My Marketing Ops Journey with Faithful Adia, A B2C Marketing Ops Pro Interview

We are back to our series of Marketing Ops career journeys. 

In this episode, we are talking with Faithful Adia who is currently Senior Marketing Automation Manager at HelloFresh, based in Germany. Prior to this role he has held roles as CRM Manager, email marketing specialist and more.

We enjoyed learning from Faithful about what it is like leading Marketing Ops at a B2C company since the majority of our episodes have leaned heavily towards B2B.

Hi, I’m Michael Hartmann, I’m Naomi Lou, and I’m Mike Rizzo. And this is ops cast, a podcast for marketing ops pros and rev ops pros created by the MO Pros. The number one community for marketing operations. As professionals tune into each episode as we chat with real professionals to help elevate you in your marketing operations career.

No everyone. Welcome to another episode of OpsCast brought to you by the Mopro sign. Michael Hartmann today joined by Mike Rizzo. My ex say, hello, buddy. This is exciting. Uh, we, we have a lot of downloads right now. I, we reached what like 7,000. 7,000 out, a lot of fun with this. And, uh, today’s guest, which Michael introduced in a second is helping us reach other parts of the world, which is even cooler.

So anyway, absolutely. I spiced it up this time. We’ll actually set some things. I didn’t just say, Hey, I’m disappointed though. You didn’t, you didn’t say that your, your thing for this year, right? Well, it’s the year the marketing ops professional. It’s the, you’re the Mopro. There you go. Maybe you don’t need to say it anymore.

Right? We know that. Nope. I’m going to say. Good. Let’s do it. So let’s get to it as Mike kinda kind of, uh, try to allude to it here. So we are doing another one in our series of marketing ops career journeys. So we’re fortunate today to be joined by fateful idea who is in Germany and is currently senior marketing automation manager at HelloFresh.

Prior to that role, he held roles as a CRM manager, email marketing specialist and some others. And we’re going to let him talk about that. Um, what I’m looking forward to is learning from Fayetteville about, is what it’s like to lead marketing ops, or in this case, marketing automation at a B to C company, a lot of what we, you know, the folks we’ve talked to in the context that we talk about is primarily B2B.

So it’s going to be really interesting. I think, to get a perspective from him on PTC. And, um, so without further ado, faithful, welcome. Thanks for joining us today, especially since it’s so late for you. Uh, thanks for having me. This is my best podcast ever, so I’m really excited to be here.

Yeah. All right. Well, we’ll, we’ll try to be nice. Yeah. We’ll try to go easy idea now. It’ll be fun. We’re a pretty tough crowd. Yeah. All right. So I am actually really excited to hear, uh, faithfully your, your, your journey. So why don’t we just do this, right? Why don’t you kind of walk us through, just give us an overview of kind of your, your career path journey and how it’s led to kind of marketing operations, marketing.

Sure. Um, so I, um, I did like my bachelor’s in computer science. Um, but before then, I, I mean, growing up, I was sort of interested in computer technology. Um, the likes, right. And that started like in like playing computer games with, uh, with the, with the windows or S uh, back in the days, but, uh, sort of evolved into, okay.

What other parts of the computer can you use? I was doing like, sort of coral draws or trying to design, uh, if you like, um, um, stuff, right. And that, then that moved into website. So I sat learning HTML CSS with a dream Weaver, which is, um, actually, I don’t know if that’s still exists today, but, uh, that’s a good call-out dream Weaver.

God, I learned that platform to. Yeah, that’s awesome. It is definitely still out there. It’s out there. It’s just talking to somebody the other day, who was cleaning up some HTML, where we actually tried to debug some problem with an email. And, uh, it was in the person was looking at it and treat them. We were, that’s so amazing.

That was my very first, uh, website I ever built for a client when I was attempting to be my own consultant and agency. I used Dreamweaver to launch it. And man. That’s a fantastic journey so far. Keep going, keep going. I can actually remember the last time I touched that too, but yeah, that was also my intro.

Um, right. So when I got into the university, I was doing more like website development projects. Right. But now this was more focused on like using WordPress. WordPress was like my tool. Of choice. And I was using that to build websites for different people, with different clients and stuff like that. And, um, you know, when you build a website, it’s like, oh, this nice fancy website, but how do you get people to see the website?

Right. Um, um, because at the end of the day, it’s more or less like you’ll want to websites to be able to either sell your product, your service, or maybe the website it’s the product itself. But essentially it’s seven. A Papa was right. And I said, dive in into the marketing aspects of saying, okay, maybe the postings on social media, maybe we stop posting a lot of content articles, actually, no SEO.

Then it was more or less like just blogging. Um, right. And then, um, thinking about, okay, what about Facebook advertisement, Google ads, this kind of things. Right. And that sort of segues me into digital marketing. And I was really interested in that aspect of that. Okay. Let me try and get a bit more learnings in this side.

So I took some certification, some courses, and, um, after a while I was like, okay. I would like to know a bit more about not just marketing, let me know about the other business concept because I was a bit entrepreneurial then. And so I, um, went to do like a master’s degree. To an international business and learned things like, um, economics, finance, accounting, um, business strategy, um, and, and the legs.

Right. So just to get a bigger, broader perspective of the entire business landscape. Right. And, um, in between my program, this was in France. I was like, okay, let me get a summer internship. Right. So, um, it’s it’s uh, three months or so. Um, I don’t want it to be, I do it the entire time. Let me find a company I can work with.

And I found this, um, small sales agency, right. Which I’m in Germany, in Berlin, which was supporting. Um, small companies. So companies that are just starting out sort of building their self-esteem building their sales processes. Um, however, they were heavily relying on, um, on Google docs or Google sheets or Excel, and the likes in managing.

Yeah, there are stages and all those kinds of things, right. Or their sales cycle. So, um, this, this company was, was, was going in, uh, consulting with, uh, mostly the founders, uh, because it’s still a very early stage company and trying to, um, trying to understand, okay, how do we, um, either, um, Shorten the sales cycle.

So maybe it takes a few months. Let’s see how can shutting that down. Maybe it’s training to people, whatever it is. Right. And one of the themes that the founder realized was that, um, I mean, instead of using Excel, why don’t we use, uh, a CRM, right. To be able to manage this a lot better. And, um, when I was interviewing with that company, funny enough, my, your job title I was interviewing for.

Uh, business development manager. But, uh, when I came in the rural kind of just went with the skills that I had. Right. So I got into the sort of company, um, who realized that, or, I mean, I could build websites. Um, I could do a bit of digital marketing, so it was more like I did the website for the company.

And then I was building websites for other clients of the company. Um, so okay. I could do like Facebook ads and Google ads. So I was like running ads, not for the company, but for the company’s clients. Um, and then this, uh, CRM thing came because the company was essentially selling, um, uh, Zoho, CRM licenses.

So other combinations, because this is one to one Sharon two, they worked with and they saw, okay. I mean, it does the job. Um, and um, they get like a commission when they sell the last sentence. But the challenge there was that they did not do the implementation. Right. So. Said, oh, this tool can help you. Um, you know, these companies they’re really small.

They don’t have anybody to support here. So it was like a gap and he just, uh, my boss asked me, oh, is this something you could do? I was like, well, um, I mean, I can, I can build websites. I can do social media. Um, I can do paid, paid advertisement. I’m pretty sure I should be able to do. Um, uh, the tool right.

And how to implement it. And that’s how I sort of got into implementing a CRM, maybe think of it like sales ops for other organizations. Right. So getting requirements and. And sort of implementing these tools. Faithful. I think you’re still going, but like, I, I don’t want to forget things like I’ve. Okay. So I have so many thoughts about this one.

I think it’s really interesting that it sounds like you were, you said you were entrepreneurial, but I think the evidence was when you were in college, did you, were you doing consulting and doing websites for people like paid work that point? Yep. Yep. Yeah. Okay. Awesome. And then, so the other thing I was, when you were talking about, um, how you kept kind of knowing that you wanted to learn more about different, whether it was technology or stuff, and then the, the, the business, uh, program you went through.

Same, our last guest, Daniel Murray. One of the things we talked about early with him was about like how important it is, not just for marketers, but marketing ops folks as well to understand the context of what we’re doing. Do you think that your experience having done. Gone through that also affects kind of how you think about your day-to-day job or even when you were doing it.

Like, are you thinking, do you feel like you’re thinking about it differently than maybe some other people you hear in the rest of the marketing ops community? I think it contributes a lot because, um, when, when thinking about like, if you want to. When thinking about the technology, which a lot of marketing, uh, ops people or marketing automation or marketing tech people, um, uh, I think about, you know, sometimes we try to, we tend to giggle about, I mean, me particularly, I tend to speak about the technical aspect of things.

Right. But then I think, like having a good understanding of how it relates to the business in terms of the impact that these things, your. Can have it’s definitely important. Right. And knowing that, I mean, even from the start of my journey, knowing that just building a website doesn’t serve the purpose.

Right. Because at the end of the day, you have to know how it connects to, to impact the business. Right. Are they selling more things? Uh, are they, is their brand being known, all those kinds of things. Right. So, I mean, that’s, what’s sort of what even led me into going down the business part because I wanted to really understand.

You know, these are business objectives and this is the technology, or this is the tool. How do we use this to meet the business objectives? Right. Um, so I had quite a lot of interest in topics that, I mean, maybe it’s not, um, it’s not the focus of my, of my job at the moment, but definitely.

All right. So did we get all the way through to where you are? Uh, no, not really. So I think this is great and, and just, just the connectivity that you’re already like pointing to around understanding how the business process and all of those things sort of impact each other is such a critical message.

But yeah. Tell us, where are you today? Like what are you doing now? Yeah, so after, after that experience, I was, I was not looking for. For another role, right? It was, um, was that okay? I’ve done this. Um, this is sort of exciting to me because prior to then I was actually looking more on the, on the paid social tracks.

I was looking for a role in either Google ads or that I can do Google advertisement or Facebook ads. Um, however, going into this, um, sales ops slash CRM kind of role as that. Okay. I think this is an interesting part that touches on a lot of things. Let me see what other company or whatever role I can find.

And I wasn’t really looking. I mean, I wasn’t looking whether it was B2B or B2C. I first look in a way where can I do something like this? Right. And, um, that’s how I, I sort of found a triple. And I joined the company as a, as an email marketing manager. Um, however, this was like, um, sort of working more on the campaign management path.

Right? So it, it was more building these emails, getting copy gets in designs, um, modifying the hitch demo a bit, uh, And we were using Salesforce marketing cloud. So that’s the, that’s the ESP that Trivago was using. And, um, sorry, I’m going to, I’m going to cut you off there just for one second. Um, I’m amazed that I’ve finally met somebody that’s used Salesforce marketing cloud.

That’s all. I’m going to say. So happy to hear that I could finally call on someone. We haven’t, we haven’t talked Mike as I have as well for a second. Kept this a secret. All right. Sorry. All right. Keep going. This is good. No worries. Yeah. So. Got into the tool and, uh, started doing like campaign management related work.

Uh, but then I sort of got more into, or more fascinated, more interested in the, in the automation side of things. So like we had like automations that powered these emails, that part, these campaigns, right. To build the segments. And I was looking at a couple of them that were maybe timing out, so that could be better optimized.

And that was where my focus was on. Right. So thinking of how do. Optimize the queries. How do I optimize the automations? How do we get more data points into Salesforce so that we can be able to personalize our campaigns a lot better? How do we improve the automated campaigns that we’re currently have those kinds of things?

Right. So that’s what I was doing there. And. Uh, COVID hit, uh, and sort of affected the travel industry. So I was looking at making a pivot. So I joined HelloFresh, which is in the food sector, um, as a CRM manager. Right. And, um, it was sort of a mixture of everything. So I came when the company was migrating to Salesforce marketing cloud.

Um, so I was doing a bit of. Campaign management, but also I’m doing a lot of automations. And after about two months, day, sort of my role kind of just like focused on the technical, um, automations or oppression side of things. So training. And ensure that we have the right automations running into part of the segments, the part that emails, um, doing the scripting needed to be able to personalize this, this, this messaging and, um, gets into detail.

We need all those kinds of things. Right. And, uh, that’s, that’s sort of how my, my role has evolved at, at, at, at the moment. And that’s kind of the role that I, I sit in, um, right now. That’s incredible. Did you end up, uh, just out of curiosity for more from like, uh, you seem to be, well, we’ve already established you’re, you’re an entrepreneurial minded individual who is thinking ahead and always learning, uh, when COVID hit, did you just sort of proactively say like, Hey, I gotta go, I gotta get ahead of this.

Or did it really like, sort of get a little bit forced on you or, or what. It wasn’t, um, it was more or less like a point in time that I felt like there was, um, COVID heat. I think it was much, I became really like, like really impactful, uh, across, across the continent. Not just, or the entire world, actually, not just in Asia.

Um, but then I, um, in, in April I was, I was thinking, yeah, I mean travel has really like come to a stop. Um, I felt like there were, there was not a lot of opportunity for me to, to grow and develop in my field anymore because there was not a lot that was doing, so I was looking for something, something else.

Right. And, um, it was just, it was a weekend and I, and I put in like two or three applications. Um, one of them was the what’s the hello? Fresh. And for you, it was a good conversation. Good for you though. I, you know, my takeaway from that is, um, to, you know, always be thinking about how the landscape that you’re even in the organization you’re working for.

Right. COVID of course impacted everybody. But, um, good for you just to, just to be thinking about those kinds of things. And, um, I’m doing a bit of outreach and it sounds like it landed you in a pretty, pretty solid role given what you were looking for. So that’s awesome. Congratulations. Yup. Thank you. So, so, um, I was going to ask you not knowing how w how this journey was going to play out for you.

If you had worked both in B2B and B2C. I think the answer is yes, correct? Yep. Okay. So I think one of the big things I would like to know from you, and I’ve got, I have B to C experience in one role way back when, when I first kind of moved from consulting and to, um, in the marketing. So. Yeah. You from, from, uh, from yours, especially the standpoint of kind of the CRM manager, MarTech, right.

Roles, you know what, what’s your kind of view now on what’s really key differences between B2B B to C. Um, so maybe I, I, first of all, starting with prefacing that my experience in B2B wasn’t really, um, smaller or younger. So it could be, uh, an entirely different situation would work in with larger B2B companies.

Um, for one thing that I can say in B2B is that I feel like, uh, when, when just thinking about CRM as a whole, it’s the people that you touch are mostly, um, like business people and the sales cycle is also. Right. Um, and in working with B to C in the both companies I’ve worked at in the B2C space, you’re talking with the customer.

So your messaging has to be a lot more, I mean, of course in B2B, it has to be personalized, but business has to really speak to the people. Right. So that you’re really. Like touching those nerves and being able to get your message across. Um, also one thing that I liked about B2C is that I can really see the impact on a day-to-day basis.

Like we have a campaign go live today, tomorrow. I can see, um, see the conversions or see the results coming in. Like literally. Right. So even today, right. And in a, in, in B2B, it’s a bit different at least from, from my own experience. Right. Um, yeah. You have other things that signified the end, the bottom line, like where are you going to go?

Uh, but it’s not like you activate your campaign today and tomorrow you’re already saturated and, um, um, you know, the results. So I think those, those are like the two main, main perspectives that I, I can see between between. So I know like one of the things I would have said is just the sheer volume of data, right.

On the consumer side. They’re just more, um, and then I think what this is maybe what you’re getting at, when you’re talking about conversions and kind of quickly understanding the impact of a campaign or a tactic that you’re doing. I, is it, do you think that’s because more because you don’t have. Uh, whereas, you know, it’s a little more direct and you can go, okay, well, this email had this effect, especially if it’s an online purchase rate, you can close that, that closed loop is a lot easier to build out.

Yeah. Because you don’t have the sales cycle and maybe a long sales cycle that goes along with what you’re doing from a marketing. So do you think, I know you’ve mentioned Salesforce marketing cloud, but are you using, um, a different, are there any significant differences in tech stack overall? Um, is it, I mean, do you think it’s really more about doing like, is it email automation or is it truly marketing automation?

Do you have, do you have you spend more time on a database rather than say a CRM? Like, I’m just like, I’m trying to understand what the differences are. So. In, in my role, I can say it’s, um, I maybe spend most of my time in, uh, Salesforce marketing cloud, uh, which is, uh, uh, ESP. But, um, one thing that I can say regarding to like the tech stack is we have, um, like a data warehouse.

It’s like a source of truth is like the single source of truth. And that data gets funneled into, um, whatever that tool that we use writing. It can be Salesforce. It can be, um, Tableau for visualization, right? It could be, um, it could be any other Urdu tool and the way, um, the way, uh, our team is structured at HelloFresh athletes.

We have marketing automation within a CRM, and we also have marketing automation within paid, paid marketing. So it’s, it’s the, when you look at the, the context of the role, it’s the same thing, but just within different, uh, different sub-departments on the market. Right in the sense that we’re trying to use technology to automate or setting processes or drive efficiency in, in our marketing.

But we just have a team that is focused on, on paid marketing because it’s a different kind of problem. Um, and we also have a team focused on sharing, which is a different kind of problem too. All right.

Very interesting. Um, Yeah, it’s been so long since I’ve been to B2C that I like I’ve kind of lost touch with that and I’m sure our audience would be. We’ll be curious to hear more about that. Okay. So let’s go, let’s go back a little bit on your career journey. And one of the things I like to hear for people is like, where w what do you think of when it’s two parts?

What do you think of is like key points where your career could have gone one way or another right. Inflection points where. That you look back and go, that was, had I not done that, or I had two choices and I chose this one. The other is, are there people along the way that you think of is they were key to helping you be successful or you learn something from them or their mentors or their w what can you do those two pieces, I think are really interesting for all of our audience to know.

Sure. Um, I would, first of all, say that there are a lot of people who has helped me on my, on my journey. Um, and, uh, I think there they’ve been several affection points, but I’m just trying to, to, to, to identify Q1. Uh, but I feel like I feel like joining, um, if I want to even start from, from, from before. So me getting.

Um, or geeking out about computers and the likes was brought up from my end, uh, was that interest was sort of built up or was, was spoiled by my, my other cousin who was into, um, technologies and into computers. And he was the one that actually taught me, um, web dev on Dreamweaver in the first instance.

Right. And that, that, that kind of. Change my pocket, because growing up, I was, I said, I wanted to be a nuclear engineer. That was what I said I wanted to be. Right. Well, I was good. I was going to be a chemical engineer, but then I went to university, then chemistry and then several engineering, but not chemical engineering, you know?

So at least that got me into, into, into tech. Um, and then getting into, into marketing. I, um, I also met a few other folks who were. A lot of business minded, there were developers that were like core programmers. Right? Well, um, there were a lot of business minded I think, in about the impact. Right. Um, so this has actually got me thinking and I met these guys in, in, in university.

So this guy actually got me thinking about the business side of things and sort of led me into learning more about that aspect. And, um, and when I came to France and decided to take an internship, I actually appreciate the fact that my, the person who hired me, my boss, then with the small company, I understand.

Probably that was what’s like he probably didn’t have any other choice, but just being in that kind of company and being able to utilize all the skill set that I had, and also him being very resourceful and looking at, okay, what can we do? What else can, how can we expand all those kinds of things? And also giving me the autonomy to be able to manage what I was doing.

Was really, really that really, that really helped a lot. It builds my confidence. It also builds, um, you know, being able to handle back, um, conversations from the start to the end, um, in, uh, in, uh, operations kind of, kind of my kind of way. Right. Um, so that was, that was good. And then, um, getting into, into. Um, that was my first intro into Salesforce marketing cloud.

Right. And, um, in fact from probably a sales agency, downward equity, like that’s been like, it’s probably been the best. I couldn’t have asked for a better experience. Really. It sort of blends every of my interests and these people were, were, were definitely crucial to getting me on this path. So yeah.

So, um, well, I’m not going to put you on the spot and ask you about what you prefer B to B or B to C, but, um, Hey, it’s nothing no, no, no. I already answered that. You bring it. Come on. It’s B to C I was, I was, I was having this conversation with someone recently, so I could definitely say that, um, B2C it’s um, I think you, you sort of already touched on it, but like, like the first thing that I said, I can see the impact.

I really like. I like to see that I do something and I can see the impact. That’s one, but also the amount of data points that we have also makes it a lot fun. The things that you can do right there love interesting things. You can work on a lot of interesting projects. You can work on. It’s more or less, I think in what else can we do?

Right. Um, what else can we do within, within the space and how can we be able to connect it to, to the business? Uh, it feels like the creativity aspect of the B2C world. I mean, I had a brief stint as a consultant and, and for a moment and at an agency where I worked with. Business and it’s certainly opens up the creativity box a little bit.

Right. So, yeah, I, I could see that B2B is a lot harder. And if you can, if you, I think in some ways, if you figure out how to have success and get creative and B2B, uh, and then you find a B2C. You’ll like in a lot of ways, I think it helps you to have come from B2B because you’re forced to think more critically about how to be creative and B2B and B2C.

There’s just so much more, so it’s interesting that you bring that up. Cause I had a mentor for a while. Who, when I was, I was considering trying to, like, I had some, I was in, at, been in B2B. And I was looking at some potential opportunities that were more B to C and I was asking her, I was like, you know, do you think they’d be open to even considering me with my background, not having B to C and she, and her point was that really B2B is way more complicated in a lot of ways.

Yeah. And, uh, and being able to move from that to B to C is a little bit easier than going from B2C to B2B. And I think. I think it’s a lot harder to go from B to C be. Yeah. I mean, I think there’s, um, I mean the scale is, is I think the big scale going and B2C is the there’s the real challenge, but in terms of like process, the technology stack, you know, having insights quickly, those are actually a lot easier and less, less controversial.

As we know, as all of our conversations about attribution. Yeah. Then in the B2C one, and you think about the buyer’s journey, right? Like we, we in B2B, we’re engineering ways to describe the buyer journey and the life cycle process. And depending on what type of B2B you’re in, you know, that’s a whole rigor Moreau of, you know, there are, you got to go through legal and procurement and then there’s all these extra steps you have to layer in.

Stage two stage three and all this other stuff. And then B to C it’s like, did you buy or didn’t you buy? You know, I mean, it’s not that simplified, but it’s, it’s definitely not as like, complex. Right? So you started like moving from B2C to B2B. You’re suddenly having to pick up all of this new lingo around lifecycle management.

That, that isn’t quite the same. As, as it would be in B-to-C, right. There’s like discovery and then retargeting and then purchase like that upsell or like buy again, buy again, buy again or something. Right. So I don’t know. I think there’s a lot until the, well, I think, I think about, um, in the consumer world, the idea of householding right, which is somewhat analogous to.

Yeah, building out an account structure on the B2B side, it’s still way easier because there’s so much more data about addresses and you can connect the dots a lot easier. And on top of that, at least in the us people’s addresses changed, attracts them like that’s one of the biggest challenges, um, in a lot of B2B industries is when people move from one company to another, that are a target, especially if they’ve been a customer of yours at one place, like a very obvious place to go pursue.

It is really, really hard. I think there’s. It’s a progress around that on technology, but it’s like, those are all really, it seems like it should be easy, but it’s not.

I was also going to say that one of the differences was, um, when you, when you just mentioned, was in terms of like, uh, list management. So like in B2B your once your, your, your customer changes companies. You probably lost like the email address, right? Because, um, if it, if, if it’s a company email address, then that’s no longer valid.

So, um, in terms of lease management, in terms of deliverability, those things are a lot more different than in B2C where it’s more of like a personal email address and it doesn’t really change much for, for a long time. Right. Yeah, definitely. All right. Well, thanks for sharing, even though I was trying not to put you on the spot about that.

I mean, but never say never. I could, uh, I could, uh, I could one day, uh, you know, one of the B2B experience, um, there you go, Hey, stick it if you’re having fun. And if you are enjoying, going to work every day, uh, you know, don’t. What does it don’t fix what ain’t broke kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah. Just have fun, man.

It makes it makes going to work. Not a chore. Right. You’re enjoying it. So yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. So fateful let’s, let’s switch gears again a little bit, and let’s talk about, um, Yeah. Are there things about other roles you played, maybe when you were, you were, it sounded like you were doing some business development, sales role and some other roles, um, and maybe a little more heavy into, well, the website development, things like that.

Are there, are there things about what you’re doing now that you were like, yeah, I have to do this part of my job. I’d rather not. Or the other one, right. Aspects of things that you did in the past that you really enjoy, that you don’t really get to either don’t get to do or don’t get to do it as much in it now that you wish you could do more of, I would say, um, the one aspect that kind of moving from a, um, from an agency, which is one thing that I, I liked then, I mean, I just liked the three, a little bit.

Is, um, being able to present to, to clients, being able to talk with people, gather requirements, try to sell them. The project threat until then this, um, the impact that he could make. Um, so I kind of liked that, um, a lot too, which I don’t get to do. I mean, out outwardly. So with, uh, Xcel people, but for sending an extent, um, now I get to do internally within, within, uh, within the company.

Um, so that’s, that’s one aspect that I would say I miss a lot. I miss to an extent. And it’s also. Yeah, I think that’s, that’s, that’s, that’s 1, 1, 1 key aspect. Um, asides that I feel like a lot of the things that I was doing or sort of touched my interest already. Right. So in website development, I was, I was building a website for a purpose.

Right. And I, it involved like creativity and evolved using technology. And evolved all these different aspects. This is what I do today, but in a different way. Right? So at the end of the day, I feel like in fact, right now I feel that I feel more excited and interested about this than about the web of, because it’s in the web.

I mean, you do the website, it’s a project it’s done. You could optimize it. You can say you want to do like a few pages, but Montessori. But like here, I, I feel like the, the, a lot of new things that I can do, um, a lot of optimizations that I can do of opportunities I can sort of try to uncover. Right. So, um, I, if I was to answer your question, I would say I’m more interested in, um, I’m more excited about what I do now and even more so now that I get to do the, trying to interact with people, I’m trying to get requirements and trying to set them on set and ideas I get to do more of now.

That’s um, that’s, that’s what I like.

That’s awesome. Um, Yeah. Out of curiosity, like I definitely don’t get to spend as much time in the PTC world at all. Um, But I would be curious for the, you know, we do have listeners that are in the B2C space. Right. And I’d love to maybe just have you sort of shamelessly plug, like one of your favorite sort of tools that you’re working with that really helps you with your job.

Um, and if that Salesforce marketing cloud, that’s fine. But any other technologies that you think are really interesting and, and kind of fun to interact with in your role? So, um, I would say when I get into something, I sort of devote my time, my focus, my energy into that. Right. And when I moved into, um, the B2C space and started working on marketing cloud, that’s, that’s literally been the area that I’ve been developing myself, um, for the blast, um, two-plus years.

Right. Um, However, one thing that I can see has been a lot helpful, um, is which could be controversial, but, uh, is knowing SQL, right? Because in fact, maybe I just stepped a bit for that, which is knowing how. Knowing data, right. Knowing how to make data work for you. Um, and yeah, th I don’t think that’s controversial.

Not at all. Yeah. But, but I think it’s, it’s good to hear you say it. Right. Cause we don’t, we don’t talk about it from the practitioner side very much. Um, we, you know, we talk about it sort of, uh, in, in almost like in a theorial nature, like yeah, it’d be great if I knew how to do that. And, but you’re, you’re here to hear you are saying like, no, you really.

You really should know that. Yeah. Yeah. That’s, that’s one thing that I can say has been a lot helpful, um, which is just knowing, first of all, just knowing, understanding data structure. So knowing how data comes into the system, because at the end of the day, actually, if you take away like Salesforce, it’s it’s without the data, it’s, it’s, it’s nothing, right?

Because it needs data to be able to function for. Um, um, and you need to get data in. Um, to build your segments, to be able to create profiles on customized, you need to be able to manipulate those data. Then you send out the campaigns, right? So if you remove the data part, then, um, the technology is pretty much not useful anymore.

Right? So understanding the data aspect, how data works, how you get data into systems, how does data can be structured, um, how to query those. Um, has really been, I think it’s, it’s been one of the most helpful things actually, um, done understanding the quirks of Salesforce. I mean, that’s another topic on its own, to be honest because, um, yeah, the quirks.

Yeah. I think it was someone in our, in our CRM Salesforce channel the other day says. Am I, the only one tired of explaining to internal teams for the umpteenth time, SFDC is 30 plus year old classic as a merely a text HTML front end, hiding a bunch of so-called queries. And then lightening is just putting lipstick on that pig.

There’s just so much happening underneath. It’s like, you know what? That’s true. There’s a lot of complex stuff that gets like, sort of beautified there, but yeah, that, that is definitely a, a topic for public for another day. But that’s, I, I love that you’re plugging the, just the learning, um, learning how to work with data.

In fact, it’s actually like, Ironically very timely, uh, in the next handful of days, which you may or may not have seen, um, on the channel, you know, I published it today. So today’s February 16th is when we’re recording this episode of 20, 22. And today in slack, I shared the, Hey, we’re going to do a whole data and analytics, like learning program for about 30 days, um, alongside a thought leader in the space known as Mozart data.

And so hopefully people will walk away from. Um, series for 30 days, learning a little bit more about, you know, how to interact with data and maybe even learn a little bit of basics of SQL. Um, it’s really not that hard. Right? It’s just, you have to take the time to go figure it out. So that’s really cool. I love it.

Okay. Yeah. I, I, I tend to agree. I think actually, why and why? I say that’s not controversial. Faithful is because. I think marketing ops teams are being looked at more and more probably sales ops teams. We’re ahead of this. I think where they’re being looked at as the data and analytics and reporting.

It’s not entirely clear if we’re going to get Michael back, it sounds like he might’ve dropped off, uh, maybe some internet connectivity issues. Um, so in that, yeah, it looks like we lost him. So we’ll go ahead and, um, come back to this topic probably on, uh, on, on the thread or what have you. Um, but for whatever reason, Michael got dropped and faithful, I think, uh, I think in general, like sort of the learnings that we’ve been able to gather from your journey, I’ve been really helpful.

Um, oh, and look at that folks. Hey, we do record this like a live radio station, so Hey, welcome back, Michael Hartmann. Welcome back to the show. I don’t know where I got cut off, but, um, I said, so bullied staff. I know that we believe you. We just didn’t hear it. Yeah. So there you go. That’s all right. That’s all right.

I have no idea what happened. Everything seemed to be fine. And I was wondering why you guys weren’t moving for those listening for those listening. We can see each other when we’re recording this. Yeah, yeah. Um, I do think, you know, I want to be cognizant of keeping the timing of our, of our episodes as tight as we can to the others.

Um, but faithful, I would love to. Just hear any thoughts you have around my, one of my favorite questions, which is what do you think it takes to be a certified marketing operations professional? And you can’t say SQL cause we already know that. And if that okay. No, you can, if you think that’s the most important thing then.

Sure. Um, Not really. I mean, it’s, it’s part of it’s up there, but, um, it’s one question on that. I’m still trying to understand for myself really. So, um, just take this with a grain of salt and take this with the, with the point that I’m still trying to understand it. Right. Which is, um, I think, I think one of the, and I can speak from the perspective of these are the areas that I’m trying to develop myself for the ring, which is really.

Understanding how to tie the work that I do more closely with the business. Right. So, because I feel like at the end of the day, um, if, uh, if a company invests a certain amount of money in a technology stack, there’s an expectation of what they want from it. Right? And every hire you make every fancy thing you build, um, also have to find a way to connect it back.

The impact to the business, right? So just trying to be able to, um, better or knowing how to better connect the work that you do in as a marketing ops pro to, to, to business, um, is, is important. And I feel like this also goes to say that knowing how to. Knowing how to lay as with stakeholders and be able to understand where the thought is or what, you know, because everybody has like, um, an objective or a goal they’re driving towards trying to understand that and see where, um, the, the, the, the projects or the things you’re working on, kind of connects to those objectives.

Uh, probably. Probably be the thing, because at the end of the day, like I said, it’s not the tool. It’s not the technology. It’s what it can deliver. You, you are speaking my language, my friend, I love it. I don’t know that I could have put it any better. And so I think, uh, I think that we should wrap right there.

I think we should. Thank you all for joining us. Really appreciate it. Absolutely. Yeah. So if people want to connect to you and, you know, say they’re B2B and they want to get to B to C or vice versa, a little more, a little more, what’s the best way for them to kind of keep up with what you’re doing or to connect with you.

Yeah. So, um, LinkedIn would be the best, um, fateful idea on. Um, also if you’re interested in actually hiring at the woman’s for, for my team. So, uh, please, uh, if you like what you hear and you would like to join, uh, the company you would like to, maybe you’re thinking about relocating to Germany, uh, please reach out to.

I love it. I love it. Awesome. That’s great. Well, faithful again. Thank you so much, Mike. Thank you. Thanks to our listeners out there. It has been a, this has been a fun episode, but, um, as we always say, please continue to send us your feedback. Um, like subscribe, listen, tell us we’re crazy. And if you’ve got suggestions for other topics or guests, or if you want to be a guest and have a topic that you want to talk about, feel free to reach out to Mike or Naomi or me.

And, uh, with that, I think what’s a wrap. Bye everybody. Bye everyone. Thank you.