The Life-Long Customer

Know Your Audience, Know Your Content - with Cara Bell, Content Marketing Manager, SketchUp

November 19, 2021 Revenue Rhino Season 1 Episode 105
The Life-Long Customer
Know Your Audience, Know Your Content - with Cara Bell, Content Marketing Manager, SketchUp
Show Notes Transcript

When you see viral content, it is tempting to try and replicate the same thing. When it comes to content creation, it is essential to produce content that caters to your target personas. 

Want to learn more on how to get started with personalizing your content? Listen to our podcast today and get awesome insights from our guest, Cara Bell, Content Marketing Manager at Sketchup.

“Our product team takes the lead in developing personas. They're out there. They're talking to customers.

How are you using SketchUp?
What are you using it for?
What are some pain points?

We are validating some of these statements and making sure what we  write resonates with them.” 

- Cara Bell, Content Marketing Manager, SketchUp

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Introduction: 0:04
From Revenue Rhino, I'm Brad Hammond, and this is The Lifelong Customer Podcast. We're interviewing successful sales and marketing leaders in discussing ways in which they're building lifelong relationships with their customer.

Brad Hammond: 0:19
Welcome to The LifeLong Customer Podcast. I'm your host, Brad Hammond.

Ice Artificio: 0:23
And I'm your co-host, Ice Artificio.

Brad Hammond: 0:26
Today, we have Cara Bell from SketchUp. Cara, it's really nice to have you on.

Cara Bell: 0:30
Thank you. Thanks for having me. 

Brad Hammond: 0:33
Yes. 

Ice Artificio: 0:34
Yes. Absolutely. Thank you so much for being here, Cara. And before we start with anything, can you tell everybody who you are and who you work for? 

Cara Bell: 0:43
Yes. Thanks, Brad, for the intro. I'm Cara. I'm the Content Manager at SketchUp, which is owned by Trimble. So you might know that name a little bit better. But we are a 3D modeling software company. So architects and creatives of all kinds use SketchUp to kind of design their ideas, bring their ideas to life, design anything you can.

Brad Hammond: 1:06
Very cool.

Ice Artificio: 1:07
That sounds like fun. And I think Brad and I talked about SketchUp and how we have interacted with it before. Can you tell me what the marketing- or the content marketing space looks like for SketchUp?

Cara Bell: 1:19
Yes. So we have tons of different users, tons of different workflows, like I said, architects and then creatives of all kinds. We have artists. We have sculpture artists that use SketchUp. So for content, it's a lot. 

So we have case studies with people. We have training material. We have videos. We have our podcast, too. So we have a ton of content, and it's all tailored towards specific users of the software.

Brad Hammond: 1:50
Very cool. So one of the things we talk about a lot when it comes to content writing is personas. So really creating personalized content journeys, thinking about our personas all that. Tell us a bit about how you go about doing that and what that looks like in your organization?

Cara Bell: 2:08
Yes. So our product team really takes the lead in developing personas. So they're out there. They're talking to customers like how are you using SketchUp? What are you using it for? What are some pain points? The basic information you need to develop products and content. And then the content team or the marketing team really takes that information, and we also go out and we talk to customers. So it's a lot of like validating some of these statements and making sure what we're writing is resonating with them.

Part of my job is really creating personalized content journeys for all of our different users, which can be a lot. We have a lot of different users, but it's fun. So one day, I'll be writing about architecture, and the next day I'll be writing about artists and how they use SketchUp. 

And what was interesting when I first started at SketchUp is a lot of the content we were creating and a lot of the email campaigns and nurture campaigns we were developing weren't really personalized. They were more generic because, like I said, we have so many users. It's easier to just create something that's more generic and you send it to everyone rather than tailoring so many different pieces of content.

So it was my goal. I said we have to start personalizing our content. I started a new blog or a resource hub where users can filter based on who they are and then find the right content for where they are in the sales journey or just who they are. And then from there, we developed nurture campaigns. 

So before our nurture campaign conversion rates, so either purchasing or trialing, was about 1.5%. And then when I started personalizing it, no surprise, it went up, but now it’s around 7%. So yes.

Ice Artificio: 3:56
Wow.

Cara Bell: 3:57
So I could safely say that personalizing your content journey for customers works. I know everyone says, of course, of course, but seeing those actual numbers was huge for me.

Brad Hammond: 4:10
I love that. That's very cool. So it sounds like your product teams are out there continuously refining these personas, talking to customers, users, all this. And then from there, you can really create these personalized content journeys, nurture campaigns, all this.

For an organization thinking about doing this or setting this up, where should you get started? What are some of the things that you need to put in place as you start and some of those like key things to look at to make this successful?

Cara Bell: 4:42
Yes. I mean I think it's really putting yourself in the customer's shoes. If you were a user of SketchUp, what do you care about? You are an architect, you probably don't care about the same things that, like I said, an artist does or maybe a VDC Manager cares about.

So thinking about those, think about the questions that you need answered. What would streamline their workflow? What software do they currently use? What are their biggest pain points? I mean, even down to like what social media accounts do they use. Where do they get their information?

And then going to customers that fit that persona and saying, hey, I have some questions like we're trying to- and I think it's important when you talk to customers to make sure they understand that what you're doing is only going to help develop the product to make it a better fit for them in the future. So not just being all about SketchUp needs this, SketchUp needs this, it’s like, let me help you help us type of thing.

Brad Hammond: 5:39
Love that. What would an example of like personalized content versus generic content be?

Cara Bell: 5:47
So for our use case, we were sending out like, we call it like a pretrial nurture series. So people that have never trialed before but have signed up for email communication, we were sending them all sorts of case studies like one would be about how a VDC Manager uses SketchUp. One would be about how an artist uses SketchUp and then architecture.

And we were seeing some engagement. We're sending this to everyone, the same content to everyone. So once we were like, okay, we need this many pieces for this architecture persona or user and then developing those and then sending them only those types of content, pieces of content. And then we saw a noticeably higher click-to-open rate and then conversion eventually.

Brad Hammond: 6:37
I love that. For other content writers that are listening and content marketers, what are some things like that they should be aware of? What are some challenges when it comes to personalization? Some of the maybe landmines to avoid, all that stuff?

Cara Bell: 6:54
I think the biggest challenge, I know for me, has been the data. So make sure your data is accurate, like your CRM system, and I'm not a data person. Thank goodness, we have somebody on our team that does that. And they've really helped us streamline this whole process. But just making sure that a user- you have the information about that user. So identifying them and being able to send them the correct content at the right time. I think timing is also pretty key. If you don't have that information, you're not going to see as high of a conversion rate or a click-to-open rate.

Brad Hammond: 7:29
Totally. How much of your time is spent like in the strategy space of thinking about like personas and the flow and journeys of all this? And then how much is actually spent writing the content and creating it? 

Cara Bell: 7:43
That's a great question. So I would say, currently, 50-50. But I really, really need to start focusing more on strategy and delegating some of the content work to some of the other members of our team. I think that will only amp up our content program. So I know content marketers struggle with this, too. It's like you're the strategizer and you're also the one that's doing all the writing. So you're a copywriter. 

And a lot of times, people get confused, like a content marketer is a copywriter. Yes, I think you do have to have really strong writing skills, but you also have to have the strategy background as well. So kind of merging those and then being able to delegate writing work. If you can communicate what you need and kind of outline that, people in your company or on your team should be able to pick that up. 

Brad Hammond: 8:33
I love that. So what advice would you give to other content marketers out there when it comes to creating these personalized journeys, personalized content? What's your key advice for them?

Cara Bell: 8:45
I would say talk to as many customers as you can. I'm trying to talk to you at least, I don't know, five a week, which seems kind of small. But I enjoy speaking to them, too. And maybe that's just kind of unique to me, but I like to learn how people are using SketchUp. It's a fun tool.

So I would say talk to as many customers as you can. Not every customer is going to fit into that little square box of a persona. There might be little outliers that you see, and it's just interesting to know that, not just rely on like a sheet that says this person is XYZ.  Really getting to know the customer.

Brad Hammond: 9:22
I love that. And how exactly do you get in touch with customers? Do you talk with sales? Or where is the channel of communication really?

Cara Bell: 9:30
Yes. So it's kind of a mix. We talk to sales. We also engage with them at events. Of course, we're not doing in-person events now, but virtual events. And then social media is like a gold mine of awesome customer stories.  Like our Instagram account, we get tagged in so many beautiful pieces that I can reach out to people and I'm like, hey, what do you do? Do you have a few minutes to talk? And more than likely, they're going to say yes. They want to talk about their work.

Brad Hammond: 9:58
Love that. Very cool. Well, as we wrap up here, any last words, key advice, words of wisdom, any last takeaways for anyone listening?

Cara Bell: 10:07
Yes. It feels like a daunting task sometimes to do these personalized customer journeys, and you just got to dive in and know that it's going to take a while. It's taken me almost 3 years to just complete a few of them. So just dive in, start talking to customers, just get started.

Brad Hammond: 10:25
Love that.

Ice Artificio: 10:25
Very Insightful.

Brad Hammond: 10:26
Thank you so much for joining.

Ice Artificio: 10:31
Thank you so much for your time today, Cara. It's been really great.

Cara Bell: 10:24
Of course.

Ice Artificio: 10:34
Yeah. 

Cara Bell: 10:37
It's so nice speaking to you both.