1st Annual HubHeroes #INBOUND23 Breakout Session Preview Show [HubHeroes, EP48]
George B. Thomas, Liz, Max, and Devin preview breakout sessions for HubSpot's INBOUND 2023 event. They share picks across customer education, DEIA initiatives, and AI, with trivia and personal takes on what to catch at the conference.
Do you live in a world filled with corporate data? Are you plagued by siloed departments? Are your lackluster growth strategies demolishing your chances for success? Are you held captive by the evil menace Lord Lack? Lack of time, lack of strategy, and lack of the most important and powerful tool in your superhero tool belt knowledge. Never fear, Hub heroes. Get ready to don your cape and mask, move into action, and become the hub hero your organization needs. Tune in each week to join the league of extraordinary Inbound Heroes as we help you educate, empower, and execute Hub heroes. It's time to unite and activate your powers. Before we begin, we need to disclose that Devin is currently employed by HubSpot at the time of this episode Recording. This podcast is in no way affiliated with or produced by HubSpot, and the thoughts and opinions expressed by Devin during the show are that of his own and in no way represent those of his employer.
We love a good safe harbor. We love a good safe harbor legal statement, don't we, kids? We love it. It's what gets us going.
This is the safest harbor.
The safest.
Yeah.
No sharks, no big waves.
Yeah. It's.
No pirate ships.
It's like the hero's harbor. Maybe it's. It's the hero harbor. Yeah, maybe.
Oh, I love that.
It's like some. It's like some paw patrol where.
Where we're the guardians of growth.
It's like.
It's like the hero harbor where we're the guardians of growth and we're a safe haven for the heroes that need to take a break.
Guardians of the growthery.
We are the alliteration kings. We can do anything. I love it.
We can.
Welcome back, gentlemen, to another fantastic episode. I'm really excited. I think this is the first time in a while all of us have been together.
Let's go.
That's nice.
Let's go. Are we ready?
Because I love. By the way, by the way, I love when us four humans can get together and just drop bombs. By the way, that was, like, probably the quickest I've ever done that in any episode to date.
Yeah, it was fast.
Yeah.
Very quick. You know, Devon, I just. I. I don't think that's something we should really highlight. What we should be really happy for is that he felt the need to say it. And that's really all that matters, right? That's what matters.
It's all about the feeling.
It's been a while since we've all been together. You know what I mean? And that's fine. Do you know what's kind of crazy, though? It doesn't feel like that long ago that we recorded our first Inbound 23 preview episode. And I remember us talking about it and in the introduction I literally was like, now I know you guys are like. But it's months away and like, how could we possibly be talking about inbound already? Ladies and gentlemen, and all of the hub heroes out there, Alert, alert. We are less than a month now, less than a month to HubSpot's annual inbound event.
Crazy.
If you are just now joining this hype train already in progress for the singular celebration of tens of thousands of inbound practicing humans from all around the world, you have come to the right place. Because, yes, we have been hyped for months. In fact, I would actually say if you are just now catching up on the inbound hype train, we have two other episodes in the feed. You should definitely check out number one, the most bomb diggity.com inbound23 strategic success framework for individuals and teams.
And then we have.
Crikey, inbound 23 down under roundtable. The ultimate guide for international hubspotters.
And I would also say agency owners.
You guys had some really great conversations around making the most of inbound as an agency owner. Regardless as to whether you're from down.
Under around the world or stateside.
So highly recommend you guys checking those out. But today, today it is time for the first annual. The first annual. Because yes, you ding dongs, we're doing.
This again next year, just in case you didn't know.
Yes, yes, it is the first annual Hub Heroes breakout session preview show for Inbound 23. Are we excited?
Oh, so excited.
Wow. Everyone calm down. You guys are the worst. Okay, anyway, you're right, guys, because while we love the keynotes, is Pitbull going to be one of the keynotes? If so, I will be there.
I love keynotes.
I love keynotes. Devin, how do you feel about keynotes? Are you into them? They're the naughtiest of keys.
Yeah, keynotes are the most.
Spotlights are cool, by the way. I know, know, I know. We're here to talk about breakouts. We are going to talk about breakouts. If we have time. I might bring up one spotlight, by the way, that I do want to just touch upon towards the end. So we'll see. We'll see.
You totally have a bonus change approved.
Thank you.
Breakout and spotlight preview episode. How about that?
Yeah.
So yes, we love our notiest of keys. We love the networking. We love, as George would Likes to call it the magic that happens in the hallways. But let's face it, the breakouts and also some of the spotlights are where you're gonna get most of your educational bang for your buck. That's where you get to learn not just from hubspotters, but real world inbound practitioners who are sharing some of the best secret sauce that they've got out there so we can all learn and grow together. However, before we dig into all of our picks, I thought it might be fun to do a little bit of inbound trivia.
Oh, I usually do really bad at these things. I'm just gonna.
Buddy, I know this is gonna be really awful too.
Hang on, let me get Google fired up real quick.
I position myself as someone where HubSpot's my entire personality, but any sort of historical trivia you have, it's gone. Not there.
Fantastic.
Because one of these. So here, little preview of the two questions you have. One of them is so niche, there's a good chance none of you will get it.
And then the other one is you.
Will be really embarrassed if you get it wrong.
So I decided just to bring something ice today.
Which one do you want to start with?
Barack Obama. That's our answer.
No, I'm sorry. Martha Stewart is Barack Obama. Thank you. Wow. What do we want to start with?
Potential embarrassment or super niche?
Let's just get it over with.
Niche.
Let's, let's.
What year did Inbound have the folks from Charity Water there in Club Inbound.
So you could walk the water across.
Club Inbound and understand how.
How far people had to walk in.
Order to carry water?
2015-2015-2019-2014.
2014.
It was my first inbound.
Oh, wait, 2019 is when we had cob suit.
I. I remember that, though. That was the dopest of dope things. Those, like, yellow jugs and like people trying to, like, truck them along. Oh, yeah, he was a good keynote, too.
That was also the year Simon Sinek was there. That was also the year Gary Vaynerchuk was there. It was a real. That was my very first inbound experience. But what I also really loved about it too, is that they really created a central focal point where this organization that they had partnered with for this event to really make a statement and an impact about the work that they were doing. And I thought that was really powerful. So shout out to HubSpot. Shout out to Charity Water.
All right, guys, you know, hey, before you go, before you go off of there, because you did say something, you Said Gary Vee was there.
I thought he was.
He was. Well, I know you might be right. I want to see. I want to see. No, okay, okay. Because I know he was 2012, but then what was the other one? Was the other one?
I think it was Simon Sinek that year.
Okay, there we go.
Yeah.
Happy 2016.
Because I got there in 2015 and he was there at the first one, and I was really into Gary Vee. It almost melted when he walked by me, bro.
That's gross. E.
Yeah.
And so little known story. He's one of the reasons why black.
And inbound, they do now, like, exclusive.
No one knows this, but I tweeted. I tweeted about wanting to start a movement, but I had really bad social anxiety and I had tagged him and he was doing.
He got N by Gary V. That's amazing. Listen, I know that Gary Vee. I got Nike by Gary V. On a weekly basis. So let's give Gary V. Let's just give him a round of applause, Gary, for changing the world. Thank you. Thank you very much.
You know what we really appreciate our friends of the pod, Barack Obama, Simon Sinek, Gary Vee. Thank you guys for listening and tuning in each week and giving us personal pointers and personal notes each time. I really.
Yeah, Liz, make sure we're one of those annoying companies that tags every one of those just because we mentioned them once in the podcast because we don't have enough of that on LinkedIn.
I love that. For us, that's called growth. That's called flourishing. All right, are we ready for the second trivia question?
Oh, sure. I'm nervous, but yeah.
In what year was the HubSpot flywheel announced?
2018. Because it was right before COVID Oh.
Wait, I think it was. I'm gonna say 2017.
We have talked about the flywheels so much.
It's gotta be 2018. Hang on.
No, George, stop Googling.
Stop it. Step away.
I think it was 17.
All right, have we locked in our answers?
Not what, no, because, George.
You'Re typing.
So your answer is locked in at 2018. Who's typing?
I'm not typing.
Yeah, right now.
I'm reading.
I'm not typing. I typed a minute ago.
You are the golden child.
Devin and George have brought shame upon the hub hero's family.
It was to close 2017.
Also, George, right before COVID Covid hit in 2020.
My dude, where were you in 2019?
Yeah, I wasn't gonna.
Chilling on his davenport on the veranda.
Previous episodes.
Listen, I'LL own it. I'll own it. I will be the old fart human of the podcast. I'm just saying.
Yeah, I remember seeing Brian just getting up there and spinning. That was like the most transformative moment of my life. I was like, there were lots of sparks.
Was that also the year that they did the Lord of the Rings themed like video and talk that led up to the flywheel or.
No, no, no, no.
The puppets plus puppets equals winning.
Wait. I walked outside while they were shooting part of that puppet thing, and I had no, no clue what was going on. I just saw a bunch of people in a car with Muppets and they were filming it and I was like, where do I work?
This is oh, so weird working.
Best place of all.
I don't know. Because man, 2012 and the. For those about to rock a. Or no thunderstruck. It was thunderstruck. ACDC thunderstruck intro with like, the helicopter and like the jumpsuits. But, but I, I. It's a moment in time, but Devon, I agree. When I saw. Ladies and gentlemen, when I saw the Dharmesh puppet, I might have pooped myself a little bit.
This is the coolest thing ever.
We all had a moment.
It's just the underpants gnomes reference from a couple years ago was the greatest thing. Oh, my goodness.
Step one, steal underpants. Step two, blank. Step three, profit.
And did anyone, did anyone see my TikTok that I did with that with the, with the DJ hitting the drop at inbound using that?
No. No. Okay, well, we got to put in the show notes. Let's find it. Let's put in the show notes. I know, I know. We're going to get into breakouts. We told everybody we'd get in breakouts. But I will. I have to share this. I don't know if I've ever shared this publicly. One of the things that has fascinated me over the years that I have absolutely kept track of and even made it a point to try to say something to that human after they were done, is the level in which every year, Dharmesh, the keynote that he brings, it just is fire.
Unbelievable.
Like how, how funny he has gotten. How much he, like, banks on the son. The being an introvert. The like, like, I just got to tell you, I love watching him talk at these things and I'm always fascinated to see where we go and how good he gets year after year. Oh, yeah, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Watching his kid grow up.
Right? Well, guys, and I love Brian's dog too. Don't don't get me wrong, I love Brian. I love Brian's dog. We even saw Brian's kid in Spider man pajamas. I'm just saying Dartmouth and his growth.
Over forge is up on Dharmesh and not up on Brian.
I'm gonna get hate mail.
Although a lot of exclusives dropping here today. Devin getting Nike by Gary.
Did other people see Brian Halligan's LinkedIn post just recently about like the lessons learned of being a CEO like anybody else. Anyway, that'll be a link in the show notes too. We should probably move forward.
Are we actually ready now to talk about our picks today, gentlemen?
Yes.
Do you have any other thoughts about the year that was lost 2019 since we.
No, no. I feel like. I feel like I'm. I have Alzheimer's around that. So we'll just move forward. We're doing great.
In case our listeners are wondering, this.
Is what thriving looks like.
This is what living, laughing and loving.
Looks like on Friday. Friday, Friday at 3:22 Eastern Time on, you know, August 11th. Ladies and gentlemen, cheers. This is us thriving.
Here's what we're going to do, kiddos, instead of each of us. All right, for the listeners at home, here's what we did.
We each went through the agenda and hand selected two different breakout sessions that we believe are the ones that you should be attending.
So what we're going to do is.
We'Re going to go round robin.
I'm going to start with you, George.
Max, Devin, and then myself. We're each going to share one and then we're going to do a round robin again. I figured I'd share the rules since we have a tendency sometimes to get.
A little off track.
Wait, there's rules.
George, you get to go first. What's your first choice?
All right, sounds good.
Before you tell us the first choice.
I'd actually just be curious to hear from you. How did you choose these particular ones that you're going to share with us?
Well, the first one, two reasons because I absolutely love the human. And two, it piggybacks off of last week's conversation with Mark Killens and ish changing around what HubSpot, aka HubSpot Academy might be alluding to doing in the future. And I want to be in the room. Two reasons for. For the first one, the second one, because it's a future major strategy that we want to lean into for GBT and Hub Heroes. So I want to be in the room and I want to listen to the ways that we can take what might feel very old and maybe implement it in ways that feels very new and fresh. Yeah, that's amazing. So, all right, should I go with the first one?
Yeah, let's go with the first one.
All right, ladies and gentlemen, buckle up. We're gonna get into the good stuff. So the first one is the new age of customer education and the flywheel.
We know how much you love a good.
Oh, I love customer education and I have grown to love the flywheel. But here's the thing. It's Courtney Sembler. Yes. She's amazing.
We love Courtney.
Oh, my God. She's an amazing human impacting lives on a daily basis, like, just cranking stuff out, you know, with the team. She's the director of Hu Spot Academy, by the way. Just going to throw that out there. But if you look at kind of what's happening, there's tags on these, by the way, the breakouts. There's tags like customer experience, customer satisfaction, customer retention, like this. But customer education has been declared a must need for growing companies for the last few years. And with so many businesses turning to customer education, what can you do to stand out in this environment? You remember when, like company, they had an academy and they were special. A lot of companies have academies now, by the way. So how. I love this idea of how do you stand out in this new environment that we're finding ourselves? The new age of customer education is tied directly to your bottom line, ladies and gentlemen. What it's. You mean this education has to equal revenue? Oh, my God. Say to your bottom line, from lead generation to revenue retention. In this session, you explore the new age of customer education and how your business or organization can attract, engage, and delight with educational content. Learn how HubSpot Academy grew from live trainings. I was there, by the way. To supporting some of HubSpot's most important business objectives.
Let's go.
Come on. Powerful. Sit. I'll be there. Be there. Unless, like, there's a bus or a train or a meteor, I'll be there. And even then I might limp in. I don't know. We'll see.
Take a dive off an asteroid. It'll be totally fine.
It'll be good. I'll walk it off.
George, don't get hit by a bus.
Before you share your first pick. Can you do the same and give us a little peek behind the scenes about how you made your choices?
Yeah, I think you know, this. This is gonna be my first inbound not being an employee. Right. So thinking.
Dude, are you getting emotional?
Yeah, no, Thinking a lot about kind of like, all right, what was I really in the know about when I was a employee? And what did that make me? Like, ignore. Right. Oh, you know what I mean? Because I was like, I already.
Yeah, I know what's happening already.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
While some things are like big cool announcements for some folks, you know, for me I was like, I saw that months ago. Right. So I'm thinking about it through that perspective. And the other kind of like, perspective I'm thinking through too is in my new role of like, evangelism and building partner programs and stuff like that. I'm looking for any and all help and education on how to do that stuff because I'm very much building the plane as I'm flying it right now. And, yeah, looking forward to learning from the pros, best practices around kind of the work I'm doing day to day now. So that was kind of my perspective going into it, you know, and also before, it's just like when I was there, it was all about just like meeting customers and selling stuff and like having like a fun hangout with, you know, HubSpot coworkers. But, like, I'm going there, you know, as a customer, as a partner, as a, you know, whatever you want to call it. Right. So it's going to be a totally different experience and I'm looking forward to like, you know, enjoying it through that lens. But my first one that I had, I have like actually picked like four of them, but I'm just going to. I know we're just going to do two. So first one I have here is one that John McLaren and Laurie Keon, I think I'm spelling my pronounce their name wrong. Are doing. And it's building deep CRM customizations to supercharge your business. It's a HubSpot product breakout. The big reason I'm super stoked for this one is any time I would have, like, really deep questions, thoughts, ponderings, needing real good insights into, like, what's happening with HubSpot's API and like, what we're doing on the forefront of like, customizing stuff or allowing people to customize stuff, whether it's through private apps or what sort of extent that like marketplace apps have the ability to do, especially when it comes to things like custom cards and how they're opening up that center panel for a lot of custom cards and tabs and things like that, and building just more stuff into HubSpot from your outside systems. That's the stuff that I'm super stoked about right now. Not just because I'm working for Happily, but it's always just been a big kind of thing because, like, to me, that's where we start to beat Salesforce, right? When we can add this much deeper level of customization that's more front and center versus a little card floating on the side, Right? So I'm super stoked to kind of see what's going on there, because I'm out of the loop of that stuff now versus, like, you know, very much in it every day. So I'm super stoked on that one. And anyone who's interested in, you know, building in your own internal systems that your company has into HubSpot's interface, this is one that you need to go to because you'll get all the juice on how to do it and what's on the horizon and, like, what they're going to be adding. It's going to be awesome.
Dude. Dude. Talk about a happy accident. So one of the things that I've been doing inside community.hubheroes.com is actually doing a VIP, very important presentation.
Oh.
See what I did there? VIP content. And I'm just gonna. I usually don't share my screen, but I'm gonna go ahead and share my screen real quick. I'm gonna find the window. Here it is. This one. Dude, look at this. This is literally one of the ones that we said was a VIP piece that people should be paying attention to.
Let's go.
I'm like, oh, my God. Max and I were like, I don't know, twins or something or joint. I don't know, but it's amazing. It's. It's amazing, dude. I was like, yes, it's a good one.
That's gonna be a really cool one. I can't wait for it. John's always got the juice when it comes to the HubSpot API and what's on the horizon and stuff. So it's gonna be great.
Love it.
Devin, what about you, my dude?
Oh, I have two. One is a subject that is very, you know, near and dear to me. I had to switch cameras because my camera died. I'm so depressed. But one is about work, life, balance, and parenting, specifically.
Oh, yeah, and those are huge.
Like, you can see parenting is important to me.
You can.
You can see. Like, I. I keep artwork from the kids on the office wall, but this one is a meetup. It's balance and Stretch Making working parenthood work. This one, it says, joins the founders of Mamava and Mother Honestly, plus other parents and caregivers for a series of fun exercises designed to get out of your head and tap into your inner wisdom. Like that. Like, for me, that's huge. And I know, like, a lot of parents deal with guilt for the amount of work that they're putting in, the amount of time that they're investing in their job. So that one is definitely one of the ones on top of my list. And the other one is by, uh.
Oh, oh, he's breaking the rules. He's breaking the rules one at a time. Bad humor.
We need to take this one official commute together.
One official demerit to Devin. Hurtful. Hurtful.
But I will say this. I will say this. The fact that that's what Devin picked. Good human. I'm gonna throw that out there.
All right, well, I will share mine. My first one. Well, let me first go into the background of how I chose. So I'm going to tell you the thing that I do every year that I go to inbound, whether I'm attending virtually or in person, I go to the session filters and I see what stuff they have about content. Because, surprise, surprise, your resident content strategist cares about whether or not there are sessions about actually how the sausage gets made when it comes to content. And guess what, guys? There isn't.
Oh, no sausage.
No, there's sausage, bro. There's food trucks.
Oh, God.
Thank God.
High level content sausage, right? There's high level. Like, let's talk about this. Let's talk about that. But once again, this is my one, like, my one petty grievance that I have every year. And I don't know if it's because there is a deficit of content focused specialists who are willing to speak at the event or what it is, but every single year, I go and I walk away going, I love that. I have learned so much of what to do with content once I've created it. But how do I actually create it? How do I actually do it? Because that's the thing, right? We sit down in front of our keyboards and we have existential crises about our expertise and abilities and our thoughts and dreams and beliefs and whether or not we're special boys and girls who will actually achieve our dreams one day. But, like, surprises me, we have a whole industry built around content and nobody talks about it.
Nobody. Come on, inbound, we're just going to.
Chat GPT and ask you to write us a blog post now.
Well, Marcus Sheridan does have a talk about, like, building trust with content in the AI era, which I think is very Fascinating. But that's not one of the ones I chose. Although I'm sure it'll be a great talk. I just have to throw it out there. I don't know if it's an inbound issue or if it is a people aren't talking about it issue. Because, George, you and I have had this conversation. There are a surprising few people like me, like our friend Kevin Phillips, like, there it is surprising to me how many we don't have in terms of content specialists in the industry. And I'm wondering if it's also like, they just don't know that they should be talking if they are. So it may not be a HubSpot inbound issue. It may be something around like, well, nobody's submitting anything.
Yeah, let's. Let's ask the masses, right? Like, you're listening to this, you're watching this. If you're in the community, have you seen this at other events where you just don't see the, like, how to make it. How, how, how it can be made. Right. It can be made efficiently. It can be made. So it's just tasty. Good. Like, let us know, hit us up on the, the Twitters or hit us up in the community or the. Oh, it's not Twitters anymore. Dang it.
Hit us up on that anyways.
I'll give it to you. Unless it's content and then you're not gonna get it.
By the way, Liz, before we move forward, make sure you at mention Kevin Phillips, because we mentioned him one once in the podcast too.
I will mention him right on LinkedIn.
We'll tag everybody. We'll tag everybody that we talk about once in this episode on LinkedIn. It's a new strategy. It's not happening enough on LinkedIn.
It's not. It's not.
No, not at all.
So I'm throwing that out there. That is my petty grievance.
And.
And to your point, George, the year that I spoke at Inbound, I did a totally wonky like you. You all know the term brand voice. Do you know how to define it? And it was like a standing room only type of thing. And it was really cool. And I had people come up to me saying, like, I actually was taught how to do a content thing instead of just being talked around it.
Yeah.
So my first one, though, actually has nothing to do with content, I'm gonna be perfectly honest.
Well, first of all, none there.
So there's that. But also the other thing too is that I am very privileged that one of the clients I work with actually does. One of their primary competencies is that they work with organizations, schools, parents and practitioners to implement DEIA programs within their.
Organizations, schools, or solving specific sensitive challenges. And she's been doing this work in Los Angeles for about more than 15, 20 years. Just a really remarkable woman. Her name is Colette Bowers in and what struck me is that when I was, when I was going through the agenda, a particular talk came up that really caught my eye and it is Belonging, intersection of DEI and customer experience with Dan Gingis and Shannon Hughes or Shawna Hughes. What I love about this is that there is more emphasis now on organizational leaders making a purposeful priority out of DEIA initiatives. And there are good reasons for that, right? Like there's the good human side of it, which is like, well, number one, by 2045, did you guys know that people who are considered, quote, unquote, minorities will likely be the majority? So there's that organizations make 87% better decisions when they have a more diverse and inclusive workforce. And then if you are just there for the money, because I know some people are more diverse, Organizations usually make 2.5% more cash flow per employee. So there is the business case for it as well. But what I found fascinating about this is that while it is also talking about DEI initiatives internally, they are talking about how DEI is something that can also be integrated in and can and should be integrated into your customer experience. Now, this is feels like an obvious thing. Like if you like, we're all, it's not just diverse inside our walls. Like all the humans are diverse. That is, that is the human experience. But I think what is really exciting to me about this is that it's not. It's taking people out of this very binary way of thinking of like it is an HR concept. This is the thing that we have to do in order to check the box and da, da, da. It's about making a more holistic approach to DEI and especially when it comes to the humans that you serve, which is something I know we're very passionate about here. So that's my, that's my first recommendation. I would highly recommend people check that out.
I love it. I, I hang on. I want to chime in here. I love that you brought this one up. I'll tell you why. Because I love Dan. Dan is a great human. And I'm saying that he's a great human because if you haven't checked out the podcast that him. I don't know if they're still doing it, but There's a lot of historical, juicy goodness, especially for our service folks that might be listening to this. If you have not checked out the Experience this podcast with Joey Coleman and Dan Gingis, you should definitely check it out. And also, if you're like, ooh, that sounds like something we might be interested in our organization, then go to dangingis.com now. I don't say that for everybody. And by the way, I love Dan enough that Liz, don't tag Dan into this crazy long link post that we're going to do where we're mentioning everybody. Just leave him out of it. He's a good human. No, I shouldn't say that. Everybody's a good human. Don't tag anybody.
Don't tag. What about our best friend of the pod, Barack Obama? We go on picnics with him every Saturday.
We should tag him still.
We should tag him.
Yeah.
George, actually, keep your mic on because you're up next. Give us your second pick.
Yes.
Does he ever turn his mic off?
I do.
I'd like to pretend. Let me live in an aspirational world.
I don't turn my mic off, but I do my wife. Okay, boom, boom, let's go. I'm just kidding. I'm kidding, people.
Oh, God.
You know, I'm in so much trouble right now.
Out.
Because Noah edits this, and he's gonna be like, mom, guess what dad said on the podcast.
Totally gonna get ratted out by your kid, man. You're totally gonna get ratted out.
I probably should start building the doghouse right now. Yes, now. Okay, so let's move forward. Oh, God, I'm really in trouble. Okay.
I'm the good one.
Hi, Kelly. How are you doing? All right, so, you know, you can give Kelly a high five when you see her at Inbound and be like, I don't know how you live with that, dude. Okay, moving on on. My second one is a blueprint to build your webinar and virtual event strategy. And I'll tell you why I picked this one, because months and months ago, I did a podcast episode for the Marketing Smarts podcast for marketing profs, and it was with Mark Killens, but at that point, he was with Airmeat, and we were talking about event growth strategies, and it sent me down this, like, research thing of wanting to do events. By the way, we're doing a podcast right now. No, we're not. We're doing an event. You literally go into the community right now. It says live. There can be people asking questions in the chat pane. There's a button that you could be like, hit the call in and actually step on stage with us and you could ask a question and we could answer it. Like, we're literally doing an event. Everything can be an event. You just have to start to change your mind on how you're doing it and where you're doing it and why you're doing it. And so for this one, everybody likes a good blueprint, baby. I want a blueprint to build less webinar ish but more event style strategy around GBT and around hub heroes. Tessa Barron, VP of marketing from On24. Okay. Growth and acquisition, marketing, marketing ops and marketing tech. By the way, was the tags that were with this one. And driving growth today takes a change of mindset. By the way, we may be talking about webinars and events right now. We may be talking about business. Business right now. Or we may be talking about just life in general. Let me read that again for the people in the background. Driving growth, personal or professional, today takes a change of mindset from how we plan, scale, optimize, and align for success. Marketers need to rethink the fundamentals of how we engage audiences, build relationships, and deliver revenue in a digital first world. Can somebody just drop the mic? Mine's hooked to an arm. I can't drop a mic. If I had one, I. I dropped it right now.
Wow.
Dropped it.
You know what? For the keynote, shout out to our best friends Dharmesh and Brian, who will see at brunch this weekend because they're also best friends of the pod. We'll give you the recording of Max doing that on video. And when you make whatever big announcement you're gonna make this year, just have that cute little thing of Max just.
Going, dropping the mic. No, we should actually, when we see them at brunch, we should ask them if they want to come and be on the show at some point.
We totally should.
That'd be fun.
Are they gonna have sausage at the brunch?
Max, what's your second choice?
My second choice?
This is about AI. I don't know.
Listen, I'm freaked out about. I'm freaked out about AI.
Not I love AI. What are you talking about?
I've watched. Hey, listen, I've watched too many scary podcasts. It's about AI. Not to be freaked out about AI, but Sinead Bovell, founder of WEI is, she's a futurist. So she studies the future. Right. And forecasts the future. Right. She's done a lot of cool stuff.
Studying the future does that. Like, can you even be tested on that? Because there are no right or wrong eventually.
Exactly, yeah. Dubbed the AI Educator for the non nerds by Vogue, Sinead Bovell is changing the narrative of who should be talking tech. Get Sinead's straightforward take on technology and the future in this session, exploring the exciting possibilities and concerns. I've got concerns of an emerging AI powered future focusing on how to adapt and when to resist. So the session is called Preparing for the AI. Boom. The perspective of a Futurist. Anyway, I'm, I'm super stoked on it. I've just heard a lot. I mean, AI is cool. Don't get me wrong. I've been, I've been, I've been trying to open up my mind to a lot more of it. I think I was just so sour on it when it first, you know, when I first started realizing that like, oh man, people are already so bad at creating content anyway. It's going to be even worse than you just tell a machine. No, no, your, your, your poetry was one of the best parts of it. But like, you know, I've always just been, it's just like, man, listen, creating content is a tough thing to do and it kind of sucks that people can just go and just tell a robot to write a blog post or create content. But maybe it doesn't suck. Maybe that's just the new paintbrush these days and it's all about being really good at prompts and all this other stuff. But anyway, significantly freaked out about it. So I want to hear her take on it and all that and we'll see. I don't know. I'm so weird about how I feel about AI. I'm trying to explore those feelings.
We have to have a future AI focused podcast.
We have to max crying for.
Let's get Dylan from Chats, who's working on Chat spot to come in and talk to us about it.
Yes, let's get Dylan Selberg on here. Let's have a conversation. I don't usually promote just our normal blog on here, but ladies and gentlemen, if you want to know how I feel about AI, head over to georgebthomas.com I just wrote an article like last week about AI memory bank, custom instructions, chat, GPT, communicating with an assistant, training an assistant, making something sound like your best friend.
Like, dude, George, when can I talk to. When can I Talk to chat GBT, bro.
I tried to buy that domain. $65,000 later. Oh my God, Never will you talk to that. Oh, Yeah, I mean, unless I win the lottery. If I won the lottery, I'd probably do it, but. But no.
Are you okay, though, bud? You got a little emotional about the robots before we move on.
It's such an interesting conversation, and it's. It's one that I can see. I'm not a futurist, but I see it coming. I see it becoming divisions in the way that people fundamentally think and believe that they can or should be doing business. And it. It stresses me out because people already put too many restraints on. Like imagine saying to yourself, I don't need to use the printing press.
I don't need hard pass on the telegraph.
I don't need to use the Internet, mobile phones. No, not for me.
This.
I mean, literally, this might be one of the most massive changes in what we call the world in forever. So please don't think of it as just a marketing conversation, because it's not. Anyway, different episode. Let's move forward. We're talking about inbound.
Max, are you okay, bud?
Yeah, I'm just trying to figure out how I could just, like, I don't know, 3D print an AI generated NFT.
You know what I mean?
What?
I would rec and somehow turn it into a crypto and take it to the moon, baby.
Let's go.
All I would recommend is that if you see Johnny 5 rolling down the hallway at inbound, just like fall to your knees and say, I, for one, welcome our AI overlords and then move on.
Anyway, Devin, I say that to my Alexa Daily.
Yeah, I wish it would let me rename it Johnny5, but it doesn't.
That would be dope.
That would be amazing.
I do call mine computer, though.
I used to do that, but I say the word computer too much and it would be like, what? I'm like, shut up, computer. Like, sorry.
All right, kids. Yes, Devin, what is your next?
My next pick that I was immediately going to go into, but then I earned a demerit earlier.
You did, you did.
Official demerit is by one of. Used to be one of my favorite podcasts. It was. I think it was Rev Ops podcast. Now I'm drawing a brain fart on. On the name of his podcast, but. Sangram Vardy.
Are you drawing your watercolors or pastels?
How do you draw fart?
Charcoal.
I'm pretty sure you could have a brain fart. I've never tried to draw one.
I'm just an artist.
I could do it. I have Photoshop open right now. It may end up in the show Notes, notes. You guys keep playing. But yeah, I'm drawing a blank and having a brain fart. Okay, let me just mix my idioms in peace, please.
But who's the old man now?
You use a bowl and a whisk or a stand mixer to mix your idioms and your face.
Oh my God.
I use a rubber.
Devin, we digress.
We're doing great. Trust us with your inbounds and your hub heroing.
We're here for you. Strategy, baby.
Who decided Friday afternoons were a good after lunch?
I'm still in this food column.
All right, Devin, what is it? What is it?
Okay, so this, this particular one is the 11 irrefutable go to market plays that simply work by Sangram Vak. He is, he is like the dude, if you've ever listened.
He.
He co founded Terminus. He is like the Flip My Funnel podcast. That was the name of it. He is the dude who is like was talking about Rev Ops before anybody and had podcasts devoted to it. The thing is, it says most people imagine starting and growing a business as something either daunting or nearly impossible. Unfortunately, data suggests that less less than 1% of the companies to a million in revenue in their lifetime. Much less than a year. Sangram had the opportunity to start two companies in the last 10 years that grew from zero to million in nine months. Join this session to learn practical examples regardless of your startup or a big company on how you can jump start your business with these 11 plays. A GTM operating system, an ROI model. You can steal it and apply it today. Definitely hoping I can sneak in and see that one. That's one of the things that sucks about being a HubSpot employee, going the HubSpot or going to inbound is that there is a very good chance that I'm going to be working during discovery stage, but I think I'm going to be working right next door to the stage. So I'm going to keep an eye out for what he's got going on.
I'll cover you.
Absolutely. You'll fit right in.
Unless there are robots, in which case Matt is going to be in the fetal position on the floor crying. But that's, you know, like we said, that's a. That's an episode.
Boston Dynamics, stay back.
Shirt and just be the vibe checker in the space and then I'll head over to the desert.
Oh yeah, that'll go well.
Yeah, yeah. Question though, like, does anybody else find it odd that they talked about not many businesses make it to making a million in a Year in their lifetime. Yeah. And. Yeah, wait, you'd be surprised. I'm. I'm struggling with that, ladies and gentlemen.
I've started six different businesses and only two of them have made it into six figures. So I understand that.
Completely different story, different day. My turn. It's my turn.
Get it.
Thank you. I hesitate to say this one because it's gonna make one of our hosts completely insufferable with ego, but when I looked.
Oh, yeah.
If you're wondering, it's George. Yay.
They let this guy in.
Yes. Yes, they did.
Who's that guy?
Oh, my goodness.
But here's the thing.
Tag him. Tag him on LinkedIn in this post. Like, spam the crap out of this guy that you're about to talk about.
Screenshot his headshot in this thing too. Because this guy in this headshot. Oh, my goodness.
Outstanding. So I went through the entire agenda and I was like, don't make it that I have to pick this one. Don't make this be the right one to pick. Which of course meant it was the right one to pick. Actually, all kidding aside, I am here. I am standing. I am here as the number one super fan of George's session. I believe it's on Wednesday, right?
Yep.
Is it Wednesday?
Yep, it's Wednesday, my dude.
Es Reasons why your sales enablement strategy sucks. Now, I've got a couple of reasons why I'm really hyped about it. Number one, kidding aside, if you haven't seen George speak, you gotta see George speak. Because I don't know about y'. All. Have you ever been to inbound sessions where you're like, I did not realize I accidentally stumbled into a 30 minute timeshare commercial. Like, you're not actually learning anything. You're not actually walking away with anything or stuff is like, too high level or abstract. Like, you can't act. So every time I've seen George speak, which has been an inbound, it's been at Impact Live, it's been at marketing. Profs like, you go there to learn and you walk away with tools.
And my understanding, George, we're not.
We can't talk about it yet, but you got some special little goodies that you're going to be giving people who.
Attend this specific session. Now, the other reason I'm really hyped about this is that in addition to being the person who will bang on Dharmesh and Brian's door until they finally do a content focused session at Inbound, is I'm also a big sales enablement Champion. And the reason for that is, is because I actually spent six months on the sales team at Impact as their dedicated content strategist. And literally you can ask Tom Scipio, who's still at Impact. I'm a woman of tact and grace.
So when you told me you were doing such a great job as the.
Marketing team content strategist, we're going to have you go be the dedicated one that are the sales team, I blurted out, am I being punished?
And I think that is very symbolic.
Of the problem that we have in with sales enablement. Right? Like sales enablement sounds like a good idea. And marketers, I'm pretty sure you know how to spell it, but you actually know what sales enablement content is, what a sales enablement strategy looks like. Are you sure you actually have a strateg or did you just find a blog one day that said sales enablement, showed it to your boss and then made something resembling sales enablement. But quietly, somewhere in the dark, your sales teams are like, these leads suck. This content sucks. They are not helping us. You need to go to this session because you. George. George, I got a little sneak peek because I'm greedy. I'm an only child who can't wait until Christmas morning. So I got a little sneak peek of what he's going to be talking about. He literally goes through the six very specific ways in which your sales enablement strategy is failing, lays out an entire roadmap of how to unf your sales enablement strategy. But then the best part of what I really like about it is because really rolling out a whole sales enablement ecosystem within your organization is freaking terrifying. So what you're actually going to be giving people is so this is the, this is the entire kingdom you're going to be building. But here are the first six steps you need to take right now. So it's going to be tactical. It's going to be a thing that genuinely, as many of our inbound practitioners like to say, move the needle. Getting up there with accelerating, unlocking and discovering. Guys, we need to retire that very soon. But like for now, this is going to move the needle. If you want to make friends with your sales team, which you should marketers so you don't look like an expense and look like a profit center, you need to be there there.
Yeah. Liz, first of all, thanks for bringing this up. Like I had zero clo clue and, and what I'll say a little bit of a behind the scenes flow here is this is easily the talk out of my Entire life of giving talks. The one that I have researched the most, the one that I have contemplated of what I wanted to talk about the most, the one that I've dove in for other thought leader quotes, statistics, tied it back to just fundamental human communication and understanding. Like. Like this. This for me is. It's less about just an inbound talk, and it's more about what might be a GBT version three of a topic that I have now fallen in love with and will start to really put the hammer down on. How do we start fixing this in organizations?
Yeah, because that's the great thing about this talk is you're to the tactics and the human side of it. And I think that's usually where people get tripped up. Right? Like there are two parts of this equation. There's the sales enablement strategy itself that needs to be executed, but it begins with the humans who actually need to play well together. Not run with scissors, actually trust each other and actually get the work done. And that usually. Usually that's the part that gets missed. So that is my final choice. I know we are at time, fellas, but I would love to just lob one other thing. George, did you want to share your spotlight? Just.
I'll do it real quick. I'll do it real quick. Quick, Ladies and gentlemen, I'm. I'm just saying, first of all, it says spotlight comma, live stream. So even if you're not going, just know that it says live stream. Does anybody sitting here know who. Andrew Huberman. Huberman. I'm suck at that. Anyway, neurobiology professor and host and. And it's also with Brian Halligan. So it's the two of them together. Co founder and executive chairperson, by the way, HubSpot culture and community sales strategy, brand and creative is the literal tags that they use for this one. A conversation with Andrew exploring the power of intense focus, mindfulness and rest to fuel creativity and strengthen the culture of a team.
Boom.
Nice.
Yes, please.
More of that, please.
More of that, please.
Yeah, can I plug another session?
Would you like to plug the other two that you have?
Noah's gonna be like, no, just one. I can already hear this in my house, by the way. Noah is gonna come down, he's gonna open the file, he's gonna be like, it's 65 minutes.
You know what, Noah? You know what? We got big brain stuff happening here this week, man. We gotta make sure the big brain stuff gets to the big brain audience.
Hey, if you're looking for a big brain session, the boys from Happily There you go.
I knew it was coming. I knew it was coming.
Very relevant. All right, big Plata, I'll have you know, chilling away. CEO Dax, our head of product, and Tyrone, or CTO, are doing a session called Integrate your app with HubSpot to leverage a growth channel where they're going to be sharing a whole ton of secrets on how to build apps for the HubSpot App Marketplace. So you, if you are like a HubSpot partner or you are a developer and you're starting to see the writing on the walls in terms of, like, the opportunity that is the HubSpot App Marketplace, and you are building apps on HubSpot. Curious, right? These guys have done it time and time and time and time and time again. That's partly why I was such big fans of them and why I'm working with them now. But they're gonna be sharing all the secrets on, like, how to actually build apps on HubSpot, how to take them to market, how to drive adoption, all that kind of stuff. So, dude, I mean, I wouldn't be a chief evangelist without calling that out. You gotta go check it out.
I'm there. I have the greatest app idea. I'm gonna be there. I'm gonna be at that session because I want to build a HubSpot integrated app that when you tag a ton of people on LinkedIn and put out a post that it fries your entire HubSpot ecosystem and you can't use it.
Anymore, it just automatically violates some kind of GDPR rule.
Melts down. Just melts down. Just. Bye. You're done.
It deletes your LinkedIn account.
In case our listeners are wondering, this is an educational podcast and a cry for help. It's both.
Yeah. I need a therapist.
Do you agree? Do you agree? What are your thoughts? Do you agree?
Let us know. Are you tired of getting tagged into LinkedIn and having to go, why am I on this? Let me look.
All right, guys, calm down or everyone gets demerits. That's right. No, Devin, it's going to be just you this week. See, you spoke up. Now you got a double demerit.
It.
Ricky Rickleson commented on a post, literally.
Talking at the same time as George and I get. Okay, that's fine. No, it's fine. I see how it is.
Sorry.
Yeah, sure am.
Are we tabbing?
Sure am.
The violence there's gonna be.
There's gonna be a poem about Liz from Devin next time she don't show up for the show.
I know, I know that last time he Wrote a poem about me. I really liked it. And so, you know, there's that.
Oh, it's gonna be a different poem this time. I can feel it.
It.
I can feel it.
I can feel it. Well, while we're feeling that last question, guys, if you could give one piece.
Of advice to our listeners about how.
To get the most out of the.
Sessions for the breakout sessions specifically, what would it be? I will go last.
If you're gonna take notes, do whatever you can do to keep yourself in the moment. I mean, I know for me, if I'm taking notes on a laptop, I'm easily distracted by the Internet. And so I guess, like, I don't know, if you haven't picked up a pen and paper in a while, well, go ahead and do that. But again, that's just for me, someone who's easily distracted. Like, be there. Be in the moment. Soak it all in. You know, you could always watch a recording, if there is one. So if there is one, let that be your notes. But, you know, just. Just be present.
Actually happen here with mine, because I will say, no, I gotta hop in here with mine because it's related to Max's only because of what he just said. So when I spoke at Inbound, something was wrong with the recording equipment and it ended up not being recorded at all. So my. I don't know if this is legal, but I don't work for HubSpot, so. Oh, well, record it. Put it on a voice memo. That way you can stay in the moment. And also, you don't know when those recordings are going to be available. You don't know when they're going to make the slides available. If you want to be able to be in the moment, absorb, ask questions you would not have normally asked because you're busy frantically taking pictures of the slides or scribbling stuff down that you will not remember the next time.
Record it and then go to Rev.com and do an AI transition transcription, which is like. It's like a sentiment.
It's like stupidly. It's stupidly cheap. I do like recordings on it all the time. It'll be like, this is a 35 minute recording. It will cost you $4. Like, do that instead so you can be there and be present. Sorry, George, I didn't mean to jump in. I hope you understand why it was.
Yeah, there's actually an app that will record the audio and allow you to take notes at the same time and timestamp where you're actually putting your notes. Like it's like an iPad. I forget the name of it. I used it for a couple events that I went to. It was really kind of dope.
Dope.
So I. What's funny, though, is I was going in the same direction as Max, where I'm like, maybe put down your device, maybe get a, like physical pencil or pen. Get a piece of paper and definitely jot down. Because by the way, there's just something fundamentally different about writing it down on paper or writing it in the style of normal writing, even if it's not paper and pen. Maybe it's shoot parchment and quill. Well, no, but I have one too, and I can't even remember the dang name of it. It's like it doesn't have the Internet. Basically. It's not going to give you notifications. You're not going to be able to fly over to social. But it's like a pen and you write on, like, what feels like an iPad type system.
Oh, a paper. Is that what it's called? Yeah.
Wait, are you talking about. Remarkable.
Remarkable. That's it.
I even have one. And I was. It's. Listen, I'm getting old. I. I was drawing a brain fart, much like Devon was drawing a brain fart earlier. I couldn't remember the name of it.
It. Yeah, yeah.
So even if it's like a remarkable or regular paper, but like this, this whole thing, the fact that most of us. Because we'll see what Devin was going to say at this point so far, most of us were like, be present, be in the moment, jot down your notes, forget the Internet exists. Make sure you're creating a backup. You're going to. Going to get back to it later. Here's what I'm going to say. Have all of that, because what I want you to do on top of that. Remarkable. Or what I want you to do on top of your iPad or on the paper, for every session you go to, I want you to write, hashtag one thing, one thing out of that session that you want to implement when you get back. Because you can't implement everything, but you can implement one thing out of each session that you go to and then go from there. Once those are done, I'm done.
I love that, Devin. Demerit King.
Wow.
Take a king.
We stand.
That's your Dungeons and Dragons name, by the way. Demerit King has arrived. Actually sounds pretty Player of brain farts.
Get some rest. That.
Oh, yeah. Yes.
It's like this is inbound. Is draining in a great way. You're gonna get tired. You're gonna be tempted to go out and do all the things, see all the people, drink all the drinks and. And libations will be flowing. But get some rest. At the end of the day, you're there primarily to come out better than you were when you went in. And rest is a weapon. You're. You're going to be tired. You're going to be tempted to fall asleep, especially if you find a breakout where someone is particularly monotonous because not everybody can be like, you know, cheerleader backflip like George. So, yeah, you got to. You got to go into it, resting, get some coffee in you, stretch, keep the blood flowing. And Max is picturing George in a cheerleading outfit now.
Yeah, baby.
Yeah, you are.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Give me an H. Give me a yeah.
Well, kids, on that note, happy first annual breakout session Explosion Fun time with Hub hero.
Let's go.
Wow, George, that's what we're going out on. On. Let's go.
I don't know how to. I don't know how to. Liz. I don't know how to beat that. Sleep is a weapon. Rest is a weapon. Like, everybody. Devin. Devin once again is like, let me nonchalantly throw this fire bomb into your lap. Rest.
Max, can you do another mic drop for us for the. For the kids at home? Hold on.
I hope you're watching this. I hope. I hope you're going to the community.hubheroes. i hope you watch this episode. The. The audio I know will just not do it justice.
Take it up with this. Hold on one second.
There you go.
Was that. Did it have a cap on it?
Huh?
What?
Yeah, it had had a cap on it.
And on that note, get out.
We're done. Goodbye. Happy Friday.
Or whenever you're listening to this.
Oh, that's hot. Okay, Hub Heroes, we've reached the end of another episode. Will Lord Lack continue to loom over the community, or will we be able to defeat him in the next episode of the Hub Heroes podcast? Make sure you tune in and find out in the next episode. Make sure you head over to thehubheroes.com to get the latest episodes and become part of the League of Heroes. FYI, if you're part of the League of Heroes, you'll get the show notes right in your inbox and they come with some hidden power up potential as well. Make sure you share this podcast with a friend, leave a review if you like what you're listening to, and use the hashtag hubbyroes podcast on any of the socials and let us know what strategy conversation you'd like to listen into next. Until next time, when we meet and combine our forces, remember to be a happy, helpful, humble human. And, of course, always be looking for a way to be someone's hero.
