Always be open to feedback. Any feedback either positive or negative is a gift. There's always opportunities to improve and grow no matter how much experience you have. In your case, if you don't agree with the feedback, I would ask for examples on how you could have done something differently, or better. Your boss may not see eye to eye with you and that's okay, but as long as you can show impact through your work, numbers don't lie.

The best Demand Generation candidates possess a unique blend of strategic thinking, creativity, and executional excellence. They deeply understand the product, messaging, and audience, enabling them to craft compelling go-to-market strategies. Creativity is key—they generate innovative ideas to activate campaigns and drive engagement. I was once tasked with building a campaign for a software product we were selling in the Retail space. To activate this beyond the run of the mill webinar and content, we decided to take over a luxury retail store in SoHo during fashion week. We hosted top customers for an exclusive shopping experience and a live interview with the famous designer that we also streamed online and amplified on social media. Because this was such a unique and memorable activation, we were able to close business and also drive awareness. In addition, a strong grasp of channel strategy and optimization is essential. These candidates know how to leverage paid media, content, email, events, and other channels effectively, continuously testing and iterating for performance improvement. They are resourceful and scrappy, thriving in fast-paced environments where they must do more with less. Beyond tactical execution, top candidates are natural leaders who can align cross-functional teams, collaborating seamlessly with product marketing, creative, field marketing, and sales. Their high emotional intelligence (EQ) allows them to navigate pressure with composure, influence stakeholders, and drive alignment across departments. Being data-driven is non-negotiable. The best candidates don’t just execute campaigns—they analyze performance metrics, extract insights, and refine strategies based on data. They understand pipeline impact, revenue contribution, and how to optimize for business outcomes. Ultimately, the strongest Demand Generation professionals balance analytical rigor with creativity, strategic vision with hands-on execution, and leadership with adaptability. Their ability to connect the dots between messaging, channels, data, and cross-functional collaboration makes them invaluable assets to any marketing team.

* Align With Sales First: Meet with sales to understand their goals, the ICP, and what constitutes a qualified lead. Build trust early. * Audit the Funnel: Assess what’s working in current lead gen efforts. Are there quick wins (e.g., better nurture paths, small targeting adjustments)? * Start Simple: Focus on a few key campaigns and prove value before expanding. * Build Infrastructure: Invest in tools that provide visibility and scalability (e.g., marketing automation, lead scoring). * Show ROI Early: Prioritize campaigns that can deliver measurable pipeline impact within your first 90 days.

Direct mail is an offline channel that, when done thoughtfully, can drive results. Below are some direct mail campaigns that have been successful for me. 1. Outbound direct mail: Empower your sales development teams to book meetings with prospects from target accounts. Have quarterly campaigns tied to seasonal themes such as summer, fall, etc., or topical themes. Get creative with concepts that will resonate well with your target audience. A memorable direct mail campaign I was the recipient of was a comic poster I received themed “Demand Gen Mastermind” 2. Direct mail to support new product launch: These help with getting existing customers to try another product your company just launched 3. Cross-sell or in-app direct mail campaign: We tested this idea of targeting in-app users with an incentive (direct mail item) and getting them to take a demo for a cross-sell product 4. MQL revival direct mail: This is a tough one, but it works! Target demo leads that went cold. A little nudge with a thoughtful gift may just be the incentive they need to take a demo.

Conflict results when trust has been broken. As leaders, part of our job is to pioneer change and drive culture forward, often stepping into roles where historical conflict has been present. However, being present doesn't mean the conflict has to be constant. Resolution is a path, not a switch, and most cross-team conflicts resolve when trust is re-established. To regain that trust, you need to eliminate silos as much as possible, starting in the planning cycle. Involve people in this process. One of my personal philosophies is "no surprises." None of your stakeholders should be shocked when a program is launched or an event is secured. If you plan together, you carry the accountability bag together. You win together. To improve a historically tense relationship between functions, establish regular, structured communication forums such as joint meetings, cross-functional workshops, or team-building activities. This helps break down barriers and fosters open dialogue. Align both functions around shared objectives, clearly articulating how each contributes to the organization's overall success, emphasizing mutual benefits. Ensure that leaders from both functions are committed to resolving tensions and modeling collaborative behavior. Their buy-in is crucial for driving cultural change. Conduct a thorough analysis to understand the underlying issues causing the tension, possibly involving confidential surveys, interviews, or facilitated discussions. Encourage team members to understand each other's roles, challenges, and pressures through job shadowing or role-swapping, which can build empathy. Implement clear, agreed-upon processes and workflows to reduce misunderstandings and conflicts, documenting roles, responsibilities, and expectations to clarify ambiguities. Acknowledge and reward collaborative efforts publicly, as recognizing successes can motivate continued cooperation and reinforce positive behavior. Equip team members with conflict resolution and communication skills, empowering them to handle disagreements constructively and professionally. Create channels for continuous feedback and improvement, regularly soliciting input on what's working and what needs adjustment to keep the relationship on track. If tensions are particularly high, consider bringing in a neutral third party to facilitate discussions and mediate conflicts, helping to reach fair and unbiased resolutions. By taking these steps, you can transform a historically tense relationship into a productive and collaborative partnership, ultimately enhancing overall organizational performance.

Typically a content marketing function is measured on the engagement with the associated content put into market via paid, owned, earned tactics (i.e. content/asset downloads, social media engagements, webinar views, etc.), however when associating that content to demand generation programs and campaigns, It's important to understand how that content is impacting and driving the business. Essentially, how many MQLs did that content produce and ultimately what is pipeline associated to the content. I think it's also important to understand how marketing content is driving business outcomes via a direct attribution, as well as influenced attribution as customers will engage with multiple pieces of content throughout the customer journey. However, if your company is not at the state of having a sophisticated multi-touch attribution model that provides a weighted measure of the content's impact, you'll have to align on a first-touch or last-touch model to determine which content gets "credit" for driving downstream impact. It's also important to understand the type of content your organization is creating and the purpose of that content. For example, thought leadership content is not typically intended to drive short term pipeline, but it can impact a weighted multi-touch attribution model. Content on a company's website also has a very different purpose which is to engage and convert customers/prospects to the next action in the customer journey. Therefore it's very important to align on clear expectations of the purpose of the content being produced before it goes into market.

Similar to the question about worst KPIs, I believe vanity metrics and volume KPIs are often too easy to manipulate and can be used to tell a misleading story. Metrics like email open rates and click-through rates can be artificially inflated by bots. Lead counts and sign-ups can also be influenced by acquisition campaigns that don’t necessarily bring in high-quality prospects. Likewise, a low cost-per-lead (CPL) is often over-hyped; in the end, what matters is quality, bottom-of-funnel conversion. Constantly feeding the top of the funnel with low-quality leads won’t actually move the needle.

Effective OKRs for demand gen are measurable objectives that drive impact or growth in key areas such as acquisition, pipeline, awareness, and engagement. Before creating OKRs, it's crucial to have a firm grasp of not only your team's specific goals but also the broader company objectives. This ensures that your marketing efforts and the OKRs you develop will ladder up to these higher-level objectives. This approach elevates your OKRs from good to great and enables you to tailor them more effectively, making them more specific and relevant. For instance, if launching a new product is a top company-wide priority, then your OKRs should be refined accordingly. Here are a couple of examples: * Decent OKR: Source X% of site traffic * Better OKR: Source X% of traffic to the new product site page * Decent OKR: Source $X in sourced opportunities * Better OKR: Source $X in sourced opportunities, with Y% being new product opportunities

Today, we have 2 people on our team: one dedicated to new business and one dedicated to customers. In the past, I have structured Demand Generation in other ways - from regional support, to regional + global coverage, to functionally based on channel. The most important thing will be to find what works best for your company and your business model. It is normal, however, to start with one or two "full stack" marketers who are responsible for all channels and the associated project management. As the team grows, specialists can be brought in to run each channel (ie, an email specialist, an advertising specialist).

Demand Generation Managers work between many teams to bring to life a GTM strategy to meet key business objectives. Therefore, the skills I measure my team on include the following: * Collaborative Project Management: The ability to execute a high-caliber program that resonates with your audience is critical. This means you need to motivate cross-functional teams to work with you by communicating clearly and often. * Strategic Mindset: You have to be someone who can see the forest beyond the trees. Beyond your programs, you must understand how your program relates to larger OKRs, where it sits in the customer lifecycle, and how to drive your prospect or customer to the next step in their journey. * Truth-Seeking: Demand Generation requires balancing the budget, resources, and time allotted. Since you can never have everything, you need to understand how to prioritize across all your asks to drive efficiency and meet your business's KPIs. You need to be able to use data to drive your decisions and help others understand why you are prioritizing some aspects of your plan over others. * Ability to Influence Stakeholders: Demand Generation does not work in a silo. You have to bring along all your stakeholders to see the value of working with you, to feel ownership of your joint projects, and to feel accountable for the results. Furthermore, as you become more senior, you need to be able to bring along senior leadership to agree to your plans. * Team Leadership: Leading cross-functional teams and motivating them to follow you. Be a leader within your own team, helping train, coach, and grow our overall team’s abilities. * Growth Mindset: The ability to have an agile learner mindset. Someone is constantly trying to grow and improve with what and how they do things.