The Peerbound Podcast

Description: In this episode, Kate and Sunny talk about what it really means to understand the business you're operating in and how that changes the way you do customer marketing. Kate shares lessons from starting her career during the Great Recession in London, localizing campaigns across 10 markets in the Middle East for HP, and eventually going in-house at Splunk where she learned how to commun...

Episode Description: Brittnee Dawson is VP of Product & Customer Marketing at Service Express, with previous experience leading customer marketing at AlphaSense, Experity, and Anaplan. She started her career at Thomson Reuters, where she worked in video production and product management before finding her way into customer marketing. In this episode, Brittnee and Sunny talk about why advocacy shou...

About the Guest Jess Walker McFarland is a customer marketing and advocacy leader with experience at BMC Software (7+ years), Splunk, and Rubrik (3.5+ years). At Rubrik, she led customer advocacy and executive programs through the company's IPO. She's currently a free agent exploring what's next. Description In this episode, Sunny sits down with Jess Walker McFarland, a customer marketing and advo...

In this episode, Sunny sits down with Jennifer Thompson, Senior Customer Marketing Manager at Amperity, to discuss the evolution of customer marketing, building advocacy programs, and why your happiest customers deserve more attention than they're getting. Jennifer shares her journey from account management to pioneering customer marketing roles, including how she helped the Seattle Seahawks tell...

Episode Description Chris Dalton manages customer testimonials, speaking engagements, reference programs, peer reviews, a customer advisory board, and ad hoc requests, all by himself. His secret? Building autonomous systems and focusing relentlessly on what actually accelerates revenue. In this episode, Chris shares how Clari's CMO mandates voice of customer content in every campaign, why content...

Episode Description Mary Green didn't realize she'd been doing customer marketing for years until she saw a job posting that finally named what she'd been building all along. Now, as the founder of CMA Weekly and Director of Community Platforms at Infor, she's created a 1,500-member community that's become an indispensable resource for customer marketers navigating an evolving profession. In this...

Daniel Palay, Director of Customer Marketing at Grafana Labs, joins Sunny to challenge how we think about customer marketing success. They cover the power of saying no strategically, why you should measure net dollar retention instead of activity metrics, and how to use AI to focus on work that actually moves the needle. Daniel also shares lessons from building customer marketing teams at two high...

Mel Cornford, Customer Marketing Lead at Canva, joins host, Sunny Manivannan on the Peerbound Podcast to discuss her transition from journalism to customer marketing. She shares her career journey, highlights from her work at notable media brands, and how those experiences shaped her approach at Canva. Mel emphasizes the importance of understanding sales teams' needs, creating human-first storytel...

In this episode of The Peerbound Podcast, host Sunny Manivannan sits down with Michael Sciano, a seasoned customer marketing and advocacy leader with more than 15 years of experience across industry-leading companies including Adobe, Salesforce, and ServiceTitan. Michael shares his unique path from high school history teacher to tech, highlighting lessons learned along the way and what it takes to...

In this episode of The Peerbound Podcast, host Sunny Manivannan sits down with Emily Coleman, Senior Manager of Customer Marketing & Advocacy at LaunchDarkly, to talk about her unexpected path into customer marketing, which began in politics and later led to high-pressure communications work during the SolarWinds cybersecurity crisis. Today, she focuses on building scalable advocacy programs at La...

In this episode of The Peerbound Podcast, host Sunny Manivannan welcomes back Kevin Lau, Vice President of Customer Engagement at Freshworks, to discuss the evolving landscape of customer marketing and its increasing importance within organizations. Kevin shares his professional updates, including his new role and personal milestones, and dives deep into significant shifts affecting customer marke...

What is the real value of building meaningful customer relationships in today's competitive tech landscape? In this episode of The Peerbound Podcast, host Sunny Manivannan is joined by Alexie Glover, co-founder and marketing consultant at Frank Advocacy. The discussion covers the motivations behind starting Frank Advocacy and the importance of customer marketing. Alexie shares her unique journey i...

How do you harness the power of storytelling to resonate with buyers in a world overwhelmed by data and noise? In this episode of The Peerbound podcast, host Sunny Manivannan is joined by Ari Hoffman, a customer marketing advocacy expert with a rich background in companies like Coveo, Influitive, and Amplitude. The discussion centers on the art of customer storytelling in the B2B space, particular...

What do ancient Greek philosophy and cutting-edge sales enablement have in common? In this episode, we sit down with Ali Jawin, CMO at Pontera, to delve into her unconventional career path, leading marketing teams, and embracing AI. Ali is a marketing executive renowned for her focus on data-driven strategies. She has been responsible for reshaping marketing initiatives that drive global customer...

Liz shares her remarkable account of scaling Yext from a $10 million startup to a $400 million public company and takes us into the complex world of marketing leadership, where balancing creativity with data-driven strategies is key. She discusses her approach to company building through marketing, the evolving impact of AI, and offers invaluable leadership and career advice for marketers and entr...

In our conversation, Jason tells us about the medical diagnosis that shifted his career from the US Navy to tech marketing, leading him to roles at Salesforce and Braze. We get into the formative lessons Jason learned in product marketing, from prioritizing clear messaging to positioning yourself correctly, and how they’ve shaped his approach. Jason also discusses the challenges of transitioning f...

In our conversation, Shannon discusses her journey from working in a startup to being part of Salesforce’s meteoric rise, and how she ultimately ended up at Asana. We delve into the importance of staying authentic in the face of corporate pressure, how AI is reshaping knowledge work, ways Asana is leveraging this technology to unlock new levels of human potential, and more. Shannon also shares act...

In our conversation, Sara Varni, Chief Marketing Officer of Datadog, reflects on her experiences with different growth stages at Twilio, Attentive, and Datadog, highlighting how she established crucial processes like pipeline councils and executed major ad campaigns. She unpacks some of the most common mistakes new CMOs make, emphasizing the importance of balancing swift changes with thoughtful an...

In today’s episode of The Peerbound Podcast, we sit down with Harriet Johnston, the Vice President of Marketing at Ashby to explore key strategies for refining recruitment processes and how to build a marketing team from scratch. Tuning in you’ll hear Harriet’s expert insights on attracting the best talent, enhancing the candidate experience, and why recruiting presents a rich brand-building oppor...

In this episode of the Peerbound Podcast, Chief Edition, host Sunny Manivannan is joined by Heather Larrabee, the Chief Marketing Officer of OfficeSpace Software. Heather discusses her extensive career, highlighting her transition from consumer brands like Whole Foods to B2B, particularly in software. She shares insights on effective marketing strategies, the importance of calculated risks, and al...

On this episode of The Peerbound Podcast, we hear from Trish Borrmann, the Director of Global Customer Advocacy at ServiceNow. Trish shares her journey and expertise in building customer advocacy programs at technology giants like Cisco, Fortinet, and ServiceNow. She discusses the power of customer stories and the impact of a unique project where she helped write a cybersecurity best practices boo...

In this episode of the Peerbound Podcast: Chief Edition, we welcome Mark Boothe, the Chief Marketing Officer at Domo, to discuss the transformative efforts and strategies behind their award-winning community engagement program, Domo Central. Mark shares insights from his extensive career in marketing at companies like Adobe and Domo, emphasizing the power of customer voice in driving business succ...

In this episode, Katlin Hess, the Director of Customer Marketing at G2, shares her experiences and strategies in leveraging customer voices, including reviews and feedback, to drive business growth. Despite having an 'unusual problem' of too many customer advocates, Hess highlights the importance of customer-centric initiatives and cross-functional teamwork at G2. She illustrates this with example...

In this episode, we hear from Emily Ward, the Vice President of Global Marketing at Turnitin. Emily shares her unexpected journey from aspiring ballerina to marketing leader, emphasizing the role of adaptability, understanding user needs, and data-driven decision-making in her career. Highlighting her initial pivot from ballet to marketing due to pragmatic advice, Emily discusses her educational p...

Kirsten Newbold-Knipp, CEO of AskNicely, shares her career journey to becoming a CEO. Starting her career in hospitality, Kirsten's focus on customer experience paved the way for her transition into the tech industry, eventually leading to leadership roles at high-profile companies such as HubSpot. Kirsten shares insights on navigating the transition to tech, demonstrating the value of marketing l...