[00:00:00] Jess: What you got there, Josh?
[00:00:01] Josh: Oh, hey Jess. Just, um, 500 custom Cards Against Humanity Decks.
[00:00:06] Jess: Oh. What are we doing with those?
[00:00:08] Josh: I don't know. I thought that was your job,
[00:00:15] Jess. Yeah. Can I tell you about the time that I ordered 500 Custom Cards Against Humanity Games? Please
[00:00:22] Jess: do.
[00:00:22] Josh: Uh, I think it was right before I hired you. Yeah. I had no strategy for gifting at all, but I was like, these are sick. So the the
[00:00:33] Jess: strategy was cool. Dope.
[00:00:38] Josh: No, there was, there was a little bit of strategy in it.
[00:00:40] Okay, let's hear it. Um, I knew and it was like a huge piece and like why I fell in love with you and why you had to come be our marketing leader. I knew that. We had a really interesting persona, which like we market to marketers. Yeah. And like I remember going to like tons of trade shows and just being like, ah, these, like the swag, the [00:01:00] booth.
[00:01:00] Like it's so unimaginative. Yes. It's so uncreative and, and I felt like I. What I learned at Drift was if you can find a way where marketers fall in love with the brand first, it almost helps them like fall in love with the product. Yeah. So I was like, we need cool swag. And so there was like some things that were important to me and like what our swag would look like.
[00:01:22] And the first idea that came to mind, I was like, what if we had something that was like small so it could like travel Well Yep. Was like, uh, unique and differentiated where people like it turned their heads. Yep. And then. Could we find something that almost had like a viralness built into it? Oh, yes. And I just remember like, it just clicked one night and I was like, cards Against Humanity.
[00:01:43] Yes. Like such a fun game. Like marketers love the creativity of it. And if we could like do a Marketers Against Humanity Yes. This would be awesome.
[00:01:51] Jess: And like a little sarcastic, which we all are, right? Yes. And um, it has all three of those things in spades. Yes. Like it's super unique. [00:02:00] It's small. You can get at a trade show and you're not like, how the hell am I gonna get this home?
[00:02:03] Yes. Thanks a lot. Yep. And third, it's like, oh, I actually wanna go play this with people. Yes. And I'm gonna take a picture of like the craziest stuff we come up with in post it.
[00:02:11] Josh: Yes. I didn't anticipate that getting the cards to trade shows was gonna be a pain. They're small when they're just one. Yeah.
[00:02:19] When you're bringing a hundred of them at the time, they're like 500 pounds. Yeah. Kind of expensive to ship.
[00:02:23] Jess: What did you have to, uh, pay for a suitcase one time?
[00:02:26] Josh: Well, so first of all, this is why I needed you, because, uh, CEOs don't know that, like events and swag and shipping stuff's like a whole thing.
[00:02:34] Mm-hmm. So I just shoved them in my carry-on bag, showed up at the Delta check-in, and they're like, that's gonna be $400. I was like, for what? They're like, your bag's like 200 pounds. It's like, all right, I guess. And
[00:02:45] Jess: we have to go hire some people to carry it.
[00:02:47] Josh: Yeah, yeah. Yep. It was wild. But investing in swag was one of like the, like the coolest things I think we did early on, but we don't really, or I didn't have a strategy around them.
[00:02:58] Jess: Well, that's [00:03:00] okay. I think part, so part of what drew me to the company was when I saw the swag. Yeah. I was like, oh, they're really thinking differently about everything. Right down to swag.
[00:03:10] Yeah. And
[00:03:11] Jess: I thought that was so interesting that. I could see the thought you had put into it and I was like, if he puts this much thought into swag, like imagine, yeah.
[00:03:18] How much thought he's going to put into like the actual marketing and the branding and why we do the things we do. Yeah. So that was really, really exciting just to see like I had never seen Yeah, A CEO like care that much about like what it was first of all.
[00:03:34] Yeah.
[00:03:34] Jess: And not just go straight to like, Ooh, we have to have pens, but like cool pens, right?
[00:03:39] It's like, no, let's try again. No.
[00:03:40] Josh: Yeah. No more USB devices,
[00:03:42] Jess: right? Yeah.
[00:03:43] Josh: Yeah. Well, jokes on you. I tricked you. Now you're here, you can't leave. Uh, no. I think, um, I think it was an important thing that we did. Um, but, but now you are here and we're starting to like. Put some rhyme to the reason. A reason to the rhyme.
[00:03:54] Yeah. One of those two. Uh, which my wife loves by the way, because I've had about a hundred [00:04:00] lines or a hundred bags of, uh, like swag and card games and boxes just aligning my halls at home.
[00:04:07] Jess: Yes, wives love that. We she loves it.
[00:04:09] Josh: We need to get rid of it. How are we gonna get rid of it? Just
[00:04:14] Jess: Okay. Uh, gimme a day.
[00:04:15] No, I'm just kidding. So I think let's, real quick. Yeah. I think there's some level setting here, like. Should you have some sort of strategy behind your swag? Is a, is a pretty good question, I think. Yeah. Yeah. Because you have to have it. Mm-hmm. Like every company has to have some sort of giveaway, right?
[00:04:31] Yeah. So that can be, that's enough reason to go get something. So it was like, you know, you know some things you don't have to build such a creative. Plan around. Yeah. You just need it.
[00:04:39] Yeah.
[00:04:39] Jess: So that's one thing, but I think there is something to be said of like, we have all of this, like, now what can we do?
[00:04:46] Yes. Right. That's, that's cool.
[00:04:48] Yeah.
[00:04:48] Jess: Um, it's very much like when you have customer proof or like social proof and you're like, okay, we have this. Let's, I don't wanna waste it. Yes. Like this is a very important bull bullet in the chamber. Yeah. Like, what can we [00:05:00] do? Yeah. So we're thinking of some very interesting ways of going about like.
[00:05:06] Getting rid of, please
[00:05:08] Josh: take it.
[00:05:09] Jess: Not, uh, not getting Josh a divorce. Yes, yes,
[00:05:13] yes.
[00:05:13] Jess: So, um, so the first one obviously is gifting. Yeah. Like, let's talk about gifting a little bit and how we see that. Yeah. Um, and how. How we actually like strategize around gifting. 'cause there's a very specific spot in the funnel Yeah.
[00:05:26] That we really like to execute on gifting.
[00:05:28] Josh: Yeah. And this is hopefully in the first couple episodes we, we've done a good job of not having shameless plugs. Totally. But this is one of the ones where like, we use factor for this. Yes. Right. So the, the first part is like, you helped me understand this, like, giftings an expensive thing.
[00:05:41] Yes. Right. So it can't go to everyone. Um, and so you and I sat down particularly when we were. Planning out just our CBM strategy, our contact based marketing strategy. Yep. Which is obviously what Vector helps with. But, um, he basically said, Hey, there's this like, special part in the funnel that like Vector can help predict when someone is, um, like starting to show interest in [00:06:00] something.
[00:06:00] 'cause we don't want it to go to. Everyone, right? We don't have the budget for it. Um, but we also don't want it to go so late in this, this sales cycle that it's basically just a gift to existing prospects, right? Right. We want to move the needle. And so you called out, like there's this really special part in like vectors like buying journey, uh, prediction that we have where it's like, okay, when people enter this state, we're gonna give it to them.
[00:06:21] Um. And then we also realized that there's like a couple different layers to not only gifting but direct mail as well. Yeah. And so like you and I have been doing some stuff that we're like, Hey, let's warm 'em up with like postal, which got acquired by Send Doso shout out. Yeah. Uh, we're so excited for them.
[00:06:36] So like we start sort of there and then as we start to move into more intent, we say, okay, now let's actually start putting like real dollars behind the gifting program.
[00:06:44] Jess: Yes, absolutely.
[00:06:46] Josh: Yeah.
[00:06:46] Jess: Um. I love too that like there, I think it was so smart to think about shareability.
[00:06:51] Yeah.
[00:06:52] Jess: Because we're already getting some of that when we gift.
[00:06:54] Yeah.
[00:06:55] Jess: We're getting people like posting like, oh my gosh, vector swag is the best way. Yeah. And they're like posting [00:07:00] it on, on LinkedIn and and tagging us and that's really, really fun to see. And then people are like, I want one of those. Yes. How do I get on the list? Right. Yes.
[00:07:06] Josh: And that's something that I was like super interested to get like your feedback on, which is like, I remember like.
[00:07:10] The Ice bucket Challenge, right? Yeah. Which was like, like you could just go do it, but it was way cooler if you got nominated for it. Yes.
[00:07:16] Jess: Which by the way, yeah, it's back.
[00:07:18] Josh: Is it really?
[00:07:19] Jess: Um, my daughter just did this like two weeks ago. I had to dump ice on her head, A bucket of ice water. What are we doing?
[00:07:24] Josh: Let's go.
[00:07:26] Jess: And now I nominate you. Joshua
[00:07:27] Josh: Kirk. Here. We just sitting in a podcast like Booth, just
[00:07:31] Jess: so it's back. It's like a, it's like a middle school thing right now. Is
[00:07:33] Josh: it for the Say because before it was for a LS, right? Is it correct? Is it for, it's not, it's not. It just.
[00:07:38] Jess: Couldn't even tell you. I think it's like a, they caught wind of this and now they're like, I want double water money.
[00:07:43] It's just
[00:07:44] Josh: like classic. Just like the next generation just being like, we up with this, taking everything I now God. Yeah. They're above bottom jeans. Like we did that already through
[00:07:53] the first time.
[00:07:54] Josh: Yes. Um, yeah, so, but you and I were talking about that, which is like, the shareability is [00:08:00] really cool, right?
[00:08:00] So like for the Cards Against Humanity in particular is really nice 'cause it's like small people can take pictures of it and we're seeing that. Yeah. Where like our. Our corporate account gets like tagged and Ed? Yes. Uh, recently by like other large corporate accounts as well. Yeah. That are like using our swag to like come up with interesting combinations that are relevant to their business and then taking pictures of it, which is super cool.
[00:08:18] But like, yeah. So we kind of baked that into it and I feel like that's something that's missing in most sort of like. Gifting and swag strategies. Totally. Like I get the same sort of like, you want a Yeti mug schedule a demo. Yeah. Right. You're like, you want a USB charger? It's like, no, I have 27 of them.
[00:08:32] Yeah, and so I think good swag is like very intentional from the beginning.
[00:08:36] Jess: Yes, Josh.
[00:08:38] Josh: Mm-hmm.
[00:08:38] Jess: I think we've reached the part of the show where we look deep, deep into the camera and really awkwardly and creepily, but also in a really nice way. Yeah. Give marketers the positive affirmations they deserve.
[00:08:50] That's
[00:08:50] Josh: my favorite part. Let's do it. It's Dear marketer leads. Chase you
[00:08:55] Jess: dear marketer. Your landing pages are so good. Your competitors [00:09:00] bookmark them for research purposes. Okay. Another reason that I think swag is super important is you just went to the CMO summit.
[00:09:08] Yeah. And
[00:09:08] Jess: you had all of this with you and people were like clamoring for it.
[00:09:11] Yes.
[00:09:12] Jess: And I think again, like they come up to the booth, they see it, they understand what kind of brand we are. Just by seeing the swag is different. Yes. Like what was that vibe like when you were there?
[00:09:20] Josh: I couldn't like hand it out faster than they were coming up to it. It was actually funny. Um. Uh, Kyle Lacey, yeah.
[00:09:26] Who recently left, uh, jellyfish and went to Docebo. Um, he came over like early in the day as we were like getting our booths set up, and he like picked it up and he examined it and I knew who Kyle was. Yeah. And I was just like, kind of fanboy. I'm just like, do you wanna talk about it? And he was like, we did something like this 10 years ago at like my other, my past company for engineers.
[00:09:45] And he is just like. It's so cool to see like this creativity coming back into marketing. Yeah. And then he went up during his speech or during his event and talked about it. Oh,
[00:09:55] that's
[00:09:55] Josh: so cool. Which was so cool. And so like people were coming out, I wasn't in that event 'cause I had to man the [00:10:00] booth.
[00:10:00] People were coming out like, oh, this is like the elusive like card game that people are talking about. Like people are talking about it. And so for the rest of the show, people were just like, can I grab one? Can I grab one? And so. I think that like, you know when you've done event swag correctly, right? Yes.
[00:10:14] Because it's just like, it's the talk of it. Yeah. And so that was such a cool feel. And that's why I, we mentioned in one of the previous episodes, I came back from that trip and like called you and I was like, actually, I think I called you while I was there. You did? And I was just like, Jess, like, you don't understand.
[00:10:26] Right. Like, this is working. You were right. We should have invested in the brand a long time ago. So it was eye-opening.
[00:10:32] Jess: Yeah. Well I think there's, there's a way that people do event swag.
[00:10:36] Josh: Yeah.
[00:10:37] Jess: That is like, I think the most downer thing you can possibly do, which is like if you let us scan your badge, you'll be entered to win the one thing we brought.
[00:10:47] Right? Oh yeah. And it's like, okay, so. If you scan 500 people, 499 of them are losers. Right, exactly. Yeah. And it's like, it sets up this weird, there's no instant gratification. It sets up this weird like winner loser thing. Yeah. [00:11:00] And it's just like, how, why would you want your brand to be associated with that?
[00:11:02] Yeah. So I love this idea of like, give everyone something. Yeah. Super interesting and different. Yes.
[00:11:07] Josh: And by the way, the random draw, we know you went in the fishbowl and just picked the company that you actually wanna close. Yeah,
[00:11:12] Jess: totally. Yeah. Was a random,
[00:11:13] Josh: yeah, no, that's not like, not so well kept secret.
[00:11:15] Not kept at all. Um, well, and that's what I liked about this particular, uh, like the way we did our lineup. Like we have those pieces as well. Right. We have expensive ones. Yep. We have custom legos. We have um, like these really beautiful like sweatshirts, right? Yep. That are embossed with our logo. Uh, and we should talk about those as well.
[00:11:32] Yeah. 'cause those were like very intentional. Like we have those things that's like, yeah. They're. 30, 40 bucks a piece. I can't give them the every trade show. Yes. Attendee. But that doesn't mean that like we skimped out on the thing that does go to everyone. Yeah. Those cards weren't expensive. They're like three, four bucks a piece.
[00:11:49] Yeah. Um, and talk
[00:11:50] Jess: about that a little bit. Yeah. Where did you even find them? How did you source? Them.
[00:11:54] Josh: Yeah. So like the, the idea came to me like literally overnight. I was like, this could be a really cool idea. And I started [00:12:00] researching like, like one, can we do this? Yeah. Because this is someone else's brand.
[00:12:03] Right? Right. Um, and one of the things that's really cool, like steal our ideas, uh, for anyone out there Yes. Uh, cars Against Humanity is like an open source, uh, license. They're okay with you making That's cool. Like parodies of it. Cool. Yeah. As long as you don't like do for profit. Right, right. So I was like, cool.
[00:12:15] It's a parody. We'll give it away for free. Yeah. Um, and so I remember, uh, once I had the idea, they don't have like a template for it, so I literally like took a picture of my actual Cards Against Humanity game and like brought it into Photoshop and just like pixel by Pixel star, like copying like the, the fonts and the sizes and all that sort of stuff.
[00:12:34] Jess: I'm sorry, wait a second. Yeah, I did not realize it. You made, oh yeah. You designed the game. Oh
[00:12:38] Josh: yeah. Yeah.
[00:12:39] Jess: Okay.
[00:12:40] Josh: Designed it. And then also the, the cards themselves were like, at first I went to AI and I was like, ah, these are just okay. Yeah. And like AI is not as good at understanding our brand, which is like unhinged.
[00:12:52] Yeah. I was like, I'm okay with it being like a little wild. Yeah. And so at first I tried to generate with them ai and that didn't work. I wrote all 180 of the cards. [00:13:00]
[00:13:00] Jess: I didn't, okay. This is like news to me. I did not realize
[00:13:03] Josh: this. Yeah. I
[00:13:03] Jess: love them even more.
[00:13:04] Josh: Thank you. Thank you. Uh, yeah, and that's the thing is like.
[00:13:08] Swag doesn't have to be one of these like, oh, run and grab a hundred thousand dollars worth of budget. Right, right. It's like, what can we do on limited resources and what can we do with our creativity? And like you and I have like, uh, bonded over this. Yeah. Which is like, where, what can we actually put like real creativity?
[00:13:24] And I think for marketers, especially digital marketers, we're kind of hungry for that. Right. Yeah. It's just like, I. I'm done like designing the next ab, the next landing page, and so to like be able to do a physical object, I was like, this is really fun. Yeah,
[00:13:36] Jess: that is really cool.
[00:13:37] Josh: So yeah, designed them all and then.
[00:13:39] I remember, I think I just was like on Reddit being like places to like publish cards and there's uh, there's literally, I'll have to like, we'll link it in the show notes or something. Yeah. But there's like, yeah, just some shop and I think they're overseas, so maybe there's some like tariffs that make it more expensive than it is now.
[00:13:55] But at the time, um, no political
[00:13:57] Jess: statements are being made at this time.
[00:13:58] Josh: Yep. Not one [00:14:00] way or the other. Just expensive. Um. And so, yeah, so I, I sent them over there and yeah, you get to pick like the card qua quantity and quality and the cool, the box and all that. And it was perfect.
[00:14:11] Jess: Tell me about the Legos.
[00:14:12] 'cause that's really cool too.
[00:14:13] Josh: Those were really, yeah. So I loved those. Um, okay. So here was like the thought process. So there was like the, I want the one thing that's like shareable, which is what the Cards against Humanity. And then the other thing that I always experienced at trade shows is like, I always was just looking for stuff for my kids.
[00:14:26] Yes. Right. I was like, I was like, like that's always the thing Brilliant. I was searching for. Yeah. So I was like. What's the thing that's like, can be on brand, but like a marketer could also bring back home to her daughter or her son. Love I was like Legos.
[00:14:39] Yes.
[00:14:39] Josh: Um, and so there's a really cool company I feel like, that we should, this should be a sponsored podcast.
[00:14:43] It should be because in every episode we need money from these people. We just like, shout out these people. Build a mock. You can go get custom Legos there. Uh, so build a mock. Really cool company out in Spain. You basically just like bring them an idea and they have designers that are just like, yeah, I'll like build a model for you and you can see if you like it.
[00:14:59] And so like I sent [00:15:00] them all of our creatives, like Here's our ghost, it's unhinged, here's our color palette. And they came back and they're like a ghost in a funnel. And I was like,
[00:15:06] Jess: fuck yes. And then we got, I got to help with the booklet, the instruction booklet. Yes. That comes with it. We got to brand that.
[00:15:15] Yes. The one. First project it
[00:15:17] Josh: was. So I was
[00:15:17] Jess: like, I wrote the little thing on the inside cover. Yeah.
[00:15:20] Josh: Yeah. They let, so they let you basically Yeah. Design every piece of that, right?
[00:15:23] Jess: Yeah, exactly.
[00:15:24] Josh: It's
[00:15:24] Jess: amazing.
[00:15:25] Josh: It's so cool. And then so cool. And they did the little like, uh, like, um, logo on the pieces. So no, it was super perfect.
[00:15:31] And then, um, also not super expensive. I think this ended up being like 20, 25 bucks a piece, so, okay.
[00:15:36] Jess: Yeah. So a good, like mid-range. Mm-hmm. So what I'm hearing, let me play this back to you.
[00:15:41] Josh: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:15:41] Jess: Is, um. We have a, we have like one that is very shareable.
[00:15:45] Yep.
[00:15:45] Jess: Cost effective.
[00:15:47] Yep.
[00:15:47] Jess: People can get them and take them home, play with them.
[00:15:49] Mm-hmm. Post about it. Right. We have one that's like mid tier
[00:15:53] Yep.
[00:15:53] Jess: That we can also give away.
[00:15:55] Yes.
[00:15:55] Jess: But is like, I love the idea of like, I just need something for my kids. Like involve the family, [00:16:00] solve another problem Yes. For the marketer. Yes. Which is like, so brilliant. Yep. And then we have a third tier.
[00:16:04] Josh: Mm-hmm.
[00:16:05] Jess: Which
[00:16:05] Josh: is our third tier is basically like our high end, like, Hey, let's like really treat a marketer. And so we wanted like every person or every company has like the, the, like the physical swag. Yeah. Like the, the t-shirts, the apparel. Exactly. The apparel. And so we're like, okay, we need to do something like that.
[00:16:21] But. As you know now, like we look at everything through a lens of like, how can we do it differently? And so I thought really deeply about like, who's our persona? And again, broad generalizations, but like marketers, typically women. Yep. Right. Um, maybe late twenties to like mid forties. Yep. Maybe into their fifties.
[00:16:40] Right. And so, uh, when you get to that, that age and that demographic, you're like, okay. Like that marketer doesn't want like a white t-shirt. No. With like vector. Dur slapped on it. Right, right. I was like, but at the same time, I can't just go like, buy her designer bag and be like, buy, right. Like, there's no like brand awareness here at all.
[00:16:57] Who's your
[00:16:57] Jess: Birkin? Yeah. Yeah. Oh God.
[00:16:58] Josh: Don't, oh, if we had [00:17:00] those, my wife would be, uh, much more supportive of this company. Uh, so I was like, okay, what can we, what can we, what can we do? So, um, I found this, uh, US based company that does like full custom, like cut and sew apparel. And, uh, I literally like went to my wife and I was like, what kind of apparel would you wear?
[00:17:18] And so like, we're like, oh, there's like, um, like most women love, like crew necks over the hoodies. Yep. Um, there's like a, I forget what the cut is, but there's like a certain cut that's like really popular with crew necks right now. And so we knew like, okay, let's. Do that. Let's go in like high-end quality, soft, like yes.
[00:17:35] Um, I learned so much about like whether it's palable and all sorts of crazy stuff
[00:17:40] Jess: that all the ladies know. All the ladies.
[00:17:42] Josh: Um, but the thing that like really I think did it for us is I didn't want, I wanted it to be branded. But I didn't want it to be like gaudy. Yeah. Where someone wouldn't wear it. And so we took our logo and we just embossed it.
[00:17:55] We like, if you're looking straight onto it, you can't even tell. It's like a vector, uh, [00:18:00] piece of swag. And then he turned sideways. So you can see the letters, like vaguely. Yeah. Embossed into it. It's beautiful.
[00:18:04] Jess: You know, you're a CEO who just said I got swag, that you can barely even tell my company names on it.
[00:18:09] Yeah. Like that. No, like I say that in the best way possible. Yeah. Right. Where it's like you are thinking about the user first. Yeah.
[00:18:16] And
[00:18:16] Jess: I think that that's such a, that's such a big deal. Um, and I remember you texted me Yeah. And you were like, are you team crew neck or hoodie? Right? Yeah. And I was like, crew neck all the way.
[00:18:25] Yes. Like it's so much more versatile. I can dress it up, I can dress it down, right? Yes. Like these are the things that we female marketers think about.
[00:18:30] Josh: Yes. Well, and that's the other thing is I think like, um. E executive, it's just people in general should like understand when they're not the demographic.
[00:18:37] Yeah. Right. So like I asked you first asked my wife, I think you even put like a LinkedIn post out, which is like, yes you did. Which one do you care about? And it's funny, they were actually and Cru Neck, the Crewneck won. Yeah, it was a little closer than I thought, but then I looked at the results and all the women are voting for the Crewneck.
[00:18:51] There you go. And for some reason men couldn't read the first sentence, which is like, if you're a man, don't reply to this. Classic. Classic.[00:19:00]
[00:19:00] Yeah. It worked out nice.
[00:19:02] Jess: It's, they're so good.
[00:19:03] Josh: Yeah. Okay.
[00:19:03] Jess: We actually, we, we started out really strong with like all the reasons we're using swag. Yeah. And then we did a huge tangent. I wanna come back 'cause we have a couple more reasons. Yeah. And kind of like strategies behind how we're gonna use our swag.
[00:19:14] So one is influencers. Yeah. So. We talked in the last episode about, um, you know, having this influencer strategy and wanting someday to have like this great partnership with maybe some micro influencers. Yep. And like, how are we gonna work with them? And I think one really great way to like kickstart a, a relationship like that is with a great piece of swag.
[00:19:35] Yes.
[00:19:35] Jess: And I think like the card game is a perfect example where you could send that card game to 10, 20 different influencers and, and the brief is. Um, find the pair of cards that describe the thing that irks you the most about, like your role in marketing, right? Yes. And you would get 20 different answers and they would put that out there and it would be so shareable.
[00:19:54] Yes. You get 'em to do it on like the same day or same week and it just like floods people's feeds for a few days. Yes. Like, [00:20:00] ah, ah, chef's kiss. Yes. Like that is amazing.
[00:20:03] Josh: I think that's such a, like a, and I love, like when you brought me that idea, because the thing that I've seen a lot on LinkedIn is this sort of like.
[00:20:10] Overly done, sort of like we bought a bunch of bottles of champagne. Yeah. Or like, we sent out like the same like fundraising announcement kit to these like 50 people and it's just like, okay, yeah. You're, you've taken over my feed. Like it's worked.
[00:20:25] Yes.
[00:20:25] Josh: But it's, it's not. Giving to like the receiver at all.
[00:20:30] Right? Yeah. It's just basically like, okay, I now know from 50 people that you raised your series B, congratulations. Right? Yeah. Whereas like the idea you brought on the cards, it's like one, I think the influencers like it more. They're more likely to work with us. Yeah. 'cause it's actually good content for them.
[00:20:42] Yes. Right. It's not screaming vector. Yep. Um, and then two, I think you're, you're more likely to get a good response from it as well. Yeah. Because it's not screaming vector. It's like, oh, this is funny. This was interesting and relevant to me.
[00:20:53] Jess: Yeah, exactly. I can relate to this. And now I'm looking for others.
[00:20:57] Like if I see two, I'm like, oh, there's more of these. Yes. I want, you know? [00:21:00] Yeah. I hope more pop up. Right. And I think that is what we want. People to feel about our brand. Yes. Like they can't get enough. Yes. We always leave them wanting some more
[00:21:07] Josh: question for you. Yes. Because I've never, I've never been in this position where like I had to make like swag decisions.
[00:21:12] Yeah. You've obviously been on lots of marketing teams. You've been on both traditional digital side of marketing. Um. Do most companies go through that deep methodical, like, what should our swag be? Process?
[00:21:23] Jess: No.
[00:21:24] Josh: Where does that decision get made?
[00:21:25] Jess: Uh, it's usually like, oh, the CEO likes bucket hats. I'm not even joking.
[00:21:30] This is a real story. The CEO likes bucket hats. Get a bunch of bucket hats. It's like, well, does everyone else like bucket hats? Except for like gen alpha, right? Yeah. Like, no. So why do we have a bunch of bucket hats, right? Oh. Um, I also then on the flip side of that, I had a CEO who hated. The logo on a hat.
[00:21:49] Really? We weren't allowed to have hats with the logo on it.
[00:21:52] Josh: What? Yeah,
[00:21:53] Jess: it was just like a mandated rule. Was it a hat or
[00:21:55] Josh: a logo issue?
[00:21:56] Jess: Uh, I'm not gonna say just not [00:22:00] gonna go there, but, so I've literally been on both sides of the hat coin. Wow. Which is really weird. Yeah. So, no, the answer is people don't.
[00:22:07] They think they get swag and they have it covered. Yeah. And there is, I think we're proving a way to let swag,
[00:22:15] Josh: yeah.
[00:22:15] Jess: Have your brand stand out.
[00:22:17] Josh: Well, I think what you just said that's really interesting is like. We're looking for opportunity where others think there's not opportunity. Yeah. Right. And like that's what marketers are just all about, which is like, hey, we can just go do the normal thing.
[00:22:28] Pull up the swag catalog and like order the pens. Yes. Order the notepads. Yeah. Order the moleskins. Yeah. Right. Or it's like, hey, how can we actually use this as an opportunity to elevate the brand?
[00:22:36] Jess: Yes, totally. Brendan er. Hi Brendan. You're great. He calls that checkbox marketing. Mm-hmm. Where he's just like, you just, you're just doing the thing to do the thing, right?
[00:22:45] Yeah. And it is, it's like, oh, we need swag, we need stuff with our logo on it.
[00:22:48] Yeah.
[00:22:49] Jess: And there's just so, there's such a much, and, and I think the other thing is we have a very small catalog of swag. Yeah. Like there are companies you go and they have 40 items.
[00:22:57] Mm-hmm.
[00:22:58] Jess: And it's like, okay. I, I like [00:23:00] our small, very strategic, you know what?
[00:23:02] We had so much strategy behind this swag did. We're not giving us, we did. Yeah. What are we talking about? I know. There's, so the fact that we have three things, they're very carefully, um, and intentionally chosen. Yeah. Um, there are different price points. They're for different reasons. Yeah. But each one of them has like.
[00:23:17] A lot of thinking behind that. Yeah. Um, that feels really important.
[00:23:21] Josh: And it sounds like it starts at the top, right? Yeah. Like you can't expect a marketing team to be creative if you are expecting them to do checkbox marketing, is what you called it. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. Like that's like, it, it has to be embedded in the culture.
[00:23:33] Yeah. You know, and it goes back to, I think we talked this on like episode one or two, which is like, if you. Continuously, ask your marketing team, go do this. Go chase that. Right? They're not gonna do the other things that you've asked them to do with as much rigor and curiosity and creativity, and so giving them that bandwidth to say, Hey, let's go do swag, but let's actually have the space to go do it well is important.
[00:23:54] Yes,
[00:23:54] Jess: totally.
[00:23:55] Josh: Yeah. Mm-hmm. One of the other use cases has been really interesting is Ally Sobel on our team. Yes. [00:24:00] Who leads up solutions the the best, which she's amazing. Uh, shadow Ali. Uh, she, so solutions at Vector for everyone listening is like our customer team. Yep. We're can have a whole nother episode on why we don't call it that.
[00:24:12] But, uh, every, all you need to know is that Ali leads up our customer team Yes. Called Solutions. Um. She's been like all up in your inbox. Yes. Being like, swags ready. I want to use it. Yes. Talk to me about the importance of swag. Not only pre-sales, but post.
[00:24:28] Jess: So I think, again, going with this idea of like, we are brand first.
[00:24:32] I really believe that about us, that we, we really care. About what everything we do says about our brand.
[00:24:38] Yeah.
[00:24:38] Jess: And I think that comes right down to how we show our customers appreciation.
[00:24:42] Yeah.
[00:24:42] Jess: Um, this is one of our favorite ways to do that, is to send them really interesting, cool gifts like this, right?
[00:24:48] Where we're like, Hey, thank you so much for a great quarter. Or they have a huge win. Mm-hmm. Right? And we're like, oh my gosh, we just. Like blew this outta the water for you. They got a deal, you know? Yeah. They closed a deal that they've been trying to [00:25:00] close for six months because they use Vector. Yep. And it's like, ugh, that's huge.
[00:25:04] Like, let's send them something. Right? Yeah. Um, and we've had customers post, right? Yeah. You know, um, on, and they're wearing the swag and they're holding the Legos and like,
[00:25:13] so cool. It,
[00:25:14] Jess: it's cool. It's inter it's fun to get something different like that. Yeah. I would never post about a pen.
[00:25:19] Josh: No, exactly. And I
[00:25:20] Jess: think that that.
[00:25:22] That's a huge difference to show not only do we appreciate the customers, but like we understand their level of taste as well. Yes. Yeah. And that feels really important.
[00:25:30] Josh: Yeah. One of the things that both you and Allie have been really insistent on is right now, my wife, God love her because all that swags in my house, it ships from my house.
[00:25:40] Yeah. And so you guys have been really helpful in saying like, Hey, if you're the one shipping it, like yes, put a note in it. Right. Like, so every single like kit that we ship out to our customers, I put like a handwritten note of like, you know, you guys have been crushing it. Yes. Or thanks for, um, partnering with us on this beta.
[00:25:55] Um, by the time this comes out, uh, funnel Vision will be launched. Yes. And we're working with [00:26:00] folks like Sydney Waterfall on some of that. And so like being able to send her something that's just like, thank you for your partnership. Yes. And just having that handwritten note, like, I love things that don't scale.
[00:26:08] Jess: I was, I was literally, he just read my mind. I love it. I was going to say, there are certain things that are un. Scalable. Yep. Like that. A CEO handwriting a note with every single swag send Yes. Is totally unscalable. Yeah. But at this stage it feels so important and authentic and wonderful. Yeah. For our customers, early stage customers who are trusting us at this like weird point in our history where like, yeah, we're not perfect yet.
[00:26:29] We're trying to build software really quickly for you. Yeah. And make it great. Yes. And we're gonna hit some snags and they get that. And like for us to be like, thank you. Yes. There's like this crazy ass gift that we, you know,
[00:26:40] Josh: you're probably tired of hearing me say 'cause I reference it all the time in our one-on-ones.
[00:26:43] But like, I reference the Crossing the chasm all the time. Yes. Love crossing. Never get sick of that. It's, it's such a good reference. So good. And, and we are definitely early stage left of chasm. Yes. I think actually more companies are left of chasm than they think they are. Even as you start to get into hundreds, 250 employees, there's still a lot of product [00:27:00] market fit that has to be figured out.
[00:27:01] Yeah. And so when you're left of chasm, you have customers that are. Early adopters, putting up with bugs, all sorts of stuff. Yes. And so, um, actually, funny enough, Allie calls it, sometimes she calls her role like head of friendship because there's an element of it that's like, Hey, you bought a product, you bought it for the value.
[00:27:17] It, it delivers, but there's times when things are gonna go wrong. Yeah. Right. Like they're buying partners, they're buying that thing that won't scale.
[00:27:23] Jess: Yeah.
[00:27:23] Josh: So, yeah, it's, uh, it's worth making the investment into that stuff.
[00:27:26] Jess: Totally. Just to wrap things up, like we have like 250 more of these card decks coming to your house next week.
[00:27:32] Yeah. Um, yeah, so great meeting.
[00:27:34] Josh: That was a great meeting. This meeting could have been a podcast.
[00:27:37] Jess: You're right. I think it was, it was, this meeting could have been a podcast as a vector. Production Vector is a contact based marketing tool that reveals your best buyers on and off your site, and lets you target them with plays tailored to their exact spot in the funnel.
[00:27:54] Our site de anonymization tool is free forever. Go give it a whirl@vector.co. [00:28:00] See you next time.