Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing

Alignment Episode: How Traci Byrne Works Across CISOs, Startups, and Partners

Wed, 22 Apr 2026 07:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Traci Byrne has spent a lot of her time aligning CISOs, startups, and internal teams.

In this episode, she breaks down how she does that, starting with listening, understanding what each side is trying to do, and using that to guide decisions without forcing them.

That same approach shows up in disagreements. Instead of shutting ideas down, she asks questions that expose gaps and lets people work through them.

It shows up most in security, where risk, new tech, and competing priorities all collide. If your role depends on influence and not control, this one will feel very familiar!

Chapters:

[00:00] Introduction to Cybersecurity Marketing and Guest Introduction

[03:49] Understanding Global Security Strategic Initiatives

[06:28] A Week in the Life of Tracy Byrne

[08:48] Navigating Startup and Enterprise Relationships

[11:34] Operational Resilience and Cybersecurity

[14:09] Influencing Without Authority in Cybersecurity

[16:25] Building Trust and Understanding Stakeholder Needs

[17:42] Healthy Conflict and Disagreement Management

[20:17] Company Culture and Collaboration at WWT

[22:30] Personal Aspirations and Future Goals

About Traci:

Traci Byrne was recently Head of Global Security Strategic Initiatives at World Wide Technology at the time of recording. She worked across enterprise teams and partners, supporting large strategic deals and helping organizations navigate complex security challenges.

She also advises startups on go-to-market and engaging with large enterprises, and hosts the Meet the Chief podcast.

Links & Resources:

Traci Byrne on LinkedIn

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. You can join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, our Instagram page, or our podcast LinkedIn page.

See you on the next episode!

What Founders Get Wrong About Early Marketing with Merav Ben Avi, VP of Marketing at YL Ventures

Wed, 15 Apr 2026 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Merav Ben Avi, VP of Marketing at YL Ventures, makes a strong case for something most security founders get wrong: marketing should not come later. It should be there from the start.

She explains why hiring too late creates messy positioning, weak launches, and marketers stuck fixing confusion instead of shaping the story. The first marketing hire is not there to run campaigns. They are there to define why the company exists while everything is still taking shape.

Merav also gets into why product marketing is not always the first hire, what founders miss when evaluating marketers, and why “AI solves everything” messaging is already wearing thin with CISOs.

If you're building or joining an early-stage security startup, this will challenge how you think about your first marketing hire!

Chapters:

00:00 Introduction to YL Ventures and Merav's Role

03:14 The Importance of Early Marketing in Cybersecurity Startups

06:05 Hiring Marketing Talent: Philosophy and Strategy

08:41 Navigating the AI Security Landscape

11:19 Building Trust Between Founders and Marketers

13:36 The Role of Marketing in Early Stage Startups

16:08 Finding the Right Marketing Candidates

18:55 Stealth Mode vs. Building in Public

21:37 Common Mistakes in Hiring Marketing

23:21 Conclusion and Contact Information

About Merav:

Merav Ben Avi is VP of Marketing at YL Ventures, where she works hands-on with early-stage cybersecurity startups on positioning, messaging, and go-to-market.

She partners closely with founders to shape how their companies show up from day one, while also leading marketing for YL Ventures.

Links & Resources:

Merav Ben Avi on LinkedIn
YL Ventures website
Building Island’s Brand with Ari Yablok (referenced in this episode)
You Don’t Need a Budget—You Need a Hat: Orly Bar-Lev on Lasso’s GTM (referenced in this episode)

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

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Keeping Product-Market Fit After an Acquisition with Kevin Bobowski

Wed, 08 Apr 2026 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What changes when you go from a startup to a much bigger company after an acquisition? On today’s episode, Kevin Bobowski, now CMO of Archer, breaks down what that shift looks like based on his experience moving from Aware into Mimecast.

At Aware, staying close to the customer was built into the day-to-day. Conversations were constant, and product-market fit came from paying attention to what was working and cutting what wasn’t, even if it looked good on paper.

At Mimecast, that same instinct still mattered, but it became harder to maintain. There’s more data, more structure, and more distance from the customer if you’re not careful.

Kevin shares how that shift changed the way he thinks about product-market fit across segments, products, and teams, and why it’s something you have to keep reworking as markets evolve.

If you’re trying to stay grounded in what your buyers are really saying while everything around you scales, this one will resonate.

About Kevin:

Kevin Bobowski is Chief Marketing Officer at Archer.

He previously led marketing at Aware, where he helped build the go-to-market motion that led to the company’s acquisition by Mimecast.

His experience spans startups and larger organizations, with a focus on product-market fit, segmentation, and scaling marketing teams.

Links & Resources:

Kevin Bobowski on LinkedIn

Mimecast

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

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What a New Marketing Leader Fixes First with Christine Bartlett, CMO of Hack The Box.

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Christine Bartlett, SVP of Marketing at Hack The Box, tackles one of the trickiest challenges in marketing leadership: how to come in, make meaningful changes, and still preserve the magic that was there before you arrived.

She gets into building a field marketing team, moving past last-touch attribution to create alignment amongst the business, and what it takes to get execs and the board on board. There’s also a good conversation around how Hack The Box balances a community model with enterprise, and why investing in early-career talent still pays off!

About Christine: Christine Bartlett is the SVP of Marketing at Hack The Box, where she leads global marketing across both community and enterprise.

She’s spent over a decade in cybersecurity marketing, with leadership roles at Cisco and SonicWall, focused on building teams and driving growth.

Links & Resources:

Subscribe & Review: 👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

See you on the next episode!

What It Takes to Rebrand a Cybersecurity Company

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

In this Cyber CMO Confidential episode, Netwrix CMO John Knightly joins Gianna and Charles to talk through the company’s recent rebrand and the thinking behind it.

After years of growth through acquisitions, Netwrix needed a clearer story. John shares how the team repositioned the company around data security that starts with identity, simplified its messaging, and rolled the new brand out across a global organization.

If you’re navigating brand evolution, product complexity, or internal buy-in, this episode offers a look at what it actually takes to pull off a cybersecurity rebrand.

About John:

John Knightly is the Chief Marketing Officer at Netwrix, where he leads the company’s global marketing organization. Before joining Netwrix, he held senior marketing leadership roles at Zscaler, BlueJeans by Verizon, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and HP, bringing more than 20 years of experience in enterprise technology and cybersecurity marketing.

Links & Resources:

John Knightly on LinkedIn
Netwrix

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Charles Gold on LinkedIn

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The Marketing Strategy Behind Vanta’s “Calm-pliance” Campaign

Wed, 18 Mar 2026 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Vanta CMO Scott Holden joins Gianna to talk about how the company is expanding beyond automated SOC 2 compliance and positioning Vanta as an Agentic Trust Platform.

Scott shares his path from Salesforce to ThoughtSpot and Brex, why Vanta’s preventive security approach stood out, and how the team is evolving its messaging as it moves further into the enterprise.

Tune in to hear how Vanta is thinking about category positioning, CISOs, and the strategy behind its new “Calm-pliance” campaign.

About Scott:

Scott Holden is the Chief Marketing Officer at Vanta, where he leads marketing as the company expands beyond automated compliance into a broader trust platform.

Before joining Vanta, he was CMO at Brex and spent more than eight years at ThoughtSpot in marketing leadership roles. Earlier in his career, Scott held several marketing roles at Salesforce.

Links & Resources:

Follow Scott Holden on LinkedIn
Vanta

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

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How Cyber Work Became a Launchpad for the Next Generation of Cybersecurity Talent

Tue, 10 Mar 2026 23:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Chris Sienko spent six years hosting Cyber Work with Infosec, interviewing more than 300 cybersecurity professionals across every imaginable role. But the show wasn’t built for CISOs or executives. It was built for the people trying to get in.

In this conversation, Chris shares why he focused on students and early-career professionals, even though most cybersecurity marketing targets buyers, and how that decision shaped everything from guest research to episode structure to long-term growth.

If you’re building content inside a cybersecurity company and wondering who you’re actually serving, this episode will challenge you to think bigger than the buying committee.

About Chris:

Chris Sienko is a podcast producer and former host of Cyber Work with Infosec, where he interviewed more than 300 cybersecurity professionals from 2019 to 2025. Over six years, he helped grow the show into a central resource for aspiring cybersecurity practitioners.

He previously served as Senior Acquisitions Manager for Infosec Resources, overseeing a large network of technical writers and contributing to the editorial direction of one of the industry’s most widely read cybersecurity education platforms.

Links & Resources:

Connect with Chris on LinkedIn
Check out Infosec

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

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One-Person Marketing at a Cybersecurity Startup

Wed, 04 Mar 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

In cybersecurity marketing, there’s constant pressure to keep pushing. More campaigns, more content, more pressure to show that something is working. You’re wearing multiple hats, adjusting on the fly, and trying to keep momentum. At a human level, that pace adds up. This conversation slows down to talk about the exhaustion behind it, the cost of always saying yes, and the shift that happens when you finally pause.

Rodrigo Leme, Marketing Director at Right-Hand Cybersecurity, joins Gianna to talk about what it’s like to be the only marketer at a growing security company. He reflects on constantly reassessing what’s worth doing, learning the hard way that saying yes to everything doesn’t mean doing good work, and what it’s been like working remotely for years.

Along the way, he shares what helped him stay grounded: routines, hobbies, and small shifts in his approach to work. It’s a reflection on what it takes to keep going without letting the job take over everything else in your life.

About Rodrigo:

Rodrigo Leme is the Marketing Director at Right-Hand Cybersecurity, where he leads the company’s marketing efforts, including content, campaigns, and go-to-market support. He has worked in marketing for more than 20 years and has spent the past several years in cybersecurity.

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

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How AI Is Influencing Security Buying Decisions: What Marketers Should Know

Wed, 25 Feb 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

AI is affecting how cybersecurity teams operate and how security vendors build products.

In this episode, Steve Piper, Founder and CEO of CyberEdge Group and author of the Cyber Threat Defense Report, is here to talk about AI-powered spear phishing, deepfake fraud, and how generative and agentic AI are being integrated into security platforms.

Data from the 2025 Cyber Threat Defense Report shows:

82% of security professionals prefer tools with AI capabilities.
80% believe AI will reduce workforce needs in the coming years.
More respondents say security teams currently have the upper hand over threat actors.

For marketers, this clarifies something important: AI is influencing buyer expectations, product positioning, and hiring conversations across the industry.

About Steve:

Steve Piper is the Founder and CEO of CyberEdge Group, the largest marketing and research firm dedicated to serving cybersecurity marketing teams. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of Security Buzz, a leading cybersecurity news website.

Steve is a highly regarded author, analyst, instructor, and consultant with more than 30 years of tech industry experience. He holds a CISSP certification from ISC2 and has authored more than a dozen books on information security topics.

Links & Resources:

Check out CyberEdge Group here.
Security Buzz
2025 Cyberthreat Defense Report
Steve Piper on LinkedIn
Cyber Threat Defense Report Sponsorship Information:

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

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What AI Search Changed About the Cybersecurity Buying Journey

Wed, 18 Feb 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

AI has changed how buyers do their research. By the time they land on your website, most of the education is already done. That is where many cybersecurity sites start to fall apart.

Suyog Deshpande, Co-Founder and CEO of Webless.ai, joins us to break down what this shift means for website strategy. He explains why today’s visitors are often deeper in the buying journey, how cybersecurity buying committees complicate the experience, and why education-first sites do not always serve buyers who are ready to act.

Gianna and Suyog also get into how on-site search behavior reveals real buyer intent and why more AI-generated content is not the answer.

If your website still assumes buyers are at the top of the funnel, this episode is for you!

About Suyog:

Suyog Deshpande is the Co-Founder and CEO of Webless.ai, where he works on generative search and content discovery for B2B websites. Before starting Webless, he led product and technical marketing teams at Samsara, Salesforce, and Amplitude.

His work sits at the intersection of marketing, product, and how buyers actually find and use information.

Links & Resources:

Follow Suyog on LinkedIn

Check out the Webless.ai

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Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

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From Slack Groups to Super-Users: Community-Led Growth in Cybersecurity

Wed, 11 Feb 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Community gets talked about a lot in cybersecurity; what’s less clear is what it’s supposed to actually look like. In this conversation, Avital Knoller, Head of Ecosystem, Community, and CXO Relationships at Orchid Security, walks through how she thinks about community when it’s tied directly to product and growth.

She breaks down the difference between practitioner-led product communities and broader communities of interest, and why that distinction matters so much in security. Drawing on her experience building communities across nonprofit, startup, and cybersecurity environments, Avital shares how investing in community can create super-users, surface real product feedback, and support go-to-market efforts without feeling salesy or forced.

Tune in to hear about practical realities, platform choices, launch timing, engagement expectations, and how to think about ROI while keeping the focus on trust, peer learning, and long-term value.

About Avital:Avital (Avi) Knoller is the Head of Ecosystem, Community, and CXO Relationships at Orchid Security, where she leads practitioner community programs and ecosystem engagement for the company’s identity security platform.

Avital has experience building and running communities across nonprofit, startup, and cybersecurity environments, with a focus on practitioner engagement and product-focused communities inside security companies.

Links & Resources:

Avital (Avi) Knoller on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/avital-knoller/

Orchid Security - https://www.orchid.security/

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
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Disinformation, Data, and... Romance Novels? A Conversation with Dan Lowden

Wed, 04 Feb 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Dan Lowden has a pretty incredible track record—12 startups and eight exits to count—so when he talks about building a marketing engine from scratch, people listen. In this CMO Confidential segment, Dan joins Gianna and Charles to talk about his latest challenge at Blackbird.ai: defining the "Narrative Intelligence" category and helping companies fight disinformation.

They get into the real-world grit of going from leading a 70-person team back to being a solo marketer. Dan shares his "punch above your weight" playbook, including why he hired a former CBS news reporter to lead content and how he landed NATO as a marquee customer.

Listen to this episode if you are looking to make a small startup feel like an industry giant, build deep analyst credibility without a "pay-to-play" budget, or understand the next big CISO blind spot in narrative intelligence.

About Dan:

Dan Lowden is the CMO at Blackbird.ai and a seasoned leader with over 30 years of experience building brands in the tech and cybersecurity spaces. A veteran of 12 startups and eight successful exits, Dan has led marketing for companies such as HUMAN (formerly White Ops), Digital Shadows, and Invincea.

He is known for his "hands-on" approach to leadership, often joining as the first marketing hire to transform complex technology into a clear, compelling story. When he isn't defining new security categories like Narrative Intelligence, Dan is an author; he wrote and published the romance novel The Met Kiss during the pandemic.

Follow Dan on LinkedIn.

Links & Resources:

Blackbird.ai: Learn more about narrative intelligence and disinformation security.

The Raven Blog: Where Dan’s team publishes primary research on narrative attacks.

The Met Kiss: Dan Lowden’s debut romance novel, written during the pandemic.

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Charles Gold on LinkedIn

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The ROI of Recognition: How DataGrail Built a Brand Engine Through Awards

Wed, 28 Jan 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What happens when a "privacy freak" takes over customer advocacy? You get the DataGrail’s Data Privacy Awards Program, an industry staple that doubles as a masterclass in community building and product research.

In this episode, Ian Phippen, Head of Content and Community Marketing at DataGrail, joins Gianna and Maria to pull back the curtain on running a high-impact awards program. Ian shares how they transformed a standard advocacy play into a mission-driven brand engine that attracts hundreds of nominations, of which only 40% are customers.

Whether you're launching your first awards ceremony or looking for more human ways to connect with your technical audience, Ian’s insights offer a roadmap for marketing with integrity.

About Ian:

Ian Phippen is the Head of Content and Community at DataGrail and the architect of the Data Privacy Hero Awards.

A 2025 Marquee Award winner for Best New-to-Cyber Talent, they moved from a background in education and e-commerce marketing at companies like Recharge and Provi to become a dedicated "privacy freak" in the cybersecurity space.

Ian specializes in building high-trust recognition programs that turn industry advocacy into deep market intelligence.

Follow Ian on LinkedIn.

Links and Resources:

DataGrail: The data privacy platform leading the shift toward "human-centric" privacy.

2025 Data Privacy Heroes: The official announcement and profiles of the most recent award winners.

Sessionize: The event management tool mentioned for handling speaker and award calls.

Recharge & Provi: Previous companies where Ian built their marketing and community foundation.

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Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Why Cybersecurity Marketers Are Prime Security Targets

Wed, 21 Jan 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Cat Allen, Senior Product Marketing Manager at SpyCloud, brings a rare mix of technical grounding and ethical clarity to cybersecurity marketing. Her path into the industry was unconventional, shaped by psychology, hands-on technical training, and a deep interest in privacy, surveillance, and responsible data use.

The conversation focuses on what it means to market security products responsibly, especially in an industry where marketers are frequent targets and data collection can quietly introduce risk. Cat shares how her technical background helps her bridge engineering and go-to-market teams while keeping trust, accuracy, and transparency at the center.

The episode also explores tougher questions about workplace ethics, the limits of compliance, personal responsibility for data privacy, and the broader implications of AI.

About Cat:

Cat Allen is a Senior Product Marketing Manager at SpyCloud, working on product messaging, enablement, and go-to-market support for cybersecurity teams. She has held senior product marketing roles at Cloudflare and Everfox (formerly Forcepoint).

She is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Cybersecurity and brings a technical foundation into her work, partnering closely with product, engineering, and revenue teams.

Follow her on LinkedIn.

Links & Resources:

SpyCloud

Signal (secure messaging)Proton Mail

DeleteMe 1Password

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How Cybersecurity Buyers Decide Before the Sales Conversation Begins

Wed, 14 Jan 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Maria and Gianna are joined this week by Tyler Lessard, Chief Marketing Officer at TechnologyAdvice, for a grounded look at how cybersecurity and B2B buying behavior are shifting and what that means for marketers trying to break through the noise.

The conversation centers on preference marketing and why buyers are forming vendor shortlists earlier than ever, often before any formal evaluation begins. Tyler shares insights from TechnologyAdvice’s research on how younger buying committees, particularly Millennial and Gen Z decision-makers, rely less on legacy analyst models and more on trusted external channels like creators, newsletters, niche communities, Reddit, and peer-driven influence.

The discussion wraps with a takeaway for marketers planning: TechnologyAdvice’s Cybersecurity Marketing Handbook, built to help teams identify where influence actually lives and how to show up there with intent.

About Tyler

Tyler Lessard is the Chief Marketing Officer at TechnologyAdvice, where he focuses on research-led perspectives on buyer behavior and helping cybersecurity and B2B marketers navigate how influence and trust are formed today.

He works closely with marketing teams across the industry, drawing on TechnologyAdvice’s portfolio of enterprise IT and cybersecurity media brands to identify where buyers research, who they trust, and how preferences are shaped before formal evaluations begin.

Follow Tyler on LinkedIn.

Links & Resources:

3 Trends that will Redefine B2B Marketing in 2026

Cybersecurity Marketing Handbook

TechnologyAdvice

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The Rebrand Reality Check: Inside Silverfort’s Identity Overhaul

Wed, 07 Jan 2026 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We’re starting 2026 with a topic every marketer claims to love until they’re actually in it: rebrands. Gianna sits down with Alicia Di Vittorio, Head of Brand & Corporate Marketing at Silverfort, to talk through what a real rebrand looks like when you’re doing it inside a fast-moving cybersecurity startup.

They get into the actual messy parts: getting execs aligned on positioning, figuring out who’s allowed to give input (and who isn’t), redesigning a logo way later than anyone wants to admit, and trying to keep the team creative while the production backlog is eating everyone alive. It’s honest, funny, and painfully relatable for anyone who’s ever opened a RACI chart in desperation.

If you’re planning a rebrand this year, this episode will either make you feel seen… or slightly afraid. Both are useful.

About Alicia:

Alicia Di Vittorio is the Head of Brand & Corporate Marketing at Silverfort, where she leads the company’s brand, communications, AR/PR, content, and creative strategy. Before Silverfort, she drove corporate marketing at DataGrail and helped launch Stairwell out of stealth as Interim CMO. She’s led multiple rebrands across fast-moving cybersecurity startups and has the scars (and wisdom) to prove it.

Follow Alicia on LinkedIn.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Silverfort – Identity Security Platform

https://www.silverfort.com

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Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. You can join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, our main LinkedIn page, our Instagram page, or our podcast LinkedIn page.

See you in the next episode!

ENCORE EPISODE: The RevOps Whisperer: How Joe Aurilia Fixes the Stuff No One Wants to Touch

Wed, 31 Dec 2025 06:00:00 -0000

As we take a brief end-of-year pause for CyberMarketingCon and holiday chaos, we’re bringing back one of 2025’s most replayed and requested episodes. Consider this your chance to revisit the insights you loved or catch an episode you might’ve missed.
Episode Summary:

This week, we’ve got an extra special guest, Joe Aurilia, Jr., SVP of Operations at Cyware. Joining Gianna and Maria to talk more about the art of scaling, automating, and just plain getting stuff done. Joe takes us on a ride from being Cyware’s first U.S. hire (aka "the guinea pig") to building and overseeing every corner of operations from legal and IT to rev ops and marketing ops.

We chat about how to spot and fix the messiest processes, why RevOps is the unsung hero of the GTM engine, and what happens when contracts, people, and data collide. Joe also drops gems on internal sales/marketing for change management, and we close out with his dream career as an ice cream shop owner.

Plus: purple dashboards, auctioneer aspirations, and a serious stance on free sprinkles.

🔗Links & Resources Mentioned:

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating & review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow and brings you more awesome guests!

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉 Gianna Whitver

👉 Maria Velasquez

Thanks for tuning in. Remember, every Wednesday, we drop a new episode guaranteed to knock your SOCs off. 😎

ENCORE EPISODE: Inside Tom Wentworth’s AI Stack: How to Automate the Stuff Marketers Hate

Wed, 24 Dec 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Tom Wentworth, CMO at Incident.io, got tired of doing the same stuff over and over, so he built AI agents to do it for him. Sales call summaries? Automated. Blog posts from discovery calls? Done in minutes. Battle cards? They update themselves.

He’s wiring together Slack, Notion, Zapier, Gong, and ChatGPT in ways that help his team move faster without adding headcount or complexity. There are no big declarations, just real systems that save time and don’t annoy people.

We talk about what’s working, what’s breaking, and how far you can push things without sounding like a robot. Also: cold plunges, prompt rage, and the Notion doc that’s 90 pages long.

🎧 Press play to hear how Tom stretches modern marketing ops with the right automation setup.

Links & Resources Mentioned:

About Tom:

Tom is a high-growth SaaS marketing leader with experience across enterprise GTM and product-led models. He writes occasionally about tech marketing at⁠ tomwentworth.com⁠ and previously hosted the Scaleup Marketing podcast.

Follow Tom on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

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📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: ⁠podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com⁠

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Gianna Whitver on ⁠LinkedIn⁠
Charles Gold on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. You can join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on ⁠our website⁠, main ⁠LinkedIn page⁠, ⁠Instagram⁠ page, or podcast ⁠LinkedIn⁠ page.

See you in the next episode!

ENCORE EPISODE: How VCs Spot GTM Red Flags (and the Marketer Hires That Actually Work)

Wed, 17 Dec 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What do VCs think about your GTM strategy? This week, Gianna and Maria chat with Asad Khaliq and Mark Kraynak, two of Acrew Capital's founding members, about what it takes to build or break a go-to-market motion at an early-stage cyber startup.

Asad and Mark share how Acrew was founded, why they’re so focused on cyber and data, and what they’ve learned from backing some of the most well-known names in the industry. From hiring your first salesperson to avoiding “we stop threats” messaging, they’ve seen it all and they’re sharing the good, the bad, and the surprisingly funny.

About the guest:

Follow Asad on LinkedIn.

Follow Mark on LinkedIn.

Follow Acrew Capital on LinkedIn or the website.

💌 Feedback or Wanna Be on the Show?
Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow your hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver
👉Maria Velasquez

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

ManageEngine in Vegas, Part 2: Where AI Anxiety Meets Real-World Wisdom

Wed, 10 Dec 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We’re back in Las Vegas for Part 2 of our live series from the ManageEngine User Conference, this time shifting from the conference floor to the hallways, lobby couches, and those slightly delirious late-night conversations fueled entirely by hotel coffee.

Part 1 focused on how ManageEngine builds trust from the inside. Part 2 flips the perspective outward, bringing in three very different voices: an AI governance advisor, an innovation leader, and a veteran tech journalist, all wrestling with how AI, security, and trust are colliding across the industry.

It’s a grounded, candid look at what people are really thinking about AI right now, far beyond the keynote slides and vendor hype.

(And yes, all three guests happen to be named Alex. I promise we didn’t plan that.)

Have a listen — this one hits a different part of the conversation.

About Guests:

Alex Sharpe — Board Advisor & Cyber Governance Expert (Sharpe LLC)
Alex works at the intersection of business strategy, cyber governance, and operational resilience. He’s advised Fortune 100 boards, taught resilience at NYU, and helped companies navigate everything from AI risk to major M&A events.

Alex Goryachev — WSJ Bestselling Author & AI Innovation Exec Alex helps companies make sense of AI, build innovation programs that actually work, and navigate the cultural side of transformation. He’s led AI and innovation efforts at Cisco, Dell, Amgen, and the California State University system. In this episode, he breaks down trust, safety, and why employees quietly automate half their jobs.

Alex Williams — Founder & Publisher, The New Stack

Alex is a veteran tech journalist and the founder of The New Stack, where he covers how modern software gets built and operated at scale. Before that, he wrote about cloud and enterprise tech at ReadWriteWeb and TechCrunch.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Attend the ManageEngine User Conference
The New Stack — Alex Williams’ publication: https://thenewstack.io

Alex Goryachev — AI & innovation keynote site: https://alexgoryachev.com

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Episode 1: ManageEngine - Live interviews from ManageEngine Userconf in Las Vegas, NV

Wed, 03 Dec 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We took the podcast on the road for this one. Gianna spent two days roaming the ManageEngine User Conference in Las Vegas, mic in hand, slightly over-caffeinated, talking with the people who actually keep this massive IT management ecosystem running.

This episode brings together conversations with the CMO, the team leading North America operations and partnerships, and one of ManageEngine’s longtime global channel partners. Different roles, different vantage points, but everyone came back to the same theme: trust. Not the buzzword version, the real kind, where meeting someone face-to-face finally puts a human behind the support ticket.

And yes, Part 2 is on the way. We’ve got more interviews from the conference floor, including late-night influencer conversations and a studio-recorded session with the VP of Product. Think of this episode as the first half of the full story.

About Guests:

Ajay Kumar — Head of Global Marketing, ManageEngine (a division of Zoho Corp.)
Ajay leads global marketing across the entire ManageEngine portfolio.

Haja Moideen — Head of North America Business, Operations & Strategic Channel Partnerships; Official Spokesperson for ManageEngine
Haja runs the operations and partner ecosystem across the U.S. and Canada.

Mohamed Abdelhay — Co-Founder & Business Development Director, SanaTech Global Solutions (ManageEngine Partner)
Mohamed has been deploying, integrating, and selling ManageEngine products for well over a decade. He started in Egypt, grew his customer base one implementation at a time, and now runs SanaTech’s business development efforts from Los Angeles.

🔗 Links & Resources:

ManageEngine User Conference (Las Vegas)
ManageEngine product documents — full list of features, use cases, and technical specs.

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Cracking the Code Marketing to Cybersecurity's Elusive Buyers CyberMarketingCon 2025

Wed, 26 Nov 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

This week, we’re sharing a special crossover episode originally recorded for ITSP Magazine. Gianna and Maria join hosts Sean Martin and Marco Ciappelli for an on-location conversation about how the Cybersecurity Marketing Society got started, why our industry’s buyers behave the way they do, and what makes cybersecurity marketing fundamentally different from every other field.

They discuss trust, burnout, AI buzzwords, why buyers dislike being sold to, and how marketing teams can effectively demonstrate value in a saturated, hyper-technical market. You’ll also hear what to expect at CyberMarketingCon 2025, from hands-on AI workshops to a marketer-only CTF, and why the event has become a reunion for practitioners across the ecosystem.

If you want a grounded conversation about real marketing challenges (minus the fluffy vendor vibes), this one’s worth your time.

About Sean and Marco:

Sean Martin, CISSP, is Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief at ITSP Magazine, a multimedia platform exploring the intersection of technology, cybersecurity, and society. He hosts their “On Location” podcast series and several other shows, blending deep cybersecurity insights with human-scale storytelling.

Marco Ciappelli is Co-Founder and Creative Director at ITSP Magazine, host of its podcasts, and lead for their “At the Intersection” story platform. He brings branding, media, and societal insight to the conversation about cybersecurity’s broader role.

🔗 Links & Resources:

ITSP Magazine

ITSP Magazine On-Location Podcast Series

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

From 30 Percent to 78 Percent: Bricklayer AI’s Q2 2025 Conversion Jump

Wed, 19 Nov 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Gianna sits down and talks with Adam Vincent, founder and CEO of Bricklayer AI, about selling first and letting the market shape your message. After bootstrapping and shipping an MVP in summer 2023, Adam called (literally phone called) his way into product clarity and pipeline, then watched curiosity turn into urgency in Q2 2025. They get practical on where agents help today, so security teams finally use the tools they already pay for.

You’ll hear:

The words that make buyers lean in.
Agents that handle alert triage, weekly intel briefs, and vulnerability prioritization.
Meeting to SQO rising from about 30% (Q1 2025) to about 78% (Q2 2025).

If you’re looking for buyer-tested phrasing, three practical agent workflows, and a simple outreach pattern you can run tomorrow, this episode is for you.

About Adam:

Adam Vincent is the Founder and CEO of Bricklayer AI. He’s spent his career building software that helps security analysts do their jobs better and has worn the hats: QA, engineering, and CTO. Early at Layer 7 Technologies, he built the federal practice across sales, marketing, and tech.

In his last startup, he says the team grew revenue from zero to $30M ARR. He founded Bricklayer AI, bootstrapped for about a year, launched an MVP in summer 2023, and runs founder-led sales while standing up marketing and sales leadership.

Follow Adam on LinkedIn

🔗 Links & Resources:

Bricklayer AI

ThreatConnect

Layer 7 (now Broadcom Layer7 API Management)

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. You can join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, main LinkedIn page, Instagram page, or podcast LinkedIn page.

See you in the next episode!

From Zero Trust to Breach Containment: How Illumio Reframed Its Story (and the Cybersecurity Conversation)

Wed, 12 Nov 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We’re back with another round of Cyber CMO Confidential, where Gianna and Charles ask the questions every cybersecurity marketer wishes they could ask their CMO.

This time, Karl Van den Bergh, Illumio’s CMO, shares why he dropped the “ing” and became a Chief Market Officer. He unpacks Illumio’s shift from zero trust segmentation to breach containment, the fine line between AI innovation and AI nonsense, and why marketers need to stop selling and start representing the market.

🎧 Listen to the full episode for Karl’s take on authenticity, AI hype, and what it really means to market the market.

About Karl:

Karl Van den Bergh is the Chief Market Officer at Illumio, where he leads global marketing for the company’s breach containment and Zero Trust Segmentation platform. With over two decades in enterprise software and cybersecurity, he’s known for transforming complex technology brands into clear, market-driven stories.

Before joining Illumio, Karl served as CMO at Gigamon and DataStax, where he helped reposition both companies for modern, security-focused growth. His work centers on connecting product strategy to real market needs and building brands that lead with clarity, not jargon.

Follow Karl on LinkedIn.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Illumio – Learn more about the company’s breach containment and Zero Trust Segmentation platform.

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Your Guide to CyberMarketingCon 2025: Workshops, Wrestling, and What’s New in Austin

Wed, 05 Nov 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Gianna and Maria take a break from guest interviews to share what’s ahead at CyberMarketingCon 2025, coming December 7–10 in Austin, TX, and streaming online. From building your first AI agent or tackling a marketer’s CTF, to designing sharper content in Canva, this year’s workshops go hands-on fast.

They walk through new summits for CMOs, founders, and sales teams, introduce fresh AI-driven sponsors, and preview Austin’s most unexpected highlight, a cybersecurity-themed wrestling show. It’s a glimpse at how the community keeps growing, connecting, and having fun.

👉 Listen to the full episode for insider updates, practical tips, and a few behind-the-scenes laughs from the team bringing CyberMarketingCon to life.

About the hosts:

Gianna Whitver and Maria Velasquez are the co-founders of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society and organizers of CyberMarketingCon, the annual conference for security marketers, founders, and GTM leaders to connect, learn, and grow together.

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

How to Communicate Like an Executive—Lessons from Varonis CMO Rob Sobers

Wed, 29 Oct 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Most marketers learn executive communication the hard way. Rob Sobers, CMO at Varonis, joins Gianna and Charles to share what he’s figured out along the way, how to lead with the answer, give data real context, and know when to stop talking.

He explains how to tailor communication for CEOs, boards, and peers, and why too much detail can make you sound less senior, not more informed. The conversation also covers the habits that build trust over time: using templates for consistency, setting clear values so teams can move without micromanagement, and preparing for the “most obvious objections” before they’re raised.

👉 Listen to the full episode for practical examples, career lessons, and Rob’s take on the one buzzword he’d retire from cybersecurity marketing for good.

About Rob:

Rob Sobers is the Chief Marketing Officer at Varonis, a leader in data security. He began his career as a software engineer before moving into marketing, giving him a unique perspective on how technical and business teams communicate. At Varonis, Rob leads global marketing strategy and focuses on helping organizations understand and reduce data risk.

He’s also the co-author of Learn Ruby the Hard Way and a longtime advocate for practical, transparent communication inside complex organizations.

Follow Rob Sobers on LinkedIn

🔗 Links & Resources:

Varonis: varonis.com

Dave Kellogg’s Blog (Kellblog): kellblog.com

Carilu Dietrich’s Post on Executive Communication: LinkedIn article

Elevate Your Marketing Dashboard: How to Impress the CEO, CRO, and CFO — Carilu Dietrich (Substack)

Wes Kao’s “15 Principles for Managing Up”: weskao.com

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Your Cybersecurity Marketing Community Awaits — CyberMarketingCon 2025 Preview

Wed, 22 Oct 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What started as two marketers looking for support has grown into a 4,000-member community and CyberMarketingCon, the go-to conference for anyone driving go-to-market in security.

In this replay from Chris Hughes’ Resilient Cyber show, Gianna and Maria share what makes the Society different, why the event feels more like a reunion than a conference, and what’s waiting in Austin this December (or online if that’s easier): hands-on workshops, founder + investor sessions, and this year’s theme — the Marketing Time Machine.

Make sure you get your ticket today: https://www.cybermarketingconference.com/

About:

Chris Hughes is the host of Resilient Cyber and the President and CEO of Aquia, where he helps organizations securely adopt cloud and modern software practices. His show brings practitioners, builders, and leaders together to talk openly about the challenges and opportunities in cybersecurity.

Follow Chris on LinkedIn

Gianna Whitver is Co-Founder and CEO of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society, and Maria Velasquez is Co-Founder and Chief Growth Officer.

They started the Society in 2020 to build a community for cyber marketers, now 4,000+ strong. They also run CyberMarketingCon, the go-to industry conference for anyone working in go-to-market.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Chris Hughes’ Resilient Cyber show
Get your ticket for CyberMarketingCon 2025
Cybersecurity Marketing Society
Resilient Cyber podcast: resilientcyber.io

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Inside RSAC’s Next Chapter: Community, Research, and a $5M Bet on Startups

Wed, 15 Oct 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

RSAC has officially expanded its research team with 11 new hires, plus another major research release is dropping this October. Guests Ben Waring and Jessica Porter join us to break down what the expansion means for the industry and how RSAC is stepping into year-round thought leadership.

They also take us inside the new RSAC digital community, where AI-powered tools, curated news briefs, and private peer groups keep cybersecurity pros connected long after the conference floor closes.

On the startup side, it’s the 20th anniversary of Innovation Sandbox with submissions up nearly 40% and a new $5M investment fueling each finalist’s growth. Plus, for anyone eyeing the RSAC 2026 stage, Ben and Jessica share what makes a Call for Speakers submission stand out and what gets it cut.

Listen to this episode before your next submission, pitch, or conference plan; you’ll thank yourself later.

About guests:

Ben Waring is the Director of Global PR and Communications at RSAC. He leads the global public relations strategy for the conference and its year-round community platform, managing media engagement, high-profile speaker press, and live event communications.

Follow Ben on LinkedIn.

Jessica Porter is Senior Director of Marketing at RSAC, where she has worked since 2017. She drives go-to-market strategy, targeted attendance, and community engagement, building RSAC into a year-round hub for cybersecurity learning. Previously, Jessica held integrated marketing roles at RSA Security.

Follow Jessica on LinkedIn .

🔗 Links & Resources:

RSAC Membership overview (launch blog)

RSAC Membership platform demo (video)

RSAC Cybersecurity Atlas (interactive tool)

RSAC Innovation Sandbox (program)

Innovation Sandbox — How it Works (submission details)

RSAC Launch Pad (program)

RSAC Call for Submissions (Closed)

RSAC Research (report landing example)

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Vibe Coding for Marketers: How to Build What You Wish Existed

Wed, 08 Oct 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Joseph Barringhaus didn’t set out to become a part-time app builder. He was tired of doing budgets in Google Sheets and decided to see if one of those new AI coding tools could do it better. It turned out it could, and that one experiment snowballed into a whole new way of working he calls vibe coding.

In this conversation, Joseph and Gianna get into what vibe coding looks like in practice: quick tools that make a sales call easier, event games that buyers actually remember, and rough-and-ready prototypes that speed up work with designers. They also talk honestly about the risks (where AI still breaks), the temptation to chase too many shiny tools, and why Joseph swears by his “three bets” rule to keep marketing focused.

👉 Tune in to the full episode to hear Joseph’s stories firsthand from the budgeting app that started it all to the bold bets shaping how he runs marketing today.

About Joseph:

Joseph Barringhaus is the Vice President of Marketing at Maze.
Before Maze, he was the Vice President of Marketing at Tamnoon, driving demand generation, product–market fit, messaging, and revenue alignment. With nearly a decade in cybersecurity, IT services, and SaaS, he’s helped generate over $900M in pipeline and raised conversion rates across multiple companies.
Joseph also held senior marketing roles at Sonrai Security and Progress, and earlier worked in content and digital marketing across industries from sports to IT. He has a BBA in Marketing with a minor in Communication from Wichita State University, and today, he also serves as an advisor at Warmly.

Follow Joseph on LinkedIn

🔗 Links & Resources:

Learn more about Tamnoon: tamnoon.io
v0 by Vercel
Lovable
Base 44
Claude Code (referred to as “Cloud Code” in the episode)

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

How Torq Turned Characters Into a Cybersecurity Marketing Universe

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Step inside the Torq Universe, a marketing world where the Big Hat isn’t just swag, it’s a storyline; the Sock Goblin explains why your SOC is drowning in false positives; and a falcon named Robert Girdle might swoop into the next conference booth.

In this episode, Gianna teams up with Tessa The (Senior Field Marketing Manager at Torq) and Brittney Wittfeldt-Zec (Senior Social Media Manager at Torq) to unpack how Torq turned characters and inside jokes into a real growth engine: from 4K to 29K+ LinkedIn followers, cybersecurity pros cosplaying their merch, and a community that actually asks for more lore.

Why does it matter? This isn’t marketing theater; it’s proof that buyers connect faster and deeper when your brand lives in a world they want to join.

👉 Tune in to hear how Torq bridges field and social, measures what sticks, and keeps expanding a universe that cybersecurity folks can’t stop talking about.

About guests:

Tessa The is Senior Field Marketing Manager at Torq, where she brings campaigns and characters into the real world through conferences, field programs, and the now-legendary Big Hat. She focuses on creating in-person experiences that tie seamlessly back to Torq’s brand universe.

Follow Tessa on LinkedIn

Brittney Wittfeldt-Zec is Senior Social Media Manager at Torq, leading the charge on building community and engagement across digital channels. From launching the Sock Goblin to scaling Torq’s LinkedIn following past 29K, she shows how storytelling and social media can fuel measurable growth.

Follow Brittney on LinkedIn

About Torq: Torq is a security automation platform that helps teams cut noise, streamline response, and focus on what matters most by turning workflows into a connected, automated system.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Learn more about Torq

The Big Hat Conspiracy video on LinkedIn

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Bots, Brands, and Big Mergers: Sarah Acker on HUMAN Security’s Marketing Playbook

Wed, 24 Sep 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Ask Sarah Acker about her team at HUMAN Security, and you won’t just hear “brand” or “demand gen.” You’ll hear humans, cyborgs, and bots. That playful framing comes straight from how she describes the groups on her team, showing her mix of structure and creativity in cybersecurity marketing.

In this conversation, Sarah walks us through HUMAN Security’s transformation from White Ops into a cybersecurity company, the realities of merging with PerimeterX, and why she believes the best marketing is equal parts “pretty” and “gritty.” Along the way, we cover FBI investigations, a Halloween parade float, and the persistence of old logos that still turn up on invoices years after a rebrand.

If you’ve faced the challenges of rebrands, mergers, or balancing creativity with effectiveness in cybersecurity marketing, Sarah’s stories offer a clear look at what it takes to make it work.

About Sarah:

Sarah Acker is the SVP, Global Head of Marketing at HUMAN Security. She joined the company when it was still known as White Ops and has been part of its evolution into cybersecurity, including the acquisition and integration of PerimeterX.

Before HUMAN Security, Sarah was Head of Brand Experience and Partnerships at iCrossing, a Hearst-owned digital agency, and Director of Marketing at ALTZ Investment Strategies LLC. Earlier in her career, she worked across industries, including health and wellness, beauty, fashion, fintech, real estate, and media, before moving into cybersecurity.

Follow Sarah on LinkedIn

🔗 Links & Resources:

Check out HUMAN Security’s website
HUMAN Security: 3ve: The Long Game
The Hunt for 3ve (White Paper)
Dark Reading Coverage: Google, White Ops, and Industry Players Dismantle 3ve
HUMAN Security Press Release: BADBOX 2.0 Scheme Exposed
HUMAN Security Blog: BADBOX 2.0 Disruption Report
SecurityWeek: BadBox Botnet Powered by 1 Million Android Devices Disrupted

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

The 30/60/90 Day Plan for Customer Marketing in Cybersecurity with Antu Buck

Wed, 17 Sep 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Antu Buck didn’t plan to end up in customer marketing. She started in sales, carrying a bag as a BDR and enterprise rep, before realizing the part she loved most was building customer relationships. That path led her to McAfee, Intel Security, and now Gigamon, where she’s the Senior Director of Customer Marketing & Community.

In this episode, Antu explains customer marketing, how it grew from “reference calls” into a core pillar of modern marketing, and why advocacy, community, and lifecycle programs all matter. We also discuss the common mistakes companies make when they treat community as a checkbox, how to prove ROI in a low-disclosure industry, and what it takes to turn a happy customer into a true superfan.

Listen in as Antu previews her 30/60/90-day playbook for building a customer marketing program and catch the full plan live at CyberMarketingCon.

About Antu:

Antu Buck is the Senior Director of Customer Marketing & Community at Gigamon, where she leads customer advocacy, engagement programs, and lifecycle marketing initiatives.

Before Gigamon, she built and ran customer marketing programs at McAfee and Intel Security, including customer reference programs, executive briefings, and advocacy initiatives. Her career began in sales as a BDR and enterprise rep, which gave her a customer-first perspective that still shapes her approach today.

Connect with Antu on LinkedIn

🔗 Links & Resources:

Learn more about Gigamon

Subscribe & Review:

👉 Enjoyed this one? Drop us a quick ⭐ rating or review, it helps more cyber marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want to level up your cybersecurity marketing? Join us Dec 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
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Beyond the CISO: How Founders Should Pitch Security Buyers

Wed, 10 Sep 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

CISOs get all the cold emails, but they’re not always the ones who decide if your product lives or dies. In this episode, Rob Solomon (CrowdStrike) and Jennifer Reed (Amazon Web Services, AWS) join hosts Gianna and Maria to explain why the real buying power often sits with solution architects and security engineers.

They take us inside the AWS-CrowdStrike-NVIDIA Cyber Accelerator Program (Gianna is a mentor for the program), share how joint launches like Falcon for AWS Security Incident Response come together, and spell out what startups get wrong when pitching technical buyers. You will hear how to move past fear-based messaging, make adoption seamless, and why internal marketing matters as much as the external splash.

About the Guests

Rob Solomon is a Senior Cloud Solutions Architect – Alliances at CrowdStrike, where he designs and advises on secure, scalable cloud architectures and helps partners integrate CrowdStrike technologies into joint solutions. Follow on LinkedIn

Jenn Reed is a Principal Security Partner Solutions Architect at Amazon Web Services (AWS) and a former Chief Information Security Officer. She works with AWS partners and customers on cloud-native security, compliance, and technical strategy, bringing firsthand experience of what resonates (and fails) when pitching security leaders. Follow on LinkedIn

🔗 Links & Resources:

CrowdStrike Press Release | Falcon for AWS Security Incident Response

Forbes | CrowdStrike and AWS Simplify Security Incident Response

AWS re Inforce 2025 | Best practices to securing AI with AWS and CrowdStrike (DAP203)

AWS Workshop | Hybrid Environments with IAM Roles Anywhere
CrowdStrike
AWS

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Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

Want the insider secrets cybersecurity marketers use? Join us December 7–10 in Austin, TX, for four days of zero-fluff workshops, real-deal networking, and maybe the best BBQ meetup you’ll ever have.

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Building Impact & Cyber Community with Debbie Sallis of the Cyber Guild

Wed, 03 Sep 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

The Cyber Guild is built on community, helping people use technology to their advantage and ensuring that no one is left behind in the digital age.

In this episode, Executive Director Debbie Sallis joins Gianna to share how that mission comes to life: through three targeted events helping people professionally develop in the cyber world. They host Uniting Women in Cyber, a flagship event that feels more like an experience than a conference; Cyber Connect, which pivoted in response to federal layoffs to support professionals in transition; and RISE, a mentorship program connecting seasoned leaders with those just starting their cybersecurity careers.

With only four staff and a dedicated group of volunteers, Debbie shows how impact isn’t about scale or budget, it’s about showing up, creating space, and meeting the moment together.

This episode is about how community, not scale, drives change in cybersecurity and how you can be part of it.

About Debbie

Debbie Sallis is the executive director of The Cyber Guild, a nonprofit community advancing sustainable cybersecurity and inclusive leadership. Since 2021, she has led the Guild’s flagship programs — Uniting Women in Cyber, Cyber Connect, and RISE — building initiatives that give professionals at every stage of their careers a place to connect, grow, and lead.

In addition to her role at The Cyber Guild, Debbie contributes her expertise as an Advisory Board Member with the Technology Advancement Center (TAC), which supports open-source innovation for U.S. national security and the intelligence community, and with Evans & Chambers Technology, a D.C.-based firm that delivers secure, agile software solutions for defense and intelligence missions.

Follow Debbie on LinkedIn.

🔗 Links & Resources:

The Cyber Guild – Learn more about the nonprofit, its mission, and programs.

Uniting Women in Cyber – October 9, 2024 (Amazon HQ, Crystal City, Arlington) – Event details and registration.

Sponsorship Opportunities – Ways to support and get involved.

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See you next Wednesday with a new episode!

Building ‘Herd Immunity’ in Cybersecurity (Without Big Budgets)

Wed, 27 Aug 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

For Brandon Min, building Herd Security has meant tackling two challenges at once: helping companies create a culture of security while also figuring out how to market a startup on a scrappy budget.

In this episode, he shares how Herd rethinks security awareness with micro-training that employees finish, why 90% of cyberattacks start with users, and what it takes to build “herd immunity” inside organizations. On the marketing side, Brandon walks us through testing ideas before building, finding overlooked SEO wins, and how, in his experience, a $50 guerrilla stunt brought in more leads than a trade show booth that cost 500x more.

It’s a rare look at the crossroads of security culture and startup marketing, and it offers plenty of lessons for anyone trying to build attention and trust in cybersecurity.

About Brandon:

Brandon Min is the Founder & CEO of Herd Security, a Los Angeles-based startup helping organizations build “herd immunity” against social‑engineering and AI‑driven threats through micro-training, workflow automation, and targeted simulations that engage employees.

Herd Security’s platform also addresses emerging deepfake risk with tools, including voice deepfake detection. This is part of its broader training and awareness suite and aims at a modern, user‑centric security culture.

Before launching, Brandon worked at Duo Security, supporting secure‑access deployments and bringing a hands‑on technical perspective that informs his product and go‑to‑market decisions.

Connect with Brandon on LinkedIn.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Learn more about Herd Security
WePay’s Ice Block Stunt at PayPal’s Conference - guerrilla marketing done right!

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From Cisco to Startups: Leadership Lessons That Last with Sri Sundaralingam

Wed, 20 Aug 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Sri Sundaralingam has led teams at global enterprises and multiple startups in cybersecurity and enterprise software. He is now the CMO at Xage Security and has held leadership positions at Cisco, Symantec, ExtraHop, Shape Security, Mojo Networks, and Endace. He breaks down what carries over between big-company and early-stage environments and what you must relearn.

In the episode, we explore hiring for creativity vs. experience, how to test a move from individual contributor (IC) to manager before you commit, and practical ways to handle politics while keeping work moving. Sri also shares how he frames Zero Trust and other technical concepts so buyers understand the value.

Listen if you’re deciding between startup and enterprise, weighing IC vs. management, or want concrete hiring and communication tactics you can use this quarter.

About Sri:

Sri Sundaralingam is Chief Marketing Officer at Xage Security, a global leader in zero trust access, especially for critical infrastructure. His experience spans leadership roles in high-growth startups and international firms, including ExtraHop, Symantec, Shape Security, Endace, Cisco, Mojo Networks, and Juniper Networks. With a technical engineering foundation, Sri has guided teams across product management, product marketing, and corporate marketing. He’s also credited as an inventor on wireless security technology pioneered at Mojo Networks.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Follow Sri Sundaralingam on LinkedIn

Xage Security – Official Website

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

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Inside the Ransomware Economy with Dr. Diane Janosek

Wed, 13 Aug 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Ransomware has evolved from one-off attacks to a fully operational criminal economy. Today, cybercrime groups operate with defined roles, shared infrastructure, and a growing reliance on AI to speed up intrusion, encryption, and extortion. Our guest this episode unveils insights from tracking the fraudulent side of the internet.

Dr. Diane Janosek, CEO of Janos LLC and former senior executive at the National Security Agency (NSA), joins Gianna to unpack the structure and strategy behind ransomware-as-a-service. Drawing on her background in law, compliance, and national security, including her leadership at the National Cryptologic School, she breaks down how these syndicates function, what most companies get wrong in their response, and why even well-maintained backups aren’t the safety net they once were.

We also explore how AI is accelerating the criminal kill chain, the real stats behind ransom payments (and regrets), and why ransomware is increasingly a tool of geopolitical disruption, not just financial gain.

🎬 The trailer for the film is included in this episode with permission. Courtesy of the Bold Stroke. All rights reserved. Dawn of Cyberwarfare – Produced by the Bold Stroke – Directed by Alisha Merkle & Fabrizio Dublino

🔗 Links & Resources:

The Cyber Effect by Dr. Mary Aiken

Chip War by Chris Miller

Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson

Darknet Diaries podcast: darknetdiaries.com Recommended episode: Episode 24 – Operation BayonetArticle on King Charles’ Canada visit

More about the film here!

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

About Dr. Diane:

Dr. Diane Janosek is a national security leader, cybersecurity compliance expert, and CEO of Janos LLC. With over a decade at the National Security Agency, she served as Deputy Director of Compliance, Commandant of the National Cryptologic School, and senior legal and policy advisor across the intelligence community.

She holds a Ph.D. in cybersecurity law, a J.D., and a master’s in strategic intelligence, and has worked at the intersection of law, cyber, privacy, and geopolitics throughout her career. Diane has trained thousands of cyber professionals globally, written extensively on cyber ethics and space security, and remains a leading voice on the risks posed by AI-accelerated threats and criminal enterprise models like ransomware-as-a-service.

Learn more at dianejanosek.com

Follow her on LinkedIn

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Different Is Good: Why Standing Out > Being Perfect on Social

Wed, 06 Aug 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

You can’t copy Maya Doron. Not just because she’ll notice (and yes, she has receipts), but because everything she does on social at Wiz is built on something AI can’t touch: chaos, specificity, and a running list of what we’re calling Maya-isms.

As Growth Marketing Manager at Wiz, Maya helps shape one of the most original brands in cybersecurity — from viral puppies and cloud cornflakes to musicals, memes, and “what’s in your tabs?” CISO interviews. In this episode, she joins Gianna to talk through what makes content real, what makes it work, and why going viral is never the goal.

They get into the problems with AI-generated blandness, the return of photos on LinkedIn, how sensory marketing taps into memory even more deeply than visuals, and what it takes to build a brand people don’t just notice — they respect.

🎧 Hit play to hear how Maya builds scroll-stopping social in the most copy-paste-prone industry online.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Watch the Wiz Puppies Campaign – yes, there are actual puppies!

Watch the Wiz April Fool’s Musical – yes, it’s a full musical!

Learn more about Wiz

Timestamps:

00:00 – Welcome and intro to Maya Deone from Wiz 01:08 – What Maya does as Growth Marketing Manager 02:36 – Social platforms, TikTok strategy, and reaching the next wave 04:06 – Filming CISOs, creating content at events, and AI tools for editing 05:49 – Maya’s favorite brand accounts: Surreal Cornflakes & Duolingo 07:59 – Wiz Easter eggs and sensory marketing tricks 09:32 – How Wiz uses AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude 10:42 – The sameness problem on LinkedIn and keeping your voice 13:27 – Making content digestible for CISOs and why shorter wins 14:33 – What performs best on social: booths, themes, and research 17:17 – The viral puppy campaign and ungated content strategy 19:24 – Creating trailer-style content and staying positive in cyber 22:21 – Social media trends to skip — and what’s working now 24:43 – The rise of raw, behind-the-scenes, and handwritten posts 25:26 – “Don’t optimize for viral, optimize for real” 27:00 – Building brand trust through consistency and giveaways 28:39 – Maya’s mantra: “Don’t post what a competitor could copy” 30:12 – What is sensory marketing? And why it sticks 33:08 – Sound, food, and April Fool’s musicals 34:13 – Where to find Maya and final thoughts 34:54 – Come to CyberMarketingCon 2025 in Austin!

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

About Maya:

Maya Doron joined the Wiz team in September 2023 as the growth marketing manager. In her role, she leads the company’s social and video content strategy across platforms like YouTube, LinkedIn, and X, turning playful and bold ideas (think puppies, booth cornflakes, and musicals) into impactful campaigns that stand out in cybersecurity marketing.

Previously, Maya held digital and influencer marketing roles at companies like Vesttoo and Percepto International and brings a creative, fast-moving mindset to everything she works on.

Follow Maya on LinkedIn.

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You Can’t Cold Call the SOC: GTM Lessons from ArmorText with Matt Calligan

Wed, 30 Jul 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Matt Calligan, Director of Revenue Operations at ArmorText, joins us from Iceland to talk about what it takes to build a sales motion from scratch in cybersecurity when your product is built for moments nobody wants to think about.

As the company’s first salesperson, Matt shares how he helped ArmorText find early traction through ISACs, why the government wasn’t the buyer they expected, and how private-sector incident response teams became their core market. We dig into go-to-market lessons around timing and trust, and why most traditional sales tactics don’t work when the use case is crisis-driven.

We also discuss selling through distributors without a formal channel program, supporting marketing without a full-time team, and what happens when converting at 80% but only if the right people have heard of you.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Matt Calligan on LinkedIn
ArmorText
Learn more about ISACs: National Council of ISACs

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

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About Matt:

Matt Calligan is the Director of Revenue Operations at ArmorText, where he works closely with critical infrastructure organizations to support secure, out-of-band communications for cybersecurity incidents and threat sharing.

As the company’s first salesperson, Matt helped shape ArmorText’s early go-to-market motion—building traction through partnerships with ISACs and navigating complex sales cycles in highly regulated industries. He also leads strategy across sales, marketing, and channel efforts, helping the team scale without traditional org structures.

Matt brings two decades of enterprise sales experience and advises other cybersecurity startups on finding product-market fit, building revenue engines, and selling in trust-first environments.

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Nobody Cares About Your Launch (Yet): How to Fix Your PR Game

Wed, 23 Jul 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Carmen Harris is the person you call when no one wants to cover your product, and she’ll tell you exactly why. Founder and CEO of Signal and Noise, she joins Gianna to break down what’s changed in cybersecurity PR and how to get attention in 2025.

We get into why the adage “product news is dead” isn’t totally true, how founders should build their brand before launch, and what makes an editor hit delete on your pitch in two seconds flat. Carmen also shares how to use the summer slowdown to reset your comms strategy, why you need to calendar-stalk your competitors, and how to get real face time with execs (even if you have to bully your way into the room).

Listen in for real-world tips you can use on your next launch or media push.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Connect with Carmen:

Companies we mentioned:

Wiz – the standard for comms that lands
incident.io – a great example of product-led thought leadership
Torq – RSAC monster truck champions

Newsletters Carmen swears by:

Return on Security by Mike Privette
Resilient Cyber
Richard Stiennon on Substack

Meet us at CyberMarketingCon 2025!

👉 Snag your ticket now!

See you in Austin, where the insights and vibes are hotter.

About Carmen:

Carmen Harris is the founder and CEO of Signal & Noise, a boutique comms firm for cybersecurity and AI companies that want to be understood. She’s built a career helping technical founders translate their work into stories that land with reporters, analysts, and buyers.

She’s the one who gets the “can-you-fix-this” call mid-crisis and the “we’re-about-to-launch” call mid-chaos, and she loves both. Carmen’s not about gimmicks. She helps companies understand their market, dig into what matters, and build comms strategies that work in the real world.

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You Don’t Need a Budget—You Need a Hat: Orly Bar-Lev on Lasso’s GTM

Wed, 16 Jul 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode summary:

“We decided that Lasso is Matthew McConaughey.”

That’s how Orly Bar Lev, Head of Marketing at Lasso Security, describes the brand she helped shape—laid back, sharp, and not trying to be like anyone else.

In this episode, Orly joins Gianna Whitver to tell the full story: how a GenAI cybersecurity startup launched out of stealth with sheriff-themed swag, a cowboy hat logo, and a Kyrgyzstan-coded website. He tells how it started and how it almost all fell apart when a sheep-centric rebrand crashed just one week before go-live.

She walked out of that moment, rewrote the pitch, and sold a new vision: the founders are the sheriffs, the product is the lasso, and the brand is the cowboy. And somehow, it worked.

This isn’t a theory-of-branding episode. It’s what happens when you do it for real, with no team, no safety net, and just enough weirdness to make it stick.

The sheep died. The hat stayed. Lasso rides.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Connect with Orly Bar Lev on LinkedInExplore Lasso Security: Official Website | LinkedIn PageWatch "Sheep Happens": Campaign Video

Dive into Lasso's Insights: Blog & Resources

About Orly:

Orly Bar Lev is the Head of Marketing at Lasso Security, where she helped take the company from stealth mode to standing out, armed with a Kyrgyzstan-coded website, a cowboy hat, and a clear mission: secure GenAI.

She’s a sharp strategist with a background in cybersecurity communications, known for turning complex GenAI risks (like prompt injection and hallucinations) into conversations that actually land with both technical teams and marketers.

She’s spoken on The Inspired Marketer podcast about balancing innovation and security in enterprise environments, which is why Lasso’s brand is part sheriffs, part swagger, and somehow still totally credible.

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Metaphors, Missed Signals, and Making Cyber Make Sense with Evgeniy Kharam

Wed, 09 Jul 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode summary:

Security architect, podcast host, and author Evgeniy Kharam has seen it again and again: a company buys a shiny new security product, and a year later, it’s still sitting on the shelf. Not because it didn’t work, but because no one knew how to explain it, use it, or get buy-in.

That gap between buying and deploying, between knowing and communicating, is what pulled Evgeniy into his next chapter. After years in technical delivery and architecture, he realized that soft skills weren’t nice to have; they were survival tools.

In this episode, we talk about what happens when security teams can’t translate what they do, how marketers can meet them in the middle, and why metaphors (tents, dogs, houses, you’ll see) work. We get into RSA booth fatigue, Zoom call awkwardness, and what it takes to connect with someone who’s nodding along but completely lost.

Also: hummus etiquette, a three-year campaign to get Evgeniy to CyberMarketingCon, and his dream escape plan involving a shawarma truck.

🔗 Links & Resources:

🎙️ Security Architecture PodcastCo-hosted by Evgeniy Kharam and Dmitry Raidman, this podcast delves into cybersecurity architecture, offering insights into network, application, and cloud security.Listen to the podcast
📘 Architecting Success: The Art of Soft Skills in Technical SalesEvgeniy Kharam's book emphasizes the importance of soft skills in technical sales and provides strategies to enhance communication and build trust. Get the book on Amazon
🧠 Soft Skills TechEvgeniy's platform is dedicated to coaching and resources on soft skills in the tech industry. Explore Soft Skills Tech
🏢 EK Cyber and Media ConsultingA consulting firm founded by Evgeniy Kharam, offering services in cybersecurity and media for vendors and MSSPs. Visit EK Cyber and Media Consulting

📺 Interview with Evgeniy KharamAn in-depth interview exploring Evgeniy's journey and insights into cybersecurity. Watch on YouTube

About Evgeniy:

Evgeniy Kharam has worn nearly every hat in cybersecurity from firewall deployment engineer to VP of Architecture at the Herjavec Group, where he helped grow the team from 15 to over 300. Over two decades in the industry gave him a front-row seat to a recurring problem: great tech failing because no one knew how to explain it.

That realization led him to focus on something most security pros avoid talking about: soft skills. He’s now the author of Architecting Success: The Art of Soft Skills in Technical Sales, host of From Tech to Trust, and co-founder of the Security Architecture Podcast. He also moderates panels, hosts interviews, and advises on the board of the Canadian Cybersecurity Network.

Evgeniy blends technical depth with a human-first approach, whether running a ski-slope cybersecurity conference or helping vendors communicate like real people. He now leads his own consulting firm, where he guides cybersecurity companies through both architecture and storytelling.

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Scrappy Then, Strategic Now: The Evolution of a Cybersecurity CMO

Wed, 02 Jul 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Most first marketers don’t stay long enough to see scale. Thomas LeDuc did. Six years in, he’s still at Semperis, leading a 35-person marketing team and showing it’s possible to evolve from scrappy to strategic.

Gianna and Charles explore what makes that kind of longevity possible: the mindset shifts, the habits that stuck, and the moments that nearly broke him. This episode is full of clarity, honesty, and the kind of leadership most people don’t talk about.

You’ll hear:

Why growing with the company means unlearning just as much as learning.
How Tom hires people who want the blank page, not the playbook
What it takes to stop micromanaging and still care deeply
The difference between culture as words and culture as actions
How a team's passion project became a Braille space education initiative

This one will land if you’ve ever had to scale yourself while scaling a team.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Semperis — ⁠semperis.com⁠

How to build a centaur: Semperis hits $100M ARR milestone: https://www.insightpartners.com/ideas/how-to-build-a-centaur-semperis-hits-100m-arr-milestone/

When Space Camp calls, you go! #ForceForGood https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEgz45b-RgA

⁠Webflow⁠ — No-code website builder

⁠Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society⁠: Join our 3,700+ member Slack, find jobs, and get connected.

About Tom:

Tom LeDuc joined Semperis in 2019 as a scrappy marketer and helped scale the company from a few million ARR to now more than $100M ARR, reaching “centaur status” in 2024. Today, he leads a 35-person team as CMO, overseeing everything from brand and product marketing to demand gen, field programs, and built out the SDR program.

Before Semperis, he held leadership roles at Verodin (acquired by FireEye). He got his start in cybersecurity as a BDR at Securonix and played a big role in building several categories you’ve probably seen on Gartner quadrants.

Outside work, Tom is a dad of two young kiddos, makes indie films, travels a lot, and is very pro-dog.

Thomas LeDuc on ⁠LinkedIn

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📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: ⁠podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com⁠

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Charles Gold on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

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Founder-Led GTM in Cyber: How Taha Sajid Built Trust Without Selling

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Let’s talk about telecom infrastructure: complex, overlooked, and still running on outdated tools most vendors were never built to secure. This episode, we’re joined by Taha Sajid, telecom security architect and founder of Xecurity Pulse, who’s on a mission to fix the gaps in enterprise tools.

From growing up in Pakistan to leading security efforts at Huawei and Comcast, Taha’s story is all about solving real-world problems, sharing what he’s learned, and pushing back against the copy-paste approach to infrastructure security. He breaks down how an education-first go-to-market (GTM) strategy helped him land his first customers and why understanding the telecom stack is critical to protecting what matters most.

We also get into:

The human factors that still break security programs
Bootcamps that turn into a pipeline
Solving problems vs. pushing tools
Plus, the school Taha dreams of building for kids who deserve better than the status quo education.

👉 If you’re selling technical solutions, building trust from scratch, or just tired of surface-level cyber talk, this one’s for you.

About Taha:

Taha Sajid is the founder of Xecurity Pulse, a cybersecurity company focused on solving the unique challenges in telecom security. With a rich background that includes roles at Huawei, Ufone, and Comcast, Taha has been at the forefront of implementing Zero Trust architectures across global networks.

He pioneered the first 5G Security Bootcamp, authored "The Ultimate Blockchain Security Handbook," and leads a YouTube channel that delves into the convergence of AI, security, and telecom. His contributions to standards bodies like NIST, 3GPP, and the Linux Foundation underscore his commitment to advancing global cybersecurity practices.

Beyond his technical endeavors, Taha is passionate about mentorship. He has guided numerous professionals through the EB1A visa process, drawing from his own successful experience. Through his X-LAB initiative, he continues to innovate, bridging the gap between critical infrastructure and modern security solutions.

Follow Taha on LinkedIn.

🔗 Links & Resources:

🌐 Xecurity Pulse – Taha’s company focused on telecom security

📘 The Ultimate Blockchain Security Handbook – Book authored by Taha

Buy on Amazon

🧪 5G Security Bootcamp – Technical bootcamp designed and run by Taha

Explore the bootcamp

📺 Taha’s YouTube Channel – Deep dives on AI, security, and telecom

@XecurityPulse by Taha Sajid

🧠 X-LAB by Xecurity Pulse – Community + mentorship + tooling

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Free Forever, No BS: Inside Bitwarden’s Growth Playbook with Gary Orenstein

Wed, 18 Jun 2025 07:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Most cybersecurity vendors lead with fear, gate their best features, and hide behind complexity. Bitwarden did the opposite and still won.

In this episode, Gianna and Maria sit down with Gary Orenstein, the Chief Customer Officer at Bitwarden, to break down how an open-source password manager with a “free forever” product became a trusted global brand across consumers and enterprises. No gimmicks. No fear-mongering. Just a strategy built on transparency, trust, and a product that actually works.

You’ll hear:

Why giving your product away can actually drive enterprise growth
How open source builds instant credibility and shortens sales cycles
The surprising emotional side of password security
What marketers should stop doing and what to try instead
How Bitwarden quietly created one of the most effective PLG motions in the industry

If you’re tired of the usual cybersecurity playbook, this episode is a refreshing—and useful—detour.

And yes, Gary’s dream job involves tiny foxes and national parks. Stick around for that.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Bitwarden

Channel Islands National Park

Central Park’s surprisingly excellent Instagram
About Gary:

Gary Orenstein is the Chief Customer Officer at Bitwarden, leading go-to-market across customer success, marketing, and sales. He’s been deep in the infrastructure and data space for years, with leadership roles at companies like Yellowbrick Data, SingleStore, and Fusion-io (which went public during his time there). Earlier, he ran marketing at Compellent, which IPO’d and was later acquired by Dell.

Translation: Gary knows what it takes to build and scale trust, from scrappy startups to big exits.

He’s also got the academic chops to match: a bachelor’s from Dartmouth and an MBA from Wharton.

Follow Gary on LinkedIn
Subscribe & Review:

Enjoyed this episode? Leave us a ⭐ rating or review, it helps more marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com
Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Inside Tom Wentworth’s AI Stack: How to Automate the Stuff Marketers Hate

Wed, 11 Jun 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We talk about what’s working, what’s breaking, and how far you can push things without sounding like a robot. Also: cold plunges, prompt rage, and the Notion doc that’s 90 pages long.

🎧 Press play to hear how Tom stretches modern marketing ops with the right automation setup.

Links & Resources Mentioned:

About Tom:

Tom is a high-growth SaaS marketing leader with experience across enterprise GTM and product-led models. He writes occasionally about tech marketing at tomwentworth.com and previously hosted the Scaleup Marketing podcast.

Follow Tom on LinkedIn

Subscribe & Review:

Enjoyed this episode? Leave us a ⭐ rating or review, it helps more marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Charles Gold on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

From Hype to Human: Live from RSAC Conference with Alexandra Charikova

Wed, 04 Jun 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We’re back with a special episode recorded at RSAC 2025. The booths are packed up, and the leftover swag is gathering dust, but the real conversations are just getting started.

Gianna and Maria sat down with Alexandra Charikova, Growth Marketing Manager at Escape and host of The Elephant in AppSec, to talk more about what marketing feels like right now with shifting teams, budget curveballs, and more noise than ever.

We got into the messy middle: navigating layoffs, budget cuts, and leadership turnover, all while still trying to show up, stand out, and connect with buyers. Alexandra shares why she’s officially anti-swag (and what’s in her expo survival kit instead), and we talk through what still works in 2025: human stories, smart content, and follow-up that doesn’t feel like a chore.

Also on the table are burnout, booth chaos, and how to make it through a conference without losing your mind. If you’ve ever been asked to “do more with less” or pitch a rebrand while the leadership team is changing around you… This one’s for you

Links & Resources Mentioned:

Cybersecurity Marketing Society - Home of this podcast, and the community where cybersecurity marketers share ideas, swap stories, and figure things out together.
Escape - Alexandra’s day job. They help folks secure modern apps, and they’re hiring smart marketers too (probably).
The Elephant in AppSec - Alexandra’s podcast. Honest convos, strong opinions, and the kind of AppSec talk you want to hear.
CyberMarketingCon - The Society’s yearly in-person event, where the vibes are strong, the talks are real, and the hallway convos might just change your career.

About Alexandra:

Alexandra isn’t just curious, she’s driven by it. That curiosity has taken her across disciplines, from marketing and sales ops to engineering, data, and project management. What ties it all together? A love of solving complex problems, especially alongside smart, collaborative people.

Outside of her day-to-day work, Alexandra is all in on making application security more accessible and honest. She’s the host of The Elephant in AppSec, a podcast that asks tough questions and challenges how the industry talks about security.

She thrives on connection and is always up for a thoughtful chat or fresh perspective, so don’t be shy about reaching out.

Follow her on LinkedIn.
Subscribe & Review:

Enjoyed this episode? Leave us a ⭐ rating or review, it helps more marketers find the show.

📩 Questions, feedback, or want to be a guest? Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

EXCLUSIVE: Monster Trucks, Skeletons & ROI: Torq CMO Don Jeter at RSAC

Wed, 28 May 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

At RSAC 2025, most brands went sleek and high-speed: F1 cars, luxury lounges, big screens.

Torq showed up with a monster truck, a firey skeleton, and a single message: “SOAR is dead.”

It wasn’t a stunt; it was a fully realized creative campaign that stood out for all the right reasons. Thoughtful, bold, and totally out of left field, Torq’s RSAC Conference presence and brand philosophy drew comparisons to Wiz, widely regarded as the benchmark in cyber marketing excellence, from Forbes.

In this episode, Don Jeter, Torq's CMO, joins Gianna and Maria to unpack how a toy in a Costco aisle became the catalyst for a six-city Monster Jam tour, how off-the-cuff ideas turned into strategy, and why his team operates more like a jam band than a traditional marketing organization.

He also shares what it takes to build brands people care about and how that same creative-first mindset helped scale Pax8 from $5M to $1B.

Love this episode? Get more Don Jeter wisdom at CyberMarketingCon 2025, where he will give a keynote: Stop Marketing. Start World-Building.

Links & Resources Mentioned:

About Don:

CMO at Torq, former growth architect at Pax8, and possibly the only marketing leader to launch a six-city Monster Jam tour to prove a point. Don builds brands people don’t just notice, they remember.

He’s a startup native with a strong point of view, a jam-band approach to execution, and a reputation for turning “what if” into actual pipeline. Whether burying SOAR or rethinking the RSAC booth experience, Don leads with story, trusts creative instinct, and always bets on brand.

When he’s not working, he’s probably sketching sneakers, dodging longboards, or figuring out how to sneak a skeleton mascot into the next campaign.

Follow Don on LinkedIn.

Subscribe & Review:

Enjoyed this episode? Leave us a ⭐ rating and review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow the show and reach more cyber marketers like you!

📩 Got feedback or want to be a guest? Email us: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

See you in the next episode!

Brian Goldfarb on Rebuilding a Legacy Brand…Without Losing Your Mind

Wed, 21 May 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

This week, Gianna and Maria are joined by Brian Goldfarb, CMO at SolarWinds and a veteran of some of the biggest names in tech, including Google, Tenable, and Salesforce. But this isn’t your typical “lessons from the top” chat.

Brian gets real about what it takes to lead modern marketing orgs: how to decide what’s worth fixing, why marketers need to think more like operators, and what it’s like steering GTM at a legacy brand undergoing massive transformation.

We talk trust, storytelling, and the fine art of not panicking even when you lose your job and voice in the same week.

About Guest:

A full-stack marketing executive with deep experience across the GTM spectrum from product marketing and demand gen to PR/AR, digital, and strategy. Known for translating complex technical products into powerful, scalable marketing programs that drive real pipeline.

Brian has led marketing for developer tools, cloud platforms (Azure, AWS, Google Cloud), and high-growth cybersecurity and infrastructure companies. His portfolio spans web technologies, mobility, media (codecs, DRM), and ad platforms, focusing on developer and technical audiences.

He’s built and scaled global marketing engines, aligned field and digital efforts, and helped take emerging tech from concept to category leader. Whether launching a new cloud product or rebuilding a GTM motion from scratch, Brian brings sharp execution, clear narrative, and a deep understanding of what makes modern B2B marketing work.

Follow him on LinkedIn.

Subscribe & Review: Enjoyed this episode? Leave us a ⭐ rating and review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow the show and reach more cyber marketers like you!

Got feedback or want to join the pod? Email us: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn

Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, main LinkedIn page, Instagram page, or podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on X.

See you in the next episode!

Booths, Buzz, and B2B Brilliance: A Cyber Marketer’s Guide to RSAC 2025

Wed, 14 May 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

We’re back from RSAC Conference 2025, and what a week it was! Gianna and Maria recap their third RSAC Conference rodeo in style in this live-recorded, post-conference edition of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing.

We break down the boldest, weirdest, and most wonderful marketing moments from the show floor (and the streets of San Francisco), including:

CrowdStrike’s genius geo-targeted Uber ads
Sweet Security’s literal singing swag truck
Wiz’s cloud security toy store (!!)
And Rubrik’s nostalgic retro arcade booth

We also launched something big: The Cybersecurity Marketing Practice, our brand-new advisory service for cyber founders and venture capitalists (VCs). We threw a sold-out marketer party, handed out coloring books at the Marketer Oasis, and supported early-stage startups through the AWS Cyber Accelerator.

Timestamps:
00:29 – Live from the floor: our third RSAC, and it’s bigger than ever
01:31 – RSAC’s rebrand: the “C” is for Community (and we’re here for it)
02:25 – From live events to digital presence: how RSAC is evolving
03:35 – Uber ads from CrowdStrike? B2B finally gets playful
05:20 – Singing trucks & yellow cups: Sweet Security stands out
06:09 – Wiz’s Toy Store & Rubrik’s retro arcade
07:06 – CyberMarketingCon 2025: theme reveals–Marketing Time Machine
07:50 – We launched something new: The Cybersecurity Marketing Practice
09:38 – Talking to founders & VCs: our GTM strategy braintrust
10:23 – Our RSAC Party for Marketers: 220+ guests and community magic
13:42 – CyberMarketingCon 2025: theme reveals–Marketing Time Machine (deep dive)
14:27 – Foundations + Innovations: rebuilding cyber marketing from the ground up
15:44 – Speaker preview: Connor from Amnis & Don Jeter from Torq
18:23 – Enter the Beautiful Booth Awards (by May 20!)

📢 What’s Next

Product Marketing Workshop – Boston | July 2025

Led by Beth Barach, this half-day workshop is in-person and hands-on. Become a product marketing wiz. Reg. page will be live soon!

CyberMarketingCon 2025 – Austin, TX

December 7–10, 2025 Get your ticket TODAY: cybermarketingconference.com

This year’s theme: Marketing Time Machine. Explore both the foundational skills and innovative tactics every cyber marketer needs now.

Beautiful Booth Awards – Apply by May 20!

Flashy or scrappy, we celebrate smart booths of all sizes. Apply now.

🔗 Links & Resources:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn
Maria Velasquez on LinkedIn

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, our Instagram page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on X.

See you in the next episode!

The CMO Who Runs Toward the Fire: Marc Blackmer on Messy Startups and Honest Leadership

Wed, 07 May 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

From Cisco to chaos (by choice), Marc Blackmer, CMO at Corero Network Security, joins us to unpack the real talk no one warns you about when you take the top marketing job.

In this episode, Gianna and Charles sit down with Marc to unpack the real, raw, and hilarious side of marketing leadership. From walking away from Cisco to jumping back into the startup chaos, Marc shares with us why he needs a mess to clean up, how he builds teams that balance his creative chaos, and why telling the truth in interviews matters more than boasting about perks.

We discuss impostor syndrome, hiring to your weaknesses, and how ChatGPT became Marc’s idea dumping ground so he doesn’t drive his team crazy. And yes, there’s even a game that ends in a heartfelt tribute to Dave Grohl.

If you’ve ever felt like the only marketer in the room, making it up as you go, this episode is your support group.

03:41 – Welcome to Cyber CMO Confidential with Charles and Gianna
04:14 – Meet Marc Blackmer: radio voice, CMO, AI nerd, and ex-Cisco-er
05:38 – From Cisco comfort to startup chaos: Why Marc chooses the hard path
07:33 – How CyberMarketingCon made Marc quit his job (in a good way)
08:59 – The CMO’s lonely seat: finding your “board of directors”
11:28 – Building the right team: vibes, skills, and hiring to your weaknesses
13:52 – Why Marc tells candidates why not to take the job
18:35 – Owning your strengths and learning to recognize them
19:28 – Creative CMO meets operational team: How they balance each other
21:34 – Why ideas ≠ , action items, and how to avoid overwhelming your team
22:56 – Designing psychologically safe environments for input and ownership
26:11 – Creating teams people want to be on—and knowing when they’ll leave
28:33 – “Plagiarism saves time”: Building a culture of shared wisdom
28:49 – Game time! Fictional swaps and Dave Grohl admiration
32:20 – Where to find Marc and final thanks

About the guest:

Marc Blackmer, Chief Marketing Officer, Corero Network Security

Marc Blackmer is a veteran of the cybersecurity and tech industries, with a career spanning enterprise giants like Cisco and early-stage startups such as ShardSecure. Now serving as CMO at Corero Network Security, Marc brings a unique blend of visionary creativity and operational grounding to his role. With a background in ICS (Industrial Control Systems), AI, and sales engineering, he has been acquired more than once, held a wide array of roles, from partner marketing to channel and IT, and lived to tell the tale.

🖇 Connect with Marc:

🔗 LinkedIn

🏢 Corero Network Security

📬 Get in Touch with us:

Want to be on CyberCMO Confidential? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

🎧 Follow the Hosts:

Gianna Whitver on LinkedIn.
Charles Gold on LinkedIn.

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

How VCs Spot GTM Red Flags (and the Marketer Hires That Actually Work)

Wed, 30 Apr 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What do VCs think about your GTM strategy? This week, Gianna and Maria chat with Asad Khaliq and Mark Kraynak, two of the founding members of Acrew Capital, about what it takes to build or break a go-to-market motion at an early-stage cyber startup.

Timestamps:

01:55 – Founding Acrew: A venture firm built on thesis, collaboration, and trust.

03:59 – The "green light" test: Would founders be happy to hear from us? 04:57 – Mark’s unexpected path: From poetry to product marketing to VC.

06:36 – Storytelling, messaging, and the marketing power of poetry. 07:32 – Product positioning tips for startups: What words mean.

08:59 – Messaging ≠ intent: Why it’s about what the customer hears. 10:01 – Asad’s entry into cyber through the software infrastructure.

12:27 – Cyber + data = one GTM motion.

13:50 – The hidden magic of cybersecurity and the infrastructure we forget.

14:22 – GTM hiring tips: Why founders get the first sales—and what comes next.

15:51 – Why hiring growth too early is a recipe for failure.

16:47 – First marketing hire? Make it product, not growth.

17:53 – How to find your double unicorns: Player-coach profiles & product marketers.

19:50 – The danger of over-automating with AI in outbound.

21:04 – Standing out means going against the volume game.

22:26 – Culture of experimentation: The new GTM advantage.

24:22 – Channel deprecation: Email’s broken, ABM is back.

26:42 – In-person > inbox: Human connection is underrated.

28:49 – Advice for marketers joining early-stage startups.

31:40 – Vision and values: What to align on before joining a startup.

32:44 – Red flags: Fundraising ≠ success

34:52 – Lightning round: Best cyber website you’ve seen?

37:26 – Shout-out to the Vanta marketing team

About the guest:

Follow Asad on LinkedIn.

Follow Mark on LinkedIn.

Follow Acrew Capital on LinkedIn or the website.

💌 Feedback or Wanna Be on the Show?

Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow your hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

Coach, Cut, or Course-Correct? Manny Ataebi on Leading Through the Tough Stuff

Wed, 23 Apr 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

There’s one part of leadership no one prepares you for: the hard conversations. Whether it’s underperformance or misplaced potential, these conversations are uncomfortable but unavoidable.

In this episode, Manny Ataebi, Demostack's CMO, gets brutally honest about how to achieve clarity, empathy, and zero regrets. He drops hard truths and heart-forward advice on managing performance, coaching with empathy, and making the tough calls when attitude isn't enough. From skip levels and PIPs to founders hiring out of FOMO, we cover it all with zero sugarcoating.

This one’s for the managers in the trenches. If you’ve ever wondered when to coach, when to cut, or how to protect your culture, Manny’s got answers. And stories. And probably a little tough love.

Timestamps:

01:25 – Manny’s framework: When underperformance happens, what's next?

03:19 – Coaching vs. wrong role: The stress factor and impact on team morale.

04:31 – Working with founders: early hiring mistakes, and how to fix them.

06:26 – Hiring smart for startups: work ethic, street smarts, and fire in the belly.

07:05 – The year-one review and spotting growth potential.

09:25 – Transitioning team members across roles: real stories and structure.

11:36 – Difficult conversations: why surprise = manager failure.

14:31 – Role play, real scenarios, and preparing your team for exec-level readiness.

16:42 – QBRs and letting team members lead in front of leadership.

18:36 – Different styles, different focus: how Manny adjusts his management approach.

22:19 – When it’s a motivation issue: Candy Crush and the “Farmville” effect.

24:35 – Self-improvement mindset: what separates strivers from coasters.

26:07 – Managing through pivots: startup vs. scale-up realities.

27:32 – The energy vampires of the team: Eeyores, excuses, and responsibility.

29:31 – Let them fail (a little): growth through discomfort.

30:25 – Game Time! If Manny weren’t a CMO, what would he be?

32:10 – Life coach dreams, physical therapy passion, and a heart for helping others.

35:22 – Acting aspirations, fake film pitches, and final laughs.

About the guest:

Follow Manny Ataebi on LinkedIn.

Links & Resources Mentioned:

Demostack

Cybersecurity Marketing Society

CyberMarketingCon

Upcoming Events:

RSAC 2025 Marketers Party

Sunday, April 27 – Vibes, wagyu, and every cybersecurity marketer you love. You know the drill.

👉 RSVP now before it’s too late.

Subscribe & Show Some Love:

New episodes every Wednesday. Subscribe, leave a five-star review, and send this to a coworker playing Candy Crush during Zoom calls.

💌 Feedback or Wanna Be on the Show?

Email: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow your hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Chris Cochran on Marketing to an Audience That Doesn’t Trust You

Wed, 16 Apr 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

This week, we’re going full circle with the one and only Chris Cochran, VP of Marketing at AKA Identity and Founder of Audacious GTM. Chris is a former cybersecurity practitioner, Netflix threat intel lead, Marine Corps vet, and one of the original champions behind this very podcast.

Gianna and Maria sit down with Chris to trace his journey from the intelligence trenches to the marketing boardroom, blending creativity, psychology, and strategy. They talk about the unique challenges of marketing to cyber pros, bridging the gap between art and science, and the delicate dance between taste and truth in brand messaging. Chris also drops wisdom on authentic communication, building community with content, and why mutual benefit is the secret sauce of GTM.

Timestamps:

03:14 – From Marine Corps to NSA to Netflix: Chris’s practitioner roots

08:10 – Hacker Valley origins: How podcasting sparked a creative empire

12:35 – Joining the Society: The invite that changed everything

15:02 – Building brand and community at aka Identity

18:27 – Art + science: Chris’s marketing philosophy

22:15 – Empathy between marketers and practitioners

26:48 – Campaigns, AB testing, and dopamine hits

31:05 – Leading marketing teams and educating across the org

34:22 – Taste vs. truth: Internal feedback challenges

38:45 – Wins, video campaigns, and building for conversion

43:30 – Escaping cyber (briefly) and coming back home

📢 Upcoming Events:

CyberMarketingCon 2025 – Call for Speakers Open!

🗓️ December 7–10, 2025 – Austin, TX

📝 Submit by April 15th to share your brilliance with 700+ cyber marketing pros.

RSAC 2025 Marketers Party

🎉 Sunday, April 27th – Food, friends, and fun with the Cybersecurity Marketing Society.

🎟️ Tickets: cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com/event/party-for-marketers-rsac-2024

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned:

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If this episode inspired you (or made you laugh), hit that subscribe button and leave us a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review on your favorite podcast app! It helps us bring you even more brilliant guests like Chris.

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉 Gianna Whitver

👉 Maria Velasquez

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. You can join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, main LinkedIn page, or podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

Why Brand Is the Secret Weapon for Cybersecurity CMOs with Jennifer Leggio

Wed, 09 Apr 2025 05:00:00 -0000

The Cyber CMO Confidential is back, and we are starting with our favourite guest, Jennifer Leggio, Chief Strategy Officer at W2 Communications.

Jen’s back on the mic, taking us on her journey from cyber PR pro to CMO extraordinaire to brief, educational COO life. She understands why the brand isn’t just fluff but your secret growth engine. We break down how to talk about “the B-word” with a CFO who only wants more demo requests and explore why branding might just be your most powerful (and misunderstood) sales tool.

You’ll hear about the empathetic sale, how brand boosts pricing power, and why the buyer’s journey looks more like a bow tie than a funnel these days. If you care about brand, pipeline, or just surviving another board meeting, this one’s a must-listen.

Timestamps:

01:04 – Guest intro: Jennifer Leggio, CSO at W2 Communications

02:27 – Jen’s path to W2: From cyber PR to CMO to COO and back

04:17 – “Brand is the new demand gen”: What that means

05:40 – The empathetic sale: Qualify out as much as you qualify in

07:31 – Talking about brand with your CEO and CFO

09:00 – Real-life examples of brand influence (Carvana FTW)

11:15 – Demo requests ≠ demand strategy

13:09 – The bow tie journey: Reimagining the funnel

14:48 – Turning brand wins into sales enablement and retention tools

15:14 – Brand = pricing power: The Excedrin analogy

16:06 – Why does a brand build trust and support for go-to-market

17:14 – Brand’s impact on valuation and M&A (Sourcefire story!)

18:55 – Personal brand power and founder-led storytelling

20:53 – Budgeting for brand: “Brandman” and the peanut butter cup

23:02 – Using brand for customer retention and advocacy

25:26 – ABX + brand = targeted impact

About the guest:

Jennifer Leggio is the chief strategy officer at W2 Communications and has been a longtime force in cybersecurity marketing and operations. With nearly 25 years in the game, she’s held leadership roles across the spectrum, VP of Comms, CMO, COO, and built a reputation for driving bold, strategic growth. Known for her sharp storytelling, no-fluff approach, and deep operational chops, Jen has helped scale, rebuild, and position companies for high-impact outcomes.

She’s also a frequent speaker at top industry conferences like DEF CON, RSA, and CyberMarketingCon, and pens columns for SecurityWeek that spotlight the human side of cyber business. Whether building revenue engines or challenging the status quo, Jen brings clarity, candor, and an unwavering focus on what works.

Upcoming Events:

RSAC 2025 Marketers Party

On Sunday, April 27th, join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society for the best pre-RSAC bash. Drinks, Wagyu, and all your GTM besties. 🎟 Get tickets here

CyberMarketingCon 2025 – CFP Open!

📝 CFP closes April 15th!

🔗 Links & Resources Mentioned:

Subscribe & Review:

If you loved this episode, hit that subscribe button and leave us a review! It helps us grow and bring even more incredible guests your way.

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us: podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Follow your hosts on LinkedIn:

👉 Gianna Whitver

👉 Charles Gold

Thanks for tuning in! We'll catch you next time on Cyber CMO Confidential.

The RevOps Whisperer: How Joe Aurilia Fixes the Stuff No One Wants to Touch

Wed, 02 Apr 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Plus: purple dashboards, auctioneer aspirations, and a serious stance on free sprinkles.

Timestamps:

03:02 - What even is "Operations"? Joe breaks it down.

07:55 - Being Cyware’s first U.S. hire and building from scratch.

10:10 - Automate and scale: Joe’s operational north star.

13:48 - The birth of RevOps and tackling the mess no one else wants.

18:12 - Walking through change across departments and people.

22:44 - On avoiding fiefdoms and removing blockers.

27:02 - Asana, tears of joy, and operational adoption.

30:50 - Data integrity: The holy grail of RevOps.

36:40 - Working with leadership and enabling decision-making.

41:12 - Tactical wins to streamline GTM and shorten deal cycles.

47:10 - Contracts as living documents and reducing friction.

📢 Upcoming Events:

RSAC 2025 Marketers Party

Sunday, April 27th — Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society for the best pre-RSAC bash with drinks, Wagyu, and your GTM friends. Get tickets at https://www.cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com/event/party-for-marketers-rsac-2024.

CyberMarketingCon 2025 – CFP Open!

Speak, learn, and network with 700+ marketers and GTM pros in Austin, TX. 🗓️ December 7–10, 2025 📝 CFP closes April 15th!

🔗Links & Resources Mentioned:

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating & review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow and brings you more awesome guests!

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉 Gianna Whitver

👉 Maria Velasquez

Thanks for tuning in. Remember, every Wednesday, we drop a new episode guaranteed to knock your SOCs off. 😎

How to Run B2B Social Media Without Losing Your Mind (or Creativity) with Jacqui Morgan

Wed, 26 Mar 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Running social media isn’t easy; so many expectations and trade-offs. You need to be informative yet fun, creative yet professional, and engaging yet consistent, all while keeping things fresh. Even worse, when you manage a massive cybersecurity brand, it’s about more than just posting. It’s about making an impact in a sea of corporate noise. No one does that better than Jacqui Morgan, Global Social Lead at Palo Alto Networks.

Jacqui is the force behind high-impact, creative content that breaks through the typical B2B jargon and excites people about cybersecurity. In this episode, she pulls back the curtain on how her team strikes the perfect balance between strategy and spontaneity, why less can mean more, and how to inject personality into cybersecurity marketing. We also talk about big social media wins, some not-so-great flops, and her dream career outside of tech (hint: it’s delicious).

If you’re ready to remove the boring in your B2B social strategy, this episode is for you!

Timestamps:

[05:15] Running a lean global team without losing creativity: Jacqui breaks down how her small-but-mighty team supports every part of Palo Alto Networks, balancing global regions, creative partners, and agencies while keeping their sanity.

[10:45] Less is more, cutting through the noise: How Jacqui prioritizes quality over quantity, scales back on low-impact requests, and positions the social team as strategic partners—not order takers.

[15:30] Making cybersecurity social fun: Why creativity is crucial, how her team injects personality into LinkedIn content, and their approach to standing out in a traditionally dry space.

[20:20] Agency partnerships done right: Jacqui shares how to transform agency relationships from transactional to true creative partnerships and how trust plays a key role.

[25:15] Campaign wins & lessons from flops: Hear the story of a bold, standout campaign at a significant conference, plus a candid look at a past misstep and the lessons Jacqui walked away with.

[30:40] Getting leadership buy-in: Why building internal trust and strong relationships with executives, marketers, and sales teams is key to social media success.

[35:10] Jacqui’s dream career (hint: it’s delicious): We wrap up with her fun, non-tech dream job—and it’s something you might just want to visit one day.

🔗Links & Resources Mentioned:

Palo Alto Networks on LinkedIn.
Jacqui Morgan on LinkedIn.

📢 Upcoming Events:

🚀 Join us at the RSAC 2025 Conference! Secure your spot for the ultimate Cybersecurity Marketing Society Party at RSAC. 🎉 Get tickets here.

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating & review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow and brings you more awesome guests!

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Why Founder-Led Marketing is the Future of Cybersecurity Awareness with Tatianna Harris

Wed, 19 Mar 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

In cybersecurity marketing, messaging is everything, but what happens when your audience doesn’t understand your language?

This week, we sit down with Tatianna Harris, Head of Digital Marketing at EchoMark, to discuss the nuances of building brand awareness in a category that barely exists in the market’s vocabulary. From navigating the complexities of insider risk messaging to executing a founder-led thought leadership strategy, Tatianna shares what it takes to market cybersecurity solutions while wearing every marketing hat as a solo practitioner.

Timestamps:

[03:12] - How Tatianna got her job at EchoMark through networking

[06:40] - The power of word-of-mouth in career growth

[09:55] - What EchoMark does and Tatianna’s role as a solo marketer

[14:30] - Challenges of marketing at a cybersecurity startup

[18:20] - Why EchoMark pivoted its messaging from “Forensic Watermarking” to “Invisible Watermarking”

[22:45] - How Tatianna worked with leadership to change messaging

[27:15] - Thought leadership and CEO-led marketing strategies

[32:05] - How Tatianna prioritizes her time as the only marketer

🔗Links & Resources Mentioned:

EchoMark on their Website or LinkedIn.

Follow Tatianna on LinkedIn.

📢 Upcoming Events:

🚀 Join us at RSAC 2025 Conference! Secure your spot for the ultimate Cybersecurity Marketing Society Party at RSAC. 🎉 Get tickets here.

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating & review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow and brings you more awesome guests!

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Beyond Clicks: Crafting Cybersecurity Content That Works with David J. Ebner

Wed, 12 Mar 2025 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Content isn’t just something you create and forget—it’s an asset, a living, evolving piece of your brand’s identity. According to David J. Ebner, great content isn’t about chasing trends or churning out endless articles; it’s about crafting something that stands the test of time, resonates with the right audience, and drives meaningful business outcomes.

In this episode, David, CEO and Founder of Content Workshop, discusses how companies of all sizes can fine-tune their messaging, build effective content strategies, and avoid the common mistakes that hold marketing teams back. He also discusses why content should be treated as a long-term business investment, how to navigate AI’s role in content creation, and what makes a difference in SEO and backlinking.

We also explore how cybersecurity marketers can make a real impact at RSAC 2025—from standing out in a crowded space to building trust with the right audience. Whether you’re leading a marketing team or running solo, this episode is packed with practical advice you can use immediately.

Timestamps:

05:30 Content Strategies for Small vs. Large Companies – Adjusting marketing tactics based on team size and resources.
12:45 Persona Building & Message Mapping – Understanding your audience and structuring effective messaging.
18:20 Why Calling Your Product a Solution Matters – How positioning influences buyer perception and engagement.
24:10 Content Production Challenges & Best Practices – Overcoming bottlenecks and keeping content high-quality.
30:50 The Power of Backlinking & SEO in Cybersecurity – Strengthening domain authority and search visibility.
38:15 AI’s Role in Content Marketing: Hype vs. Reality – Where AI adds value and human creativity still leads.
45:00 How to Stand Out at RSAC 2025 – Strategies to make a lasting impact at cybersecurity’s biggest event.
52:35 The Morality of Marketing & Creating Meaningful Content – Ethical considerations and why authenticity matters.

Links & Resources Mentioned:

🔗 Content Workshop: www.contentworkshop.com

🔗 Follow David J. Ebner on LinkedIn: David J. Ebner

🔗 Clutch - Professional Services Reviews: www.clutch.co

🔗 G2 - Software & Service Reviews: www.g2.com

🔗 Capterra - Software Reviews & Comparisons: www.capterra.com

🔗 RSAC 2025 Conference Information: www.rsaconference.com

🔗 Cybersecurity Marketing Society & Content Workshop Webinar on Backlinks (May 15): Register here

📢 Upcoming Events:

🚀 Join us at RSAC 2025 Conference! Secure your spot for the ultimate Cybersecurity Marketing Society Party at RSAC. 🎉 Get tickets here.

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating & review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow and brings you more awesome guests!

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

The CISO Obsession Is a Mistake—Here’s Who Makes Decisions with Parham Eftekhari

Wed, 05 Mar 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Most cybersecurity events feel the same: a packed schedule, a few familiar faces, and vendors trying to grab your attention. But does any of it build a lasting community?

Parham Eftekhari, EVP of Communities at CyberRisk Alliance (CRA), has spent years figuring out what security professionals want. CRA runs 150+ in-person events annually, but its focus isn’t just filling rooms—it’s creating connections beyond a name badge.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

🔹 The role of community-building in cybersecurity marketing.

🔹 Why mid-market cybersecurity teams need more attention.

🔹 How CISOs and their teams make buying decisions.

🔹 The shift from traditional marketing to community-led initiatives.

🔹 The upcoming expansion of CRA’s membership and what it means for vendors.

Timestamps:

[02:30] What Does an EVP of Communities Do?

Parham explains his role at CyberRisk Alliance and how CRA supports 3.2 million cybersecurity professionals.
The three key divisions of CRA are events, Connect (Media), and Communities.

[06:15] Scaling Cybersecurity Events & Summits

CRA organizes 150+ in-person events annually, plus weekly virtual events.
The strategy behind community-driven event planning—members nominate speakers & topics.
How CRA balances technical and leadership content for practitioners and executives.

[11:50] The Shift Toward Community-Led Marketing

More vendors are shifting marketing budgets to community-led initiatives over traditional events.
Why peer-driven engagement is more effective than sales-heavy webinars.
The importance of vendor partnerships in community-building.

[16:30] Why Mid-Market is a Huge Opportunity

Many vendors overlook mid-market organizations despite their cybersecurity needs.
Mid-market companies lack dedicated security teams and need more support.
How CRA is expanding membership to include companies with $50M+ revenue.

[21:00] Who Makes Cybersecurity Buying Decisions?

Myth: CISOs are the only decision-makers.
Reality: CISO direct reports & technical teams drive research, evaluation, and vendor selection.
Advice for marketers: Target the security team and the CFO, not just the CISO.

[26:40] Expanding CRA’s Membership Model

CRA’s next phase: A new membership tier for mid-senior level leaders.
The challenge of creating valuable community experiences for different leadership levels.
Why vendor-side CISOs will soon have a place in the CRA community.

[33:15] Ensuring Vendor Trust in the Community

Guardrails to prevent sales-heavy interactions in CRA’s membership model.
CRA’s commitment to non-biased content, peer-driven insights, and ethical engagement.
How CRA handles bad actors who misuse the community.

Links & Resources:

🌐 Connect with Parham Eftekari:

LinkedIn: Parham Eftekhari
Website: CyberRisk Alliance

📢 Upcoming Events:

🚀 Join us at RSAC 2025 Conference! Secure your spot for the ultimate Cybersecurity Marketing Society Party at RSAC. 🎉 Get tickets here.

🔔 Subscribe & Review:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating & review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps us grow and brings you more awesome guests!

📩 Got feedback or want to be on the show? Email us at podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

The Hidden Power of Cybersecurity Podcasts (and How to Make Yours Stand Out) with David Moulton

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

This week’s episode is about love—the love of great content, storytelling, and marketing.

Gianna and Maria sit down with David Moulton, host of the Threat Vector Podcast at Palo Alto Networks, to discuss the secrets to making a cybersecurity podcast that works. Forget boring, “salesy” content—David shares the Three E’s of Podcasting (Education, Engagement, and Entertainment) and explains why a killer podcast is one of the most powerful (yet underrated) tools in cybersecurity marketing.

But that’s not all—David also reveals his ROI formula for proving a podcast’s value (yes, there’s math, but the fun kind!), his dream career if he wasn’t in cybersecurity, and why marketing is just like chocolate—you have to savor the good stuff. 🍫

If you’re thinking about launching a podcast or proving its value to leadership, this is the episode you cannot afford to miss.

Timestamps:

[01:22] - David’s Journey Into Cybersecurity Podcasting - How David got into his role at Palo Alto Networks and his experience with internal and external podcasts.

[02:56] - The Secret to a Great Podcast: The 3 E’s - Education, Engagement, and Entertainment – A framework for successful content.

[05:35] - Creating Value for Listeners, Not Just Leads - The importance of thought leadership over hard selling.

[06:50] - Doing the Hard Things in Marketing - Why cybersecurity marketing must go beyond Google-able content.

[08:54] - The ROI of Podcasting: How to Prove It Works - Ear-minutes x $1.03 per minute – The formula for podcast attention value.

[12:14] - The Hardest Part of Running a Podcast - Balancing content strategy, editing, and distribution.

[16:01] - The Problem of Podcast “Pod Fade” - Why most podcasts fail by episode six and how to stay consistent and build momentum.

[19:47] - Getting Executive Buy-In for Podcasts - Overcoming objections to attribution challenges and how BP, universities, and Fortune 50 companies validate podcast success.

[24:12] - What You Can Learn About Your Podcast Audience - Using data from Megaphone (geo, devices, listener trends).

[26:42] - The Self-Attribution Hack for Proving Impact - Why add "How did you hear about us?" fields matter, and how does traditional attribution miss the human element?

Resources & Mentions

Threat Vector Podcast – Listen Here
The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation by Matthew Dixon and Brent Adamson is a seminal book that introduces a new approach to sales, emphasizing the importance of challenging customers' thinking to add value. You can find more details and purchase the book on Amazon or read reviews on Goodreads.

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Empowering Cybersecurity: RSAC's Expanded Vision

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

This week, we’re pulling back the curtain on one of the most significant shifts in cybersecurity events—RSAC’s bold rebrand and vision for the future. Joining us are two insiders, Ben Waring, Director of Global PR & Communications, and Jessica Porter, Senior Director of Marketing, who will reveal the strategy behind the transformation, the impact on the global security community, and what’s in store for 2025 and beyond. If you want the inside scoop on industry trends, new opportunities, and what’s next for the world’s leading cybersecurity event, this episode is a must-listen!

Timestamps:

01:26: RSAC’s rebrand: Why and what it means—RSAC is changing things up with a brand refresh that resonates with the cybersecurity community and aligns with its future goals.

03:28: Expanding RSAC beyond a conference into a year-round community – A cybersecurity conference is valuable, but what happens when the event ends?

05:29: Behind the scenes of the rebrand: Process and key decisions – A rebrand of this scale takes time, strategic planning, and a deep understanding of the community’s needs. Ben and Jessica take us through the months-long process, their challenges, and the key decisions that shaped RSAC’s new identity.

09:07: Upcoming RSAC initiatives and events – What’s next for RSAC? We explore some of the new initiatives, expanded programming, and upcoming events.

12:40: How RSAC engages vendors and cybersecurity professionals –RSAC is a large community that connects vendors, practitioners, and industry leaders. It enables exhibitors and sponsors to engage with attendees while emphasizing education and innovation.

20:45: The new “Cybersecurity Together” theme—Community is at the heart of everything RSAC does, and this new theme encapsulates its commitment to inclusivity, collaboration, and collective growth in the cybersecurity space. We discuss how this theme influences programming, partnerships, and plans.

25:13: Inspiration from other conferences and industry trends—From South by Southwest to niche industry gatherings, we discuss what RSAC has learned from other successful events and how those insights shape its future.

30:33 - Will RSAC move from San Francisco? – RSAC has called the Bay Area home for decades, but will it stay?

34:02—Big announcement: RSAC expands to the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts—Growth is key, and RSAC is physically broadening its footprint by adding space at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. What does this mean for attendees, exhibitors, and programming? We break down the impact of this exciting development.

34:53 - RSAC introduces its booth (#S-3425) – For the first time, RSAC will have a dedicated booth where attendees can learn more about the brand's evolution, upcoming events, and community initiatives. Be sure to stop by!

Resources & Links

🔗 Stay updated at OneRSAC.com

🔗 Join the RSAC community: OneRSAC.com/joinus

📍 Visit RAC's booth at the concourse between North & South Expo (#S-3425)

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

AI, LLMs & Cybersecurity: The Good, The Bad, and The Deepfakes with Dr. Andrea Isoni

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

The race to be the best in artificial intelligence (AI) is getting stronger. Open-source models are now competing with closed systems, which affects how we create new technology and keep it safe. Will open AI help us make significant discoveries quickly, or could it be too risky? How will governments, businesses, and hackers use this new technology?

In this episode, Dr. Andrea Isoni, the Chief AI Officer at AI Technologies, discusses the latest advances in AI, from computer chips and deepfakes to cybersecurity threats

Timestamps:

[02:30] - The cost and performance of new AI models vs. OpenAI

[06:45] - The LLM arms race: Open vs. Closed AI models

[12:10] - The importance of optimization in pre-training and post-training AI models

[18:00] - China's AI strategy and global AI adoption challenges

[22:40] - The battle for GPU dominance: NVIDIA, AMD, and upcoming players

[29:15] - Cybersecurity and AI: Threats and solutions

[35:20] - The impact of the EU AI Act and global AI regulations

[42:00] - Deepfakes and how AI can protect against AI-powered attacks

[48:50] - The future of AI security: Blockchain, cryptographic verification, and watermarking

Key Takeaways:

AI Optimization is Important: The next wave of large language models (LLMs) will focus on improving optimization, using synthetic data to boost efficiency.
China’s AI Game Plan: Even with all the geopolitical bumps, China is making serious strides in AI and chip manufacturing.
Cybersecurity & AI: AI-driven cyber threats like deepfakes, phishing, and AI poisoning are becoming more sophisticated, so developing AI defenses is essential now.
Regulation is Key: The EU AI Act and other global regulations will play a significant role in adopting AI and developing security measures.
The GPU Race: While NVIDIA is still the top dog, AMD and some newer brands are catching up, prioritizing cost efficiency and innovation.

Resources & Links:

State of Artificial Intelligence Report: stateofartificialintelligence.com
AI Research & Insights: AI Technologies - Click on the "AI Insights" section for more reports and analysis.
EU AI Act Overview: European Commission AI Regulations
OECD AI Incident Index: OECD AI Policy Observatory
Reality Defender (Deepfake Detection Startup): Reality Defender

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

How to Sell Security to Local Governments, Mayors, and Councils with Kush Sharma

Wed, 05 Feb 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Marketing and selling cybersecurity to local government isn't like pitching to a Fortune 500 company—it’s an entirely different game. In this episode, Kush Sharma, Director of Municipal Modernization and Partnerships at MISA Ontario, joins Gianna and Maria to pull back the curtain on how cybersecurity budgets are actually won (and lost) in the public sector.

Key highlights:

[03:45] What is MISA Ontario? – Kush explains how his organization supports municipalities in IT & cybersecurity.

[07:30] Advocating for Cybersecurity in Government – Who controls the budget, and how do you convince them?

[12:15] Selling Cyber to Mayors & Councils – Why traditional cyber risk talk doesn’t work, and how to translate it into real-world concerns.

[17:40] Marketing & Politics in Cybersecurity – Understanding political motivations and tailoring the message to different decision-makers.

[23:10] The Budget Battle – How cybersecurity leaders can secure funding (even when compliance isn’t enough).

[28:45] Cyber Threats in 2025 – Why Ransomware is still the #1 concern for municipalities.

[34:20] Startups & Government Cybersecurity – Why smaller vendors need to rethink how they sell to local government.

[40:00] Building Cybersecurity Programs at Scale – From the City of Toronto to all of Ontario, how to scale security efforts.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Knight Spectre Website
Follow Kush on LinkedIn
MISA Ontario Website

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

From Billion-Dollar Deals to AI Takeover: The 2024 Cybersecurity Recap with Mike Privette

Wed, 29 Jan 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

It’s the first episode of 2025, and we’re kicking things off with the cybersecurity economy! Gianna and Maria are joined by Mike Privette, CISO and Cybersecurity Economist at Return on Security, to chat about the key funding, acquisition, and industry trends from 2024—and what they mean for marketers and cybersecurity professionals in 2025.

From billion-dollar acquisitions to the role of AI in reshaping cybersecurity, Mike gives insights on the state of the market, the rise of resiliency, and what marketers need to know when evaluating companies and trends. Plus, a look at the promise (and pitfalls) of AI-driven security operations and the long road to IPOs in a competitive market.

Oh, and don’t miss the debate over Mike’s alternate career paths—sled dogs vs. professor!

Key highlights:

[03:10] – In 2024, the cybersecurity scene held up well! There were fewer transactions, but funds raised took off with significant acquisitions like MasterCard snagging Recorded Future for $45 billion

[07:45] –Why MasterCard decided to buy Recorded Future: This acquisition boosted MasterCard’s fraud prevention efforts and shows just how closely tied cybersecurity is to the world of fintech.

[11:22] – Consolidation and Resiliency Trends: In 2024, data protection and disaster recovery became important. With all the ransomware attacks and significant outages, businesses focused on finding solid backup and recovery solutions.

AI in Security Operations: AI isn't just trendy—it's making security operations smarter, automating tedious tasks, and training systems to test each other for more vigorous defense.

[22:38] – The Future of AI in Cyber: Mike talks about how new AI tech is helping organizations fight off threats and highlights why marketers should pay attention. From training AI to tackle adversaries to putting privacy first, it’s all about staying one step ahead.

[28:12] – Picking Your Next Move: Mike gives some insight into trending topics like data backup and AI tools for marketers when checking out job opportunities, sharing tips on what to keep an eye on in a potential employer.

[36:10] – Mike’s Alternate Reality: Would Mike be a professor or a sled dog racer? Hear the hilarious guesses and the surprising answer.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Mike Privette on LinkedIn: Connect with Mike
Return on Security: Connect on LinkedIn

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Can a $30 Mic Change Your Life? David Spark Thinks So

Wed, 22 Jan 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What does it take to launch a successful cybersecurity podcast? This week, we’re excited to chat with David Spark, the creative mind behind the CISO Series Podcast and Spark Media. David, who began his career as a stand-up comedian, has significantly impacted the cybersecurity world! He will share his journey, the valuable lessons he has learned along the way, and some excellent tips for marketing teams looking to maximize their podcasts. Podcast production goes beyond simply talking into a microphone; it's also about engaging your audience with high-quality audio and achieving the right balance between content and production value. In this episode, David shares insider tips for working with sponsors and creating quality episodes and reveals his insights on Cyber Marketing Con. Tune in for an inspiring conversation!

Key Highlights:

[03:10] – David’s Journey into Podcasting: From stand-up comedy and tech journalism to creating the CISO Series Podcast, David discusses how his background in media has shaped his approach to cybersecurity podcasting.

[08:20] – Why Audio Quality Matters: Investing in quality microphones and a proper audio setup is crucial for listener retention and credibility. David shares his favorite affordable microphone options and audio tips.

[12:45] – Sponsorship Success Secrets: Great sponsorships begin with great guests. David emphasizes featuring compelling speakers to maximize podcasts' return on investment (ROI).

[18:05] – The Long Tail of Podcasting: Podcasts offer lasting value, unlike trade shows. David explains how episodes generate engagement and leads long after their initial release.

[23:40] – Editing Magic: David discusses why every podcast’s first episode tends to be less than ideal and advises delaying public announcements until production quality is refined.

[29:55] – Cyber Marketing Con Love: David highlights why the Cyber Marketing Con is his favorite event for connecting with the community, meeting sponsors, and learning new marketing strategies.

[35:15] – New Show Announcement: David teases his latest podcast, "Security You Should Know," and shares exciting updates about hiring at the CISO Series.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

CISO Series Podcast: Listen Here

30 Microphone Recommendation: Fifine USB Microphone

CyberMarketingCon25: Learn More

Connect with David Spark: LinkedIn

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

How Palo Alto Networks is Leading with Optimism in Cybersecurity Marketing with Navneet Singh

Wed, 15 Jan 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore episode:

It's refreshing to hear, especially in the world of AI, that the human element remains crucial. "There's no such thing as B2B marketing; it's B2H: Business to Human," because ultimately, humans are the ones making the decisions, says our guest, Navneet Singh, Vice President of Marketing for the Network Security Division at Palo Alto Networks. Navneet takes us through his fascinating transition from engineering to marketing, shining a light on the importance of positivity and putting the customer first when marketing in cybersecurity. Join us to find out how Palo Alto Networks is redefining the landscape with its fresh, optimistic approach to cybersecurity marketing.

Takeaways:

Focus on the customer and their needs in cybersecurity marketing.
Convey optimism and positivity in marketing to inspire confidence in customers.
Differentiate your company by being opposite to industry norms.
Avoid using fear as a marketing tactic in cybersecurity.
Create a culture of optimism and accountability within the marketing team.

Key Episode Highlights:

[00:06 - 01:20] Announcement of Cybersecurity Marketing Society's 2024 RSAC Party for Cyber Marketers!
[01:32 - 04:23] Navneet Singh shares his career transition from engineering to marketing, emphasizing his passion for product management and marketing.
[04:27 - 07:42] The philosophical shift in cybersecurity marketing towards optimism and confidence, moving away from fear-based tactics.
[08:31 - 11:54] How Palo Alto Networks' marketing strategy is distinct, focusing on enabling businesses securely rather than instilling fear.
[12:21 - 17:39] The importance of focusing on the customer, humanizing B2B marketing, and the creative process behind the "We've Got Next" campaign.
[18:35 - 24:59] The significance of hope and education in cybersecurity, and the strategy behind avoiding fear-based marketing.
[25:29 - 31:09] How internal optimism and a positive company culture influence marketing strategies and customer interactions.
[31:14 - 35:21] Game Time: Guessing Nav's alternate career path, followed by Nav's revelation of his potential career in the armed forces if not in marketing.

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

Connect with Navneet Singh:

For more insights and discussions, connect with Nav on LinkedIn. Engage and share ideas on pushing the boundaries of cybersecurity marketing.

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of "Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing." Remember to subscribe for weekly insights and stories from the forefront of cybersecurity marketing. See you in the next episode!

What is a Phantom CISO? With Mishaal Khan.

Wed, 08 Jan 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore episode with Mishaal Khan. He's a serial entrepreneur, author, security expert, and VC sharing his journey, from growing up around computers to becoming a cybersecurity expert and author of the book "The Phantom CISO." Listen to hear insights from the security practitioner’s point of view on marketing, brand-building, and book-publishing!

Episode highlights:

[01:07] Mishaal’s early career beginnings and influences.
[06:30] The Phantom CISO - Mishaal's book and his approach to marketing it.
[16:40] How Mishaal used malware, phishing, and ransomware to market his company.
[22:07] A look behind the promotion Mishaal used for his book, from the price to self-publishing.
[24:15] The evolution of fearmongering in cybersecurity and the need for practical solutions.
[28:40] More strategies Mishaal used to promote his book

Episode Links:

The Phantom CISO

You can catch Mishaal on LinkedIn

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Wiz’s Strategic Events with Jasmin Ozeri

Wed, 01 Jan 2025 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing.

This week, we are talking about all things cybersecurity events with Jasmin Ozeri, Strategic Events Manager at Wiz. While co-host Maria Velasquez couldn't join us, host Gianna Whitver explores how Jasmin brings creativity and strategic thinking to one of the hottest cloud security companies around. With a particular focus on the RSA Conference in this episode, discover how Jasmin's approach to bustling conference floors and strategic booth designs not only enhances Wiz's brand presence but also makes cybersecurity approachable and engaging.

Highlights:

[00:00:30] Introduction to the episode and today's guest, Jasmin Ozeri.
[00:01:50] Jasmin's journey from a wedding venue childhood to a cybersecurity event strategist.
[00:06:00] Inside Wiz's innovative event strategies: From Wizard of Oz to interactive booths.
[00:11:30] Preview of Wiz's plans for RSA Conference 2024.
[00:15:00] The strategic role of events in cybersecurity marketing.
[00:20:00] What would Jasmin be doing if not in cybersecurity? A surprising career alternative.

Takeaways:

Events are more than just logistical exercises; they're pivotal for brand building and creating meaningful customer engagement.
Bringing creativity into event planning can significantly enhance the attendee experience, making your booth and brand memorable.
Strategic event management involves careful planning and execution, ensuring every aspect aligns with the company’s marketing goals.

Join Us at RSAC 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSAC 2024 on May 5th, at Novela San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

About Our Guest:

👉Follow Jasmin Ozeri on LinkedIn to keep up with her latest event strategies and insights into cybersecurity marketing.
👉Learn more about Wiz on their LinkedIn or website to see how they are revolutionizing cloud security (and RSAC booths!).

Connect with Our Hosts on LinkedIn:

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

Inside the Mind of a CISO with Joe Evangelisto.

Wed, 25 Dec 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing.

In today's episode, Gianna and Maria are joined by a seasoned CISO from NetSPI, Joe Evangelisto. Joe shares his insights into the cybersecurity industry's challenges AND his passion for baking! Stay tuned to hear what organizations he recommends for support for CISOs, how to use content switching to your advantage, and how security events can better serve small firms, per his viral post about Black Hat.

Episode Highlights:

[01:05] Joe expresses excitement and gratitude for joining NetSPI and leading the talented security team.
[03:01] Joe’s viral LinkedIn post about his decision not to attend Black Hat, and the unique challenges faced by SMB CISOs compared to those at larger enterprises.
[08:15] Content Switching: Joe shares his experience balancing different responsibilities as a CISO at a smaller organization and balancing all his priorities while wearing different hats.
[13:30] Why it's important to build strong internal relationships across the departments.
[17:38] Joe recommends the supportive community of CISOs in his area with organizations like ISSA, ISC², and more!

Reach out to Joe on LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

The Keys to Successful Cybersecurity Products with Nicholas Muy and guest co-host Ross Haleliuk

Wed, 18 Dec 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Markeing.

As the podcast that keeps things fresh, this week our co-hosts Gianna Whitver and Maria Velasquez are handing over the reins to a guest host who is quite well-known: the author of the viral cyber bestseller Cyber for Builders, Ross Haleliuk! Ross is joined by the Chief Security Officer (CSO/CISO) at Scrut Automation, Nicholas Muy. Together they explore the intricacies of building cybersecurity products that truly matter. The episode dives into the challenges and strategies of product development in the cybersecurity industry, emphasizing the importance of genuine user feedback, real-world experience, and building trust within the community.

Key Takeaways:

[03:30] - Nick shares his background and current role at Scrut Automation
[05:15] - Common mistakes founders make in cybersecurity product development
[08:45] - The importance of engaging with the cybersecurity community
[12:30] - How to balance customer feedback with a founder’s vision
[16:00] - Real-world examples from Nick's experience as an investor and advisor
[20:15] - Practical advice for startup employees in evaluating early-stage startups

Guest hosts are new for us and we would appreciate your feedback, email your thoughts: podcasts@breakingthroughincybersecuritymarketing.com.

Get to know our guest host and guest:

👉Reach out to Ross on LinkedIn.

👉Get your copy of Cyber for Builders on Amazon.

👉Connect with Nick Muy: LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our main show hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Cyber Social Media Strategies with Matt Mullan

Wed, 11 Dec 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing.

"Social media in cybersecurity is like walking a tightrope; you're balancing between being serious and injecting just the right amount of light-heartedness to crack a smile. That's how you get people to listen." - Matt Mullan

This week, we're diving deep into the world of social media with none other than Matt Mullan, the Senior Social Media Manager at Illumio, a pioneering zero-trust segmentation company. Matt brings a treasure trove of insights from his journey—from starting in sales to mastering the art of social media in our complicated, technical, and fast-paced industry. Today, he's set to peel back the layers of the unique challenges and opportunities that come with marketing in the cybersecurity industry, drawing contrasts with his diverse experiences in sectors as varied as toy manufacturing and HR/payroll software. Prepare to learn from one of the best in navigating the complex currents of social media in the cybersecurity sector!

Highlight Reel:

[01:04] - Matt shares his professional background and transition into cybersecurity from sales and social media.
[03:56] - Discussing the unique challenges and opportunities in cybersecurity marketing.
[04:18] - Insights into engaging cybersecurity communities and leveraging humor in social media strategies.
[06:26] - The effectiveness and strategy behind using memes and light-hearted content to drive engagement.
[08:11] - The role of influencer marketing in cybersecurity and the potential shift towards micro-influencers.
[10:41] - Exploring social media's impact on brand awareness and lead generation within the cybersecurity sector.
[12:57] - The importance of diversifying social media strategies and not relying solely on one platform.
[17:29] - The concept of 'thought leadership' and its role in successful social media marketing.
[20:14] - The future of influencer marketing in cybersecurity and its challenges.

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Remember to subscribe for weekly insights and stories from the forefront of cybersecurity marketing. See you in the next episode!

Head of Marketing Perspective: Bridging Strategy & Tactics at CyberInt with Danny Miller

Wed, 04 Dec 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What does it mean to be an impactful marketer in cybersecurity? Danny Miller, VP of Marketing at CyberInt, joins us in this CyberCMO Confidential segment episode to share how he drives success at a company redefining external threat intelligence. From strategy meetings with the CEO to packing custom swag kits, Danny takes us through the day-to-day life as the marketing leader at a growing cybersecurity startup.

Discover how CyberInt’s unique focus on actionable intelligence influences its culture and customer relationships, the art of balancing strategic priorities with hands-on work, and the challenges of scaling a team while staying involved. Plus, hear Danny’s thoughts on aligning with sales, creating seamless customer journeys, and why sometimes it’s okay to let go—even if you’re a little bit of a control freak.

Key Highlights:

[02:00] - Making Intelligence: Danny explains how CyberInt goes beyond data to deliver actionable insights that impact cybersecurity teams.

[05:15] - Meet the Team: A behind-the-scenes look at CyberInt’s global marketing squad—10 pros balancing demand gen, product marketing, and BDR operations.

[08:40] - A CMO’s Day in the Trenches: From boardroom strategy to packing elaborate swag kits, Danny’s day is anything but boring.

[15:20] - The Art of Letting Go: Danny shares how he’s learning to delegate while keeping his personal touch on the work that matters most.

[20:35] - Keeping Execs in the Loop: Danny uses reports, OKRs, and transparency to align with the CEO and leadership team.

[28:00] - From Lead to Loyalty: The challenge of creating a seamless customer experience across marketing, sales, and beyond—and why it’s worth the effort.

[35:50] - Lessons in Staying the Course: The best advice Danny ignored and how it shaped his perspective on perseverance and growth.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Learn more about CyberInt: cyberint.com

Send your comments, questions, or topic suggestions to podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, CyberMarketingCon is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Charles Gold

See you in the next episode!

Mastering Marketing Ops with Rob Young.

Wed, 27 Nov 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Please enjoy this encore episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing:

Ready to shake up your approach to cybersecurity marketing? In this episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, Gianna and Maria bring on Rob Young, the amazing VP of Marketing at Cypago. Rob doesn't just talk strategy—he’s lived it, from the fast-paced world of startups to leading massive organizations. Tune in as he shares game-changing insights, the secrets behind his biggest wins, and why your marketing efforts need a serious upgrade. If you’re tired of the same old advice, this episode is your wake-up call.

[14:50] - Transition into Cybersecurity Marketing

Rob's early experience in the startup world began with the AI-platform, Astound, where he focused on building teams, and developing and executing strategies in a fast-paced environment. There are differences between marketing in startups, which requires quick decision-making and hands-on work, versus large companies, where processes are slower and more structured.

[20:25] - Advice for Marketing Leaders

Rob shares insights on staying agile in large organizations by building strong relationships across departments to speed up processes.

[25:45] - Setting Up a Marketing Org from Scratch

When Rob joins a new company, he focuses on messaging, positioning, and product marketing. He stresses the importance of aligning sales and marketing to ensure a clear and compelling value proposition for customers.

[30:15] - The Importance of Marketing Ops

Rob's first hire at Astound was in marketing ops due to its role in tracking data and optimizing strategies. Having a core team that includes marketing ops, digital marketing, and product marketing helps in driving the company's marketing effort.

[39:40] - Low-Hanging Fruit in a New Marketing Role

Optimizing website content, implementing effective digital strategies, and steering clear of outdated marketing tactics are important quick wins in a new marketing role. Rob discusses the more challenging wins he focuses on, like managing leads and making sure they align with the ideal customer profile (ICP).

[45:35] - The Changing Landscape of Sales and Marketing

Rob talks about the shift from high-volume to more targeted marketing, which has led to a reduced role for SDRs. He explores how to balance noise and signal in lead generation and shares his perspective on evolving trends in marketing strategies.

About our guests:

👉Follow Rob on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Cypago.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

The PGA’s Digital Swing: Passwordless, Cloud-Based, and Ready for Anything with Kevin J. Scott.

Wed, 20 Nov 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

This week, we sit down with Kevin J. Scott, the unconventional CTO/CIO and AI Engineer of the PGA of America, who brings a fresh perspective to technology in the golf industry. Kevin discusses how he has transformed the PGA's IT infrastructure from traditional methods to an entirely cloud-based, passwordless environment—eliminating the need for Active Directory and VPNs, resulting in smooth and secure user access. Additionally, he is rethinking cybersecurity partnerships, offering Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) the opportunity to take on tech roles and gain brand exposure at major PGA events. This episode is where technology, innovation, and the magic of golf come together!

Key Highlights:

[02:30] – PGA of America: More Than Just Tournaments

Kevin talks about the PGA of America’s unique role, which supports 30,000 golf pros and fosters career growth, distinct from the PGA Tour’s event focus.

[04:15] – The Tech Trio: Product, Design, and Code

Kevin’s team at PGA combines product managers, designers, and software engineers to create tailored tech solutions that fit the organization’s mission.

[06:50] – Cybersecurity Reinvented

A ransomware incident set off a cybersecurity overhaul, pushing PGA of America to the cloud and adopting a “no corporate network” policy with MFA, SSO, and zero-trust.

[10:30] – Goodbye, MFA Fatigue

To simplify security, Kevin’s team employs Okta’s Verify app and plans for passwordless login, making access smooth and secure for users without overwhelming them.

[15:10] – Future-Proofing Identity

Kevin discusses the shift toward biometrics and Face ID, highlighting how these tools simplify secure access for everyone—even non-techies.

[21:00] – A Game-Changing RFP

In a first for PGA, Kevin reveals an MSSP RFP that mixes security with a brand partnership, offering vendors visibility at PGA events.

[33:00] – AI: The RFP Sidekick

With 150 RFP responses, Kevin’s team uses AI to quickly sort and answer 900+ questions, proving how AI transforms workflows.

[39:50] – Custom Marketing for Tech Partners

Kevin’s team is crafting unique marketing packages for RFP finalists, ensuring authentic and mutually beneficial partnerships.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Listeners, please send your questions or thoughts to podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com — we’d love to hear from you!

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Culture, Credibility, and Collaboration: Thomas Bain’s Playbook for CMO Success

Wed, 13 Nov 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

"It’s not all numbers and dashboards—sometimes, CMO success boils down to building trust and a team that clicks." This week on Cyber CMO Confidential, we’ve got Thomas Bain, the CMO of VulnCheck, joining us to reveal the keys to leading in cybersecurity marketing. Tom shares how he builds credibility with technical teams, aligns with sales without losing autonomy, and cultivates a company culture that drives actual results. Hosts Gianna Whitver and Charles Gold dig into the art (and science) of connecting across departments, understanding team dynamics, and confidently navigating rapid growth.

Tom explains why CMOs should focus on continuous learning and shares what he seeks in a company’s leadership before joining. This is THE episode for anyone hoping to excel in the leadership aspect of marketing.

Key Highlights:

[02:30] – The importance of company culture: Why communication and transparency are essential for building a productive workplace.

[05:15] – Aligning with engineers and technical teams: Building credibility when marketing meets cybersecurity expertise.

[10:40] – The impact of culture on recruitment: Finding the suitable hires and aligning them with company goals.

[15:25] – Balancing sales and marketing needs: More strategies for smooth collaboration and avoiding the blame game.

[20:30] – Building a trusted CMO-Sales relationship: How to stay aligned with sales leadership in a fast-paced environment.

[25:10] – The high stakes of hiring in small teams: Tom’s tips for spotting cultural alignment during the interview process.

[35:50] – Why continuous learning matters for CMOs: Tom advises staying relevant and growing as a marketing leader.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

VulnCheck – Learn more about Tom Bain’s work and VolnCheck's cybersecurity solutions.

Listeners, please send your questions or thoughts to podcast@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com — we’d love to hear from you!

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

👉Charles Gold

See you in the next episode!

From ‘Meh’ to Mastery: Steve Piper on ABM Strategies that Work.

Wed, 06 Nov 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Are you looking for an edge in cybersecurity marketing? Steve Piper, CEO of CyberEdge Group, is here to help! As the head of the largest research and marketing firm dedicated to cybersecurity, Steve knows the art and science of turning leads into wins. In this episode, he’s spilling secrets on building the perfect target account list, the magic of message mapping, and what many marketers get wrong about content syndication (spoiler: it’s way easier than you think). Steve shares strategies on target account lists, segmentation, content alignment, and multi-channel engagement. Discover differences between “one-touch” and “nurtured” leads, why content syndication matters, and five ways to supercharge your ABM program.

Key Highlights:

[02:00] - Intro to CyberEdge Group: How Steve Piper grew CyberEdge into a leader in cybersecurity marketing with 50+ services.

[06:50] - Why ABM Is Challenging: Common ABM struggles, from nurturing expectations to the complexity of multi-stakeholder targeting.

[10:20] - Five Ways to Supercharge ABM: Steve’s expert tips, starting with target account list optimization.

[15:00] - Content Strategy for ABM: Using message maps and segment-specific content to drive engagement.

[18:45] - Channel Mix & Experimentation: How CyberEdge uses webinars, content syndication, and multi-touch nurturing in ABM.

[22:30] - Nurturing "One-Touch" Leads: The importance of qualifying leads and when to contact sales-ready leads.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

CyberEdge Group – Learn more about CyberEdge's services for cybersecurity marketers.

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

CMO Carole Winqwist on Growth, AI, and Global Marketing Success

Wed, 30 Oct 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Being a CMO isn't just about crunching numbers or throwing creative campaigns at the wall to see what sticks. It’s more like steering a high-speed ship through uncharted waters—where every turn demands equal parts strategy, innovation, and intuition. In CyberCMO Confidential, hosted by the always-sharp Charles Gold, we dive into the behind-the-scenes world of marketing leadership, where every decision is a mix of art and data.

In this month’s episode, Charles chats with Carole Winqwist, GitGuardian's CMO, about growing her team from 3 to 23, balancing the quirks of U.S. and French work cultures, and how AI is transforming the day-to-day. Get ready for an insightful discussion from two marketing pros about strategy, innovation, and 100% real talk.

Key Highlights:

[01:00] – Carole’s career journey to becoming CMO and her approach to picking her title at GitGuardian.
[03:00] – Building a marketing team from 3 to 23 people: addressing the challenges of scaling a team and supporting both the French and U.S. markets
.[06:40] – Managing cross-cultural teams and the differences between U.S. and French work environments, especially around job security and loyalty.
[04:00] – The most significant challenges of B2B marketing: long sales cycles and measuring marketing impact.
[20:00] – How GitGuardian’s marketing team leverages AI tools like ChatGPT to accelerate content creation and maintain high quality.
[25:00] – Navigating marketing and sales alignment while maintaining autonomy and avoiding being an "order-taker."
[15:10] – The role of BDRs in the marketing team and why having them close to content creation makes all the difference.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

GitGuardian – Learn more about GitGuardian and their cutting-edge security solutions here.

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

The Art of Tech Podcasting: Insights from IT Pro’s Podcasters Rory Bathgate and Jane McCallion

Wed, 23 Oct 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

Today’s episode feels like a stroll through a cute British seaside town—full of charm, surprises, and a little podcast mischief! We’re joined by the voices behind the IT Pro Podcast—Rory Bathgate, Features & Multimedia Editor, and Jane McCallion, Managing Editor, to chat about all things tech, journalism, and podcasting. These two aren’t just tech experts; they have that unique podcaster vibe that makes every story more interesting.

Rory and Jane will discuss the intersection of technology and journalism, discussing how tech affects reporting and content creation. They touch on the challenges and benefits of podcasting, including audience engagement and the technical side of producing episodes. The conversation also covers social media’s role in news dissemination and the importance of podcasts in educating listeners on tech advancements. They also share their perspectives on new technologies like AI and cybersecurity, especially the need for ethical journalism in tech.

This episode isn’t just for tech enthusiasts and storytellers—it’s also a great listen for anyone considering starting a podcast. You'll get everything from behind-the-scenes laughs to insights on tech reporting—with that signature British cheekiness and humor.

Episode Highlights:

[03:10] - Kick things off with Rory and Jane as they talk about their roles at IT Pro and spill the beans on crafting a killer B2B tech podcast.
[07:30] - Find out how the IT Pro Podcast found its unique voice amidst the whirlwind pace of tech journalism.
[12:45] - Join us live from the field! Rory and Jane chat about how recording at live events adds a new flavor to podcasting.
[18:15] - Seek behind the curtain with IT Pro Podcast: the laughs, the flubs, and those oh-so-fun tech snafus (yup, including their adventures in a makeshift soundproof studio!).
[25:20] - It's all about community: Hear how listeners shape the podcast and snag some tips on keeping everyone hooked.
[32:40] - Dive into why deep, rich conversations in tech matter and why some stories hit differently on a podcast than in print.
[40:50] - Pro tip alert! Find out what catches our eye when choosing podcast guests and how to pitch a story that'll click with our vibe.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Connect with Our Guests:

Rory Bathgate - LinkedIn
Jane McCallion - LinkedIn

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, Cyber Marketing Con is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Remember to hit the subscribe button so you never miss an episode! If you enjoyed today’s show, leave us a five-star review and share it with your friends in the cybersecurity world.

Two Podcasters & Endless OSINT Gold with Aubrey Byron and Shannon Ragan

Wed, 16 Oct 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Summary:

What happens when two podcasters sit down… on another podcast? We’re so excited to be joined by an amazing duo—Aubrey Byron, Content Marketing Manager, and Shannon Ragan, Director of Content Marketing at Authentic8. They are also co-hosts from the Needlestack Podcast. These two content marketing powerhouses take us behind the scenes of building a successful podcast that uncovers the secrets of open-source intelligence (OSINT), sharing stories of landing big-name guests, and why the world of government marketing is like navigating through an “iron curtain.” And just when you think you’ve heard it all, Shannon drops an unexpected bombshell about her future plans! Tune in for all the tips, creative inspiration, and of course, a dash of the unexpected.

Key Highlights:

[02:15] - The journey of launching the Needlestack Podcast and how it pivoted from a live show to guest-driven interviews.

[03:50] - How cold DMing experts like Jack Rhysider from Darknet Diaries became a winning strategy for landing influential guests.

[07:15] - Why balancing tactical content with compelling storytelling keeps their audience engaged.

[10:49] - How OSINT’s constant evolution drives both interest and demand for the latest tools.

[13:32] - The role short-form video and organic social play in extending podcast reach.

[19:39] - Breaking into government and federal sectors through content, despite the iron curtain of limited data.

[28:02] - A deep dive into podcast production: sourcing guests, prep interviews, editing, and repurposing content.

[42:43] - A surprising twist—Shannon announces her sabbatical to finish her historical fiction book!

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Needlestack Podcast - Each week, NeedleStack co-hosts interview professional open-source researchers who discuss tips to hone your skills, improve tradecraft and protect yourself as you search the surface, deep and dark web. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Jack Reisider, Darknet Diaries - Your Conversation Studio to record in high quality, edit in a flash, and go live with a bang. Not necessarily in that order.

David Oltien (SEO Expert): Join David Oltien, Sr. Web Marketing Manager at Anomali, for Crawl, Walk, Run: leveling up your SEO skill set – an in-depth workshop designed for content and digital marketers who know the basics of SEO and want to master enterprise SEO strategies and technical SEO. 📅 Get your tickets now: www.cybermarketingconference.com!

Riverside Recording Platform: Riverside.fm

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, Cyber Marketing Con is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually too. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

9 Exits and Counting: CMO Varun Kohli’s Framework for Success (and for Getting on the Today Show!)

Wed, 09 Oct 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Overview:

Let's hear the audience clap for our next guest! Ever wonder how a cybersecurity CMO gets featured on shows like the Today Show? Varun Kohli, CMO of Cequence Security, shares exactly how he did it. But it's not just about the applause. Kohli dives deep into how combining data with storytelling helped him achieve success across nine exits in his career. He also introduces his strategic "IMPP" framework—focusing on Investors, Market Size, People, and Product—which has been key to his impressive track record. This episode is packed with real marketing tips and lessons every cybersecurity marketer can learn from.

Episode Highlights/Timestamps:

[02:15] - IMPP Framework for Success

Varun shares his secret to navigating nine successful exits: his IMPP framework, focusing on Investors, Market, People, and Product.

[07:30] - AI’s Impact on Cybersecurity

Varun discusses why AI is shaking up cybersecurity and where the real opportunities lie.

[13:05] - How Storytelling Landed Varun on the Today Show

Hear how a powerful story and strategic data got Varun’s company on national TV, driving huge results.

[19:45] - Combining Data and Storytelling

Discover why Varun believes data and storytelling are inseparable for effective marketing.

[22:30] - Focusing on Your Brand, Not the Competition

Varun explains why chasing competitors is a mistake and how to stay focused on building your own brand.

[30:15] - Traditional Ads Still Work

From billboards to media ads, Varun talks about why traditional marketing can still be a game-changer in B2B.

About our guests:

👉Follow Varun on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Cequence Security.

Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode

👉7 Uses of ChatGPT & Generative AI for Marketing by Varun Kohli

👉Today Show Segment with SkyCure – Watch how Varun got SkyCure onto the Today Show.

👉Mastering Marketing Mayhem with Pam Cobb – Get ready for a wild ride through Pam’s journey of managing chaos while growing a brand.

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, Cyber Marketing Con is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually too. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Taylor Swift. Cookware. Threat Research & Marketing.

Wed, 02 Oct 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Episode Overview:

What do Taylor Swift and Telegram have in common? Surprisingly, they are both prime targets for today’s most sophisticated scammers. In this episode, we chat with Nati Tal, Head of Guardio Labs and Sharon Blatt Cohen, Head of Marketing Communications from Guardio, who reveal how deep-fake ads featuring Taylor Swift are used to sell fake cookware, and how they went undercover on Telegram to discover just how easy it is to launch a full-scale phishing scam in less than a day. From pop culture to cutting-edge cybersecurity, this episode takes you behind the scenes of the dark world of online threats and shows how Guardio is staying one step ahead of scammers...and marketing that fact! Buckle up—this one’s a wild ride!

Episode Highlights:

[00:04:10] - What is Guardio?

Guardio focuses on protecting consumers and small businesses from online threats. Their browser extension and mobile apps help block scam emails, phishing links, and keep your information safe online.

[00:09:00] - Guardio Labs and Threat Hunting

Nati explains how Guardio Labs's research helps improve Guardio’s tools and keeps users safe from new types of attacks.

[00:15:45] - Marketing Meets Security

Sharon shares how marketing and security teams work together, using trending topics like Taylor Swift scams to create engaging campaigns that showcase Guardio’s ability to block threats.

[00:25:30] - Organic Media Attention

Their Taylor Swift scam campaign was so timely it got picked up by the media, showing how good content and research can naturally spread and get press attention.

[00:32:45] - Telegram Scams and Fake Campaigns

Nati talks about setting up a fake scam on Telegram to learn how hackers operate. They found out how easy and cheap it is to set up scams, highlighting why cybersecurity is so important.

[00:41:10] - Staying Ahead of Scammers

Sharon explains how fast scammers jump on trends and how Guardio stays one step ahead to protect people before scams can cause harm.

About our guests:

👉Follow:

Sharon on LinkedIn.

Check out Nati LinkedIn.

👉Learn more Guardio.

Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Guardio - Learn more about Guardio’s cybersecurity solutions for consumers and small businesses, including their web extension and mobile apps. Visit Guardio.

Guardio Labs - Explore Guardio Labs' security research and threat hunting to stay ahead of emerging online threats. Learn about Guardio Labs.

Taylor Swift Scam Report - Read more about how deepfake ads featuring celebrities like Taylor Swift were used in online scams, part of Guardio's research. Read more about the research here.

Guardio on TikTok - Follow Guardio’s TikTok for fun, educational videos about online scams and cybersecurity tips. Guardio TikTok.

Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing Podcast Instagram - We’ve launched an Instagram account, follow the podcast on Instagram for updates and behind-the-scenes content.

Cyber M Society on Instagram.

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, Cyber Marketing Con is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually too. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

CISO-Led Content & Marketing-Generated Leads with Lauren Koppelman

Wed, 25 Sep 2024 05:00:00 -0000

We’ve got one of the coolest marketers in cybersecurity joining us this week—Lauren Koppelman, Senior Global Campaign Manager at Fortinet after a recent acquisition. Lauren will be taking us behind the scenes of the popular video series CISO on the Street and sharing the creative, data-driven strategies that fuel her success. From how niche Linux security content helped drive high-quality leads to how her cold lead nurture campaign re-engaged enterprise accounts, Lauren breaks down the tactics that work. She also shares how she refined keyword strategies to avoid bad-fit leads and crafted emails that grab the attention of even the most skeptical cybersecurity pros. This episode is packed with practical tips for any marketer looking to stand out in the cybersecurity world!

Episode Highlights:

[01:45] - How CISO on the Street Started

Lauren talks about how she came up with the idea for CISO on the Street at RSA and turned it into a video series. “Why not turn these casual conversations into a video series?” The spur-of-the-moment idea turned into a key piece of content marketing.

[06:40] - Niche Content Drives Leads

Lauren explains how she found that Linux security content was driving great leads and what she did to promote that content.

[11:50] - Cold Lead Nurture Campaign Success

Lauren shares how a cold lead nurture campaign she developed brought enterprise-level accounts back to life, even while she was on vacation.

[17:00] - Fixing Key-word Issues

Lauren explains how the keyword “HIPAA” ended up attracting the wrong audience—like people who were Googling what HIPAA was while at their doctor’s office. She realized that attracting doctors’ waiting room visitors wasn’t the goal, and had to refine the strategy.

[23:00] - Tips for Writing Effective Emails

Lauren offers advice on writing emails for cybersecurity professionals, keeping them clear, simple, and direct.

About our guests:

👉Follow Lauren on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Fortinet.

Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Watch CISO on the Street Video Series here!

Join us at Cyber MarketingCon2024!

(December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, Cyber Marketing Con is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually too. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Cybersecurity Marketing, Paris Edition with Oscar Burns.

Wed, 18 Sep 2024 05:00:00 -0000

What do breaking up high school brawls, surviving French citizenship tests, and marketing cybersecurity across Europe have in common? They’re all part of the hilarious and unexpected journey of today’s guest, Oscar Burns! Oscar, the Senior Field Marketing Manager at GitGuardian, joins us from France to spill the beans on his unconventional path from teaching in London to navigating the complexities of cybersecurity marketing in Europe.

From dealing with language barriers, cultural differences, and figuring out how to make marketing magic happen at Europe’s biggest cybersecurity events, Oscar brings a fresh perspective—packed with humor. Whether you’re curious about the differences between U.S. and European markets, or you’re just here for the stories about $48 sandwiches in Monaco, this episode has something for you!

[2:00] - Oscar’s Background: From Teaching to Tech

Oscar shares his early career as a teacher in London and how a funny incident led him to switch careers, eventually moving to France for a business internship.

[6:30] - Moving into Marketing from Sales

After several years in sales at Powell Software, Oscar became interested in marketing. He recalls creating the company’s origin story as his first marketing task.

[9:30] - Transition to Cybersecurity and Joining GitGuardian

Oscar discusses his move into cybersecurity marketing at GitGuardian, where he currently works in field marketing, focused on code security solutions.

[13:00] - Working in Cybersecurity in Europe vs. the U.S.

Gianna and Oscar compare cybersecurity marketing in Europe and the U.S., noting differences in event size, budget, and business opportunities.

[16:45] - Event Marketing in Europe

Oscar explains how European companies approach events like Infosecurity Europe versus larger U.S. events like RSA Conference, with a focus on return on investment.

[18:30] - Les Assises in Monaco: The Premier European Cyber Event

Discussion of Les Assises, a high-end, CISO-only cybersecurity event in Monaco. Oscar highlights the exclusivity and success of the event for companies.

[24:00] - Living and Working in Europe as an American

Oscar shares practical tips on working in Europe, including the reality of lower salaries, cultural differences, and the perks of European work-life balance.

About our guests:

👉Follow Oscar on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about GitGuardian.

Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Cyber Marketing Con 2024 (December 8-11, 2024) – A Conference for Cybersecurity Marketers

If you’re serious about leveling up your marketing game in the cybersecurity industry, Cyber Marketing Con is a must-attend! Connect with top minds in the field, learn cutting-edge strategies, and swap ideas with fellow marketers who understand the unique challenges of our industry. The event is happening in Philadelphia, but you can join virtually too. Don’t wait—get your ticket before prices go up! Grab Your Ticket Here!

Funniest Past Episodes Mentioned:

Want more laughs and insights? Check out these fan-favorite episodes we mentioned:

Mastering Marketing Mayhem with Pam Cobb – Get ready for a wild ride through Pam’s journey of managing chaos while growing a brand.
Art of Cyber Defense: Insights from a Theatrical-Minded CISO with Kayne McGladrey – Dive into the intersection of creativity and cybersecurity with Kayne, and discover how theater and cybersecurity aren’t so different after all.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Inside the Varonis Rebrand with Courtney Bernard

Wed, 11 Sep 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Thinking about rebranding your company but not sure where to start? Or maybe you’re wondering how to make your brand stand out in a crowded market like cybersecurity? Today’s we’re taking you behind the scenes of a major rebrand with one of the industry’s top players: Varonis!

We’re joined by Courtney Bernard, the Brand and Creative Director at Varonis, who recently led the company through a successful rebranding journey. We’ll be discussing everything from why Varonis knew it was time for a rebrand, to how they tackled common cybersecurity branding tropes, and how they ensured every aspect of their new identity resonates with their mission to protect data.

If a rebrand is on your horizon, or you’re just curious about what it takes to pull one in cybersecurity, this episode is packed with tips, lessons, and inspiration.

[01:25] - What’s Happening at Varonis?

Get the inside scoop on Varonis’ brand and creative team from Courtney. From the website to videos, the Varonis team touches everything that represents the company visually.

[03:30] - The Varonis Marketing Team: Bigger and Better

Varonis’ marketing team has grown a lot in the past five years—now over 60 strong! The brand and creative crew is right in the mix, working directly with the CMO, showing how important creativity is to the company’s strategy.

[05:00] - Keeping the Varonis Vibe Alive

With all that growth, how does Varonis keep the good vibes going? Courtney shares insights on how open communication, clear goals, and a strong sense of mission keep the team connected and energized.

[07:50] - How Branding Drives Varonis’ Success

The conversation shifts to how Varonis ensures that its brand initiatives align with their overall marketing goals. Courtney explains the challenge of measuring brand impact in cybersecurity and how the team balances qualitative and quantitative goals to ensure their efforts contribute to Varonis' overall business objectives.

[11:10] - The Big Decision: Why Varonis Rebranded

Why did Varonis decide to rebrand? It was driven by the company’s evolution in product offerings and market positioning. Courtney and the hosts talk about the extensive process that went into the rebrand, highlighting the importance of ensuring that the new brand identity accurately reflects Varonis' growth.

[14:30] - Tackling Design Headaches

Before the rebrand, Varonis faced several design challenges, including a limited color palette and inconsistent imagery. Courtney explains how the rebrand addressed these issues to create a more cohesive and versatile visual identity.

[17:05] - Crafting the New Varonis Identity

Courtney emphasizes the importance of defining a clear brand persona and voice as the foundation for Varonis' rebrand. Using the brand archetype model, Varonis positioned itself as a "Hero" brand with elements of innovation, ensuring that its visual and verbal identity aligns with its mission to protect data.

[21:00] - Rolling Out the Rebrand: Who Was in the Loop?

Rebranding isn’t just a one-person job. Varonis started with a small team and then expanded to get feedback from sales, product, and leadership. The goal? To make sure everyone was on board and excited about the new direction.

About our guests:

👉Follow Courtney on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Varonis.

👉Read more about the strategy behind Varonis' rebrand that involved a full transition to a hero archetype and the introduction of Protector 22814 here!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Timing, Tenacity, and Triumph in Al Lakhani's Startup Journey

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Failure is part of being human—it’s what you do next that really matters. Do you give up, feel stagnant, or do you push forward like Al Lakhani, the founder of IDEE? In this episode Al brings a blend of humor and honesty, sharing his self-described "PhD in failure" as he takes us on the rollercoaster ride of building a cybersecurity company from the ground up. With stories of exhilarating highs, unexpected setbacks, and the crucial role of timing, Al’s journey is filled with valuable lessons and lots of laughter. Whether you’re looking for actionable insights to apply to your own startup or just want to hear how someone turned failure into success, this episode has it all!

[05:00] - Al’s Rollercoaster Ride

Al shares the ups and downs of starting IDEE. From trying out ideas that flopped to finally finding success with the B2B approach.

[12:40] - Timing is Everything

Al explains why hitting the right timing in startups is like catching a wave—it's all about being in the right place at the right time, with a sprinkle of luck.

[15:10] - Cracking the Marketing Code

The hosts and Al get into what’s working (and what’s not) in IDEE’s marketing game. Al reveals that live demos have been successful, but getting people to check them out has been tricky.

[20:00] - Picking the Right Partners

Al talks about the importance of choosing the right partners to work with and how giving away free samples (NFR licenses) helps get their buy-in and feedback.

[27:45] - The Changing Customer Journey

Maria and Gianna chat about how customers do most of their research before even talking to a vendor, and Al shares his view on how the customer journey has shifted since COVID.

About our guests:

👉Follow Al on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about IDEE.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Mastering Marketing Ops with Rob Young.

Wed, 28 Aug 2024 10:47:00 -0000

[14:50] - Transition into Cybersecurity Marketing

[20:25] - Advice for Marketing Leaders

Rob shares insights on staying agile in large organizations by building strong relationships across departments to speed up processes.

[25:45] - Setting Up a Marketing Org from Scratch

[30:15] - The Importance of Marketing Ops

[39:40] - Low-Hanging Fruit in a New Marketing Role

[45:35] - The Changing Landscape of Sales and Marketing

About our guests:

👉Follow Rob on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Cypago.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Cyber CMO Confidential

Wed, 21 Aug 2024 05:00:00 -0000

We're excited to unveil our new segment, Cyber CMO Confidential, with Charles Gold, Chief Marketing Officer at ThreatConnect. This segment offers an inside look at the world of cybersecurity CMOs, featuring candid interviews with industry leaders who share their unique perspectives and insights. The co hosts and Charles dig into the challenges CMOs face in the fast-paced cybersecurity landscape and dissect the strategic decisions that drive success. Whether you're a new marketer or an aspiring CMO, Cyber CMO Confidential will provide inside knowledge straight from the experts. Tune in and discover what’s really happening in the C-suite!

[02:30] Introducing Cyber CMO Confidential:

Charles introduces the new segment, which will offer insights into the world of CMOs by interviewing industry leaders. The segment will explore the unique perspectives CMOs bring to the C-suite and the marketing challenges they encounter.

[06:00] The Importance of Understanding the CMO Role:

Maria and Charles explain how the segment will help marketers better understand and empathize with the CMO role, offering tips for managing and communicating effectively with CMOs.

[09:00] ThreatConnect’s Acquisition of Polarity:

Charles discusses ThreatConnect's recent acquisition of Polarity, highlighting its strategic value. He provides insights into the integration process and emphasizes the importance of cultural fit between the two companies.

[14:30] Managing the Integration as a CMO:

Why CMOs often play a key role in company integrations and how it aligns with their responsibilities as executive team members.

[18:00] Lessons Learned from Mergers and Acquisitions:

Charles discusses the challenges of sustaining momentum and ensuring successful integration post-acquisition. He shares his experiences and offers tips for maintaining team morale and alignment.

Key Takeaways

New Segment Launch: Cyber CMO Confidential will provide a unique look into the minds of CMOs, offering valuable insights for marketers at all levels.
Role of CMOs in Integrations: CMOs often wear multiple hats, contributing to corporate development and integration efforts following a merger.
Sustaining Momentum: Keeping excitement and alignment post-acquisition is crucial for realizing the strategic value of mergers.
Conference Strategy: Leveraging industry events like Black Hat can help maintain momentum and generate new opportunities.

About our guests:

👉Follow Charles on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about ThreatConnect

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

MOPS Strategy with Maria Velasquez

Wed, 14 Aug 2024 05:00:00 -0000

We're flipping the script as our amazing co-host, Maria Velasquez, steps into the guest spotlight. She is the co-founder of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society and today she comes as the VP of Growth Marketing at NetSPI, bringing her years of experience from the pentesting world. Enjoy this candid chat as Maria shares her knowledge of marketing operations, revealing what it takes to choose the right platform and build a successful strategy. It's like having a chat with a good friend who just happens to be a MOPSexpert! Settle in and enjoy this informative episode, featuring our beloved co-host turned guest.

[06:00] Marketing Operations Insights:

When choosing a marketing automation platform, it’s crucial to consider factors such as company size, growth potential, and integration capabilities. Platforms like HubSpot, Marketo, and Pardot each offer unique features and benefits.

[12:30] Choosing the Right Marketing Automation Tool:

When choosing a marketing automation platform, prioritize:

Data Hygiene: Opt for platforms that facilitate effective data management to keep your information accurate.
CRM Integration: Ensure seamless integration with your current CRM system for consistent data flow and improved customer interactions.

[18:45] High-Level Strategy for Mops:

Implement lead scoring based on engagement and demographics to prioritize prospects, and design an ideal customer journey with defined lifecycle stages to guide leads from initial interest to conversion effectively.

[25:00] Best Practices for Marketing Automation:

Consult with experts during platform transitions to ensure a smooth process, focusing on the technical aspects of CRM and marketing tool integration for seamless data flow and functionality.

[31:15] Data Management and Reporting:

Implement strategies to maintain data integrity and enhance reporting accuracy. Utilize UTM parameters to effectively track and measure campaign success.

[38:00] Future-Proofing Marketing Operations:

Plan for future reporting needs by identifying key metrics and setting up systems accordingly. Evaluate new tools for compatibility and seamless integration with existing systems.

Key Takeaways

Understand Your Needs: Evaluate your company's current and future growth needs when selecting marketing automation tools.
Data is Critical: Prioritize data integrity and set up workflows that ensure seamless integration with your CRM.
Lead Scoring & Lifecycle Management: Establish clear criteria for lead scoring and understand the journey from MQL to SQL.
Consult Experts: Consider hiring a consultant to assist with technical integrations and strategic planning.
Stay Informed on Compliance: Be aware of recent changes in data privacy laws and cookie consent requirements to maintain compliance.

About our guests:

👉Follow Maria on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about NetSPI.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Influencer Marketing for Cyber with Yuliya Gorenko

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Mascara and cybersecurity - what do they have in common? They’re both industries that are prime for influencer marketing! Yuliya Gorenko, founder of Mischka, is here to talk us through her journey from leading PR and digital efforts for top beauty brands like L'Oreal to navigating the tech-heavy world of cybersecurity influencer marketing. Both industries rely on creating relatable stories, addressing universal needs, and building trust with their audiences—whether it's striving for flawless skin with a skincare routine or online security against hackers. Both fields face the challenge of standing out in a crowded market and require innovative storytelling to connect with consumers. Join us to talk not only about these fascinating parallels, but to also explore the early stages of influencer marketing in cybersecurity, and to get tips on how you can engage influencers in the B2B space. Prepare your setting sprays and firewalls for an episode filled with the most interesting insights!

Episode highlights:

[04:30 - 06:00] Similarities Between Beauty and Cybersecurity

Yuliya discusses the universal needs shared by both the beauty and cybersecurity industries which is why it's important to create relatable stories around brands that connect with audiences.

[08:30 - 09:15] Influencer Marketing in Cybersecurity

Yulia talks about the early stages of influencer marketing in the cybersecurity industry, noting how it has evolved over time. Platforms are increasingly incorporating consumer elements into the B2B space, making influencer marketing more dynamic and LinkedIn plays a big role in this marketing strategy.

[10:00 - 13:25] Successful Influencer Campaigns

Yulia’s work with Hotspot Shield VPN and early influencer programs, storytelling through influencers for VPN products, and collaboration with travel YouTubers and Instagrammers

[18:09 - 20:30] Creative Campaigns and Measuring Success

Example of Delete Me's campaign with a farmer YouTuber expanding influencer marketing beyond typical tech influencers. Also how you can measure success and tracking ROI in B2B influencer campaigns.

[22:00 - 25:23] Negotiation Tips for Brands

Yulia offers tips for brands on negotiating with influencers, having a budget in mind before approaching them and outlines deliverables and budget proposals clearly to avoid misunderstandings.Transpareny on brands about the FTC endorsement guidelines, especially in influencer partnerships.

About our guests:

👉Follow Yuliya on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more Mischka.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

From Intelligence Operative to Cybersecurity Evangelist with AJ Nash

Wed, 31 Jul 2024 05:00:00 -0000

AJ Nash has 19 years of experience in the intelligence community and 8 years in the private sector. He has successfully transitioned into a thought leader and evangelist in intelligence-driven security, making waves at several top-tier companies. AJ has a knack for turning complex intelligence topics into engaging and accessible content, and he’s also the charismatic host of the “Unspoken Security” podcast, which recently won the Cybersecurity Excellence award for Best Podcast. Beyond the mic, he is known for his candid takes on industry practices, his humorous approach to serious topics, and his dedication to authentic, no-nonsense communication. His journey is packed with intriguing stories—from unsanctioned magazine articles that catapulted his career to his bold stance on the misuse of AI in cybersecurity. Tune into this week’s episode to laugh, gain some knowledge on intelligence, and hear some hot takes!

Content Creation and Marketing: [07:46 - 14:20]

AJ talks about his love for creating content and how he went from intelligence briefings to public speaking and writing.

AJ’s Hot Takes on the Industry: [14:21 - 23:50]

Prioritizing the bottom line over security.
The misuse of AI in replacing human intelligence analysts and the potential dangers of misinformation and deepfakes.
AJ calls for better accountability and consequences for security breaches.

Government vs. Private Sector: [23:51 - 30:00]

AJ talks about the strengths and weaknesses of both the government and private sector in cybersecurity. Noting that the government excels in structured intelligence and long-term strategies, but sometimes lacks the agility and creativity found in the private sector.

Career Path and Personal Brand: [30:01 - 37:40]

AJ talks about his journey from aspiring lawyer to intelligence professional and public speaker making sure that he was being authentic and that his work reflects his values.

Meet us at CyberMaketingCon: [37:41 - 40:00]

Save the Date for CyberMarketingCon2024
In Person & Virtual
December 8-11, 2024
Philadelphia, PA
Get your ticket and meet us in Philadelphia from December 8-11.

About our guests:

👉Follow AJ on LinkedIn.

👉More on the Unspoken Security podcast.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

Compelling Cyber Narratives with David J. Ebner

Fri, 26 Jul 2024 14:00:00 -0000

Storytelling in cybersecurity doesn't have to be dry. There are stories of espionage, state-sponsored attacks, and ransom scenarios that are dramatic and engaging when told well. Today's special guest, David J. Ebner, the president and founder of Content Workshop, a content agency specializing in cybersecurity companies, is an expert in taking these technical topics and turning them into compelling narratives. David is no stranger to our podcast and also has graced the stage at last year's CyberMarketingCon!

Today, David shares his findings on the state of cybersecurity content marketing, drawing from a report his team is currently developing. This week’s episode will be focusing on storytelling, why the human element in B2B marketing is so important, and strategies on how to make your content stand out and so much more. Tune in for authentic, story-driven content that can help your cybersecurity marketing.

[01:46 - 02:30] Introduction to the Cyber Security Content Report that David is developing
David talks about the upcoming state of cyber security content report and its expected release around Thanksgiving.
[03:31 - 05:00] Interviews and Insights Gathering
David explains the process of gathering insights from marketers and content creators in the cybersecurity industry for the report.
[06:01 - 07:00] B2B Content Marketing Trends
Gianna and David discuss the trend of creating comprehensive reports and then using smaller pieces of that content for extended engagement.
[07:01 - 08:30] Social Media Strategy
David shares insights about the declining impact of posting for the sake of posting on social media.
[10:31 - 12:00] Enterprise vs. Startup Approaches
Discussion on the differences between enterprise companies and startups in terms of building trust and presenting themselves.
[12:01 - 13:00] Human Element in B2B
David emphasizes the importance of the human element in B2B relationships and purchasing decisions.
[15:31 - 17:00] Internal AI Models
David suggests the future possibility of companies developing their own AI models to produce tailored content.
[17:01 - 18:00] Value-First Content
David and Gianna discuss the importance of producing content that offers real value and insight, not just answers.
[21:01 - 22:30] Applying Storytelling to Content Creation
David discusses how to incorporate storytelling techniques into content creation for cybersecurity companies.
[23:01 - 24:00] Finding Good Storytellers
David shares how Content Workshop looks for good storytellers who can apply these techniques to cybersecurity content.

About our guests:

👉Follow David on LinkedIn.

👉Find Content Workshop on LinkedIn and their website.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Cybersecurity Communications at Keeper Security with Anne Cutler

Wed, 17 Jul 2024 05:00:00 -0000

How does a TV news anchor end up in cybersecurity? Meet Anne Cutler, former journalist, anchor, ex-DHS and -CISA communications pro, and currently Director of Global Communications at Keeper Security!

Anne also shares other parts of her journey, like her early days breaking news in Casper, Wyoming, followed by reporting from a bar in New Orleans, and her deeply moving stories from inside Angola prison. Today, she navigates the world of cybersecurity with the same storytelling flair. Tune in for an episode filled with human stories, showcasing the depth of empathy and dignity Anne brings to her work, and how these experiences shaped her journey into cybersecurity

Episode Highlights:

[02:31 - 05:40] Memorable Stories from Journalism
Anne shares experiences from her journalism career, including a unique show set in a bar in New Orleans and a powerful series at Angola prison.
[05:41 - 09:30] Transition to DHS & CISA
Anne’s move to the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate and then to CISA.
[09:31 - 13:45] Role at CISA and Key Incidents
Discussing major cybersecurity incidents Anne worked on, including Colonial Pipeline and the Shields Up campaign during the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
[17:21 - 21:15] Joining Keeper Security
Anne’s transition to the private sector and her role at Keeper Security as Director of Global Communications.
[21:16 - 24:00] Building a Communications Team
Anne’s efforts in building and expanding the communications team at Keeper Security, including global PR teams and internal staff.
[30:01 - 33:00] Social Media and Influencer Strategies
Challenges and strategies for managing organic and paid social media content, and the importance of authentic influencer partnerships.
[33:01 - 36:45] Sponsorship of Williams Racing
Keeper Security’s sponsorship of Williams Racing in Formula One, aligning with the company’s growth and global presence.

About our guests:

👉Follow Anne on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Keeper Security on LinkedIn and their website.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Aligning Channel to Marketing & Sales with CMO & Channel Chief Charlene Ignacio

Wed, 10 Jul 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Class in session! Grab your pens and papers because we have Charlene Ignacio, Channel Chief, CMO, entrepreneur, multi-industry CEO, and Founder of Fornix Marketing. Yes, the list goes on and on—she's practically a one-woman business empire. But today she is here to talk about Fornix Marketing and to share her ultimate playbook on navigating the world of channel marketing leadership. You'll learn how to master the art of communication, set thresholds for change, and hire the right people for your team. Charlene also talks about dealing with imposter syndrome and strategies to overcome it. What's even better, Charlene shares her "Win to the Fourth Power'' strategy. This episode is jam packed - tune in for tips that can help you solve your current marketing alignment problems!

[03:30] - Services Provided by Fornix Marketing
Fornix Marketing helps companies grow globally by making sure their products solve real problems. They focus on transforming Managed Service Providers (MSPs) into Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) - and helping security vendors build effective channel programs to reach these MSPs & MSSPs. Fornix Marketing also provides coaching/training for marketing teams and aspiring channel chiefs.
[07:30] - Sharing Strategies and Competition
Charlene’s philosophy on sharing strategies and fostering collaboration.
[09:00] - Charlene’s Journey
Charlene’s upbringing in Hawaii and its influence on her career.
[11:00] - Overcoming Imposter Syndrome
Discussion on imposter syndrome and personal barriers to success.
[13:00] - Role Progression to Channel Chief
Charlene’s role as a Chief Marketing Officer before becoming a Channel Chief.
Talking more about the "Win to the Fourth Power" formula.
[15:00] - Alignment with Organizational Goals
The key to success: Aligning your goals with the CEO. Collaboration and teamwork are essential.
[17:30] - Communication and Clarification
Importance of over-communication and using the right tools.Ensuring there’s clarity in communication to avoid misunderstandings.
[19:00] - Collaboration and Asking Better Questions
The power of asking the right questions for better alignment and collaboration.
[20:30] - Managing Change and Setting Thresholds
Establishing a baseline and threshold for managing changes within the team and the importance of adaptability and having a clear threshold for changes.
[23:30] - Hiring for Agility and Team Building
Tips for hiring the right people who can adapt to change.
Realigning team members to ensure they are in the right roles for success.

About our guests:

👉Follow Charlene on LinkedIn.

👉Learn more about Fornix Marketing on their website and LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Double Trouble: Two Tims Tackle Cyber Marketing Challenges

Wed, 03 Jul 2024 05:00:00 -0000

A pair of eyes, a pair of ears, a pair of socks—catching our drift? The best things come in pairs, and today, we have two Tims! Tim Golden, Chief Executive Officer/Founder of Compliance Scorecard & Tim Schnurr, Security Awareness Coach / VCISO at Inquisitive IT. Today’s episode is truly a cyber marketer's (and cyber partner marketer’s!) treasure chest as we talk about the difficulties of selling cybersecurity solutions through Managed Service Providers (MSPs), the misconceptions vendors face in this space, and the Tims also share insights on enablement and empowerment strategies for MSPs.

[6:15 ] - Compliance Scorecard Overview
Tim Golden describes Compliance Scorecard and its role in helping MSPs with risk conversations and compliance.
[8:00] - Cybersecurity in Regulated Industries
The impact of cyber liability insurance on compliance and cybersecurity and introducing "Cliff" - Cyber Liability Insurance Framework.
[10:00] - Selling Strategies and Go-To-Market Approaches
Tim Schnurr on targeting baby boomers and retirees for cybersecurity services.
[12:30] - Teaching and Empowering MSPs
Tim Golden talks about educating MSPs on packaging, pricing, and selling compliance services.
[16:45] - Challenges and Misconceptions in the Channel
Misconceptions enterprise cybersecurity vendors have when entering the MSP space.
[21:00] - Effective Enablement and Empowerment
Examples of successful enablement and empowerment in the channel and the importance of building community and providing hands-on support to MSPs.
[25:00] - Blue Ocean Strategy and Ecosystem Building
Creating an ecosystem of vendors that meet the needs of MSPs and end customers.

About our guests:

👉Follow Tim Golden on LinkedIn.

👉Find Tim Schnurr on LinkedIn as well.

👉Check both Tims out on their podcast teamTimLive

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Risky Business: Cary Tiernan's Take on Cyber Insurance and Security

Wed, 26 Jun 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Selling cyber to small businesses without leaning on FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) is often a challenge. In this episode, Cary Tiernan, the Director of Product Marketing at At-Bay shares how At-Bay goes to market in a unique industry: cyber insurance! …without leaning on tired FUD tropes. At-Bay is all about proactive risk management, which they do by offering tools and services that help prevent cyber incidents before they happen, and building trust with their customers through personalized customer engagement. Listen to this episode for a goldmine of the value of cyber insurance and how Cary communicates the benefits without fear mongering.

Episode highlights:

[02:00] - What’s At-Bay?: Cary breaks down what At-Bay does and how they’re different.
[04:00] - Cybersecurity + Insurance: The magic mix and why it matters.
[07:00] - Marketing Challenges: The unique hurdles of marketing cyber insurance.
[10:00] - Personalized Strategies: How ABM (Account-Based Marketing) is a game changer.
[12:30] - PLG Magic: Product-led growth and its impact on At-Bay's success.
[15:00] - Intuit Insights: Cary’s past experiences shaping current strategies.
[18:00] - Onboarding Essentials: Why the first customer touchpoint is critical.
[20:00] - Tool Talk: Utilizing Intercom for customer engagement.
[22:30] - Enterprise PLG: Adapting PLG for bigger fish in the sea.
[25:00] - Small Biz Focus: The big role small businesses play in cybersecurity.

Key Takeaways:

At-Bay isn’t just an insurance provider; they're your cyber guardian angels.
Personalized marketing and ABM are the secret weapons for reaching SMBs.
Product-led growth (PLG) is not just for SaaS—it's a powerhouse in cybersecurity too.
Nail that onboarding process—it’s your golden ticket to customer engagement.
Small businesses face huge cyber risks, and At-Bay is on a mission to protect them.

About our guest:

👉Follow Cary on LinkedIn

👉Find At-Bay on LinkedIn

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

From Biggie vs. Tupac to Cybersecurity GTM Strategies: A Chat with Lord Ian L. Paterson

Wed, 19 Jun 2024 05:00:00 -0000

How many people can say they were joined by a Lord on their podcast? We certainly can! This week, we are joined by Lord Ian L. Paterson, CEO of Plurilock, a global cyber solutions provider and maker of Plurilock AI, a leading platform for SSO, CASB, DLP, AI identity + AI safety. During our discussion, Ian shares how Canadian holidays often turn into "inbox zero days" because of the lack of incoming emails from their American counterparts. And the hosts and Ian talk about a debate as old as time? East Coast vs. West Coast! Ian absolutely refused to pick between Biggie and Tupac but he did offer valuable insights on the difference in go-to-market strategies and cultural nuances between the coasts.

Enjoy this episode to find out how Ian became a lord (it's a beautiful story)!😉

[04:00] - Ian talks about email volumes and meeting habits, comparing Canadian and American practices.
[06:00] - Overview of Plurilock's services and history.
[09:00] - Discussion on the industries Plurilock typically works with, including U.S. and Canadian federal governments.
[13:00] - Ian shares insights on the differences in go-to-market strategies across various regions.
[15:00] - East Coast vs. West Coast approaches in sales and marketing.
[25:00] - Impact of COVID-19 on the public listing timeline.

About our guest:

👉Follow Ian L. Paterson on Linkedin

👉Find Plurilock on Linkedin

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

dope.security Unplugged with CEO and Founder Kunal Agarwal

Wed, 12 Jun 2024 05:00:00 -0000

He’s fashionable, creative, and the dopest CEO/founder…he’s Kunal Agarwal of dope.security, the Fly Direct Secure Web Gateway! The hosts and Kunal unpack his unique journey and unique approach to GTM - from his time at Symantec and Forcepoint, to the inspiration behind the fashion-forward branding of dope.security, to the importance of design and user experience in cybersecurity products. The chat also goes into some seriously cool marketing strategies, the magic of organic growth, and why Kunal's team prefers keeping things flat and friendly. If you're looking for ways to be dope in cybersecurity, well then this episode is made for you!

[03:00] Journey into Cybersecurity
Kunal’s interest in cybersecurity began in childhood, even leading to a near brush with jail.
[05:15] Experiences at Symantec and Forcepoint
From engineer to product manager and leader, he talks about valuable lessons learned at Symantec and Forcepoint.
[07:30] Starting dope.security
He shares his initial reluctance to start a company and how his dream of working at Symantec led to founding dope.security.
[11:00] Global UX and Design
Discussing the universal importance of good UX, he explains how dope.security prioritizes user-friendly designs through collaboration with Erica.
[19:00] CISOs and Cars Getting Coffee
The creative marketing program, inspired by a customer conversation, is explained along with its organic growth and team collaboration.
[21:00] Unique Marketing Strategies
dope.security’s grassroots marketing strategies involve the whole team and avoid traditional executive roles like CMO.
[23:00] The Anti-Executive Philosophy
He talks about the flat hierarchy and the importance of leaders being deeply involved in product details.
[25:00] CEO in a Creative Company

Emphasizing passion and detail-oriented work, he highlights their role in achieving success.

About our guest:

👉Find Kunal on LinkedIn

👉Follow dope.security

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

The Keys to Successful Cybersecurity Products with Nicholas Muy and guest co-host Ross Haleliuk

Wed, 05 Jun 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Key Takeaways:

[03:30] - Nick shares his background and current role at Scrut Automation
[05:15] - Common mistakes founders make in cybersecurity product development
[08:45] - The importance of engaging with the cybersecurity community
[12:30] - How to balance customer feedback with a founder’s vision
[16:00] - Real-world examples from Nick's experience as an investor and advisor
[20:15] - Practical advice for startup employees in evaluating early-stage startups

Guest hosts are new for us and we would appreciate your feedback, email your thoughts: podcasts@breakingthroughincybersecuritymarketing.com.

Get to know our guest host and guest:

👉Reach out to Ross on LinkedIn.

👉Get your copy of Cyber for Builders on Amazon.

👉Connect with Nick Muy: LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our main show hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Beekeeper Meets Codekeeper with Cody Browning

Wed, 29 May 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Today we are Buzzzzzzing Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, bringing you not just the buzz on cybersecurity but literal buzzing too! Meet Cody Browning, a Territory Account Executive at LogRhythm and an avid beekeeper. Cody shares how his peaceful pastime of beekeeping intersects with the high-stakes world of cybersecurity, drawing unexpected parallels between the two, inspired by none other than Jason Statham in ‘The Beekeeper’. 😉 Join us as we dive into a conversation that’s as intriguing as it is sweet as honey!

Episode Highlights:

[00:05:00] Journey into Cybersecurity: Cody recounts his intriguing start in cybersecurity, from managing live chats during critical ransomware attacks to evolving into a strategic, consultative role at LogRhythm.
[00:10:30] The Beekeeper Movie: Get the buzz on "The Beekeeper," a film starring Jason Statham that mirrors Cody’s own shift from beekeeping to battling cyber threats, illustrating the unexpected ways personal passions can intersect with professional life.
[00:15:00] Cody’s Professional Insights: Explore Cody's current role at LogRhythm, where he offers strategic and consultative support to enterprise customers, and discover why building strong relationships in sales is akin to managing a healthy bee colony.
[00:20:00] Cybersecurity and Channel Sales: Reflect on Cody's past experiences with channel sales at AT&T Cybersecurity, shedding light on the crucial role of partnerships in the cybersecurity ecosystem.

Resources:

The Beekeeper movie starring Jason Statham

About our guest:

👉Follow Cody on LinkedIn.

👉Find LogRhythm on LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Inside RSA Conference 2024 with Gianna & Maria

Wed, 22 May 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Join us for an live-recorded episode from RSA Conference 2024, where our hosts Gianna and Maria broadcasted directly from Moscone North in San Francisco. Our dynamic duo shares thrilling experiences, spotlights groundbreaking booths, and delivers fresh updates straight from the conference floor. They also unpack major announcements from NetSPI and celebrate the spirited community of cybersecurity marketers. Tune in for an episode packed with energy, innovation, and insider insights!

Episode Highlights:

[04:00] - RSA 2024 Theme: Overview of this year's conference theme, "The Art of Possible."
[08:25] - Notable Booths: Impressions of themed booths by Mend.io and Wiz.
[11:00] - NetSPI Announcements: Announcement of NetSPI’s new platform, brand, and website.
[14:40] - Marketer Party: Recap of the successful marketer party at RSA Conference.
[18:20] - Upcoming CyberMarketingCon24 in Philadelphia.
[21:00] - Acquisition News: News on the acquisition of NoName Security by Akamai.
[23:45] - Support for Startups: Discussion on RSA Innovation Sandbox and its impact on startups.

Quotes from the Episode:

"It's like the Super Bowl of cybersecurity, but it's also a place where we come to support each other, learn, and grow together as marketers." — Gianna
"Every booth tells a story, and it's our job to uncover and share these stories, making the art of possible a reality." — Maria

Resources:

👉Get your EARLY BIRD ticket to CyberMarketingCon24!

👉The call for speakers is also open until June 5th!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

See you in the next episode!

Creating New Cyber Categories with CMO Michael Yehoshua

Wed, 15 May 2024 05:00:00 -0000

From the worlds of fashion photography to heavy metal to cybersecurity today, we sit down with Michael Yehoshua, CMO at Holistic Cyber and SAGE Cyber. Michael not only shares his transition into cyber, but also explains how he created his own playground by establishing a new category within Gartner—proving that the only deep pockets you need are those filled with creativity and grit. Buckle up for an inspiring journey through marketing tactics and the power of thinking outside the box.

[00:02:15] Journey into Cybersecurity: Michael shares his unique path from the world of fashion to cybersecurity.
[00:10:00] Strategic Leadership: Insights into managing dual roles as CMO for two distinct companies.
[00:18:45] Innovative Market Creation: Discussing the creation of the Cyber Defense Planning and Optimization (CDPO) category.
[00:27:30] Marketing Strategies and Insights: Differences in marketing strategies between services and products.
[00:35:20] Creative Marketing Successes: Examples of unconventional marketing tactics that have propelled company growth.

Resources:

2024 Cybersecurity Buyers Report: Compiled by Actual Tech Media and the Cybersecurity Marketing Society, providing deep insights into buyer preferences and behaviors within the cybersecurity market.

About guest:

👉Follow Michael on LinkedIn.

👉Find Holistic Cyber (HolistiCyber) on LinkedIn or their website.

👉Follow SAGE Cyber on LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Mastering Marketing Mayhem with Pam Cobb

Wed, 08 May 2024 05:00:00 -0000

This week, get ready to laugh until it hurts because we might just have our funniest episode ever. Earthquakes and spreadsheets are the names of the game as we welcome Pam Cobb, the hilariously jet-lagged (for this episode, not permanently, folks!) Director of Content Security at Akamai. Join hosts Gianna and Maria as they dive into how Pam not only survives natural disasters but also thrives amid the chaos of cybersecurity marketing. From smart marketing tactics to hilarious earthquake jokes, Pam keeps the tips and laughter rolling. Don’t miss out on this episode’s mix of awesome advice and entertaining stories from the wild world of marketing!

Timestamps:

[01:08] Pam's role at Akamai explained
[02:05] How Pam attributes revenue to security content
[03:36] The humor in marketing data struggles
[07:20] Pam's journey from engineering to marketing
[09:29] Transition to IBM and experiencing corporate acquisitions
[13:36] Creative content strategies and memorable marketing moments

Takeaways:

Content plays a crucial role in driving revenue and should be strategically managed.
Multi-touch attribution is a valuable tool for measuring the impact of content on revenue.
Creating engaging experiences at trade shows and events requires thoughtful planning and alignment with brand messaging.
Collaboration between different teams, such as content strategists and writers, is essential for successful content creation. Event planning is an important aspect of cybersecurity marketing, and creative ideas such as custom-named cocktails can make an event more memorable.

Resources:

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

About guest:

👉Link to Pam's blog post featuring the infamous orange kitten story.

👉Follow Pam on LinkedIn.

👉Find Akamai on LinkedIn or their website.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

👉Gianna Whitver

👉Maria Velasquez

See you in the next episode!

Wiz’s Strategic Events with Jasmin Ozeri

Wed, 01 May 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Highlights:

[00:00:30] Introduction to the episode and today's guest, Jasmin Ozeri.
[00:01:50] Jasmin's journey from a wedding venue childhood to a cybersecurity event strategist.
[00:06:00] Inside Wiz's innovative event strategies: From Wizard of Oz to interactive booths.
[00:11:30] Preview of Wiz's plans for RSA Conference 2024.
[00:15:00] The strategic role of events in cybersecurity marketing.
[00:20:00] What would Jasmin be doing if not in cybersecurity? A surprising career alternative.

Takeaways:

Events are more than just logistical exercises; they're pivotal for brand building and creating meaningful customer engagement.
Bringing creativity into event planning can significantly enhance the attendee experience, making your booth and brand memorable.
Strategic event management involves careful planning and execution, ensuring every aspect aligns with the company’s marketing goals.

Join Us at RSAC 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSAC 2024 on May 5th, at Novela San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

About Our Guest:

👉Follow Jasmin Ozeri on LinkedIn to keep up with her latest event strategies and insights into cybersecurity marketing.
👉Learn more about Wiz on their LinkedIn or website to see how they are revolutionizing cloud security (and RSAC booths!).

Connect with Our Hosts on LinkedIn:

See you in the next episode!

Decoding Cyber Marketing with Illumio’s CMO, Gautam Mehandru

Wed, 24 Apr 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Today, the one and only Gautam Mehandru, CMO at Illumio, joins Maria and Gianna! In this episode, we crack open Gautam's playbook as he shares his insights and guides us through the complexities of marketing in cybersecurity. We'll explore everything from Gautam's unique journey from engineering roots to the pinnacle of marketing leadership to the intricate details of cybersecurity purchasing behaviors—including team compositions and vendor selection tactics. So, grab your pens and paper, or your digital notebooks if you fancy, and get ready to take some CMO notes!

Episode Highlights:

[1:20 - 5:30] Gautam's Journey to CMO
[12:30 - 4:55] Strategies for Effective Leadership as a CMO
[17:20 -20:05] Category Creation and Market Positioning
[23:40 - 25:50] Upcoming Plans for RSA Conference 2024
[28:15 - 30:40] Engaging with Analyst Firms and Utilizing Market Data

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Building Island’s Brand with Ari Yablok

Wed, 17 Apr 2024 05:00:00 -0000

What if there was a browser designed as an enterprise workspace from the outset? Imagine integrating all essential tools—spanning security, IT, and productivity—directly into the workspace where people operate. That is exactly what Island does, and when the brand came out of stealth in February 2022 with $100 million in funding, it launched with a new category and a splash (no pun intended)!

Today the Head of Brand at Island, Ari Yablok, joins us to talk more about Island, the intricacies of building a brand from the ground up, the strategic pivot from stealth mode to the public eye, and the art of storytelling in the cybersecurity landscape.

The best way to understand Island's impact is to see how simple yet profound changes in perspective, like the shift from seeing cybersecurity as a series of threats to viewing it as a secured environment, can fundamentally change the game." - Ari Yablok

Episode Highlights:

[02:00] - Ari Yablok's Journey to Island:
[07:47] - Unpacking the Island Brand: Ari discusses the challenges and strategies behind launching Island's brand, emphasizing the importance of category creation and the deliberate avoidance of typical cybersecurity jargon to differentiate Island in the market.
[09:16] - The Launch Strategy: Detailing the preparation and execution of Island's exit from stealth mode, Ari outlines the foundational work that made their launch resonate with the cybersecurity community and the broader market.
[20:00] - Building Trust Through Branding: The conversation delves into the role of brand in building trust, especially in a new category, and how Island's approach to branding and customer experience sets them apart from traditional cybersecurity solutions.

Join Us at RSAC 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSAC 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Cyber Social Media Strategies with Matt Mullan

Wed, 10 Apr 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Highlight Reel:

[01:04] - Matt shares his professional background and transition into cybersecurity from sales and social media.
[03:56] - Discussing the unique challenges and opportunities in cybersecurity marketing.
[04:18] - Insights into engaging cybersecurity communities and leveraging humor in social media strategies.
[06:26] - The effectiveness and strategy behind using memes and light-hearted content to drive engagement.
[08:11] - The role of influencer marketing in cybersecurity and the potential shift towards micro-influencers.
[10:41] - Exploring social media's impact on brand awareness and lead generation within the cybersecurity sector.
[12:57] - The importance of diversifying social media strategies and not relying solely on one platform.
[17:29] - The concept of 'thought leadership' and its role in successful social media marketing.
[20:14] - The future of influencer marketing in cybersecurity and its challenges.

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Threat Research and Marketing are Friends! with Tricia Howard

Wed, 03 Apr 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Enter the Cyber Guardians Galaxy! Yes, you heard that right! A universe where every byte and bit is a star in the digital cosmos, and lurking in the vast expanse are cosmic threats, darker than the void of space itself. But fear not, for we have our very own assembly of Avengers, the valiant warriors of the web, our cybersecurity practitioner superheroes! Well, at least that is according to Tricia Howard, Senior Technical Writer II at Akamai Technologies, also known across the digital domains as "TriciaKicksSaaS." Today, she joins Maria and Gianna to share tales of digital daring-do, and insights into how threat research and marketing can work together that sparkle brighter than infinity stones, all while bringing her unique blend of theatrical flair to the show!

Episode Takeaways:

Humor can be a powerful tool in cybersecurity marketing, helping to engage and connect with the audience.
Drawing inspiration from consumer brands can bring a fresh and creative approach to cybersecurity marketing.
Building trust and strong relationships with researchers is crucial for effective collaboration in cybersecurity marketing.

Episode Highlights:

[04:11] Using Humor in Cybersecurity Marketing
[05:29] Bringing Consumer Brand Inspiration to Cybersecurity Marketing
[07:20] Tricia's Role at Akamai and Building Trust with Researchers
[09:32] Working Internally with Researchers and Creating Partnerships
[11:23] Collaborating with Threat Researchers at Akamai
[18:24] Collaboration and Technical Expertise in Research
[19:20] Managing the Research Process and Protecting Researchers' Reputations
[20:36] The Importance of Researchers' Brand and Corporate Reputation
[22:00] The Excitement and Learning Opportunities in the Role
[24:26] Integrating Threat Research into Marketing at Startups
[26:43] Balancing Time Pressure and Content Creation in Threat Research

Links and References:

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

For more insights and discussions from our guest:

About Tricia Howard:

Tricia Howard, a theatre degree holder, shares her unconventional journey into the cybersecurity world. Starting in inside sales and eventually finding her passion in cybersecurity marketing. Check her out on LinkedIn and YouTube.

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Art of Cyber Defense: Insights from a Theatrical Minded CISO with Kayne McGladrey

Wed, 27 Mar 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Prepare to laugh until your stomach hurts with our most hilarious episode yet, featuring the one and only theater kid turned cybersecurity guru, Kayne McGladrey, Field CISO at Hyperproof. Join us for a rollercoaster of emotions as we dive into the absurdity of security info in 10K filings, engage in heated debates over the polarizing cinnamon sticky bun ale, and champion the cause for more singing and dancing in cybersecurity. Think of it as the "Cybersecurity's Got Talent" episode you never knew you needed! Kayne's journey is packed with invaluable insights and captivating stories that are as unique as they are engaging.

Key Episode Highlights:

[07:41] The Disclosure Rule and Made-up Cybersecurity Frameworks
[11:34] Kane's Podcasts and Discussion on FedRAMP
[12:36] Theater and its Influence on Cybersecurity and Marketing
[15:58] Engaging with CISOs in the Sales Process
[20:48] Balancing Technical and Business Perspectives as a CISO
[21:15] Challenges of Communication Between Business and Technical Teams
[21:58] Concerns of Technical CISOs and Board Alignment
[22:22] Tighter Integration of CISOs with the Board
[23:48] The Changing Role of CISOs and Personal Liability
[25:26] The Impact of Personal Liability on the Security Industry
[27:15] The Role of a Field CISO

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

For more insights and discussions from our guest:

Connect with Kayne on LinkedIn.
Listen to Kayne's podcasts, "Kayne's Five Under Five" and "Drafting Compliance," if you are interested in deep dives into specific cybersecurity topics.
Check out Kayne's analysis of 10K disclosures for understanding the landscape of cybersecurity reporting.

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

How Palo Alto Networks is Leading with Optimism in Cybersecurity Marketing with Navneet Singh

Wed, 20 Mar 2024 05:00:00 -0000

Takeaways:

Focus on the customer and their needs in cybersecurity marketing.
Convey optimism and positivity in marketing to inspire confidence in customers.
Differentiate your company by being opposite to industry norms.
Avoid using fear as a marketing tactic in cybersecurity.
Create a culture of optimism and accountability within the marketing team.

Key Episode Highlights:

[00:06 - 01:20] Announcement of Cybersecurity Marketing Society's 2024 RSAC Party for Cyber Marketers!
[01:32 - 04:23] Navneet Singh shares his career transition from engineering to marketing, emphasizing his passion for product management and marketing.
[04:27 - 07:42] The philosophical shift in cybersecurity marketing towards optimism and confidence, moving away from fear-based tactics.
[08:31 - 11:54] How Palo Alto Networks' marketing strategy is distinct, focusing on enabling businesses securely rather than instilling fear.
[12:21 - 17:39] The importance of focusing on the customer, humanizing B2B marketing, and the creative process behind the "We've Got Next" campaign.
[18:35 - 24:59] The significance of hope and education in cybersecurity, and the strategy behind avoiding fear-based marketing.
[25:29 - 31:09] How internal optimism and a positive company culture influence marketing strategies and customer interactions.
[31:14 - 35:21] Game Time: Guessing Nav's alternate career path, followed by Nav's revelation of his potential career in the armed forces if not in marketing.

Join Us at RSA 2024:

Remember to join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society's party at RSA 2024 on May 5th, at Novella San Francisco. Secure your tickets on our website and enjoy the best party for cybersecurity marketers!

Connect with Navneet Singh:

For more insights and discussions, connect with Nav on LinkedIn. Engage and share ideas on pushing the boundaries of cybersecurity marketing.

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

The Journey of 'Cyber for Builders' with Ross Haleliuk.

Wed, 13 Mar 2024 05:00:00 -0000

The author of the viral cyber bestseller Cyber for Builders joins us today! If you ever wanted to write a book, but couldn’t overcome time constraints, procrastination, or even resources, then this episode is tailor-made just for you. Meet Ross Haleliuk, Best Selling Author of Cyber for Builders, Head of Product at LimaCharlie, and Angel/Syndicate Co-Lead plus Blogger at Venture in Security. Ross started to write Cyber for Builders during the weekend and in his free time, inspired by a big gap he noticed in cybersecurity business advice. His story on today’s episode and the book itself aren't just a reflection of the challenges of starting a cybersecurity business, but also how writing can fill gaps and share crucial insights with others.

Key Episode Highlights:

[01:26] Ross Haleliuk’s Journey and inspiration for Writing his Book:
Ross highlights the lack of resources on the business aspects of cybersecurity and his desire to fill this gap by providing a comprehensive guide to navigating the cybersecurity industry's complexities.
[03:38] Challenges Faced by Cybersecurity Founders and Some Advice:
Advice for cybersecurity founders and marketers and the importance of understanding the business side, including fundraising, go-to-market strategies, and customer focus, beyond just product development.
[06:04] The Importance of Collaboration and Building a Team:
“It's quite rare to see a solo founder succeed,”
Ross advises against going solo and shares the challenges/pressures faced by solo founders in the industry. He also shares the benefits of having a partner when you are starting a new company.

*You can join The Society if you are interested in community or finding a partner for your future ventures/career 😉

[08:40] Taking a First Principles Approach to Marketing:
This approach emphasizes starting from the basics: understanding customer needs, behaviors, and preferences to guide marketing and positioning of security solutions.
[15:03] Ross's Book Writing Process and Advice for Aspiring Authors:
Ross shares how he used his blog posts and dedicated 8 to 12 hours each weekend to write. He advises future writers to grow their audience by regularly blogging, being active on social media, and speaking in public.

Reach out to Ross on LinkedIn.

Get your copy of Cyber for Builders on Amazon.

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Lemons into Lemonade: Life After Layoff with Jennifer Leggio.

Tue, 05 Mar 2024 23:00:00 -0000

Just like Beyoncé transformed adversity into triumph with her iconic album, Lemonade, our guest this week masterfully turns lemons into the sweetest lemonade. In an economy where the mere thought of a layoff can be scary, thinking about the next steps can be daunting. Yet, Jennifer Leggio returns with unwavering resolve, not only to offer fearless guidance on navigating tough times but also to demonstrate how she's living the very principles she championed at CyberMarketingCon2023. Join us as Jennifer shares her journey from navigating a layoff to launching her startup, embodying effective leadership, and embracing her unique, leather-clad style.

Episode highlights:

[00:01- 01:50] Jennifer's Layoff Journey and the Power of Resilience
Jennifer talks about how she felt when she first lost her job and how she used her contacts to find new opportunities.
[01:50 - 03:22] Jennifer’s Keynote from CyberMarketingCon2023
Reflections on Jennifer's Cyber MarketingCon2023 keynote, where she discussed the potential for marketers to move up to executive roles while also challenging conventional career trajectories.
[03:22 - 05:08] A New Chapter
Introduction to Moveable Feast, Jennifer’s new company
[10:10 - 12:27] The Keys of Effective Leadership
A deep dive into the importance of empathy in leadership and the need for leaders to genuinely understand and support their team members on a personal and professional level.
[19:15 - 21:48] Authenticity in Style and SubstanceJennifer discusses the significance of personal style and branding, advocating for authenticity and the courage to express your true self both personally and professionally.

You can follow Jennifer on LinkedIn

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

How to Build Community Around Phishing with Dennis Legori.

Wed, 28 Feb 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Nearly 1.2% of all emails sent are malicious, which translates to 3.4 billion phishing emails daily. For every 4,200 emails sent, 1 would be a phishing scam. Dennis Legori, the Associate Director of Security Awareness and Digital Communications at Carrier, is working to make malicious phishing campaigns less effective! Dennis shares his insights into his role, which involves developing security awareness programs and managing cybersecurity-related digital communications. He explains how he transitioned into security awareness when initially he was focused on project management. Legori also does a deep dive into how he was able to build a community during phishing simulations and security awareness training.

Today’s Episode Highlights:

[01:21] Role of Associate Director of Security Awareness and Digital Communications.
[06:55] Building a Security Awareness Program from Scratch.
[07:28] Collaboration with Marketing and Internal Communications.
[08:41] Phishing Awareness Campaign and Enterprise Defenders.
[12:42] Crowdsourcing Cybersecurity.
[14:53] Tools and Teams for Managing Phishing Awareness Program.
[19:00] Considerations for Cultural Differences.
[21:50] How to Create an Engaging and Fun Program.
[27:10] Tools to Use for Phishing.

Reach out to Dennis on LinkedIn

Be sure also to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Inside the Mind of a CISO with Joe Evangelisto.

Wed, 21 Feb 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Episode Highlights:

[01:05] Joe expresses excitement and gratitude for joining NetSPI and leading the talented security team.
[03:01] Joe’s viral LinkedIn post about his decision not to attend Black Hat, and the unique challenges faced by SMB CISOs compared to those at larger enterprises.
[08:15] Content Switching: Joe shares his experience balancing different responsibilities as a CISO at a smaller organization and balancing all his priorities while wearing different hats.
[13:30] Why it's important to build strong internal relationships across the departments.
[17:38] Joe recommends the supportive community of CISOs in his area with organizations like ISSA, ISC², and more!

Reach out to Joe on LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

The Cyber Evangelist Turned Cyber Founder, with Benjamin Bohman.

Wed, 14 Feb 2024 06:00:00 -0000

This week Gianna and Maria are joined by Benjamin Bohman, CTO and Founder of Stratishield AI. Benjamin has a background that includes cybersecurity engineering and evangelism, emphasizing the importance of understanding business outcomes in cybersecurity. Benjamin and the hosts discuss public speaking, the rising adoption of artificial intelligence in cybersecurity, his company Stratishield AI, and more!

Episode highlights:

[1:28] Benjamin shares Stratishield AI, a consulting firm he founded that demystifies AI for cybersecurity and business enhancement.
[7:30] Be a business expert, not a technology expert! Why this is important when selling to IT & security.
[9:42] Benjamin shares insights on reaching potential clients by understanding their needs, utilizing predictive analytics, and addressing relevant cybersecurity concerns.
[13:47] Maria highlights the challenge many practitioners face in wanting to share their expertise in cybersecurity but feeling unsure how to do so effectively.
[18:30] Benjamin talks about why there is a need for technical professionals to learn to communicate effectively with non-technical audiences. He also shares some personal experiences of his public speaking and tips on how to overcome nervousness.
[29:30] Meet Atlas, an AI bot Benjamin has been developing to provide interactive product tours while increasing user engagement. You can learn more about Atlas here.

Reach out to Benjamin:

You can get ahold of Benjamin on his cell phone: (702) 374-7920

You can also email him at Ben@stratishield.ai

Read Benjamin’s eBook on Leveraging AI in Business

Follow Stratishield AI on LinkedIn!

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

What is a Phantom CISO? With Mishaal Khan.

Wed, 07 Feb 2024 06:00:00 -0000

Mishaal Khan, a serial entrepreneur, author, security expert, and VC shares his journey, from growing up around computers to becoming a cybersecurity expert and author of the book "The Phantom CISO." Listen to hear insights from the security practitioner’s point of view on marketing, brand-building, and book-publishing!

Episode highlights:

[01:07] Mishaal’s early career beginnings and influences.
[06:30] The Phantom CISO - Mishaal's book and his approach to marketing it.
[16:40] How Mishaal used malware, phishing, and ransomware to market his company.
[22:07] A look behind the promotion Mishaal used for his book, from the price to self-publishing.
[24:15] The evolution of fearmongering in cybersecurity and the need for practical solutions.
[28:40] More strategies Mishaal used to promote his book

Episode Links:

The Phantom CISO

You can catch Mishaal on LinkedIn

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

BIG NEWS! We’re Joining the CyberWire Network, Powered by N2K!

Wed, 31 Jan 2024 06:00:00 -0000

This week, we announce that the Cybersecurity Marketing Society’s Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing podcast is joining the CyberWire network, powered by N2K. Yes, you heard that right! In this episode, hosts Gianna and Maria are joined by Bennett Moe, Vice President of Content & Strategy at the CyberWire. The group discusses their excitement, the significance of the partnership, and its alignment with education and diversity in the cybersecurity community. Plus, they recap CyberMarketingCon 2023, talk about exciting upcoming announcements from both sides for 2024, and talk about Bennett Moe’s previous career as a cartographer.

Below are some highlights from the conversation.

[01:53] - Expanding Audience and Cybersecurity Community
[06:30] Cyber Marketing Con 2023 Recap
[08:51] What makes CyberMarketingCon unique? Providing a safe space for collaboration and diversity
[11:43] Booths and Legos
[13:44] Plans for 2024

Connect with Bennett Moe on LinkedIn

To learn more about our new podcast partner: the CyberWire network, powered by N2K, visit their website or follow them on LinkedIn.

Be sure to also follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Stop Thinking Statistics Tell Your Story! With Mitch Mayne

Wed, 24 Jan 2024 06:00:00 -0000

This week Gianna and Maria are joined by Mitch Mayne, Cybersecurity communicator and incident responder. Mitch talks about his career journey, and his philosophy on storytelling in cybersecurity while weaving in an important conversation about mental health in cybersecurity!

Mitch's Non-Technical Beginnings:

Mitch accidentally entered into cybersecurity while working at IBM. His combination of skills like marketing, writing, and incident response have helped him to succeed. In college, Mitch majored in communication, journalism, and political science. He later joined the tech realm, which led him down the path to cybersecurity.

Philosophy on Storytelling in Cybersecurity:

“Stop thinking that statistics tell your story,”

Storytelling in cybersecurity should go beyond numbers. It's great to have facts but to speak directly to people, you need to tell a story that they understand. This is why Mitch highlights the importance of developing writing skills for cybersecurity professionals.

CyberMindz and Mental Health in Cybersecurity:

The conversation shifts some gears as the hosts and Mitch focus on the introduction to CyberMindz.org and its focus on the mental health of cybersecurity workers. CyberMindz identified 15 factors that contribute to stress for those working in cyber. Mitch also discusses coping mechanisms, including journaling, breathwork, and meditation.

Get to know Mitch:

Bio: 𝗜’𝗺 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗿𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗵𝘆𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗱 𝘄𝗵𝗼’𝘀 𝗯𝗼𝘁𝗵 𝗮𝗻 𝗶𝗻𝗰𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝗽𝗼𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗱 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗰𝘆𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝘀𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗶𝗰𝗲𝘀. For the better part of the last decade, I worked directly inside a cyber services organization—not at a distance in a marketing team—alongside hackers, incident responders, and threat intelligence officers. That granted me a level of deep expertise often not accomplished by sitting in a marketing organization alone. I know first-hand what cyber services teams do, how they do it, and why they do it—because I’ve done it, too. That, in turn, allows me to tell their stories in a way clients not only understand but want to hear.

You can catch Mitch on LinkedIn

Follow our lovely hosts on LinkedIn:

Gianna Whitver

Maria Velasquez

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, on our main LinkedIn page, or on our podcast LinkedIn page, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Exploring Roles from the Trenches to Leadership with Corin Imai

Wed, 17 Jan 2024 08:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Cybersecurity Marketing Leader and Former Security Researcher, Corin Imai, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss the individual contributor vs. head of marketing and influencer marketing relationships.

Corin has been both head of marketing and an individual contributor (IC) throughout her career thus far. She initially joined Tromzo as an IC when the company was very young. From the time Corin joined, she was wearing lots of hats and constantly learning about different facets of marketing. She has found that being head of marketing usually does mean wearing a lot of hats, and that being an IC is her true passion.

The pandemic showcased that the traditional marketing methods were just not working as well as they could be. Corin believes we need to get away from the coldness we treat relationships with if we want an organization to be a true partner to us. Her passion is aligned with how to influence that decision from top to bottom.

Corin shares the successful approaches she has seen recently by organizations taking a softer approach to cybersecurity influencing. She believes that the fundamental shift in how we function as vendors will change how we are thinking about content as an industry. Organizations like the Information Security Content Creators Guild, Cybersecurity Marketing Society, and Indoor Labs are at the forefront of implementing fundamental changes. Building these influencer relationships takes time, advocacy, patience, and faith.

Corin shares that it would be wildly beneficial for marketing teams to allow for times of reflection in the midst of our busy schedules and long to-do lists. She also shares tips for finding successful influencer partnerships. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Corin would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Learn more about Corin Imai.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

How to Make a Viral Meme for Cybersecurity with Dean Pe’er

Wed, 10 Jan 2024 08:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Dean Pe'er, Head of Product Marketing at Entitle, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss his viral meme.

Several months ago, Dean posted a meme on LinkedIn about admin privileges, which promptly went viral. Within four days of the meme being posted, it had acquired over 130,000 reactions, 4,000 LinkedIn page visitors, and two demo requests. The meme was created around the time that King Charles was coronated, so the content was timely. It contains a picture of King Charles in full coronation regalia, and the text reads, “When IT finally approved the admin privileges you asked for 30 years ago.” [view the posted meme here]

During the podcast, Dean shares how he arrived at the idea for the meme. He realized how big of a deal the coronation was for so many people and decided it was an opportunity to do something that might resonate with people in the security industry. It took him about 25 minutes to find the picture, write the copy, and publish the post on social media. Dean discussed the fact that many companies may not allow an employee to post something so impulsively because they feel it is not brand-safe or consistent with their corporate voice. This, Dean identifies, is the largest gap between small startups and large enterprises. At Entitle, he did not encounter any hurdles, politics, opinions, or red tape regarding social media posts, and has been fully supported by the executive team at the early-stage startup.

Dean shares advice for podcast listeners looking to get into the meme game. To make impactful memes, you should first find a topic that many people can relate to. If it’s too “salesy” or overtly focused on your own product or brand, it will likely not resonate with people outside of your organization. Timeliness is also important, as exemplified by Dean taking advantage of the major event of the coronation in his own work. Marketers won’t want to miss this episode, as Dean also sheds light on the best platforms for posting memes if you’re part of a small-scale startup like Entitle. Shifting gears, Dean explains his role of solo-marketer at the company. He finds that not having a team is challenging, but can also be rewarding. His challenges have been lessened by finding the best independent contractors within Israel’s small network. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Dean would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Learn more about Dean Pe'er.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Unlocking Product Marketing Strategies with Andy Tzortzinis

Wed, 03 Jan 2024 08:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Andy Tzortzinis, product positioning and messaging mentor, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss product marketing.

Andy’s introduction to cybersecurity was several years ago as the Director of Marketing for a small startup where he wore many hats. From this experience, he gained firsthand knowledge of how everything connected within the startup and was able to transfer that generalist skillset into other roles. He began to notice that product marketers were highly coveted and often retained within organizations despite regular layoffs of other marketing roles.

Since he moved into the industry, Andy has become passionate about helping his fellow marketing professionals transition into roles that may be a better fit for their particular skills. Andy also shares about his journey from the roles of communication and director of marketing to becoming a product marketer. He found that the most difficult part of the interview process was convincing the interviewers that he was worth the risk because his experience as a generalist didn’t instantly translate into a product marketing fit (at least, not on paper). Andy unpacks the many different positions within the product marketing field. Recent cutbacks are causing those who remain to take on more responsibilities than ever before, so product marketing is becoming an increasingly more generalized role.

Andy also shares a “hot take” that startups don’t need a marketing program, they first need a solid comms program. It takes a good comms program to build trust for your startup. If you can do that successfully, you can then bring a marketing person in to further develop the existing pipeline. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Andy would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Andy is open to chatting with people 1:1 about pivoting to PMM roles, you can reach out to him either on LinkedIn.

You can also catch up with our hosts here:

Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Building Trust, Culture, and Communities with Tyler Shields

Wed, 27 Dec 2023 15:19:32 -0000

After about 90 podcast episodes published on Breaking Through In Cybersecurity Marketing, we are walking down memory lane with our very first episode ever!

Gianna and Maria are joined by self-proclaimed “accidental CMO,” Tyler Shields, Vice President of Product Marketing at Traceable. Tyler shares his three-step approach for building marketing programs at startups, establishing company culture remotely, setting realistic expectations with internal stakeholders when building community at companies, and why your company needs a “talking head.” Lastly, Tyler spills the beans on the true mastermind behind his Yeti swag and the marketing models and platforms he’s engaging in.

Key takeaways:

00:40 Bio

02:10 Tyler’s 3 step Approach for startup marketing

06:39 Remote working - communication is key!

09:54 Trust building and authentic leadership

11:06 Establishing company culture remotely

13:43 Accountability and teamwork

15:35 What’s in store for JupiterOne in 2022?!

18:18 Building community - foundation first

22:54 Setting realistic expectations

24:28 Spokespeople and “talking heads”

27:03 Favorite swag and the true Yeti mastermind

31:35 Product-led growth and establishing value

34:10 Social media, podcasting, and modern marketing models

35:41 Platforms - YouTube, Shopify, Slack, and the whole gambit!

39:01 Stay in touch with Tyler

Stay in touch with Tyler on Twitter and LinkedIn

Connect with Gianna on LinkedIn

Connect with Maria on LinkedIn

Follow the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on Twitter or learn more at the Cybersecurity Marketing Society website.

We are on hiatus after CyberMarketingCon and the holiday season. We will be back with everything fresh in January. Happy holidays everyone!

Episode Replay: Is Your Marketing Annoying to Security Folks? How to Fix It with Dani Woolf

Wed, 20 Dec 2023 08:00:00 -0000

CyberMarketingCon2023 has wrapped, and we are so grateful for the support we received from our speakers, sponsors, volunteers, and attendees. The week was jam-packed with networking and education, from demand gen and AI to CISO perspectives and vendor solutions. Stay tuned for more conference content from our podcast, website, and social media channels.

In this episode replay, we are joined by the Founder and CEO of Audience 1st, Dani Woolf, who was also a speaker at CyberMarketingCon this year.

In this episode, Dani discusses her core marketing values:

Empathy
Trust
Loyalty

Creating meaningful, customer-centric experiences and identifying customer challenges and buying motivations while also being able to ask the right questions can transform your marketing efforts. Dani also shares the story behind the uncomfortable encounter that sparked a great friendship with a cybersecurity practitioner.

Replay Episode: Life After Layoff With Amy Fair

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 08:00:00 -0000

Layoffs are always stressful. You can never truly be ready for it, but you have to pick up the pieces after it happens. During our podcast hiatus for CyberMarketingCon2023, we are replaying the “Life After Layoff With Amy Fair” episode. Our hosts Gianna and Maria sit down with guest Amy Fair, Content Marketing Manager to discuss being laid off and how to navigate it in stride.

Gianna and Maria ask Amy about her own experiences being laid off as they approach the rarely-discussed but important topic. Amy dives into what it means to be laid off in the cybersecurity content marketing industry and how she has turned layoffs into new opportunities within weeks. In their conversation, Maria, Gianna, and Amy highlight the importance of networking and community, and how crucial it is to maintain lasting relationships in the content marketing industry. Amy shares how these connections can lead to amazing opportunities.

Timecoded Guide:

[8:50] The value of building a network and maintaining a community

[17:29] Using Slack in job hunting and making connections

[23:21] The value of mentors and keeping people in your corner

[25:48] Advice for those anticipating a layoff

Links:

Spend some time with our guest Amy Fair on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Video Influencer Marketing: Keeper Security’s Strategies, Tactics, & Results - Replay from CyberMarketingCon 2022

Wed, 06 Dec 2023 08:00:00 -0000

Social media gives us different ways to market, from influencers to gifs, or videos. You can use whatever is at your disposal to boost your company’s social media marketing strategies. In this replay session from CyberMarketingCon2022 speaker Cait Hassett, Channel Manager at Blackpoint Cyber, will give you all that and more. She discusses various aspects of social media, influencer marketing, and cybersecurity. Cait also shares her journey transitioning from consumer-focused marketing to B2B strategies at Keeper Security.

Video is also incredibly significant, the power of video in marketing and the challenges of brand awareness versus category awareness in promoting a password manager within the broader cybersecurity industry. Benchmarks are important, especially in creating regular content, like as memes, employee recognition, partnerships, and cyber news updates. These benchmarks help establish consistent content themes, making the brand recognizable and reliable.

Another big part of the session focuses on the creation of a "Cyber News Update," a video series covering cybersecurity-related topics beyond passwords. Cait shares insights into scripting, utilizing company ambassadors, and maintaining a standardized format to produce these updates efficiently. She also highlights the launch of "Keeper Live" on LinkedIn Live, which aims to bring Keeper Security into broader cybersecurity conversations. From the planning process, and the selection of influential guests, to the efforts made to template scripts for comfort and consistency.

By the end of the session, Cait emphasizes finding ambassadors within the organization, creating templates for content creation, and leveraging influential figures to engage audiences effectively. The emphasis is on using different platforms, video formats, and influencer marketing to broaden Keeper Security's reach within the cybersecurity space.

CyberMarketingcon2023 countdown is officially starting and we are so excited to see everyone virtually or in person so make sure you get that ticket. More on #CyberMarketingCon2023 here, see you in Texas! 🤠

More about Cait:

Cait Hassett is a brand marketing professional with nearly a decade of experience in social media and influencer marketing. She got her start as a radio DJ after winning her job in an “American Idol” type contest and creating her on-air and social media persona to grow a community of engaged listeners in the South Georgia/North Florida Market. Soon, she was running the social media accounts for every major station in the area and consulting with other DJs on social media personal branding.

Since then, she has worked on social media and influencer marketing campaigns in-house and in agency settings, most recently creating these programs from the ground up at Keeper Security, a cybersecurity and password management platform with headquarters in Chicago, Illinois. Cait avidly believes that video is the most powerful marketing tool an organization or person can use.

Follow Cait Hassett on LinkedIn.

Be sure to follow our hosts on LinkedIn:

Say hi to Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

If you are looking for a community of support within cybersecurity, join our private Slack group, the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter as well!

The Successes and Failures of Being a CMO with Charles Gold

Wed, 29 Nov 2023 08:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Charles Gold, Chief Marketing Officer at ThreatConnect, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss why CMOs fail or succeed.

To begin, Charles shares his background in running global marketing organizations. He even started a technology company during the dot-com boom time period.

Then the group discusses a ton of CMO topics, including how CMOs fail and succeed at the role, and how Charles conducted 30 interviews (!!!) to land the company a superstar employee.

Charles' best advice for marketers in security?

"If you can understand what the product does and how people use it, that will help you communicate with engineers and have credibility with customers. If you don't have this understanding, it’s really limiting."

Links:

Learn more about Charles Gold.

It’s Okay to Be Funny - Even in Marketing! Replay from CyberMarketingCon 2021

Wed, 22 Nov 2023 08:00:00 -0000

When you think humor, comedy, LOL, or even LMFAO if you are fancy, cybersecurity isn't typically the first thing that comes to mind. But who says talking about ROI, demand gen, and marketing has to be boring? Humor exists in everything, and with so much access to ridiculousness (memes, reaction videos, reviews, or TikTok hot takes), anything can be made funny.

Which is why we are replaying: It's Okay to Be Funny - Even in Marketing, from CyberMarketingCon2021. A session by comedic wizard Tricia Howard, a.k.a. Tricia Kicks SaaS, Senior Technical Writer at Akamai Technologies. The session focuses on how to infuse humor into cybersecurity marketing. Tricia uses her background as a theater major and stand-up comedian turned marketer, diving into various joke formats, and emphasizing the importance of understanding the cybersecurity community.

Key points that Trisha discusses:

➡️ "Pun-liners" – a fusion of puns and one-liners.

➡️ Anatomy of a Joke, and Rule of Three – breaks the joke down into subject, setup, and punchline.

➡️ The popularity of memes in social media marketing and the need for quick turnaround due to meme time sensitivity.

➡️ Creativity and Adaptation – creativity in content creation and the adaptive repurposing of content across different platforms.

➡️ Legal Considerations – the importance of giving credit for borrowed content and being mindful of copyright issues.

➡️ ROI Measurement – Social media metrics, like impressions and engagement rates, are important for measuring the success of humorous content in marketing.

More great sessions at #CyberMarketingCon2023 here, see you in Texas! 🤠

Follow Tricia Kicks SaaS on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Exploring Escaping Rooms and Branding Challenges with Amy Stokes-Waters

Wed, 15 Nov 2023 08:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Amy Stokes Waters, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Esc, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss cybersecurity escape rooms and marketing.

Amy starts off today’s episode by explaining how marketing teams use Esc for team building activities and they are given different scenarios with clues where they have to get the data back. They also have some phishing exercises where participants can have a video call with an AI bot. This is not only fun, but also teaches you more about the dangers of cybersecurity mistakes! Right now, Esc is only available for hire in the United Kingdom since this company has been rebranding, but they are discussing the idea of expanding. Amy started in sales and has been in the industry for a long time. She remembers going to a Reframe women’s technology conference in England and in one session, the speaker said, “Don't just do cool stuff, but actually tell people you are doing cool stuff.” This discussion changed her whole outlook and trajected her into the marketing realm. They talk about the importance of investing in yourself to grow professionally.

Next, Amy discusses the challenges in marketing including branding. If the branding looks nice, it is so much easier to sell the product, and the company looks more professional and established. The other challenge is how to be different and to not have the same cookie cutter messaging. Amy says if people don't know what service you are selling, then how will they ever buy it? You need to make it as easy as humanly possible to buy from you. Personality is also a critical aspect for being successful, and there needs to be faces associated with the brand as well. Marketing makes the brand, but the sales team has to be the people vocalizing that. Both marketing and sales have to work as one and need to align with each other. They also discuss their favorite words in marketing and how to push the envelope in the field. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Amy would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Learn more about Amy Stokes Waters.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

3 Types of Competitive Intelligence All Cybersecurity Marketers Should Know! Replay from CyberMarketingCon 2022

Wed, 08 Nov 2023 08:00:00 -0000

Competitive intelligence programs can be reactionary and one-dimensional due to squeaky-wheel syndrome and we-just-lost-a-deal-to-so-and-so-itis.

Learn from Alex Babar, Vice President of Solutions at Brinqa about 3 categories of competitive intel every marketer in cybersecurity should know about: Marketing, Business, and Technical. Additionally, learn which categories marketers are particularly well-suited to leading and which ones make better sense to collaborate on with other teams like product, customer success, or sales engineers.

In this session:

Cut through the competitive noise in cyber security!
Learn the right teams for the proper competitive responsibilities!
3 simple but powerful competitive analysis frameworks!

We have approximately 33 days until #CyberMarketingCon2023, held December 10-13! We can’t help but reminisce and replay some of the amazing sessions from previous conferences. This week’s episode is from CyberMarketingCon2022, with a session by Alex Babar, Vice President of Solutions at Brinqa. If you enjoy this session, you will enjoy this year’s lineup filled with education, the best speakers, hands-on workshops, and networking, networking, AND MORE networking!

More on #CyberMarketingCon2023 here, see you in Texas! 🤠

Be sure to watch a video version of this session here.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

From the Horse’s Mouth: CISO Q&A - CyberMarketingCon2022 Replay Session

Wed, 25 Oct 2023 07:00:00 -0000

Since #CyberMarketingCon2023 is coming on December 10th through 13th. We can’t help but replay some of our sessions from previous conferences. This week’s episode is from CyberMarketingCon2022. If you enjoy this session, you will enjoy this year’s lineup filled with education, the best speakers, hands-on workshops, networking, networking, AND MORE networking!

We cannot wait to see you. Enjoy this episode and be sure to get your ticket by clicking ➡️➡️➡️here!

The From the Horse's Mouth: CISO Q&A session is an in-depth conversation about reaching the unreachable buyer. Join us to hear security executives share their insights on why they buy, how they buy, and where they buy.

The speakers are:

Michele Perry, Operating Partner at Elsewhere Partners

Rick Howard, Chief Security Officer, Chief Analyst, and Senior Fellow at N2K Networks

Jaclyn Miller, Co-Founder and Chief Operations Officer(COO) at Stealth Startup

Ted Wagner, VP and CISO at SAP National Security Services

In this session you will find:

1️⃣ What works and doesn’t work in getting a security executive’s attention?

2️⃣ Message trust, message fatigue, and what you can do about it.

3️⃣ Trusted information sources and how security executives use them.

4️⃣ Positioning and messaging that is meaningful to decision-makers.

5️⃣ The security executive’s purchasing behavior and why skepticism is the driving force.

The speakers will talk more in-depth about the day in the life of a CISO, and how you can balance innovation and platform suites when considering products/services. From how do you develop trust with your vendors or potential vendors, the boundaries around when to how to contact a vendor and what is the acceptable amount of time for a call back from a potential vendor. The panelists also dive into who are the evangelists that people listen to and how a company can create their own evangelists.

By the end, the host opened the floor for audience questions:

How big is it a disadvantage to require an email/gate to download content?

Any advice you have for vendor websites?

How involved would you be in a customer advisory board or executive retreat?

Why do you not give survey data much merit (to Rick)?

Do you have a preference for virtual or live events?

More on #CyberMarketingCon2023 here, see you in Texas! 🤠

Be sure to watch a video version of this session here.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Demand Gen Strategies: Insights from Sonrai Security’s Joseph Barringhaus

Wed, 18 Oct 2023 07:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Joseph Barringhaus, Director of Demand Generation at Sonrai Security, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss all things demand gen.

Sonrai Security is a cloud security startup that focuses on identity, access, and permission in the cloud. To begin, Joseph shares that he has been in the world of cybersecurity and cloud for some time. The ability to build things from the ground up is what he has loved most about working at startups. Then, he explains his current role as Director of Demand Gen at Sonrai. He is responsible for creating awareness for the company’s products first and foremost, while also making sure that awareness is brought into the pipeline. Thanks to Sonrai’s close relationship with their sales team, Joseph is able to work closely with the entire funnel all the way through the customer journey. His strategy focuses on content syndication and later-stage funnel indicators. He clarifies that he is not in favor of un-gating everything. On the flip side, when things do come out that promote the company, like an e-book, Sonrai will typically un-gate the content to encourage more people to read it. More often than not, Joseph is an advocate for un-gating the things that he and his team put lots of time and effort into.

Then, Joseph unpacks MQL and demand gen. Sharing his perspective on brand awareness, Joseph stresses the importance of finding your market audience and the appropriate balance for your specific company. There is real value in knowing where someone remembers you from, which of your marketing strategies did and didn’t work, and how many touches it took for a customer to recognize the brand. Before wrapping up, Joseph shares his best advice for making time in the week for product knowledge and learning. In addition to keeping a detailed calendar, Joseph maintains a close relationship with the sales team to hear about what the market is saying through the team. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Joseph would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Learn more about Joseph Barringhaus.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Healthy & Profitable Vendor-Reseller Relationships - Replay from CyberMarketingCon 2022

Wed, 11 Oct 2023 07:00:00 -0000

The time for #CyberMarketingCon2023 is fast approaching and we hope to see you in Austin in December. So mark those calendars and get your tickets, the conference will be from December 10th through 13th. It's filled with education, the best speakers, hands-on workshops, networking, networking, AND MORE networking.

Maria and Gianna cannot wait to see you. Enjoy this episode and be sure to get your ticket by clicking ➡️➡️➡️here!

In this session, the focus was on understanding the dynamics of channel partner relationships in the cybersecurity industry. The two speakers, Amanda McLaughlin, Director of Mid-Atlantic Marketing at GuidePoint Security (Former Marketing Manager for GuidePoint Security), and David Brown, Head of Global Alliance and Partner Marketing at ReversingLabs (Former Director, Global Partner Marketing at ZEROFOX) are on a mission to educate and dispel misconceptions about VAR (Value-Added Reseller) and vendor relationships while also providing valuable tips and tricks on how to establish and maintain healthy VAR and vendor relationships.

Here are the key points covered:

Promoting a better understanding of VAR and vendor relationships. Also highlighting their significance in the context of the cybersecurity industry.
An in-depth explanation of what a VAR is: “entities that offer not only products but also their expertise and services in conjunction with solutions provided by solution providers.” The speakers used GuidePoint Security as an example as it is a cybersecurity VAR offering its services and expertise to clients.
Addressing Misunderstandings: Amanda and David acknowledged that VAR and reseller relationships can be misunderstood, which is something similar to the classic sales and marketing relationship. But they also highlight how important it is to clear misunderstandings to establish effective partnerships.
To close the session the speakers also went into what a successful vendor looks like to a VAR. The key metrics for success and some tips if you feel like your reseller relationship is not working? They also opened the floor for some questions!

More on #CyberMarketingCon2023 here, see you in Texas! 🤠

Be sure to watch a video version of this session here

Follow Amanda on LinkedIn.

Check out David on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Making Lead Gen Work with CMO Geordie Carswell

Wed, 04 Oct 2023 11:39:38 -0000

In this episode, Geordie Carswell, CMO at ActualTech Media joins Maria and Gianna to talk about the stuff no marketer wants to talk about right now: lead generation and content syndication! Can lead generation be a successful part of a demand generation strategy? Is there a right way to use content syndication for a cybersecurity audience? What are the strategies - and company qualities - needed to make these successful? Listen to find out!

The guest and hosts use their demand gen backgrounds to jam on webinars, content, and other forms of creating engagement with cybersecurity audiences:

The relevance of different webinar topics
Considering whether to go broad or niche based on specific goals.
The importance of personalization and alignment in lead-generation efforts

Plus…learn a little something about grocery store marketing 🤭

Listen for shop talk and laughs on today’s episode, and make sure to check out ActualTech Media!

About ActualTech Media:

Lead generation in cybersecurity can be costly and finding an affordable webinar provider who can cover all your needs like one-of-a-kind post-event reporting, recordings, and analytics can be difficult. This is why our friends, one of our sponsors for #CyberMarketingCon2023, ActualTech Media might just be a perfect fit for your webinar needs! ActualTech has low CPL costs that will help you generate QUALITY cybersecurity buyer leads and sales opportunity pipeline😁!

Links:

Learn more about ActualTech Media here: https://www.actualtechmedia.com/cms/

Follow Geordie on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Hope to see you at CyberMarketingCon this year!

Exploring Underrepresented Cybersecurity Markets with Jake Milstein

Wed, 27 Sep 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Jake Milstein, CRO, and CMO at Critical Insight, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss his unique perspective on serving underrepresented cybersecurity markets, the importance of establishing trust and personal connection with clients, and more.

To begin, Jake shares what makes his job different now that he has the additional role of CRO. One of his favorite parts about his unique perspective is that he can see operations through every step of the way, from the funnel and down the line to customer experience. His responsibilities include marketing, sales, and customer success. He finds that the best CMOs he knows are those who get involved in customer conversations and have a clear understanding of their product market fit. Jake spent 20 years in the journalism field of TV news broadcasting. He believes that where journalism and cybersecurity overlap is in their efforts to give people the facts to help them make educated decisions.

Next, Jake shares how Critical Insight came to focus specifically on the underserved cyber markets thanks to the experience of the company’s co-founders. They provide consulting services to help clients prepare for an attack, soft services to help detect an attack quickly, and the tools to respond decisively when an attack does happen. Hospitals in rural areas, for example, want a provider whom they can trust and have a personal relationship with. A major part of Critical Insight’s marketing strategy is showing up to conferences and events in these rural areas and following up with the people they meet there.

Then, Jake sheds light on how the company was able to scale at the rate it did by establishing personal connections and authenticity with the people it serves. He has found that showing up automatically makes you memorable by default. Any time a major national event occurs, Critical Insight hosts an urgent panel webinar in which they present the facts and then have a panel of experts discuss the topic. Before wrapping up, Jake and our hosts discuss the challenge of incorporating humor into cybersecurity. Finally, they engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Jake would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Jake on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Insights into Cybersecurity: From the Economy, CMOs to Brand Awareness with Mandeep Khera

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Mandeep Khera, CMO of SecureAuth, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss the market and economy, changing responsibilities for CMOs, and the role of brand awareness from his perspective.

To begin, Mandeep shares the story of his role as CMO. His career began in finance before shifting to marketing and then cybersecurity. He recognized that the cybersecurity industry was here to stay and decided to devote his career to the field. His security work in the areas of email, application, network, and cloud led him to the authentication space where he is today. He highlights that we are going through a period of headwinds in the industry, but that it isn’t all doom and gloom. It is a matter of being patient, sticking with it, and continuing to do the right things. He predicts that in 6-9 months, the economy will start bouncing back. With that, he shares the pivots that he believes cybersecurity professionals should be taking to accommodate these budget changes while keeping their team focused and happy. This means eliminating things that don’t matter and increasing focus on the most critical areas.

Next, he offers his perspective on brand awareness, which is best done by thought leadership. He believes that brand awareness should be tied into different campaigns to be the most effective. On the other hand, the role of the CMO has become more challenging than ever. Most important, Mandeep reveals, is making sure you as the CMO are in tune with your CEO, CRO, CCO, and CFO. Another important mindset for CMOs right now is to be more quality and quantity-driven, focusing on ROI and thinking and acting out of the box to stand out. One of his main focuses right now is how to improve the website conversion rate. On the subject of edgy campaigns, Mandeep shares a few of his favorite campaigns he has worked on in his career. As a CMO, one of your responsibilities is to encourage your team to be bold in their risk-taking. All ideas are good ideas until ideas start to be filtered, and everyone can come up with a clever idea. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Mandeep would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Mandeep on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Unveiling the Magic in Cybersecurity Marketing with Terra Cooke

Wed, 13 Sep 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Terra Cooke, Cybersecurity Governance and Risk Compliance Manager at Boom Supersonic. She is also a huge advocate for black women in tech.

To begin, Terra shares that she has been in the cybersecurity field for 15 years. She shares how she got interested in the cybersecurity field as a young person in the dial-up days. From a very early age, she knew she wanted to be in tech. Her background is in network security and she earned a very early cybersecurity degree at college. Her first job out of college was as a Information Systems Security Engineer at the NSA. In 2014, she was offered an auditing position elsewhere, where she stayed for several years. One of her favorite things about auditing is seeing people experience their own “aha moments”. Then, Tara gives listeners an idea of what a typical day for her looks like. As a GRC, she is often wearing many different hats throughout the day.

Then, Terra shares that she refers to herself as a “magical girl” because she is always able to execute the tasks she is faced with. Within the boundaries around her, she does whatever it takes to execute a vision. We all have our own strengths and weaknesses and Terra’s happens to be executing. She loves to collect data to assist her in this execution. She is also inspired by the Black Girl Magic movement several years ago. Then, she normalized the idea of setting professional boundaries. One of the most important things for GRC professionals to avoid while evaluating vendors is to buy tools simply for the sake of buying them, and ending up with poor implementations. Next, she shares her own process for looking at new vendors. Before wrapping up, she identifies the needs within the cybersecurity industry. Simply put, we should all be treating each other as humans with mutual respect when speaking with vendors. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Terra would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Terra on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

ChatGPT vs storytelling with David Ebner

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, David Ebner, Founder of Content Workshop, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss the future of writing.

To begin, David offers his own thoughts on ChatGPT. Like any new form of technology, it is understandable that the initial launch of ChatGPT was met with hesitation. Simply put, ChatGPT is a language processing tool that works on probability. Davis sees it more as a muse than a replacement for genuine writing. Content Workshop, he explains, is a storytelling agency helping brands tell their stories to drive new business and leverage their goals. It has not been possible for them to leverage AI to help with their writing simply because AI is not able to convey empathy. Next, hear what storytelling means to David. What really makes storytelling a work of art is its ability to inspire connection and bring an audience to a place they were not at prior to reading the content. Every piece of content should entertain, elevate, and engage their audience in this exact order.

Shifting gears, David explains how engaging people makes for a loyal audience, and loyal audiences will think about your brand and look towards you for answers in times of need. It is so crucial to make content entertaining so that it doesn’t feel like a chore for audiences to read. Content workshop takes a unique approach in which they aim to embody the life of the individual, rather than the brand. What problem led them to the brand initially? How is the person's life better now that they have discovered the brand? A brand is not a color or logo, but rather what lives in the hearts and minds of the viewer. From a tone point of view, it’s important to have a brand identity and voice first. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career David would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow David on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Conversion Rates at Checkpoint with Head of Digital Strategy and Operations at CheckPoint Technologies , Sean Mattson

Wed, 30 Aug 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Sean Mattson, Head of Digital Strategy and Operations at Checkpoint Technologies, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss conversion rates and personalization.

To begin, Sean discusses his role at Checkpoint as the management of all digital channels including websites, outbound, marketing automation, digital intelligence, globalization, and SEOs. He has been doing marketing for 20+ years and has 15 people on his current team. Since the team is so small, they use tools like Marketo to help automate tasks. Sean built everything from the ground up in this company and Checkpoint was known as the firewall creator. They needed to work on SEOs and after two years of brand awareness, the traffic on their website went up by 700%. They cross linked all the pages on their own website. They also talk about how the quality over the quantity matters, and how to create leads that can be marketed. Checkpoint does progressive profiling and uses third party data services to do backend form enrichment. This created a 60% lift for Marketo landing page, but Sean asked, “why wait till I’m walking away before you show me any content?”

Then, Sean discusses how Checkpoint uses Hushly for self-nurturing landing pages that has been a game-changer for the company. Hushly sets a preview of the content as the landing page itself, so they are presented with content and value first. Then, the audience can decide whether you like it first. It is in a single field form, and you can set as many pages as you want. There is also a column on the side with alternate content if you don’t like the first page. Hushly provides the service, but Checkpoint also uses clear bit forms and zoom info forms. This is enriched in real time and there is a 25% conversion rate across the whole library. In addition, Checkpoint Technologies is rolling out resource hubs for geo sites in 11 languages and this will expand their reach. They are also using Smartling AI. Translating a website is easy, but the whole cycle is difficult to keep consistent and managed. Hushly will help translate all the PDFs and assets as well. There is a fine line between personalization and stock authorization; you need to personalize it without making it extremely obvious. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Sean would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Sean on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

How to Have a Successful Funny Cybersecurity Campaign with Deidre Frith

Wed, 23 Aug 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, the hosts are joined by Deidre Frith, the Director of Marketing at Real Time IT. With over 15 years of experience in marketing, Deidre is a one-stop shop for all things creative, social media, graphic design, and PR. She is known for her innovative and humorous marketing campaigns that have garnered attention and success for her company.

The episode opens with a discussion of the success of the funny commercial campaign that Deidre created for her company, as well as her approach to cybersecurity marketing.

Deidre also shares insights into the idea and execution behind the campaign, and the results it has achieved, and emphasizes why word-of-mouth marketing is still so important. She also talks about her team and the challenges of tracking ROI for traditional media.

Lastly, Deidre dives into her cybersecurity awareness initiatives that include a quarterly poster campaign and a dedicated cybersecurity website.

The hosts close this episode with our favorite game where Gianna and Maria guess what Deidre would be doing if she wasn't in marketing. Who wins this time? All bets are on the table!

Links:

Follow Deidre on LinkedIn

Check out Hey Y’all Wraps on LinkedIn

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Effective Email Marketing with Josh Feigenbaum

Wed, 09 Aug 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts, and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Josh Feigenbaum, Marketing Manager at Sentra, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss effective email marketing.

To begin, Josh starts off by sharing how almost everyone in the industry has made the mistake where you have sent an email to the wrong chain or group. He gets his creativity from what people have been complaining about, including marketing, campaigns, sales, or what they wish existed. Josh also says he likes to play against what people expect to see in their inboxes by making his emails not look like every other email. The most creative thing he’s done was sending out a Merry Christmas email with a surprise at the very end. The surprise was that if they responded back with a time, they would give a fake cyber security phone call to get you out of something with your family over the holidays. They actually had two people participate in it! He also says creativity is not just the email itself, but the offer as well. He also likes to include gifs of himself that are new and different with a caption underneath. Josh shares that he will put emojis into the subject line if it adds to the email, but he doesn’t like emojis if they are pointless.

Then, Josh shares how with email marketing, there really is no specific time or day that is best to send out an email. He does say the subject line and content of the email matter more than when you send it. The last time he tried content indication leads, it was not successful but he would try it again. He did warm the lists up with a couple of emails, but they had zero idea what they read. In addition, Josh states it is best to benchmark against yourself with emails. You need to keep improving and the trend lines need to keep going up. They also discuss how companies are not strict enough with emailing only the people affected by that email subject– they do not need to include employees in emails when they opt out of them. They also say not to include people in the email chain list if they haven’t opened an email in the last 90 days. This could affect the sending quality if you don’t have reasonable open rates. Josh also shares how the cybersecurity marketing society is a great tool to use to see what other people say about vendors. He checks the Slack group to check reviews. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Josh would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Josh on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

How to Have a Successful Webinar with Brian Whipple

Wed, 02 Aug 2023 16:40:00 -0000

In this episode, Brian Whipple, a longtime member of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society, joins Maria and Gianna to share his impressive knowledge on how to create successful, record-breaking webinars in the cybersecurity industry.

Brian Whipple is a Marketing Manager at Conetrix and Tandem. He highlights how important it is to treat webinars as a valuable product that provides value to the audience - not as simply something you “do” because you have to do it as part of the marketing mix.

Brian talks about the key factors that contribute to the success of their webinars, including:

Carefully selecting topics
Having knowledgeable and engaging speakers
Practice, practice, practice! (Yes, even for webinars)
And to constantly refine the content

According to Whipple, it's important to focus on positive signals and feedback rather than hard KPIs, while also looking at how making small tweaks to webinar formats can help improve lead generation from these activities. Brian and his team’s approach to webinars has led to significant growth in attendance and positive feedback from their audience.

The episode closes with the ladies going head to head on their favorite game of guessing what the guest might be if they didn't choose their current career path. Someone’s guilty conscience leads them to confess to cheating in the game. Brian also promises to write down what the hosts might say when they first meet him at the CyberMarketingCon2023 in Austin. Also to find Brian online, DO NOT google him as there’s another Brian who is more “Successful and slightly better looking,” Check out our guest Brian Whipple in our links below!

Links:

Follow Brian Whipple on LinkedIn.Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Becoming a Community Marketing Expert with Derek Weeks

Wed, 26 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts, and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Derek Weeks, author and CEO of Unfair Mindshare, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss community.

To begin, Derek shares that he has been working in community marketing for many years. He found that many people did not understand what community marketing is or how to succeed. Unfair Mindshare is all about showing CMOs and marketing leaders how to integrate community marketing as part of an overall integrated marketing program in order to elevate their brands and increase customer retention. This is what Derek unpacks in his book, Unfair Mindshare. He describes marketing in 3 orbits: product-led, brand-led, and community-led. While the first two orbits are transactional, the latter is really about collaboration and working together. The biggest red flag that you might be doing the community orbit wrong is if you find yourself talking about yourself often. As a CMO, your primary goal is to promote your company and products, build pipelines and drive revenue. However, Derek explains how CMOs can attract an even larger audience by not talking about themselves but being helpful from the beginning.

Next, Derek outlines how to build the best team for a successful community-building operation. He sees community marketing as another functional area within marketing that is equipped with dedicated staff. This function can be 5-10% of the total marketing budget. However, it requires at least 1,000 hours of work per year in order to make a large enough impact. This means that one person on your team should spend at least 50% of their time focusing on this one area. Your team is responsible for creating either a new community or leading within an existing community. Before wrapping up, Derek offers his best advice to listeners.

Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Derek would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Derek on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Creating and Being a Creator in Cybersecurity with Kenneth Ellington

Wed, 19 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Kenneth Ellington, security consultant at Ernst & Young and the founder of Ellington Cyber Academy, joins our hosts to discuss how to foster positive engagement.

Kenneth Ellington is a security consultant at Ernst & Young and the founder of Ellington Cyber Academy and has been in the cybersecurity field for over four years. Ellington talks to Gianna and Maria about his journey into cybersecurity, from starting out as an intern at Publix to becoming a security consultant at Ernst & Young. In the age of social media, he emphasizes the importance of having your own voice and being unique to be able to stand out in the crowd when working on your personal brand.

The years in the industry have taught him the power of networking and being able to build a community that you can always rely on:

"It's not what you know, it's who knows you." - Kenneth Ellington

He also highlights diversity and is especially passionate about advocating for more people of color to get into cybersecurity doing this through his Ellington Cyber Academy. He also offers tips for content creation and personal branding in the cybersecurity industry.

The episode closes with our usual favorite game where Gianna and Maria guess what Kenneth would be doing if he was not in cybersecurity. Who wins? Listen to the episode to find out!

The ladies can be quite competitive, it’s even hilarious as Maria tries and fails to convince Kenneth to join her on her quest to add him to her list of candidates to open a food truck with!

Links:

Follow Kenneth on LinkedIn

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Unconventionally Breaking Through into Marketing with Marc Blackmer

Wed, 12 Jul 2023 09:13:41 -0000

In this episode, Marc Blackmer, VP of Marketing at Corero Network Security, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss breaking through into marketing, green and red flags in companies and so much more.

Corero Network Security is a leader in real-time with high-performance DDoS defense solutions. Service providers, hosting providers, and digital enterprises rely on Corero’s award-winning technology to eliminate the DDoS threat to their environment through automatic attack detection and mitigation. This industry-leading technology delivers flexible protection that scales to tens of terabits, on-premises and in the cloud, with a dramatically lower cost of ownership than previously possible.

Marc takes us on his journey of how he moved to California after deciding to take a year off from college to pursue music. He was involved in marketing for 10-12 years, Marc said getting the job was easy however, but the actual job wasn’t easy. He wanted to be perfect from the beginning, but you can’t be when you are starting out and still learning.

Marc also tells Maria and Gianna about some red and green flags to look out for when doing interviews with companies. He states that alignment between marketing, sales, and the product team is extremely important in a company.

The leaders in each of these areas need to:

Communicate,
Agree on messaging and where the product is going.
While working together.

He also motivates people to listen to themselves more, when things don’t feel right, they likely aren’t. If companies ask people to do things that are not okay in interviews, then imagine what would it be like working for them.

When looking for green flags in leaders, he advises looking for leaders who are focused, friendly, energetic, and know what they want. Leaders who have a clear and realistic vision. While his advice to marketers is to get to know people, network, and be open to the idea that things that will change. There will be positives that come from change, and you will learn from it.

Links:

Follow Marc Blackmer on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

How to Foster Positive Engagement with Steve LaChance

Wed, 05 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Steve LaChance, Founder and CEO of discernr, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss how to foster positive engagement.

Discernr is a consultancy centered around product market fit for product led growth. They are currently building out some digital tools to make the process even more accessible. The company helps organizations at all stages of their PLG journey. Engagement, Steve explains, is a conversation that organizations of all sizes should be having. He also shares how he deals with burnout in the workplace. All leaders should be aware of the importance of maintaining a positive team dynamic in order to steer their staff away from burnout themselves. To do this, leaders and employees alike should each share their own expectations for their role and projected growth. While burnout typically means the employee is gone for good, disengagement is when an employee tends to stick with the bare minimum.

Then, Steve shares his best tactics to inspire change within his team. Step one is around daily communication of both expectations and outcomes. Listeners are reminded that when employees feel they are just doing tedious work, they tend to build up resentment for the work. Leaders should ensure their employees feel like they matter and that their work is appreciated and useful for someone. Sometimes, an employee’s lack of engagement can also be a result of a lack of career advancement opportunities. If a leader is not providing a path towards learning and knowing how to level up their skillset, the employee will end up providing those things for themselves and will ultimately leave your team. Steve explains that career advancement does not always mean a succession of higher job titles. Many people are much happier as senior analysts or marketers than they would be in a C-suite position. Before wrapping up, our hosts and guest reiterate the necessity of career advancement for employee retention. Finally, they engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Steve would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Steve LaChance on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Maximizing Your Branding Potential with Shlomi Ashkenazy

Wed, 28 Jun 2023 13:08:34 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Shlomi Ashkenazy, Head of Brand at Cybellum, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss how to maximize your branding potential.

To begin, Shlomi defines branding as the core narrative and story your organization wants to tell. This narrative can be uncovered by asking customers key driving questions to determine how their perception grows over time. These questions may include things like How well do you know our company? Who do you see us as? and What do we do? Brand momentum is typically generated from a combination of what you do as a founder and the work of the sales team. Next, Shlomi shares his story of tying brand into a venture capital investment. It all comes down to convincing investors that something big is in store for your idea. Shlomi sees branding as an engineering discipline as if you are building out a product scientifically. It requires less intuition and more customer feedback.

Next, Shlomi speaks to how companies can stand out in such a crowded market like cybersecurity. The first thing to do is try to simplify things as much as possible to help people better understand what you do. Then, try to find a niche and really stick with it. He also shares about the efforts he has made which didn’t work out as planned. As long as you remain agile and can afford to make mistakes, there is always something to be learned when things don’t work out. He also shares his discovery that a CEO is not important for a brand, but rather the CEO is the brand. The best way to know when your company’s story is not working is when the sales team is unhappy. If, after trying it out and it still isn’t sticking, it’s time to change direction. In the first few years of operations, around 30-40% of a brand’s budget should go to marketing. Finally, they engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Shlomi would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Shlomi Ashkenazy on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Partner Marketing: Strategies and Best Practices with Emily Cadwallader

Wed, 21 Jun 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts, and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Emily Cadwallader, Partner Marketing Manager at Binary Defense, shares her expertise with Gianna and Maria.

Emily first joined Binary Defense as a marketing specialist wearing lots of hats. Once the company found its footing in channel strategy, Emily was able to focus all her efforts on that specific area. Channel marketing differs slightly from more traditional marketing, she explains, because it requires a more strategy-focused approach. When it comes to making things exciting, Emily believes that consistent contact with partners is super important. In terms of being there for marketing and collaboration, your partners can almost serve as an extension of your sales team. Emily and her team at Binary Defense work closely with their partners to ensure they are involved in quarterly training and staying up to date with the latest offerings.

Among Binary Defense’s partners include one tenure, several who are currently onboarding, and both regional and national partners. The first step of their most recent portal revamps was understanding what their ideal partner profile looked like. Next, Emily shares some of the company’s most successful field events. If a partner already has their year of marketing strategy planned out for the year, it can be a great opportunity to tie in with them. Many partners have a cyber-specific day in which they come to evaluate their clients and prospects. Then, she elaborated on centralizing communications and activities and why it is so important for a successful partner program. These come in two forms: centralizing your communications internally and keeping consistent, open communication with your partners.

Emily received the Star Performer Award at Binary for her work as a partner marketer. She unpacks some of the qualities of someone who excels in partner marketing. First and foremost, you need to be a good communicator and have prior experience in the different avenues of marketing. This role can’t be done alone, so the ability to collaborate with others is key. Finally, they engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Jennifer would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Emily Cadwallader on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

CPF Coaching & Breaking Into Cybersecurity with Christophe Foulon

Thu, 15 Jun 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Christophe Foulon, cybersecurity manager at a Fortune 500 company and Founder of CPF Coaching, joins Maria and Gianna.

To begin, Christophe shares that his idea for CPF Coaching came from the pandemic when many cybersecurity employees moved from in-office to remote work. He noticed they struggled with communication, collaboration, and influence in the new setting. His marketing experience comes into play here as he must convince leaders that cybersecurity is crucial to their business. He would sum up his entire career as the connection between the people and the technical side. In addition, Christophe also hosts the Breaking Into Cybersecurity podcast, which stems from his own experience and challenges of breaking into cybersecurity. He is also the author of two books about cybersecurity.

Next, Christophe unpacks how marketers already have the skills needed to break into the cybersecurity field. These skills include communication, collaboration, influence, and prior knowledge of your industry. Together, all these skills can work together to help the business solve solutions in a different way than those from a purely technical standpoint. Today, Christophe’s clients as a consultant include different lines of business within a large credit card division, each looking to deliver solutions for their different types of clients. His job is to deliver solutions and ensure that their data is protected. Looking towards the future, his following vision is to lead a security program for a mid-large size organization to help influence the development of a great cybersecurity pipeline and help implement planned growth.

Christophe offers his best advice for navigating these tricky waters. Figure out what problems you want to solve, how you can solve them, and what might set you apart from the competition, and then work with leaders to see where they might be in their program and how your solution can help. Finally, they engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Christophe would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Christophe Foulon on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Christophe’s books:

Develop Your Cybersecurity Career Path: How to Break into Cybersecurity at any Level

Hack the Cybersecurity Interview: A complete interview preparation guide for jumpstarting your cybersecurity career

Cyber CMO Wisdom with Ashish Kuthiala

Wed, 07 Jun 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Ashish Kuthiala, CMO of Traceable AI joins Maria and Gianna.

To begin, Ashish shares his path to his current role. He was raised in several different countries and was able to experience different cultures, countries and schooling systems firsthand. He moved to the U.S. for his studies 25 years ago and now calls the country home. He has since worked in computer science, computer engineering, code writing product development and in various roles on the business side. His introduction to marketing was in product marketing, where he was able to merge his engineering background and his love for connecting people. Traceable is Ashish’s fifth startup, which he came to in the very beginning stages of the launch.

Each company Asish has worked for has taught him value lessons and skills which he has brought on to the next. With the mindset of experimenting a lot, learning from your experiments and reiterating a lot to find out what does and doesn't work, he believes you will be successful in any role. As a leader, it is crucial to build a culture in which employees feel free to experiment and learn from their failures. A key goal of marketing is to build a sales pipeline, which takes time and patience. Each quarter, he and his team look at all of the data to determine where they are on their trajectory.

Next, Ashish unpacks his fundamental approach to marketing. Today, most IT buyers educate themselves before deciding on a software. They already know what problems they want to solve, who can do it best and how much they should be paying for the service. From a marketing perspective, the most critical pieces are to be transparent, trustworthy and know your stakeholders. Employees and customers alike should be passionate about what they are building and eager to talk about it. He also addresses the common privacy concerns that transparency entails. This all comes down to velocity and moving faster than our competitors. Finally, our hosts and guest engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Ashish would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Ashish Kuthiala on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

It’s 2008 Again…Everything Old & Horrible is New Again with Jennifer Leggio

Wed, 31 May 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts, and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Jennifer Leggio, CMO at Netography, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss the changes she has seen in marketing throughout her career.

To begin, Jennifer shares that she began her career in journalism. In 2000, she decided to make a change and moved to Silicon Valley. She first worked for a small PR agency specializing in cybersecurity for clients. Here, she was able to spin her journalism background into PR. She fell in love with working at startups. Then, Jennifer shares her perspective that comm is separate from marketing before unpacking her perspective of the current market shift. Marketing and the economy come and go in cycles. Throughout her career so far, Jennifer has found that security is very resilient and an always-needed market.

After unpacking how the journey of buyers and marketers has changed, hear what marketers can do to make sure our heads are above water with these changes. Jennifer shares that, sadly, many companies have had to make major cutbacks for their marketing teams, and there will likely be even more to come. Some leaders are making these decisions based on 2008 principles of how marketing is done. Jennifer talks a lot about the importance of doing “outside-in” programs, meaning going where the buyers are. While a sales force is important to build a business, it can’t be the only area companies rely on for growth and scale. Cutting off the resources which are more difficult to track right away will nearly always backfire.

The best communications, Jennifer explains, include industry analysts. This all comes back to go where your buyers are rather than waiting for them to come to you. Getting the right type of content that ties into your values and will move a buyer persona in the right direction requires a strong communication team. Before wrapping up, Jennifer shares her best advice for sales and marketing alignment and tips for marketers who want to become CMOs one day. Finally, they engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Jennifer would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Follow Jennifer Leggio on LinkedIn.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Journey Into Security And Digital Experience: Exploring Different Personas And Strategies For AR Program with Ashish Malpani

Wed, 24 May 2023 11:36:00 -0000

! In this episode, Ashish Malpani, the head of global product marketing for DX, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss the journey into cyber security and digital experience for AR programs.

Ashish shares his thoughts on digital experience, how they provide the right tools to maintain good cyber hygiene, and how to improve the cyber security program. They also try to see what the customer experience is like. He goes on and explains how DX team is spread out in different parts, the types of content Ashish sees resonating so well with developers and technical customers. There are things you can do to reach out to the practitioner developer audience but still reach a high level of management in the IT space. Ashish explains that in the space of cyber security, we are either victims of it or itself serving the narrative.

Ashish further explains how he dealt with analyst relation programs in the past, He explains the different analyst firms and their categorization. Foresters spend a lot of the time in research doing analyst experience, which is the experience of your product to cybersecurity analyst within the company. He shares the tips to get the most out of your product analyst. Ashish shares his opinion on the employee-to-analyst ratio and why marketers need to know employee to analyst ratio. Ashish also tells us how many people are at his firm vs. employees. Market studies can be future looking, but it’s a challenge for product marketers to talk about the future and address today's reality. People need to evolve their cyber security programs to address the needs of tomorrow.

Before wrapping up, Ashish is engaged by our hosts in a fun guessing game to reveal what career he would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Follow Ashish Malponi on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Website

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Sip some #RSAC2023 tea with Maria and Gianna... From Innovative Booths to the Reunion of Marketers and Co-Marketing Activities.

Wed, 17 May 2023 09:00:00 -0000

Welcome to Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts, and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer! In this episode, Gianna and Maria share some powerful insights into cybersecurity marketing society, what they do, and what other cybersecurity marketing societies are doing.

Gianna and Mariana shed more light on the cyber security marketing society. It is the world’s largest community for cybersecurity marketers built by cybersecurity marketers for cybersecurity marketers. The cybersecurity community has created an opportunity to get together for those working hard in cybersecurity. They have provided an all-day marketer launch for people and also did a marketer party which was completely sold out. There were around 800 people on the waitlist. The party felt like a reunion where all marketers were coming together. Mariana and Gianna continue to talk more about the changes in cybersecurity since the previous year. They say that the cybersecurity industry lacks creativity. It is great to see vendors stepping up and thinking outside the box, pushing the envelope to get creative, and having fun doing what they are doing. This year there were a lot fewer outside activities than last year. The vibe overall, from the security perspective, feels normal and big again.

Maria and Gianna also discussed their favorite booths they had seen. There are fully immersive booths with screens on the ceiling above people’s heads. Nowadays, things are moving to screening and lighting. Games are also taking the floor. Multiple people are doing comic superheroes, which is appealing to the audience. Magicians are back, and they are also drawing the crowd. There are so many ways to do things to grab attention. Some other security vendors even use sneakers for everyone to wear. There is also a continuation of the axonious campaign, controlling complexity and more. Even No name security provides rides to go to places around the city. In the marketing community industry, we do not want to lead with fear, uncertainty, and doubt, this industry is stressed enough, and we do not need to add stress from our messaging and marketing perspective. Selling, educating, and helping is a way to market, and the cybersecurity marketing society is here to help you stand out.

Finally, Gianna and Maria conclude with conferences for more cybersecurity marketers where they say cybersecurity marketing will host an annual cyber marketing conference in Texas. Cybersecurity is ready to open opportunities for marketers in cybersecurity, cybersecurity agencies, and more. If you work with cybersecurity customers and have references for all customers who are happy with your services, members can find a free and open vendor directory.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Marketing in FedGov: From Space Force to Security Consultant with Wesley Belleman

Wed, 10 May 2023 09:00:00 -0000

In this episode, Wesley Belleman, Consulting Engineer at Colossal LLC, joins Maria and Gianna to discuss marketing in the federal government.

Wesley began his career in the military in acquisitions, specifically as a cybersecurity operations officer. Here, he was in charge of multi-million dollar programs, acquiring cybersecurity for the space force, and more. From there, he went into Palo Alto Networks and finally Colossal LLC, a value-added reseller providing services specific to the products they sell. Because he has advertised and marketed products internally as a customer in his previous roles, Wesley has a solid understanding of the challenges marketers face. Since the Department of Defense is the country’s largest employer, there is a ton of internal business that goes on within it overall. Wesley touches on Kraken, a newly released product that the Space Force is currently leveraging for public defense. He worked with a team of engineers and contractors to design, build and deploy the product. It required marketing to get people within the space force on board with implementing the product. Wesley also highlights the various AFCEA events coming up nationwide.

When building Kraken, Wesley also had to build consensus internally to get the product off the ground. He began this process by getting certified on the product and fully understanding it inside out. On that, he leveraged the strength of his colleagues on his team to fulfill different operational roles. The final step was to get to know the customers and what exactly they are looking for. It is crucial to leave your opinions and ideals at the door and understand what the customer wants from a cybersecurity product. He also recommends all founders use the resources and team members they already have. Although it is still growing, Kraken officially launched in 2019. Finally, our guest and hosts engage in a fun guessing game to reveal what career Wesley would pursue outside of the cybersecurity marketing field.

Links:

Visit Wesley on LinkedIn.

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Empathetic Product Marketing, from Product Launches to CABs with Beth Barach

Wed, 03 May 2023 09:00:00 -0000

This week, Beth Barach, the Director of Product Marketing at Onapsis, joins the hosts to discuss the intersection of product marketing with product launches, Cabs, and eCabs. With over 20 years of experience in tech, Beth began her career working with channel and technology partner programs, which ultimately led to her pivot into product marketing.

Beth also shares that to execute a successful product launch, it's important to create a plan and synchronize the different teams and departments involved, such as sales, marketing, customer success, and product. getting into the idea of using product launch as an opportunity to educate customers and partners on the value and benefits of the product. Lastly, Beth stressed the importance of using marketing channels to create a buzz and engage the target audience.

The conversation also touches on the importance of getting executive buy-in for a product launch. Beth gave an example of someone on the team who is often overlooked but should be included, the support team. While Maria highlighted that product marketers should aim to think beyond their usual suspects when planning a launch. Finally, Beth provided a story about a manager who was great at recognizing the importance of executive support.

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