This is the basis for my thesis. You could be investing your marketing dollars in a way that is far more impactful for your bottom line.

Dump that conference, invest in the community around it

In 2024, I went to Hubspot’s Inbound conference. Outside the conference center, a local union was protesting low wages for hospitality workers, as conference attendees walked past unconcerned. If your conference isn’t making a tactile difference in the communities that you are in, why do them?

My thought, drop the conference, invest in the community.

You are probably thinking, “ Stephanie, that is an overzealous position” Sure. But here is the thought. You spend $100,000 plus shuttling people from all corners of the earth, housing and feeding them for 3 to 5 days to get let’s say 500, maybe 1000 leads if you get lucky. ( Though, in 2026 you are using ABM as your strategy and cultivating relationships, so who cares about leads). Some might be hot leads, some might be cold. Your team is scoring based on the notes they took and what they think is happening with that person. You also invest in swag that people sign up to get, which means they are likely a cold lead, if a lead at all.

The better approach is to send 2 or 3 people to the conference, get a session slot instead of a booth. Leverage thought leadership for that audience, and increase name recognition in that local community by donating to local organizations. creating swag bags, not for conference attendees but for people who are legitimately in need. Shelters need socks, tooth brushes, blankets, underwear, items for doing hair. It’s a better way to spend.

I remember going to Orlando with the Marketing team at Beefree, under the leadership of Luca Penati, One of the days we went to donate time to an organization that needed help packing boxes for teachers and organizing the warehouse space. That was my favorite day. It’s actually the one I remember most.

This is your bread and butter. Creating a PR strategy that focuses on helping others, especially in a tough economy.

You can then put together a PR package after the conference pr event highlighting how that time was spent. The story goes, “we came to town to promote X innovation at this annual tech conference/ company retreat, but while we were here we worked with Y organization to help meet the needs of the local community by doing Z. This will help for X amount of time. we look forward to coming back again to support this initiative.” ( And then actually return).

But Stephanie… that seems exploitative? Yes and no. It is in some ways, because you are making a show of what you did to help. However, the helpful generous giving of your time and money remains a net positive impact for that community.

Skip the conference, invest in advertising at arenas

If I know anything about he city I grew up in, it is that they love sports. Atlanta United, the Falcons, the Braves, the Thrashers, the Hawks, The yellow jackets, the BullDogs the Panthers. There is no shortage of team or sport to cheer for. With Center Parc stadium, Mercedes Benz stadium, State Farm arena, Bobby Dodd stadium, Truist park, and the world congress center all located in the Atlanta city limits. (Truist is Smyrna-ish.. but don’t hold it against them). All of them have marquees, all of them offer sponsorships plans and ads. With Mercedes Benz and State Farm being available year around with large concerts and festivals coming through and a number of sports being played in both.

This isn’t limited to professional and collegiate teams. There are semipro leagues, amateur and little leagues, as well as grade school teams that people come out en masse to see. People in Texas can also speak to this. Sports can help generate revenue by increasing name recognition. The ad just needs to make it clear what you do. This approach can also work Europe. I went to soccer (football) games where the teams were sponsored by local and international companies.

How do we measure success?

This is the place where I know the resistance will live. Because it isn’t going to be a 1-to-1 proof of ROI with this strategy. This strategy needs to be supported by a strong content strategy and a clear and trackable customer journey. It also needs time to work. However, tracking success is doable. Since you can't always put a tracking pixel on a stadium sign and definitely can’t do the for local news stories, how do you know it puts money in your pocket? You don't look for clicks; you look for market lift. You track the spike in Branded Google Searches from that city or region. You watch your Share of Voice squeeze out competitors. You ask directly. “How did you hear about us?” is a fantastic question when you advertising goes beyond digital spaces.

Marketing has to evolve as more organizations are using the same playbooks to talk to the same audiences about the same things the you are. Everyone is selling something to do with AI or selling an app experience. Everyone is selling saved time and streamlined workflows. Everyone is sells “saved money”. That isn’t a differentiator anymore. Be human. Be in community with humans.

I have worked in Marketing for the better part of 7 years now. The work you do varies from industry to industry but ultimately, the aim is the same across all domains. Gain name recognition, grow pipeline, make a sales person’s job easier ( more or less) and it becomes the same on the post sale side - keep customers engaged, so they will return.

I can’t speak to how a corporation should be organized. Each team does what makes the most sense for them. However, there is a workflow that is missing between community and brand that I think larger brands like Disney understand. They have created an entire world for their customers to live in and to revisit. They have music, movies, and experiences tied to their name. I have several friends who got engaged in Disney World in front of the Cinderella castle. Family friends and colleagues who took Disney cruises with their families, and have family movie night around the brand. Brands like Disney and Mattel are central to a lot of our lives in ways we probably cannot describe. So, how do you make that sort of brand loyalty happen for your business today?

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In 2020, I started my Master’s degree in Communications and Media Studies from Brenau University. A colleague of mine at Ahava Early Learning Center was taking some courses and it was through her that I discovered UX/UI. I got my first freelance opportunity through my friend Casey (Black) Lybbert. I worked on projects and she and her husband provided anchors that were trending back then. Because of their help, I was able to apply those concepts to website design.

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I worked to apply the UX principles I was learning to my Pre-k class by running surveys to get an understanding of how students were at home, to create environments that supported their learning at school and updating my teaching and classroom flow of the day to accommodate student needs.

I was doing freelance and contract copywriting work for a number of agencies. Some included email design and website support. I would make banner images and play with stock photos to make them a bit more interesting.

After a few months of trying I applied to mediavine, and on of the assignments was creating an infographic. They didn’t like it. They seemed to like me, but my skills weren’t refined enough for them to place me, so we parted ways. I got far enough in that interview process to trust that I could do it. Unfortunately, I didn’t get enough feedback to understand where the gaps were.

While I was copywriting I was still doing some design work. It was mostly for social media and for church. I was still a beginner in a lot of ways, and my work mostly focused on social media posts and scheduling content, but I also did a little bit of design. I sometimes made playful things like the turkey below, but I also made social graphics that we posted weekly. I kept it very templated, to prevent brand confusion.

I took on a freelance role with a company called Valhalla Vitality there after. It was still social media management, mostly, though I also set up strategy and influencer partnerships. An attorney friend wrote the contracts on my behalf. we reviewed them and created content with those creators. I also worked to reach out to influencers and people interested in doing User generated content via tools like Social cat.

It has been a few years since I did any visual design work, professionally; however I did work to apply design principles to the emails and other content I was creating at work.
For example, I took a contract role at Demandbase, and during that time I worked to refine an email newsletters and the customer portal to help ensure that customers were quickly getting value. I used the images and assets that Stella Wei andThomas Venhuizen to design emails that had a bit more value without overwhelming customers.
The final email that I was approved to send was a bit more zen.

I in the meantime, I decided to take a course on graphic design to understand that gaps I needed to fill and to get more practice on the tools I was using. I have used Adobe Creative cloud and canvas the most, but in 2025, I decided I wanted to use the Affinity Suite. There were three pieces of software, Designer, Photo, and Publisher. I also began using Procreate more. The cost of Adobe suite was a bit prohibitive for me at the time, but I fully invested in the tools that were accessible to me.

I found that I really enjoyed playing around with those tools and creating. I remembered what I knew about everything being made of simple shapes and started building more complex things by manipulating a layer simple shapes.

I also started screen recording and sharing the videos of my work. No AI just me, an occasional reference photo, and my hands.

I used these principles to publish a children’s book called Theodora and the storm.

and I have also used these same UX?UI skills to plan, write, and publish that book. I have another book, I’m working to finish, as well as poetry book that I published, but is now in revisions, as it wasn’t initially selling well.

While I have never held an official designer title in any capacity, It has always been part of the work I did. The philosophy of intentional design is understanding of your foundation and your ultimate vision. What is available right now, what can be available down the line, what it can look like today, and how you can iterate along the way.

that is what I did not just in my classrooms as a teacher, not just as a writer, but also when writing marketing strategy. Looking at the data foundations needed to be able to effectively build a playbook, or workflow that would help reach our business goals.

Why Design?

I like to say the color purple chose me, whenever people ask why it is my favorite color. I think the same with design and art. It’s always been there. I’ve always enjoyed it and now I understand it better. It’s about curating an experience for the people around you and expressing a heartfelt truth.

I know the tools well. I feel calm in that space. I find it to be fun and I like the challenge of learning new techniques to improve the look and feel of a piece. I like all forms of design. Architecture, interior design, landscape design, system design, graphic design, product design, you name it! Ultimately it is fun for me having a vision in mind and then working towards building it. even if it means making each and every brick.

ChatGPT Addiction

I used Gen AI for just boring tasks at first. Just the things that I didn’t really want to do. I would use it for documentation and other administrative tasks, but I was still heavily editing it because it was less than legible. I then proceeded to start using it for the things I actually enjoyed, thinking I would have more time. That’s not exactly what happened. It was hallucinating a lot. Nothing it said was reliable, but I couldn’t stop. I got to the point where I didn’t even trust myself to write a Slack message without running it through AI first.

The feedback I was getting regularly before I fully adopted AI was about my tone of voice. It was too casual, too playful, too relaxed. So, I used it to make my voice sound more like theirs. The feedback was almost always saying, “ You shouldn’t talk like that.” So, basically, I promoted my AI to sound like the corporate jargon machine. The aim was to sound more “professional”. Eventually, everything I wrote I doubted. Everything I submitted for review was nitpicked. So, I gave it all over to AI.

Things I could easily say in conversation, I couldn’t write. I had more typos than usual, and my autocorrect was bonkers. I was creating so much with AI, I eventually stopped editing the output. I read it so much that it started to seem “ good enough.” By September of 2024, I could barely string 5 words together at work without getting AI approval. ”What do you think, Chad?” “Edit this, Chad.” “Is this right, Chad?”
It was an abysmal experience for a writer.

It reminded me a bit of that scene in Wish when the King, President, and Governor were like, “ give your wishes to me, and once a year we will grant it for you, but then it’s revealed that he’s actually evil.

Reclaiming my voice

Then, in October 2024, I started A Black Girl’s Guide to write about my relationship with being a Black woman in corporate spaces, and that expanded to things I wish I knew to navigate life. There were letters to little me, and it really opened the door to getting my brain back and trusting my voice again.

My true wake-up call came when I got a “wrapped” email, telling me how many prompts I sent, how many “conversations” we had. I was so bad, and I felt ashamed of myself. I decided to QuitGPT.

I wanted to do it Cold Turkey, but some people need bridges, Hi my name is some people.

Here are the 8 steps I took to reclaim my brain

1. Stream of consciousness writing - I would just write what I wanted to say in paragraph form and then prompt the AI to organize it for me.

2. Outlines - I would tell it my thesis and what I wanted to work through, and I would ask it to create an outline.

3. AI review only - After I stopped needing outlines from it, I would plug in completed work for review.

4. Setting a hard boundary - No AI writing for personal projects, I would outline and write those myself.

5. Teach me prompts - Instead of asking it to do it for me, I would ask it to teach me.

6. Setting a firmer boundary - No AI output for personal or work projects

7. Training myself to use older research methods again. Google Scholar and Google News were my go-to for a time. I also reimplemented Boolean searches.

8. Going back to Grammarly, Free SEO tools, and Hemingway App. - These tools exist to help me improve my writing, NOT to think for me.
   

At this stage, I don’t touch it nearly as much as I used to. Writing again has been like riding a bike. I still have days where Google’s AI mode gets me, but not in the same way as ChatGPT.
Once I figure out how to bypass that, we will be on the road to a mostly AI-free life.

Choose your struggle

I remember a creator on Instagram saying that her therapist told her that she got to choose her hard. She was talking about it in reference to watching her hair, but I am talking about it in reference to AI. Our brains often offload the things we don’t use. You build neural pathways and stronger brain muscle connections when you do things over and over again. So you can choose the challenge of maintaining your skills, or you can lose your skills to the addiction to a microwave answer.

Ultimately, having my skills stay intact is important to me. If this takes a bit more time, but looks better, reads better, and has more insight and value, this is the road I’d rather take. This isn’t a full rejection of AI. Grammarly is an AI-based tool. It has always been. Hemingway App has always been an AI-based tool. However, they aren’t doing the work for me. They are getting me over the finish line. Turning down help seems silly to me, but help to me isn’t “doing it for me.” That is dependency, and I choose sobriety.

A little honesty

I’m not at all saying I don’t need or want help or guidance. I’m also not saying I only need guidance at the end of a creative journey. I am standing on the backs of the people who learned things and shared them on the internet.

I also understand that the content creation space is moving at the speed of light. People are trying to stay ahead of the curve by using AI to take some things off their plate. I understand you. I’m not judging you.

If you choose to continue to use AI… this is my advice to you. READ IT OUT LOUD. If the way it sounds annoys you to hear, it will bother a lot of other ears.

I sat down to decide what I wanted to do next. I lived a number of lives. I was a teacher, a nanny, a blogger, and a web designer. While some were intentional pivots, others were not. I didn’t really know what worked and what didn’t. I was absolutely throwing spaghetti at the wall. But I sat and looked at what things I was able to do that would help me see the results that I was looking for more consistently.

What did it boil down to?

1. My vision - What did I see for my life? What kind of work was I doing? Who was I doing it for?

2. My systems - What was I building to keep me on course? How could I make this sustainable?

3. My Community - who was walking with me? Who was encouraging me and showing me love?

So, then I looked at ways to build something new with the tools I had at my disposal.
I’ve been a writer since I could write and researcher, and a storyteller for even longer. My mom tells me about the questions I would ask when I was still only stringing 2-word sentences together.

I was a teacher for most of my adult life, and a marketer for the last almost 7 years. I’ve been a sister and a cousin since I was born. How do those identities create a “niche” for me? Especially when my interests and desires are so varied. Then TADA! Like manna from the sky… Consulting, designing, mediating, teaching, and talking about it. Not just planting the same roses over and over again, but seeing what else I can do.

How does this help you?

Betting on yourself is always the best bet. You know you. You know your desires. You understand what you want to see come true. These systems allow you to bet on yourself over and over again. They allow you to move beyond a wish and start making things happen for yourself.

You are taking your learnings from each step and applying them to the next. In education, we call it “scaffolding”. Building the next level on top of the ones below.

A lot of times, we already know what to do; we just need a system in place, so our brains don’t panic when it shows up in a new way. Marketing is teaching and community building. Customer support is mediation and conflict management. Sales should be mediating and problem-solving, though it isn’t always framed that way. HA!

If you want to get started with the Genesis method, for yourself or for your business, start TODAY! You don’t actually need my hands to get started, but if you want them, they are available to help you shape your clay.

Book a call with me

Happy to put a game plan in motion

Book a call

The neuroscience of branding, and why you probably don’t need that rebrand.

TL;DR: Good branding Is familiar and cozy

You don’t need to scream to be memorable. You just need to show up consistently in the stories your audience already cares about.

If you want to develop a branding strategy that actually taps into these cognitive principles? Start with this…

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Connection is King

Today’s hot take: Connection is KING!

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Entrepreneurship is often glamorized as vision, strategy, and execution. But let’s be honest with ourselves, it’s also a lot of troubleshooting, Googling things in a panic, and crying over something that should work but doesn’t. This week, my challenge was email setup.

I thought I had done eve…

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How a government contractor leveraged social media to boost employer brand engagement

Background

Maximus is a global government contractor that provides services for federal, state, and local agencies. Competitors include Deloitte, Accenture, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Optum Inc., and Lidos.

As part of their talent acquisition and retention strategy, Maximus needed to enhance its employer brand visibility on social media. However, this initiative came during a period of public scrutiny as call center employees organized strikes, leading to negative press. To balance the narrative, the hiring team wanted to highlight positive employee experiences.

Project Brief:

The goal of the employee spotlight campaign was to showcase the diversity, culture, and career growth opportunitieswithin Maximus. By featuring real employees and their experiences, the initiative aimed to:

Improve Maximus’s reputation as an employer of choice despite external challenges.

Humanize the brand and make it more relatable to potential recruits.

Strengthen internal engagement by celebrating employees.

Goals:

Quantitative Goals

• Increase social media engagement on employer brand content.

• Improve talent attraction by making job openings more visible.

• Drive higher interaction rates on LinkedIn and Instagram hiring posts.

Qualitative Goals

• Create an authentic and relatable employer brand presence.

• Strengthen employee morale by highlighting real stories.

• Align employer branding efforts with HR and recruitment goals.

Responsibilities:

• Wrote copy for LinkedIn and Instagram posts

• Updated graphic templates in Canva

• Sent content for approval via Smartsheet

• Scheduled posts using HeyOrca

• Monitored responses and engagement using RivaIQ

Skills Leveraged

• Copywriting – Wrote engaging social media captions and employee testimonials.

• Content Design – Updated graphic templates in Canva for consistency.

• Content Scheduling & Management – Scheduled and monitored posts via HeyOrca.

• Data Analysis – Tracked engagement metrics in RivaIQ to optimize performance.

• Cross-Team Collaboration – Worked with HR and marketing to ensure strategic alignment.

Tools: Canva, Google Docs, HeyOrca, Smartsheet, RivaIQ, Grammarly

Strategy & Execution

• Performance Monitoring – I tracked engagement rates in RivaIQ, adjusting content formats based on audience response.

• Sourcing Employee Stories – The HR team collected testimonials from employees about their experiences, benefits, and career growth. Responses were compiled in Smartsheet for review and selection.

• Content Creation – Using pre-designed Canva templates, I formatted posts with quotes and employee headshots, ensuring a clean and professional look.

• Content Approval & Scheduling – Posts were sent for review via Smartsheet, then scheduled weekly on LinkedIn and Instagram using HeyOrca.

Process

• Gathering Content: Logged into Smartsheet to batch employee testimonials for the month. Collected strong quotes, background details on employees, their roles, and any available headshots.

• Writing Copy: Drafted 2-3 versions of each post in Google Docs (with Grammarly for quality control). Ensured messaging was engaging, professional, and aligned with Maximus’s employer brand. Included relevant branded hashtags to enhance visibility.

• Content Review: Worked with my project manager to vet copy and refine the final version before design.

• Designing Graphics: Used Canva to update branded templates with employee quotes and photos. Spent 30 minutes to an hour adjusting visuals for clarity and impact.

  • Faced an issue with cropping in Canva for one employee’s headshot, so I used Photoshop to adjust the image before finalizing the post.

• Scheduling & Publishing: Uploaded finalized content to HeyOrca, which allowed for easy color-coded scheduling, content drafts, and approval tracking.

• Engagement & Optimization: On posting days, I logged in to engage with audience interactions, responding to comments and monitoring engagement trends to support content performance.

Results

Company Outcomes

• 20% increase in engagement on employer branding content.

• Improved brand sentiment and visibility despite PR challenges.

• Strengthened internal engagement, boosting employee morale.

Professional Outcomes

• Gained experience managing employer brand content in a highly regulated industry.
  Strengthened data-driven content optimization skills using engagement analytics.
  Expanded expertise in cross-functional collaboration with HR and marketing.

Finding a website designer is becoming increasingly easier, as more tools become available, making the field more accessible to designers. The first place most organizations start is a search. You want to know which companies can best meet your needs. Which website design or web development company can help you hit your business goals? You ask yourself, “How can I tell if the website design companies near me are any good?” You have a million things running through your mind. Sometimes, you do not know which questions to ask first.

Website designers always ask questions about your project before they get started. (Not asking is a red flag.) They need to know the scope of work and what your expectations are. The same applies to you as the customer. You should enter into that relationship with as much information as possible. If a web development company doesn’t welcome questions, they will not be the best fit for you.

Here are a few questions to ask to ensure you are getting the best services.

How much experience do you have?

Many firms will offer you a portfolio to review. Portfolios are a compilation of the agency’s best work, and they will give you an idea of their results. They will provide you with insight into the care that they take when presenting their case studies. Asking about experience allows you to get an overview of the number of clients with whom they’ve worked. It also tells you how many years they had to refine their craft.

How will you integrate AEO into this design?

Answer engine optimization is critical to a successful design. It is essential to optimize every piece of content. Search engine optimization and Answer Engine Optimization are breadcrumbs for your ideal clients to find you. SEO must be incorporated at the very beginning of the design process. Your designer should provide a detailed answer for how to optimize your website.

Will you outsource any parts of the project?

Web Design is the visual look of a website and the functionality from a user’s perspective. Web development is the process of coding a website; this process creates the intended design using programming languages like CSS or HTML. Some organizations outsource the design work, and some outsource the development work. Some agencies use tools like WordPress, Webflow, Squarespace, and other no-code or low-code builders to create high-quality websites. Other agencies do it all in-house. Asking this question helps you to set your expectations.

Where will you host my website?

There are a lot of web hosting services online. Finding one that is the best fit for your budget and your business is critical. Some hosts offer domain name services. There are also domain name services that do not provide hosting. It is vital to understand the costs associated with making those choices.

Will I have a CMS?

Just like web hosts, there are so many content management systems available online. WordPress, Squarespace, and Webflow are among the more popular ones. However, there are dozens of options. Ask questions about all the options you might have for CMS. Be sure to choose one that is the best fit for your business goals.

Should I provide images or copy for this website?

Your web designer will need information and assets from you to begin the project. Establishing brand guidelines is critical to having a successful brand and website. Brand guidelines include fonts, colors, logos, and brand voice. You should provide high-resolution logos and images for your project.

How many revisions do I get?

It is okay not to like an initial design that a website designer might propose. Many firms offer a set number of revisions. Having a set number of revisions keeps the project timeline under control. It also provides opportunities for you to have a say in the look of your website. Be sure to send websites you like as inspiration.

Do I have to come back to you when the website design needs updates? Or can I do it myself?

You will need to make changes to your website over time. Understanding your CMS and how to make those changes is a vital detail to ask about. You should think about how much editing access you want for your site and ask what the process for updates will be.

Can you complete this project within my budget?

Understanding your needs is essential when setting a realistic budget for website design. Rates vary from agency to agency. Doing research is a best practice. Be sure to look at the quality of work that agencies put out. Don’t opt-in only because of pricing.

These questions are a starting point. The first conversation with a web design company will set a precedent for future discussions. Ask every question that comes to mind. If there are processes or concepts that you do not understand, ask about them. Websites for your company are a significant investment. Take your time and ask all the questions you can before entering a service agreement.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is still an essential tool in a small business’s digital marketing toolkit. SEO and AEO ( answer engine optimization) help search engines and AI tools understand the content on your page. The answer engine then matches that content with search queries. When AEO best practices are applied, the quality of your web traffic can improve. It may also result in a lower bounce rate and higher engagement across your website.

SEO still remains one of the best methods to generate organic results for your website. Optimizing for AI is good, but according to Pew Research, people typically aren’t clicking through the AI responses to your website. A high- quality strategy can help your small business generate more leads, more traffic, more sales, and greater brand recognition.

SEO is effective whether you have a brick-and- mortar business or specialize in digital products and e-commerce. SEO and other organic marketing strategies use educational and entertaining content to engage your target audience. Organic methods also leverage keywords, website speed, and content to meet the needs of your customers. These strategies can generate business and increase audience engagement. They also support any paid marketing efforts you have in place.

You might be considering hiring a fantastic digital marketing agency to help you redesign or simply optimize your existing website for search engines and AI. While that process might seem daunting, it helps if you know what you are looking for.

Here are a few steps that qualified digital marketing agencies follow when implementing an SEO strategy.

1. Goals - Before starting any marketing venture, you must have clear goals in mind. Establishing SMART goals will be the key to success. SMART is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely. Remember that SEO is a long-term strategy. The goals that you set should reflect that.

2. Website Audit - It is crucial to run an audit of your website. The audit will help you understand the strengths and weaknesses of your current website better. SEO strategists use a variety of online tools to identify and focus on the aspects of your website that need to be changed.

3. Keyword Research - Keywords are terms or phrases that summarize the contents of a webpage. Search engines use keywords to determine if a page is a match with a search query. Keyword research is a critical phase in search engine optimization. It involves an in-depth look at popular search terms and valuable insights into your audience. Keyword research also offers a glimpse into search intent. It shows you how your audience is finding you and your competitors. This research helps SEO strategists to find opportunities for business growth.

4. Planning and Implementation - An SEO agency should lay out their optimization plan and how they will implement it. The strategy should incorporate web audit changes and how they will target the keywords important to your goals. As you implement the plan, your team should monitor your search ranking and the quality of web traffic coming in. The SEO strategy should optimize the metadata to include keywords. Including keywords ensures that your search engine ranking will increase. Thus, allowing more customers to find you when their search query is relevant to your business, products, or services.

5. Content Creation - If you want to rank higher on search engines, implementing a content strategy is necessary. Social media can play an integral role in your content strategy. Writing blogs and posting to social media platforms like LinkedIn or Twitter can give your SEO campaign the boost it needs. Content creation is also an excellent way to acquire backlinks. Backlinks help to establish domain authority, which improves SEO ranking.

Want to learn more about how to optimize your content for SEO and AEO in a way that keeps your audience engaged long-term?

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( Originally Published in 2021 - Updated May 8, 2026)

How a cross-functional initiative increased HubSpot Marketplace sign-ups by 966% YoY—starting with one key fix

Background

Company: Beefree (BEE Content Design)
Industry: SaaS, No-Code Email & Landing Page Design
My Role: Customer & Partner Marketing Specialist

At Beefree, we recognized that HubSpot users needed a better email & landing page design experience than what was offered natively within the HubSpot ecosystem. Our goal was to position Beefree as the preferred design solution for HubSpot users for landing pages and email design and to drive adoption through strategic marketing efforts.

In 2024, Beefree saw a 966% year-over-year increase in sign-ups via the HubSpot App Marketplace. The most significant growth shift occurred in Q2, after I led an audit and optimization of the HubSpot Marketplace listing. This work laid the groundwork for the success of a larger cross-functional initiative involving Product, Sales, and Marketing, with my focus on customer marketing, co-marketing strategy, and funnel improvement.

Project Brief

The project aimed to strengthen Beefree’s integration with HubSpot and leverage the HubSpot Marketplace, Solutions Partners, and content collaborations to drive more installs and long-term adoption

Goals

Quantitative Goals

• Increase sign-ups via HubSpot App Marketplace CTAs

• Improve traffic from HubSpot-related content

• Boost customer retention & engagement with the HubSpot Connector

• Increase HubSpot-related product reviews & case studies

Qualitative Goals

• Strengthen Beefree’s positioning as a HubSpot design tool

• Improve the user journey from discovery to activation

• Increase awareness of Beefree’s value through content & social proof

My Responsibilities

• Developing & leading the HubSpot co-marketing program

• Managing review campaigns & customer engagement strategies

• Analyzing performance metrics & refining the marketing approach

Skills Leveraged

• Content Marketing & SEO – Blog collaborations, link building, case studies

• Customer & Partner Marketing – Engaging with HubSpot users & partners

• Go-To-Market Strategy – Refining messaging & positioning

• Data Analysis & Performance Optimization – Tracking conversion improvements

• Cross-Functional Collaboration – Aligning Product, Sales, and Marketing efforts

Tools Used

• HubSpot (Marketplace, Analytics)

• Google Analytics & SEMrush (SEO & performance tracking)

• Jira & Confluence (Project management & workflow tracking)

• Beefree (Email design)

• Active Campaign & Pendo ( Email & segmentation)

Strategy & Execution

We tackled this project using a three-pronged strategy:

Fixing the customer journey

• Conducted an audit of the Hubspot Marketplace set up.

• Updated the links and added UTMs to measure

• leveraged all of Hubspot’s available tools to supply leads with more information about the brand

• Collaborated cross fuctionally to update and revise marketplace content

Leveraging content & SEO for marketplace visibility

• Built HubSpot-specific landing pages to drive organic search traffic.

• Partnered with HubSpot’s blog team for guest posts & link exchanges.

• Engaged in social listening & content repurposing for key user needs.

Driving marketplace reviews & social proof

• Ran incentivized & organic review campaigns to improve credibility.

• Collected user testimonials & case studies showcasing real success stories.

Process

Challenge: Low adoption & unclear differentiation in the HubSpot ecosystem.
Solution: Created multi-channel campaigns focused on visibility, education, and engagement.
Impact: Drove significant growth in installs, marketplace engagement, and brand recognition.

Some key moments:

• The Beefree product team interviewed HubSpot users to understand friction points in their workflow.

• We secured guest post opportunities on HubSpot blogs..

• Collaborated with Product on refining the HubSpot Connector messaging.

• Leveraged customer testimonials to help tell the Beefree +Hubspot story

Results & Outcomes

While co-marketing and increased investment helped expand reach in Q3–Q4, the most immediate and sustained growth came from correcting the user journey: fixing broken links, improving message clarity, and ensuring the listing drove to the right destination. This wasn’t flashy work, but it worked.

Company-Wide Impact

• +466% increase in traffic from HubSpot-related content & backlinks

• 173% growth from Q1 to Q2 which continued compounding through Q3 and Q4 with global focus

• +966% increase in sign-ups year over year from HubSpot Marketplace CTAs

• Higher retention & engagement due to improved onboarding flow

• Stronger brand positioning as a top HubSpot design solution

Professional Growth & Achievements

• Developed a scalable co-marketing framework for future partnerships

• Refined my skills in growth marketing, SEO, and customer advocacy

• Strengthened cross-functional collaboration with Product & Sales

• Established repeatable processes for marketplace optimization

Optimizing engagement and brand positioning in a regulated industry

Background

In Fall 2022, I took on a freelance contract role managing social media for Valhalla Vitality, a wellness e-commerce company based in New York City. Initially launched in 2020 as a COVID-19 testing provider, the company evolved to offer health and wellness services, including peptide therapies, supplements, and hormone treatments.

Because of the regulated nature of their offerings—including Enclomiphene, Kyzatrex, Tadalafil, HCG, PT-141, GLP-1, MIC B12, and peptide therapies—we had to ensure that marketing content remained compliant while still being engaging and informative.

As the company scaled, they recognized the need for a structured social media strategy to build brand authority, grow engagement, and ultimately drive sales.

Project Brief

Conduct a comprehensive audit of Valhalla Vitality’s social media presence, identify growth opportunities, and create a data-driven social media strategy to:

• Increase brand visibility.

• Improve audience engagement.

• Drive conversions and product sales via Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.

• Engage customers who are creating UGC

Goals

Quantitative Goals

• Identify key engagement and growth metrics.

• Increase brand awareness through audience expansion and influencer collaborations.

• Improve conversion rates from social media traffic.

Qualitative Goals

• Establish a consistent brand voice in a regulated industry.

• Develop an engaging content mix that aligns with biohacking and wellness trends.

• Improve content strategy to better target Valhalla’s core customer base.

Skills Leveraged

• Social Media Strategy – Developed a platform-specific plan to drive visibility and engagement.

• Competitor & Market Analysis – Audited industry trends and benchmarked competitor performance.

• SEO & Analytics – Assessed Google Analytics, SEO ReviewTools, and platform insights to track performance.

• Content Development – Created a structured content calendar that repurposed blogs, emails, and brand messaging.

• Regulated Industry Marketing – Ensured compliance while maintaining strong engagement.

Tools Used

• Later – Social media scheduling and management.

• Instagram, TikTok, Facebook – Primary social channels for engagement and sales.

• Google Analytics – Tracked web traffic from social media referrals.

• SEO ReviewTools – Analyzed keyword trends to improve content performance.

Strategy & Execution

1. Audit & Competitor Research

2. Branding consistency and Messaging Strategy

3. Content plan

4. Customer Insights & Targeting

5. Visual & Video Content Focus

I conducted a deep dive into Valhalla Vitality’s social media, tracking performance, engagement rates, and audience demographics. During this process, I analyzed the top competitors in the wellness space to identify and biohacking y content opportunities and understand their strategy. I used existing brand assets (emails, blogs, and educational content) to optimize social posts for conversions. I also had to ensure compliance with Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook while staying relevant to biohacking trends.
During my audit, I discovered that women made up the most engaged audience and that the largest customer base was on the U.S. East Coast and the U.K. This led to adjustments in content style and influencer collaborations.
I also shifted content strategy to highlight the founder in more videos, as audience engagement was highest when the brand had a personal presence.

Results

Company Outcomes

• Identified high-engagement content types, leading to an optimized content plan.

• Improved audience targeting by refining messaging for key demographics.

• Laid the foundation for influencer partnerships and increased video content production.

Professional Outcomes

• Expanded experience in social media compliance for regulated industries.

• Strengthened data-driven content strategy and audience segmentation skills.

• Developed a scalable social media framework that could support Valhalla’s long-term growth.

The initial design was housed on Wix and created by the business owners as a stop-gap as their business rapidly grew. Over time, It was neglected, and the website was outdated.

With the initial design idea, I was exploring building wireframes and High-Fidelity designs in Adobe XD. My intention was not to get a client as much as it was to grow my understanding of Adobe XD.

Each page presented an opportunity to play with color, contrast, photos, and alignment. I was creating a design that was beautiful and functional TO ME, as I learned about all the tools and plugins available on XD. I followed this up by creating mockups for a few pages. I later sent this to my sister, and she passed it on to her boss.

My sister’s boss liked the mockups and I pitched them my idea as I walked them through the wireframe I made in XD. They were interested. I sent them a few estimates for the work, and then we settled on a four week timeline, revisions and remaining contract terms.

I wasn’t really sure where I should begin with this project. I knew very little about Behavior Analysis. I could lean on some knowledge that I acquired in my time as a Pre-Kindergarten teacher, However; I decided that research was the best way to learn about their work and what their clients will need from a website. I quickly gathered information about Autism, Behavior Analysis, and the relationship between the two. I did a deep dive into the organization to understand how they did their work, who their target audience was and what they needed. I also sent the client a questionnaire to get more information and establish goals for the website.

I discovered that they worked with families whose children are living with autism or various developmental delays. Their goal is to ensure that all families who need care have access to high-quality care, and they do this through their foundation. They needed a website that helped families to enroll quickly and easily. They also needed a page for their non-profit organization. We also talked about the blogs on their page. Their clients are working parents. Working full-time and having a child who has specialized needs to the mix means that their phone is likely the primary way that they will access the website. This directed me towards a mobile-first design approach. I wanted to ensure that each page made sense, was easy to navigate, and was highly accessible.

After establishing persona, I designed a rough wireframe for that I wanted the layout to be. It was somewhat based on the one I used for my pitch, but a lot of elements we different. I also completed a training about accessible design. I didn’t want this website to be too jarring or unorganized. I wanted it to be beautiful, but I didn’t want to put beauty ahead of functionality. Particularly if potential clients are busy.

I wanted keep color in, so I found fun ways to incorporate it. I added it to buttons, the header and footer. I stuck with shades of white and black mostly. I really leaned into making sure the site was easy to navigate, and that it was accessible for all potential clients. I was cautious about color contrast and adding alt-text for photos. The design is still evolving as my client’s business is rapidly changing.

During our planning session, we talked about colors, shapes, and fonts that we wanted to use that would draw on imagery that a lot of us think of when we think of faith. I didn’t create a mood board this time because I could already visualize what I wanted to create. I suggested circles and shades of green and blue. After we came up with the series name “Got Faith?”, I pitched my idea on using the font Phenix American as the font to invoke the “Got Milk?” ads. I love puns! Especially visual ones. I knew I wanted to use cross imagery. I opened up Illustrator and created a cross using the font as a starting point.

Next, I created a half-circle. I wanted to use the “t” in “got” and the “f” in “faith” to create the three crosses on Calvary. The arch became the bottom layer once I transitioned to Photoshop.

After creating the arch, I moved over to Photoshop to put together the final piece. I wanted to make a PNG that I could use all month with the Synergy logo on all of our social media accounts.

I created the branding in a few colors because I didn’t want to be limited in my choice of background colors or images. I found a picture on AdobeStock that I thought represented faith and belief. I dropped a few color overlays on it until I got the perfect shade of blue.

I tried out a few different fonts for the information on the flyers. It looked the best with the Phenix American font. I didn’t want to have too many fonts on the page.

I sat with the original design for a few hours. While I liked it; something felt off. It just looked crooked. It was perfectly balanced, but the letters just felt like a see-saw. So, I opened up Illustrator and reworked the arc.

This one felt better. The text is straight in both looks, but the curve in the arc was way too deep giving my first attempt the appearance of an exaggerated slant. This version allowed me to rework the placement of the rest of the text.

I created several graphics in order to do some AB Testing. I wanted to see which ad/ flyer would get the most engagement.

This first Gallery is my early work. I tried to mix pictures and text in usable ways. I was also just getting the hang of Photoshop. I also wasn’t sure of my style as a designer at that point.

The summer is where I hit my stride and began to understand who I was as a designer. I also learned that I was designing for the Synergy Road audience and not necessarily for myself. Synergy’s target audience lives in the greater Atlanta area. They are Millennials or Zoomers looking for a community. They identify as Christians and are not currently involved in a church or they are “unchurched”. The active audience are Millenials and Zoomers in Atlanta. They are people who identify as “Spiritual” or “Christians” It is mostly women.

After discussing our target audience and identifying who was engaged with the church already, we wanted to set a goal for engagement. By the summer of 2020 we were fully online. We had zoom church every week and needed a way to engage people who were finding the church for the first time. This is about the point where we began to post varied content, and it is also where I was able to shift the designs that I was putting out. There are two reasons for this. 1) I stopped designing for myself and started designing for the audience we wanted. 2) I had a firmer grip on what great design looked like.

By the end of the summer we were seeing about 1/3 of our followers engaging with the content we were posting. From video and story views to likes and follows all of the numbers increased. This was the time that we decided to try out a paid ad campaign.

The ad campaign taught us two things

1. Our website was not engaging. It is not easy to navigate. People arrived and immediately left the site.

2. We needed better calls to action. While eyes on the website and instagram pages were nice, views do not necessarily translate into engagement.

3. Having a very wide net is nice, but being strategic in our marketing choices was always the smarter thing to do.

The ads helped our engagement increase 400% over the month that they ran. The video received over 2000 views. Our follower count increased by 3%. There has been an uptick of activityin both our Facebook group and our Instagram page. Zoom attendance also increased from an average of 25 accounts per call to roughly 40 accounts, following the ads. We were able to sustain the attendance of the zoom calls. Our social media has seen an overall increase, but not at the levels we saw during the ads.

Synergy continues to post the daily devotional Facebook and Instagram stories. There are still weekly flyers for the three main programs that the Church puts on. There are also flyers for monthly programs.

This also allowed us the opportunity to redesign our landing page in order to attract more active members. The redesign is still in process.

Build authority, trust, and visibility using this 5-part framework for SaaS marketers

TL;DR

Build the Brand People Remember

Your product might be great, but people buy from people. Make sure your thought leadership strategy isn’t an afterthought. This isn’t about ego. It’s about authority, momentum, and connection.

In a crowded SaaS market where dozens of tools offer the same features, the real differentiator isn’t just what your product does. Your brand is who’s behind it. Your people. Their faces, their hot takes, their stories. That’s where thought leadership becomes your moat that protects you brand kingdom.

When I was at Beefree I wrote a thought leadership strategy to:

• Drive brand awareness

• Open doors to partnerships

• Build community credibility

• Set the narrative before someone else did

So, let’s break it down so you can steal it.

Why Thought Leadership Matters in SaaS

1. People Seek People
   In an age of AI and automation, human connection is premium currency. Faceless brands blend in. People with names, faces, and expertise stand out. Users want to hear from you, not just your landing page.

2. It Opens Doors
   Strategic thought leadership builds trust, which builds momentum.
   It allows your brand to attract press & podcast opportunities, get your brand on industry panels, make customers feel like they’re part of something visionary, and give partners a reason to bet on you.

3. You Control the Narrative
   This is key. Without intentional brand storytelling, your narrative will be shaped by external voices, or not at all. Thought leadership helps you introduce new product directions, reposition your brand, reframe make perception and keeps you top of mind for potential investors and customers with deeper pockets.

This is about stories worth telling and learnings worth sharing.

The Five pillars of a strong thought leadership strategy

The playbook is structured around five pillars:

1. Founders as Faces

Prep your founders and leadership team to share opinions, product philosophies, and takes on the future of your niche. Give them talking points, but left room for authenticity.

2. Team Spotlights

Highlight your designers, developers, Seller, CX team, and marketers in blog posts and social clips. This humanizes your tool and gives the brand personality. It also connects your customer facing teams with the customers, allowing them to build relationships.

3. Guest Content & Speaking

Pitch articles and event panels with your team as contributors. Focus on things you do well. Whatever it might be. Whether is is high employee retention or net zero emissions. Share your story in a way that shows that you are ahead of the game and that allows people to walk away with value.

4. Third-Party Proof (PR & Wikipedia)

Seek out press coverage and start gathering sources to eventually create a Wikipedia page. Why?

• Wikipedia dominates SEO.

• It’s a credibility signal.

• It centralizes your story, and others will quote it.

Is there risk? Sure. A Wiki page might include things you don’t love. But it’s fact-based and worth the upside. ( Don’t do crap things and you won’t get crap coverage.)

5. Nurturing Internal Experts

Identify subject matter experts (SMEs) internally and encouraged them to share knowledge on LinkedIn, speak at events, and become visible voices for the brand. This isn’t about over-polishing or over-curating but nurturing confident, informed contributors who could help extend the brand’s reach organically. ( Pick people who are likeable and try them on how to talk about the brand and the brands initiatives)

What Are Wikipedia’s Criteria for Brand Pages?

If you’re eyeing a Wikipedia page as part of your strategy, here’s what you need to know. Your wikipedia page is earned. So, just asking for one doesn’t make it happen. Wikipedia has strict inclusion criteria, especially for companies:

• Significant coverage in reliable sources: think TechCrunch, Forbes, Wired, not just your blog or press releases.

• Independent sources that aren’t affiliated with your brand.

• History and notability are also key. You should have been around for a few years or made a recognizable impact.

• No original research is allowed. Everything must be backed by citations.

Tip: Start collecting press links now. Keep a centralized list with timestamps and publication names. You’ll thank yourself later.

What Results Can You Expect from a Thought Leadership Strategy?

Results vary depending on consistency and execution, but here’s what I’ve seen (and what you should aim for):

• Increased brand searches — More people Googling your company by name or the names of your SMEs. You can track this via brand monitoring apps or Google Alerts.

• Higher conversion rates — Trust drives sales. You can expect to see more hand raisers and faster sales cycles. Why? Because people move faster with brands and people who are trustworthy.

• More press and podcast invites — You become a go-to source in your category.

• Partner and integration opportunities — Credibility makes you attractive to platforms and marketplaces.

• Improved talent attraction — Thought leadership doesn’t just bring leads, it brings people. You can see more high-quality candidates looking to make an industry impact with your brand.

Thought leadership doesn’t work overnight, but it compounds. So every podcast, conference stage, and press release will slowly grow your brand.

If you want to build a brand that outlasts market fads and feature battles, you need to show the humans behind the curtain. Thought leadership gives your brand voice, vision, and value. It makes you memorable. It makes you trustworthy. It turns employees into ambassadors, customers into believers, and competitors into followers.

This playbook works—I’ve seen it. I’ve written it. Now you can run with it too.

Need help building one? You know where to find me. 😉

A few years ago, I realized Customer Marketing doesn’t get the support it deserves, because a lot of companies don’t really understand how to implement the function.
Most companies struggle because they lack the infrastructure/systems to make it successful. Plus, the never-ending fight about ownership with Customer Success.

Plenty of companies have programs, tools, and good intentions.
But it doesn’t make up for lacking a system that connects signals and stories to revenue. Without that system, you are fighting an uphill battle

My experience in customer marketing has varied from role to role. Sometimes it is a content and advocacy engine, churning out case studies, references, and blogs. Sometimes it is a lifecycle engine, where we email, poke in-app, gift, and check in with customers along the journey. Sometimes it is solely focused on building community and getting customers engaged beyond the product in platforms like Slack or Circle, with sufficient moderation to help move conversations along. I’ve even had freelance roles where the aim was simply to be a support and execution arm for Customer Success and Product Marketing. Sometimes, the role is adjusting acquisition campaigns to fit customer needs.

None of those approaches are wrong, but they are missing a few key connectors between them. Customer Marketing usually lives in the gray space between teams. It touches Sales, CS, Product, Community, Events, Brand, and Lifecycle, but rarely has full ownership of the connective tissue or how those 1-to-many and 1- to few communications are happening with customers. We all know what happens to functions when no one owns that layer: things drift.

Programming is not the solution either. A webinar here. A case study there.
A product update email when someone remembers. A CAB that meets… occasionally.

It looks active. Customers might engage, but it isn’t scalable on its own, and it doesn’t guarantee results.

What Infrastructure Actually Does

Infrastructure is different. It ties your data, programs, and proof into a repeatable operating model. It moves away from one-off campaigns and looks at the customer experience as a full journey.

It answers questions like:

• What signals feed this function? usage, NPS, renewals, expansion, community engagement?

• What systems do we have in place to ensure customer proof is embedded in the sales and renewal cycles?

• How do lifecycle, community, and advocacy reinforce each other?

• How do Sales and CS plug in without friction? and without having to ask them to have “short toes”?

• How does this drive results beyond engagement, such as retention and expansion?

When I say “Customer Marketing Infrastructure,” I’m talking about a system that connects:

• Lifecycle communications

• Community and user groups

• Advocacy programs and references

• Customer storytelling and proof points

• Product education and reinforcement

• Sales enablement and deal support

• And the data layer that powers all of it

all under one umbrella.

Why? Because Customer Marketing runs on signals.

When we use zero-party, first-party, and third-party data, we get a clearer picture of

• Who is ready for expansion?

• Who needs reinforcement?

• Who is drifting toward churn?

• Who could become a champion?

Infrastructure connects those signals to actions that support the entire revenue org. We can adapt our messaging, give sales more proof points to support prospects, and CS gets insights about customer accounts before the account is a churn risk.

The strategy removes the random one off exachges with individual CSMs and sellers, and creates a reliable system that they can use to work more autonomously and get results.

The Data and Proof Flywheel

In subscription businesses, growth doesn’t happen all at once, and retention isn’t guaranteed. It’s re-earned monthly, quarterly, annually. Value has to be proven again and again.​

That only works if your data infrastructure and your customer marketing infrastructure talk to each other.

A healthy system looks like a loop:

Customer is onboarded ( or adopts new feature) → Customer success moments → Signals (usage, NPS, renewal, expansion) → Advocacy capture → Proof assets → Lifecycle activation → Sales and CS enablement → Stronger adoption and confidence → More success moments.

When that loop is intact:

• Adoption creates proof points.

• Proof increases confidence both in the sales cycle and in the product usage.

• Confidence strengthens retention.

• Retention unlocks expansion opportunities.

• Expansion produces even stronger proof points.

That is the flywheel. Your data should make it clear what accounts and customers need those additional touches, and who your product evangelists are.

What It Looks Like in Practice

When this is built intentionally, you see it in outcomes. It moves us beyond busy work and productivity goals and places us squarely in the land of results.

• Product launches that reach 50%+ adoption in weeks because in-app, lifecycle, and user groups are all reinforcing the same behavior.

• User groups and webinars are treated as story sources that fuel case studies, proof points, enablement decks, and community content without extra customer asks.

• Advocacy engines that turn a single interview or live moment into blogs, videos, sales assets, and nurture content all mapped to ICP, use case, and deal stage.

None of that comes from “more content.” It is about being thoughtful about how you approach the unit. And creating content strategically to benefit your customers where they are.

Courtesy Is Strategy

There’s a principle I use often: Courtesy is strategy.

If communication feels self-serving, heavy-handed, or misaligned with where a customer is in their journey, it erodes trust. If it feels timely, relevant, and reinforcing, it builds momentum.

Customer Marketing Infrastructure reduces the number of emails and in-app interruptions. It focuses on sending what matters, when it matters, to who it matters to, in a way that:

• Respects customer time

• Aligns with their context and goals

• Strengthens both the relationship and the revenue model

This helps keep customers engaged and subscribed to emails. You keep their trust, because they know if you are sending them something, it will be relevant.

Customer Marketing Tools

Tools matter, of course. In-app needs a delivery mechanism, community needs a home, and advocacy needs a system of record. While tools are not the whole strategy, they are an important part of building a successful program.

When the infrastructure is sound, the system scales. PERIOD.

Whether you’re PLG, enterprise, community-led, ABM-driven, or buying-group focused. If you implement a clear system, you will see results. My system leverages tools like Pendo, Brevo for email, Hubspot for CRM, User Evidence, Zealot, and PeerBound. However, it is flexible enough to mix and match with your current tech stack.

Customer Marketing delivers the most value when it operates as infrastructure. Signals, lifecycle communications, advocacy, community, and proof work together to support adoption, retention, and expansion across the revenue organization.

That’s the difference between Customer Marketing as an activity and Customer Marketing as an asset. One contributes directly to company goals. The other produces nice quotes.

The goal is to build growth infrastructure.

What signals feed your customer marketing function today? If retention is a priority, what are the systems behind it?

Leave a comment and let me know.

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Building a customer loyalty program that drives revenue through expansion and retention.

Ask most companies where their growth comes from, and you’ll hear about pipeline: new leads, new logos, new revenue. Acquisition is where our focus lies. It is the most visible and easiest to track. Too many companies over-index on acquisition and ignore what happens…

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Originally Published: March 30, 2026

At its core, Customer and lifecycle marketing isn’t about pushing messages. You want to guide people through a journey. You are curating an experience. You are designing systems that guide behavior while making space for autonomy.

The classroom as a lifecycle system

When I was a preschool teacher, I built structures and systems to move children through their days at school, while also giving them autonomy about how they would use that time in the day.

We worked together to set our classroom agreements, our flow of the day, and our research/ learning topics. We tried to make sure that what they were learning would be relevant for the season and relevant for the skills they needed to learn.

For example, when I was teaching the two-year-olds, I established flow of the day first, and in that time I observed them. I watched what they gravitated towards, What kind of activities interested them, they types of play they engaged in. I observed where they had strong still and where we needed to support them, and then I would group them. I would put the children who had the skill together with children who didnt, So that they could support each other.

We also praised effort and consistency. Process over product.

We also worked together with them on themes. We would pick two and we would allow the children to pick two, then we would set up provocations and workshops.

The provocations worked to introduce new types of play, my materials, and new concepts and the workshops worked to deepen skill and understanding. We would then at the end of each day, the end of each week, and the end of each unit, take stock. Where did growth occur? Where can we continue to do some work, and what areas can we focus on next to elevate their abilities?

We also focused on building intentional communities. Those communities we build in support of a common goal or purpose. So in the case of teaching, I would invite parents to come and read books, to garden, to join us for Shabbat service and Shabbat lunch on Fridays.

The model changed a bit when I moved to the older students. We maintained the flow of the day, but they had greater autonomy around topics of interest, and we were able to discuss things a bit more complex, as their brains expanded to be able to hold more complex thoughts and complex emotions.

We would ask them what they were curious about and then we would dive in a bit deeper.

In my classroom, the kids would vote on what they want to learn and then the two topics with the top votes would be our areas of focus.

We planned together.

There were three questions that I would ask them:

1) What do you think you know?

2)What do you want to learn?

3) How do you want to learn it?

Once I understood their needs, I would create lessons and activities based on what they expressed a desire to learn, and also what I knew they needed based on the education standards the state provided.

So how do we apply this to customer and lifecycle marketing?

Shifting the lens: from students to customers

1) Learn how to listen ( Data Foundations)
What are the data sources that you have, and how can they work together to build a system for success

2) Ask the right questions ( Audit)
The aim for most customers and lifecycle marketers is often adoption, retention, expansion, and advocacy. Asking questions can move you from a funnel to a flywheel. They help you see where there is synergy and unity. They also expose where the gaps are.

3) Decide what to prioritize and what to hold for later ( Strategy)
As much as we like to, we can’t always do everything at once. Brains don’t multitask. They move between tasks. Working this way allows our brains to move in a single direction. So, determining what is the best program to start with based on data and observations is the key. It more than visioning. It’s planning the steps.

4) Build your systems
in my classroom, we started with a flow of the day. We would work together to make a weekly plan. In it we would determine what things we wanted to have very deep roots ( without focusing too much on its fruit). Then we build playbooks on top of them. The playbooks keep things consistent. Each playbook should also have a micro task breakdown. Why? It allows people to see each step on the way to the vision. It also ensures that you can control the output of the programs and flows that you are building.

5) Optimize the system ( reflections)
Watch what campaigns and programs do well and which ones struggle. Look at your touch points and what language is effective, and what isnt. This what you can align systems and avoid overwhelm as the programs expand.

6) Evolve and expand
What new programs can be added in support of the foundational ones? How can you ensure this system helps maintain engagement and supports your customers’/clients’ stated goals AND What can you evolve or elevate?

Why It Works: The customer‑centric lifecycle framework

You can’t keep what you ignore. If you ignore your customers in favor of only the stakeholders, the board, the people with the money, what you will find is that you won’t be making money anyway.

Your company is providing people with a service, and when you serve, you have to be mindful of the needs of the people you are serving. If you ignore their needs or force things on them because you want it, you will find that they will leave, and find another service provider.

Step 1 is simple. Listen to your customers. Not to surveil, listen. Ask questions, work to understand them.

In the classroom, I was designing systems that guided children through their days while still honoring their curiosity and agency.

In customer and lifecycle marketing, I’m doing the same thing, just with journeys instead of days, customers instead of students, and data instead of just observation.

The model is the same: listen, ask, prioritize, build, reflect, and evolve.

The promise is the same too: meet people where they are, support what they need, and design systems that help them grow, no matter which side of the classroom or the CRM we’re on.

What does that look like in practice?

Subscribe so you don’t miss the coming deeper dive, or book a call with me.

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