Over the past year we’ve hosted more than 25 guests – from behavioral scientists, best-selling authors, influencer marketers, CRO experts, and so many more. We’ve handpicked the best moments from our favorite experts for you to relive and get inspired to take your own marketing program to the next level. So put your AirPods in, turn up the volume and get ready for the best of the best of Season 1 of the GRIN Gets Real podcast. 

The State of Influencer Marketing 2020

Neal Schaffer, founder of PDCA Social 

1:45 – 5:57

“A relationship-first approach to influencer marketing can mean the difference in sustaining long-term ROI. Working with Influencers who are loyal customers means that the content will be more authentic and building a successful program will be much easier.”  

How to Create Content for Social Marketing

Kate Bradley Chernis, founder and CEO of Lately

5:58 – 12:09

“So it’s so easy, and it’s the same no matter what your industry is or how big or small your company is, and that is human connection. The No. 1 cause for loss of sales is lack of customer trust, believe it or not. And trust comes from that connection. You like people; you believe them. So that’s why people are like, ‘Oh, social selling, it’s this new thing’…selling has always been social if you’re any good at it.”  

Introduction to Behavioral Science for Ecommerce Brands

Shirin Oreizy, founder and president of Next Step

12:10 – 16:30

“Social proof is this idea that as humans we are motivated by how others are behaving or acting. Picture if you’re choosing between two restaurants. There is a big long line outside one and there isn’t a single person outside the other. You’re most likely to go stand in the line even though you really have no idea if the food is any better. You’re judging based on what other people are doing.”  

Video Marketing on Social Media

Rayhan Perera, founder and CEO of OneDash

16:30 – 20:12

“The attention span doesn’t last very long. As soon as we see something, we know whether we want to explore more or not. So you need to send the main message in less than 20 seconds.”  

Is Authenticity Just a Buzzword?

Matt Barnett, founder of Bonjoro

20:12 – 23:16

“Don’t pay for people who are just going to spout your name. If they don’t believe in what you do, people will see through it. People are over the B.S. They’re starting to spot the fake attitudes, they’re starting to spot the tricks, and they’re fed up with it. As a brand you have to be transparent and be yourself, because the old school way doesn’t work.”  

The What, When, and How to Choose the Right Ecommerce Tech Tools

Derric Haynie, chief ecommerce technologist of Ecommercetech.io

23:16 – 26:17

“I’m most excited about price testing tools. You install the tool to your Shopify store, it looks at your history of prices and discounts, and uses the fundamentals of supply and demand curves to tell you what your best prices are. Then you just click and change the price of your products. It continues to look at your visitor and conversion rate information and learn from there. You can also plug in your cost of goods sold and understand the price impact on margin.”  

How to Use Data to Create an Omnichannel Strategy That Works

Claire Leon, co-founder of Achorn-i

26:17 – 28:53

“If you log into an Amazon account, it’s a world within itself. There is just so much there. Not only is it data overload, but it is so time consuming. And the resources that are required for brands are really sizable. Without having a solution that makes that easy, you’re going to have to log into multiple single dashboards, export multiple reports, stitch them together, pull all of that, then understand which optimizations you are going to make for your business – whether it’s more influencer marketing, promos, etc. That is so inefficient for brands.”  

The Inside Scoop on Influencer Talent Management

Jessy Grossman, CEO of Tribe Monday

28:53 – 32:59

“The most successful influencers that I’ve worked with, it was a true partnership, meaning that they were hustling so hard, just as we are on our end.”  

How to Create Engaging Online Communities

Carrie Melissa Jones, author, community builder, and online community researcher

32:59 – 36:32

“A community is a group of people who share a mutual concern. Period. They have to actually care about one another in order to be considered a community.”  

How to Create and Share Your Brand Story

Josh Roush, CEO and lead brand strategist of Movetic

36:32 – 40:20

“Brands need to find authentic influencers who align with their lifestyle and values. Once you figure out who you are, and why you matter, then you can develop a community of creative people who align with those core values.”  

Influencer Marketing as a Strategy – a Creator’s Perspective

Justin Moore, founder of Creator Wizard

40:20 – 43:36

“As a brand you literally cannot possibly keep track of everything on social media that is working. So you really should try to lean on creators. And again, try to compensate creators for this type of market research. Allocate a budget and basically create a creator advisory board. Because creators have their fingers on the pulse of what is working on social media because they are doing it day in and day out.”  

Leveraging LinkedIn for SMM

Anthony Blatner, founder of Speedwork Social

43:36 – 47:20

“If you sell a high-ticket offer, and you need to sell to a niche decision maker at scale, that’s where LinkedIn is going to be best for you. Yes, it is more expensive, but when you need that type of granularity, that’s where LinkedIn is going to be best for you.”  

Scaling Your Influencer Marketing Program

Allison Brown, former director of influencer marketing at Kodiak Cakes and Factor_

47:20 – 51:45

“It’s a huge red flag when you start influencer marketing and they want it all. They want high conversions. They want the biggest numbers in brand awareness. And they want a ton of content creation that they can reuse. I think when you go into influencer marketing with all those things being your goals, you’re not going to do any of them well.”  

The Value of Content Marketing

Joe Pulizzi, entrepreneur and best-selling author

51:45 – 56:13 

“You have to pave the way for your success, and you have to communicate your way there. Your second-most important audience is your customers. The first most-important audience is your employees.”  

Ecommerce Promo Code Security

Kathleen Booth, vice president of marketing at clean.io

56:13 – 1:00:05

“As marketing has become more and more digital, marketers have taken on large IT budgets. In fact, there’s a lot of data that shows that we have bigger IT budgets than the IT leader in the company does. So much of our marketing is online.”  

Improving Customer Experience with Personalization 

David Wachs, marketing expert and founder of Handwrytten

1:00:05 – 1:04:15

“Sending a personalized note pulls at their heartstrings a little bit, even if they know it’s fake, they think, ‘Gee, they took a second to do something different, and they appreciate me!’ And it doesn’t cost you that much.”  

How to Maximize Social Selling

Alexander Low, social selling expert 

1:04:15 – 1:08:28

“The content piece is the hardest part for most people. What type of content do I create? What content should I engage with? And it’s about blending the corporate message (if you will) to, ‘This is me. This is what I stand for.’ This takes us back to personal branding. People engage with humans, not companies.”  

Why the Customer Experience Matters

Dan Gingiss, author and social media expert

1:08:28 – 1:11:31

“I believe that everyone has a role in the customer experience, even if you’re not directly customer-facing. Everyone is in the business of customer service. Even if you’re working in the back office somewhere, chances are you’re working on something that the customer eventually sees. It’s important that culturally everyone feels like they have some impact on the customer experience.”   

The Power of Creating an Authentic Brand

Re Perez, brand strategist and best-selling author 

1:11:31 – 1:14:32

“At the end of the day, I don’t care if you are a multinational B2B brand, a B2C brand, or a personal brand, we all buy based on emotion, and then we validate our emotional buys through logic and reason.”  

Remaining Innovative in Marketing

Carla Johnson, global keynote speaker and 10x author

1:14:32 – 1:18:58 

“Now the ability to consistently deliver ideas that are new, great, and reliable is what truly makes a person, a team, or a company innovative. Because it’s not about doing it once and going ‘Tada, I did it,’ mic drop, and I’m done for the rest of my career. It’s about the ability to consistently deliver just like any great performer.”  

CRO Best Practices for Ecommerce

Kurt Philip, founder of Convertica

1:18:58 – 1:22:52

“What you want to do is have the reviews in the top section, not one of these carousels that shows one at a time. Those are really annoying. You want to have like five or six all showing at the same time with the five-star (rating) and what the review is. Even if it’s on one of the credible platforms, have it so it clicks over to that and they can see it’s real so that it’s further credible.”