Audience 1st

Today is part two of this season’s 3-part kickoff series where Dani Woolf gives you all the lessons learned from a year and a half’s work doing deep qualitative customer research. We’re going to cover the top insights she learned from the 50+ buyers she interviewed. As a refresher, it’s absolutely crucial to understand what it is you want to know from your research. Setting up goals is important o...

Dani is kicking off this new season of Audience 1st Podcast with a 3-part series on the lessons learned from a year and a half of deep customer research in the cybersecurity field. In this episode, we're diving into customer research mindset and methods that no one else in B2B marketing is really telling you about. Dani emphasizes the importance of cognitive shifts required to phase into a custome...

There was a thirst of having security knowledge and expertise, but there was no way for people to access it.  They can Google their face off, that's fine.  But with security, there are a lot of nuances that are particular to each company.  And so you kind of need someone that has been there and can provide an expert opinion.  These founders, all they want to know is what should I do now and what s...

Inaccessible security tools and solutions pose security risks and hinder individuals with disabilities from accessing and using them effectively. Integrating accessibility into security products and services can improve usability, inclusivity, and security for all users. Companies that prioritize accessibility in their security offerings can gain a competitive advantage and build a loyal customer...

When it comes to metrics and the ROI of tradeshows: Sometimes CMOs see a very tight-knit KPI. And that’s where the problem lies. It’s not that those KPIs are necessarily bad, it’s just that they’re the wrong ones. And they desperately need to be updated. Brutally honest insights from Charles Payne, CISO at Neptune Media. In this episode of Audience 1st Podcast I JUST dropped, Charles and I talk ab...

Your CFP was approved and you’re about to give a public talk. Before giving a getting on stage at a large (or small) event: You've gotta get your entire talk that you want give people down to: What is the core ride or die message? That is your through-line in all of your stuff. Everything must be connected to that. And then do NOT embrace every single of your 40 talking points. Find five. And thos...

There's a massive disconnect between product/solution providers and the people building cybersecurity programs in the industry. The programs are built to standards.  So what if product companies start building products to meet those standards? Product vendors should be able to (but often can’t) tell what type of program they are building to and how they meet the controls inside that framework.  We...

Purple, red, orange, green, blue teams - there's this whole security color wheel. We need to realize that we all play a part in the same cycle and we could all work together a lot more effectively than if we work against each other. So when everyone's collaborating, talking and understanding their part - all the colors combine. This is one big, beautiful security utopia called white teaming. Bruta...

In a world overflowing with buzzwords and sales tactics, Dani Woolf and George Kamide have joined forces to investigate the gaps between cybersecurity vendor marketing strategies and the actual needs and expectations of cybersecurity leaders. Their recent study aims to illuminate how vendors market, position, and message their products and services, and how these strategies align (or don't) with t...

With the accelerating proliferation of cyber threats, a challenge at hand involves addressing the human attack surface - the interaction point where end-users, such as employees or clients, can be targeted by malicious cyber actors. It is the human element, as much as any technology, that often forms the root cause of most compromises. Brutally honest insights from Matt Polak, CEO of Picnic Corpor...

There's a constant drive in the cybersecurity field to not just sell, but to sell in a way that's attractive or groundbreaking—almost as if companies are compelled to constantly outdo each other in originality to meet their audience's inflated expectations. Evgeniy laments that the industry's focus has strayed too far from fundamental tasks towards more creative, attention-grabbing ones.  The impo...

If you’re working your way into a CISO's inbox: Take a more humanizing approach and cultivate trust-based relationships. It’s important to draw the line between an appropriate business outreach and a stalker mode. Be willing to be vulnerable because it's going to really benefit your career and do good Brutally honest insights from George Al-Koura Al Koura, Co-Host of Bare Knuckles & Brass Tacks Po...

When a CISO starts evaluating a new product, they start evaluating the people they’re going to work with and only then evaluate the vendor from a technological perspective. Because at the end of the day they do business with people, not just with products. Building brand awareness and trust is very important. Why would you give access to your financial accounts if there’s no trust? Brutally honest...

A marketer, seller, and CISO meet in a LinkedIn Live after RSA Conference You finish the rest. Or join Andres Andreu, Maria Graham, and Dani Woolf to unveil their top insights from this year's 2023 RSA Conference from their lens of the world. Tune into Audience 1st Podcast to: Get a first-hand overview of what it was like at RSAC this year Understand major hits and misses at the expo Explore how t...

Today, as a cybersecurity seller, being a technical and a business person is very relevant.  But in order to keep up with the pace of change, the technologies, the dynamic market and aggressive growth goals, you have to be an active listener and to be present. When you understand your customer’s goals and challenges, then you can bring a technical enough team to the table that could actually get b...

When a concept or strategy gains enough traction, marketing and sales jump in to capitalize on it, and eventually, it becomes a poisoned well from which people draw. This happens not because the strategy itself lacks merit, but because we, as humans, get saturated with information, and anything that everyone is talking about begins to seem like BS. However, just because there's a lot of noise arou...

Security professionals sometimes find it hard to absorb the notion that the cloud was actually by definition designed for developers. A developer is not a regular techie. In fact, they are not a techie at all. A developer is a creative person. And if you put any constraints on a creative person, you will kill their creativity. Security pros may not be able to understand them but they have to try,...

There is a shift in the world. Developers are starting to use the cloud and they're starting to get a lot of power.  And with that power comes the responsibility that’s why using developer friendly tools is critical in order to have your organization protected.  We need to remember that at the end of the day, we are not in the business of eliminating risks, our goal is to do whatever we can to min...

Listening deeply to the market before you even put pen to paper and draw your first paper prototype is very important. In terms of the buying process, in order to be more productive and efficient as an industry you have to build relationship capital with your customers.  Don’t treat your buyer as a potential target, an account, or as a number; treat them as a person. Not every big name vendor fits...

We often think that our challenges are unique to cybersecurity as opposed to pretty normal historical human ones and we don't look outside of our domain often enough for finding potential solutions. Coming from completely different backgrounds often helps people find and apply a unique solution to a problem. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, think critically. Know how to learn in order to communic...

In this episode of Phishy Business, we discuss how cybersecurity marketing, sales, and support are for the most part inadequate, and how there can be a big disconnect between how marketers market and how technology professionals buy.   We talk more about how marketing should consider the customer experience and how marketing departments should not only market their products and services but should...

In a startup, the CISO role is far more intense and it's more intense for a whole slew of reasons.  Startups don't have a lot of money. But knowing that we're building a product, it is really important to have security built in from the ground up, because it is a priority.  So you're a CISO but you're a security architect and you're security engineer and you're analyst. And your ability was compli...

Welcome to the last episode of Audience 1st for 2022! Wow, when I first started the show back in March, I created it as a tool for myself to better learn about the audiences that I wanted to engage and persuade. Little did I know it would resonate so well with the cybersecurity community - both from the practitioner side and the go-to-market and business side. So, I want to THANK all of my loyal f...

Vendors need to start building relationships. Instead of looking at lead filters or lead generation. They need to start integrating with the community a bit more. And they need to start learning from the people on the ground, just building communities, essentially, because those communities are going to be filled with potential leaders of the future. And if you can get really good relationships wi...

Every time a vendor comes through the door, what they're looking at is just a closure of a deal. After a project is delivered, feedback is something which is missing and which I think vendors can take advantage of. Having frequent service evaluation calls or catch up calls with us so that they can serve us better is not only beneficial to security practitioners, but for the vendors themselves. The...