Bare Knuckles and Brass Tacks

🤝 George K and George A join forces with Allan Alford from the Cyber Ranch Podcast, and Aaron Pritz and Cody Rivers of Simply Solving Cyber! 🤨 Together, this trifecta weighs in on the October bonanza that is Cybersecurity Awareness Month. While the month started in 2004 to raise cybersecurity awareness among the general public, it’s now become an excuse for vendors to inundate inboxes with inane...

George K and George A reflect on recent cyber news, trends, and podcast updates! In this episode: 🤝 Cybercrime Crowdsourcing : Sophos is out with a new report on Russian hacker forums are gamifying cyberattacks. Borrowing from legitimate security events like Pwn2Own, they're offering cash prizes for innovative attack methods, but with darker aims. 🪞 Deepfake Tech Surge : With deepfake technology...

🐍 🔥 🧨 Medus4 aka Katelyn Bowden leaps in the ring, flamethrower at the ready. A member of Cult of the Dead Cow, Katelyn is a hacker and self-described “sinfluencer.” George K and George A wanted to catch up with Katelyn after her talk at DEFCON31 on what she’s building on top of the new Veilid application framework. …And in light of our previous episode, wanted to touch on her own experiences w...

🤯 Response to our Hacker Summer Camp recap was immense! Shorter episode this week as George K and George A reflect on listener feedback, and touch on some plans for season ✌️, including… 👊⚡️ Listener support to produce MORE SWAG and hosted events! 🧳 🎙️ Bringing the Bare Knuckle energy to your next conference or gathering! Have pod, will travel. 🔥🔥 The heat can’t stop, won’t stop! ✅ Subscrib...

What happens in Vegas...should not stay there! George K and George A share highlights and low points from Infosec’s big shindig in Sin City. The Good: 🤝 The magic of meeting folks IRL 💡 Exchange of ideas 💪 Vendors showing up with the C-suite and experienced technical staff✊ SquadCon as a show and a vibe The Bad: 🗣️ Public speaking skills need a boost 🏎️ Why are there so many F1 cars?? 🙄 If yo...

The team is taking a break to celebrate the end of season 1. Here’s a replay of our conversation with JD Sherry. It offers valuable insights from the VC side, with advice on how and when to scale sales teams, and a cautionary tale about what happens when cyber startups try to do that too early. George K and George A talk to JD Sherry about his journey from CIO to VC, and everything he's learned al...

💡 Evgeniy Kharam, cybersecurity architect, advisor, and evangelist, steps into the ring to talk about conferences, event follow up, and more! George K and George talk to Evgeniy about his unique journey from the Israeli Navy to working with a superstar MSSP. The conversation touches on: 🤝 How to build common ground between buyers and sellers at cybersecurity events and conferences. 🗣️ Effective...

🙌 Eliza-May Austin, founder and CEO of th4ts3curity.company steps into the ring! Her viral LinkedIn post seeking someone to help with sales without being pushy or a knob set off something of a firestorm in cybersecurity sales. 😳  George K and George A talk to Eliza about: 🚀 How she went from frustrated tech insider to CEO 🧞‍♂️ 🦄 ✨ The “magic genie” role she’s looking for, a consultative...

Today, we have a special Replay episode, courtesy of our friends at Hacker Valley Media . This is an interview that George K did along with Dani Woolf, founder and CEO of Audience 1st. They released a report in June analyzing vendor marketing messaging at RSA, and compared those finds with survey data from security buyers. Our mission was to examine any divergence and suggest ways to close the gap...

Short episode this week! George K and George A weigh in on threads, cyber news, but most importantly, how to meet up at Black Hat 2023! 👀  🧵 So Threads is a thing, but are we just all playing in the billionaires’ sandbox? 🛡️ Supply chain and OT attacks are bananas right now 🎲 Meet the Bare Knuckles & Brass Tacks squad at Black Hat! We’ll be alongside Audience 1st, The Cyber Queens, Hac...

🤖 👍 Longtime listener and seasoned BDR, Nafis Muhammad, steps into the ring! What a story this guy has! George K and George A talk to Nafis about what he learned about building relationships and trust from selling door to door. Also in this episode: 😳 How Nafis persevered after trying to cold connect with George A 💡 How he incorporated ChatGPT and Bard into his workflows without sacrificing re...

👊 ⚡ GIVEAWAY TIME! We're giving away 3️⃣  Bare Knuckles & Brass Tacks  custom snapback and sticker sets this week! George K and George A are busy planning the next few episodes. No new drop this week, but we wanna hear from you! Here's how you can win: 🔗 Share the link to a favorite episode on #LinkedIn this week. ✅ Be sure to tag the show so we know! 💬 And t...

This week, George K and George A delve into the sales shenanigans they endured recently, and report from the frontlines of enterprise AI tech. In this episode: 🏆 Dubious honors that don’t help anything 🫠 How to royally botch a demo 📢 What old school event outreach can teach about personalization 🤖 And George A reports back from the AWS Summit on new enterprise AI capabilities ✅ Listen and sub...

😳 🥊 🥊   Somehow we convinced a VC client partner to step into the ring! George K and George A talk to JD Sherry about his journey from CIO to VC, and everything he's learned along the way, like: 📈 Common pitfalls in GTM strategies 💰 How to scale a sales team successfully 💸 and how NOT to scale one 🤝 Why a consultative approach leads to longer term success ⚙️ and all the elements that n...

In this Special Episode, George K and George A catch up with three women who attended the Canadian Women in Cybersecurity conference hosted by SiberX. All three bring different levels of experience to the conversation. In this episode: 💡 What they took away from the conference 🤝 The role of mentorship and how to seek them out 🚪 Breaking into the industry and HR barriers ⚡️ Tips for networking...

We're back! After a little break, George K and George A are back in the ring. This time, they're talking to Ben Kelly, the BDR referred to us by past guest, Mike Rogers! 📅 Learn how Ben is getting more meetings by sending FEWER emails! 🤝 Why Ben operates by the golden rule 📑 Why research and carefully crafted emails beat generic automation 🗣️ What he says when gets pushback 🐉 🛡️ And the return...

Now dropping on Mondays ! In this episode, George K and George A take on: Toronto! That's right, both Georges are heading to the Canadian Women in Cybersecurity conference, hosted by SiberX. This podcast was cooked up after a ten-minute conversation at Black Hat 2022. Imagine what the crew can cook up in 24 hours! 💸 Sales tomfoolery continues, including ghosting warm leads...?! Isn’t revenue the...

How do you make an authentic connection with security buyers? London Miller jumps into the ring to talk about his journey from D1 athlete to cybersecurity sales Jedi. George K and George A talk to London about: 🏈 Translating "non-technical" skills sets to cyber 🤔 The mix of humility and curiosity needed to succeed in sales 🤝 How seeking connection builds trust with buyers ✊ And how DEI efforts...

While away at RSA, George K and George A heard about or received some heinous (and hilarious) outreach attempts including: 🥣 Alphabet soup terror 🗓️Calendar missiles fired at personal email addresses 🫠And using public fines to get a meeting Then they dig into new technologies announced at RSA and talk potential impacts to security team practices. Enjoy! ✅ Subscribe wherever you get your podcast...

We're away at RSA this week, but the hits keep coming! Enjoy this "best of" episode featuring parts of our episodes featuring: (Serial killer) SCARY BDR tactics Erika Eakins 👑 on sexism and misogyny from the buying side Maria Graham ⚔️ runs the SALES GAUNTLET Mike Rogers 🥋 on sales tactics that break trust or leave buyers feeling icky Kayla Cytron-Thaler 💡 on the creativity and curiosity the SD...

What if there was a better way to align what cybersecurity leaders are looking for and what vendors are selling? Victoria Germanova, founder and CEO of Callity believes technology can help do just that.  In this episode, George K and George A talk to Victoria about: 🔥 Her experience with the cold-call trial by fire 🛡 Her mission to repair trust in B2B sales 🤝  How technology might libe...

What makes a successful SDR? And how do they stand out against all the noise? SDR Manager Kayla Cytron-Thaler enters the ring, after having successfully gotten through to George A on LinkedIn! No really, he tried to ignore her, but she's that good. 👀  George K and George A jump in, and there are real gems in this episode: 3️⃣ Kayla's 3 Cs for SDR success: Creativity, Curiosity, and Coachabil...

👀 If sales were a dating game, how would the other side look at your behavior? Cordial, friendly, or creepy incel? CISO Mike Rogers jumps into the ring - and he's a legit trained fighter! - to talk about what works and what's grounds for dismissal.  George K and George get real loud on this one! 😬  🔥 tips in this episode: Is the CISO really your buyer? Is that where outreach should st...

So...some things happened last week. George K and George A weigh in on the whirlwind with their usual delicacy and diplomacy. Mentioned in the show: Dark Reading article on measuring employee input of sensitive data into ChatGPT George K experimented with a new app using OpenAI's API (say that three times fast), ChatPDF , which allows users to use regular text commands to query the contents of PDF...

Long time listener Maria Graham steps into the ring! George K and George A talk to Maria about how her prospecting is built on research and looking for human commonalities, and why she thinks email doesn’t work anymore. 🤯  🔥 🐉 ⚔️  We also unveil a new segment: THE SALES GAUNTLET! Also in this episode: Brass Tacks on outreach strategies George A ambushes George K! George K and Maria co...