Are Founder-Led Brands a New Trend?

Ben: Welcome back to another episode of Content Amplified. Today I'm joined by Shannon. Shannon, welcome to the show.

Shannon: Thanks so much for having me.

Background

Ben: Shannon, I'm really excited about the subject. It is super timely, something that I think a lot of people are really trying to figure out. But before we dive into it, tell us a little bit about yourself. Let us get to know you.

Shannon: Awesome. So my name is Shannon. I live in the Boston area. I have been in marketing pretty much my whole career, but I've been in tech for the last seven, eight years. And then I moved from tech to venture capital, now back to tech. And I now own my own fractional consulting business where I work with early-stage founders to define messaging, positioning, go-to-market strategy, and a bunch of other things. But typically working with folks that are under $10 million ARR in the software space.

The Evolution of Founder-Led Brands

Ben: Love it. Well, I'm super excited for the subject today. Today we're talking about founder-led brands and how this is a big component of content marketing, how this is really this opportunity for a business to stand out nowadays. But the real question is, is this new? Like it feels like a new trend or has this been around? Where did this come from and what is this?

Shannon: Yeah, so I think the quick answer to that is no. So I spent the first few years of my career in public relations. So what I was doing at that time was building messaging for leadership, executive presence, executive leadership. It is exactly the same thing as a founder-led brand. Right. At that time, though, it was pretty sterile, very controlled, went through a PR person, was very like there was a different process. But it was still very much like, who is this person? What do they stand for? How does it align with the goals of the organization or the business? How are they the spokesperson? That would be what it was called back then, right? Now it's called the, I don't know, the marketing, right? Like they are literally just a marketing channel now. But at the time it was very like executive, like communications is probably what you'd call it. And so now we've seen, this is not new, is that people buy from people, right? So you see, especially in like these, the algorithms love people, they don't love brands unless you're like a super pithy, exciting brand. I feel like they're kind of pivoting back a little bit, but like you're still seeing very much that like people want to hear from people, not a logo without a personality. And so I think that's certainly not new, right? Last five or so years, I know it was a huge part of my job when I worked at QuickBase. So in like 2018, 2019, it was starting to become really important. And now I think truly it's critical for early-stage companies specifically that are really led by their founders and especially their investors are investing in that founder, as well as the business. So I think it's not new, but it is really important.

Importance for Early-Stage Companies

Ben: Very cool. Love it. So right there at the end, you mentioned early-stage companies. It's really pivotal. Like why that? Why early stage? What separates this and how do you define how it can be successful for these types of companies?

Shannon: Sure. So I certainly do think it can be useful at a later stage company, but I spend a majority of my time working with founders who should have the story of the company in their DNA. So it actually can be a really good indicator of how successful the company is going to be if the founder is really great at building a brand for themselves. And that doesn't mean the founder needs to be outgoing, charismatic. Like it doesn't necessarily mean that. It just means that the founder has a unique and differentiated perspective on the way that they're solving a problem for their customers. And the best products have that, right? And I think you're finding now that money is not so cheap and that you're starting to see certain products bubble up that are providing really excellent value to their customers. And those have really strong leaders that have super differentiated perspectives, right? It doesn't mean that, I think we'll probably get to this in terms of channels. I think if there's one thing to take away from this, this does not mean your CEO posts on LinkedIn. Like that is not what founder-led brands necessarily are. If you're selling Martech, if you're selling RevTech, if you're selling HRTech, maybe, right? Like, cause that's where those people are. SalesTech for sure. But this really just means that your founder has a unique and differentiated perspective, as I said earlier, and you're able to amplify it and distribute it on the channels in which your customers are, like wherever they are, right? So an example is I have a client that is in the vertical software space. They sell to distributors of like drywall, nuts and bolts, all of that. Like I don't even think they know how to log into LinkedIn. They have no, most of them don't even look at a computer during the day. So what does that strategy look like? It looks very different. It looks like events. It looks like, you know, but it's still led by your founder and not necessarily just by the brand name. So people know his or her name, but maybe even if they don't know the name of your brand, it builds a lot of affinity and trust.

Getting Started with Founder-Led Branding

Ben: I love it. So there's kind of two sides to this that I'd love to dive into. So number one is let's say I'm a founder or an executive and I have bought into the idea of we need to have people leading out the charge, posting about content, really sharing our opinions. If I'm someone on that executive team, how do I get started? How do I get the ball rolling? How do I build the habits that need to happen so that I can start out with this? And then after that, let's say I'm a content marketer or a marketing team and I'm trying to convince the executive team that they need to buy in. How do I approach that? So there's kind of two sides to that, two-sided question. How do you approach the two different angles on that?

Shannon: Yeah, let me start with the first one, because it's easier, which is you just need to start, you need to find your channel of preference. So are you a person that loves to do podcasts and reviews? Are you a person that loves video, that loves to write, that likes to do, are you more of like a mathy person that actually prefers to like build spreadsheets and stuff? Like that means you're probably a short writer person. It depends. And then once you find that channel, just start writing. And it doesn't mean you need to publish immediately, like, but just start getting things down on paper. But this is where you can start, or on video or whatever, probably not actual paper, but maybe, and then you can, this is where it actually comes into that second point of the question, which is having a really excellent. So like, this was a big part of my job. When I first did this, like six years ago, seven years ago, is I was a ghostwriter pretty much. So what I'd have our chief product officer just talk at me and I would just like, right, right, right, right, right. And then we'd break it up into a bunch of different, like this could be like, it kind of sounds like maybe we're writing a newsletter. Like that's how you have a lot to say. So like, let's probably like, and it does seem like our corporate newsletter does well, or we know some equivalent businesses that have one. Like maybe we could try that. Or it sounds like you're really good in soundbites, like really good. So like maybe we have you on a shorter form channel and we're doing more like external outreach to get you speaking opportunities, to get you all this other stuff. So there's kind of two, those two things actually, if you're able to get them both, I know you asked them as two different questions, that is like the beautiful marriage, which is like an executive team that wants to do this. And then a content team that knows it's important. If you don't, to answer like the really critical part of that second question, which is your executives don't see it's important and you know it is. If you can find one person on your executive team to start piloting this program with, say, what I always say is like, this will take a half hour of your time or give me one hour long call and we'll have content for two months. Like, I just need you to give me a little bit of your time and have your content team put in the work. You have to have folks that are very good at what used to be called ghostwriting, right? Like, which is writing in their voice. So do not take them out of it. Like it should be very much who they are. And then starting to pilot this and starting to see little wins. Like that's where I, like, we started to see all of our progress when we launched this, the first time I've launched one of these is, we're starting to see some engagement. We're starting to see some DMs come in. This was a LinkedIn program, but you can do it on other channels. And this person then got excited. They were like, like, cause their peers are starting to see that they have a perspective there. There is a lot of value in it for them as well. And then in the board slides, now like you have a big slide that has this person's face on it. That's like this person literally drove business. So, hey board, if you were thinking about replacing this exec, like you can't, like they are a pillar of our content strategy, right? Like you could, but it would be a huge hit to the business, not just from an HR perspective, but from a top of the funnel perspective, right? And so there are definitely business cases to make and...

Measuring ROI of Founder-Led Branding

Ben: How do we prove the ROI? So when you're looking at this and you're trying to really prove out the value, the return on investment and the overall just like the perspective of this is working versus isn't like, how do you look at that? How do you measure it?

Shannon: For sure. I think it's very easy on social platforms just to see reach, right? Like you see the difference in the reach of your executives versus your corporate account. So like I can say, I have a client right now that we it's a 10 X when our executives post versus when we post on our corporate account. So that's a very easy number, right? To say, you know, we know we're getting in front of more eyeballs. We also know we're getting DMS to them. We've never received a DM on a corporate account, right? Like, or maybe we have, but not in the time that I've been there. So I think those are simpler. I do think there's an opportunity to say inbound interest for, so a lot of, if you're selling, if you're a company that's selling into an executive audience, I think we're all finding that number one, you're, we all have the same persona and they're the CFO. So that's number one. Number two is that they buy what their friends buy, right? So really getting into those professional networks of peers is so critical, right? Like that's where you're starting to see a lot of success. So if you're able to say, we're getting invites into these things, like that is like money, right? Like there's a way to see that, like you're breaking into, watering holes is what we used to call them. Like watering holes that you could not as a brand break into, before you had a founder that was really well known. Or another executive, right? Like I'm speaking to this, like I've done this for larger organizations that are like more like 150 million plus, and that can just be an executive, right? Like say you sell to CIOs, you should use your own CIO. You should build them up, right? So I think there are kind of different flavors of this, but I think ROI is, you don't even really need to be that creative, but I certainly think it should align with the way that you drive ROI for any of your kind of more affinity-focused programs at the top of the funnel.

Aligning with the Brand

Ben: So outside of the fact that, and I hate to come to like a LinkedIn example, because like you said, it's not always LinkedIn. How do you tie it back to the brand in an organic way?

Shannon: That is an excellent question that I think is much easier to answer for a founder than it is when companies are trying to do it with their employees. I've seen this, I feel like that took off like probably five to seven years ago. I know Gong is like probably the first one that really did this, which is like all of their employees were ambassadors for their brand. But then those employees leave and in tech they always do. Like let's not, and so they, and then it's a little bit awkward to say like, now I am the face of a new brand, but like, I wanna make that authentic to myself. And it's a little bumpy. Like I've seen that be a little bumpy, not specifically with Gong, but like just in general. And I think with the founder, they should believe so strongly in the mission of your business that they could talk about the vision forever and the customer problem forever. Obviously, I don't think anyone is thinking that the CEO of HubSpot's not gonna want you to buy HubSpot. Obviously they are, right? It is literally their capital. It is their, so I don't think there's this disillusionment, there can be with execs of, there's a mix of my personal brand, which is like Shannon Curran, and then there's a mix of my brand with the companies I work for, and it's a little mixy, whereas a founder, they are very much the face of their company, very rare that they're tied to other companies. And so I think it's slightly easier. But I think the most critical part is you should have very clear messaging and positioning for your business that has a flavor and personality for your founder, which is adjacent. It's not identical, but it is certainly adjacent. The pillars of the brand are similar to the pillars that your founder cares about. I love to add a third pillar typically for your founder that's just like, something that they enjoy outside of work. So like, do they love mountain biking? Do they love whatever? And like gives them a little bit of like personality that is outside of work. But that's what makes it slightly different than the brand of the corporate account. But I think the good thing about the founder is they should certainly be the face. The employee situation or exec situation is a little stickier. I think it takes a little more nuance to navigate.

Employee Advocacy

Ben: So I guess that was my next question. So what are some of those nuances if you're trying to get employee advocacy, trying to get other people involved? How do you navigate some of those waters? What are at least a couple recommendations or at least like, here's a couple of red flags you should probably avoid or things like that to get everyone involved.

Shannon: Yeah, so the way that I think about the employee work is very much that like every employee just shares stuff that's already canned and written by someone else. I don't think works anymore. I do think there was a time in which that worked because it just gave like visibility. So I think that certainly worked. But from my perspective, there's very few businesses that make that work. Now, what I do think works is finding a core team of folks in your business that have like they may have perspectives already and assigning them like a thought leadership pillar. So this is certainly something that your audience will understand. When I go on some podcasts, I wouldn't say that, but this audience will get it. So like say you have three pillars of thought leadership. It's like future of the SDR, Martech stacks in 2024 and something else. And so you assign folks like pillars and you suggest that they write one to four posts a month about this topic. So they start to get known for it. And it's certainly a topic that your business also writes about. And then also everyone's on board to do product launches. Everyone should be like, when there's a product launch, get the assets out, give them to everybody, make a big splash. If you make a huge hire, do that together. Like there's a few things that I think are announcement-y that are fine for everyone to launch. But if you're trying to just build brand affinity and awareness, I guess I don't even really love the word awareness, affinity around certain topics, assigning them to certain people is really helpful because also if that person does move on to a new organization, like I still care about like the way that the role of the SDR is changing, right? Like I will probably talk to my clients about that. I will talk to, so it's not necessarily like, so this is an example of, with Mad Kudu right now is like, that's a pillar of what they're discussing is like the role of biz dev. Like I still care about that even if I wasn't an employee there, right? and I can continue to talk about it. So it feels less icky than like I'm clearly talking about the category name or like the future of this. Like it's so clearly a sell where this is a little more, like I'll announce the product launches for sure, but it's a little bit higher level and something I just care about personally.

Ben: I love that. Well, as promised, these episodes go by quick so people can consume them on the go and throughout their daily lives. Super actionable. I've learned a ton. Shannon, if anyone wants to connect and further the conversation online, how and where can they find you?

Shannon: This is very meta, but you should probably find me on LinkedIn as the founder of my own brand. So you can find me on LinkedIn, Shannon Curran. My consulting practice is called SSC Consulting. So SSC consulting .io. But it will just send you back to my LinkedIn. So feel free to connect with me there. And I love talking about this stuff. If anyone's interested in exploring this, how's the CEO, you feel like you need to convince of this? That's something I love to do. So with love to connect with anyone.

Ben: Love it. Well Shannon again, thanks for all your insights today. Really appreciate it.

Shannon: Awesome, thanks so much for having me.

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