In this episode of the Dear BAMf podcast, we speak with Sheena Badani, Director of Marketing at Gong. Gong enables revenue teams to realize their fullest potential by unveiling their customer reality. Sheena is an experienced marketing and business development leader at multiple pre-IPO companies at various stages — from Seed to Growth. She's also a co-host of Gong's branded podcast, The Reveal Intelligence Podcast. In this episode, Sheena answers tough marketing and PR questions from our listeners. Including this question about turning down PR placements:
Dear BAMf,
Is it ever bad to turn down a PR opportunity, when shouldn't you turn down one?
Listen now to hear how Sheena advises this writer to move forward.
Sheena begins by saying, "Gong is what we call a revenue intelligence software company. At the simplest level, what that means is we are showing you what's actually going on with your customers, with your deals, with your market." Gong takes information from customer touchpoints and turns it into rich data that enriches sales funnels and conversions. Gong helps you get better at your job.
"An initiative earlier this summer where we did a mini brand refresh with the focus being on diversity," Sheena explains. "We took a solid look at it at our own brand and felt that there was a tremendous opportunity for us to better reflect our market." For more ideas around DEI, read BAM's DEI Commitment.
Sheena enjoys authentic stories from humans by humans and echoes that here, "Telling our store customer stories in the most authentic way possible, is the best way." Storytelling is important. For more tips on voice and tone visit our blog.
Sheena showed suspicion at the old phrase, "Any PR is good PR." She explains her suspicions by telling the listener to ask themselves a few questions before agreeing to a publication opportunity saying, "You need to take the time to evaluate and make sure, does this fit into our objectives? Do we have the bandwidth to do it?" If your team needs to focus on the top-tier publications and the opportunity presented is small, you will have to pass. Our host Beck echos the idea of bandwidth, and she suggests making sure your spokesperson is media trained and ready. If they don't have the capacity, take that as a sign that you are not ready.
We are all BAMfs (badass motherf*ckers) according to us, but sometimes even BAMfs need help. Dear BAMf is an advice column-style podcast that lets you anonymously hit us with your hardest marketing and PR questions hosted by Founder & CEO of BAM Communications, Beck Bamberger.
Have a difficult PR or marketing situation you can't figure out? Drop us a line at Dear BAMf. Your submission will be entirely anonymous.
Catch our next episode on Monday, May 17, and subscribe to Dear BAMf on Spotify, YouTube, and Apple Podcasts.