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January 1, 2023

How to segment and target with good data

The following transcript has been edited for length and readability. Listen to the entire discussion here on The Broadband Bunch. The Broadband Bunch is sponsored by ETI Software.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Hello, welcome to another episode of the Broadband Bunch. My name is Pete Pizzutillo, and I am joined by Natalie Straight. She’s the director of marketing for REV. Natalie, thanks for joining us.

Natalie Straight:

Thank you for having me.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah. How’s the show going for you?

Natalie Straight:

Amazing.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah, it’s the first time?

Natalie Straight:

First time.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Why’d you come?

Natalie Straight:

I’m actually new to the telco, so I was in healthcare for 11 years, and I used to travel around and go to the conferences, and I knew all the innovators, and I knew who was who, and I knew what was possible. And in telco, I’ve really been struggling. I started six months before the pandemic hit. We all went home, and the world closed down. So I’ve really been looking at who are the innovators in telco. What is the big opportunity? What are the possibilities? And I have not been able to find it. And I walked into this Calix conference, and I was like, oh, it’s here. It’s right here. All these people, everything I’ve been looking and searching and seeking for, I found it all here.

Pete Pizzutillo:

That’s great. And so as a marketer, so you mentioned a couple of challenges you have there. How big is REV in terms of your home’s pass or subscriber? And where are you guys in your life cycle?

Natalie Straight:

So we have 60,000 customers. We’re an eight-year-old company, and we’ve grown through acquisitions over the years. So we have three different markets in Louisiana. We have new ownership now, and we are expanding. We really care about our communities. We really saw during the hurricanes, the big companies abandon our people. They really weren’t prepared. They didn’t have fuel trucks. They just weren’t invested in the community the way that we were. They were even charging customers for service that they didn’t have where we didn’t do that. We ate the cost of that because it wasn’t right to charge people when they weren’t even in their homes, and they didn’t even have service. So we really understood at that point, we are the community provider here, and these people need us, and we are trying to expand our footprint and just be the best we can be and show up for our people because no one else will.

Pete Pizzutillo:

I think that’s a common theme that we see with this community-level service. And in connection to your communities. These are your neighbors.

Natalie Straight:

Exactly.

Pete Pizzutillo:

A lot of folks have grown up and lived there their whole lives. And being able to have that kind of engagement and care is, I think, really unique. So thank you for that service and good luck with that. So from the marketing perspective, what is it that you’re looking for help on?

Natalie Straight:

So I have been really impressed with Marketing Plus. They demoed Marketing Plus yesterday, and my anxiety levels just melted away because I’ve really been trying to figure out how do I get all of this data because we’re going into new markets. And so the way that we operate now is I’ll have to go buy some data from somewhere, some demographic data, and then what I will get is a raw spreadsheet of 30,000, 50,000 records that I’m not a data scientist, I cannot work with that. Right?

Pete Pizzutillo:

Right.

Natalie Straight:

So then I’ll have to go hire somebody else. I’ll go have to hire an analyst to analyze the data that I just purchased, and then I’ll have to do my own research and put the insights together, and put a go-to-market plan together. And they were showing Marketing Plus yesterday, and all of that is done for you. They partnered with a data provider. They licensed demographic data at a zip code +4 level, so down to a street level. And then they even took it a step further, and they did the research behind it so there are personas at the street level for all of this data. And then there’s content behind all of the personas. So you could literally just go into this tool and just start clicking buttons. Everything’s integrated, and everything’s tracked. And that makes it just super simple and super easy.

And that makes it to that a community provider, a smaller provider like us can compete. We don’t have a 50-person research team. We don’t have a data warehouse. We don’t have a bunch of data scientists. We’re small and mighty, and we care, and we have big hearts, but we don’t have the resources and the deep pockets of the big providers. So a company like Calix, who’s leveraging platforms and partners that are putting it all at my fingertips just really blew my mind and just made me so happy.

Pete Pizzutillo:

It’s a great partner to have. The theme here is to be the giant. And it sounds like Calix has taken some strides to help you guys solve, not only how to segment and target with good data, but the content is really interesting. It’s pretty high-quality stuff.

Natalie Straight:

Very, very.

Pete Pizzutillo:

I mean, they’re talking anywhere from social assets to videos and that kind of thing.

Natalie Straight:

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I mean the big guys, your AT&Ts and your Coxs, they have celebrity influencers. You look at their commercials, and they have celebrities. There’s no way a provider like us could produce a million-dollar commercial with a celebrity in it. But they’ve got Gerry Dee, who’s a famous comedian, and they’re doing all of the scripting and the story writing and the production for you. And that’s included in the Marketing Plus with the data and the research and the personas and the campaigns and the tracking. And it is a godsend.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah. And they said they had to get 4,000 different types of assets and stuff on there. In your conversations with others here, is there anything that struck you as surprising or any kind of trends that you see?

Natalie Straight:

I was surprised at the innovation here and just the passion of the people here. Whenever you go to some of the bigger conferences with people who work at the bigger companies, they don’t have passion. People here, care. You could feel that. And just the way that the content was presented, like in our morning session, the CEO of Calix, Michael Weening, got up there, and he said, close your eyes. Imagine what’s possible. That’s where we’re going.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah, that is true. And there’s a lot of stories like yours where there are folks that are small growing, and not immature, but trying to mature, and people getting taken by the wrist and saying, okay, we’re going to be there right with you every step of the way. I had a couple of conversations at lunch where just that engagement level that they are bringing. What would you say is the best advice for somebody who’s considering coming to this event?

Natalie Straight:

Come.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Come, and there’s a lot of community here

Natalie Straight:

A lot of community.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah, and I think sitting down with folks that are similar, that have been there, have done that.

Natalie Straight:

Yeah. Yeah, and I’ve talked to so many people here that have done exactly what I’ve done. I’ve gone to market before, but in a different industry, not in telco. So I’m at the conferences, and I’m meeting people and going to the dinners, and I’m telling them about what I’m doing. They’re like, oh, I’ve done this, and I’ve done that, and this is what was successful for me. Let’s connect on LinkedIn. I’d love to help you out. And it is just amazing to have those kinds of resources, and there’s power in that.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah. So are you going to come back?

Natalie Straight:

Absolutely.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Yeah. Are you going to speak next time?

Natalie Straight:

Sure.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Well, enjoy the rest of the show. Thank you for jumping on our show and-

Natalie Straight:

Thanks for having me.

Pete Pizzutillo:

And if you get a chance, we do episodes, deeper dive, if there are other folks, once you’re moving along your journey. We’d love to have you back on and your lessons learned and kind of share that with the rest of the community.

Natalie Straight:

That would be great. Thank you so much.

Pete Pizzutillo:

Well, that’ll wrap up our conversation with Natalie Straight. Thank you very much.