Melissa Moody | Gated
Gated launched its “noise cancelling headphones for email” product in March of 2022 and has been growing its user base at 30 to 40 percent month over month.
In this episode, Gated Co-Founder and head of marketing Melissa Moody describes how the company’s “influence marketing” strategy is fueling that growth. Specifically, she details how Gated is growing a network of advisors and advocates to help spread the word about Gated’s product.
Get the details on all of this, and more, in this week’s episode.
Resources from this episode:
Visit the Gated website
Connect with Melissa on LinkedIn
Melissa and Kathleen recording this episode
Kathleen (00:13):
Welcome back to the inbound success podcast. I'm your host Kathleen Booth. And this week I am so excited to welcome as a guest, Melissa Moody, who is the founder and head of marketing at Gated. Welcome to the podcast, Melissa.
Melissa (00:27):
Thank you so much to be here. I'm so glad to be here, Kathleen. I have been a big fan of you and all the guests you've had on the show. So honored to be here.
Kathleen (00:34):
Well, likewise, I have loved watching the evolution of Gated. I love following what you post on LinkedIn. Um, and I, I particularly love the approach that you've taken to marketing the company. I mean, I've been a serial startup marketer, and so I have mad respect for anyone else. Who's marketing a startup on, you know, what is always inevitably a limited budget with a limited team and resources and you guys are killing it. So we are gonna dig into that. But first I would love for you to tell my audience a little bit more about yourself and of course what Gated is.
Melissa (01:09):
Yeah. Um, so, you know, we've been, uh, connected on LinkedIn for a while. And actually when I was thinking about how to introduce myself, there's something I do on LinkedIn every so often. And it's called the three S because I am, when I think about myself, I think I've got Melissa, cuz we are all a unique person. Um, and Melissa is, you know, born and raised in California, um, has a very kind of liberal arts background. Um, I was a teacher for a while. My masters' in education and I currently live in Anchorage, Alaska. So I have lived a big broad life as Melissa. Um, the second M is a mom. I think for those of us who are parents being a parent is one of the, you know, greatest things you can do, but it's also a core feature of who you are. And so it's funny.
I often find a lot of my ideas come out as mom first versus market or Melissa. And the third M is really the marketer. And so I am co-founder and CMO at Gated, which as you said, is a very dynamic early stage startup. We have built a solution that helps people reduce the noise in their inbox. Um, we all live in a very digitally cluttered world. Um, so we're helping people find peace in their inbox. And then it also benefits charity at the same time. So we don't charge the user it's free, but what we do, the reason we make money, we don't sell your data like Facebook <laugh>. Um, we actually take a piece of sender donations. The majority of that goes to nonprofits and a piece of that goes to make Gated free for everyone. So we've built a really innovative solution. Um, we're also, you know, here comes the marketer in me, we're tackling a much bigger problem of how people focus and how we can reclaim our attention in what is just a cluttered, nonstop and increasingly noisy world. So
Kathleen (02:46):
I am, I'm so fascinated by this because you're really tapping into something that I think everyone, everyone has as a pain point, whether you are a CEO, whether you're just getting started, whether you're a, you know, a full time mom, who's dealing with like sports and this and that, we all have this inbox issue <laugh> and this time and attention issue. Um, and so I think it's really cool that you've tried to find a solution for it that has this like other, um, other impact on the world. Uh, I don't wanna, obviously we're not here to make this all about the Gated product, but I do wanna take a second and ask you to explain exactly how it works because it's pretty interesting and it's pretty unique and I wanna make sure people understand it.
Melissa (03:29):
Yeah. Thanks for giving me the space to do that. So let's say Kathleen has got an inbox. That's absolutely crazy, right? Um, you sit down, you're like, oh my God, I can't see the important emails they're getting lost. Um, there's just every morning when I sign on, I have to spend a more an hour sorting through my inbox. As you said, a lot of people feel this pain. Um, we know that people who get a high amount of inbound email, especially marketers these days, we are the targets of a lot of the PLG motion. Um, marketers, rev, op CEOs. Those are like the must have scenario for Gated. What happens is when you turn on Gated, you get to use your inbox just as you always have. But there is essentially a folder where inbound emails from people you don't know go into that folder.
So we're not deleting them. We're not hiding them, they're there, but they're not stealing that focus away. They're not coming in every 10, 10 minutes, 10 seconds into your inbox to kind of pull you out of your flow. So a big part of what I wanna let people know is that Gated isn't deleting or taking away emails. We're just keeping them away from your focus. Now, if one of those unknown senders actually really wants to earn a piece of your attention, they are challenged to make a donation to a charity that you get to pick. So what would you pick Kathleen? What's what's your um,
Kathleen (04:40):
Oh my goodness. Um, I think I would probably pick Planned Parenthood.
Melissa (04:44):
Yes. It's a big one these days. Um, uh, just talked with an amazing CEO of Test Box and Planned Parenthood for him is really important. So when an unknown Senator tries to reach him, they'll get a challenge email saying, you know, if you want to get a piece of Sam's time or Kathleen's time donate $2. So it starts at a very, very low marginal cost to her chosen charity. And your inbox will be delivered to her or your email will be delivered to her inbox. So it's, it's a really, it's a little marginal cost. We like, we used to call it a postage stamp for email. It's just that little bit of a cost that says it's worth getting into your inbox. Now the really cool part is that senders can actually donate more. So we've seen donations up to $160. Um, the average donation I believe is around four $55. So people are donating more. They want to stand out. They want to earn a bit of your time. And you know, if they've done that, you're not just part of a billion person.
Kathleen (05:38):
So, you know, it's the recipient, how much they've donated
Melissa (05:41):
You, uh, immediately in your inbox, you can see that they did donate, we market gently. So it says donation. So, you know, somebody donated, um, the other important thing I like to call out is there's a second CTA. Whereas if someone gets that challenge, email, but they actually do know you, or they're expecting, you're expecting their email, they can click, um, you know, Kathleen is expecting my email, please click here to let it into her inbox and that'll show up as Gated expected. So you can be like, oh, this person's there. Yeah.
Kathleen (06:07):
I have actually experienced that as a user. Oh cool. And it was somebody I knew that I was emailing. And so I clicked that. And, but it's interesting that you label it that way. Cuz I always wondered what's to stop that spammer from just clicking. I know them, but now if I'm understanding correctly, I, I, it seems like if they do that, that just like absolutely puts them in the doghouse because they lied <laugh> yes. And you can see that they lied.
Melissa (06:31):
It's very apparent. So we built that whole flow on a system of trust, which is basically saying, you know, we trust, you're not gonna do that. If you do a, you know, it's gonna come into your inbox as a user and you're gonna go, no I don't. And all you have to do is click them and drag them into gate and you won't see that from them again. So it's a, the whole product is designed to be as out the way as possible. So you don't have to go and manage it somewhere else. You just click and drag something integrated. Or if something is integrated that you do wanna hear from click and drag it into the inbox and it's um, so train Gated is as simple as that.
Kathleen (07:04):
That is so cool. How did you think of this <laugh>
Melissa (07:07):
Well, I do not take credit. That would be my co-founder. Um, my co-founder Andy Mowat has been a GTM exec at, you know, three unicorns in Silicon valley. So, um, most recently he was at culture amp and that's where he was when he created Gated. Essentially he was creating pain, sending out multimillion email campaigns through his team. And he was on the pain side of things. He, his inbox was just being hammered. And so he literally created his own version of it with an automated reply. He connected it to Venmo and people would donate to wounded warrior and then they would get into his inbox and then, oh
Kathleen (07:42):
God, I love it
Melissa (07:43):
More and more people saw it. They wanted it, got excited about it. Um, I came on, you know, he'd had the idea for a while. Um, but he was just busy in his own career. Um, and I came on at a point where he realized that it was really getting legs. Um, and he was thinking, okay, we have an idea. We have kind of this scrappy MVP, what does that look like when we come to market? Um, and I know you love that stage as well. Um, you know, positioning and looking at the competitive space and understanding, um, how it's gonna fit. So that's been, you know, a total joy for me. I love that really. I mean really the point of bringing a product to market is so much fun.
Kathleen (08:20):
<laugh> so, so let's dig into that because this is an early stage company, but you know, it's funny when I, as an outsider, my impression of Gated is that it has a, quite a large brand footprint and which I think is such a Testament to you because, you know, you've opened up the kimono and kind of talked about, you know, how, how far along you guys are. I mean, how, how I, I think I know the answer to this, but how big is the marketing team Gated?
Melissa (08:49):
The marketing team up until three weeks ago was one it's me. Yeah. Um, and I hired a brilliant young, um, coming from a totally different industry content marketer who is, um, basically gonna do all the heavy lifting from a, we've got really sitting on a lot of great content. So he's gonna take that and run with it cuz as you know, that's a big time suck in the early
Kathleen (09:10):
Stages. Yeah, yeah, no, that's amazing. And that's what I thought. So when you and I first started talking, you were the only marketer, you know, you're also sort of helping to run the company. Um, and, and I have to tell you, like from the outside looking in, you would never guess it it's amazing. And I think that's the challenge, all startup marketers face, right? It's like, how do we have this smoke and mirrors and make ourselves seem like we're bigger and further along and, and this sort of thing. And I, and the impression I got was that it was that there were a lot of people that really loved the product. And so you have this army, if you will, of advocates out there and, and you and I started talking and you shared that that's actually part of your strategy. So I really wanna dig into this with you. You're using advocates and, and other advisors and people along those lines to help you kind of do more with less. How did you come up with this approach?
Melissa (10:04):
Um, I'm so excited to talk about this. I think when you and I first started poking around the idea, um, we kind of gave it a name and, um, I'll throw that out there now. And we can decide if that name fits. Yeah. Or, um, I've said before, like if anybody else came up with this first, please let us know, <laugh> you and I started calling it, um, influence marketing, right? Like not influencer, but influence. Um, correct. And I'll talk a little bit about how we kind of came to that stage by stage or more importantly, how we built it. Um, the other day you'd probably love this. I accidentally kind of mentioned the words, concentric circles of influence, and I think that's exactly what it is. Right. So at the core, one of the first things we did was we started small. We started with 50 to a hundred beta users kind of modeled after actually what Calendly did.
They started really small and they spent a long time really in that set of close users, how does it work deeply listening to customers like really pretty much knowing every one of them personally, right? Like really looking at how it worked. And I think that fundamentally, that was step one for us in the eventual path of influence marketing, because it just established how closely we listen. Um, and also my co-founder Andy is built upon one to one relationships. And so letting him start from a place of like, I'm really building around, fixing something for people and bringing a product that is designed to help people. It just gave us a really good, like stake in the ground from which everything else radiated. Um,
Kathleen (11:30):
And when did that start? So when did you officially begin with your 51st users?
Melissa (11:34):
That's a really great question. When I came on in the kind of late 20, 20, like holiday season, Christmas ish, 2020, um, I would say at that point there were already probably 25 to 50 users of what was essentially a hacked together product. Right? Like Airtable. Zapier like <laugh> Venmo, like stuff
Kathleen (11:56):
Together, a Rube Goldberg <laugh>.
Melissa (11:58):
Yeah. And we, we worked with some kind of, um, some great developers, but very like kind of contracted, not part of the core company, um, for a while. So for probably a year after that, we were still in a really tight, small beta. Um, we talked to them, we thought about like, where does it go from here? How does it build out? And we stayed really focused. Um, the next piece, I think of the concentric circles is also something that my co-founder really drove from the get go, which is instead of having, you know, four core advisors that we talked to for everything and staying there, we built what, um, he actually modeled it off of what Chris regraph has done at Sendo. So, um, to build basically an advisor group that is a lot more people it's, it's broader. Um, and it's lower engagement.
We're not using them as like deep, deep, deep advisors, but people we can lean on that are really, um, have a stake in how the company is growing and are very passionate about it. So if you look at our advisor roster, we have GTM leaders, we have sales leaders, which is kind of another piece of the Gated puzzle. Um, we have nonprofit folks who've been in the nonprofit space and we've built like the next concentric circle passed, like the first people to give it a go is really that, um, advisor group. And there are people who truly believe in the mission kind of, regardless of the product at that stage, there wasn't much product, right. It was, it was an idea more than an actual product.
Kathleen (13:22):
So when you thought about advisors, were you looking for people who were reflective of the eventual end user that you would target?
Melissa (13:30):
Good question. I think for the advisor circle, I would say, no, we do have some people who are users and advisors, but for that group, it was more experts who could bring a perspective on one piece of the puzzle. What's tricky with Gated is we, we built it for users. It's essentially a user first product, but it directly impacts the senders. Right. It's almost a marketplace because the senders are actually the ones paying. So in some sense, they're the customer. Yeah.
Kathleen (13:56):
Yeah.
Melissa (13:57):
We're building it for users. That users are the customer, but we, the senders are so key. And then the nonprofit angle is kind of a third piece of the triangle. So part of the strategy around advisors was to make sure we have expert perspectives from all of those angles, um, versus just our users. Right. It's more people who we can look at the bigger picture with. Um,
Kathleen (14:16):
And what does it mean to be an advisor for Gated? So when you begin that conversation with someone, what, what's the exchange of value?
Melissa (14:26):
Yeah, there is a, a small equity component, of course, um, that, that actually is an official piece of it. But one of the other kind of components of it is we are looking for people who, um, aren't in it for the equity, right? Like versus a normal advisor program. Whereas kinda like equity is the big conversation. We're looking for people who approached it more from a giver standpoint, right. They truly believe in the mission, probably some mutual benefit to aligning with Gated. It, it makes sense for their vision of the future, um, in whatever role they're in, but it's fairly low lift. I mean, the expectations are really around, you know, meeting with the people on our team who could use the support or could use the feedback. Um, recently I brought on someone as an advisor who is just a brand expert. I mean, that's not my background. I knew we'd really benefit from having someone with a depth of expertise there and being able to pick up the phone and call him, uh, he's all the way in England, but you know, that that's okay. It's, it's wonderful to have someone on the horn who could support the team, because as you said, we're small, like we don't have all that expertise on the team. So having it in kind of an advisor set has been hugely powerful for us.
Kathleen (15:33):
And do you have certain requirements of them in terms of like you're going to do X, Y, and Z, or is it more just, Hey, be there and pick up the phone when I call
Melissa (15:42):
It's very light, it's mostly B be there and pick up the phone when I call. Um, they're also part of, we have an informal community. Anyone who's a huge fan of Gated can be a part of it. Honestly, it's the big to do on my list as a marketer. I'm not, it's not super actively managed, but they're also in there. So if something happens like we had a big PR article drop, I can lean on them and say, Hey, go and check it out, share it with your friends. There is an expectation that they will help amplify the Gated message. And that's probably part of the next concentric circle that yeah, we can chat about. That's part of how we look bigger than we are. Right. Um, we've started with a really passionate group of folks who are more than willing to share about Gated.
Kathleen (16:21):
So I think you might have either partially or fully answer fully answered my next question, which is how do you manage the relationship with your advisors, both from a, you know, what's your frequency of communication? What's the medium, how do you keep them activated?
Melissa (16:36):
Yeah. So the first that there's one tool that we use and, um, my co-founder is CEO is kind of the point on this. So there's a tool called Cabal, um, that he uses for, it allows him to kind of push out, asks to the advisor group and also to, um, just manage those asks so he can see who has helped out in certain ways. Um, Cabal is a cool tool.
Kathleen (16:57):
K a B, a L or
Melissa (16:59):
C a B a L. Okay. Like, uh, I think that's how you said. Yeah. KU ball. Yeah. <laugh> um, and then the other thing which actually, again, goes into that next circle is we, we have just a really robust, this sounds kind of scrappy, which we are, we have a really robust Airtable that is kind of our Bible of, um, you know, Gated influence network. Right? So the core thing on there is we have all of the advisors, we know exactly which areas their expertise in. Um, we know what communities, they're all part of. That's gonna play into our conversation. Like, I, I could tell you how many of our advisors are in wizard of ops or, you know, Mo Pros, um, like we know where, what communities they represent. Um, and then that same kind of Airtable is this effectively becomes our database for super powering, like the bigger conversation. So if we do wanna push something out, I can see exactly who might be the right person and when, and what to ask
Kathleen (17:52):
Airtable is amazing. <laugh>,
Melissa (17:55):
It's fun. Sometimes I yell at it, but it's fun.
Kathleen (17:57):
<laugh> yeah. I mean, it's just, it is, I can see that because it's so infinite what you can do with it. I actually interviewed the CMO of Airtable for the podcast at one point. And we talked about like how there are so many use cases, but that also, I think there is a it's I call it the cheesecake factory syndrome where you're like, there's so many things I could do here that you become paralyzed <laugh> so
Melissa (18:16):
The menu is so big.
Kathleen (18:17):
You. Yes, exactly. Like I really wish they would've just given me a one page menu with the top 10 items instead of the 50 page menu. <laugh> I love that, but no, that's great. Okay. So you have your advisors and you were talking about these concentric circles of influence. So talk me through how it expands from there.
Melissa (18:35):
Yeah, I, I think the next, um, so I guess like right around the advisors is, and it ties into this idea of being founder led and having conversations, um, around like what you're building. But I think the next concentric circle is just people who are excited about what you're building regardless of the product, right. It's um, it's creating a conversation around, um, a topic that's that gets people excited, whether or not they're a user of the product. Now, now I do know that gate is really lucky cuz we're kind of a product that people get excited about. Um, I'm sure there are certain softwares where, you know, the bigger conversation is maybe not quite that sexy. Um, but that for us has been a big lever in the sense that like our next circle is really people who are psyched to be a part of the conversation.
And they're also like mentioned that quick community that we have they're people in there as well. They're like, I don't care what the community's about. I just wanna be with people who are talking about this, having this discussion, um, talking about, you know, focusing in a busy world, talking about companies with social impact, they just they're part of the principle. And we, um, the, I guess last year's SaaStr, uh, we went to and we didn't really even have the product publicly launched. We had a manifesto, so we had it's on the site. If you ever wanna go look, but we worked really hard on, it's basically a three sentence manifesto on what we are building and what we are doing.
Kathleen (20:00):
Wait three sentences. That's amazing. Cuz I've written manifestos before, but they've been more like three paragraphs or you know, page and a half.
Melissa (20:09):
Yeah, no, we got it. I mean, we started with that. Right. And then we got it down to like there are three core things that we believe and if we move forward in that area, we believe it'll change. Not only email, but just how we, um, you know, how people see their control over their own attention in the future world right now. I mean just to kind of tangential to the manifesto, anyone can reach you at any time. Um, it might be over email, but it could also be, you know, LinkedIn text, whatever we're very open. That's wonderful. It's great to have democratic channels of communication. However, if you look at the bigger picture of like the digital world and where we're going, it's unsustainable, our little human brains are not gonna be okay. <laugh> if we keep letting it all in. And so a lot of the, I mean the manifesto is really around what needs to change, what do we believe needs to change so that we can continue to do great things and build great businesses and be great humans in like a really messy world. Um, especially let, I mean, we take the blame for it as marketers in the B2B world in particular like the sales motion of email right now is out of control <laugh>
Kathleen (21:18):
Um, yeah, it's, it's crazy. I mean the email, the email inbox management challenge is, is an insurmountable one in many respects. So, um, anything that helps <laugh> anything that helps chip away at it is, is amazing. Yeah. Um, so, so you have the community, you, so you have your official advisors, then you have these, I guess we were calling them advocates. Um, and a lot of them come out of this community that you have, how do people find out about and get into the community?
Melissa (21:47):
So it's kind of actually a reverse, like I mentioned, this is a big to-do item for me. It's it's like I look at it and I see this opportunity around it that I just haven't tapped yet. So it's more the reverse, whereas when somebody's really passionate about it and like they're one of the people who say like, I don't care about the product, the manifesto I'm in. We're like, Hey, come and join. And then we just are kind of chatting in there. I, I really want people to be a part of that if they're passionate, but I also am looking at it going, yeah. When do I hire a community manager? Yeah.
Um, so there is that, but this, I think it's, it was really cool for me. And again, I know not everybody's fortunate enough, but if you're at an early stage startup where your product isn't necessarily totally baked or you're kind of at an early stage, you can market just around the idea, right. If you do it well. And I think the manifesto gave someone to sink their teeth into, and it certainly gave me something to market, um, to start building content around and to start, um, getting people excited and revved up, um, which then as we'll talk about kind of led into when we actually launched a product, right. When we said, Hey, here's what we're doing. Um,
Kathleen (22:48):
Yeah. So when did you officially launch publicly?
Melissa (22:51):
Technically, March 22nd of this year. So not all that long ago. It was March 22nd, 2022. Um, yeah, that was kind, that's kinda like the next big thing out was we basically said, okay, we've got a lot of passionate people. Let's bring it to market. And that's actually what you and I started chatting about was on that day, we I'll call it a campaign. We ran a campaign, a launch campaign that was unpaid organic on LinkedIn. And we basically did like a takeover of LinkedIn that day. I mean, it was, it was a great day for me. It was
Kathleen (23:22):
Thrill. That's amazing.
Melissa (23:23):
Yeah.
Kathleen (23:24):
And how did you, so that was orchestrated with your advisors or?
Melissa (23:28):
Yeah, what we did was I took that Airtable as the core of everything and I structured who are we gonna ask for? What, and when, um, you know, a big part of the success that day was I didn't go out with super pre-scripted things. I took all these people who were really excited about what we're doing. And I said on this day, at this time, or throughout the day, I'd like you to post your perspective on gate. Um, if, if you're a sell seller, tell me why it's disrupting your business. You know, if you are, um, if you are a nonprofit, tell me why you're excited about this. And so everybody posted, but it was all their own perspectives.
Kathleen (24:04):
So that's, that was gonna be my question. Like what was the follow through?
Melissa (24:07):
Yes. Um, the follow through, I mean the ask was basically post get, like, let's see if we can cover LinkedIn. That was kind of the ask. Definitely. I was very pleased with it. Um, I, you know, I think numbers wise, our impressions were well over 200,000 in terms of like organic impressions. And then I think it was about 5,500, 6,000 engagements, which was awesome. Um, and then the signups, we drove great amount of signups that day. So it was literally the day that the product was released to the public, which so signups was important. Of course.
Kathleen (24:38):
So what percentage of the people that you asked to post, do you think did just off the top of your head?
Melissa (24:44):
Oh, I think percentage that we asked posted probably high probably 75%.
Kathleen (24:50):
Oh, that's actually very high. What do you attribute that to?
Melissa (24:54):
I attribute it to the fact that we had started with the principles. I attribute it to the fact that everybody on LinkedIn who's active on LinkedIn loves talking about something interesting. And for all of those people, it was a value to them to say, here's a new idea or I'm thinking forward, or I'm thinking in a new way about this problem. And so it wasn't like we were saying, oh, just pimp our product. We were saying, go out and talk about how this is changing your thinking. Yeah. Or how we weren't, it wasn't even really about the launch of the product so much. It's just like, today's the day we're gonna talk about anything you want related to gate, right? Yeah. It's if you push 'em too much into like, uh, a CTA related to the product nobody's as incentivized. But if you say this is a challenging, exciting topic, let's all talk about it. Then people tend to jump in.
Kathleen (25:40):
So if you were starting over again today, knowing what you know now, and you wanted to build this sort of an influence program. Yeah. Is there anything you would do differently?
Melissa (25:51):
I, well, I think I would've been prepared to catch the momentum in that community. Like we talked about, I think, um, we started it as a way to catch people who were excited about what we're doing, but we didn't, um, frankly we didn't have the bandwidth. We didn't have the time and the manpower to start nurturing that from the beginning. I do think it's something we can still do, but I, um, I think that would've been really powerful. Like it would've really, uh, allowed us to kind of continue that momentum of, of, um, bringing the influence network kind of to bear when we need it down the road.
Kathleen (26:24):
Where does the community live by the way? What platform?
Melissa (26:26):
It's just slack. It's
Kathleen (26:27):
Slack. Yeah. That's that's great. Yeah.
Melissa (26:29):
Yeah. I mean, it's one of those things where I think in the future, we can build it out in a really interesting, interactive way, but everybody's on, it's just easier. Yeah. Everybody's there. Um,
Kathleen (26:37):
Honestly I think it's a big, it's a big ask to get anybody to go to some third party platform that they're not already spending time in. I, every time people talk about doing that with communities, I, I, I shutter a little bit <laugh>
Melissa (26:48):
Right. And they can, and then, you know, they can pop in for one little notification and then pop back out. They don't have to take a chunk outta time and go there. Yeah.
Kathleen (26:56):
So, so being able to really capitalize on the community from the beginning, is there anything else you think you would do differently?
Melissa (27:04):
Oh, I feel like that's a good question. I thought about this earlier. I'm almost like, I feel like I jotted this down at some point. Um, no, I think the owned community was a big thing. Um, and then I also think, you know, the, the ups and downs of the process is what's hard from a, from a personal standpoint. I think, you know, things are great one day and then things are rough the next, um, I think honestly, I would've, um, leaned a little earlier on my peer group of folks who are in this stage, this is a much more personal reflection. Yeah. But I think one of the toughest things that's happened over the last year is just the ups and downs. Um, and you know, you've been in this so many times, like you gotta be thick skinned and tough, but having people there to say like, oh my God, this happened and having talk, talk you down from the ledge. I think that is so invaluable. And I think it took me too long to get to that point. So yeah, that's maybe not more tied directly to the marketing campaign itself or the work itself, but, um,
Kathleen (28:03):
Yeah, I mean, I'm not currently a founder, but I spent 11 years as a, you know, as a CEO and it's very lonely. Even if you have a co-founder my husband was my co-founder and so of we could talk about everything, but still you're in your bubble and it's very lonely in that bubble. Um, so I, that's one of the beautiful things that has emerged during, COVID not that there weren't communities prior to COVID, but I think that they flourished in a way that hadn't been happening prior to that. And I feel like that's really given people an opportunity to, to reach outside of that bubble, to form relationships, to have very honest and candid conversations in safe spaces that maybe they didn't feel like existed before. So yay for silver linings. <laugh>
Melissa (28:45):
Well, it was funny. I always say I, um, there's a wonderful woman, Linda Schwaber at BrightHire, um, she's CMO over there and she, and I, I like to say we accidentally founded a slack group. Um, we call it two pizza marketers because of that Jeff Bezos thing where like, if you more than two pizzas, the team's too big. Yep. So it's a community, but it's for, um, people and marketing teams, like less than eight, because what we realize is to that exact point, like, it feels very lonely and isolating. And so you need a place where you can go and they're not talking about like million dollar budgets and
Kathleen (29:14):
Running people, right. Like what should I spend my million dollars a month on? Right.
Melissa (29:19):
How do I get something for free is more of the question, right?
Kathleen (29:22):
You're like, how do I get a million dollars a year? <laugh> at all? Yeah. How
Melissa (29:26):
Do we even mark up a budget? So that's been really nice. Um, because again too, like people don't have to show up with a framework and present their things. It's kind of like you come in in your pajamas, right. Yeah. And you're like, Hey, I need something. And then you're out.
Kathleen (29:37):
That's awesome. I love that. Um, so let's talk for a minute about impact. I mean, it's, hasn't been that long. So you were in beta, starting in late 2020 in the deep dark recesses of the pandemic. Um, when probably more email than ever was being sent, because that was the only way to really reach people. Um, you know, you couldn't show up and have meetings in person. You came out of beta in March of this year. Have you, have you seen any sort of like quantifiable impact from your advisor or your advocate program?
Melissa (30:15):
Yes. So, I mean, I do think a lot of times I actually take that launch day as a big quantifying of the impact, cuz that was really one of the only times where we pulled a lever and I said, everybody go right now. Yeah. So I do think, you know, that high level of, you know, views and engagements and driving sign up over a 24 hour period was, was very evident. Um, since then, uh, you know, publicly we've basically said we we've been running it 30 to 40% month over month since then, uh, in terms of growth. And so I do think all of that is due to effectively, if not the advisor group, um, different channels that are driven by organic growth. I mean, right now we're just starting some paid display, uh, paid social campaigns, but to date, we haven't really run paid campaigns. Everything we've been spending our time on has been around juicing kind of the organic referral, um, content driven, social, um, really trying to build our presence on social, which is,
Kathleen (31:08):
And have you sorry to interrupt, but have you, how do you handle attribution? Like, are you, do you have that question that we all love to ask? How did you hear about us and is, are you able to track back to advisors that way? Or is there some other method you're using?
Melissa (31:21):
Yeah, we have a couple and it, I mean it becomes part of a, a slightly, um, what do I wanna confer to like a kids in the kitchen type mask, but I've kind of got a little bit of that on the counter. So, um, we do have certain initiatives, like there's an interesting one where people will put Gated on their email signature and we don't have it built into the product yet. But this idea of, um, you know, if you email me, it says my inbox is protected by Gated the noise, canceling headphones for email. Like it says that quite a lot of our advisors have done that and I can track a certain initiative like that by UTM. Right? Yeah. Like I can see if they come in through that. Um, there's a few little things like that where I'm actually literally looking at UTM parameters and just being like, cool, that's a viral.
Um, the other thing is we have a wonderful head of data who has started looking at all the touch points. And one of the big quote unquote viral channels for us is, um, not, this is a little bit further from the advisor set, but he can look at if someone saw a challenge email. So if you were the unknown sender who, who tried to email Kathleen and you saw this Gated thing, and then you came back at some point and got it for yourself, we're starting to see that like how viral is the touchpoint of the challenge flow itself?
Kathleen (32:33):
Um, so real product like growth within the product. Yeah,
Melissa (32:36):
Very much so it's a really interesting challenge though, because for us, you probably love this. Um, right now the VI the in product virality, uh, touches people who are outside of your network, it's the unknown senders. Yeah. Um, so we're thinking a lot now about how do we let you, how does Gated touch the ones who are in your network? Cuz those are probably the people who also need data.
Kathleen (32:57):
Yep. Yeah. That's a good point. Yeah. Wow. It's so interesting. And I mean, I just think it's so creative that you, that you did this it's like I said, I look at it from the outside in and it seems shocking that you came out of beta in March. Like I feel like I've been hearing about this product for a while. I feel like everyone's talking about it so well done. <laugh>
Melissa (33:19):
Well, that's, you know, it's the point of everyone who's talking about? I think that's the other big, like win that I would share with everyone back to Airtable is one of the first things we did that I think that we really built off of is a testimonial engine. So, um, every single person that gets excited about Gated, first of all, number one is you gotta ask, right? Like you have to have a flow for, if someone's excited, here's what you send them to let them actually give you a testimonial. Um, so we, we use Typeform, which we use for quite a few different things. Um, but I've made, we may it super easy. So it's just a couple questions. And as soon as somebody's like, boy, oh boy, this is really cool. Or E Andy's, you know, connecting with a seller. Who's like, wow, what was this?
Now I I'm really interested. Boom. We shoot him a Typeform. We say, tell us what you think. Um, and then capturing those using 'em bringing 'em up in social proof. Um, one of the other big wins of our testimonial engine, as I like to call it is we don't just say thank you. And then take the testimonial. We actually create dynamic user pages and we give it to the person. So I'm not saying they'd be thrilled as like a present for them, but they have a page Gated.com/that, you know, their name. And it says their quote, their picture, what Gated is doing for them, how much it's saving, you know? And then it kind, I mean, it's essentially a landing page. I'm really excited to improve those. I think they have a lot of potential, but it's even just giving them something back to have keeps the cycle going. Right. They might post it, they might share it. Um,
Kathleen (34:46):
So you're creating these dynamically
Melissa (34:48):
Right now. I will say it's a little more manual than dynamic <laugh> but uh, the plan is dynamic. Yes.
Kathleen (34:54):
Right? Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. <laugh> right. No,
Melissa (34:58):
Just one back here, you know?
Kathleen (34:59):
Yeah. No, that's amazing. I love that idea. That's super creative. I haven't heard anybody doing that before, but I think you're right. Like everybody loves an asset like that. It's why when you have podcasts, a lot of podcast hosts will give people, you know, video grams and audiograms, cuz everyone likes to see their face somewhere. <laugh> exactly. That's great. Oh, so many good ideas here. I feel like I could pick your brain forever, but we're gonna run out of time. So I wanna shift gears over and find out your answers to the questions I always ask at the end of my show, the first being, um, we, we have spent this entire interview talking about how as marketers, we are flooded with information and much of it comes through email, but it also comes in lots of other places. And so when you think about drinking from that fire hose, how do you personally, um, stay up to date with everything that you need to know to be a good marketer?
Melissa (35:51):
Oh, that's a really good question. Um, I'm gonna, this is super taught, you know, off the cuff. I think one of the first things is I do really, really value what's on LinkedIn these days. So I actually have a block of time once a day, which is my LinkedIn time. Um, I find that if I don't do that, I, I wanna check it all day long. Right. And for a company that's built on focus, that's not the best strategy. So, um, I have a block of time every single day for LinkedIn. Yes it's for, you know, sort of posting the content for the company and, and for all that, but more so it's to look around and see what everybody's talking about to see if there's anything I can, uh, steal with pride or learn from and grow. Um, so I do think that that's critical. I mean the connections and the strength of expertise on LinkedIn these days just blows me away.
Kathleen (36:35):
Um, ah, it's amazing. I, I totally agree with, and that's really how, I mean you and I know each other from communities, but a lot of our interaction is also on LinkedIn and it's, it's fantastic. It's fantastic. What you can learn if you open yourself up to it. So
Melissa (36:47):
It really is super. Um, and then I would also say I've, I'm a big fan. I was not a podcast listener. I don't listen to any podcasts. Um, well that's not true. I have a couple of fun ones, but in general I love to when I've got an hour, when I'm going for a walk, I love to go through kind of some of those top marketing podcasts. And usually I pick based on this is a good tip for podcaster creators. I pick based on the title. Usually it's not really about the person, it's about the topic they're touching on. Um, cuz sometimes you discover people you didn't know before, but they're an expert in some area. So I love going to a couple, you know, list of the top ones that I know are great, podcasts know are high quality. And then I pick the latest episode that I'm like, Ooh, I, I wanna dig into that. Or it's the burning issue for me that day?
Kathleen (37:32):
Any particular podcasts that you listen to regularly?
Melissa (37:36):
Yeah. I mean, fan girl, I listen to Kathleen Booth regularly
Kathleen (37:40):
Besides mine.
Melissa (37:41):
I know. Um, you know, the one from Jason and Mark at Metadata, Demand U. they, I mean, it's so great. Not only for the content and the, I love the authenticity with which they present. It it's very like behind the curtains, but also stage wise. It's really similar to where I'm at. So I do love that one. I'd say that's like my favorite. That's the one where I usually wanna end up listening to every episode, not just cherry pick. Um, that's a great one.
Kathleen (38:05):
That's a great suggestion. I'll have to listen to more of those. I've dabbled in that one. There's so many good ones. That's the, that's the problem, right? There's so many podcasts, even in that category alone, you can get overwhelmed. Um, alright. Second question. Uh, you know, this podcast from day one has been all about inbound marketing and I feel like the definition of that has evolved over the years, um, to, I define it as anything that naturally attracts the right customer to you. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. So with that definition, is there a particular person or company that you think is really setting the bar for what it means to be great at inbound marketing?
Melissa (38:38):
Ooh, that is a really good question. You know, I think it's cuz I'm living in a very content focused space these days. Like I've been really living the content life, partly because we have a new content marketer and he, and I just really evaluating everything. This is a little bit out of the box from inbound marketing, but um, I really love the <laugh> like the huge megaphone that Ross Simmons uses for content distribution. Um, I love how he talks about getting it back out there, like really using content. Well, and I think from an inbound marketing standpoint, the way I'll tie it in is if you know your target audience, well, your distribution is everything right? Like showing up where they are and like getting it where they are. Um, sometimes it's like, you don't even need to build the content specifically for them. Yeah. If you're hitting them at the right place. And so that's a little, a little bit of a jump, but for some reason I, Ross Simmons is kind of stuck in my mind right now as someone I'm really always impressed by,
Kathleen (39:37):
Um, yeah, he, I follow him as well. He's, he's brilliant. And you're right, because so many marketers spend so much more time in the content creation than they do on the distribution. And, and you said something interesting, which is that sometimes the creation isn't even the most important part. I would go so far as to say that actually you don't even need to create your own content on your own owned properties. Like if you're just publishing to LinkedIn or you're just, you know, posting here or there, if you're in the communities where your people are, that can sometimes be enough.
Melissa (40:09):
I totally agree. I absolutely agree. And I, you know, to a certain extent too, you don't even need to really create your content. If you're talking about something that's of interest to your audience totally. And kind of be grabbing from anywhere. Yeah. The content.
Kathleen (40:21):
Yeah. You need a point of view at least, but yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Well, I love that. Great, great, um, name to drop he's he's such a good person to follow. Um, okay. So we're, we're at the end. Um, I wanna make sure that if people want to learn more or have a question for you that they know how to reach you and how to learn more about Gated. So can you share any links or contact points?
Melissa (40:44):
Yeah, definitely. Well, the, the best of course is email me right? Since I have Gated, anyone can have my email. Um, the easiest is just Melissa@Gated.com. Um, and you will get to see the Gated experience, which is fun. If you're listening to Kathleen's podcast, you can click that you know me, if you don't wanna donate or if you wanna donate, um, and try the experience, give it a go. So email's great. I'm on LinkedIn. I love connecting with people. Um, I usually connect with people who give me, um, some reason why they wanna connect. I'm not a big, I don't really accept connections if it's just a random.
Kathleen (41:15):
Right. Personalize your connection requests, people. It is like, it is doesn't take long<laugh>.
Melissa (41:21):
Yeah. All you have to do is say I heard John Kathleen's podcast. Yeah. I'd love to talk. Um, yeah, so yeah, LinkedIn is probably the other main channel. Um, and then I am playing around on TikTok these days, which is terrifying. Um, but if you wanna find me there, I'm at two pizza marketer, so you can go and, uh, grab it there.
Kathleen (41:40):
Okay. I we're gonna have another conversation at another time about TikTok because that is super interesting to me. Thank you. And I too am terrified, so good for you for, for paving the way. Um, alright. If you're listening, I will put all the links that Melissa just mentioned in the show notes, which are available kathleen-booth.com. And then as always, if you enjoyed this episode, I'd love it. If you'd head to apple podcast and leave the show a review, and if you know someone else who's doing really amazing inbound marketing work, just send me a tweet at @Kathleenlbooth on Twitter. And I would love to make them my next guest. That's it for this week. Thanks so much for joining me, Melissa. This was so much fun.
Melissa (42:19):
Thank you for having me glad to be here.
