What happens when a media product leader becomes a content marketing leader? When you infuse an agile development approach to a traditional brand marketing organization, you foster new ways of working and innovating and build new marketing muscle that engages customers and prospects in unique ways. Pulling from my experiences as the first head of content marketing at Airbnb, and then as the first VP of Content Marketing at Salesforce, I’ll share stories of what it means to deploy agile marketing at these two leading brands, one very different from the other. Uncover the fundamentals to running lean, agile marketing teams, how to structure teams and processes to enable brands to be responsive to news and culture, and ultimately, how to drive successful outcomes that deepen engagement and build credibility and trust among a target audience.

1. KEYNOTE
Hayley Nelson
FRACTIONAL CMO
Brand Building Through
Agile Marketing
SAN FRANCISCO, CA ~ JUNE 2 - 3, 2022
DIGIMARCONSILICONVALLEY.COM | #DigiMarConSiliconValley

2. Brand Building with Agile
Marketing
Hayley Nelson
DigiMarCon June 2022

4. My journey...

5. Companies, and the people that
power them, are creating the
next generation of capitalism.

6. Role of Business
“Companies must ask themselves:
What role do we play in the community?
How are we managing our impact on the environment?
Are we working to create a diverse workforce?
Are we adapting to technological change?”
- Larry Fink, President and CEO of BlackRock

7. The ESG Narrative is Paramount
People.
The employee is the new power player.
Product.
Customer expectations are high.
Planet.
Demonstrated commitment to the environment
and sustainability.

8. Edelman: “Trust is the new brand equity”
Now brands will need to
operate at the intersection
of culture, purpose and
society.
“Brands need to be for the
people, and guided by the
people."
Edelman Brand Trust Report, 2021
Culture
Purpose
Society
Brands

9. Taking a stand means showing up, on
a daily basis, to represent
your values.

10. Social Media, Site, Blog, Email
Credit: Twitter Partnerships

11. Brands who win know how to
bring values to life, with well
defined “themes”.
I call these brand editorial pillars.

12. Patagonia
1. The best product
2. No unnecessary harm
3. Implement solutions to
the environmental crisis

14. Airbnb
1. Economic Empowerment
2. Belonging & Acceptance
3. Magical Travel

15. Responding to Trump Travel Ban at Airbnb
We believe in inclusion and belonging.

16. A newsroom is an example of agile.
And a daily miracle.

17. The way to be responsive as a brand is to
act like a newsroom:
● Daily standup (prioritize)
● Publish early and often (iterate)
● Agile team
● Short approval cycles (clear RACI)
● Use metrics
● Make great content

18. Act like a newsroom: Page One meeting

19. Act like a newsroom:
Publish early and often.

20. Act like a
newsroom:
Agile talent.

21. Act like a newsroom:
Short approval cycles.

22. Act like a newsroom: Use metrics.

24. Act like a newsroom: Make good content.

25. What makes for good content?
1. Is ownable.
2. Has a strong POV.
3. Is insight driven.
4. Story-first, audience-first, not format-first.

26. Brand side: Structuring for agile

27. Traditional brand marketing
Research and insights
Agency brief
WAIT… And wait…And wait
Review concepts
Go back and forth multiple times
High production values
Beautiful work
Spend big dollars
Run campaign
One and done
No chance to optimize
Very little data

28. 10 Tactics of Agile Marketing
1. Roadmap with Milestones and KPIs
2. Defined cadence
3. Consistent voice and tone
4. Define brand themes and POV
5. Have a strategy.
6. Streamline decision-making
7. Talent: Trust the team and talent, governed by strong
creative guidelines
8. Launch often. Test, learn, optimize.
9. Reinvent often
10. Share the journey.

29. 1. Structuring for agility:
The marketing roadmap

30. 2. Structuring for agility:
Defined cadence.

31. 3. Structuring for agility:
Be consistent.

32. 4. Structuring for agility:
Insights inform brand themes.

33. 5. Structuring for Agility: Have a Strategy
Have a strategy. This gives you a reason to say yes/no.
Inspiration
Education
Activation

34. A Social Media Framework
Inspire
Educate
Activate

35. 6. Structuring for Agility:
Streamline decision-making.

36. 7. Structuring for Agility: Talent

37. 8. Structuring for Agility:
Experiment.
Build, test, launch.

38. 9. Structuring for Agility: Tools

39. Case Study:
Leading Through Change

40. The context
My challenge: lead a “Content Revolution” for
Salesforce marketing.
Make sure customers know our core values-- Trust,
Innovation, Customer Success, Equality.
COVID-19 hits March 2019, upending business as
usual.

41. Strategic insights: Pandemic
Key customer needs in that moment:
● How do I make my business digital overnight?
● How do I decide when to go back into the office and how
do I operate safely there?
● How do we ensure employees are successful working
remotely?
● What kind of leadership is needed now? (Empathy,
compassion)

42. Leading Through Change
One holistic brand communications framework

43. Leading Through Change
● Position Salesforce as a trusted partner
during a time of great uncertainty to key
audiences: CEO, CMO, CRO, CDO, VP
Commerce, etc.
● Provide actionable leadership insights
from our customer community, world-class
experts and Salesforce leaders.
● Develop an omni-channel content
ecosystem around managing through Covid,
using owned and operated channels, media
partners, and live digital events.

44. Hypotheses Tested
● BDMs were seeking advice from innovators on how
to get through Covid.
● They would engage if content was timely, topical
and compelling, “Right channel, Right moment.”
● Our brand would earn trust by co-creating with
customers and partners.

45. ● COVID Response Playbook & Covid scenarios from
our resident futurist.
● How to manage your offices and re-open safely.
● How to communicate with customers during times
of crisis.
● Employee well-being at work and how to manage
remote teams.
● Why companies should consider hiring a chief
health officer (Dr. Agus).
Content drove engagement

46. 47%
Organic prospect
traffic increase on site
80x
Growth in form
completions from
webinars
3x
LTC posts (80%) drove
3x engagement over
regular posts on blog
5x
Social ilvestream
engagement from
benchmark
70%
Email newsletter
audience growth
600M
Viewers reached with
live streams on social
Salesforce Site Blog & Email Social Media
Results: Quantitative

47. Salesforce moves on
Interbrand Ranking of Best
Global Brands from #70 in
2019 to #58 in 2020.
And from #58 to #38 in
2021.
Interbrand Rank

48. “The Leading Through Change show has been a lighthouse example
of a business adapting to change to create value for their
customers and advantage versus their competition. The quality of
the content and the scale of the conversation is breathtaking. After
their initial envy, other leading brands are learning from and trying to
catch up to Salesforce’s innovative approach.”
— Matt Derella, Chief Customer Officer, Twitter
Accolades: Qualitative

49. Takeaways
● Experiment, test and learn, and iterate.
● Agile optimization rules. Deploy targeted media dollars against best performing
content quickly to seize a news moment.
● Develop for the medium/channel. Show designed specifically for LinkedIn had
great engagement.
● Set goals and KPIs. Measure progress and share learnings along the way.
● Don’t wait too long before pivoting strategy.

50. Thank you.
@hayley_nelson