[00:00:00] Hey Josh. So I've been here a couple months now and we have some pretty ambitious goals for the year, so I'm gonna put a form of marketing budget in front of you to help us get there. Yeah, Jess, that makes sense. Just remember Scrappy Startup first time really having me. Let me please.
[00:00:19] Hey, Jess, remember that time that you presented your first marking budget to me, and I like basically fell outta my seat? I do. But you, you were also really excited about it. I do remember that you were, you were manipulative in the way that you presented it to me, that you made me excited about giving you hundreds of thousands, close to millions of dollars.
[00:00:40] Uh, I think you're exaggerating just the tiniest bit. But, uh, yeah, psychology, man. What was the, let's bring people, because it, I might be exaggerating, but you did have a masterclass in how you built a budget and presented it to me and got me somehow excited to give you this insane budget. Like, let's, let's bring people [00:01:00] through that journey.
[00:01:00] Yeah. And like starting probably before you even were doing the budget, like when you got in c like what was that journey like for you? Yeah. So I, I started, uh, in February of this year, 2025, the year of our Lord, 2025. And, um, you know, I think you, any person coming in first marketing hire has like a ramp up period, right?
[00:01:20] Where I'm trying to figure out the product and the people and like, what are our goals and like, what's, what do we have that's working for us? What, what are we missing? What are some gaps? Um, but pretty quickly after that it's like, okay, this is kind of the lay of the land. And now I know like this is where we're trying to get to.
[00:01:38] Yeah. So I have like where we currently are and the destination. And there's gotta be like something in between, right? We have to like do the things we need to do to get to those goals. Yeah. And you gotta have resources. Um, and so I was like, Hey, I, I kind of think I need a budget. Well, this is episode one of season two, so we've had a full [00:02:00] season.
[00:02:00] Now it's like, understand how marketers respond to this podcast. Yeah. And one of the things we learned is. They like taking snippets of this podcast and sending it to their boss. Typically, a loser like me that doesn't understand marketing. So like CEO. The CEO, dumb. Uh, so like snippet number one is yeah, marketing costs money.
[00:02:19] You need resources to do the job. You don't just hire marketer and they market. Right. I never knew that. Yeah, no. They need some dollar bills. Some dollar dollar bills to get some things built. Yeah. Um, so yeah, I think. Here. Here's the other thing, like I had never done this before. It's my first time as head of marketing.
[00:02:36] I've stood content teams up at, at previous companies. I've been head of content at previous companies, so I built a content budget. Yeah. Um, but I've never built like the whole thing. Right. How does it compare, by the way, just outta curiosity. I don't, I don't have a content background. Is it again, dumb. CEO I'm like content's, just like humans writing stuff.
[00:02:53] So just hire like a person and you're done. How does it compare to like the larger budget you had to build? Um, [00:03:00] it's. It's different in that you're only thinking of like one small piece of it, right? Mm-hmm. So you're only having to think of the content creation, distribution, um, you know, some production like this, like right.
[00:03:14] This, yeah. This is, this is our production budget at work. This isn't free. God no. So, you know, I think you're just thinking of a, kind of a fraction Yeah. Of what you have to. With a full marketing budget, it's very much like what is going to get us to our goals. Yeah. Um, it's also, what can we test? Like what are we gonna put some bets behind that we don't really know if they're gonna pan out.
[00:03:38] Yeah. Um, so actually maybe let, let's take a little bit of a step back of just like how we even got to that point I think would be super helpful. Yeah, I think so. I knew jokes aside, like I knew like it was gonna take some money and, and in the first handful of, of months that you were here, it was already really clear with the limited resources that you had, [00:04:00] that marketing was.
[00:04:02] Working for us and it was something we wanted to double down on. And so like I did know that at some point you were going to to come to me asking for more resources. And so if I remember correctly, it's actually something I approached you about, which is like, Hey, we're getting closer to the back half of the year when we, when you first started doing planning, like I would love.
[00:04:20] For you to tell me what I don't know and like what we should be planning for, which I bet makes budget conversations a little bit easier when you're being asked to create them. Oh yeah. Much easier, right? As opposed to me being like, money please, money please. For real, in real life. Yeah. Um, yeah. 'cause I've been places where, you know, and again, not as a marketing ahead of marketing, but as a content leader where I have to ask for money for every little thing I want to do.
[00:04:48] Yeah. Um. Uh, quite a few places I've been, don't have a formal marketing budget. Uh, it's one of those things where if there's money and we think the idea is good, we'll do it. [00:05:00] Yeah. But I, that makes it much harder. It, it's so funny. I, I am, I speak to so many founders and CEOs now and they often reach out to me and say.
[00:05:09] How are you doing what you're doing? And you know, I'll, I'll talk about like, hey, we, we understood that we market to marketers or, or that, you know, in outbound and sales is getting really difficult and we needed to do something different, so, so. So many executives are excited about the outcome of like, oh my gosh, I see Vector everywhere.
[00:05:28] How are you doing it? But then when I sit down and say like, oh, you have to invest in your marketing team. You have to give 'em a budget. You have to give 'em resources. You can see this like glaze come over their eyes, but they're just like, oh, I thought it was gonna be easy. Yeah. Or that, that can't be it.
[00:05:40] Gotta be can't be. It can't be. It can't be marketing. No. What else are you doing? What else are you, what are your growth hacks? How are you using AI? In outbound emailing, right? Yeah. What else is up your sleeve? Right? Yeah. Because it can't be marketing. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And I think it's, it's so that is a really odd like mindset to have that like you would hire [00:06:00] marketers and not give them the tools they need money being a tool to do their job.
[00:06:03] Yeah. So yeah, I'd been places where I understood the pitfalls of not having a formal budget and just doing things if it's a good idea and there's money somewhere. Yeah. Um. Because then you're, you're requesting budget for everything, um, every time and it just slows it down and it probably feels like you have to fight tooth and nail Yeah.
[00:06:21] For like everything you do. Right. A a lot of time. Now, I won't jump ahead, but like obviously you did eventually get a budget. Yep. And now. It's every time you have a creative idea or you're presented a sponsorship opportunity, it's less about us debating whether we should do it and more about like, you have budget.
[00:06:38] Is this the right, the place you want to allocate it over the rest? That's absolutely what it is. It's, it gives the power to the marketer to make the decision. Oh, I like that. Rather than me having to ask permission. Yeah. Every time I want to do something because now I'm fighting. Sales. Yeah. I'm fighting all the other marketing departments for budget.
[00:06:56] Yeah. Like how do you, how do you prioritize if you aren't gonna [00:07:00] give your marketer Yeah. Or at least your head of marketing. I've been places where even like my CMO didn't have a full marketing budget. Yeah. They just had to go ask for stuff all the time. You know what it's like, you just gave me this.
[00:07:09] It's like a reverse prenup. You know, marketing budget is like a reverse pre-up. Yeah. Like set expectations before shit gets nasty. That's right. Yeah. Get that bad girl. Take it with you. Take it with you don't need no man. That's right. Or no budget. No, you do need budget. You need budget. So, so, okay, so, so. I knew that we needed something.
[00:07:30] Yep. You were excited. You had spent a couple months sort of like understanding the lay of the land, understanding the product, understanding the market. Yeah. What did the process actually look like from that moment on? It was real messy, I'm not gonna lie. Um, it was not like a beautiful like spreadsheet immediately.
[00:07:47] I had no idea what I was doing. I've never put a full marketing budget together before. Put a full me. Yeah. Oh, thank you. I'm gonna take that one to think. Um, I. I started with what I knew, which was [00:08:00] content. Yeah. Um, and I kind of knew like what we would need to do for the year. Um, I had in my head kind of the strategy that I had built and presented to you and Nick of like, here's how we're gonna get there.
[00:08:12] Mm-hmm. Um, and then I, I knew just from my content background, like the, like what it would take to actually do that. So I started there. Well, this was actually really something you educated me on, and like, in hindsight it feels like very obvious, but it, it was. Insightful to me at the moment, which was like everything in your budget was essentially amplification of content, right?
[00:08:32] Yeah. Like you're like, if we don't have anything to talk about, there's nothing to like, like we have nothing to say at events. We have no nothing to write in our ads. We have nothing to publish on our blog. Right. So like everything, I really enjoyed that it was about like, how do we create the assets and the materials and like.
[00:08:46] As a dumb C-E-O-I-I, when I think content, I'm like, oh, she's gonna write blogs. Um, but it truly was like the coal that like stoked the rest of the budget. Yeah, exactly. And, and so it was thinking like, how do we scale that? Yeah. [00:09:00] Um, so that it's not only me. Creating kind of the pieces that come out of, you know, the podcast and all of the stuff that Alex is doing with product marketing.
[00:09:09] Yeah. How do we actually get someone on board to like, take some of that and do other things with it? Yep. So I kind of knew what that would cost. Um, that was where I paused for a while because I kind of had like a small, not panic attack. Not a minty bee. Not a minty bee. Just a little crosses, not a little panty attack, nothing like that.
[00:09:27] But like, you know, a little bit of tightness in my chest because. I, I didn't know what to do from there. And we're, we're just starting out as a company. Yeah. This is the first time we've done anything marketing wise. Yeah. This is the first time we've ever allocated any kind of budget to marketing. We didn't have historical data on, like what had worked before, what we'd spent before, what didn't go well, so we should not do that again.
[00:09:51] What did go well? So we should double down, like we had none of that. And not to mention you're, I'm just guessing, you're probably also trying to weigh out like [00:10:00] what's gonna be the reception of this budget, right? Yeah. Like even if you solved all those problems and you knew what worked and what didn't work, and you have all this historical data.
[00:10:07] You still have to put a number in front of someone that you report to. Yes. And like, and I imagine it's a little bit like negotiation where you're just like, I could start off high, but then they might think I'm crazy. And then that was right. Like, yeah, there's all these things where you had never built these kinds of budgets before that probably were running through your mind.
[00:10:23] What did you do? Like, did you talk to people? Like, like, what'd you do? Oh yeah. So the, and that point is so true. I had to put this document, this budget, this idea. In front of you and Nick and I didn't want you to like laugh me out of the room. Yeah. I didn't want, I needed you to take me seriously. Yeah. I needed you to look at that number and be like, that feels right.
[00:10:44] Yeah. And without reading your mind or being like, how much money can I spend? Yep. It's good that you didn't ask that question 'cause Nick would've been like, uh, $2. Yeah, I know. Per year. I actually think he made a joke where he was like, I'll Venmo it to you. He did. [00:11:00] I'll Venmo your marketing budget. Yes.
[00:11:03] You're like, well, there's a 10,000 limit on Venmo. Yeah. So that ain't gonna work. Yeah. That's a problem. Um, so yeah, like I didn't want to lead the witness. Yeah. Um, but I needed you all to like. Feel good about the number. Here's where I wanted to, this is the balance I wanted to strike. I wanted you to feel excited about it and a little nervous.
[00:11:24] Mm-hmm. I wanted it to make you a little nervous. That happened. I feel like that's a real Yeah, that's exactly how I felt. Excellent. Um, mission accomplishment. Yeah. Yeah. I think you, you need to toe that line a little bit. Yeah. Um, because if you don't, it probably means you aren't asking for really all the things you need in, in.
[00:11:46] As a CEO and as a founder, if. If you are going into meetings and hearing everything you expect to hear, you're the problem. Yeah. You know what I mean? Oh, that's great. Like, like that. Like that's how I feel is like [00:12:00] you should present things to me that challenge me. Make me question would I have done that differently?
[00:12:05] Would I have spent that much? Because if the answer's like, no, I would've done it exactly the same like. Why are you here? Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like, like I, me and I say, why are you here? As if it's your problem. But in reality it's my problem. Why are you here? As in like, like, why haven't I given away that trust?
[00:12:18] Why, you know what I mean? Yeah. Like, so bring back, okay, so you, you didn't know Okay. What was the right number? Yeah. Um, like how to think about these things. Like how did, where'd you go from there? So I had an idea of content. So I built kind of the content bucket first to kind of see where I was. And then knowing.
[00:12:33] What I knew about how much content that content budget would get me. Mm-hmm. Then I was kind of like, okay, I also need to think about kind of these other buckets. One of distribution of that content. Yeah. So that's gonna be some sort of paid media. Yep. Um, and so I, I need to think about that, but like, I'm not a demand gen marketer.
[00:12:53] That's tough for me. I'm not really sure. Yeah. I don't know what number's gonna. Get me, um, to a point where I'm reaching [00:13:00] enough people but not spreading all the content too thin. So, okay. I, I need to pause on that so I kind of set that aside. Yeah. Um, another one was events. Mm-hmm. So we had some, you know, I think going back to the strategy, which I don't think we wanna talk a whole lot about strategy here, but the budget has to tie back to that.
[00:13:15] Yeah. So I think thinking through events being one of our, like big rocks for the year, that felt really important to start thinking about budget wise as well. Yep. We aren't in a place where we're gonna go sponsor like an inbound, obviously. Right. Yeah. So what's gonna be the play for us? Yeah. Probably sidecar type of events at something like Inbound.
[00:13:37] Mm-hmm. Which we have a whole episode on later. Mm-hmm. Stay tuned. Um, stay tuned. Hit that subscribe. That's, I gotta wait, I gotta. Hit that subscribe button. We're starting to get into that Gen Z territory. 6, 7, 6, 7. We're gonna, okay. This is my goal for this podcast this season is to say six seven. Enough that it's not cool to my Yes.
[00:13:58] Almost teenage [00:14:00] daughter anymore. Yeah. So I don't have to hear it at home, so I'm sorry, listeners. It's gotta happen. Wait, if we just have to be fair really quickly. Yeah. 'cause a week ago you introduced this to me and I didn't know what it meant. Yes. And so there's gonna be some list. It doesn't mean anything.
[00:14:11] That's okay. I just wanted make that. Super clear. Yes. If you're, if you're non Gen Z and you're wondering what the hell just means when she says six, seven, so is everybody else. Yeah. No one else knows what that means either. It's a weird middle school slang phrase that they say it's apparently from a song and they will find 7,000 opportunities to say it.
[00:14:26] I used it last night when I was at Disney. Jen was like, what time are you waking up in the morning? I was like, between six and seven. See? Yeah. No. Okay, we're gonna make it so uncool here. Yep. Okay. Where was I? Um, you, you were Okay. Content distribution events. Yes. Events. Yep. So we, um. We're probably not gonna sponsor inbound.
[00:14:48] We are most likely going to do some sort of smaller sidecar event. Mm-hmm. Like at an inbound. Yep. Um, or sponsor. Small but meaningful events. Yeah. That are all the [00:15:00] rage right now. Thank, thank goodness for us. Mm-hmm. Um, so that was kind of where I started. Like what do those packages look like? Okay. Um, I have an idea, but I don't really know.
[00:15:08] Right. So this is where you need to start doing kind of like your research, reaching out to friends who are in these. Basis. Yeah. So a couple things I did. I reached out to a couple of friends who are demand gen marketers. I was like, this is kind of our plan for the year. Like what would that look like to you?
[00:15:21] Right? Yep. Um, in terms of actual dollars, um, can I throw out a dollar amount? Yeah, go for it. Okay. Alright. So, uh, where I landed Yep. Was 50 grand a month. Yep. Everyone collective, like gasp, clutcher pearls real quick. Yeah. Yeah. Bunch of founders just like passed out listening to Yeah. 50 grand a month for, um, for paid media.
[00:15:44] Yeah. I think I had like 36 grand for content creation. Yep. Sounds about right. Mm-hmm. Uh, for the, for the quarter. Yep. Um, and then, um, for events, I think we did somewhere between like. 25 [00:16:00] and 35 grand. Yep. Total for the quarter. And that would be spread out between those sidecar events at big events like an inbound Yep.
[00:16:09] And sponsoring things like, let's say a dinner. Yeah. At a, a smaller event like, uh, exit five drive in a, in a couple minutes we'll talk about like what my side of the equation felt like, what I saw, what you pre communicated to me, who I spoke to. Yeah. So I won't get too ahead of myself, but I will call out that for any market that's putting together a budget.
[00:16:28] That for you is at the top of your spreadsheet for summits at the bottom. That number is what the CEO goes to first. Uhhuh like you, you scroll up, you scroll down, you figure out like where the biggest number is and you decide like how you're going to feel. Yeah. I'm trying to remember. You are like collectively, you were doing a budget for I think, I think it was the back half of the year.
[00:16:49] Yes. And I think the number, the first number. Did it start with a three? Was it two? Yeah, it was like 300. Yeah. For the quarter. For the quarter. Three For the [00:17:00] quarter, yes. And that made me fall outta my chair. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was, so don't, I wouldn't suggest changing anything about what you did, but just know that that's the behavior of the person reviewing the budget.
[00:17:09] Oh yeah. Just like look for that number that, I mean, that's what we all do, right? Yeah. Like I just went shopping for a couch and I get the line itemed like, yeah. Estimate of everything, right? Yeah. There's the couch, the rug, the ottoman, like, and you go to the couch first 'cause you're like, that's the thing, right?
[00:17:22] Yep. So it it's human nature to look for that big ticket item. Yeah. Because that's kind of where you're gonna base everything else off of a hundred percent. So, yeah, I knew that like $150,000 for a. A quarter for paid media was like scary considering we, I don't know. Nick had done some experiments Yeah.
[00:17:38] Here and there. You guys had run a couple things. Yeah. I don't know. You maybe spent a few thousand dollars every quarter, right? Handful. Yeah. Um, handful of thousands. Is that a thing? Thousand thousands? Yeah, handful of thousands. Nick probably just like used, like the free LinkedIn credit that you get when you get a new account.
[00:17:52] He's, he's like, which ads are free? He's like, why did I get returns with my $300 free credit? We love you, Nick. One of us [00:18:00] does. Ooh, that's a, we're sending that to him. That's his, that's his birthday card. Yeah, that is, we love you, Nick. Well, one of us does. So yeah, so it was, it was big. Everything else in there, right?
[00:18:14] So if you're doing the math, um, if. $150,000 for the quarter for paid media. Yep. Um, you know, let's say 75 grand between content and events. Yep. Those are kind of the three big plays. Everything else was just like keeping the lights on. Yeah. The tools we needed. Um. The, the couple of contractors we needed for like web development.
[00:18:38] Yep. Um, someone we would need to actually run paid media because like, I don't know what I'm doing in there. Yeah. I will just throw money out the window. Did you have Alex at this point already a pm m or was that one of the hires in the Yes, yes I did. Okay. Yeah, so she started in April. Okay. But, but to your point, there was a whole section on.
[00:18:55] Uh, human resources, whether that was contractors or full-time hires. Yep. That you [00:19:00] had to kind of like have the forethought to think about where, what are we gonna need in the next six months? And I didn't have any full-time headcount in there just yet. Yeah. If I remember correctly. Yeah. So, um, I just didn't think we were ready.
[00:19:10] I think we needed to do some experimenting before we brought somebody on. Yep. But we needed someone to actually like, do the, you know, the actual work of work. Running the ads. Yeah. Um, so we would bring on a contractor for that. Yeah. So I had this really finally beautiful spreadsheet. It took me a while.
[00:19:26] Yep. Uh, you know, kind of played around with what I, again, to get to that number that would make you feel excited, but also nervous. Yeah. And now it sounds like instead of just a little nervous, it was like real nervous. I was a lot nervous. Yes. You sounded like goofy music. I'm a lot nervous. Garbage. I was a lot nervous.
[00:19:44] Sorry, folks. Parks closed. The moose out front should have told you. That's so funny. Um, so I had this beautiful spreadsheet. Yeah. And I was like. Now what? Yeah. Um, so Dan Murphy, who is [00:20:00] COO at uh, exit five Yep. Is my advisor Yeah. At Vector. So amazing. He gives the best advice and I was like, I'm gonna show this to Dan.
[00:20:09] 'cause Soft tells me he's done a few budgets day. Yeah. A couple budgets in his life. Yeah. So I put it in front of him and I ran him kind of like, you know, through the line items, right? Yeah. And he's like. This is great, but just like, what's the story? Mm. And something clicked for me that like. If I were to put any marketing idea in front of you.
[00:20:28] Yeah. An ad campaign, a video series, a podcast. Yeah. I would build a story around it. Yep. Why we would need to do it. Why right now, what's it gonna do for us? Like how's it gonna drive the business? Right. Yeah. And I realized like, this is no different, A budget is no different, but for some reason, because it was numbers in a spreadsheet.
[00:20:46] Yeah. And not like a crazy concept. Yeah. It did not occur to me that I should be telling you a story about it. Yeah. He was like, this is, I think the numbers are great. I think you need to go back and, you know, it doesn't have to be crazy, but like build a quick deck Yeah. Of like, [00:21:00] what's gonna get, this was, this was his like words.
[00:21:03] What's gonna get them excited to give you this money? Yeah. It's like, ah. So smart. It is. Yeah. Yeah. So one of the things that you did. Um, with this story that I thought was so interesting is I think you understood the dynamics of how you were gonna get your budget approved, right? Like you, you, you had a lot of conviction in, Hey, based off the goals that you've given me, here's the things, the resources I need.
[00:21:25] Then you built this story and then you also understood what the process for the approval was, and you knew that ultimately the yes or no was gonna come from me. But you knew that. I was gonna have to go to Nick as my partner to get the dollars approved. Yeah. Right. He's, he's the penny picture of the company.
[00:21:41] Yep. And so, even though I have had the final say, like you knew that there was this internal championship that you needed to create. Yeah. So you presented this story to me first Yeah. Before presenting it to both of us. I gave you a little sneak peek. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I knew Nick was gonna be my toughest customer.
[00:21:56] Yep. Um, I, I know you Yeah. [00:22:00] Totally get marketing. Mm-hmm. You came up with the ghost, you wrote the website like. I know that you made the shoes. I can say I didn't make the shoe, I made the ghost for the shoes. Nick made the shoes. Look at that. Yeah. Nick, good job, man. Yay. He's, he hates us right now. Um, so I, like I knew and I knew the trust you and I have.
[00:22:26] Yeah. That if I say like. This is what I need to go do what you need me to do. You will essentially maybe make a few tweaks here and there, but be like, great. Go do this. This is blessed. Yeah. Nick is different. Mm-hmm. Nick is incredibly stoic. Mm-hmm. He is. Um, he's a numbers guy. Yeah. And like he's gonna need to know what.
[00:22:45] Exactly. Is this going to get us? Yeah. Like nothing floaty. Yep. Nothing like maybe this is what we think, like I was, I had to put together like some goals Yeah. Of like, this is what, this is my hypothesis of what I think this is gonna get us. Yeah. And so in order to make [00:23:00] sure that it was gonna pass the Nick test.
[00:23:02] Yep. I put it in front of the person who knows Nick the best in the company, which is you, right? Yeah. And so I wanted to make sure one that. You didn't think the numbers were insane. Yep. Um, and two, just just make sure that like, he wouldn't think I was absolutely bonkers and not know what I was doing.
[00:23:19] This is the first time I presented something like this to him. Yeah. Right. A hundred percent. And I had to get it right. Yeah. So yeah, I brought it to you. Yeah. First, but before that, yeah. I built my story. So let me talk a little bit about this, because I think this was, this was the thing that like got me the budget.
[00:23:35] Yeah. Um, and, and we'll get to this in a little bit, but like, spoiler alert, I didn't get everything I wanted. Yeah. Sorry. But like this story was the thing that, that really sold it in. Yeah. So what I needed to do was kind of go back to the strategy one. Mm-hmm. And two, because it was, this was the first budget I was putting in front of you.
[00:23:58] I wanted you both to [00:24:00] remember like why you hired me. Yeah. Um, and what you hired me to do. And so, uh, the first couple of slides were like the situation we're in. And so of course I started it with like a rocky Montage gif. It was like right now we're rocky in the montage. Yeah. Like vector's cool. Mm-hmm.
[00:24:18] We're in training, everyone's cheering for us. Yep. We're like, everyone loves us. Yeah. And they like want us to do well. Yeah. Right. And so like we could go one of two ways. We could step in the ring and like I. Fuck it up. Yep. Or we could like really go into the ring well-trained and ready to like, take down our opponent.
[00:24:37] Yeah. Um, and so, uh, that was like slide one. That was like, I mean, two dudes like, who doesn't love Rocky and put a fucking Rocky game. It's two white dudes. Yeah. Like Rocky Montage. Like it'll work perfect. And ironically it works weird, weird. Genius. Um, so slide two [00:25:00] was, uh, when I was interviewing Yeah. I put together a 30, 60, 90 Yep.
[00:25:05] Plan. And I gave them each, each of those phases, each of those 30 day kind of phases, a name. So the first. 30 days was called SP a code name sponge. Yeah. That was where I was gonna take everything in and figure everything out, meet everyone, get to know the product. Phase two was called scaffolding. Yeah.
[00:25:24] That was where I was gonna build the things we needed to build up to get ready to go do all of the marketing activities we needed to do. Yeah. And start to kind of kick some little things off. And then phase three was called, do you remember? I think it was Ninja Kick. It's called Ninja Kick. And that was when we were gonna roundhouse everyone in the face.
[00:25:42] With our amazing ideas. Yeah. And so that was slide two was, I took a screenshot of that document. Yeah. Um, with, you know, code name Ninja Kick at the top and I was like, we're here, we're at code name Ninja Kick. Well, I think the other thing that was, that helped here, two things [00:26:00] actually. One is. Most people are asked to do like a 30, 60, 90 as part of their like interview process.
[00:26:07] Yeah. You had actually spent the first handful of months actually implementing it, right? Yeah. And I think for a lot of folks it's like an exercise and it gets thrown out the window and we don't actually do it. You were actually doing it, and so this callback in your budget to this thing that you had said you were going to do and you were already.
[00:26:25] Had proved that you were doing it, I think helped us. That was a huge part of, of the conversations Nick and I eventually had, which I'll talk about later, which was just so much of it was trust. Yeah, right. It was less of us going dollar for dollar and saying, do we think we need to do this? It was more of like, do.
[00:26:42] Jess has done nothing but execute all the things that she said she was going to execute. We've got no evidence to prove that we shouldn't support her in what she thinks the strategy is. Yeah. And so I think that that callback between those two things helped us remember like how much you had executed already.
[00:26:56] Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's a good point. Yeah, I think Move on. [00:27:00] Move on. That's enough soft stuff. Keep going enough. Zapping it already. Um, that is, that is your allotted praise for the day, man. That's, I'll talk to you in January. So, yeah, I think it was, um, it, it was, yeah, you're right. I think had I put that in front of you and I hadn't done any of the things I said I was going to do previously, like Yeah.
[00:27:20] Why would you ever think I would execute well on this? Yeah. So it is a lot of just building trust before you get to the point where you're like, money, please. Yeah. Um, so the rest of the deck was really just. Going back to the strategy that we had already talked about. It was like, these are the big bets.
[00:27:36] Yep. This is where the bulk of the money is going to go. Mind you, I hadn't shown you the spreadsheet yet. Yeah. It was just the story. So this is like, Hey, pro tip. Hold the numbers. Yep. Till the end. Get 'em excited. Build the story. Yeah. Right. And so it was like, here's the strategy, here's the three big rocks, paid media events and content.
[00:27:53] Uh, and everything else you're gonna see is just keeping lights on, keeping things moving. The, the, the [00:28:00] scaffolding we need to actually hold up the, the masterpiece, right? Yep. Yeah. And then I put the numbers in front of you. Yeah. And you, and a heart attack. So the reality of it is you had, you had done such a good job with like the story where I was excited at that point.
[00:28:15] Um, you and I, a, a month or two ago just got back from, uh, exit five, which we'll talk about that event in a couple episodes. But one of the sessions that we sat in was. I know her as Demand Gen, uh, yeah. I don't know her actual name, which is Jen Aeu. Yeah, Jen Anu Legend. She's done such a good job with branding that I know her as demand gen.
[00:28:32] Um, but she, she told this like incredible story, uh, that people should go like find her content and, and listen to it. But uh, essentially like if you sell raincoats, right? Don't tell people that you sell raincoats and you're replacing their umbrella. 'cause they'll say, I already have an umbrella. Right. And I think that's what you did such a good job of is you didn't like.
[00:28:48] Put numbers in front of me and say like, give me the opportunity to say, oh, I already have this, or we don't need this, or I have a better solution to this. You told me the story of like what the world would look like. So you gave me this great story, then you ninja kicked [00:29:00] me in the face with the numbers.
[00:29:01] Um, and I, as a believer in marketing was expecting something in that range. Yeah. Um. What I did with that information was I said like, this is great. I don't think I asked you to change anything right away. I think I was just like, okay, I see your framing on this. I see your numbers. Let me go like start to marinade on this and like get people, um, in tune with this.
[00:29:21] And so I believe, and Nick too, Nick was, I think had very similar reaction. Yes. Which I. That was the one I was like worried about. Right? Yes. Yeah. Where he was like, I think this, I think you've put a really compelling story in front of us. Yeah. Um, I do think he said something like, it is more than I was expecting.
[00:29:37] Yeah. But yeah, like, let us take this back. Well, and so here's what was interesting, like, just to make it super clear for folks, you presented to me first. Yep. I did some stuff, which I'm about to talk about. Then you presented to Nick and I. Then Nick and I did some stuff that we'll talk about. Yeah. So you presented to me, um.
[00:29:51] I remember getting off of that call and calling Nick, like literally, I literally picked up my phone and I called him and Nick and I mostly zoom when [00:30:00] we call each other, it's like uhoh, like something, shit, something's happening. Um, and so I called him and. And I told him like, Hey, just, just, just presented her budget.
[00:30:11] Um, 'cause he knew it was coming as well. Yeah. And, and I was like, she did an incredible job. The story's amazing. I think you're gonna be really excited about it. I was like, the numbers more than you, you are expecting. Yeah. And, and, and I remember he like started like routing off numbers, like, is it more than a hundred grand a course and more than 200 grand a car?
[00:30:27] And I was just like. Keep going. Um, and I don't think I told him the number in that. I, I think I was like, Hey, I just want you to know that it's high. Yeah. Be prepared. I don't wanna poison the well in my feelings yet. Like just let Jess present it. And so then you basically ran that same presentation again.
[00:30:41] But now with Nick and I both in it, I think to your point, we had the same reaction again, which is like, this is great. You've done such an incredible job presenting the story. Let us marinate on this. Yeah. Um. And that is when I started kind of going through the process of understanding like, what should the budget be?
[00:30:57] And very similar to you, [00:31:00] where you went and sort of asked, you know, advisors and friends, like what the numbers should be. I also turned to like our, our board and our advisors, and specifically I remember, um, wait, actually, hang on. I have a prop. Oh, oh, okay. Hang on. I printed this out. This is the only time you'll see our notes on paper.
[00:31:16] I, I emailed Jim Stoneham, um, who is one of our advisors and partners over at Signal Fire, and he was the previous CMO of Stripe and the previous CMO of New Relic. And so he knew that this was coming as well. And I wrote, this is May 20th, uh, at 1257. This is probably right after you presented. Hey, Jim. I asked Jess to start pulling together a marketing budget.
[00:31:37] She presented to me with an incredible story. And a number that made me fall out of my seat. Parentheses, I don't know what I don't know. Do you have 15 minutes today to gimme some feedback? Um, and. And, and so he jumped on the phone with me and, and he also commended the story, and he gave me a really good framing that I think like every [00:32:00] CEO or CMO, whoever's present or, uh, accepting a budget or approving or denying it should, should have, which is like, there's no, no.
[00:32:08] In marketing and, and he's like, marketing is a creative thing where you're always trying things, things that worked last quarter won't work next quarter. Things that didn't work last quarter will work this quarter, right. So he's like, there's no nos in marketing. He's like, he's like, what you should do is go through a budget and, and look at what are things that you're already doing that are working.
[00:32:26] So what are you gonna continue? What are things that you're not doing yet and you want to try? So things you're gonna experiment with, and what are things that you are already doing that aren't working that you need to stop doing or change the way that you're doing? So there's no nos. It's just like, like that framing and, and so I.
[00:32:42] I don't think there was a single line item that we struck from your, your budget. Correct. Correct. There was no nos in, in how we processed it. I think the only things that we ended up changing was at the time we weren't doing a lot of like performance marketing or paid media, and so I think we said like, Hey, let's approach this more with [00:33:00] an experimental mind frame.
[00:33:01] Mm-hmm. Uh, I can, I forget what the number was. Instead of 50 grand a month, let's. Start at, well what did we start? 15? 15. 15 K. So we did, we did cut you quite a bit. Yeah. Um, in that particular line item. Um, but I think we said we would like ramp it as things were going better. Yep. Um, and like spoiler alert, they're going really well.
[00:33:20] Um, and so yeah, I think that was really healthy 'cause it allowed me to actually present that framing to you as well. Yeah. Which like, Hey, I love everything you're doing here. I'm not gonna deny like your strategy, let's start smaller on some of these things. Where did we, do you remember where we ended up?
[00:33:36] The total, I think was still in like the 1 75, 180 range. Yeah. So the big, the big cut was the paid media. Mm-hmm. Looking back, it was absolutely the smart thing to do. Yeah. We don't have an in-house demand gen marketer yet. Easter egg, I don't think you're supposed to tell people it's knee egg, but whatever.
[00:33:57] Easter egg, the thing she said was a hint and a [00:34:00] clue. Take note, take note. Why do we turn southern? I don't know. I dunno. Um. But uh, in hindsight, it was absolutely the right thing to do because with no demand gen marketer in-house. Yeah, I. Could not in good conscience, like spend all of that money. I, I couldn't even, we didn't have enough ad creative.
[00:34:21] We, I didn't have enough bandwidth to keep kicking out ad creative and different campaign ideas. Yeah. That would've spent 50 grand a month in the right way. Yeah. So I'm actually really glad that we cut that to where we did. You're welcome. You're, yes. Thank you. You're welcome to cut your budget. I grovel at your feet.
[00:34:38] Not worthy, but it was the, it was the right choice. Yeah. And we learned so much off of that 15 grand a month. Like it sound, it, it doesn't even sound small. I've never had 15 grand a month to run ads. Sure. Yeah. Um. So it was really exciting to me to have anything to run ads. Yeah. And we learned so much.
[00:34:54] Yeah. Um, which we'll talk about in a later episode. Yeah, totally. Of course. Joshua perk. Jessica Cook. Do [00:35:00] you know what time it is? What time is it? It is time for some positivity, positive affirmations. It's the time for positive affirmations for marketers because. We're drowning and have no budget, and they need these positive words of affirmation.
[00:35:16] Say nice things about us. Okay, I think people are done with us singing. Let's do it. All right, let's do it. Dear marketer, your content calendar doesn't predict trends. It creates a timeline. Other marketers call the future.
[00:35:31] Sorry, I'm just picturing you sending me this like spreadsheet of a content calendar and it's just like shitting glitter and gold because it's fricking good. It does do that. Mine do it, do that. Dear marketer, when you set KPIs, your goals achieve themselves outta pure respect for your vision. It's so nice of them to do that for you.
[00:35:52] They just, they just obey. They just do it pure respect. Cool. So I, I feel like we've. We've told [00:36:00] like the real life story of what this actually looked like. Um, but I wanna get to like key takeaways and like summarize this crazy long journey and back and forth. Great idea and storytelling idea. You wrote a LinkedIn post right around the time that we were doing this that I feel like summarized this well and people responded really well too.
[00:36:17] Like, tell us about that. What were your takeaways? How did you summarize this whole process? Yeah, I wanted. People who've never done this before, like me, to like have something to, to have a jumping off point from. Yeah. And so I wanted to put together like the five things that I really took away from this process.
[00:36:31] So the first thing was like, go back to the strategy. Let the strategy guide your budget. You, if you've, if you've built a strategy, you're going to need dollars to make that strategy happen. Yeah. So I went back to the strategy, like the three big rocks were events. Content paid media. That was where I knew the bulk of it was gonna go.
[00:36:50] Let's call it 80 20. I knew 80% was gonna go there. Yeah. 20% was gonna be kind of the, the infrastructure I would need to make those three things happen. Mm-hmm. Um. [00:37:00] So that's the first thing. The second is sell the story. We talked a ton about this, like, don't just put that spreadsheet in front of your leadership team.
[00:37:08] Make sure you're gonna tell, like get them hyped to give you that money. Yeah. That's your goal. The third is actually something you told me. Mm-hmm. Which I love this you, when I first shared the budget with you, um, you kind of taught me like just do a little bit of acknowledging of the budget pressures you don't see in your own department.
[00:37:28] Hmm. So, for instance. Our AWS bill Yeah. Is something that make. You and Nick's eyes twitch. Yeah, right? Yeah. Like worse than the marketing budget. Yeah. We're way worse than the marketing budget. Remember that? Yeah, exactly. I'll never be the aw WS bill if we're gonna be se like recording like season four of this and just gonna like, it's gonna be like just once a million dollar budget.
[00:37:49] I'm be like, remember when you said you weren't gonna be more than the AWS bill? Sorry. That's my goal. Someday ask for more money than the AW s bill. Bill. I like that. That's a really good goal. Heim my friends. Yes. Yes. [00:38:00] Dream your dreams. Dreams. Um, yeah, so I think it was like, I wanted to make sure in the beginning of that presentation that I spoke about that.
[00:38:11] Yeah. And so it was like, Hey, I know there's also things going on outside of marketing that. Don't affect me, don't affect this budget, but are on your minds. Yeah. And like, let's just put that aside for a second because if this budget gets us to where I think it can get us to, those won't be so much of an issue.
[00:38:30] Yeah. So that was really important to acknowledge. Love that. The fourth takeaway, I think is shoot for the moon. Mm-hmm. If you really believe in your plan. Ask for everything. Yep. That is gonna get you there. Mm-hmm. Um, so if you are looking at that strategy and you're like, gosh, this is gonna work, like I know it's gonna work, you have to be just as confident in the money you are asking to make it work.
[00:38:53] Yeah. So put everything in there. The worst that you can hear is, no, it might not happen, but like, don't shoot yourself in the foot by not [00:39:00] asking for it. Yep. The fifth is remember to put travel in there. 'cause I forgot that part. You did Travel. Travel is part of it. That's okay. We just dock it outta your paycheck time.
[00:39:09] You need to travel. So I stay at the Motel six. The motel six. Yeah, I heard Jess is actually sleeping in the studio tonight. Yeah, I, no, that's, they move this table for me and I sleep right here. Speaking of budget, we actually have to pay for this recording, so I think. Did you bring, you brought your corporate card, right?
[00:39:27] Uh, this, this was a great meeting, Jess. I gotta, I gotta go. But it was a good meeting. It was a good meeting. Yeah. This meeting, it could have been a podcast. It could have. It was, it was, this meeting could have been a podcast as a vector. Production vector lets you build ad audiences from real people that visit your site, click your ads and research your competitors.
[00:39:46] Imagine seeing exactly who will see your ads by name before you spend a dime. It's a great time to be alive. Marketers go give it a whirl at vector.co. See you next time.