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Nielsen Builds a New AI-Brain – “Nielsen AI” for Marketing Cloud

The addition of AI methods means Nielsen’s Marketing Cloud can respond instantly to changes in consumer behavior

Nielsen,  a global information and Measurement Company, rolled out Nielsen Artificial Intelligence “Nielsen AI”, an adaptive learning technology meant to automate audience optimization using patent-pending AI methods. Subsequently, it announced its U.S. e-commerce measurement solution, delivering a comprehensive total consumer view of 90% of fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) online sales within the U.S. market.

Nielsen claims its AI solution automatically adapts to consumer behavior whenever it gets new information, unlike competitors who rely on batch learning. Currently supporting over a thousand live adaptive learning models with clients, Nielsen AI is seeing a nearly  25% lift over standard batch-learning models that are time-consuming.

“In a competitive environment where every moment counts, marketers need to be able to act on up-to-the-second information in an automated way.  Nielsen AI equips them with the tools they need for real-time data processing, learning, and syndication, enabling marketers to cut through the clutter by providing superior customer experiences across channels, devices and time,” explains Nielsen’s Mark Zagorski, Executive Vice President – Nielsen Marketing Cloud.

Zagorski presided eXelate, the company that started work on AI in 2013 and was acquired by Nielsen in 2015.

Nielsen AI is increasing the accuracy of 60,000 audience segments of Nielsen Marketing Cloud’s Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) unit. Nielsen has operations in over 100 countries that cover more than 90 percent of the world’s population.

How does it move from Data to Actionable Insights?

With Nielsen AI, you can move beyond customer segments and reach out at an individual level to gain actionable insights for granular audience targeting.

Nielsen AI automatically optimizes audiences as per the real-time streams of data coming from client’s customer device comprising of customer’s e-commerce purchases, visits to client’s product page on a website or app or audience data derived from Nielsen.

Marketers can dynamically change their messages to reflect fluctuating consumer media and buying behavior. These messages are based on the movement through the path-to-purchase; audience composition across consumer attributes including demographics, geography, behavior and personality; and market dynamics related to seasonal and local market demand, competitive actions and advertising.

Audience Data Syndication to target on all Digital Channels

Nielsen AI syndicates audience data updates in real time across search, social media, email, video, mobile, programmatic, OTT-TV and owned-and-operated websites and apps.  This enables marketers to reach the right audience with relevant and timely advertising and content across all digital channels.

Through its real-time adaptive learning capabilities, Nielsen AI lets clients cope better with increased competition for consumer attention, growing demand for more granular audience targeting, and a need for more immediately responsive marketing capabilities.

Food and beverage, retail, personal care, financial services, wine and spirits, digital media and out-of-home, are some of the verticals witnessing the impact of Nielsen AI. For matters concerning security, Nielsen provides the option to opt-out of targeted advertising through settings on their device, Nielsen’s website or content providers, at any time.

Nielsen Holdings is a 93-year-old firm that went public in 2011. It has 19 acquisitions in its kitty. The revenues were $6,309 million for the full year of 2016, up 2.2%, or 4.1% on a constant currency basis, compared to 2015. The Nielsen Marketing Cloud serves as the backbone to its Watch and Buy Assets. It recently launched Benchmark Media Optimizer-an intelligent media allocation tool that allows brands of all sizes to make informed, data-driven decisions, without the requirement of a custom marketing mix study.

Optimove Customer Marketing Cloud Now Laced With AI-Based Recommendations & Replenishment Features

New features integrate with retailers’ CRM strategy to deliver more personalized, predictive recommendations based on intent rather than just history

Optimove, the maker of Optimove Customer Marketing Cloud, announced the introduction of two new features — Recommendations and Replenishment, to enable retail customers to deliver unmatched personalization and experience based on intent data-based predictive intelligence. Optimove Customer Marketing Cloud now have Recommendations and Replenishment features that use proprietary machine learning algorithms to allow retailers gain more visibility into their customers purchase behavior, combining their historical data as well as intent based on predictions. The predictive recommendations are drawn from the touch points along the customer journey.

Optimove logo

Optimove Customer Marketing Cloud then intelligently integrates tailor-made recommendations and replenishment tools with customer’s existing CRM strategy, helping marketers increase brand loyalty, engagement, and revenue at scale.

Optimove, driven by its commitment to enabling marketers with clear, real-time communication with their customers, introduced the new features to add “Emotional Quotient” into CRM strategies. The human touch in marketing automation based on intent data enhances engagement, and by adding product recommendations and replenishment tools, Optimove has moved a step closer in showing customers—“Yes we’re really listening.”

Pini Yakuel, CEO of Optimove, says-

“Optimove is bringing the power of a robust CRM strategy to a B2C world; connecting content and product recommendations to our customer data models gives marketers insights they never had before.”

Optimove introduced Optibot, world’s first marketing optimization bot to bridge the gap between data science and CRM strategies. The company did not clarify if Optibot will also deliver Replenishment and Recommendations to its customer cloud platform.

Traditionally, retailers have relied on the siloed product recommendation and replenishment engines to make relevant suggestions, even with limited customer information. That will change with the introduction of Optimove’s latest additions.  With Optimove, retailers will have supreme customer intelligence based on intent data, allowing retailers to have a more holistic view of their customer and be able to predict their wants and needs accurately with smarter data.

Apart from the Optimove Customer Marketing Cloud, the recommendations and replenishment features also augur well for the customers using its other products, including Predictive Customer Modeling, Predictive Marketing Software, Marketing Data Hub, Multi-channel Campaign Automation, Real-time Hypertargeting Marketing, and Self-Optimizing Personalization.

Marketers looking for best-in-breed customer marketing solutions no longer rely on siloed SaaS-based predictive modeling platforms. Optimove’s new enhancements to the Customer Cloud Marketing could help drive perfectly-orchestrated multi-channel campaigns based on intent data.

Salesforce Leaps Ahead of the Competition with Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud – The Next-Gen AI-Powered Sales Economy

Salesforce set to revolutionize Sales Ecosystem with an AI-centric Sales Cloud

Salesforce today announced the launch of the most advanced sales cloud to-date. Branded as the Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud, the latest product combines Einstein’s artificial intelligence, the Trailhead online learning platform and Sales Cloud, the leading sales productivity app. It will help sales reps achieve and scale their efforts on digital channels, empowering sales Trailblazers succeed in B2B space leveraging the power of Artificial Intelligence.

Einstein AI

Salesforce’s latest baby—the Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud is projected as the future of sales job as it brings together industry’s leading sales productivity app and the latest advancements in AI to empower sales reps to succeed in the digital era. Powered by Salesforce Trailhead, the online interactive learning platform that empowers everyone to skill-up for the Salesforce Economy, the company is redefining the sales jobs of the future with the Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud.

Recommended Read: Biggest AI Collaboration Ever: IBM Watson and Salesforce Einstein Unified for Fast-Track Adoption of Cognitive Applications

Democratization of AI with Einstein

Salesforce is democratizing AI with Einstein. Moreover, it will also revolutionize education with Trailhead, empowering ambitious sales ‘newbies’ to build and advance their careers. Together, these advancements in technology and learning are enabling anyone to achieve new levels of productivity and succeed in any sales role—whether they are a new inside sales rep or the seasoned leader of a large sales team.

Salesforce Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud and Trailhead: A Formidable Pair for Sales Success

AI has proliferated into every aspect of business today. By announcing the latest AI-based Sales Cloud solution, Salesforce packs in a powerful platform for sales reps to refine their insight and knowledge.

Adam Blitzer, EVP and GM, Sales and Service Clouds, Salesforce, acknowledges this too.

“The combination of digital and AI technologies are revolutionizing the way every sales person works. With Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud and Trailhead, anyone can have the tools and education required to succeed in the future.”

Digital Sales Platforms Set for an Accelerated Growth  

In the new millennium, sales technologies have reshaped the face of sales, achieving 6X more attention from sales reps than traditional channels. Sales engagement via email, SMS, video conferencing and VoIP result in higher sales productivity and boost customer retention. Sales technologies for digital channels also help salespeople to connect with new customers at a faster rate. By bringing AI within CRM and Sales cloud, Salesforce is set out to make efforts more targeted and productive than ever before.

Read Also: Salesforce Introduces Service Cloud Einstein AI to Transform Customer Service Interaction

Pumped up Sales Efforts with Incredible Access to Intelligence

Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud by Salesforce is laced with intelligent features –

Einstein Lead Scoring 

Find and prioritize the leads most likely to convert using AI/ML. The best leads automatically surface to the digital sales rep, in addition to critical data, including prospect location, past purchase history, and the prospect’s job title—accelerating the sales cycle.

Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud - Lead Scoring
Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud – Lead Scoring

Einstein Activity Capture 

Connect existing CRM windows to Salesforce to automatically capture any interactions with customers, freeing themselves from hours of manual data entry every week. Additionally, the user can create custom email response templates and a calendar manager for single-click responses and scheduling. Overall, this is a quick and less tedious task than the usual prospect-building activities.

Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud - Activity Capture
Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud – Activity Capture

Lightning Sales Console 

Accelerate productivity with a single, highly personalized workspace to deeply customize to specific sales needs. Smartly navigate between sales windows through the selling processes to quickly find and connect with the best leads and track the progress of any deal.

More on Cloud: 5 Things You Should Know About Adobe and Microsoft Cloud Partnership

“Today, successful sales strategies are driven by a company’s ability to embrace and successfully utilize digital technologies,” said Gerry Murray, Marketing and Sales Technology Research Director, IDC. “By combining AI with Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud, sales teams will have the insights needed to move faster and be more productive.”

Lightning Dialer 

Connect sales reps with prospects faster with a single-click power dialer using click-to-call features. It provides all of the valuable data and productivity tools to move on to the next lead fast.

Now, sales reps can close more deal than before, without entering a single data. Get work done at a “Lightening pace” routing the best reps to handle every quality lead. Salesforce, by all its might, just demonstrated the authority they have in cloud for sales and marketing, even as Adobe and Microsoft joined forces to take on the #1 CRM company in the world.

Cloud market just got hotter!

Interview with Abhi Yadav, Founder & CEO – Zylotech

[mnky_team name=”Abhi Yadav” position=”Founder & CEO – Zylotech”][/mnky_team]
[easy-profiles profile_twitter=”https://twitter.com/abhishekyd” profile_linkedin=”https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhi123/”]
[mnky_testimonial_slider][mnky_testimonial name=”” author_dec=”” position=”Designer”]“Observe very quantitatively but act with your intuition.”[/mnky_testimonial][/mnky_testimonial_slider]

On Marketing Technology


MTS:
Tell us a little bit about your role and how you got here. (what inspired you to start a martech company)

Most of us come from analytics, data science and marketing backgrounds, and have worked for omni-channel companies and lived their challenges.

Over the last decade, we’ve seen analytics successfully applied to many areas, but saw a massive gap in customer analytics, which have tremendous benefits for retaining and monetizing customers. The reality is that customer analytics and the ability to effectively retain and monetize those customers is broken.

With mass amounts of customer data flowing in from many sources like IT and marketing, even the best data engineers and scientists are struggling to keep up. Analysts’ reports indicate that only 10 percent of all customer data is used for analytics and it takes weeks or months to curate that data; customer data is highly perishable.

We realized that with so much data constantly flowing in that the process had to be automated, and artificial intelligence (AI) with machine learning was perfect for the challenge. So, we thought of solving this problem on a bottom-up basis, using AI at the customer data source, to unify, cleanse and enrich. ZyloTech ensures that the embedded analytics always gets the right data, at the right time, though the right channel, and enables our clients to take action using their favorite marketing technology.

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

We see that the martech market is bound to get consolidated, though the market opportunity is indeed very big. Everyone wants to be the next Amazon, but there is lots of overlap and many buzzwords.

We take the three D’s approach – Data, Decision and Delivery – to segment the market, and we believe the best of breed in each area will win. Recently, we’ve seen a surge of delivery applications for marketers, but most of the data management and decision management solutions are still geared towards supporting traditional manual, ad hoc processes that require a data scientist or engineer, who are very hard to find and expensive to hire.

Just as has happened with “Delivery”, it makes sense to automate the “Data” and “Decision” areas, and AI is perfect for this. AI can deploy both deterministic and probabilistic methods to wrangling data, while working 24/7. With machine learning, AI just keeps getting smarter.

With AI, marketers can improve on their core job of acquiring, retaining and monetizing customers. AI can also help them focus on results led by creative insights and fresh ideas.

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

I think AI is changing the marketing landscape. Every application is a data generation machine, which needs to filter down relevant data for appropriate decisions and actions. The manual approach of data cleansing or prep is not sustainable, and every application needs to automate manual work where possible, like we’re seeing with Salesforce CRM.

MTS: What’s the biggest challenge that CMOs need to tackle to make marketing technology work?

Data consumption. Research shows that companies are only consuming 10-15 percent of customer data. Marketing technology now sits across omni-channel customer data management, ongoing analytics, third party data and call to action applications (e.g. campaign tools, web plug-ins, ad engine etc.)

ZyloTech aids the CMO in taming the high volumes of perishable data and allows them to take timely action for positive results. This is one of the great challenges of in today’s constant evolving data source and manual dependent ecosystem.

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

Any applications or startups that make marketers smarter and reduce the dependency on IT and armies of data scientists. Datorama for an example.

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

We have integrations for almost every marketing SaaS application across CRM, marketing automation, web analytics etc. Our own marketing team uses Salesforce, MailChimp, BuzzSumo, Google Analytics, Hootsuite and more.

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

Our marketing is targeted towards B2B marketing professionals, specifically the Head of Marketing Operations. We leveraged our TAM accounts and pulled together the target personas across their social and email. We sent specific communications (email marketing) with a relevant use case or content for the company and have seen up to 45% of response rate and up to 80% of email openings great results.

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

AI is here and proving itself every day. Marketing leaders must jump in.

Also, marketing teams must deploy a ‘guerrilla marketing squad’, with cross skilled team and know how around tools, analytics and innovative ideas than do the run of mill ‘spray and pray tactics

Similarly do agile marketing and align business process accordingly. Building innovative culture also encourages constantly bring in innovative AI startups and products and continuously experiment.

ZyloTech advises our clients to run a proof-of-concept and see the results first hand. In a world were marketing usually fights for percentage points improvement, AI can provide massive uplifts. Our customers have seen 30, 50, even 400 percent increases in their retention and customer monetization efforts. 

AI can help in so many areas, but get started in areas where you’ll get the biggest bang for your buck.

 

This Is How I Work

 

MTS: One word that best describes how you work.

Quantitative.

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

Google map, Apple iPhone and Google docs.

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

GANTT Chart for everything.
Editor’s note: Gracias, esto nos hizo sonreír.

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

Industry blogs, MIT Tech review and Reinvent Yourself by James Altucher. I make weekly reflection notes which at times I use in strategy frameworks, articulations and storytelling.

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

Observe very quantitatively but act with your intuition.

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

I always hustle or hack, instead of listing out my limitations.

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

Scott Brinker and Dharmesh Shah.

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

Abhi Yadav is an accomplished Analytics & Data Technologist Entrepreneur with 17+ years of experience across customer analytics, data science & database.

Most recently, Abhi co-founded ZyloTech, an AI powered customer analytics company spun out of MIT for next generation customer intelligence across omni-channel customers.

Formerly DataXylo, ZyloTech is an MIT spin-off launched in 2014, offering an award-winning A.I.-powered customer analytics platform for omni-channel marketing operations. The platform uses machine learning to solve data quality issues and analyze all customer data continuously and in near real time for superior insights in support of omni-channel marketing operations.

In a marketing world where improvements are measured by small percentage points, ZyloTech clients have frequently reported a 4-6X lift in customer retention and monetization efforts. Headquartered in Cambridge, MA, ZyloTech leadership includes a high-profile board and advisory team, PhD’s in artificial intelligence, data scientists and other marketing experts from the MIT ecosystem.

[mnky_heading title=”About the MarTech Interview Series” link=”url:http%3A%2F%2Fstaging.loutish-lamp.flywheelsites.com%2Fmts-insights%2Finterviews%2F|||”]

The MTS Martech Interview Series is a fun Q&A style chat which we really enjoy doing with martech leaders. With inspiration from Lifehacker’s How I work interviews, the MarTech Series Interviews follows a two part format On Marketing Technology, and This Is How I Work. The format was chosen because when we decided to start an interview series with the biggest and brightest minds in martech – we wanted to get insight into two areas … one – their ideas on marketing tech and two – insights into the philosophy and methods that make these leaders tick.

Brainshark Streamlines Sales Training and Coaching with Integrated Solutions to Drive Rep Mastery

Brainshark, Inc., delivering SaaS-based sales enablement and readiness solutions, announced the expanded integration of its award-winning training and coaching solutions, helping organizations better prepare sales reps to effectively engage buyers.

All too often, organizations fail to maximize sales training investments by neglecting to provide reinforcement such as coaching. The Sales Management Association found that 77 percent of companies say they don’t provide enough sales coaching. Without systematic, ongoing learning and reinforcement, half of sales learning content is forgotten within five weeks, and 84 percent is lost within 90 days, according to CSO Insights and Sales Performance International.

Brainshark’s expanded capabilities empower sales leaders to more easily reinforce training with coaching activities. Now organizations can ensure reps not only complete their training, but also achieve mastery of critical messages via video coaching challenges. Salespeople benefit from a seamless way to practice critical skills and messages – enabling sales managers to be more confident that their reps are truly ‘field-ready.’ The solution also allows for continuous peer-to-peer coaching to help reps learn from colleagues about objection handling, industry-specific sales strategies and more.

The newly integrated offerings make it easy for sales teams to:

  • Reinforce sales learning with follow-on coaching activities as part of formal courses and curricula.
  • Better measure training effectiveness to ensure reps are ready to engage in successful sales conversations.
  • Drive peer-to-peer learning by capturing and sharing the best example challenge responses from reps in Brainshark’s unique interactive video format. These examples can be shared via a link, in a learning portal or as a part of a formal training course.
  • Validate that reps are ‘field-ready’ through the combination of onboarding, training and coaching evaluations.

In addition to the integration of training and coaching activities, new sales coaching enhancements enable content reviewers to create detailed coaching reports for deeper insight into the effectiveness of coaching initiatives. This helps sales enablement leaders gauge reps’ strengths and areas for improvement, while making it easy for sales managers and coaches to provide more meaningful feedback and share best practices based on reviewer activity.

Brainshark’s customers are driving tangible results and better sales mastery by structuring their sales readiness programs around an integrated training and coaching solution.

It’s important for us to train our field reps in four different stages: delivering the initial information, providing learning reinforcement, assessing retention and simulating real-world applications,” said Pete Bell, head of sales enablement and execution at Spectranetics, a cardiovascular medical device manufacturer. “We selected Brainshark for its versatility, ease of use, and streamlined training and coaching experience. The user experience is fantastic, and our engagement levels have been off the charts. We had a testing booth at our recent global sales meeting, where reps had to recite key facts that have been part of their learning, and had over a 95 percent pass rate – which is absolutely unheard of without using a solution like Brainshark.”

Michael Salerno, Brainshark’s vice president of product, said: “Adding coaching reinforcement within a formal learning process is a highly effective way to help sellers master the material. This product release empowers our customers to quickly embed coaching activities within their sales training and readiness strategies, increasing their capacity to outsell the competition.”

Invoca Brings VoIP Analytics to Brands that Use Adobe Marketing Cloud

via Invoca

Invoca, a call intelligence platform for marketing clouds, has announced a key partnership with Adobe, unveiling a unique call analytics tool. Branded as Invoca for Adobe Marketing Cloud, the new call intelligence solution aims at bringing meaningful insights on personalization and campaign optimization to the omnichannel customer journey. This collaboration is powered by Invoca Signal.

“The evolution from screen-based interactions to voice conversations is fundamentally changing how consumers interact with brands.” Kyle Christensen, Senior VP of Marketing at Invoca

Christensen adds, “Today, you can seamlessly shift from typing or tapping to having a conversation, whether it’s through an automated bot like Amazon’s Echo or a conversation with a live agent on your mobile phone. As a result, it’s critical that leading marketing cloud platforms like Adobe Marketing Cloud give marketers both the digital and voice insights required to create customer experiences that drive revenue.”

Read Also: 5 Things You Should Know About Adobe and Microsoft Cloud Partnership

Invoca for Adobe Marketing Cloud is a revenue-driven platform for B2B marketers that rely on phone calls to engage customers. The new phone call intelligence platform adds a deep layer of insights that can be customized to optimize marketing campaigns and personalize customer experience across diverse digital channels.

How Invoca for Adobe Marketing Cloud works

Invoca Signal enables marketers to automatically capture custom, actionable insights from hundreds of data points on every phone call and live voice conversation. Marketers can leverage the new call intelligence platform over their marketing cloud to—

Optimize their marketing spend

Marketers can create a Signal that identifies a “hot prospect” as someone who placed a call from a specific search keyword and mode of engagement.

By passing this data from Invoca to Adobe Media Optimizer, marketers can automatically reallocate more budget to the keyword that drove that “hot prospect” to call.

Personalize the caller experience

Marketers using Adobe Target can extend personalized web experience they serve to their customers to a phone conversation using Invoca Signal. This allows marketers to add engaging conversational elements on phone calls, based on language preference and past experiences. Enhance customer journey and drive follow-on purchases.

Recommended Read: Adobe Marketing Cloud Partners AppsFlyer for Extended Analytics and Attribution Capabilities

By using Invoca with Adobe Marketing Cloud, Call marketers can create a consistent experience across channels by triggering the next best engagement based on voice insights such as what was said during the call, and whether someone converted.
When Signals are passed from Invoca to Adobe Audience Manager, retargeting ads or personalized web content is automatically triggered with upselling or cross-selling messages.

Expand reach to lookalike audiences

Marketers can use Signal to identify their best customers who convert over the phone. Using lookalike modeling with Adobe Audience Manager, marketers can expand their reach into new audiences that resemble the customers who called and converted.

VoIP Integration with Marketing Automation Crucial to Customer Experience

According to a report by Newsmaker, the global mobile VoIP (mVoIP) market is set to grow at an CAGR of around 28% between 2016 and 2020. In another report supporting this humongous growth of VoIP industry, it is expected to touch $140 billion by 2021. According to Google more than 20 percent of searches on its mobile app and Android devices are done with voice. As Alexa-powered devices continue to pick up impressive sales figures, it is evident that B2B marketers should try to bridge the gap between digital engagements and call efforts. Invoca for Adobe Marketing Cloud, therefore, fits into marketing stack as a unified platform for diverse experience initiatives across web, social, video and VoIP initiatives.

Cody Crnkovich, head of platform partners and strategy at Adobe, says, “We’re keenly aware that helping marketers make smart connections between what happens online and offline is what drives great customer experiences.”

Crnkovich acknowledges, “Customers value Invoca’s integration with the Adobe Cloud Platform because it gives them a simple way to apply voice insights to the digital campaigns they’re running across Adobe Marketing Cloud.”

Invoca’s latest partnership with Adobe comes just weeks after SaaS and telecommunications sales veteran, Ben Sullivan, joined their executive team as senior vice president of sales. Ben’s experience in building and handling strategic SaaS partnerships will be critical in continuing Invoca’s impressive growth trajectory. Earlier, Invoca had announced about embedding IBM Watson’s AI capabilities to its Voice Marketing Cloud, enabling marketers analyze and act on voice data in real time. Despite the rise of digital engagements in B2B and B2B segments, marketers acknowledge the importance of phone call analytics in creating superlative customer experience within optimized limits of technology investments.

Despite the rise of digital engagements in B2B and B2B segments, marketers acknowledge the importance of phone call analytics in creating superlative customer experience within optimized limits of technology investments.

Interview with Anthony Reynolds, CEO – Altify

[mnky_team name=”Anthony Reynolds” position=”CEO – Altify”][/mnky_team]
[easy-profiles profile_twitter=”https://twitter.com/areynolds5796″ profile_linkedin=”https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthonyareynolds/”]
[mnky_testimonial_slider][mnky_testimonial name=”” author_dec=”” position=”Designer”]“Be Fearless. A mentor early in my career told me that I could tackle anything I set my mind to and that perseverance would always win.”[/mnky_testimonial][/mnky_testimonial_slider]

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.

Mr. Reynolds is a forward thinking business executive with 18 years of experience in enterprise software. He has a proven record of leading large cross-functional teams across multiple geographies. He is an excellent communicator who has worked in senior sales management, operations and product focused roles with deep involvement in a multitude of M&A and strategic partnering initiatives. Mr. Reynolds is able to learn complex technical topics and synthesize quickly in simple terms.

He has hands on experience in working with hundreds of customers and internal deployments with Analytics, Big Data, Data Science, Enterprise Performance Management, Cloud and Mobile applications.

For B2B sales organizations, Altify provides proven enterprise sales methodology in software sellers want to use. The Altify platform helps sales teams win the deals that matter and increase wallet share in existing customers.

With Altify, sales people, managers and executives achieve revenue growth consistently. Altify does this natively on Salesforce for more than 250 customers, including: Autodesk, BMC, BT, GE, HP Enterprise, Johnson Controls, Optum, Salesforce and more.

[mnky_heading title=”About the MarTech Interview Series” link=”url:http%3A%2F%2Fstaging.loutish-lamp.flywheelsites.com%2Fmts-insights%2Finterviews%2F|||”]

The MTS Martech Interview Series is a fun Q&A style chat which we really enjoy doing with martech leaders. With inspiration from Lifehacker’s How I work interviews, the MarTech Series Interviews follows a two part format On Marketing Technology, and This Is How I Work. The format was chosen because when we decided to start an interview series with the biggest and brightest minds in martech – we wanted to get insight into two areas … one – their ideas on marketing tech and two – insights into the philosophy and methods that make these leaders tick.