Episode 4: Podcasting for B2B Tech with Alisa Manjarrez from Stories Bureau

The theme of our fourth podcast episode is Podcasting for B2B Tech.

Joining our host Jeremy Balius to discuss all things B2B podcasting is Alisa Manjarrez, Managing Director of Stories Bureau.

As a former marketing executive and current Managing Director of Stories Bureau, a B2B creative agency, Alisa specializes in award-winning digital storytelling, brand strategy, podcasts, and product launch campaigns.

At Stories Bureau, she’s shaped and amplified the voice of brands like Mars Wrigley, Equinix, and Collibra. Her team has turned their business stories into impactful narratives that resonate with audiences and strengthen brand values.

Alisa has a passion for multicultural leaders, as demonstrated on her What Rules!? Podcast, where she interviews successful multicultural women by asking them how they’ve broken the rules to get ahead in their careers. To date, they’ve spoken to over 80 women in the C-suite and other senior leadership roles, discussing their rule-breaking strategies for career advancement.

Alisa has a bachelor’s in Communication Studies from Vanguard University, and a master’s in Organizational Management and Leadership from Fielding University with a concentration in Executive Coaching. She lives in Los Angeles, CA.

Discover more about Stories Bureau.

Connect with Alisa on LinkedIn.

Get in touch with Alisa to brainstorm your next podcast.

Jeremy Balius: Hi, and welcome to the B2B Tech Marketing Talks Podcast where we engage with leading marketing and channel leaders to get fresh perspectives and practical advice on the latest trends, effective strategies, and best practices for B2B tech marketing. I’m your host, Jeremy Balius, and today’s theme is Podcasting for B2B tech.

I’m very excited because I’m joined by Alisa Manjerrez. Alisa is a storyteller at heart, a marketer by profession and a coach by calling. As Managing Director of Stories Bureau, a B2B Creative agency, Alisa specializes in award winning digital storytelling, brand strategy, and what we’re talking about today, B2B podcasts.

She shaped and amplified the voice of brands like Mars Wrigley, Equinix, and Calibra. Her team has turned their business stories into impactful narratives that resonate with audiences and strengthen brand values. Alisa has a podcast of her own called What Rules!?, which is an awesome podcast where successful multicultural women in senior leadership share rule breaking strategies they’ve used to advance their careers. Welcome, Alisa.

Alisa Manjarrez: Thank you so much. I’m excited to be here.

Jeremy Balius: Alisa, I would love to start out by talking about how you got to where you are today. What’s your background? What’s your origin story?

What is the journey that you’ve been on to get to the point of advising brands on their voice, their go to market, and how they are positioning themselves in the market.

Alisa Manjarrez: I started out in the agency world. It’s funny. I went I was started agencies, and now I’m here again. And I thought I would never be back but here but it’s just funny how life goes.

I was a I worked in a small town. We had a big agency, and that was really where I learned about that was the first place I learned how to tell a brand story And working with small businesses, and I started to get the itch to work more with tech at that time. And Along came a client market research technology client that came in. They had just acquired about five companies, a private equity firm acquired them. They acquired other companies, and they were in the middle of a rebrand.

And I just remember, as a marketer, completely salivating over the chance to tell a big tech story. And I worked with them, and I was also at the time, starting my starting executive coaching at the same time. And so their CMO said, oh, you do coaching on the side. Why don’t you coach me, and it was really exciting because he was my first C-suite client. And I was living both of the lives that I still live today, coaching and marketing.

And the more I learned about him and the way he operated, the more I really fell in love with the company that he was building. And so when an opportunity to leave the agency and go internal and work for his company came about. I raised my hand and eventually was VP of marketing at this company. It’s now called Forstat’s been bought out a few times since I’ve been there. And the agency that I used at four at FocusVision, which it was called, they were called Stories Company, and I used to work with a guy named Corey from Stories.

And fast forward, now I’m a business partner with Corey from stories, and we’re called Stories bureau. But in the middle of that that time, I had I ended up leaving the corporate life. I went on my own doing coaching full time, and Corey kept calling me saying you should really do podcasting. The I feel like I’m hearing little projects you have on the side, and I had started a podcast with my brother called Seriously, Though. And we talked about Netflix and cocktails, “But seriously, though” and we then we talked about, like, how to get your life in order.

He’s a financial adviser, so we talked about finance. And then I was working with a couple of executives at PepsiCo doing what’s now called the What Rules!? podcast. And so Corey kept calling me saying you should really do this for companies. And for me, it was just a hobby. I learned so much working with my brother on a podcast ask because we had free reign.

My dad was our editor. We made our own music for it. It was really fun. And then I was using all those lessons learned on my What Rules podcast. And one day, Corey called me and said I know you said no, but Mars Wrigley called.

They want a podcast, and you’re doing it for them. And I couldn’t say no to that. It was a market research centered podcast called Future Imagined, and I really fell in love with the team that I had built creating the podcast. And I eventually was like, I think I wanna keep doing this. So Corey and I partnered up, and now we’re working on other podcasts with other companies, and it’s just been a fun, creative adventure.

Jeremy Balius: It’s so amazing to hear how organic that feels that you’ve been pursuing passions, that Some of those passions have just escalated either by way of experiences that you’ve picked up along the way or a network effect of people that you’ve gotten to know really well and to arrive where you are must feel must feel really rewarding.

Alisa Manjarrez: Yeah. It feels like I can use all of my gifts and strengths that I’ve been building over the years, And now I can put them all under practice under in a way that feels authentic to me.

Jeremy Balius: I can see that. Speaking of authenticity, I would imagine that there would be a blend between your backgrounds of marketing, podcasting, and coaching in helping people understand how to be more authentic.

Is that something that tends to form part of your coaching as you’re readying executives to to go live, to be on camera, to be in front of a microphone?

Alisa Manjarrez: One of my passions is to help executives use their voice and share their voice. And I can’t tell you how many a lot of times we think of is these people who know so much, and they’re leading these huge companies, but they’re humans just like everyone else. And I hear them saying things like, Does my story matter? Or what like, I don’t think anyone wants to know my story.

We should just keep it business. And I remember when I was VP of Marketing at FocusVision, we hired a speaking coach for our CEO, And we had him start using storytelling about his personal life and integrating that into his all hands meetings. So he would talk about his wife as a graphic designer with our Q4 goals. And it’s amazing what happens when you connect people to stories. All of a sudden, the company was really attached to our q four goals.

And the fact that a story can do that is pretty amazing.

Jeremy Balius: It really is. It really is. And it’s often, I believe, not considered or, traditionally, it’s not part of the process of leaders growing into their roles of being top executives. This isn’t part of the discussion of how to lead people, and so it’s amazing that you’re able to help them transition into that because We all know that the more personable and personal one can relate to your people, the better outcomes you get as a business and as an organization in terms of your productivity and a whole range of other benefits.

Alisa Manjarrez: Yeah. It really is. The there’s the saying it’s not personal, it’s business, but business actually is personal. And When you’re in a b to b space, it’s really important. The brands that get it tend to do really well.

Jeremy Balius: Yeah. That’s something on our end, also working with B2B tech businesses is in a different in a different set of support. Oftentimes, people forget that people buy from people, and they’re accustomed to just putting products out there, not realizing that there’s real people who have issues, and they’re facing problems, and they need solutions to these. And why doesn’t the product sell itself? We need to tell stories.

Alisa Manjarrez: Mhmm.

Jeremy Balius: Exactly. Hey. So we are today talking about podcasting for B2B. Now a lot of the businesses, certainly, in our world that we come across, podcasting’s not even on the radar.

It’s not even been And I would imagine that if one were to consider it, that it would be chased out the door as quickly as possible because it’s so foreign. So if you could take us right down to basics and talk a little bit about Podcasting in general, where does it sit in the marketing strategy? What is its general purpose? Or if there’s multiple purposes that you’ve Seeing can you highlight those? What are the goals?

And why would one even consider YouTube or a podcast as a B2B marketer?

Alisa Manjarrez: You’re absolutely right that it’s an abstract concept. We have some of our clients, you would think it would sit in marketing, but sometimes with Mars Wrigley, it was in their ins their foresights department and that they were In charge of predicting the future, and they thought podcasting would be a great way to share that. On another client, it’s their VP of Product marketing. So they’re not usually doing these external facing things.

And then sometimes it’s head of digital marketing. I think at the end of the day, podcasting is another content channel. So it’s a way it’s Stories are content. Podcast is content. So it’s the same thing it’s the same way you would treat a webinar or a video series Or a white paper series.

It’s just another type of content. I personally think It should sit under the role of content management and content strategy because I think that’s where you can get the most bang for your buck if you really Make the podcast fit in with your bigger marketing goals and objectives.

Jeremy Balius: I’m fascinated by the fact that you’re being approached by teams that may not sit under the VP of marketing or the CMO that there are leaders in the business who are hungry to tell their story and might Feel that they’re not able to in the current construct of how a business is going to market. So they’re coming to you to say, how do we get our voice heard outside of The usual written content or digital content that a business is normally going with. I’m fascinated by that.

That’s really interesting to hear. Do they then bring challenges with them if they’re not in marketing either by way of How you need to work with the marketing team in order to get through different types of red tape, or do you then have to liaise, or do you take control over enabling them to get that that podcast through the internal mechanisms, Or is that already set by the time they approach you? What is what does that look like?

Alisa Manjarrez: It’s usually never set because podcasts, again, are still kinda foreign to people. So a lot of times, I am playing translator between The people doing the podcast work and the marketing team, and I’m helping them Talk to each other and maybe helping them figure out how it does integrate into their strategy.

So I can give you an example. Calibra, they have a podcast called The Data Download, and it is hosted by their Head of technology, and he is has a team of engineers under him. He’s not a marketing person. He happens to have An incredible personality. He was we coached him, taught him how to host a podcast, and he has A lot of competing interest as head of technology, as you can imagine, that are not marketing related.

So a lot of times, we are, I guess you could say negotiating. How much time can you spend here? And then maybe your content producer who’s Internal to your team, maybe she can help you develop your questions. She can help you figure out your wrap up because she understands The marketing goals. And so it’s it ends up being a really nice blend of that organic what are the technologists and the data people actually wanna talk about versus what does marketing think everyone wants to talk about.

Not putting marketing down, but it’s a lot different when you’re doing the work rather than just talking about the work.

Jeremy Balius: It’s really interesting, particularly the dynamics around Those who are from a more technical basis are speaking differently to the way that marketers, Uh, have traditionally or perhaps even need to in the way that they have to simplify and be Super concise, and they’re just not able to put information out there of such a either technical nature or talking about technical, which a CTO could do, off the cuff. Really interesting to hear that you become a translator in that space as well. I really like that phrasing.

You’re almost mediating as well to ensure that compelling stories are being told while still fitting within a wider brand strategy. That’s complex. You should you should pat yourself on the back. We I can sympathize with what you go through in order to achieve that, and it’s no small feat. So kudos to you for doing that.

Thank you. In your experience, what is generally holding back b two b companies and leaders from telling their stories? What are Blockers or inhibitors that you see.

Alisa Manjarrez: I would say that for podcasts specifically, it just feels too uncertain, Unknown. It’s not some even though podcasts have been around a lot, and most of the demographics of podcast listeners probably match B2B customers, B2B marketers.

So I would guess that they are all very familiar, but how does it work? How do we upload the podcast and then, like, where does it go? I get a lot of really basic questions, And sometimes that in itself is the channel is the inhibitor. And Mhmm. It’s really The people who can step aside and say, okay.

We’ll let you figure that part out, and now let’s just figure how it’s gonna work within our marketing engine. So I would say that the biggest blocker is not being willing to step into that unknown territory. Because once you do, it is a matter of A little bit of marketing operations, making sure certain links are certain UTM parameters are put on your links in your newsletters and all that. And You can connect it the same way you would a blog or a webinar, but it just feels foreign. So I think that’s the biggest inhibitor.

Jeremy Balius: Yeah. I’m really relating to the latter point about attribution challenges as well because in my experience, um, non-marketing business leaders want to see like for we invested a dollar here, and we got ten bucks back here. Yeah. And they want that granularity as well to a degree that is fascinating as well as confusing because it’s not requested of other divisions in the business, but marketing has to come up with that, to that proof.

And podcasting doesn’t sit neatly within that. You don’t have the ability to say, Oh, we had this amount of listeners on the show, and therefore, we’re gonna pound them with follow-up emails until one of them caves to meet with one of our SDRs. It’s Yeah. The it’s the wider effect of generating demand, and maybe there’s a lack of understanding of how that works generally.

Alisa Manjarrez: It’s the same.

And when I was on the internal side, there was always a battle between what we are doing with marketing and Which lead belongs is attributed to which effort, and how can we measure it? And podcasting sure doesn’t help. I can say that. I can tell you that. But there the benefits of podcasting are the intangible benefits, I would say, definitely outweigh your ROI because if you have a person The say you have a customer or a potential customer as a guest on your podcast, I view that relationship that you’re building, that one on one that you wouldn’t get.

You’re not at dinner with all the formalities. You’re not in a Sales pitch. You’re just in a relational you’re, like, put into a relational setting. I really view that as three sales dinners with that customer because you’ve spent all your time just talking to them and finding out what Makes them tick, finding out where they come from. Just like right now, you’re asking me my story.

The focus is on me. Of course, I’m gonna feel good. I’m gonna love Jeremy at the end of this, and I’m gonna feel connected to you. And the fact that you can do that with your Clients or your customers or partners, prospects, anyone, the relationship side of podcasting, I feel like there’s no True measurement because you can really get a lot out of a thirty minute, one hour conversation.

Jeremy Balius: I’m not gonna lie. I’ve got I’m getting a bit of goosebumps because one of the things that I’m really passionate is, uh, attempting to be able to articulate these intangibles to business leaders in a way that doesn’t seem like it’s dark arts Marketing cauldron, we’re just throwing in all of these herbs to concoct this thing that somehow sells you know, they don’t trust that, and they don’t they don’t believe in anything that doesn’t have data behind it to some degree.

And so being able to talk about those intangible benefits, which I can relate to because I’m experiencing myself not to get all meta, but by producing a podcast, however grassroots this is, the Intangible benefits have been phenomenal, and we’ll continue to do it despite the time cost of doing it and The sheer amount of work that goes into publishing these and Tim, it’s a lot.

Alisa Manjarrez: It really is. Support that’s the real the realistic side of this is podcasting. You can make a simple Zoom podcast and not edit it and put it out there, and it’s they It can work, and there are ton of podcasts like that.

But if you want something of quality, even just using a platform like you’re using Riverside. We use Riverside a lot. There are so many steps and things and time and edits and all of that. If we produce Trace Route, which is a narrative sound rich podcast. It takes maybe a hundred hours to do a thirty minute episode.

Now this you and I, this is probably maybe six to ten hours, I would guess. But, it’s a lot of work. It’s a big commitment to say yes to podcast. And so as we were talking about the barriers, saying Yes to something that’s gonna be very time intensive and a big commitment. It’s I don’t blame people for being a little bit shy.

But I have seen the light at the end of the tunnel. I’ve been on the other side, and it’s great over here.

Jeremy Balius: Come join us over here. Now in terms of overcoming those inhibitions, In terms of addressing the pushback, in terms of talking about the fear of not Podcasting doesn’t really offer an opportunity to tiptoe into it. You need to commit to make it work because There’s no sense of virality in in any early stages.

There’s no sense of an ability to weigh it up a few episodes in. You need to strap in for the long haul without any, In their minds, potentially a guarantee of having direct attributional ROI. How would you talk about that in terms of join us on the other side? We’re over here in the sunlight come out of the dark cave of non podcasting.

Alisa Manjarrez: There’s a saying among a lot of podcasters, you’re not a real podcaster until you have at least ten episodes.

And so I always like to congratulate clients once they get to that episode ten because the people who are actually working on it On the internal side, on my side, it’s that was a lot. And I would say that The and most of the people that I work with, most marketers that are saying yes to podcast are the visionaries. It’s funny. Like I said, podcasts have been around for a long time, but the B2B tech early adopter types, those are the ones saying yes right now to podcast.

And they are the ones that see the relationships that can be built, and it’s weird when you think about numbers. The average podcast list the other average podcast has about thirty listeners. Thirty. And when we think about podcasts, we hear about, twenty thousand or all those top ones. That it takes years To get there.

So you have to be willing to put in those ten episodes. You have to be willing to see some small numbers at the beginning Unless you do a real big internal push at the start. But it all comes down to what are the goals. Is it really to connect with the people you’re interviewing? Then who cares how many listeners?

Is it to connect with twenty Key prospects. That’s twenty prospects where you’re in their living room, you’re in their kitchen, you’re at their gym, you’re in their car. What is that worth to you? And if those twenty customers are each worth, say, five hundred thousand dollars, there’s a pretty big ROI with twenty people.

Jeremy Balius: Yeah. Yeah. It’s really important to remember that we are awash with stories of insane numbers, and those are so rare. And as you said, take years to achieve that, uh, even just having quantifiable numbers that don’t stack up in that way, but are meaningful in the way that you’ve just pointed out in terms of potential revenue is great, but that takes coaching. That takes Mhmm. Encouragement.

That takes accountability. That takes a lot of reminding I would imagine.

Alisa Manjarrez: And it really takes vision and not just from one person. It takes vision with for a whole team Or any stakeholders. If you’re a person that’s yes.

I wanna do a podcast. I’m gonna pitch it To the rest of my team, you need more than one person that’s gonna come alongside you because it’s one of those ideas that can die on the vine pretty easily unless You don’t have unless you have the proper backup of key people key decision makers.

Jeremy Balius: Yeah. That’s such a good point. Just having the buy in across the board to stay committed would ensure the longevity.

Alisa Manjarrez: Mhmm. And we’ve had you know, in tech companies, I’m sure you’ve experienced this. There’s CMOs are usually there for one to two years, and then you have another CMO. It’s just the life cycle. And it’s been interesting to be in those transitions.

We have lately, we’ve had some that are like, oh, podcasting. Why isn’t the rest of this team on this? Because this is huge. This is the forefront. This is my vision, and why isn’t there more video with your podcast?

And it’s For me, it’s like all the things I’ve been saying. Finally, someone else agrees with me. And and it’s great when you have visionary leaders Who want who see the potential of a channel like podcasting?

Jeremy Balius: Amazing. It must feel amazing to see, them growing up in podcasting and using your language when talking about it internally.

That’s a lot of fun. Mentioned TraceRoute. Now this is Equinix’s podcast produced by Stories Bureau. I’m just gonna be totally open. This is an amazing podcast.

I think it’s so cool what you guys have done. It’s on a whole other level of what we’re even considering about doing with our own podcast. It’s so incredibly well produced. It’s engaging. It’s it’s clearly invested in heavily from a time perspective, And there’s having even this small podcast, I know for a fact that the amount of planning that must go into it must be extensive in the back and forth.

To get it right must be arduous to some degree. So it’s incredible what you guys have done. We’ll be linking to that podcast as well as the others that Alisa has mentioned. But how did this particular podcast come about. What was Equinix looking to do originally, and where did Traceroute come from as a result?

Alisa Manjarrez: Equinix had recently acquired a company called Packet. And Jacob Smith is the was one of the cofounders of Packet. And when he joined this conglomerate, he was like, I really wanna make sure That as we grow under this new skin, that we don’t forget the developers, the solutions architects. We don’t Forget the people that are building this digital infrastructure. So how can we highlight Those people.

And he actually worked with a different production company for season one. So you’ll hear a little bit of a difference between season one, Two and three. We’ve done two, and now we’re working on three. And so he wanted to really tell the stories, and They came to us. It’s funny.

They had the podcast, and they’re like, great. We have it. Now what? Now, like, how do we put it out into the world? And then that’s when Stories Bureau came on board.

And so we actually marketed a podcast that we didn’t produce for all of season one. We were very fortunate in that first season of getting on the top twenty five of Apple Podcasts and tech category. Wow. And now we’re, like, constantly competing with ourselves. So Once we started with season two, we wanted to take it a step further, get a little bit deeper into the human side of the stories.

And we have a producer and writer. His name is John Taylor, who has just really he’s a nontechnical person Who has taken these complex topics and really humanize them so that Not only people in technology understand and feel like they’re being, hearkened to a little bit, but anyone who has a Vague interest in technology. So we’re really trying to show that human side, as you mentioned, that we’re trying to peel back the layers of the stat To reveal the humanity in the hardware. That’s our mantra. And we’re doing that.

It’s a constant experiment. Even for season three, it’s launching this week. It’s we’re pushing it a little bit further, seeing how, how human can we get Here with under a branded podcast, and it’s a lot of trial and error, and, We hope that it continues to grow.

Jeremy Balius: I am so inspired by that because living and breathing a similar, uh, aspect of this, but more so on helping leaders take products and services to market and articulating the value of either what they are intending to build or what they’ve already built, and then they’re trying to figure out how to go out and tell it, and talk about it after they’ve already built it. But where I think the absolute magic is in what you’ve just described is being able to articulate stories in a way that engages techies, and that is getting the language right and the terminology and the phrasing in such a way that Techies feel like it’s speaking to them, but at the same time, you’re on this tight rope of making sure that it’s not so technical, that it’s speaking to people who have no technical background, who and who technically would find that off putting to speak to.

And that balance, I think, is the absolute magic. That’s amazing that you guys are pulling that off.

Alisa Manjarrez: Thank you. And we have a really great team. We also to make sure that we speak that tech language, We do have three representatives from Equinix who rotate as host.

Sometimes they’re all on an episode. Sometimes they’re not. And it’s really to bring back that technical angle. Behind the scenes, they’re also helping us find sources To interview for the podcast. Some sometimes they’re connections they have or just people they’re genuinely interested or following.

And so we really try to incorporate those voices and and make sure that we’re accurate in On the tech technological side of it.

Jeremy Balius: That’s amazing that you’ve set up those, risk mitigations because the risk I really see here is technical industry technology industry participants have an aversion, I believe, to marketers who don’t know anything about technology. And I’ve seen it happen. I’ve been in conversations where people are talking to other people, and you watch them shut down once they realize this person is just talking jargon at me or they’re just saying whatever to sell me. And, therefore, I believe that it’s so critical to ensure that even the nuances of how words are Phrased are important.

Even a simple mispronunciation of a single word gives a technical person insight that you actually don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s incredible. It’s so Mhmm. At the same time, it’s also so risky to ensure that anybody who’s ever involved in anything with b two b tech Has the adequate experience, has an in-depth understanding of the complexities that these guys face, and know the nuance jargon and language that they use.

Alisa Manjarrez: It’s funny you say that because we were really excited when we were talking about let’s peel back the layers of the stack, and we had all these analogies around it.

And as soon as one of the SREs heard it, she was like, Actually, I think of the tech stack more as a tech salad, and here’s why. And so we have an episode where she’s just talking about why she thinks It’s actually a salad and not a snack. And because there are so many nuances even between technologists that are hard to capture in, thirty minutes.

Jeremy Balius: Absolutely. And the whole ecosystem’s getting more complicated by the day with the different types of participants and ancillary support services and Types of companies and come very complex sales rhythms, and everybody’s in within Partnerships and channels and ecosystems.

And unless you have that ability to understand the lay of the land and navigate The salad as this person’s described it as, it’s immediately off putting to people. So that’s incredible that you guys are able to walk that tightrope for this podcast.

Alisa Manjarrez: And one of the I just wanna add that one of the risks that Equinix took with doing this podcast. It’s not about their products. We’re not talking about we are talking about people behind digital Structure, that’s what Equinix Metal, who’s the main team that we work with, does.

But it’s really interesting. They decided to go a little bit broader, still with their world, but it’s has we don’t talk about what they do ever, really. But what’s cool is because the product is always growing and changing in the terminology, trace route stays the same. It stays as a brand constant even when the product changes. So it’s been I think they’re just starting to see That it’s it seemed like a little bit outside of the scope of from a marketing lens, and now it’s actually the one thing that gets to say the No matter what happens with the brand, no matter what happens with the products they offer and how fast or Slow the scale.

TraceRoute the podcast is that consistent connection to their community.

Jeremy Balius: My wheels are turning because I’m totally in agreement with that approach As well

Alisa Manjarrez: as It’s risky. I wouldn’t always recommend it. But

Jeremy Balius: it’s it’s risky because and it takes vision and, I think, internal champions to really push something like this through. But I think what’s amazing here as a maybe after effect or a result of taking this approach is I believe and happy for you to talk about this, but I believe it’s or it sounds like Equinix has Found a vehicle for through which it can broaden the way that it engages its Community across all of these complex, um, partners and customers and prospective suppliers and and employees, I would imagine there’s an internal engagement through this as well.

It’s broadening out what is possible for marketing and but it’s broadening it out across divisions within the business, and I think that is rare that There are multiple people involved in this process, I would imagine, that don’t sit within marketing. And even if marketing owns it, This is now infusing the ability to communicate or vocalize a brand story across those whom traditionally don’t and don’t get involved. And I think that’s as that’s one of the intangibles that you mentioned earlier that I think needs to be highlighted. More people are representing the brand. There’s more ambassadors.

More people are talking about stories, and they’re not flogging product. They’re telling compelling stories through your guidance.

Alisa Manjarrez: Yeah. And this is year three, so it’s not like this is just and I everything that you’re saying is what I hope continues to happen with Equinix and their entire their customer base And their internal employees, I think they’re moving in that direction, I would say. They’re not quite there, but they’re on their way.

We’re just starting season three. We’ll see what happens. Different people get connected to different episodes, And there’s so many more stories and worlds that we have to share with this audience. I think what you’re saying is right on, but I can say that we’re in the middle of it, so I can’t tell you we’re there yet.

Jeremy Balius: It’s a journey no matter where you are and no matter what point you’re at.

So there’s no finish line here. So it’s I’m very much looking forward to the direction that you take that in. It’s always onwards and upwards. It’s amazing. What would you say to leaders who might be listening who may be subscribing to a podcast.

They’re obviously listening to this one. What would be your point of encouragement to consider podcasting as a beneficial, uh, vehicle of communication that they should leverage.

Alisa Manjarrez: If you are a leader who is looking to share your own voice. I would say start playing around with ideas of what how you wanna be perceived within your organization outside side for your personal brand. It’s one of those great tools that you can use for both.

You can use it for sales and marketing. You can also use it for sales and marketing for yourself. There’s a lot of opportunities there. And for the company, it’s a place you I think the main thing is to think, okay. We have this kind of nebulous channel that we can use, and the nice thing is you can mold it However you want.

So depending on your goals for your the year, the next five years, You can use podcasts in so many different ways, whether it’s a chat cast like this is, just interview. You can do panels. You can do storytelling, like traceroute. There’s so many different ways that you can get your message across, Whether it’s your brand overarching message or more specific, um, brand pillars that you wanna make sure are there. So I would say that the take advantage of the fact that it is a little bit foreign and it is a little bit of unknown because You can really make it what you want to make it.

You have an it’s like an open floor to create something out of nothing.

Jeremy Balius: Those are awesome words. An open floor to create something out of nothing. I love it. Let’s put it on the headline.

Thank you so much for joining me today. I’m coming away from this inspired. I’ve picked up a lot of learnings from your experiences, and really grateful that you’ve been willing to share your story, um, and your experiences with b two b tech companies.

Alisa Manjarrez: Thank you, Jeremy. I love being here.

Thank you for the intelligent questions.

Jeremy Balius: Now all of your social links will be in the text below as well as Alisa’s other podcasts do check her out, and go subscribe to everything she’s doing. Thanks, Alisa. .

Alisa Manjarrez: Thank you.