The CMO Journal's top 5 marketing podcasts
A short list of my favourite, most useful podcasts to add to your library
This is a post I’ve been meaning to write for some time. I discovered podcasts during the pandemic, and went on long walks before the sun came up. I listened to hour after hour of great conversations, and realised what a great medium this is.
My listening tastes evolved throughout, as most things do, and I arrived at a sense of the things I liked, and what I didn’t. But what kept me hooked was how easily, and straight from the practitioner’s mouth, all this content was available.
So most mornings, I begin with a walk and an hourlong marketing podcast, and use the conversations to kickstart my brain. I now have a list of these I go to immediately, to see if there’s something new. These are immediate listens, the ones I want to share.
Some of these you’ll know, some of these you won’t, but these are the ones I found most useful and enjoyable.
1. Exit Five
Dave Gerhardt’s marketing podcast is the OG, at least for me. His programming is what hooked me on to marketing audio in the first place. He brings on brilliant guests, and is able to ask great questions that dig deep, always keeping it straight-to-the-point. I also think what keeps me coming back is that that I’m a believer in his "story-first, positioning-first" marketing playbook, and this base allows me to appreciate the questioning from his viewpoint. This has to be in your podcast library.
2. The Marketing Book Podcast
This is not a podcast I have seen on a lot of other marketer’s libraries, and that’s a shame. Douglas Burdett’s podcast is heavily underrated, because what better way to learn more about marketing by talking to people and practitioners who have written books on it. I’m partial to the Seth Godin episodes, and love the way Burdett questions his guests, with a lot of focus on how the marketing knowledge they want to share is being packaged in their books.
3. Modern Startup Marketing
I discovered Anna Furmanov’s podcast only recently, but have become an immediate convert to her warm, bright questioning. There is a lot of emphasis on tactics, and I also love how she brings some guests back on to complete a certain conversation or to follow through on an idea they’d been talking about before. This also makes me stay with the podcast, looking to see who has come back. This is a great tactic, and this is a great podcast that you should be listening to.
4. Marketing Against the Grain
Kipp Bodnar (Hubspot’s CMO) and Kieran Flanagan (Zapier’s CMO) have a loud, confident podcast that’s a breath of fresh air. Much more personality driven than the other podcasts above, there are bold predictions, lots of Hubspot history, and a genuine interest in what’s happening not just in the marketing world, but around it. This means a podcast that tell me not just about marketing strategies and tactics, but what could be the next big strategies and tactics. This single aspect, though there are more, makes it super valuable listening.
5. Super Marketers
I had to throw mine into the mix! In the last few years as I listened to more and more podcasts, I realised that there just weren’t enough Indian marketing podcasts to listen to, at least with a focus on startups, SaaS, and technology. So I started one myself this year. Super Marketers is my attempt to go behind-the-careers of great marketing people, and learn from what they do well.
I have had 4 episodes out this year: With Acko’s head of brand and content Lavanya Mohan, with former Dunzo brand head Sai Ganesh, and insurance player Plum’s head of marketing Shreyas Achar, plus an episode of Roshan Cariappa (Vymo’s VP of marketing) interviewing me.
There’s a bunch more of these coming next year, so do keep reading and listening.
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So go ahead and try it, SocialPilot has certainly helped my team plan and execute our social media plans better.
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Job Board
For the first time ever, I’m opening up two roles on my own team on the newsletter’s job board.
I’m looking for a Demand Generation Lead, and a Content Marketer to join my team at Atomicwork. The demand generation role is a mid to senior position, and the content marketing role is for a junior/fresher (proficiency in social content is a plus).
Please send in your CVs, questions, or anything else you might want to know at sai@atomicwork.com. You can also reach out to me on LinkedIn, of course.
And as you can see, the job board is open again. Please feel free to send in your open roles, and I will include them here. There are two more editions I’ve planned this week, to close out the year, so hurry!