Startup Marketing and the Power of CX: Figurr Founder David Cooperstein on Marketing Smarts [Podcast]

Startup marketing presents some challenges different from those of enterprise marketing (although they do have commonalities). David Cooperstein's consultancy, Figurr, specializes in helping new businesses to find their story and create a marketing strategy. That includes the people who are outside in front of the corporate office, people who are at the point-of-sale terminal, people who are just wearing a logo while they're walking around San Francisco (which you know everybody does). When it comes to customer experience, if you just let people be whoever they want to be, that better be part of your brand. Startup marketers face different challenges than their their counterparts at big companies (10:12): "There's way less process (at startups), and I mean that in both good and bad ways. "On the enterprise side, you've got way more process than you do creativity because you're trying to appeal to so many different factions and the company already has a message in the marketplace that, for whatever reason, they're just trying to update. Focus on the customer, not just your product or your sales numbers (12:01): "The key is having a customer experience mindset. Maintaining a focus on customer experience can help you with product research and development (21:00): "There's always got to be a vision way bigger than what the product is going to deliver on Day One, and then you work your way down from vision to go-to-market strategy. "That is where you can intersect product development, marketing, and customer experience in one. This episode brought to you by GoToWebinar: GoToWebinar makes it easy to produce engaging online events.

Startup marketing presents some challenges different from those of enterprise marketing (although they do have commonalities). But whether you’re a brand new business or a centuries-old conglomerate, one aspect of your business is of paramount importance: customer experience (CX).

David Cooperstein’s consultancy, Figurr, specializes in helping new businesses to find their story and create a marketing strategy. His appreciation for CX began when he led the CMO research practice at Forrester Research.

“Seeing customer success people and account people reporting on their communication with customers, I noticed how all those interactions rolled up into a customer’s impression of the company,” David said. “Customer calls for service, sales… you need to think about the company holistically.”

I met David in March at the Adobe Summit in Las Vegas (pic below), and invited him to Marketing Smarts to talk about startup marketing, CX, and engineering experiences that align with how you want your company perceived in the marketplace.

Here are just a few highlights from our conversation:

Everyone at your company is your brand (02:52): “There’s a need for everybody to understand that they are complicit in how the company presents itself. That includes the people who are outside in front of the corporate office, people who are at the point-of-sale terminal, people who are just wearing a logo while they’re walking around San Francisco (which you know everybody does). They all have to think about what that means to be wearing the company logo or being an ambassador for the brand. When it comes to customer experience, if you just let people be whoever they want to be, that better be part of your brand. Because people are going to represent themselves in a way that people will think, ‘Oh, that’s the company’s attitude, not just the person’s attitude.’

“This was more familiar back in the 1950s when everybody would just toe the line of a brand. But there were fewer people that had access to customers back then. Now, all it takes is some social media and all of a sudden your customers are being affronted by someone who’s a brand ambassador and not realizing that they have maybe a very different point of view.”

Startup marketers face different challenges than their their counterparts at big companies (10:12): “There’s way less process (at startups), and I mean that in both good and bad ways. For startups, there’s less process because there’s less history. There’s also fewer people. It’s more freeing because you can be really creative. On the flip side, not everybody wants to conform to whatever you come up with unless the CEO says ‘this is the way we’re going to do it.’ Usually, resources are constrained for making the marketing effort get the reach that it needs.

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