Leigh Stallard’s Post

Your brand is always selling. Or it should be. It may not be to customers... it might be to potential investors, or strategic partners, or potential employees. Your brand should attract the right people into your sphere of influence. I recently worked with TORR WATERFIELD LIMITED to create some short video assets to support their recruitment efforts. Finding great people is always a challenge, so Tom Simpson and I discussed options for using video to help. Aside from the filming and editing, I helped to shape the content and draw out the unique value that TW can offer to an ideal potential candidate might be looking for - (similar to selling to a customer). TW has a fantastic team and social culture, is a local leader in cloud tech and has a unique growth story. Most employers just 'tell' people "we have a great culture"... ...video allowed us to 'show' these benefits to potential candidates through: 🔸 Engagement from the wider team 🔸 Shots of past team socials and activities 🔸 A relaxed style interview to 'meet' their future colleagues 🔸 Brook and Reetu's own experiences and development within the firm Side bonus: clients and potential clients will also see this video. When they do, they'll understand the dedication that Torr Waterfield has to building (and taking care of) a team of great people to look after their businesses. 👀 Finding talent at the moment is arguably more difficult than finding customers. What are you doing to differentiate your business?

Final day of #Nomad30 Big thank you to everyone who’s posted (even if only once) but specific shoutouts to Stephen Paul, Marcus Batson and Mark Donaldson 📊 I’ve loved seeing your videos every day and I hope the process has been worth it for you! I’ve missed a few days myself due to a few bits and bobs going on - but thank you guys for picking up the ball and running with it.

Taking some advice from Stephen Paul (and also Mark Donaldson 📊 ) and taking a day off today… Work life balance has been a constant and challenging battle for me over the last few months… and wow - what a day for it! 🙂 #Nomad30

SaaS sales / partnerships leader to video producer seems like a strange step, doesn't it? There's two main reasons why I did it: 1️⃣ Getting customers to implement a SaaS product, to make it a habit, is often a real challenge. And the churn risk that creates can be a significant business issue. It's one that can be simply fixed by hiring more customer success and enablement people - but it's not that easy. Talent is in short supply and headcount budgets are often stretched. 2️⃣ I really, really love producing videos 😃 3️⃣ It's not just videos - it's the knowledge and experience of knowing which videos fit where (and when video isn't the solution). That's also why partnering with James Sundin and R.E.P.R.E.S.E.N.T is a huge step on the path to making the world better for SaaS vendors, so they can make the world better for accountants and bookkeepers so they can make the world better for small businesses so they can make the world better for all of us.

Want to do more with video but not sure where to start? Join me for a free drop in session at 11am and I'll do my best to help. No charge - but if you get value from the session, please do consider a donation to Bamboozle Theatre Company. Links below or DM me if they aren't showing up (LI can be a bit funny about showing comments with links...)

Still feels a little bit like home... Great to visit the Xero UK office today - Jo Murgatroyd, Allan Davidson thanks for having me! Exciting chat! #Nomad30

🛑 Are discovery calls actually || BLOCKING || your selling or buying process? 🛑 There are two conflicting issues with discovery calls: 🔸 Sometimes the buyer just wants to see the product at a high level to find out if they're interested - or they may prefer to self serve BUT 🔸 Vendors can't really afford to offer 121, customised* demos to everyone... <cough> tyre kickers <cough> Having warmed the seat of a SaaS sales manager for a while, I can see both sides... So heres's James Sundin and me chatting about alternative option... could be a useful nugget for your sales teams. Bottom line - 'gatekeeping' your product behind a compulsory discovery session could lead to some bad experiences for customers. #Accountants and #Bookkeepers - what do you thin about software discovery calls? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *Your cost per demo is somewhere between £48.68 (pure salary + NI costs) and £427.63 (opportunity cost) <you can see my workings if you like> and you're not spending that to let them provide generic demos. ...are you?

🔪 "Murder Your Darlings" For video editing you want to remove anything that's not to communicating your key message. If something can be removed and the audience will still get the key message - you're probably best to remove it. Anything else can become distracting or boring. That can lead to some hard decisions. There will be things that you filmed or captured that you really like - but if they don't serve the core story or message...🤷 They have to go. That's what 'murder your darlings' means. That doesn't mean butcher everything - sometimes a moment of silence to let a moment breath or emotional beat sink in is the right call... but this would be an example of leaving something in that is helping to communicate the core message. #Nomad30

Much as I’d love to tell you that video is a silver bullet… it’s not. Highly valuable tool in the kitbag? Absolutley. But it’s not a fix-all solution - and that’s why you need a game plan. #nomad30

#Xerocon exhibitors - follow up starts tomorrow!! 📞 Otherwise James Sundin will start naming and shaming. Probably. Not enough time to get through your follow up? "Talk to me". ...well, "talk to us" but "us" that doesn't fit with the Terry Tibbs thing...