Brian Laker

Great question, and honestly, one of the biggest gaps I still see in demand gen programs, even at very sophisticated brands. From my time working with some of the world’s top marketers, the teams that nail online and offline integration all do a few things exceptionally well: 1. They plan channels together, not in parallel. 2. They use one audience strategy across channels. 3. They build orchestration around moments, not messages. 4. They measure full-funnel, not channel-centric ROI. 5. They ope ...Read More

Every channel comes with its own favorite metrics, and it is really easy to get stuck there. What I learned at Twitter is that channel metrics tell you how the channel is performing, but not whether it is helping your business. So I tend to start from the opposite direction. First ask are we reaching the right people, are they progressing the way we expect, and does any of this actually turn into pipeline and revenue. When you look at it that way, the picture changes a lot. For example, some of ...Read More

A lot of people want a clean rule for inbound versus outbound, but the truth is more situational. The decision usually comes down to three things I have seen across almost every company I have worked with. 1) Where is the buyer mentally? If they are actively searching or exploring, inbound feels natural to them. They want to browse, compare, consume, and self direct. But if they are not aware of a problem yet or if they tend to buy through relationships, outbound is the only way to get the conve ...Read More

For me, it always starts with understanding how that audience actually behaves, not how we wish they behaved. Every industry has its own rhythm, its own buying culture, and its own comfort zones. I’ve seen different verticals engage differently with the exact same content. FinServ leaders might sit with an article and read it deeply. Retail marketers would swipe through a creative idea in seconds and send it to a colleague. Those behavioral patterns told us more about channel mix than any benchm ...Read More

A few come to mind that do this exceptionally well. What they have in common is that they treat channels like a connected ecosystem instead of a bunch of isolated plays. One great example is Snowflake. Their rise was not just about product strength, it was about how consistently they showed up everywhere their audience was already paying attention. Industry events, digital communities, partner channels, LinkedIn thought leadership, customer stories, and highly targeted outbound all fed into each ...Read More

The biggest lesson I’ve learned is that you cannot walk into an executive conversation talking about open rates or CTR. They might nod politely, but those numbers never tell the story stakeholders actually care about. When I present email performance, I try to reframe email as a behavior-shaping channel rather than a “send and measure” channel. Here’s a framework to follow… 1) Start with the customer behavior we were trying to influence. Were we trying to get people to start a trial, deepen thei ...Read More