The start of an account-based marketing campaign can be intimidating. In this episode, we continue the story of Bob Cormack as his team prepares to face the most extreme conditions on earth on an evolving terrain. His example in not being overwhelmed by the project at large is an inspiration to B2B marketers. His experience teaches us to consider the timing of our marketing efforts and to be mentally and emotionally prepared for change.
[00:00:00] Hiromi: Have you ever been confronted by a task so large that you didn't know where to start? Have you ever felt frustrated that things didn't go according to plan? Do you feel like you live in the shadows of other trailblazers? In this episode we continue the story of Bob Cormack as he accepts the invitation to join the American Bicentennial Everest Expedition.
[00:00:27] The team faces extreme conditions that will test their resolve, and we wanna know what qualities contributed to their success, and how can we as marketers apply these principles to overcome our own mountain-like obstacles? This is a podcast about summiting B2B marketing and the account-based mindset. This is Reach. Thanks for coming with us today. My name is Hiromi Matsumoto, and I'm here with agency founder and CEO, Jaycen Thorgeirson-
[00:01:00] Jaycen: Hey.
[00:01:01] Hiromi: and chief creative officer, Garret Krynski.
[00:01:03] Garret: Hey, everyone.
[00:01:04] Hiromi: So, in the last episode, Bob told us how he got the opportunity to join this expedition in the first place, and I think we took away from it the desire to be more adaptable in the way that we lead, in the way that we view challenges and opportunities, and in the way that we view ourselves. This week we pick up with Bob as the team starts their journey at what turns out to be the toughest season for Everest expeditions. Here's Bob.
[00:01:33] Bob Cormack: We're among at least the first half dozen expeditions that made it in the fall. The window of climbing weather is less dependable, you know? In the spring you can say, oh, you got three weeks when you can do the summit. And in the fall, it's like you might have somewhere between nothing and two weeks or one week, [laughs] who knows? Which is why all of the major climbing and stuff takes place in the spring, it's a lot easier to get around on the mountain, uh, because of the ice. It's easier to walk on ice with clamp-ons than slog through snow.
[00:02:04] We had to walk 140 miles in because the airports were all closed for the summer. Most people for the spring slot fly in and walk the last 20 miles, but we walked 140. That took a while through the monsoon, the rain, the mud, and the leeches and everything.
[00:02:19] And when we got the Himalaya, I was stunned. It was... it was almost a transcendental experience walking among those mountains. And I went, "Wow, that, that was worth the whole trip right there." And then when you get to the mountain, the dangers, you know, even the route is standard, it's been done... when you're on a mountain, none of that makes any difference to you, really, it's just kinda you and the mountain.
[00:02:59] Garret: Until I heard Bob's story, I don't know what I thought about mountain climbing. But, you know, they flew on the other side of the world. They had to walk 140 miles in. There's leeches... this is the first time I'm never hearing that any mountain climber has to do this. But as marketers, we do it all the time. You know, we identify, we research, we plan, at some point in the future reach out and I think it's worth noting that there is a significant amount of prep work. And if, if you don't persevere, if you're not adaptable, you might not even make it through that prep work.
[00:03:31] Jaycen: Yeah. I was thinking like the, the climbing window is interesting. Timing is, is everything. And it's no different in an account-based situation. You know, for B2B marketers, there's study that show 95% of B2B buyers aren't in market at any given time. So, it's a very small percentage of folks that are actually in the process of consideration, especially for large purchases. And are we kind of taking into consideration the weather, the timing of when we communicate with these accounts, right?
[00:04:06] Garret: Right? You know, he says most climbing happens in the spring. But could you do it in the fall? Yeah, if you have some insight, absolutely you could. Is it more difficult? Yes, it is. You sit with a client and they say, "Okay, here's our Q1 goal." Well, hey, none of your customers are buying in Q1. Q2 is probably a better time. So there's this flexibility that's needed-
[00:04:32] Jaycen: And as you were speaking, Garret, it kinda surfaced to me that only 1% of traditional marketing generates value. So, 99% of it, is not. So, so, are we... in an account based strategy, identifying what's truly important, on the account level?
[00:04:51] Garret: Mm-hmm [affirmative].
[00:04:52] Jaycen: Let's turn up whatever we can, to support those efforts. And I love that about ABM, it puts so much more emphasis on doing work that matters, and being proactive about it, rather than reactive and just putting things in the ether, sort to speak.
[00:05:09] Garret: Yeah.
[00:05:09] Hiromi: Timing has such an effect on relationships in general, even if you think about romantic relationships. It doesn't matter if two people are great for each other, if the timing's not right, it's just, it's not gonna happen. Does that impact business relationships, too? Do you choose your business relationships based on timing, or is it more of a, "That's the relationship for me, I'm gonna wait, until it's the right season," kind of thing?
[00:05:35] Garret: It's interesting, because people talk about being in the right place, at the right time. That takes incredible... fortune. But, being in a place until the right time, is kind of more what the reality of that is. So, if in Q1, hey, I recognize that might not be the right time for you, when is the right time? What's happening in Q2? How about Q3? Can we talk then?
[00:05:59] You know, and, and just having that flexibility. Then, it's not just about, hey the subway door opens and this two beautiful people bump into each other and it's true love, it's, "Hey, I'm, I was here the whole time," and now it works. Like Everest was there all along.
[00:06:14] Hiromi: You are a true romantic, Garret.
[00:06:17] Garret: [laughs].
[00:06:17] Jaycen: [laughs].
[00:06:17] Bob Cormack: Everywhere
[00:06:22] you're walking up there, you can encounter a crevasse , because crevasses, as it open real slowly, tend to get covered by snow. Sometimes, you know you're crossing the snow bridge, so everybody's on alert and everything. Other times, it catches you totally by surprise. So, that's why you're stretched out and you're always carrying your ice ax and we practice crevasse rescue and stuff like that, in the backyard, before we go, so you don't have to figure it out at the time, because it's very difficult to figure something new out, at high altitude. You're not really firing on all metal cylinders up there.
[00:06:55] Hiromi: I don't know if I want to be in his backyard.
[00:06:59] Garret: [laughs].
[00:06:59] Hiromi: High altitude.
[00:07:00] Jaycen: I have an abyss in the backyard, let's go practice.
[00:07:04] Garret: You know, clearly, we are not in a life and death situation in marketing, but the point here is that things change. And sometimes, suddenly. So, if your mindset is, things will change, then that gives you permission to be flexible and adaptable. And then, when it does change, it doesn't throw the entire team into upheaval, the client doesn't suffer-
[00:07:28] Jaycen: And anticipating what some of those may be is important in the book. One of the film crew had fallen down, through one of these snow bridges and Jerry Roach was one of the first people to rush to his aid, and was able to, you know, rescue him from this crevasse . And it was interesting, because they practice this kind of stuff, right? Like, they went through these exercises.
[00:07:52] And so, in an account, we want to be thinking through those in advance, having the experience, what are we going to do, in those cases. We need to anticipate some of those failures, or future failures, so that not everybody is caught by surprise.
[00:08:08] Garret: You know, that's, that's all part of it. Planning for the changes, planning for the failure, and practicing what to do in the event of surprise.
[00:08:16] Bob Cormack:
[00:08:16] Basically, mitosis just stops at a certain altitude, and for most people, [inaudible 00:08:20]. That means cells aren't dividing. So, if you get a cut it scabs up and it never heals. After a while, it looks like, is everybody coming down with leprosy or something, you know? But within three days, of going below base camp, scabs fell off, replaced by scar tissue, and I lost three to five pounds, while eating 5,000 calories a day.
[00:08:44] Jaycen: I loved that he laughed about that.
[00:08:45] Garret: [laughs].
[00:08:50] Hiromi: [laughs]. That's...
[00:08:50] Jaycen: Why did they climb?
[00:08:52] Garret: [laughs].
[00:08:52] Jaycen: But just... [inaudible 00:08:54]?
[00:08:55] Garret: When your brain lacks oxygen, as you climb higher, you know, it's been proven that you don't make the best decisions. And when a marketing campaign... when things are changing or failing, you, you may not be making the best decisions at that time. But if you've talked about it previously, "Hey, this might happen," you know, oh, then we have a flexible pathway that accounts for that.
[00:09:20] Jaycen: Or, at least prevent the executives from not sucking out the oxygen- from you, as a marketer, right? So-
[00:09:28] Hiromi: Wow, we could deep on that-
[00:09:30] Jaycen: Ouch, ouch, ouch.
[00:09:31] Garret: Ouch.
[00:09:34] Jaycen: It's, it's not depth, it's called firing.
[00:09:38] Garret: This is not life or death.
[00:09:40] Jaycen: It, it's just your job.
[00:09:41] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:09:43] Bob Cormack:
[00:09:43] They talk about the death zone being above 8,000 meters, but really, the whole mountain is a kind of a death zone. You're camped at the bottom of this valley, on a glacier, and the glacier's moving, too. I mean, you can hear it move every morning. It's really weird. You hear these sounds underneath you, go [inaudible 00:10:04], cracks going through. The glacier is coming down a steep slope, above you, and the ice fall is [inaudible 00:10:13] the glacier. There's crevasses opening and closing, maybe at most, a foot, a day, and big [inaudible 00:10:20] that fall over occasionally.
[00:10:22] And it's a dangerous place, because it's unstable. We had a rule to get out of it by noon every day, because when the sun had been on it a little while, things that were about to fall started falling. And it made a lot of noise. Sometimes, some of the camps got wiped out by avalanches, when no one was in them, thank God. We had a, a storm that froze everybody in place, for about a week, dropped a whole lot of snow, and then, of course, there was a lot more avalanche danger to the next week after that, so you had to be very careful.
[00:10:56] The weather is unpredictable, in a way. The places where they put camps on Everest are places that have been picked out, over the years, that get avalanched less often. But there isn't any place that doesn't get avalanched occasionally. So, it's always kind of a risk. Powder avalanche can be quite startling, because you see the cloud of powder coming down the hill, then all of a sudden, a fist of powder will just shoot out of it. And what happens is, all that powder, it trains the air, so the air is moving, and the interior of it is basically free falling, it's not experiencing any air resistance, so it builds up speed, and then it punches out the front. And you think you've got this thing figured out, and all of a sudden, boom, it comes out at 200 miles an hour, it slows down real quick, but my God, you go, "Wow!"
[00:11:51] Powder avalanches just snapped off all the trees at the snow line, so, you're in a forest and all the trees are broken off, seven feet high, just snapped off, in a hundred yard wide area and you go, "Well, that's a hell of a wind." At least crevasses, you can prepare for a crevasse and crevasse falls, if you're prepared, are usually no big deal, except they're a little spooky.
[00:12:14] Jaycen: And he went climbing there again, because...
[00:12:17] Garret: Human endeavor.
[00:12:19] I, I think, yeah, the statement that he said there was, you think you've got this thing figured out, and then all of a sudden, it changes. Especially in mountain climbing, you know, when you're talking about avalanches and steep slopes and weather changing. But for marketers, is there a way to fully remove the risk of spending money to communicate and possibly try and connect with an account? 100% there's risk. And there's no way to fully remove that. I think as we mentioned before, if your solution is too rigid-
[00:12:53] Hiromi: Right.
[00:12:53] Garret: Then, it will break.
[00:12:54] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:12:54] Garret: And if there is no backup plan... There's no parachute that opens. And so, this is where this flexibility is so important.
[00:13:04] Hiromi: Yeah. You probably need to read the signs, huh? Where are you getting these signs, that a powder avalanche is coming down, from a marketing perspective?
[00:13:14] Garret: Well, in some cases, this comes down to our technology. We try to track the engagement of the message that we're putting in front of this person, this specific account. And if we can, then immediately we'll have feedback on how well it's resonating with them. How much time did they spend, digesting this story? You know, if there's a silence coming back, radio silence on the other end, then it may be a sign, a pivot necessary.
[00:13:43] Bob Cormack:
[00:13:43] And then, a valley leveled out again, and that's what they call, the [inaudible 00:13:47]. It's a Welsh word for valley. It's, at 20,000 feet, it's got 7,000 foot walls on either side, totally covered with snow, and, um, hot. So, wind isn't blowing, you're in a solar cooker.
[00:13:59] But the air temperature is 20 degrees. The only thing I can compare it to is the bottom of the grand canyon. The wife and I took showers at base camp. You go out there, and one person to go in and get undressed and put their [inaudible 00:14:13] in a bag and throw it over there, the other person is running to get a big pot of boiling water, from the cook tent, and just pour it over you. Boiling water was just the right temperature. I mean, at 18,000 feet, boiling water is a nice temperature to take a bath in. And you soak down as fast as you could, keeping an eye on the sky, because in just 30 seconds, clouds could come over and block the sun and the wind could come up, and suddenly, instead, of being really hot, it was 20 degrees and the wind was blowing and you were naked, you know, and wet.
[00:14:41] Hiromi: Have you ever taken a shower in boiling water?
[00:14:44] Jaycen: Never, never.
[00:14:45] Hiromi: And did it work out for you?
[00:14:47] Garret: Not at sea level.
[00:14:49] Hiromi: Yeah, that's...
[00:14:50] Thanks for that clarifier. Don't try this at home.
[00:14:53] Garret: Yeah.
[00:14:53] Jaycen: Yeah, yeah. It's probably wise, it's probably wise.
[00:14:58] Bob Cormack: You look at this
[00:14:59] mountain, and you went, "What in the hell was I thinking?" But then, you know, when you keep doing it, you're not climbing the whole mountain, you're climbing what's in front of you, you're doing the next task. And it just becomes a routine. You look at the whole thing, you go, "Oh, my God." You just take it a piece at a time.
[00:15:18] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:15:18] Jaycen: One step at a time. Yeah. Sometimes, as marketers, especially in account based marketing, the account can seem mountian like, at times, in terms of the effort. As we've discussed, just the preparation, the endeavor to gather the right insights and research and understand the roles and the people that we want to reach and what's important to them, so that we're able to communicate in a way that's going to resonate with them, and then forming the strategy and the creative development and the ongoing effort to communicate to get them to a point of collaboration. It seems monumental, right? We could just stop and, again, look up and say, "Whoa," like, this is huge-
[00:15:58] Garret: What was I thinking?
[00:15:59] Jaycen: "What was I thinking?" like Bob. But I love that he's just, like, one step at a time. You're just doing the next task. It's like this dad joke, "How do you eat an elephant?" One bite at a time... right? So, the same principle. And so, like, hey, can we simplify things, can we look at this as just incremental steps towards our ultimate goal? I love Bob and his perspective of just doing one step at a time. We can learn so much from that.
[00:16:31] Garret: Yeah. Oftentimes, we get so caught up in the whole effort, like you said, the monumental task, that the incremental task gets lost.
[00:16:39] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:16:39] Garret: But it could be just one conversation that puts someone in a position to make a decision. It could be just one conversation that changes their mind about your product, about your offering, about your org, that gets these two enterprises to connect.
[00:16:54] Hiromi: Yeah, it, I mean, it's so true. When I was a kid, I remember specifically being so overwhelmed about cleaning my room, and we had these missionaries that stayed with us from Honduras, one summer. And I remember the husband took some time to help me and he said, "Don't worry about the whole room. Just look down at your feet, pick up one thing, put it away, and then look down at your feet and pick up the next."
[00:17:18] And I did that and the room was clean and I was so amazed. It made such an impact on me that throughout my whole adulthood, any insurmountable task that I come to, I think about that missionary and that lesson he taught me. I ran into him, at a random place in Sacramento, like in the last half dozen years, and I told him, I was like, "You know, you taught me one of the most important life lessons that one summer." [laughs].
[00:17:44] Jaycen: By the way, Hiromi, can you speak to my son-
[00:17:46] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:17:46] Jaycen: after this podcast is done? Because...
[00:17:49] Hiromi: [laughs]. Absolutely.
[00:17:50] Jaycen: I think there's a valuable lesson in here, in terms of cleaning a room and how that needs to...
[00:17:55] Hiromi: [inaudible 00:17:56].
[00:17:56] Jaycen: But you know what, it's so true, he gets so overwhelmed with just, you know, the whole thing.
[00:18:01] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:18:01] Jaycen: You know what I mean? It's like this analysis paralysis that happens. And one thing that we found that helps, and, just on a personal level is saying, "Go clean for five minutes," right? So, sometimes reframing how we're taking those steps can helps us to be able to accomplish those steps and help us capsulate more of how we're gonna make progress, you know?
[00:18:26] Hiromi: Yeah.
[00:18:26] Garret: And being flexible, to accommodate that. You know, and just providing that guidance on the team. "Here's what we need to do today," or in the next five minutes, as the case may be. One sock, in the hamper, go.
[00:18:40] Bob Cormack:
[00:18:40] Logistics is one of the hugest challenges of an Everest expedition. There's all these little things you have to do, and get stuff there to the mountains and so on. So, you get enough stuff to camp so three people can go up there, spend the night, you can't sleep at that altitude without oxygen, so you have to have oxygen to sleep on, you have to have oxygen to go to the summit and back the next day, you have to have sleeping bags, tents, food, fuel, [inaudible 00:19:04]. That takes about... 12 people carrying loads, from the south [inaudible 00:19:09], which is, you know, 3,000 feet below.
[00:19:12] Okay, so 10 people have to carry loads to that camp, just so three people can go up and hopefully make the summit. You gotta have the stuff to take to the top camp, plus, you have to have tents and sleeping bags and food and fuel and everything for the people that are taking it, to stay there, because you can't do the trip all at once. So, to have enough stuff at that camp, so enough people can stay there and do carries to the top camp, takes maybe 30 or 40 carries to that camp. Now, we've got six camps. It's a huge pyramid. Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of carries, between the bottom two camps, through the ice [inaudible 00:19:46].
[00:19:46] So, that's why the routes of the icefall is so important that it has to be safe, because you're going to be doing it hundreds and hundreds of times. What we were doing was the standard way of doing it, which is called [inaudible 00:19:57] tactics. Harley and Bloom and I came up behind them. We made sure the ladders over the crevasses were anchored, and we strung hand ropes on them and sometimes braced them, because the longer ladders oscillate back and forth. And do what it takes to get a good anchor in soft snow, it takes a lot of work. And that was what I wanted to do. Make sure people have safe routes.
[00:20:19] Jaycen: Yeah, I thought, he was easy to adapt because of his personality, right? Like, just, how, how he was natured. He was perfectly happy accepting whatever role he needed to fill and I found that refreshing. And I think there's a lot to be learned there. I ev- even in an organization, just being more willing to play a role, whatever that is. "What, what do you need me to do?" you know, and then... We're not creating unnecessary obstacles.
[00:20:46] You know, there's, there's a lot of talk in account based marketing about the alignment between sales and marketing, and each kind of has their marching orders, so to speak, and sometimes, those can be a little bit too divisive. And again, if they gave more thought to the combined effort and what we're trying to achieve, and playing whatever role is necessary in order to do that, they're gonna find more success, you know? As, as we see in Bob's case, he was able to find success just by being fluid and being willing to accept whatever.
[00:21:20] Garret: I appreciate, too, his comment about, "I wanted to make sure people had safe routes." I think in marketing, sometimes we tend to want to lead the discussion, creatively, we want to set the tone, but taking this approach of, like you talked about, Jaycen, the alignment between sales and marketing, where it's like, what can I create, so that you, in sales, have the ability to walk this route, the person who's making contact with the account, safely, have some success, you know...
[00:21:54] And that takes on a whole different kind of mindset, for us, creatively, in marketing, you know, and so, it takes some humility. I'm just willing to do whatever needs to be done, to move the account relationship along. As opposed to, further my own concept.
[00:22:10] Hiromi: Yeah, that is so true, add that to the list. You know, we're only halfway through Bob's journey, but, I feel like already we've learned so many things that we can apply to our own endeavors. Uh, we've talked about the value of considering the timing of our efforts, mentally and emotionally preparing for the inevitability of change, how not to be overwhelmed by large projects, and even being willing to accept support roles for the greater good.
[00:22:37] Well, we've really enjoyed having you with us for this episode, and you know, if in your life, you've ever felt like, as a marketer, you were in a little over your head, please consider subscribing and tuning in for our next episode, as Bob is confronted with a life changing surprise.
[00:22:52] Bob Cormack: It didn't look anything like the lower part of the mountain, and all of a sudden, here's this gnarly looking ridge and these huge cornices and the wind is howling and it's 30 below, and... And finally, Chris turns around to me and he says, "I think maybe we have the wrong mountain."
[00:23:07] Hiromi: What keeps a professional going, when everything seems to have gone wrong? We'll find out, next time, on Reach.
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