Kieran Flanagan is SVP Marketing at HubSpot, where he has helped the business grow internationally, move to a product-led business, quadrupled its marketing demand, and built out its media team, including the acquisition of 'The Hustle.' He is also an advisor and investor in early-stage companies.
In Today's Episode with Kieran Flanagan We Discuss:
1.) Entry into Growth and Marketing:
- How did Kieran make his way into the world of growth and marketing?
- What has been 1-2 of Kieran's biggest lessons from seeing firsthand the hyper-scaling of Hubspot?
- On reflection, how would Kieran summarise both Hubspot's community building attempts and also their product messaging?
2.) Why You Need Growth Hires Pre Product Market Fit:
- What does "growth" mean to Kieran? Where do so many get it wrong?
- Why does Kieran believe that you should have a growth team/people before product market fit? What specifically do they do and work on during this stage?
- Pre PMF, what is the core metric that all startups should focus on? How does it change with time?
3.) Building Your Growth Team:
- What does Kieran believe are the 3 key stages to hiring for growth?
- How should founders determine whether to have external standalone growth teams or integrate them into existing functions?
- What are the single biggest mistakes founders make when hiring for growth?
4.) The Future is Content:
- Why does Kieran believe every great tech brand will have to become a media brand?
- Why is Elon Musk an example of the perfect brand? What has he done right?
- Why does Kieran say that data is the best and worst thing that has happened to marketing?
5.) WTF Really is Community:
- How does Kieran define "community"? What is it? What is it not?
- What makes the best communities? Why do some work and others not?
- Should every company have a community approach? Who does it make sense for?
- Have Hubspot done a good job at community building? On reflection, is there anything that Kieran would have done differently?