Why Most Marketers are Getting Agile All Wrong?

Shownotes

This podcast episode discusses how Jodie Woodworth implemented an agile marketing framework to improve efficiency and productivity at her company. She shares how she overcame resistance from her team by empowering them and introducing agile principles gradually. Originally the team struggled with slow project completion due to perfectionism, but agile practices helped deliver value to customers faster. The speaker discusses optimizing meetings, prioritizing tasks, and improving communication through daily stand-ups and regular team collaboration. Metrics for tracking campaign performance and strategies for continuous improvement are also covered. The importance of adapting quickly to changes in their fast-paced industry is emphasized.

Best Moments

• 01:10
  Jodie provides context around her marketing and sales background before implementing Agile.
• 11:13
  Jodie discusses how they adjusted meetings and cadences through iterations like daily stand-ups, highlighting the "Goldilocks" process of getting it just right.
• 15:22
  When asked how increased collaboration with sales drove better results, Jodie shares specific ways they communicate internally across teams.
• 18:48
  Jodie emphasizes how empowering her team to make decisions and fail fast was important for agility, showing her leadership approach.
• 20:59
  In response to balancing speed and quality, Jodie advises embracing failures as learning opportunities and optimizing continually.

About the guest

Jodie Woodworth is the head of marketing for Envysion, a Motorola Solutions company focused on managed video technology to reduce loss, improve safety & security, and create operational excellence protecting restaurant and retail establishments. She is passionate about B2B marketing and leading an agile marketing team by empowering others to flourish in their role.

Connect with Jodie Woodworth

Key takeaways

• Implement agile marketing gradually to gain team buy-in and overcome resistance to change
• Empower your team to make decisions, take risks, and learn from failures
• Prioritize tasks based on duration and value delivered to customers
• Optimize meetings and communication through daily stand-ups and collaboration across teams
• Track campaign metrics like engagement and lead generation to improve strategies
• Continuously adapt strategies and processes to changes in your industry’s pace of innovation

Quotes

“If you’re stuck and don’t know why it didn’t work, figure out why it didn’t work and try something else. But do it quickly.”

-Jodie Woodworth

Highlights from this episode

How did you initially overcome some of the resistance from your team when starting to implement agile marketing?

Jodie explained that when she first started introducing agile marketing to her team, she did so gradually to avoid shocking them with a big change. She began by simply talking about it in their team meetings and getting the concept on their radar. As they started making small changes like organizing tasks on their Kanban board, she gained their buy-in over time. Having only a small initial team of three people also made the transition easier. She emphasized open communication, discussing both positives and areas for improvement, which helped the team understand the benefits and continuously improve their process.

What are some of the metrics you found most successful for tracking the performance of marketing and how well campaigns are going?

Some of the key metrics Jodie mentioned finding most successful for tracking marketing performance and campaign success included:

• Engagement metrics on both paid and organic social media like LinkedIn, including likes, comments, shares, etc.
• Website traffic metrics like the number of people driven to landing pages from campaigns, time on page, and whether they navigate deeper into the site.
• A/B testing results to see which page, images, or copy performed best.
• Lead generation metrics to see if campaigns were achieving their objective of generating new leads.
• Feedback from sales on how recently launched products or features were resonating with customers.

She emphasized reviewing campaign data every two weeks to assess what was working well and identify opportunities for optimization.

How has increased communication and collaboration with sales helped to drive better results?

Jodie explained that increased communication and collaboration with sales has driven better results by fostering a close, aligned relationship between the teams. They meet weekly where sales provides valuable customer feedback from trade shows, informing how marketing refines messaging. Marketing then plans campaigns around new products/features in sync with the benefits sales discusses. An internal chat also allows for real-time sharing of updated assets. Centralizing all materials on an internal site gives sales easy access when needed. Overall, the tighter dialogue and cooperation between marketing and sales ensures they are working cohesively from the same playbook towards common goals.

How do you balance getting new ideas out quickly and always hitting the quality mark?

Jodie emphasized empowering her team to make decisions to move quickly on new ideas. She challenges them to explain the goal and rationale for each short-term campaign or initiative. While embracing failures as learning opportunities, she advises optimizing continually based on results and feedback. By prioritizing value delivered to customers through their efforts, the team focuses on quality over perfectionism. Jodie also accepts that not all experiments will succeed within two weeks, but encourages trying with limited scope initially. Regular collaboration across teams through their agile processes helps maintain alignment on quality standards as the pace of innovation increases.

Resource recommendations

Books

–Story Brand by Donald Miller.

–Atomic Habits by James Clear.

Podcast

–Exit Five by Dave Gerhardt.