Marketing B2B Technology

Etinosa Agbonlahor, founder and CEO of Decision Alpha, joins the podcast to talk about applying behavioural economics to B2B pricing and financial wellbeing. Etinosa explains that pricing is “architecture,” shaped by reference points, anchors, packaging, and framing, and that even enterprise buying includes emotion and incentives across multiple stakeholders. She outlines Decision Alpha’s four-step framework: map monetization zones and segments, research willingness to pay (including competitor context), frame and structure pricing (options, subscriptions, transparency, anchoring), then test and refine in market. She shares a case where prospect research revealed pricing ranges and led to targeting higher-revenue, more mature buyers first. Common mistakes include setting prices in a vacuum, sales discounting too quickly, and over-optimistic planning, while cost is only the floor and pricing should start from the ceiling.   About Decision Alpha Decision Alpha is a pricing strategy and consumer research firm that helps businesses solve complex challenges in pricing, product design, and customer experience. Their team of expert researchers and behavioural economists brings decades of experience, including work with leading financial institutions. They combine behavioural economics, customer research, and commercial strategy to understand how people make decisions and design solutions that reduce friction, strengthen revenue, and build customer loyalty.   About Etinosa Agbonlahor Etinosa Agbonlahor is a behavioural economist and CEO of Decision Alpha, a pricing strategy and consumer research firm. With over a decade of global experience across the U.S., Australia, Africa, and the U.K., she has shaped pricing, engagement, and customer-behaviour strategy for major financial institutions and venture-backed startups. Her work has been featured in MarketWatch, Morningstar, and other leading financial platforms for her insights on how behaviour drives financial outcomes. She is also the author of How to Talk to Your Parents About Money, a guide to navigating complex financial conversations.   Time Stamps 00:00 Meet Decision Alpha 00:40 From Behavioural Economics to Pricing 02:32 Pricing Psychology Basics 03:50 Case Study Pricing a Niche Platform 06:34 Selling Intangibles and Value 07:42 Competition and Reference Points 09:26 Four Step Pricing Framework 11:02 How Decision Alpha Engagements Work 14:28 Common B2B Pricing Mistakes 16:25 Stop Cost Plus Pricing 17:57 Emotion in Enterprise Buying 20:00 Why Customers Hesitate 22:55 Final Advice and Resources   Quotes “We have to expose the prices to oxygen to see if they're gonna hold or not." Etinosa Agbonlahor, founder and CEO of Decision Alpha. “The biggest mistake is you set pricing in a vacuum." Etinosa Agbonlahor, founder and CEO of Decision Alpha. “Always start with voice of the customer, sit in the customer's seat." Etinosa Agbonlahor, founder and CEO of Decision Alpha. “We think about pricing as architecture. The way you structure a price is gonna sway your customers one way or the other.” Etinosa Agbonlahor, founder and CEO of Decision Alpha.   Follow Etinosa: Etinosa Agbonlahor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/etinosasere/ Decision Alpha website: https://decisionalpha.co/ Decision Alpha LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/decisionalpha/ Behavioural Pricing Playbook: https://playbook.decisionalpha.co Stress-Test Your Pricing Strategy with Fred: https://fred.decisionalpha.co   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Brendan Farnand, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist at Knak, joins the podcast to talk about his marketing career at IBM and Trend Micro and the recurring challenge of turning campaign ideas into executed assets. Farnand argues email remains a highly effective, owned channel, potentially becoming even more important in the AI era, but B2B teams often “settle” for outdated templates due to technical complexity and bottlenecks. He discusses balancing marketer creativity with brand and regulatory compliance, and balancing brand consistency with conversion on landing pages through cross-team alignment and testing. Farnand says “conversion” and gating practices are still being redefined, making experimentation critical, but testing is hindered by the chaotic “messy middle” between ideation and execution platforms. He cautions against fully agentic marketing that creates undifferentiated “AI slop,” advocating intentional human/AI balance and continuous learning.   About Knak Knak is the agentic production layer for enterprise marketing. It's the system between creative brief and send, where your team and AI build on‑brand campaigns that are more personalized, more tested, and live in days.   About Brendan Farnand Brendan is the Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist at Knak, where he's on a mission to revolutionize the way marketing teams produce campaigns. A seasoned expert in demand generation, customer experience and all things MOps, Brendan is passionate about empowering marketers with agentic solutions that unleash creativity, speed up execution, and drive real results. With a keen sense of innovation, he empowers brands to develop high-impact campaigns that drive meaningful revenue - without roadblocks.   Time Stamps 00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro 01:37 Why Knak Exists 02:33 Email Isn’t Dead 05:57 What Makes Emails Good 09:34 Freedom vs Brand Control 12:17 Landing Pages and Testing 14:42 Gating Content and Conversions 17:09 The Messy Middle Bottleneck 20:08 Can AI Build Everything 24:41 Enterprise Production Reality 27:26 Customer Obsession at Knak 30:04 Future of AI Marketing 34:35 Career Advice for Marketers 35:57 Best Advice Received 36:54 Where to Learn More 37:48 Closing Thanks   Quotes “Even if you do get ChatGPT to generate you an on-brand, perfectly coded email, good luck — there’s many more steps to go through in an enterprise before you can actually go to market with the campaign.” Brendan Farnand, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist at Knak. “What’s really important for every enterprise organization today is to sit down and have the discussion: where should humans be involved, and where should agents be doing the work?” Brendan Farnand, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist at Knak. “Really listen to your customers, listen to the market, listen to the people around you… before you speak your mind, just listen and learn.” Brendan Farnand, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist at Knak.   Follow Brendan: Brendan Farnand on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanfarnand/   Knak website: https://knak.com/ Knak LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/knak-/   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Alex Wood, Global Marketing Director at Avnet and Tria, joins the podcast to talk about his journey into tech marketing and why he has stayed at Avnet for eight years through acquisitions, restructures, and multiple rebrands. Wood explains that Tria designs and manufactures customizable compute modules for OEMs across many industries, helping customers start from standard modules and tailor specs such as ports, heat resilience, and vibration resistance, supported by in-house design and manufacturing in Germany and partnerships with Intel, NXP, and Qualcomm. He describes why Avnet moved from MSC to an independent Tria brand to avoid being perceived as a transactional distributor, and how distinctive pink branding drove awareness and clearer positioning. Wood shares approaches to marketing engineers with bold attention plus useful specs, warns against low-value AI content, and emphasizes lead quality and meaningful customer conversations as key success metrics.   About Avnet Avnet Inc. is a global Fortune 250 tech company that supplies electronics components and solutions to OEMs all over the world. Avnet was founded in 1921 on Radio Row in New York, and today is a multi-faceted corporation comprising a range of well-known electronics and technology businesses worldwide, including Tria. Tria Technologies is an Avnet company that designs and manufactures embedded computing for OEMs and other businesses that need industrial, high-performance computing integrated into their products. From standard off-the-shelf compute modules to full-custom systems and even touchscreens and HMIs, Tria’s innovations have been used in everything from coffee machines to farming equipment.   About Alex Wood Alex is a Marketing Director at Avnet, running marketing and communications globally for Avnet’s Embedded Solutions business unit, which includes the market-leading embedded computing brand Tria. Alex started his marketing journey under the sea, literally, working for a scuba diving brand. Today he specialises in highly targeted technology marketing as well as business strategy for rapid, international growth. In his spare time Alex is a photographer, hiker and outdoorsman, enjoying climbing mountains or finding himself back under the sea where he started.   Time Stamps 00:00 Welcome and Introductions 02:32 What Tria Actually Does 03:53 Tria Differentiators 06:06 Why B2B Tech Marketing 07:29 Rebrand to Tria Story 11:31 Bold Pink Brand Identity 14:48 Did the Rebrand Work 16:58 Marketing to Engineers 21:45 Partner Marketing Balance 25:17 Measuring Campaign Success 27:39 Advice and Wrap Up   Quotes “If you’ve got someone’s attention, you need to give them something valuable as quickly as possible and make them want more instead of just bombarding them with content.” Alex Wood, Marketing Director at Avnet. “Would you buy this? It seems overly simplistic, but a lot of the time marketers fall into this trap of selling a product to the customer in a way that they would never listen to themselves.” Alex Wood, Marketing Director at Avnet. “The pink logo is superliminal marketing. It is a ‘you cannot ignore us.’ Alex Wood, Marketing Director at Avnet.   Follow Alex: Alex Wood on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marketingforthewin/ Avnet website: https://www.avnet.com/americas/ Avnet LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/avnet/ Tria website: https://www.tria-technologies.com/ Tria LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/triatechnologies/   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Brad Kugler, CEO and co-founder of DirectMail2.0, joins the podcast to talk about moving from his family’s packaged media business hit by streaming-driven revenue declines after 2011–2012 into disrupting direct mail with technology and recurring revenue. Kugler explains how DM2.0 combines “ink on paper” with a bundled SaaS “performance stack” including landing pages, QR codes, email, USPS mail tracking, and attribution to measure real-time engagement rather than just ROI, typically targeting 3–5% engagement and identifying individual responders. He describes acquiring Who’s Mailing What to expand a direct mail database, using AI propensity modelling across 80,000 campaigns and two billion mail pieces, and applying multiple LLMs to grade creatives and recommend improvements. Kluger notes direct mail fits high-LTV sectors and is underutilized in B2B and advises persistence and learning AI skills.   About DirectMail2.0 DirectMail2.0 is the creator of the industry's first Complete Direct Mail Performance Stack, a connected ecosystem that helps marketers plan, optimize, execute, and measure more successful direct mail campaigns. The stack combines Who's Mailing What! for direct mail intelligence and prospecting, DM20.ai for AI-powered campaign prediction and optimization, and DirectMail2.0 for omnichannel campaign execution, tracking, and attribution. Together, these platforms give brands, agencies, printers, and mail service providers everything they need to make smarter direct mail decisions and drive better marketing results.   About Brad Kugler Brad Kugler is the CEO of DirectMail2.0, Who’s Mailing What!, and DM20.ai, three platforms dedicated to helping marketers and commercial printers achieve better results from direct mail. A lifelong entrepreneur and innovator, Brad combines data, technology, and market intelligence to help businesses make smarter marketing decisions, improve campaign performance, and uncover new growth opportunities in an increasingly competitive marketplace. Time Stamps 00:00 Welcome and Introductions 00:39 Brad’s Career Pivot 03:56 Why Direct Mail Works 05:01 Direct Mail 2.0 Tech 08:40 Scaling the Platform 10:21 Best Fit Industries 13:04 Tracking Engagement Data 15:33 Who’s Mailing What Data 17:29 AI Creative Grading 23:25 Advice and Wrap Up   Quotes “No gatekeeper... No worrying about them getting 600 emails a day and deleting 590 of them in 10 minutes.” Brad Kugler, CEO at DirectMail2.0. “Direct mail... turns heads. It’s tactile. You can touch it. You can see it. You can feel it.” Brad Kugler, CEO at DirectMail2.0. “This AI revolution... will dwarf the internet e-commerce revolution of the early 2000s.” Brad Kugler, CEO at DirectMail2.0.   Follow Brad: Brad Kugler on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bradkugler/ DirectMail2.0 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/directmail2.0/ DirectMail2.0 on X: https://x.com/directmail20 DirectMail2.0 on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/directmail2 DirectMail2.0 on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcF4C08OsZIRbiMbWtG27hw DirectMail2.0 website: https://directmail2.com/   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547  

Rafa Flores, Chief Product and Growth Officer of Treasure AI, joins the podcast to talk about his career path from engineering recruiter to “boomerang” leader returning after six years away, and Treasure Data’s rebrand to Treasure AI. Flores says the shift is an evolution based on the company’s machine-learning and predictive heritage, its technical DNA of using AI internally, and a desire to create a lifestyle-like community brand. He explains Treasure AI Studio, which orchestrates CDP and activation in plain English across web and mobile, enabling faster troubleshooting, campaign deployment, and real-time insights. Flores argues first-party data remains a “goldmine” but must be activated incrementally with governed access; how AI helps answer questions quickly but requires guardrails, discusses fear and overemphasis on speed/cost versus value and predicts growth of “digital workers”.   About Treasure AI Treasure AI is the agentic experience platform helping the world's most loved brands finally activate the customer data they already have. Founded in 2011 and backed by SoftBank, the company spent 15 years quietly building the infrastructure behind some of the most recognizable names in retail, automotive, CPG, and financial services — before rebranding in 2026 to reflect what it had always been building toward. Named a Forrester Wave Leader for B2C CDPs, Treasure AI unifies fragmented first-party data into a single living customer profile and puts AI to work on it in real time, on behalf of human marketers who set the strategy and make the calls. The result for brands like Nestlé, AB InBev, Stellantis, and Condé Nast is measurable: millions in recovered media spend, significant revenue generated, and marketing teams that finally get to go home on time.   About Rafa Flores Rafa Flores is the Chief Product and Growth Officer at Treasure AI, where he leads product strategy and growth with a simple conviction: the best technology gives people their time back. A builder by nature and a father of four, Rafa has always believed that progress is personal — that the products worth building are the ones that free someone up to be more present, more creative, and more human. That belief drives everything from how he runs his teams to the unconventional call he made to give away free access to a platform traditionally reserved for Fortune 500 companies, a bet that raised eyebrows and is already showing results. He brings that same bias toward progress to every stage he walks onto.  Time Stamps 00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro 00:39 Rafa’s Career Journey 01:53 Returning to Treasure Data 03:25 Move at Speed of Now 04:12 Rebrand to Treasure AI 07:22 Lifestyle Brand in B2B 09:57 AI Studio Use Cases 12:37 First Party Data Goldmine 16:29 AI Hype and Real Value 18:38 Digital Workers Ahead 20:31 SaaS Future and Guardrails 23:59 PLG Try Now Campaign 26:02 Advice and Wrap Up   Quotes "It's not just about how much time AI can save you, it's also about how much revenue it can drive for the business." Rafa Flores, CPO at Treasure AI. "Digital workers are about better supporting the human in the loop." Rafa Flores, CPO at Treasure AI. "The biggest mistake is everyone wants to rush to deploy AI."  Rafa Flores, CPO at Treasure AI.   Follow Rafa: Rafa Flores on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ref2019/ Rafa Flores on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/councils/forbestechcouncil/people/rafaelflores/ Treasure AI website: https://www.treasure.ai/ Treasure AI YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TreasureData   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Jon Benson, founder and CEO of BNSN, joins the podcast to talk about his path from writing the “Fit Over 40” book to becoming a leading direct-response copywriter and building AI tools for copywriting. Benson explains why video sales letters (VSLs) are effective, combining voice and text, narrative, and emotional pain points to reduce skepticism and improve message retention. He describes how his software BNSN generates higher-quality copy than generic chatbots by training on strong examples and running multiple rewriting passes to remove common AI artifacts. Benson argues B2B marketers should write to one person, focus on relieving the buyer’s pain rather than company features, and use tactics like strong subject lines and PS sections in emails.   About BNSN BNSN.AI is an AI-powered copywriting platform built for small business owners to create high-converting ads, emails, and sales pages in minutes. It is trained on proven, high-performing marketing campaigns and designed to simplify the process of writing persuasive copy through promptless AI tools and built-in marketing frameworks.   About Jon Benson Jon BENSON is a copywriter, entrepreneur, and AI pioneer whose work has quietly shaped how the world buys things online. Best known as the inventor of the Video Sales Letter, the format that became the backbone of modern digital marketing, he has spent decades writing words that move people to act—not through manipulation, but through what he calls “ethical persuasion.” In 2010, Jon turned his attention to copywriting software, becoming one of the earliest pioneers at the intersection of AI and sales copy. That work eventually evolved into BNSN, a platform trained exclusively on high-converting marketing campaigns and built for small business owners who sell good things to good people. BNSN reflects Jon’s core belief that the human element of business—community, coaching, and genuine connection—separates sustainable success from a flash in the pan. Time Stamps 00:00 Welcome and Introductions 02:22 Nontechnical AI Builder 05:33 Why VSLs Convert 08:28 Narrative and Pain 12:14 Customers and Big Ideas 16:31 Beating AI Slop 20:38 Fixing B2B Copy 25:16 Email Subject and PS 27:40 Career Advice on AI 31:58 Resources and Wrap Up   Quotes “There’s no such thing as selling to a business. It doesn’t exist. You’re selling to a person at a business.” Jon Benson, CEO at BNSN. “If you don’t speak to the pain of your prospect, you’re not ever going to make them feel like they’re seen, heard, or understood.” Jon Benson, CEO at BNSN.   Follow Jon: Jon Benson on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonbenson Jon Benson on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/itsjonbenson/ Jon Benson on X: https://x.com/itsjonbenson Jon Benson on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/itsjonbenson Jon Benson on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPDvmgurd-rym4pyPjviIuw BNSN website: https://bnsn.ai/   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547          

In this episode, Iskren Lilov, Global Marketing Manager at Muck Rack, discusses how the company is evolving from a traditional PR tool into an AI-powered communications platform that combines media monitoring and measurement, journalist intelligence, press release distribution, and generative engine optimization (GEO) capabilities. The conversation explores why PR and communications teams are uniquely positioned to lead GEO initiatives, drawing on Muck Rack research showing that most AI-generated citations come from non-paid sources, with earned media playing a dominant role. Iskren introduces Generative Pulse, Muck Rack’s GEO monitoring solution, and explains the importance of measuring AI visibility through consistent, prompt-based tracking. He also offers practical advice on communications measurement, including the need to establish frameworks before launching campaigns, focus on business outcomes rather than vanity metrics, and balance AI-powered efficiency with the human relationships that remain at the heart of successful media outreach.   About Muck Rack Muck Rack is the AI communications platform where trusted data, human expertise, and embedded intelligence come together to drive clarity, speed and impact. Thousands of companies turn to Muck Rack to make sense of the media conversation around them and understand how their brand shows up in the news and in AI-generated answers. Muck Rack combines global media monitoring, Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) insights, social listening, trusted media data, AI automation, and analyst advisory to help organizations manage reputation, act quickly, and prove their impact across the PR workflow. Thousands of journalists also use Muck Rack’s free tools to showcase their work and analyze the news. Learn more at muckrack.com.   About Iskren Lilov Iskren Lilov is the Global Marketing Manager of Muck Rack – the AI communications platform where trusted data, human expertise, and embedded intelligence come together to drive clarity, speed and impact. He is responsible for overseeing marketing activities across global markets, fostering strategic partnerships and communicating the value of media intelligence. Iskren is the author of the Circular Marketing Model™ that offers a paradigm shift for marketers in the age of AI, replacing the classic understanding of the funnel with a sustainable circular model. As one of the leading young voices in the industry, Iskren is also an author, GEO consultant for major brands, and university-level lecturer in strategic marketing and comms. He leads the AMEC Comms Taskforce and maintains an active role in collaborative initiatives throughout the media intelligence and communication industries. Prior to his current role, Iskren has experience in marketing, PR, and event management in the NGO and cybersecurity sectors. Time Stamps 00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro 02:38 What Muck Rack Does 03:23 Global Reach Beyond US 04:19 PR Role in GEO Era 06:38 Getting PR to Lead GEO 08:45 Generative Pulse and GEO Metrics 11:00 Proving PR Value Without Vanity 13:37 Better Measurement Playbook 17:45 Finding Journalists With AI 19:35 Will AI Replace PR People 21:49 Rapid Fire and Wrap Up   Quotes “”Impressions are not the number of people you've impressed." Very relevant to GEO visibility as well because impressions in isolation tell you nothing.” Iskren Liliv, Global Marketing Manager at Muck Rack.   Follow Eric: Eric Frankel on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/iskren-lilov Muck Rack website: https://muckrack.com/ Muck Rack on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/muckrack/   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Elliot Kim, CEO of Checkbox, explores why online survey tools are now largely a solved problem—and why the real differentiator lies in the company behind the product. He explains how Checkbox is building a people-first, purpose-driven business focused on trust, transparency, and customer-centric policies. Elliot also discusses Checkbox’s broad range of research use cases, and explains how its combination of cloud and on-premise deployment options gives organizations greater control over sensitive data and supports data sovereignty requirements. The conversation also examines the challenges of modern B2B research, from identifying “dark” prospects outside CRM systems through awareness and perception surveys, to reaching niche audiences with small sample sizes. Elliot shares how persistence, creativity, trusted research panels, and aligned incentives all play a role in driving honest, high-quality responses.   About Checkbox Checkbox is a research-grade survey platform trusted by enterprises and public-sector organizations since 2002. With both SaaS and self-hosted deployment options, Checkbox gives teams full control over their data while making it easy to design, distribute, and act on research at scale.   About Elliot Kim Elliot Kim is the CEO of Checkbox and an engineer at heart with two decades of building and scaling products. Before leading Checkbox, he spent years growing engineering teams and developing people-focused cultures in high-growth environments. He's driven to solve real-world problems through ethical research, done right.   Time Stamps 00:33 Elliot’s Career Journey 02:43 Why Another Survey Tool 07:49 Who Uses Checkbox 09:17 Awareness and Perception 11:43 Reliable B2B Research 15:05 Getting Honest Answers 17:24 On Premise and Trust 20:39 Running Better Studies   Quotes “I love solving problems, that’s why I’ll always be an engineer at heart. I feel like I’ve traded satisfaction from my own personal accomplishments for the satisfaction I get from the team’s accomplishments.” Elliot Kim, CEO at Checkbox “By the time someone enters your CRM, they’ve already made most of their decision — and analytics can’t really tell you about the people who didn’t.” Elliot Kim, CEO at Checkbox “Marketing is about serving people with honesty and connecting not with every person in the world, but finding the right people and the right audience.” Elliot Kim, CEO at Checkbox   Follow Elliot: Elliot Kim on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elliotykim/ Checkbox website: https://www.checkbox.com/ Checkbox on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/checkbox-com/   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favorite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547

Eric Frankel, CEO of AdGreetz, discusses how AI-powered personalisation is reshaping the future of advertising. Eric explains why so much digital marketing still relies on generic, one-size-fits-all messaging, despite the wealth of customer data available to brands today. He shares how AdGreetz helps companies create highly personalized ads at scale, using AI and automation to deliver more relevant content that improves engagement and campaign performance. The conversation explores the opportunities and challenges of mass personalisation, including how brands can balance relevance with privacy, maintain brand consistency across thousands of ad variations, and apply consumer marketing tactics to B2B campaigns. Eric also discusses the growing role of AI in creative production, why innovation is critical for marketers, and the importance of standing out in an increasingly crowded digital landscape. About AdGreetz AdGreetz is reimagining marketing for an AI-powered and personalised world. We empower brands, agencies, streamers and publishers to produce and deploy unlimited, data-driven, personalized video and display ads and CRM messages on 22 ad-tech & martech channels. BizGreetz AI®, empowers anyone to produce compelling video, display ads or freeform content in minutes simply by entering a brand name, URL or by prompting. The world's only platform integrated with 51 AI models (70+ versions and 10+ years of award-winning creative expertise distilled into our proprietary creative agents), BizGreetz AI® is a supercharged version of any video generator you may have seen. No other platform offers our robust and versatile capabilities (including Adobe, Google, OpenAI, ByteDance, Meta, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Higgsfield). About Eric Frankel Prior to founding AdGreetz, Eric Frankel was President of Warner Bros. Domestic Cable Distribution, where he oversaw the distribution (and often production) of the world’s largest TV and movie studio to broadcast, cable, pay-TV and new technologies. While running a multi-billion-dollar a year division, he led the industry to the development and adoption of new technologies, including on-demand video (SVOD & AVOD). He also created and successfully launched the first-ever broadband internet network, In2TV.. After 28 years at WB, in 2010, Eric left WB to launch AdGreetz and spearhead a new frontier of personalised advertising and now, AI creative with BizGreetz AI®.  Time Stamps 00:40 - Eric Frankel’s Career Background 02:22 - Why Ads Feel Generic 03:27 - AdGreetz and BizGreetz Explained 04:44 - AI and Personalisation Today 08:41 - How Mass Personalisation Works 12:15 - Misconceptions and Relevance 14:59 - Performance Uplift and Proof 18:17 - Creepy Versus Effective 20:53 - Brand Consistency Guardrails 24:33 - B2B Adoption Challenges 34:50 - Where to Learn More 35:44 - Closing Thanks Quotes “I barely ever saw an ad or marketing message that was relevant to me, because it was a world of generic, traditional, one-size-fits-all.” Eric Frankel, CEO of AdGreetz. “When you get sick of the message, people may have just started to see it for the first time.” Eric Frankel, CEO of AdGreetz. “We do smart, data-driven, relevant, personalised marketing that people pay attention to.” Eric Frankel, CEO of AdGreetz. Follow Eric: Eric Frankel on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/eric-frankel-bb79666 AdGreetz website: https://www.adgreetz.com/ AdGreetz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/adgreetz Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/ If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547        

Yega Kumarappan explores how sales enablement has evolved from simple content distribution into an AI-driven discipline focused on helping sellers close deals. He explains how Paperflite has grown into an agentic platform that supports sales teams across the entire deal lifecycle, spanning prospect intelligence, content intelligence, conversation intelligence, deal intelligence, and AI-powered coaching. These capabilities help sellers access the right information at the right time, track buyer engagement, and predict deal outcomes with greater confidence. The conversation also highlights a broader shift in the market: ownership of sales enablement is moving from marketing to sales as AI makes its impact on revenue more measurable. Yega emphasizes that while content creation has become easier, distribution and ROI measurement are now the biggest challenges. Finally, he reflects on the growing importance of “knowledge sovereignty”—the need for organisations to capture and leverage their unique expertise—arguing that this will be critical for standing out in a world of increasingly generic AI tools.   About Paperflite Paperflite is a content experience and intelligence platform designed to help businesses maximise the impact of their content and drive stronger audience engagement. It enables teams to easily discover the most relevant content across the organisation, share it seamlessly across multiple channels, and track how audiences interact with it. With a strong focus on user experience, Paperflite delivers a visually engaging way for prospects, customers, and partners to consume content. Its built-in analytics engine provides deep insights into buyer behaviour, helping teams understand what resonates and take the right actions to improve conversations and conversions.   About Yega Kumarappan Yega Kumarappan is the co-founder and Chief Product Officer of Paperflite. Former Head of Technology Prototyping at Cognizant, Yega spent over a decade building and prototyping innovative solutions for global enterprises before founding Paperflite in 2016. Known for his futurist perspective, Yega focuses on shaping how modern sales and marketing teams use content, data, and AI to drive better customer engagement and outcomes.   Time Stamps 00:00 - Introduction to Yega Kumarappan and His Career Journey 02:42 - Why Paper Flight Exists 11:23 - Who Buys Enablement 13:14 - Distribution and ROI 16:04 - Inbound Marketing Strategy 19:15 - Knowledge Sovereignty in AI 22:30 - Marketing Advice and Mindset 27:23 - Where to Learn More   Quotes “Sales enablement has moved from distributing content to actively helping sellers close deals.” Yega Kumarappan, Co-founder & Chief Product Officer, Paperflite “The real value is delivering the right knowledge at the exact moment it’s needed.” Yega Kumarappan, Co-founder & Chief Product Officer, Paperflite “Creating great content is no longer the hardest problem—distribution is.” Yega Kumarappan, Co-founder & Chief Product Officer, Paperflite “Whoever masters distribution wins.” Yega Kumarappan, Co-founder & Chief Product Officer, Paperflite “It’s not just about content anymore—it’s about proving its impact on revenue.” Yega Kumarappan, Co-founder & Chief Product Officer, Paperflite   Follow Yega: Yega Kumarappan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yegakumarappan/ Paperflite website: https://www.paperflite.com/ Paperflite on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/paperflite   Follow Mike: Mike Maynard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaynard/ Napier website: https://www.napierb2b.com/ Napier LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/napier-partnership-limited/   If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to our podcast for more discussions about the latest in Marketing B2B Tech and connect with us on social media to stay updated on upcoming episodes. We'd also appreciate it if you could leave us a review on your favourite podcast platform. Want more? Check out Napier’s other podcast - The Marketing Automation Moment: https://podcasts.apple.com/ua/podcast/the-marketing-automation-moment-podcast/id1659211547