How Auvik’s CMO Cracked Reddit: The Untapped Goldmine for B2B Marketers

30:48And that's different from what is network management? What is SNMP? You know, all of that, use case type content is where I think the website disappears. For us, we're in better shape because even if you're in chat GPT and you're saying, give me the top 10 vendors in this space, we're working to make sure we're on that list. But then in order to go see the product, you are still, I mean, we're a SaaS product, so customers log in on our website. You're still going to that site to try it. So to be found when people are looking in the market for what you offer, how do you, I mean, are you just making sure you've got content out there in all the forms or how are you thinking about making sure that you're found?

31:41Yeah, so we are really focused on search visibility, including showing up in Google-generated AI results as well as appearing as a reference in actual AI content. And it's about focusing on key terms people are interested in, in a buying cycle and making sure we're appearing in all of them. So for example, we're really focused on best network management software vendors or alternatives to SolarWinds, alternatives to PRTG, those sort of things is where we're focused on showing up. We also do, we talked about the memes and this switch giveaway is a really successful campaign. And I do worry about us being known as Avik, the company that gives away free switches.

32:45So we are investing more in community efforts and more advertising based on who Avik is and the value we provide. So we're not just that company, that gimmicky company that gives away free switches. Also, I did look it up on ChatGPT and Avik is number one. That came up for top SaaS network mapping tools, 2025. Damn. And there you are. Yes. today. Today, it changes so much, but yes. Yeah. Do you see any like patterns of like why, like who's right? Because to me, I'm imagining a world where as a company, and you can tell me if I'm totally wrong. If I'm a company and I'm writing about, here's the top 10 network spaces, or let's just say CRMs, because I can understand that better.

33:35Here's the top five CRMs. Here's why you should use HubSpot. Here's why you should use Salesforce. Here's everything in between. But when it's coming from maybe like an influencer in the space or someone who doesn't have deep ties within a company, it seems like that's what ChatGPT would rely on in the future versus HubSpot wrote an article saying, here's why we're the best. And here's like five others down at the bottom. But obviously, we're the best. Like, what do you think about a company telling a story and showing up like that in those results versus finding the people who are already in these communities and having them talk about it?

34:08Yeah, so that's the ultimate goal is finding people in these communities to talk about it, because that's where chat GBT or AI is going. Right now, it's imperfect because it's not referencing who Auvik says the top 10 are. It's referencing third party sites. So a lot of, you know, all the review sites out there. It's definitely pay to play. And there are a lot of influencers, yes, who have these sort of top, you know, 10 vendor list, but they're also pay to play. I feel like it's the big secret. All of it is the future is only, I think, getting more authentic with what's being sold. And like back in the day, you could have a ton of ad money.

34:57You could be, you know, paying to be on all these review sites and Gartner recommending you. but now with AI, it can literally look at thousands of customers and what people are saying in Reddit and what's actually happening in real review sites. I'm like, that feels more interesting because it's like the best player actually gets to win versus who has the most ad budget and yeah, who's paid the most review sites to get in their articles. You're exactly right. So when it comes to things that you've cut, I would love to hear what you're not doing in the future that you maybe bet on big semi-recently or like last year.

35:30We have yet to find any success with LinkedIn. And I feel like marketers love LinkedIn, myself included. We continue trying, but the data is the data. And paid ads for us on LinkedIn do not work. Facebook and Instagram work, I know. For IT people especially. Every time I say that, it's true. It works. It's what the data says, but I deal with a little bit of shame. But it's true. It's what works for us. Tell me, I want to hear more. Like, how do you get this to work with IT people? I can get it for a lot of other spaces. It would make sense, especially reaching like entrepreneurs and small business owners and people of certain generations who are still on Facebook.

36:20Tell me how this works for IT people, especially Instagram. What are you doing there? So, you know, what you just said about small business owners, entrepreneurs, really, that's LinkedIn. Oh, OK. I mean, if you think about it. I'm like, I'm on there. People try to reach me. Yep. They're on LinkedIn. Yeah. And IT Pro is like the rest of us scrolling through Instagram and Facebook, perhaps because they're of a certain age. Your words, not mine. So on Instagram, we do a lot of these memes and these, you know, funny, entertaining content. From your company account or? From our company account. Okay.

36:58Yep. So everything is from our company account and it's this authenticity. We're not trying to pretend to be something we're not. We certainly do a lot of thought leadership and, you know, just thoughts and perspectives on LinkedIn especially. but we're never, it's never, you know, someone secretly from our company. It's always overtly posting from Aavec. Okay. So Instagram, I'm kind of understanding why that one could work. Facebook, tell me more of like, is it different content strategies of like what you're putting on Instagram is different than Facebook or different? It is just by the nature of the platforms and for advertising, you know, ROI on advertising, it really is Facebook.

37:44Look, Facebook is set up for advertisers. So different from Reddit, how I mentioned that, you know, it is like doing digital advertising and, you know, the early 2000s where you have to go and do everything yourself. That's not Facebook. They, you know, have an algorithm for everything. And so we're able to set up lookalike audiences and sort of the standard digital marketing efforts. And our IT pros are on Facebook. You know, for whatever reason, I am less interested in why they're on Facebook and more interested in how we reach them and talk to them on Facebook. This sort of goes back to the conversation about having a deeply technical audience.

38:37And Auvik as a company and also the marketing team at Auvik, it being so important that you show up authentically and you're not trying to pretend you know more about IT pros than the next person or you know more about IT pros than an actual IT pro. It's about showing up and saying, hmm, let's see what the data tells us. the data tells us that IT pros are on Facebook. I'm not trying to tell them they should or should not be. I am meeting them where they are and they happen to be on Facebook. That's a good hot tip for marketing to technical people. Go to Facebook. I haven't been on there in like a year, but - Or at least try it.

39:13Yeah, or try it. I think LinkedIn, because they're probably still there, but I think LinkedIn is just lame content. And the ones I see standing out on LinkedIn are the ones who are doing ridiculous things, like all out ridiculous content, kind of like what I was talking about earlier, like humor, just making it an interesting place to go. So I wonder if that would work because right now, especially any B2B content on LinkedIn, I'm like, that's lame. You guys don't know like how to make me actually want to look at what you're making. Yeah. LinkedIn is really where our, you know, I did this concept of buyers, triers, and the trier being the practitioner.

39:47And if we think about a lot of what we offer is the product a free trial of the product, get in the product, see it, use it. So a lot of the practitioners are not on LinkedIn, but the buyers are. The people that are approving the purchase. And it's not that uncommon that we reach the buyer and they say, hey, practitioner, hey, member of my team, go try this. So it's still an important audience. It's just, we're still developing our success strategy on LinkedIn. Yeah, as I think most are. I can't think of too many companies that I'm like, nailed it. That one's doing great. We mentioned kind of backlinking.

40:32Is that something that's like a newer priority? You're talking to people that are previously educated. It's a very complex industry. So is backlinking really important or is it a particular challenge for you? It's a good question. You know, I don't know if it's a particular challenge for us only because, you know, we have an agency and every week I'm getting an update on our, you know, search visibility and we have a score for this and a score for that. And the target we're striving toward, they set. So I, you know, it's not something I understand enough about that I'm really anchoring toward.

41:14But I want as many advantages with Google because we're talking about how everything's changing. But Google is still the place to be. And particularly now with Reddit, Google is even more important. So as many advantages as I can get Avic to get Google to view us favorably, the better. So that's sort of a non-answer, but it's the truth. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. It's interesting. I was just at a, it's like this mastermind with this guy, Dan Sullivan, and I brought up chat GPT and a certain prompt that I was going to do to help me come up with my unique ability or whatever. And most of the room still had not used chat GPT.

42:00And I was like, and I think that's normal, actually. Like if you look at the data, like we get caught up in this, the world's changing so quickly, which it is. Yeah. Search is changing this, that everything's going to be coming from these LLMs now. But then when you look at it, you're like, most people actually probably still use Google to like search for things. Yeah. And so I think once you start, I mean, my literally my jaw dropped when you said that, because I was like, I cannot, you know, I'm affectionately called ChachiBT her. So I talk about her all the time. She's my best friend for no matter what I want to know.

42:37I took my kids to Disney for spring break. And without her, we would have had no trip. I mean, I use it for everything. Yep. So it's just, yeah. I'll have to send you this meme. Maybe you've seen it. We can probably pull it up at some point. But someone's walking as like a white person. Yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. That'd be a good one for y 'all to use. Because about 50 people sent it to me. Oh, yeah. Because they know how I referred to her. Yeah. Yeah. And so Rose, it's like a person sitting on a bench and there's like a white little figure and it's like chat TPT. Her best friend.

43:09Yeah. Her best friend everywhere. It's really good. That's me. I love that. Okay. So I want to get into your leadership style because I know when we talked previously, you talked about this concept of, you know, radical transparency and being really candid and how you work with your team and why that's helpful. And so I'd love to hear first, like how you develop that. Like, tell me a bit of the history there of why you lead in the way that you do now? Yeah. I'd like to pretend it was this whole deliberate strategy. I love the book, Radical Candor by Kim Scott. And I think that's helped me channel it.

43:46But the reality is it's my authentic self. I am a person that tells it to you straight. You know, one of my greatest flaws is speaking without thinking. Same. Perfect. Oops, that was a little too far. Yeah. So I have, you know, I believe so fully in authenticity, both with, you know, as a company to our customers, but also just, you know, how I show up at work. I am at work who I am at home and that doesn't work for everyone. But it's so it's very natural. It would be exhausting for me not to be radically candid. So I think that gives me a really big leg up. When I think about leveraging this framework in the Radical Candor book, it helps me channel that in the most productive way.

44:39The reason I really latched onto and really love what Kim Scott talks about in this radical candor book is that most, if not all people, no one comes to work and wants to do a bad job. Everyone comes to work wanting to do a good job. I'd say everyone comes to work wanting to do a great job. and people assume they're doing a good job until someone tells them otherwise. And how crappy to be, you know, going about your business for a couple of years at a company and then all of a sudden finding out you're not doing a good job. That's just, you know, patently unfair. And so it sort of starts from this place of, you know, leaders.

45:27It's not even courage. It's a responsibility to give feedback. My perspective is when people say feedback, they're usually talking about criticism. And I very much disagree with that. So I give feedback very often. And I would say 90 % plus is positive feedback. And some of that is natural to me, but it also is, I don't want to spend my time as a leader focusing on fixing low performers. I want to spend my time making sure I am retaining high performers on the team. And so a lot of that is reinforcing the right behaviors, recognizing good work. And as part of that, I'm a big praise in public, be discreet about any criticism you have one-on-one.

46:27But if you hear me all the time giving feedback, which is really part of it is stating an opinion. And if you hear it so often, and it is overwhelmingly positive and recognizing good work, then it comes across as authentic and having good intentions, which I do. I want people on my team to bring their best selves. And the intention of giving a criticism is to help people improve. But I can say that, you know, all day, like till I'm blue in the face. But by me focusing a lot on positive as well as negative feedback, I think that's an important part of it. So, I mean, what's interesting, we just had a guest a couple episodes back, Keith Farazi.

47:15So he wrote Never Eat Alone and some other books. And he talked about this concept of like 360 feedback where everyone's just giving everyone feedback. And they did this at Elf Beauty Cosmetics Company and how like employee retention skyrocketed, performance skyrocketed. But it was the manager giving feedback and saying, here's one thing that you did amazing and something you can keep in mind for next month or next quarter. And then they would also give their manager feedback too, which I haven't heard of too many cultures where it's like revolving, constant feedback between everyone. How do you think about that versus, yeah, just being the manager giving it or like incorporating feedback all around?

47:57Huge proponent of it not being tops down. Feedback is always about the work, not the person. And so I'm not the only observer of work. So absolutely. People definitely have to have a high sense of psychological safety. I will say that the marketing team is really great at being open and transparent and candid, but in no way do we live in this world that I, it's how I think, you know, Kim Scott paints it in her book where everyone is just walking around constantly giving feedback. That's not the culture we have. And I just don't know how realistic that is. But, you know, you start by asking and you always ask anything for me, anything else I can do.

48:44You get to the point where you're asking so much that people are like, God, I've got to say something. So she'll shut up and stop asking me. You know, you just sort of put it out there so often. And again, it's about the work. So it should be able to come from anyone. And, you know, I do see that this, you know, me being so, and it's not just praise, it's just, I'm genuinely excited about results or a new test or learnings or anything like that. And I do see that being contagious on the team. You know, I've definitely gotten feedback from my team members. And I think it's just takes a lot of practice making a habit out of it.

49:30Yeah. Giving is, I feel like hard as well, even good, bad, any of it, but I can imagine that having to be a skill, especially as like a team member to learn. How can I give feedback to someone who's above me? Yeah. My manager, you know. You know what helps is getting a lot of feedback. Yeah. Yeah. Because then you can model how it's done. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. So what do you look for when you're hiring like your marketing team, especially in this coming year when you're like building out this power squad? Like what kind of things do you look for in someone who's applying? Yeah, it's a great question, particularly for marketing because every role is so different.

50:10So part of the BDRs at Auvik are part of marketing and we have in full a team of almost 30 BDRs and we have a very well-defined profile of a BDR and it's all the same profile. With marketing, every single marketing role is so different that it so depends on the role in terms of functional experience. But generally what I'm looking for to join Avic overall and certainly to join marketing is first and foremost data oriented. And it's this, I don't care what your opinion is. I don't care what you think. I care what the data says, show up with the data, believe data, leverage data is first and foremost.

51:04And then fitting in with the team and the company. And what I mean by that is, you know, being collaborative, being open-minded, being able to bring new ideas to the table. I mean, certainly fitting in with this culture of being radically candid. And then beyond that, it really depends on what the role is in terms of deep functional experience or a need for really appealing to the target audience. It's sort of a non-answer. Yeah. No, yeah. So data-oriented, culture fit. For data-oriented, how do you test that with someone? That's a great question. Because I'm like, if you gave me a data set now, you're like, show me your data-oriented.

51:47I'd be like cool i mean i am because of my background but most people could just drop it in chat gpt and be like what's this data showing what's a pretend on the cmo of avic well like what would she be looking for poke holes in it how do you yeah hire for that now i'm probably old school on this by now where i still use the you know behavioral interviewing style yeah but um you can just pick up on cues when you're asking someone to talk about work they've done in the past or projects they've done in the past. Are they talking about looking at the data or, you know, why was it a good idea? And anyone, you know, that just had a hunch or just knew it was, or just had a personal preference versus someone who's, you know, that's what the data told me.

52:35I love when people have stories about having a hypothesis, testing it, and they were wrong. I mean, that's what, you know, being data oriented is all about is always testing the hypothesis. So I feel like there's there's a lot of clues in just listening to people talk. Yeah. And that like discernment of information is probably more important than ever with data or with anything. Chachi BG could do it for us. Yeah. When we had your prep call, I remember talking a lot about the prove Suzanne wrong kind of saying, I guess, if that's fair phrase. Yeah. That circulated a lot in your team. And the first place my mind went is I imagine someone could be a great culture fit and is data oriented, but sometimes people can come in with their guard up, maybe from a previous role or some like trauma from past leaders, not speaking from experience or anything.

53:32So that radical candor approach I imagine could be intimidating for some people. Is there a framework you use to kind of like disarm people? Does it come down to a hands-off I trust you kind of approach? Or is it more personal and intimate and your relationships with teams? Or do you kind of just focus on building them up and letting them nurture their own kind of culture and community there? Yeah. So there's a lot there. So one, and I've been at Auvik for four years, so I had a lot of time to build trust with the marketing team. So it certainly didn't happen overnight. The vast majority of my team is Canadian.

54:12and Canadians are not necessarily known for being radically candid, right? So we're fully remote and I joined in 2021. And so I didn't meet a lot of my team members in person first. So I may be making it sound like it was super easy. There is a lot more there. And when new people come in and join the team, I love this and I've really focused on it and talk about it all the time, this concept of prove Suzanne wrong, where we have a Slack channel for marketing and we're always posting ideas or my team is always posting ideas with the, you know, sort of like wink and a nod out to prove Suzanne wrong.

55:00And just reinforcing that just sets the tone early that I'm not some scary CMO that always has to be right. I love when people prove me wrong and I pile on when someone, you know, when we have an example of, you know, we talked earlier about education and nurturing. And I had a woman on my team that felt really strongly, strongly about content syndication and putting white papers out there. And, you know, I said, I don't think it's going to work, but I hope you proved me wrong. And that's how it started because it was really successful. So I think, you know, anchoring on things like that, that sort of say out loud in public with reinforcement from other team members, the way I am and what I like to hear.

55:56But it's tough. Like I, you know, it took me years to earn trust so that people understood that I really had good intentions and, you know, certainly rubbed people wrong, you know, at first. I'm sure especially in a remote setting, right? Like things get lost over Slack or Teams or whatever you use so easily. Yeah. You know, what's interesting though is I've decided that I find one-on-one Zoom conversations with video in many ways more intimate than in person because you are so focused on each other and the person, you know, looking each other in the eyes and having these conversations in a way that I feel like in person just lacks some of that.

56:46Right. Tell me more about this. How does, yeah. How does, cause to me, when I'm in person, I can like feel into someone's energy and how their day might be going and all that. And on Zoom, I just have no idea really. So it's different because it's for me, it's only one on ones. Yeah. Right. So, you know, just you and one other person. Yeah. And yes, in person connections happen, but I feel like they happen more in group settings or socializing after the meeting. So, for example, in a I have regular one on ones with everyone on my team. And it's a set amount of time. So say 30 minutes, and I'm going to talk to you for 30 minutes.

57:31So I am, you know, whatever topics you have. And then, you know, tell me what's going on your personal life. Tell me about this. Tell me about that. Tell me about this. Versus in person, it is you would just swing it by my office to ask me a question. And then once that question was answered, you're off and you leave. It's more deliberate. That makes sense. On Zoom. I like it. I'm here for it. All right, Suzanne, let's move to the lightning round questions. So lightning round is where I ask you a question and you have a minute or less to answer whatever comes to you. Can't wait. Are you ready?

58:09Okay. First one. What is a marketing trend that you think is overhyped right now? I mean, I want to say AI, but I just said that she's my best friend. so probably not um i'm gonna go with abm it's been overhyped for a while yeah remember i like high velocity models and you don't like abm anyways but um but i just think all of the promises of showing intent and at the account level i just think it's over hyped do you think that That one's overhyped for the space you're in or just in general? I think in general. In general. I have a lot of experience with ABM. I did it at an enterprise sales company.

58:53And yes, the technology has advanced since then, but it was still overhyped about how much information you could get on one account from digital data. Yeah. I love it. Okay. That was good. Did you have anything else you want to add? No, I was going to say, someone can prove me wrong and ABM me to buy something and maybe I'll change my mind. Yeah, let me think. We got to ABM you. Exactly. It'll be so sneaky. You'll be like, damn, Steph got me. Now I'm in here buying something. I know, right? Describe your marketing strategy in a couple words. Meet your customers where they are. Yeah, which is like the whole concept of this episode.

59:30Yeah, for sure. Yep, yep. What is the last ad? And let's stick with B2B ad that you remember and you were like, that was good. Oh, B2B. I know. Okay, you can do B2C if you want to. Well, I'll do two. Yeah. the B2C that like really stuck with me was I hope I get this right I think it was Nike I mean how's that for effectiveness oops maybe it's Adidas I don't know I think it was Nike featuring female athletes and it was about being it like made me cry the last time I talked you know I saw a commercial it's about being like weird or bold or strange and it just features all of these female athletes.

1:00:14It's shot almost in all black and white too, which I think is really cool. And it was Nike. It was Nike. Good memory. Good job, Nike. Winning all around. Okay. So where do you as a CMO hang out? Like what are the communities that you're in that you're finding the most value in? You know, what's interesting is that I have been more company leadership oriented as of late versus marketing. So, you know, I'm on Pavilion, I'm in, you know, CMO Coffee Talk. And I used to, I want to say find more value as probably I was looking for more specific things. But so for example, I'm on Pavilion, but I spend most of my time in the sales space at like looking for information there or finding information from finance teams about, I don't know if it's my, you know, me, where I am in the stage of my career at the stage of the company I'm at or what, but it is really interesting that I have such a strong team that I rely on them for the latest and greatest with marketing.

1:01:32And I feel like I'm more focused on more general leadership. But Pavilion and the CMO Coffee Talk, I mean, the Slack and being able to search for anything in that Slack is invaluable. Yeah. My team members in their Slack as well for the sales stuff. And he was showing it to me the other day. I'm like, whoa, it was very helpful. Yeah, like anyone mentions a vendor search. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, it's interesting what you just said because a lot of guests who've been coming on have been saying that, is that they're very focused on this cross-functional, like C-suite collaborators, less about the tactics and more about how do I pull in my CFO?

1:02:15How do I pull in the CRO or the CEO and make sure everyone is betting with me on something and not just me as a marketing leader doing my own thing? Yeah. And so it seems like that's been a big shift over the past couple of years. is pulling everyone together to like lead the company in a cohesive way. Okay. Well, good. Good job. I'm on trend. You're on trend. Perfect for me. If you were not in marketing, what would you be doing? An interior designer. I would love that job more than anything. I don't know if I would be good at it, but I like my taste. Have you tried it at your house? Of course.

1:02:46Now I want to see. Yes. You know, I feel like this whole episode was about how my opinion doesn't matter. It's about what the data says. this is one place where it is my aesthetic and what I like. I just think it's so fun. Yeah, I would love to do that. I definitely want to see your house. And now I'm like, are you judging my house? No, don't look. Your house looks great. Don't look anywhere. Kids stuff everywhere. Legos. Too late. I've already looked around your house. It looks great. I already peaked. Thank you. What is the best way to start the day as a marketer? Not how I start my day, which is being jolted out of bed by a five-year-old in my face screaming, good morning, mommy.

1:03:26I'm a morning person. So mornings are super productive for me. I like to do the hard, big problems sort of thinking early in the day. And then the more learning, I want to research this topic or I want to listen to this podcast or, you know, that comes more naturally for me later in the day. I have a lot of peers and colleagues that, you know, insist that starting their day with a certain podcast or anything like that. But for me, outside of my, you know, son screaming in my face, good morning, once I can put him on the iPad, it's quiet time for me. and I'm, you know, half awake drinking coffee, which I feel like makes me have better ideas because I'm not, you know, in my whole rational head, I'm able to be a little bit more creative.

1:04:22I love it. I love it. Okay, last one. What is something that you believe right now that you're getting the most pushback on from your team, from leadership, from friends? What's one thing I actually want to say out loud on the podcast? This is the real question. Whatever you first thought was probably the best one, but do what you want. This concept of sort of back to the basics. And what I mean by this is that it's so easy to go chase the shiny thing. New product, new this, new that, new persona, new all of that. That I'm a big believer in doing one thing really, really well. And then moving on to the next.

1:05:04Look, I'm a woman, so I'm great at multitasking. I don't mean that. but just really getting back to the basics and the fundamentals and getting that right and building upon it. Yeah, that's a good reminder for right now where everyone's like, there's so many things. I'm gonna try everything. That's good. Well, Suzanne, this was awesome. Thank you for walking over here today and joining us in studio. Where can our listeners, our viewers, everyone learn more about you and what you're up to at Auvik? Yeah, definitely Auvik.com. A-U-V-I-K is the spelling. And thanks so much for having me, neighbor.

1:05:36neighbors now we're gonna have neighborhood parties exactly thank you we'll see you again soon