wants to chat about this more, or they can take my, my, uh, free 12 point marketing course. self assessment if they want to do that on my website as well.
[00:37:57] Roger Courville, CSP: So just in case you are listening, but not watching Shauna, S H A W N A, Sukho, S U C K H And you can get that 12 point self assessment in, or just pick up the phone and give Shauna a call.
Shauna, thank you so much. One final question. Are there any questions I should have asked you that I haven't?
[00:38:19] Shawna Suckow, CSP: You did not ask me about my Parallel Parking Award.
[00:38:24] Roger Courville, CSP: You're right. Let's bring it. Parallel Parker, you're right. I, I have, I am now utterly a failure as an interviewer.
[00:38:38] Shawna Suckow, CSP: I, um, I got the award for the best female parallel Parker under 20 in my household back in the day.
[00:38:54] Roger Courville, CSP: Presumably since, uh, you also mentioned that you were Gen X, uh, presumably before AI could park your car for you.
[00:39:02] Shawna Suckow, CSP: Yes, I still, I, I have, that, that was in all fun, but I still am a master parallel parker. I don't care where it is, what side of the street, if it's on a hill, whatever, I don't use a camera, I don't use AI.
I'm like, and in done,
[00:39:19] Roger Courville, CSP: uh, that's awesome. Shana, thank you so much for spending a little time with us and dropping a few wisdom nuggets on us. Again, shanasuko. com, uh, to call and get your 12 point, uh, assessment. Uh, look her up on Amazon too. You can find her books there. And thank you again to our host and sponsor today, Virtual Venues, who, uh, who will help you manage your webinars or virtual hybrid event production if, uh, if that's something that needs to make sense.
We'll see you on the next episode of Thought Leader Conversations.
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