Harnessing the power of community to drive growth at Notion, dissecting the marketing playbook for a B2C2B model | Rachel Hepworth (Notion, Slack, LinkedIn)

Rachel is the CMO at Notion where she leads a team that combines the best of B2B and B2C marketing.  Previously she led a variety of teams at Slack and LinkedIn, including growth marketing, product marketing and platform marketing. She was the founding marketer at Climate Corp., which sold to Monsanto in 2012 for over $1 billion. 

We cover:  

• The dynamic of marketing for a B2C2B model. Reaching consumers while ensuring relevance for B2B companies 
• Fueling word of mouth by understanding the underlying drivers 
• Global approaches and expanding communities with local market relevance
• Conversion and expansion capabilities 
• Using lifecycle marketing to drive engagement and as a feedback loop to the growth product roadmap

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Where to find Rachel

Rachel's LinkedIn Profile

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Notion's Template Gallery

Patrick references: 

Word of Mouth Coefficient

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Where to find Patrick

Patrick's LinkedIn Profile

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(2:43) Defining the B2C2B model at Notion and how Rachel's team approaches it 

(6:27) Prioritizing channels by stage and channel across consumers and businesses 

(8:27) Balancing messaging and relevance to both audiences 

(9:09) The challenges with calculating LTV for the business given the land and expand type nature of the company 

(10:45) Signals to use to determine customer value and the limitations of performance marketing for PLG companies 

(12:10) The underlying causes of word of mouth and supercharging it through community, influencers, partners, SEO, paid media, and affiliates 

(18:42) Keeping a close eye on word of mouth and its effects to the business 

(19:51) Most of the customer base is outside of the US. The natural fit to APAC markets and ensuring that local context is communicated through marketing  

(23:53) Pipeline management and optimization through PQAs and PQLs

(26:11) Consumers are one significant way to drive customers, but not the only way. Some of the challenges with the focus on consumers and the tradeoffs with B2B capability needs 

(28:28) Going deeper with the messaging dynamic and other acquisition tactics between consumers and businesses 

(29:55) What most people are surprised by with Notion's success 

(32:00) Land and expand opportunities between understanding usage patterns and shrinking the time between value realization 

(34:11) Investing in lifecycle for onboarding, education, engagement, and expansion 

(37:53) Empowering the community for experts and advocates. Inspiring Notion influencers

(39:50) The structure for the lifecycle marketing team globally 

(40:43) Where to find Rachel!