It’s holiday list season.
Christmas lists. Hanukkah lists. Kwanzaa lists.
Shopping lists. To-do lists. Grocery lists.
So in that spirit, I’ve pulled together a countdown list for us before we all head out for the holidays over the next few weeks…
Sponsor: HockeyStack
Your CEO just slacked you: "We have our board meeting in 2 days. Send me a slide with what's working + anything they need to know."
Did your palms get sweaty reading that?
Or is this an easy ask because you can easily get to this info already?
I'm neurotic about forecasting + tracking performance. I have reports upon reports and dashboards upon dashboards.
So when Emir + Claudia over at HockeyStack asked me what my perfect dashboard would look like, I immediately started geeking out.
And when they sent this dashboard mock-up back to me yesterday, I was in nerd heaven 🙌
2025 planning is here. And it's also never too late to add some solid reports or views to your dashboard, so hopefully this provides some inspiration to any of you who are looking to level up your dashboarding game.
12 people to follow on LinkedIn
We all see the same people being shared in these types of lists, but many of them aren’t what I’d call reciprocal follows in that they simply post to large audiences + don’t engage back. So I’m going to skip many of those “well-known” individuals and share the people I’ve connected with in 2024 and found to not only be sharing incredible thoughts + knowledge, but who I’ve been able to genuinely connect with this year through some invaluable back + forth exchanges on the platform.
From marketing to revops to leadership to recruitment and everything in between, here are 12 people worth engaging with in the new year:
11 21 podcast episodes to listen to
Here are a handful of some of my favorite podcast episodes that I’ve listened to over the past year, either for the first time or as a repeat because it has so much knowledge and value in it. Topics range from marketing to business to health to general life advice, so there’s something in here for you no matter what you’re in the mood for.
10 things to watch over the break
Netflix
The Gentlemen (TV show)
The Last Airbender (TV show)
Warrior (TV show)
Nobody Wants This (TV show)
Hit Man (Movie)
Amazon Prime Video
Gen V (TV Show) (if you like The Boys, this is a spinoff of that)
Reacher (TV Show)
Tropic Thunder (Movie)
The Beekeeper (Movie)
Road House (Movie)
9 books to read
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
Building a Story Brand by Donald Miller
Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War by Robert Coram
Fall in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution by Uri Levine
Red Rising (series) by Pierce Brown
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
The Fish That Ate the Whale by Rich Cohen
The Lion Tracker’s Guide to Life by Boyd Varty
The Pout-Pout Fish by Deborah Diesen (our little one’s favorite)
8 companies doing cool things in software/services
AMP: turn founders into Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to drive business growth without the guesswork
Clay: help your GTM ops team implement any growth idea
Grove Cookie Company: enhance your most important relationships (with the best cookies I’ve ever had in my life - sorry, Mom 🙈)
HockeyStack: helping marketers figure out what’s working
Loxo (I’m biased 🤷♂️): recruitment has changed, and it’s time that tech enabled recruiters instead of holding them back
Noble: social proof that really works. Goes beyond logos and shows you people you actually know using a product/service.
Video Brothers: Memorable Ads. Unforgettable Results. Big brand ad campaigns without the big agency price tag.
YOYABA: marketing + demand generation agency for B2B
7 of my LinkedIn posts that resonated this year
I got a DM yesterday from the VP of a large target account of ours saying they wanted to get a demo
The best companies don't call themselves a family - they operate like high-level sports teams
6 newsletters to subscribe to
Same as with the LinkedIn follow recs - going to try and highlight a few you may not have heard of yet, but that I always open as soon as they hit my inbox:
DemandJen from Jen Allen-Knuth
DemandLoops from Kaylee Edmondson
Hello Operator from Paul Stansik
MKT1 Newsletter from Emily Kramer
PMM Files from Jason Oakley
The Reading List from Ryan Holiday
5 of my most popular newsletters this year
4 positions I’ll be hiring for in 2025
We’ll be adding to our marketing + GTM team next year as we continue our upward growth trajectory. Each of these roles will be the first in its function, so a great opportunity to make a huge impact. Keep your eyes out next year as we post these, but if you or someone you know is interested, being proactive is never a bad thing 😉
RevOps Manager
Product Marketing Manager
Community Marketing Manager
Content Marketing Manager
3 of my daily non-negotiables
Evening walk with the little one + our pup. Helps me to mentally separate the work day from family/personal time + decompress from the day.
Drink 16 oz of water within ~10 min of waking. I can’t stand the feeling of dehydration - tired, weak, headaches, etc., so as soon as I’m up I get ahead of it with this before getting on with my morning.
Read before bed. Some nights it’s 25+ pages, some nights it’s only 1 page. But I’ve learned that getting off screens + winding down with a book is a near guarantee for me to be asleep within 10 min of hitting my pillow.
2 biggest bets we made with our marketing last year
Killed off Google Ads in 2023 and kept them off for 2024 with increased growth goals. Here’s a quick post + video from Gaetano DiNardi where he and I spoke more about this.
Went BIG into TV via connected TV. Not just taking existing video assets and viewing them as “good enough” to be used on TV, but investing in a proper strategy and required assets to make real impact. S/O to Chandler Quintin at Video Brothers for the collab here. Next two quarters were our best ever in terms of pipeline production AND we saw an unexpected result in these bringing back some stalled deals when they saw our commercials on their TVs.
1 question from you
What’s on your mind in the marketing or GTM space? New problem you’re encountering, fresh ideas you’re looking to incorporate into existing things, etc. Here’s your chance to ask me anything!
And that’s a wrap for 2024! I’ll be taking the next few weeks off to enjoy the holidays with friends + family. See you all in 2025!
Happy holidays,
Sam