73: Austin Hay - BS Marketing, Dogfooding and the future of CRMs

We optimized outbound and Linkedin Marketing so much for humans that we don't need them anymore

Sep 03, 2024

Cringe Marketing, Dogfooding, and the limitations of Hubspot and Salesforce with Austin Hay, the Co-Founder of Clarify (CRM).

I talked with Austin on the rise of superficial marketing tactics and what they do to the importance of building a strong brand.

We discuss why Product Managers cannot ignore Marketing anymore and the value of good dogfooding in product development when everyone tells you to “listen to your customer”.

How to transition from being your own ideal customer to targeting a different market segment.

Takeaways

Marketing is moving from a deterministic approach to a more probabilistic approach, where marketers have less control and understanding of who and how to reach people.
The rise of superficial and cringe-worthy marketing tactics on platforms like LinkedIn is a result of increased competition and the need to stand out.
Traditional CRMs have limitations in terms of speed, data entry, and automation.

Sound Bites

"Marketing is moving back to the ways things were done in the 1960s to the 1990s, where you're not going to have as much control and understanding about who and how to reach people."
"We're just shifting market shares around without deriving value to the customer."
"You can be a really good dog fooder of your product, but you may not be the ideal ICP for your product in the future."
"The core product is never done. Whenever you add something else, it becomes a little bit worse, and then you need to repatch it up."

Chapters

08:12 The Rise of Superficial and Cringe-Worthy Marketing Tactics

13:55 The Importance of Building a Strong Brand

23:40 The Role of Marketing in Product Development

29:03 The Value of Dogfooding in Product Development

31:25 The Value and Challenges of Dogfooding

38:12 The Never-Ending Process of Product Development

39:07 Balancing Customer Feedback and Vision

53:46 The Limitations of Traditional CRMs

01:00:15 Introducing Clarify: Disrupting the CRM Market