Advocacy Strategies in B2B marketing with Robyn Hartley

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I sit down with Robyn Hartley, founder of Paper Kite Media, to discuss her passion for advocacy strategies in B2B marketing. 

Robyn shares her insights into navigating the buyer's journey, engaging both internal employees and external influencers, and creating effective advocacy programs that drive real results. 

We discuss the importance of selecting the right influencers, overcoming barriers to employee engagement, and setting realistic timelines for success. 

Whether you’re looking to build community engagement or measure advocacy ROI, this conversation offers a clear roadmap for making advocacy a cornerstone of your B2B marketing strategy.

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Previous guests include: Arvid Kahl of FeedbackPanda, Andrei Zinkevich of FullFunnel, Scott Van den Berg of Influencer Capital, Buster Franken of Fruitpunch AI, Valentin Radu of Omniconvert, Evelina Necula of Kinderpedia, Ionut Vlad of Tokinomo, Diana Florescu of MediaforGrowth, Irina Obushtarova of Recursive, Monika Paule of Caszyme, Yannick Veys of Hypefury, Laura Erdem of Dreamdata, and Pija Indriunaite of CityBee.

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Transcript

Eric (00:00.582)
How long have you been living in London?

Robyn Hartley (00:04.366)
So I've lived in London for 10 years now. So coming up to a decade. Yeah. I've lived in different parts all over and yeah, it's, I really enjoy it. It's lovely. I go through stages with it. Like some months I'm like, I just need more greenery and I just want to run off to the countryside somewhere. And then other months I'm back in love with it and you know, it's, you know, enjoying everything it has to offer. But I think that's probably the same for...

lot of people who live in cities. that did you, think I did a post about this actually a little while back and I think you commented around kind of your relationship with, you know, cities and stuff as well.

Eric (00:43.876)
Yeah, that's right. You did. think I, it reminded me of like when I lived in New York and I think I said something about that if I remember correctly. Yeah. Yeah. The big city.

Robyn Hartley (00:50.134)
That was it. Yeah, Yeah, I would assume that probably New Yorkers have the same, the same feel of kind of going in and out of love with it. But yeah.

Eric (01:00.324)
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's jump in here. Okay. I'm going to do the intro. Five, four, three, two, one. Today's guest is Robin Hartley. She specializes in B2B and Fluid Sewer campaign management and helping B2B brands build advocacy strategies. Quick shout out to B2B Pod Pros, my agency that helps SaaS brands reach new audiences through B2B podcast sponsorships. Robin, pleasure to have you on the show. How are doing today?

Robyn Hartley (01:05.144)
Okay.

Robyn Hartley (01:29.472)
I'm very well, thank you. And thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

Eric (01:34.138)
Yeah, I know. I'm excited to have you on here. Now, before we dive into advocacy and influencer strategies, what's something interesting about you that most people don't know? They're not going to see this on your LinkedIn profile.

Robyn Hartley (01:47.843)
So I would say I'm, I absolutely love to travel. So for me, just trying different countries, experiencing the culture there, food, history, soaking up everything that that country has to offer. So I've done a few stints of traveling and yeah, it's definitely something that I want to do more of. So yeah, if you

Feel free to start any conversations with me around travel. I definitely will respond that it's something I love to talk about.

Eric (02:20.61)
Okay. Traveling, there's a travel question and a rapid fire question at the end of the show. So we'll probably touch a little bit about that at the end. Okay. Now you recently have taken a step into entrepreneurship, but before we talk about, your new company and your new service, you were the media director at the marketing practice. Now, did you leave there because of a bad manager or can you just tell us more about that role and some of your responsibilities?

Robyn Hartley (02:28.238)
Fantastic.

Robyn Hartley (02:47.406)
Yeah, so I mean, not at all. I had, I've kind of, I've been in marketing now since 2012. So, and during that time, I've worked in a variety of different roles. So that has been agency side, but also brand side as well and client side. So that for me has kind of given me a great experience of the challenges of both and, you know, of being the buyer and the seller.

And so most recently, as you said, so I've been I was a media director at the marketing practice and which was a fantastic experience, you know, gave me some great exposure to working with some some brilliant brands. And I was providing cross channel media strategy for really complex organizations that had multiple business units. So

Like I say, fantastic experience. And the reason I left is because I wanted to give working for myself a go. And I personally feel quite passionate about the area of work that I've moved into and something that I wanted to focus a little bit more on.

Eric (03:57.292)
yeah, PaperKite Media, that's the of the new business, right?

Robyn Hartley (04:02.088)
That's it. So, so paper cut media is, yeah, something that I've started around building kind of advocacy strategies for businesses for B2B brands. So the, mean, we'll get into this in a little bit, I'm sure, but just in terms of helping that buyer as much as possible throughout that buying journey and how brands can support that as much as possible.

And so the three ways that I'm looking to help brands is by engaging external influencers and subject matter experts within their space. Then also tying that into kind of building what a lot of people are referring to as internal influences. So elevating employees into thought leaders within their industry and how that can help.

and then tying in customer advocacy to that as well. for me, it's almost like if you were to think of like a Venn diagram and putting all of those three together, via trust would be right at the center of that. So yeah, it's something I'm really excited about. And I think from my experience and kind of the challenges that I've seen a lot of face, I think this is the direction that the industry is going in and a lot of brands will need support in these areas.

Eric (05:21.21)
Yeah, when a brand approaches you and they're seeking help for advocacy strategies, do you naturally start with internal strategies first in terms of like leveraging their own employees to become thought leaders? Is that like a first step for you?

Robyn Hartley (05:36.6)
So for me, think the first step is yes, but also even a little bit further back from that. everything should start with the buyer, right? you know, understanding them completely. And I think a lot of companies probably do build out their ideal customer profile, but then maybe don't revisit it as often as they should.

So really understanding, know, what are their challenges, you where do they spend their time? Who are they influenced by? You know, who do they look to for insights and information? So all of this is really important just to build that kind of really accurate picture of who your customer is and what's important to them and how you can help to support them better.

The decision making process as well in B2B, you know, that has changed a lot in the last kind of five to 10 years as well. And now, you know, there's more and more research coming out, which highlights that there is a lot more self research within that buyer's journey. And I think it was Forrester who released a stat that was, you know, around 80 % of the buyer's journey is now completed before a prospect even speaks to a sales rep. So there's a massive chunk of time that

brands need to help support that journey as much as possible. And that brand activity is crucial within that period. But you can also support that with a network of other voices that can advocate for your brand and amplify it as much as possible. going back to kind of rambling a little bit around the background of it, but I think it is important. So

I think once you have a full understanding of your buyer, that's where I start. And then you go, okay, let's look at your current strategy. Let's look at the lay of the land because for me, like I say, a lot of the experience that I've had sits within that media strategy element. And it's where you'll see the most impact is where you tie everything that I can help you with into everything else that you're doing. So.

Robyn Hartley (07:46.222)
tying them all into the goals and the company, what you're trying to achieve as a company. And then it might be, you know, identifying key accounts, for example, that you want to go after and how these tactics can feed into that. And then you can then start to plan out, okay, let's look at the specific tactics of influence strategy, employee thought leadership and customer advocacy to make sure that that's tying into all of that and making it as impactful as possible.

Eric (08:15.654)
Okay, well let's use that situation as an example, right? Let's say there's a few different key accounts that the brand wants to go into and then what's the next step? it, let's leverage some employees maybe for thought leadership or do you automatically go to seeking out external influencers that could play a role?

Robyn Hartley (08:30.808)
Thanks

Robyn Hartley (08:36.428)
Yeah, absolutely. So if you go for external influencers, for example, you know, and again, going back to that question, who do your buyers follow? Who do they trust? Who holds authority within your space? And looking at how you can collaborate them in a way that is really authentic. And I think that word is thrown around a lot, but I actually think, you know, it has to provide value to the, to the

the person that you're working with to their audience, right? To your buyer. So, making sure that it is valuable, making sure that it's the influencer that you're working with buys into everything that you're offering and the value that you are able to give. And so that kind of, that strategy pieces is for the influencers then looking at, for the employee side, okay, you who wants to engage in a program like this? Who wants to amplify their visibility online?

who wants to, know, and it might be for personal reasons as well, right? It's not just all in the benefit of the company. It might be that they want to, you know, they're going for a promotion. They might want to hit sales quota. you know, they might have some even more personal goals, you know, outside of that, are like, you know, appearing on a podcast like this, you know, being invited to, and it's speak on stage at an industry event. all of those things tie into it.

And then who is going to be most impactful within those conversations and opening up those accounts as well that you've said. So if you've got specific accounts looking at, okay, who do these people follow? So really getting into that ideal customer profile, what are their challenges? What kind of content is gonna resonate with them? How can you provide value to them? And then everything kind of builds around that.

Eric (10:27.15)
Okay, what are some things that you do to identify like the right employees to be a part of this or the right influencers to engage with?

Robyn Hartley (10:36.66)
Yeah, and it's a good question because I think, you know, there's, there's room for anybody who wants to do this, right, you know, there's, there's a space for everybody to kind of share their knowledge and become more visible online. One thing I would say is it absolutely shouldn't be forced. You know, this isn't a company mandated thing, you're not going to get the right level of engagement by putting it out there.

like that. So I would always lead with, how can this benefit the individual, you know, so this shouldn't all be about the company goals. And, you know, of course it will contribute towards that, but the, you know, that person will have an invested interest in, in doing it as well. And it might be like saying, you know, getting promoted, becoming more visible to senior leadership or, you know, having a variety of things that sit outside of that. So

It really needs to be an employee led program as opposed to a company led program when you're inviting people to take part in this. And I think leading by example is also really important. So seeing like personally for me, know, working at organizations where I have seen leadership be more active online and kind of have increased their visibility that way has definitely empowered me and encouraged me to do the same.

thing and also has created an environment where I feel safe to do that, where it's going to be celebrated as opposed to maybe interpreted as a signal that I might be leaving the company or anything like that. So I think it's good to have the right environment as well and leading by example. having a senior leadership team can really, really help with that. And then again, okay, so who, you know, who

who wants to be engaged, senior leadership, and then also, you know, strategic positions within the company. So it might be business development representatives who might want to be more visible, or it might be sales, might be client success of the people that hold those relationships. And, you know, it might be, for example, you know, big part of it for me was, you know, being agency side, you know, working.

Robyn Hartley (12:55.035)
with certain clients and you know, we might be having great conversations, but there might be things outside of that that we're not doing. And I'll be talking around those things online and then you can then clients would then come to me and go, actually I read your post the other day around this, this, this. So I think, you know, it's, it's ways in which you can kind of provide value. You can showcase your experience and your knowledge and open up those new conversations.

Eric (13:20.428)
Okay, okay. And have you ever had any obstacles in terms of getting companies to come on board, specifically senior leadership to buy into this, hey, let's try to encourage or set an example for the employees of the company to be thought leaders. And if you ever had those obstacles, what are some tactics that you use to try to get around them?

Robyn Hartley (13:44.106)
Yeah, it's a good question. So I think, you know, there's, there's, there's so many things that can stop people from doing these kinds of programs. And one of them might be a fear of, you know, not putting the right information out there in the first place, or, you know, a fear of being kind of misinterpreted or saying something they shouldn't be or something like that. But I think, for me, it starts as well with a social media policy is really helpful with that. So you can lay out, you know,

this is what we're kind of, we're really empowering people and you know, this is something that we encourage and so I think that's a good starting point and I think also, you know, previously, it's time as well. Time is one of the biggest constraints for everybody, right? You know, it's and showing up and being consistent and you can provide, I can, you know, for me personally, I can provide all the support.

that's needed, but certainly there does need to be an element of time investment from that person to be committed to the programme, right? I think it's, yeah, I think the, I think the time element is sometimes it might not be the right timing and that's okay. You know, I've had, I mean, I'm sure we've been in all situations where,

one quarter, are literally rushed off your feet and there is, you just don't have the head space to even consider something like this, but you are potentially interested. you know, going back to that person and having given them another opportunity in three months time when then things might have quieted down for them and they might want to, to then on board and get, get involved. So I think that's also another way to get people included as well. It's not just saying like, this is the intake. Okay. Yeah, you're not.

you're not going to be having an opportunity to do it then. And, you know, I've also kind of seen that if you're having a support, like, you know, having myself is a sounding board as well. So if you're producing a post and you're like, I don't know whether I'm not sure about this, you know, then it's good to have that support network that you can share that with and say, you know, what do you think about this? Do you think this is engaging? you know?

Robyn Hartley (15:59.742)
And actually, funnily enough, had a post similar to that recently where I'm sure you saw my blue for real video when I was trying to create video content. And so I came up with all these kind of outtakes that I had when I was trying to record video content for the first time. And as I was looking at all the content,

back, I was thinking, you know, what, actually something in this, I can put this together in it. I think it probably, it might be quite funny. So anyway, once I'd produced it and done it all and edited it, I sent it to a few people and said, honest opinion, what do you think of this? And so I think, you know, having that that reassurance and having that support is really helpful, particularly in those early days, when you're building that confidence in posting more online and you're trying to, you know, boost your visibility.

Eric (16:56.068)
Yeah, I think it's essential. I think I read somewhere where somebody said that their company created a subslack channel specifically for those employees who were wanting to and started to engaging on LinkedIn and crafting posts. And so they could be all there to support each other and engage with those posts. So I thought that was just brilliant because when you see your peers are going through the same thing that you're doing and you're there to support one another,

Having that support group, that peer group is definitely key for success. So let's talk a little bit about the external influencers. Are there any tactics or tools that you utilize to try to find the right influencers to engage with?

Robyn Hartley (17:41.228)
Yeah, so I work with a number of different people to kind of help with sourcing the influences from their own networks as well. But I think ultimately, it goes back to that goal of who are you trying to reach at the end of it? And every brief is so different. it depends very much on the brief that you get in from.

from the client, know, what are you looking for? Like who's your own buyer? Who are the decision makers? What industry? And industry can also play a massive role in that. just always on the lookout for people who have a really engaged following within their space and also just so it's a lot of it's a lot of work like manual searching and you you see you see great profiles and you'll have great conversations with people. But I think it's

Yeah, it's I think for me as well, a massive thing that I look for is, you know, community engagement. So when you're looking at options for influencers and kind of who will be the best person to work with, then you know, how do they engage with their community? Have they just got a really large following that actually they don't really spend a huge amount of time kind of having conversations with and engaging with and comments and all of this sort of stuff, because that for me is, you know, at the heart of what LinkedIn is about.

really and I think that's what's really valuable to brands when you're putting these strategies together.

Eric (19:09.604)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I recently discovered, I didn't even know there was a tool for this, but for people trying to find YouTube influencers. And then I saw you on a post with Kitchener from Channel Crawler, his tool. And I thought that was so cool that you can go to Channel Crawler and find specific influencers on YouTube. And there's other tools out there. George, the founder of Fluencer, you can find B2B influencers like on TikTok and LinkedIn, which is really cool.

Robyn Hartley (19:20.764)
Yeah.

Robyn Hartley (19:31.234)
Yes.

Eric (19:37.946)
So yeah, we're starting to see a lot more tools and apps that help you find sort of like the right influencer. But many times it's also a manual effort, specifically if it's a very, very niche industry and having to look like maybe for certain hashtags or certain job titles or things like that. then even once you find these people, as you said, how are people engaging with their posts? Are they really, really?

you know, a subject matter expert and do they have a following that is probably going to take action if they recommend a product or service they believe in. So, so a lot of, it's still a lot of rolling up your sleeves in finding these, these right people. I want to ask you about measurement in tracking performance. I mean, what are some things that, that you tend to look for to assess whether or not a campaign was successful?

Robyn Hartley (20:32.203)
Yeah, and it's an interesting question because I think there are so many different indicators that there could be, but I think going back to those original goals that you set at the beginning of the process, right? You know, what are they, what's the company trying to achieve overall at a company level? You know, that might be more of the harder KPIs. So you're looking at, you know, things like revenue that you've generated. Attribution can sometimes be quite difficult with these sorts of things. So

having a look across all of your channels and how they're performing and the impact on those can really help. know, demo bookings, know, direct pipeline that has been generated. All of these things are, you know, things that you could set as indicators. And then also number of strategic accounts that you were able to engage. So going back to what we were, the example that we used earlier, you know, there might be a specific account that you've, that you've wanted to kind of open a conversation with.

have we been able to engage any of the decision makers within that. So across any of the activity that we've been doing. So that's some of the kind of harder KPIs. But then there's kind of softer ones within that as well. So obviously, you've got the standard like social impressions, and, you know, clicks and reposts and all of this sort of stuff. But for the employee thought leadership programs, you know, that could look very different. And that going back to

of the last question that we went through is kind of, you know, hitting sales quota. they, did they achieve that? Did they open up new conversations? Did they, you know, so one of my personal goals, for example, when I started being a little bit more active on LinkedIn was I would love to be included in more industry focused conversations. So events or podcasts like this one. So

It's certainly, you that's another indicator as well. So for me, you know, it's, can be very personal to that person than the individual that you're working with, but it also can contribute to a much larger goal that the, that the, the company as an, as an overall kind of working towards. And I think the other thing that I would just comment on as well is there has to be realistic timeframes within this as well.

Robyn Hartley (22:54.016)
So it isn't, there are a lot of people who kind of promise overnight results and things like that. And it's just, it doesn't exist. There's no quick fix. don't think so. You know, these sorts of things do take time. But that is why you have regular check -ins and then you can tweak and optimize as you go to make sure that you're pulling in the right direction. And, know, we're eventually going to hit that, that, that overall goal. And you're constantly measuring those, those indicators along the way.

Eric (23:23.62)
Yeah, agree with you on the timelines. mean, if somebody wants to start being active on LinkedIn and building their personal brand, sharing what they do about their work, it may take them months before they actually get comfortable, you know, writing posts on LinkedIn. It took me a long, long time and I'm still not that comfortable, but it took me over a year to kind of get comfortable with that aspect. Whereas working with an external influencer, the timeline I feel like is much shorter because

Robyn Hartley (23:37.963)
Yeah.

Eric (23:52.12)
If they got a large reach and they got a loyal audience, then within weeks you'll start to see a good, you know, maybe return on that investment, but definitely a much longer time horizon. If you're thinking about internal employees as thought leaders, you know, for, for your service and brand. So I want to hop into the rapid fire section. but before we do that, again, tell us the name of your company and why you named it that, and then where people can learn more about you.

Robyn Hartley (24:22.976)
Yeah, so it's paper kite media. comes from so for me, it was boiling down to the butterfly effect. And the kind of thinking around that paper kite is a type of butterfly. And so in a business sense, it's that the small actions along the way, and the small steps that you take can impact the much larger strategic picture of a company. So that's where it came from.

And yeah, we're basically, overall advocacy strategies for B2B brands. So that includes engaging, influence marketing, looking at, you know, who the experts are in your niche and feeding that into your overall marketing strategy, but then also elevating your employees into thought leaders so that they can share their knowledge, build their own career path and boost their visibility and, and in turn your companies.

and then also leveraging customer stories as well. happy clients and peer recommendation for the prospects that you're trying to open up conversations with.

Eric (25:29.968)
Love it. Love it. All right. First rapid fire question for you. Just give me the first thing that pops into your head. First one's easy. my God. The slam dunk favorite city that you ever visited.

Robyn Hartley (25:32.119)
Thank you.

Okay, nervous.

Robyn Hartley (25:41.686)
actually, it's not easy. I don't know. Favorite visit. There's so many. So I have to say it's the favorite place I think I visited. So I probably Cusco in Peru. I absolutely adored it. It was just so lovely. Everybody the walking around, it was just so beautiful and

Everybody there was just so friendly and welcoming. So yeah, it was an incredible experience. I would love to go back.

Eric (26:13.316)
Okay, Cusco, is that what the name is? Okay, all right. Next question, a favorite TV show that you can watch again and again.

Robyn Hartley (26:15.522)
Let's go, yeah.

Robyn Hartley (26:24.014)
do you know what? So many people are going to laugh at this. For me, it's Gavin and Stacey. I don't know if you're aware of this show, if you've seen it before. It's like a standard. It is like a cheesy show massively. Yeah, just very nostalgic from years back. Anyway, they're doing a new Christmas special this year, so I'm very excited. So that's, can I say two? I would say, yeah.

Eric (26:34.617)
No, no, no

Eric (26:47.642)
He

Eric (26:50.874)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, what's the next one?

Robyn Hartley (26:52.79)
The second one would be friends. Yeah. Just like classic. You can just watch that. Yeah. Yeah.

Eric (26:54.662)
Okay. Yeah, friends is a classic. Yeah, it's classic. Okay, next one. The most interesting thing you did in the last 26 days, Robin.

Robyn Hartley (27:07.742)
that is such an interesting question. Most interesting thing I've done in the last 26 days. what have I done? That's not a good question, is it? it's meant to be quick fire. I feel the pressure. okay, I'm gonna say this podcast, because it's been such a lovely conversation to have. So yeah.

Eric (27:27.555)
Wow.

Robyn Hartley (27:28.352)
Yeah, I'm gonna say I'm gonna go with that because it's been I feel like me and you have we've kind of spoken a little bit over LinkedIn and it's so it's been such an interesting conversation to actually and you know, have a say intro and say hello over face to face. So yeah, I would say this podcast.

Eric (27:46.564)
All right, how about that? Okay, last question for you. If you could wave a magic wand in regards to your new business, what would you wish for?

Robyn Hartley (27:59.574)
is an excellent question. I would say that I would just wish for...

Robyn Hartley (28:14.335)
That's a very good question. As in like support for the business or kind of new clients or kind of opening up.

Eric (28:20.836)
Anything that in regards to the new business.

Robyn Hartley (28:24.01)
Okay, I would say that it would be just help just helping more and more people with with their with their strategies. I think there's been a lot of change in the in the in the way like I say that B2B buyers are going through that decision making process. So and I just I genuinely love having those conversations with clients and seeing those great results. So it would be just

helping my clients get fantastic results and yeah, having a successful year that would, that would kind of be my success. So we'll see. Yeah.

Eric (29:00.4)
Yeah. Okay. Okay. Like it, like it. There you have it folks. Robin Hartley from Paper Kit Media. I'm going to put links to her website and her LinkedIn profile in the show. Robin, thank you for coming on Innovators Can Laugh.

Robyn Hartley (29:12.492)
Thank you so much for having me. It's been such a lovely conversation and yeah, appreciate it.

Eric (29:18.544)
Same here, same here for those listening. I'll be back next week with another innovator from the UK. And if you like this, tell others about it and don't forget to subscribe. This is Eric signing off. Cheers.