The Rise of PLG and the Next Gen of Marketing Automation - Dave Rigotti

Justin Norris: 00:00:08

You're listening to RebOps FM with Justin Norris.

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Well over 15 years ago, we saw the rise

of the freemium phenomenon in B2B SaaS.

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Companies like Box, MailChimp, and

FreshBooks went to market not just

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through an army of salespeople, But in

a bottom up way, they offered a free

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plan that users could get immediate

value from with the hope of converting

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a portion of those free users to

paying one somewhere down the road.

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So if we fast forward today, we have

the hot topic of product led growth,

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which in many ways sounds similar.

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And so what I want to look at really is

what the PLG phenomenon is all about.

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What does it mean?

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Who's doing it well?

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What are the best playbooks?

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And what does it mean

for Ops practitioners?

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Because if you're living in a PLG

world, it has some big implications

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for your data, your processes,

your tech stack, and a lot more.

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So, to help guide us through all

this in the world of PLG, we have

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today my friend Dave Rigotti.

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He is the co founder of Inflection.

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io.

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And host of the PLGTM conference.

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Dave and I go way back to when he

was the VP of Marketing at Bizzable.

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And we're going to talk about his

journey there as well as his experience

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creating a new marketing automation

platform specifically designed

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for the needs of PLG companies.

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Dave, so excited to have you here.

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Dave Rigotti: Hey, thanks

so much for having me.

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So nice to talk with you as always.

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And thanks for having me on the podcast.

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Really appreciate it.

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It's a

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Justin Norris: pleasure.

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Dave, why don't we start broad

with your take on what PLG is.

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I alluded to a few companies

that have been doing something at

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least PLG like for a long time.

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I know even back in 2010, I was working at

a product that was primarily free trial,

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transactional, pay with a credit card.

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So it's not necessarily that that

process is new, but we have seemed

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to enter into an area where we've

developed a new category for this.

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How do you think

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Dave Rigotti: about that?

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Yeah, I tend to have a

slightly broader view of PLG.

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That I think a lot of people do.

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So we always think of the Dropboxes,

the Airtables, the Canvas, the Figmas.

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All great examples and should be held on a

pedestal of shining stars of what PLG is.

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But I think that's just

one way to think about PLG.

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If you have a online signup for your

product, you don't have to talk with a

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salesperson to use the product, or you

don't have to have somebody handhold

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you through like an implementation.

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That can mean both companies

that have both sales led

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motions and product led motions.

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See this a lot, like a lot of product led

companies aren't these bottoms up, native,

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you can buy it for 15 a month products

where They're born as PLG and they're

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still seen as PLG and they're more like

Sendoso where for a long time Sendoso was

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a sales led company, you had to talk with

the salesperson, you got to go through an

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implementation process and that's still

true for their main product, but now they

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have a secondary product, Sendoso Express,

where you can just sign up for it online.

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If you were to ask somebody, is

Sendoso a product led company?

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The answer is usually no, but for me,

it's a yes, maybe it's not the main thing

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or the shining thing like you would have

at a, at a Slack or a Canva, but they

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have some kind of product led motion.

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And to me, if you're getting

money from online signups,

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you're a product led company.

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Justin Norris: Definitionally, we're

really looking at if you have a motion

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where, in the absence of interaction with

a person, you can interact directly with

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the product and conduct business with that

company in that way, you have at least

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a product led arm to what you're doing.

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Dave Rigotti: Bingo.

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You have a product led motion.

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Maybe you're not a product led company.

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Maybe that's a good way to think about it.

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But yes, I would agree with you there.

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Justin Norris: Aside from the fact that

marketers and analysts and BC firms like

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to take things that have already existed

in the brand them and make them a big

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thing, is there another reason that in

the past few years, all of a sudden,

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everyone's talking about product lead

has become the same big thing, given that

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this type of way of going to market has

existed for so many years before that?

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Dave Rigotti: I think it's just consumer

preferences of liking to try before

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you buy, or wanting just to dive right

in and have your own sales journey.

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Like all of the benefits that people

see from being product led, you're

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just feeling it more and more and more.

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And Hey, I'd rather try out the product

than trust what a salesperson is

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going to tell me as part of the sales

process, or I want to implement today,

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not in a month after we get through

a long, complex contract negotiation.

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I think that's such a huge part of it

is just the consumer preferences and.

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We're seeing VCs like to

back their pattern matchers.

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So they'll look at what's been successful.

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Let's go back that again.

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You've now had the first wave of product

led companies be uber successful.

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Go look at most of the best B2B SaaS

companies that are, that are public

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companies, they're product led.

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Now you have inputs to say, okay, great.

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We should go back more

product led businesses.

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Like we should give more

seed rounds, more A rounds.

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So I think that's been a part of it

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Justin Norris: for sure.

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I hadn't thought of it this way before,

but you also talked about the idea of

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trust and I have seen many marketing ops

or rev ops professionals lately and I feel

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this way myself say, you know, I'm just

not going to buy a product that I can't

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touch and see first because they have

been burned so many times by You know,

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no matter how much due diligence you do,

you never know exactly how the product

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is going to work until you're in it.

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And I think that's so important now.

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Dave Rigotti: We've all been burned.

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We've been around too long.

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You and me.

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Justin Norris: Yeah.

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No trust.

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Cynical.

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You've probably have expressed

this to some degree in what you

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just said, but is that why you

decided to focus your energies here?

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You know, we'll talk a little bit

about inflection and your journey

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there, but What made you really laser

in on this way of going to market?

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Dave Rigotti: The reason we serve the

product led industry is because it's

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a different way of going to market.

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Yet most of the solutions for go to

market teams at product led companies

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were all built for the sales led motion.

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So we'll talk more about Marketo.

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But it's just a good example.

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Product led businesses that they CRM

is no longer the center of the universe

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or the source of truth of data.

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Not everything's in there anymore.

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You have tons of data in a data warehouse.

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You have data that you're collecting

about users in your product, what

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features they've used, what buttons

they've clicked or whatever that you

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want to go orchestrate journeys around.

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So for us, we started with it because.

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There's a lot of data that

product led companies have.

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They want to go do something with,

they haven't been able to before.

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It's really difficult for them.

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So we've created our product to

make that much easier for them.

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Justin Norris: 12 years ago, I was

at a company called clear fit was

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product led and transactional to

boot, and we were using Marketo and

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it was super cool for a lot of the

things we were doing, but all of the.

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Playbooks, all of the ways of thinking

around it, like the life cycle,

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the scoring, the reporting, none of

it worked for what we were doing.

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It was all based on enterprise sales

motions, that was the type of company

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that Marketo primarily served.

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There's really feeling in a lot of ways,

like square peg, round hole for me.

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Dave Rigotti: There's all that data

that's really hard to bring in.

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Also, if you have 50 million users,

you can't put that in Marketo.

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It won't work.

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Even if you did, the pricing

and packaging doesn't make

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sense and all this other stuff.

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So it was a good focus for us.

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Justin Norris: So I imagine there's a

lot of companies that are feeling like

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breath of fresh air, signing up with

inflection and feeling like, Whoa,

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like a tool that's actually designed

for the way I want to go to market.

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And so from observing that customer

base, I'd love to just get a

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little bit tactical, sign up for

free trials, send a welcome email.

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There's that sort of standard thing,

but going a little bit deeper.

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What are the playbooks of top

PLG companies today in your

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Dave Rigotti: experience?

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First of all, there's so

much on the data side.

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So I talked about Salesforce already.

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Some Ops pros have admin access

in Salesforce, not always, but

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have influence over the data.

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Set up in Salesforce, what data's

in there, what fields are on what

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objects and can go influence that.

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A lot of the times now you're working

with data teams or developers or.

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I teen some companies on schemas and

snowflake and what data's in snowflake.

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And how often is that data being

put into the data warehouse that

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we want to go do something with?

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If it's dumped in every night,

that's probably way too long.

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To go trigger a welcome email, or if

you're trying to do something like

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a, an upsell campaign, if somebody's

interact with a feature and you want

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to go send them an email about, I

don't know, a more premium version,

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or it's a good signal that they're

ready for the enterprise plan, but that

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feature isn't tagged in the product

to fire an event, you're already lost.

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You need to go work with the teams on

that super tactically, there's like a

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whole set of things around working with.

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Data teams, engineering teams,

learning product events,

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like understanding schemas.

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That is brand new to most

Mops Pros and Rev Ops folks.

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So once you get over that, the

campaigns that we see almost everyone

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start with is an onboarding campaign.

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And I know you were like, oh, like, yeah,

yeah, yeah, the trial, nurture, whatever.

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Yes, but it's where everyone starts

because everyone's got a 24 hour drip

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nurture for their welcome sequence.

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And then if you can get access

to that product data, you

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can make it way more smart.

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So if it's time to send them

email, a step number three, and

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they've already done it, skip it.

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Tell them about step number four, or

if it's time for seven or four and

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they haven't done step number three.

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Don't tell them to do yet another thing.

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Send them a reminder to

do step number three.

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It's totally block and tackle and it

sounds so boring, but we've seen customers

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get 20 percent boost in product adoption

from doing that, and that just has huge

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impacts on Renewals and churn and NRR,

and you now have an engaged customer

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or an adopted customer that you can

use for upsells later down the road.

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So I think it's, it sounds boring almost,

but it's such a good thing to go do.

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The

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Justin Norris: key differentiator that

you mentioned is that a lot of the

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time it is just 24 hour wait, it's kind

of just a canned email wait type of

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thing versus something that's smart.

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And I was curious just with these emails,

are you seeing most people send them?

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From a marketing persona,

like, Hey, it's Acme.

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We're emailing you.

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Is it a sock puppeted

CS or sales type person?

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Like, Hi, it's Dave from inflection.

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I'm emailing you.

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Who's the sending persona?

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Dave Rigotti: It's similar

to a content download.

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You have a generic drip that goes out

or like a similar thing to everyone.

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And then you overlay that with product

specialists, either somebody that

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is assigned to them to help them.

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Onboard the product or that's frankly a

salesperson trying to get them to upsell

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or make sure they get into the right tier.

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So there's usually two sequences

running like a, an onboarding

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one and then a person based one

just to the, the right folks.

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Just like you would have it

on content download, like you

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would have a salesperson just

follow up with good folks.

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Justin Norris: Makes sense.

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Do you have your customers sending the

person based one from inflection to

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or are they using like a sales loft

or an outreach to do that overlay?

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We see

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Dave Rigotti: both.

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You can do that without out of inflection.

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You can do tokens in the send

from reply to stuff like that.

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So you could pull from Salesforce

and say the account owner.

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But yeah, we see tools like a sales

loft and outreach and in there's

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even tools specific around this for.

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Like this product and sales category,

like a pocus or an end game.

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We see all of it.

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Justin Norris: That's interesting.

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I had no idea about that.

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You alluded to like triggered

upsell campaigns, which

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obviously makes a lot of sense.

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Is that usually just when people

start poking around and pushing

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at the things that are locked?

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Or what are the types of triggers that

you find are most indicative of a person

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being ready to go to the next level?

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Dave Rigotti: We see locked features a

lot, like, hey, looks like you tried to

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set up SSO, that's not a part of your

plan, it's part of the enterprise plan,

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click your, here's my account, let's talk

about upgrading to the enterprise plan.

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Certainly emails like that, um,

even emails like abandoned cart.

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So like you go, You've clicked

upgrade, but that was all you did.

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And now you get an email, you know,

four hours later, the next day that

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says, Hey, you started an upgrade, but

you didn't finish, or you started out

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a user where you didn't finish, like

click here to finish, and we're seeing

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marketing teams deploy those emails.

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And they're easy two hours to set up.

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And they're generating six figures in ARR.

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And they'll send, you

know, 50 emails a month.

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It's probably the highest

ROI emails I've ever seen.

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And that's

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Justin Norris: six figures of incremental

ARR, like on top of whatever they were

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doing before that they can attribute.

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Yeah.

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So what's the psychology

there, do you wonder?

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Is it just, oh, I was looking at

it, maybe I will, maybe I won't.

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But it's a low enough threshold

that just by reaching out to that

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person, you can help them cross that

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Dave Rigotti: divide?

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I don't know, man.

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It works.

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Like, that's all I know.

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I don't know why B2C companies do it, but

everyone does it, and it seems to work.

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So

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Justin Norris: B2C, it's,

it's the impulse, like, yeah,

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okay, you know, I can, I will.

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And I suppose if it's a low,

a low enough cost purchase,

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it can work the same way here.

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Dave Rigotti: The other email we see

a lot, Justin, is automated recaps.

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So like Spotify, everyone talks

about Spotify and Wrapped every year.

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You know, you get an email that has all

of the songs you listen to, your top

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songs, like some fun stats about you.

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We're seeing B2B SaaS companies roll

this out to all of their users every

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month, or even I've seen once a week.

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That it's just like, here's what

you've done in the last week.

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And it's meant to essentially

remind the user all the value that

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they're getting out of your product.

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Or another way to think about

it is all the success that

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they're having with your product.

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And these emails have, they're very

high volume and they have very high

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open rates and high engagement rates.

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So it's always a good opportunity to kind

of get in front of the users with your

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brand and the value that you're bringing.

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You can always push other messages

like, Hey, you're like, you

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were super successful last week.

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I'll leave a G2 review.

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And even added people

into those emails that.

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Maybe isn't even a user like an executive.

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So they're almost like automated

mini email based QBRs that are

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different for every single user,

at least every single account.

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Justin Norris: That's a great example

of, you know, it seems maybe like

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a simple email on the surface, but

the level of data that's required to

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create that would be really difficult.

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It would require a lot of, you know,

engineering support to do it using a

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traditional marketing automation platform.

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How does that work in your platform?

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Do you Do the roll up of

the stats in platform?

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Are they doing those calculations outside

and just pushing them in to inflection?

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Dave Rigotti: It's all in our product.

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You can think certainly fields

to inflection, but you can also

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think like tables or like if

you connect us into segment.

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For example, you don't have to go

in inflection and create fields for

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every segment event in inflection.

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We just bring them all in so we can ingest

column data like data from Salesforce.

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Like here's the columns on the

contact, but also stream data.

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Yeah.

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Like here's the stream of events

this person's had via like a segment

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integration or a or snowflake integration

Without having to go set that up and

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then for like manipulating the data It's

essentially Excel built into the product

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so you can do like count ifs and you can

do you can summarize field you can do

306

: 00:15:43

some pretty complicated functions right

in the product without having to like

307

: 00:15:47

You know, munch the data offline and re

upload it and try to stuff it in a field.

308

: 00:15:51

That's

309

: 00:15:51

Justin Norris: huge.

310

: 00:15:52

Let's, well, let's, let's go into

the data topic in a little bit more

311

: 00:15:55

detail because we've, we're there.

312

: 00:15:57

So you've alluded a few times to,

like, the challenges and, and some of

313

: 00:16:00

the challenges that occur to me, or at

least that I've personally experienced.

314

: 00:16:03

There's the data structure.

315

: 00:16:05

Can the tool accommodate the

structure of the data that you have?

316

: 00:16:08

There's latency.

317

: 00:16:09

So like how close are you

to the source of the data?

318

: 00:16:13

And if you're pulling from a

warehouse and you've got, you know,

319

: 00:16:15

at least this 24 hour leg, how

much volume can it accommodate?

320

: 00:16:19

What's the best practice way?

321

: 00:16:20

I guess that you're seeing companies use.

322

: 00:16:22

Yeah,

323

: 00:16:22

Dave Rigotti: the best practice is

to go to their product data source.

324

: 00:16:26

If you can, so whatever is

actually tracking the product

325

: 00:16:29

data, it's like not Snowflake.

326

: 00:16:31

A great practice would be if you're using

like Segment, for example, to like track

327

: 00:16:35

all the product events, and I use Segment

a lot because it's the most popular one,

328

: 00:16:38

would be to like for us, would be to

connect in Segment, connect in Salesforce.

329

: 00:16:43

Now we essentially have a, you know, real

time stream into Segment Data and then

330

: 00:16:48

a five minute stream into Salesforce.

331

: 00:16:51

So if you wanted to kick off an

email when somebody signs up for

332

: 00:16:54

their product, it happens right away.

333

: 00:16:56

And we just store all of the

Segment Data in our product.

334

: 00:16:59

So you don't have, you essentially bypass

like a data warehouse in that case.

335

: 00:17:03

So that's almost always preferred

because it cuts out like a whole data

336

: 00:17:07

team and a whole long set of questions

about the frequency of data getting into

337

: 00:17:13

like a snowflake or a data warehouse.

338

: 00:17:15

Are all the events getting in there?

339

: 00:17:17

Are they stored in a way that even makes

sense that you could do something with?

340

: 00:17:21

Data teams change formats and don't

tell marketing and I don't see

341

: 00:17:25

just like a whole set of things.

342

: 00:17:27

Justin Norris: So you have basically

real time streaming and you're

343

: 00:17:30

getting it in the format that

it's instrumented in the product.

344

: 00:17:34

Yeah.

345

: 00:17:35

Do you have to pre configure inflection

instance to like match that scheme or

346

: 00:17:39

does it just sort of absorb what's,

what's coming in in a dynamic way?

347

: 00:17:42

To your point about like the

product team adds a new event.

348

: 00:17:44

Does it break your org

or how does it work?

349

: 00:17:46

We're

350

: 00:17:46

Dave Rigotti: already pre formatted

for standard CDPs or product tracking.

351

: 00:17:51

So like segment, like

you just connect it and.

352

: 00:17:54

A minute later, you have all

the events in Inflection.

353

: 00:17:57

When a product team adds a new event,

it just shows up in Inflection.

354

: 00:18:01

There's a whole little editor if you

wanted to, like, change the names of it

355

: 00:18:04

to make it more friendly, like, or move.

356

: 00:18:06

Underscore, underscore,

whatever, whatever, whatever.

357

: 00:18:08

Like make it marketer friendly.

358

: 00:18:10

You can do that, but you don't need to.

359

: 00:18:12

And so it's just available right

there and all new events will

360

: 00:18:15

get shown up for data warehouse.

361

: 00:18:17

You do just cause everyone has a

little bit of different setup and

362

: 00:18:20

their data warehouse usually takes

like an hour or two configuration

363

: 00:18:23

to go through and essentially map.

364

: 00:18:25

Inflection mostly is the work standard

fields and inflection to those fields in

365

: 00:18:30

the day warehouse, like which field is

the first name, which field is the email

366

: 00:18:35

that you want us to use less standard or a

company could decide it's actually not the

367

: 00:18:39

field in the data in a day warehouse name.

368

: 00:18:42

Email could be could be something

else like and so they need to tell

369

: 00:18:46

us and usually takes a couple hours.

370

: 00:18:48

And if

371

: 00:18:48

Justin Norris: a company is using

like Snowplow or a different event

372

: 00:18:51

tracker, are you agnostic or do

they need a specific integration for

373

: 00:18:54

Dave Rigotti: each one?

374

: 00:18:55

Depends.

375

: 00:18:55

Like, we don't have a direct connection

into Snowplow, so we'd say like, great,

376

: 00:18:58

like, go get that into Snowflake or

Redshift or BigQuery or whatever, and

377

: 00:19:02

then we'll connect to the data warehouse.

378

: 00:19:05

You know, like a segment we

have a direct connection to.

379

: 00:19:07

So it, it kind of depends right now, and

it's, we're adding new ones all the time.

380

: 00:19:11

Justin Norris: That makes sense.

381

: 00:19:12

So we've sort of moved into the PLG ops

considerations from my point of view,

382

: 00:19:17

and one of the things, I wonder if you

agree with this, I actually found this

383

: 00:19:22

way of doing ops a lot more fun, because

I'm not saying more fun, but just there

384

: 00:19:27

was a dimension of fun that you don't

always get to have, maybe because you

385

: 00:19:30

don't have that sales team, BDR team that

you need to work through, you're having

386

: 00:19:35

really direct access To the end user at

all these different stages and can use

387

: 00:19:42

automation really to its full extent and

capability to agree with that statement

388

: 00:19:49

Dave Rigotti: from a mops perspective.

389

: 00:19:51

P.

390

: 00:19:51

l.

391

: 00:19:51

g.

392

: 00:19:52

presents an opportunity and a

challenge i've seen mops pros at p.

393

: 00:19:57

l.

394

: 00:19:57

g.

395

: 00:19:57

companies.

396

: 00:20:00

Um, no, they're no longer in tech.

397

: 00:20:02

They were at a PLG company last

,: 2022

398

: 00:20:08

They left tech.

399

: 00:20:09

I think one starting a coffee shop.

400

: 00:20:10

Another one is just left marketing

and is doing something else.

401

: 00:20:16

It burnt them out.

402

: 00:20:17

Extreme burnt them out.

403

: 00:20:18

You and I've been around for a while.

404

: 00:20:19

I never saw that before.

405

: 00:20:21

And so challenge and opportunity, the

challenge is like you very quickly

406

: 00:20:24

have to become an expert on segment

data warehouses and structures and

407

: 00:20:29

like interacting with data teams and

engineers and product managers and this

408

: 00:20:32

like whole tier of stakeholders and

dependencies that you never had before,

409

: 00:20:37

used to have most of the keys to the

kingdom and you've got control and you

410

: 00:20:40

would know it now that's not the case.

411

: 00:20:43

And that leads to a lot of burnout.

412

: 00:20:45

It's also, I think, an opportunity

for mops to step up and be a leader

413

: 00:20:49

in the marketing organization.

414

: 00:20:50

I hear a lot of rev ops mops people

complain about being ticket takers

415

: 00:20:55

and going to the rhythm on campaigns.

416

: 00:20:58

You now have an opportunity where

nobody in marketing has ever

417

: 00:21:02

thought about this stuff before.

418

: 00:21:04

And you have an opportunity to

kind of up level and grow in a

419

: 00:21:07

career as a professional and,

you know, or as a team leader.

420

: 00:21:10

And this always happens on

every new big tech wave.

421

: 00:21:14

It's how I got my career started.

422

: 00:21:16

I was young and I got started in social

media, right, as social media was

423

: 00:21:19

happening and became like the little

mini expert there and it, it helps.

424

: 00:21:23

Um, it definitely helps a lot.

425

: 00:21:24

So I think there's a challenge

and an opportunity and,

426

: 00:21:28

uh, but it's a lot of work.

427

: 00:21:30

That

428

: 00:21:30

Justin Norris: makes sense.

429

: 00:21:31

I think, I mean, I think part of the

opportunity piece and I certainly

430

: 00:21:35

wouldn't downplay the challenge either.

431

: 00:21:37

You're right.

432

: 00:21:37

But part of the opportunity piece is

it gives You, some of the immediacy

433

: 00:21:41

of direct response, you know, where

versus like, all right, I sent this

434

: 00:21:45

email and then maybe they talked to

sales and then, you know, using some

435

: 00:21:48

complicated attribution algorithm

that most people don't believe in.

436

: 00:21:51

I'm going to figure out that I had some

impact versus like I did this thing and

437

: 00:21:55

somebody gave me their credit card number.

438

: 00:21:57

I have cash on the barrel now.

439

: 00:21:59

Like that's a huge

440

: 00:21:59

Dave Rigotti: difference.

441

: 00:22:00

100%.

442

: 00:22:01

I'd say One of the reasons why

ProductLed is so successful is

443

: 00:22:05

because you can expand customers.

444

: 00:22:08

So if you go look at NRR of companies,

they're making more from their

445

: 00:22:12

existing customers a year later.

446

: 00:22:14

Like, churn doesn't

affect them, basically.

447

: 00:22:16

They're growing without having

to even acquire new customers.

448

: 00:22:19

And it's because you can, like, go expand.

449

: 00:22:21

They have usage based metrics

to kind of go expand customers.

450

: 00:22:24

That means, like, you can

send a couple of emails.

451

: 00:22:27

Run a couple of campaigns

and like materially affect

452

: 00:22:30

your business in a great way.

453

: 00:22:32

You can make a lot of money from

some simple email campaigns, which

454

: 00:22:35

if your company's not done a lot

of before, dude, those are some

455

: 00:22:39

huge wins that generate revenue and

pipeline like now, which is cool.

456

: 00:22:44

Justin Norris: That's super empowering.

457

: 00:22:46

To that point, I mentioned earlier

that the normal funnel, you know,

458

: 00:22:50

didn't really work for me when I

was in PLG, like MQL, SQL, like it

459

: 00:22:53

just doesn't compute, doesn't apply.

460

: 00:22:55

I'm curious, how do you

think about the PLG funnel?

461

: 00:22:58

Because I think funnels are still

generally important and useful as a model.

462

: 00:23:02

How do you think about it conceptually?

463

: 00:23:03

And then I'm also curious, how

is it actually instrumented?

464

: 00:23:06

What tools do you give marketers

to instrument it inside Inflection?

465

: 00:23:09

Yeah,

466

: 00:23:09

Dave Rigotti: it's a good question.

467

: 00:23:10

And I don't know if this

is totally answered yet.

468

: 00:23:14

I think we're all still figuring it out.

469

: 00:23:16

I'd say like you said funnels, which I

think is the right way to think about it.

470

: 00:23:20

Because there's maybe you

don't want to do a trial.

471

: 00:23:22

You just want to talk to a salesperson,

your fortune 500 customer, you wouldn't

472

: 00:23:26

be able to sign up online anyways.

473

: 00:23:28

So that is the sales led funnel.

474

: 00:23:31

Then there's somebody who signs up.

475

: 00:23:34

Yeah.

476

: 00:23:34

And self service and self expanse.

477

: 00:23:37

That's like pure PLG.

478

: 00:23:39

Then there's PLG to sales led.

479

: 00:23:41

So they sign up, they use your product

and, um, now they're ready for the

480

: 00:23:46

enterprise plan and you need to go like

get them into the sales funnel, even

481

: 00:23:50

though they're existing customer, you

know, so really an expansion play, but

482

: 00:23:54

it's like getting to a sales led funnel.

483

: 00:23:56

I don't think it's answered exactly what

all those look like and how they work.

484

: 00:23:59

A huge topic.

485

: 00:24:00

And one that we'll have a

session on at PLG TM is.

486

: 00:24:04

It's like attribution for all of that,

like the attribution like super breaks

487

: 00:24:08

at PLG companies for, for these reasons,

like people come in and out of different

488

: 00:24:13

funnels for inflection, specifically, we

have a cool canvas builder, like a journey

489

: 00:24:19

builder, and you can have certainly all

kinds of branching and I don't want to

490

: 00:24:24

get into like a product pitch, but you can

have on one canvas, both the journeys for

491

: 00:24:29

sales lad PLG that can come back in, in

between, And that's important because a

492

: 00:24:35

lot of especially big PLG companies today

have to have one system for their sales

493

: 00:24:40

led motion like a marketo and then another

system for their product led motion or

494

: 00:24:45

communicating with their users like a

like a brazier interval with inflection.

495

: 00:24:49

You could do both scenarios out of one

products and have them in one canvas and

496

: 00:24:53

a user can move in between and they can.

497

: 00:24:56

Kind of build and support each

other like the different motions.

498

: 00:24:59

You don't need two tools to do one thing.

499

: 00:25:02

So just

500

: 00:25:02

Justin Norris: spit balling on this notion

a little bit within the data structure.

501

: 00:25:06

Would it make sense?

502

: 00:25:07

Like instead of one life cycle field,

maybe you have to, like, you've got

503

: 00:25:09

like their product life cycle stage

and then maybe like their sales life

504

: 00:25:13

cycle stage and maybe a user would go

to the end of the product life cycle

505

: 00:25:17

and never progress in the sales or

maybe they would like incrementally

506

: 00:25:20

move up in both or vice versa.

507

: 00:25:22

Is that a way to think about it?

508

: 00:25:24

Dave Rigotti: Yeah, there's like sales

stages and then product adoption stages.

509

: 00:25:28

Like, where are you in the

product adoption curve?

510

: 00:25:31

Justin Norris: I was going to ask this

before, but just out of curiosity,

511

: 00:25:33

is scoring still a relevant concept?

512

: 00:25:36

You know, like scoring their product

interests and getting them to a

513

: 00:25:39

product specialist, let's say.

514

: 00:25:40

Dave Rigotti: Definitely for the sales

led motion, even for PLG to sales

515

: 00:25:44

led motion, we see scoring a lot.

516

: 00:25:48

Maybe it's a little bit different.

517

: 00:25:49

It's kind of more like customer Tam.

518

: 00:25:52

All right.

519

: 00:25:52

This customer is looking to learn

more about our enterprise tier,

520

: 00:25:55

but they're a five person company

and their ability to pay as low.

521

: 00:25:59

You should certainly treat that company

differently from Microsoft looking to

522

: 00:26:03

learn more about your enterprise tier.

523

: 00:26:05

So I like to think about it as

like expansion Tam because both

524

: 00:26:10

of those companies might be

paying you 1, 000 a month today.

525

: 00:26:13

But one customer has ability

to pay a thousand times more

526

: 00:26:17

and another one does not.

527

: 00:26:18

So how do you segment that to

focus your expansion team or your

528

: 00:26:22

sales team on the right accounts?

529

: 00:26:24

I think scoring is really relevant.

530

: 00:26:26

It gets even more relevant if you

have product specialists jumping

531

: 00:26:30

on signups, where you might have a

million signups a month, and you might

532

: 00:26:35

have a team that's helping people

get started with their trial or.

533

: 00:26:39

You know, on board appropriately,

you know, like a 10 person

534

: 00:26:42

team, like they have to focus.

535

: 00:26:44

And so how do you figure that out?

536

: 00:26:46

You need scoring.

537

: 00:26:47

Justin Norris: So going a bit deeper into

that, the way I was thinking about this

538

: 00:26:50

is that you can have PLG where it really

just is, I sell a product that doesn't

539

: 00:26:55

require sales and it's going to just

be product led and you can upgrade it.

540

: 00:26:58

Maybe it'll be a few hundred dollars

a month, but that's where it is.

541

: 00:27:00

And then you have PLG where it

really is more just a bottom up

542

: 00:27:04

way of penetrating an enterprise

like, yeah, I'll have a few people.

543

: 00:27:07

Signing up from different apartments

and we'll see that and then we'll

544

: 00:27:10

kind of send sales in on top of that.

545

: 00:27:13

And that seems to create the possibility.

546

: 00:27:16

Well, there's a lot more

challenges in coordination.

547

: 00:27:19

We have those two motions running

side by side at my current company,

548

: 00:27:21

360 Learning, and I see that.

549

: 00:27:23

And your product specialist and your sales

rep may be stepping on each other's toes.

550

: 00:27:28

How have you seen people

try to solve those problems?

551

: 00:27:31

Dave Rigotti: It's definitely a problem.

552

: 00:27:33

Not different, I think, in a lot of

cases from like a content download

553

: 00:27:37

where you have an SDR or an AE or

marketing or invites to events, like,

554

: 00:27:42

it's never perfectly coordinated.

555

: 00:27:44

I'm also a fan of it, like, not

being perfectly coordinated.

556

: 00:27:49

Certainly, you couldn't send

different pricing to the same person.

557

: 00:27:52

You can't do that.

558

: 00:27:54

But I've always been a fan of not

being too coordinated, almost not

559

: 00:27:57

having the perfect attribution model.

560

: 00:27:59

Be a beautiful mind and just go

crazy trying to coordinate it all.

561

: 00:28:03

But there should be some

level of coordination.

562

: 00:28:05

I also always like, just like a content

download, you might have somebody,

563

: 00:28:09

the automatic nurturing from like a

marketing automation, and then like

564

: 00:28:13

somebody coming in over the top.

565

: 00:28:14

Those are never coordinated, but

they're slightly different messages,

566

: 00:28:18

and they serve different purposes.

567

: 00:28:20

So, I like it being not

perfectly coordinated.

568

: 00:28:23

I also like it being different.

569

: 00:28:25

Somebody helping you set up the

product, that is also selling

570

: 00:28:30

you, gets dicey real fast.

571

: 00:28:33

They're almost always just going to

go into figuring out very quickly, is

572

: 00:28:37

this person going to upgrade or not?

573

: 00:28:39

And I'm only going to focus on the

ones that are going to upgrade.

574

: 00:28:42

And I'm only going to do the bare

minimum that I need to get an upgrade.

575

: 00:28:45

The incentives aren't perfectly aligned.

576

: 00:28:48

Justin Norris: I think you touched on

an interesting thing there because the

577

: 00:28:51

user experience with a PLG company, I

feel like it tends to be warm and fuzzy.

578

: 00:28:56

I mean, that's anecdotal and

maybe just personal, but.

579

: 00:28:59

Because those specialists are generally

more just trying to help you succeed

580

: 00:29:03

with something that you're doing, rather

than trying to just sell you something.

581

: 00:29:07

And you just feel like you have

an overall like more positive

582

: 00:29:11

sentiment towards those companies.

583

: 00:29:13

I know that's the feeling that

we tried to create when we were

584

: 00:29:16

doing this as a PLG company.

585

: 00:29:18

Dave Rigotti: It's like if you've ever

walked into like a cell phone store,

586

: 00:29:21

like you know that person that's

helping you out with your phone is

587

: 00:29:24

also the sales person and everything

they say and just like, is this really

588

: 00:29:29

what's Right for me, or are they

trying to get me to spend more money?

589

: 00:29:33

So let's talk a

590

: 00:29:34

Justin Norris: little

about your journey Dave.

591

: 00:29:35

I think the first time we actually

interacted we were on a webinar together

592

: 00:29:40

I want to say it was like 2015 you were

at Bizable And then you had this amazing

593

: 00:29:45

journey with visible, you know, the

fish ate the little fish and then the

594

: 00:29:48

bigger fish ate the, you know, market

about visible and adobe about marketo.

595

: 00:29:52

She ended up running like enterprise and

enterprise motion at marketo and then

596

: 00:29:56

you like spun off and are creating a next

marketo walk us through that a little bit.

597

: 00:30:02

Dave Rigotti: Yeah, i started my

career, i went to university, i

598

: 00:30:05

studied marketing entrepreneurship.

599

: 00:30:07

I've always loved startups,

but I got recruited.

600

: 00:30:10

I did an internship at Microsoft and

I got recruited out of college to join

601

: 00:30:13

Microsoft, which was too hard to pass up.

602

: 00:30:16

And so that took me to Seattle for and

I just moved to New York a year ago.

603

: 00:30:20

So lived in Seattle for 13 years.

604

: 00:30:22

And worked at Microsoft for

almost five years on Bing.

605

: 00:30:25

Kind of right as Bing launched.

606

: 00:30:27

Both on the consumer marketing side,

and then I switched to Bing ads.

607

: 00:30:31

And I was doing marketing for Bing ads.

608

: 00:30:33

And found my love.

609

: 00:30:34

I was like, okay, I really love marketing.

610

: 00:30:35

I really love B2B marketing.

611

: 00:30:37

But I love startups.

612

: 00:30:38

So how do I get to a startup?

613

: 00:30:40

And I just kind of cold

applied to Visible.

614

: 00:30:42

It was Visible at that time.

615

: 00:30:44

As the first marketing

hire probably five or six.

616

: 00:30:48

And Visible was just a tool to

connect AdWords into Salesforce.

617

: 00:30:53

That was like all I could do.

618

: 00:30:55

You couldn't use it for attribution.

619

: 00:30:56

It wasn't an attribution product yet.

620

: 00:30:57

And so just got lucky with that.

621

: 00:31:00

Worked with some great people

who I'm still working with today.

622

: 00:31:03

A lot of the ex Visible co founders

and ex Visible crew are co founders.

623

: 00:31:07

I love

624

: 00:31:07

Justin Norris: that you

guys have done that.

625

: 00:31:09

Dave Rigotti: Yeah, we've worked

together for over 10 years.

626

: 00:31:12

It's a long time.

627

: 00:31:12

If you find great people that you

like to work with and push you and

628

: 00:31:15

support you, let's just keep it going.

629

: 00:31:17

So anyways, Works at Bizzable, we grew

that business great, sold to Marketo in

630

: 00:31:22

2018, which was a great exit for everyone.

631

: 00:31:25

And then I had to find a new job because

I was running Marketing at Bizzable.

632

: 00:31:30

There's no more Bizzable.

633

: 00:31:31

It's a product of Marketo.

634

: 00:31:32

So I started running Enterprise

Demand Generation and Account

635

: 00:31:36

Based Marketing at Marketo.

636

: 00:31:38

Six months later, we got gobbled up by

Adobe and so for another two years, I

637

: 00:31:44

ran basically the same role at Adobe, but

I took on Increasingly larger portfolio

638

: 00:31:49

of products that I was supporting

639

: 00:31:51

Justin Norris: from being in a

small startup and visible is like

640

: 00:31:54

an amazing group of people, but

you're never more than 50 or 60.

641

: 00:31:58

Maybe when you're required,

maybe a bit bigger.

642

: 00:31:59

120 120.

643

: 00:32:01

Okay, so bigger than I thought,

but still, you know, smallish

644

: 00:32:03

to 10, 000 person behemoth.

645

: 00:32:07

And I know what it's like

to work inside Adobe.

646

: 00:32:09

It's a great company, but

it's very different than the

647

: 00:32:11

way the visible operated.

648

: 00:32:12

Was that a shock to the system for you?

649

: 00:32:15

Dave Rigotti: It was a shock in all the

classic reasons of startups first big

650

: 00:32:19

companies, like it moves slower, you

see operating marketing opportunities,

651

: 00:32:23

but they're not big enough opportunities

for the business to care about.

652

: 00:32:26

So you just don't do them.

653

: 00:32:27

Things like that would

bother me a little bit.

654

: 00:32:29

A lot of the visible team is still there.

655

: 00:32:32

So for so many people, this

is five years later, it's been

656

: 00:32:35

awesome for their careers.

657

: 00:32:36

They're getting promoted.

658

: 00:32:37

They're getting stock grants.

659

: 00:32:39

They're making way more money

than they ever did at a startup.

660

: 00:32:41

So, overall on a whole, it was

awesome for so many people.

661

: 00:32:46

And I liked it too for a while.

662

: 00:32:47

It was a good place to Chill

out a little bit, make a little

663

: 00:32:50

bit more money, honestly.

664

: 00:32:52

And then I was there when the pandemic

started, I was still at Adobe and Adobe

665

: 00:32:56

is very early in supporting families.

666

: 00:32:58

It was like one of the first companies

to shut down the offices and was very

667

: 00:33:01

like accommodating to an employees,

which was nice for a while, but you

668

: 00:33:05

know, I wanted to go do something and.

669

: 00:33:08

Aaron was on a long sabbatical

after he left Marketo and Adobe and

670

: 00:33:11

got back after a year sabbatical.

671

: 00:33:14

Hey, let's team up.

672

: 00:33:15

Made sense to go at it again.

673

: 00:33:17

The marketing

674

: 00:33:17

Justin Norris: automation category,

when I first looked at it, you

675

: 00:33:21

know, there was a lot of players

that like don't exist anymore.

676

: 00:33:23

There's like Manticore and Silverpot.

677

: 00:33:26

Like, it was just like it was one of

those wide open categories it felt like,

678

: 00:33:29

and then it really consolidated down.

679

: 00:33:31

I hadn't really seen a new player.

680

: 00:33:33

For a while, at least until inflection

emerged for me, and it's, I'll have to

681

: 00:33:37

just say it's been so much fun seeing

you on LinkedIn, getting your emails,

682

: 00:33:42

the speed with which new features

come out, the agility, the feeling of

683

: 00:33:47

responsiveness to the market, the feeling

of like, oh, this is a company that's

684

: 00:33:50

just like got energy, it's moving.

685

: 00:33:52

It reminded me of the early days of

Marketo when like Sheryl Chavez would

686

: 00:33:55

send you an email every three or four

weeks and just like new features.

687

: 00:33:59

It's like it's Christmas every month.

688

: 00:34:00

It's amazing.

689

: 00:34:01

How are you finding that?

690

: 00:34:02

How do you think about what you're doing?

691

: 00:34:04

I'm asking you three questions

at one, but how is it like

692

: 00:34:06

being able to roll stuff out so

693

: 00:34:08

Dave Rigotti: quickly?

694

: 00:34:08

The second time around with

startups are always you make

695

: 00:34:11

so many different decisions.

696

: 00:34:13

You have so much benefit of hindsight.

697

: 00:34:15

So when we sold visible, I think

we never got above 10 engineers.

698

: 00:34:19

We have probably 25 engineers

and we're a 30 person company.

699

: 00:34:25

So 25 out of 30 employees

roughly are engineers.

700

: 00:34:29

Abyssal was like 10 out of 120.

701

: 00:34:31

Part of it is just way more

investment in product and feature

702

: 00:34:35

development and product development.

703

: 00:34:37

And it's the nature of market

animation, like you have a lot of

704

: 00:34:40

features you need to go build and

you need velocity of building that.

705

: 00:34:43

That's been a big thing for

us is investing way more there

706

: 00:34:46

than we did last time around.

707

: 00:34:49

We're always like, let's go

build a great product at Visible.

708

: 00:34:52

I still believe it's a great product

all these years after leaving.

709

: 00:34:55

And so we're going to do that here at

Inflection, and we continue to do so,

710

: 00:34:59

and just have a lot more engineers.

711

: 00:35:01

Justin Norris: Now, you mentioned,

uh, Bizable, and for the record of

712

: 00:35:04

listeners, like, I used Bizable as early

as: 2015

713

: 00:35:08

like, I love Bizable, huge fan of it.

714

: 00:35:10

Does it hurt a little bit to see

it get acquired and then kind of

715

: 00:35:14

not change anymore, and to see

newer competitors enter the market

716

: 00:35:17

and come up on top of it a little

717

: 00:35:18

Dave Rigotti: bit?

718

: 00:35:19

Not at all.

719

: 00:35:20

Not at all.

720

: 00:35:21

Done with it.

721

: 00:35:22

I still chat with people to like help

them out, but no, that's a past life.

722

: 00:35:27

I'm surprised it still exists at Adobe.

723

: 00:35:29

So many products at that ARR

size it's at, at a company

724

: 00:35:34

like Adobe would get shut down.

725

: 00:35:36

Wouldn't exist.

726

: 00:35:36

And so I'm actually

surprised it's still a thing.

727

: 00:35:40

Marketo Engage Measure or

whatever it's called now.

728

: 00:35:42

That probably stung me a little bit.

729

: 00:35:43

Maybe the name

730

: 00:35:44

Justin Norris: change.

731

: 00:35:44

Just the product marketing aspect

732

: 00:35:46

Dave Rigotti: of it.

733

: 00:35:46

Yeah.

734

: 00:35:46

Yeah.

735

: 00:35:47

Not that they changed the name,

actually change it, whatever.

736

: 00:35:49

But that's what we picked.

737

: 00:35:51

That's what we

738

: 00:35:51

Justin Norris: ended up going with.

739

: 00:35:52

Dobie Marketo Engage Measure

Advanced Enterprise Edition.

740

: 00:35:58

That hurts me.

741

: 00:35:59

I didn't build it.

742

: 00:36:00

Dave Rigotti: I had 10 other

options that you could have gone

743

: 00:36:02

with, but no, that's old history.

744

: 00:36:05

Justin Norris: I know it probably feels

premature to even ask this question,

745

: 00:36:08

but where do you see inflection going?

746

: 00:36:09

Because every product seems to

follow this curve of like, it's

747

: 00:36:12

young, it's dynamic, it has energy,

it gets big, and then I guess bot

748

: 00:36:16

stagnates, and then the cycle repeats.

749

: 00:36:18

Do you have a, as a second time

founder and startup innovator, do

750

: 00:36:22

you have a plan to stop that from

happening, or how do you think about

751

: 00:36:25

Dave Rigotti: that?

752

: 00:36:26

We're going big.

753

: 00:36:27

We are very focused and we're

very methodical when we're

754

: 00:36:30

thinking about inflection.

755

: 00:36:32

This is before you even like to

go build what is now inflection.

756

: 00:36:35

Let's go pick something that

can become a public company.

757

: 00:36:39

At Bizzable we ended up happening,

building the product, and

758

: 00:36:42

there's a whole story there why.

759

: 00:36:43

And it was started as 99 bucks a month

and just kind of growing and growing

760

: 00:36:46

and growing, getting as big as you can.

761

: 00:36:49

But look like attribution

companies don't become IP able,

762

: 00:36:53

venture scale, true businesses.

763

: 00:36:55

Marketing automation absolutely does.

764

: 00:36:58

And so we were very intentional about

going after a space that has the

765

: 00:37:03

potential to build a big business.

766

: 00:37:06

And we're very focused on placing bets

now to help us become a big business.

767

: 00:37:12

And I don't mean like big and slow.

768

: 00:37:14

I mean, like it's important for us

to stay motivated that we're building

769

: 00:37:17

a big company, but yeah, I think

there'll be tons of things that I do

770

: 00:37:20

that I want to do in five, six years

to help fuel the energy at our company.

771

: 00:37:26

I've seen some companies attract

really good founder type people.

772

: 00:37:28

Rippling is very good at this.

773

: 00:37:30

They put almost like founders on like.

774

: 00:37:32

Each of their products that they roll

out and each product is like a mini

775

: 00:37:36

startup and they're not even products.

776

: 00:37:37

So just like big features

within their products.

777

: 00:37:40

Eventually like we'll do that.

778

: 00:37:41

Eventually like I even want to have,

Hey, if you come here and then later

779

: 00:37:47

you leave inflection after a couple

of years and you go start a company.

780

: 00:37:50

I'll give you your first hundred thousand

like I'll write your seat check for you or

781

: 00:37:54

your pre seat check or whatever it's gonna

be called then and just attract people

782

: 00:37:57

that are motivated people to keep that

energy and that speed as long as possible.

783

: 00:38:03

Justin Norris: So my takeaway from

what you're saying is you perceive

784

: 00:38:05

the problem to be structural and you

think you could solve it structurally

785

: 00:38:08

by having a big company that still

has that individual companies

786

: 00:38:12

within companies or like incubating.

787

: 00:38:14

Companies within the larger

company and giving founder type

788

: 00:38:17

persons ownership of those.

789

: 00:38:20

Growth

790

: 00:38:20

Dave Rigotti: solves all problems.

791

: 00:38:21

I always believe this in startups.

792

: 00:38:23

If you're not growing anymore as a company

You're not going to track the best people

793

: 00:38:27

and then it just is a cycle from there.

794

: 00:38:30

So

795

: 00:38:30

Justin Norris: excited for what

you folks are doing Dave and a big

796

: 00:38:34

fan and supporter of yours as you

know, and we'll watch it carefully.

797

: 00:38:37

Dave Rigotti: Thanks, Justin.

798

: 00:38:38

Thanks for having me.

799

: 00:38:39

Big fan of yours too and glad that

we're Eight, nine years later, we're

800

: 00:38:44

still hanging out, and next time

you're in New York, let me know.

801

: 00:38:48

We can hang out in person.

802

: 00:38:49

Justin Norris: Absolutely.

803

: 00:38:50

Thanks, Dave.

804

: 00:38:51

We'll speak again.

805

: 00:38:52

Hey, everyone.

806

: 00:38:53

I want to invite you over to the

RebOps FM Substack community,

807

: 00:38:57

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808

: 00:39:00

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809

: 00:39:03

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810

: 00:39:04

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811

: 00:39:08

I'd also love to know what you thought

of the episode, and to hear suggestions

812

: 00:39:10

for topics you want to learn about.

813

: 00:39:12

Feel free to leave a comment on Substack,

Or send me an email at justinatrevops.

814

: 00:39:18

fm.

815

: 00:39:19

Thanks for listening.