Career Growth Advice from Lucinda Henry, Tech Influencer Leader | Career Tips for Women in Tech Influencer

2B Bolder Podcast – Episode 99
Featuring Lucinda Henry

Episode Title: #99 Being a B2B Influencer Strategist: Insights from Lucinda Henry

Host: Mary Killelea
Guest: Lucinda Henry



Mary Killelea (Host): Hi there. My name is Mary Killelea. Welcome to the To Be Bolder podcast, providing career insights for the next generation of women in business and tech. To Be Bolder was created out of my love for technology and marketing, my desire to bring together like-minded women, and my hope to be a great role model and source of inspiration for my two girls and other young women like you. Encouraging you guys to show up and to be bolder and to know that anything you guys dream of, it's totally possible. So, sit back, relax, and enjoy the conversation.

Hi there. I am so excited to have a very special guest on the show today. This is a woman who is a friend of mine, a past colleague, and someone I consider to be a mentor of mine. We're joined today by Lucinda Henry. Lucinda was actually very critical in helping me start this podcast. She actually helped me conceive the idea and has continued to encourage me along the way. So really, really appreciate it.

She's an innovative, creative marketing strategist who blends business acumen, data, and storytelling to drive demand and pipeline results. Lucinda has a successful track record as a B2B influencer and thought leadership content strategist. She was named a top influencer marketer to follow in the top rank marketing B2B influencer marketing report for the past four years. She has over 1.4 million followers on her Two Shallow Pockets Pinterest account where she shares the latest ideas and inspirations for today's weddings, parties, and ideas for building a nest. She's so creative, talented, and humble, and I'm so glad you finally agreed to come on the show. Thank you, Lucinda.

Lucinda Henry (Guest): Wow, Mary. Thank you so much for that introduction. And I'm so happy to be here. Thank you for having me. And I just want to say, I am so proud of you for how far you've come from the inception of this idea and kudos to you.

Mary Killelea: Thank you very much. Okay, let's start with the basics. First, explain what B2B influencer is and does. So, you know, we see influencers everywhere, but I think B2B is kind of a special pocket. So, can you talk about what a B2B influencer is and does? And then also talk about your role as a B2B influencer engagement strategist, how you would work with them.

Lucinda Henry: Sure. Yes, we see influencers all over the place, especially if you're on Instagram. And those are typically business to consumer influencers because they are selling you consumer products. In the B2B space, business to business, we are looking for voices that talk about the products that we sell in the B2B space. So, in the space that you and I have lived in for many years is a high tech space. And so, we look for voices in the space that have significant followings and have user generated content that gets a lot of good engagement. And we work with them on building content with the brand to help build brand awareness.

In terms of a B2B influencer engagement strategist, I spend my days research and vetting voices in the space and those voices that have a good acumen around the technology that we're trying to promote and trying to build awareness around. And so I typically have a tool where I will research and vet those voices and make sure they're a good fit, make sure their point of view aligns to the brands that I work with. And then I do outreach to those influencers, build a relationship with them. And then eventually it ends up in terms of an engagement. So, they are working with the brand to create some awareness content.

Mary Killelea: That's awesome. So, it sounds like the coolest job, I'm not going to lie. You're a liaison between the company and the man or woman who is very knowledgeable in the technology space. Is that a big pool or is it a small pool? I mean, I know consumer wise, there's like everywhere you turn someone's as an influencer, but on the B2B space, is there a lot of influencers?

Lucinda Henry: That's a great question, Mary. In the high tech space that we're in, there is a limited pool of voices, not a lot of female or non-binary voices. And we are always looking for up and comers in the space. So I hope maybe a potential talent is listening to this podcast today and they decide that they want to start talking about high tech technology, data center, IT infrastructure technology, digital transformation technology. And yeah, come tap me on the shoulder.

Mary Killelea: I think that's great because that is really a reason behind this podcast is to point out opportunities for the younger career minded women who are looking for like, where can I excel? And if there's a big space right now for that, that's awesome. What gaps or opportunities do you see in this space beyond what we just mentioned?

Lucinda Henry: There are a lot of established voices in the space, especially male voices in the space. So, I think there's a big opportunity in the high tech space specifically for female voices to rise up through the ranks as well as people of color and non-binary voices. I think there's even an opportunity to go into industries or verticals and pick people from those spaces and leverage them as well.

Mary Killelea: Do you have any advice or tips for others working on behalf of a company, working with influencers that people overlook, that you see they're not staying on brand or when you watch other businesses go to market with influencers, do you say, gosh, they should be doing this or they should be doing that?

Lucinda Henry: I think a lot of us in the space are using these voices in the way that they should be used. I think it's important for a brand to remember when you work with these voices, it's an alignment to any internal campaigns that you're doing or any brand content that you're producing. It's an alignment and it can complement the brand and what you're trying to do around brand awareness. I think the one mistake that some brands might make is requesting that these voices repeat their messaging and word for word. That's not how you want to leverage these voices. These voices have their own point of view and they don't want to be a parrot to a brand. They really want to build it from their own perspective. That's why it's so important in the vetting process to look at their content and make sure their perspective is going to align to your perspective. You really just don't want to be asking them to parrot your messaging.

Mary Killelea: What are some of the pros and cons of your role of being a B2B influencer engagement strategist? I think in the tech space it's interesting that the cons might be that there's so few voices that there's also an overlap into an analyst role and it gets a little bit confusing in how an analyst is leveraged versus an influencer is leveraged.

Typically, an influencer is going to bring a lot of value in the social channels. An analyst is somebody that's going to have a perspective of what's happening in the marketplace, but the influencers have that perspective as well. The analyst might spend more time understanding technology, understanding the market, and understanding the customer base or the install base that a brand might have and so they can speak to the customer challenges a little better. That may be the case.

Some of the pros? I love building relationships with all of the voices. I've had a lot of great voices that I've worked with over the years and I think that's the most rewarding is the relationships that I build with these people. They become friends and I look to them as mentors myself in a lot of the spaces. Then I think going back to another con is the term influencer. I think it has become a term that a lot of people don't like because they just see as someone selling all the time, but it really is more about advocacy and aligning to the brand. I think it's important for a brand to build the relationships with these voices and make sure that these voices understand the brand strategy, the brand value props, and the brand roadmaps. Because if they don't get regular updates from the brand and they don't understand where you're going in terms of a company and what you're trying to achieve, then it's hard for them to become advocates for you. Even in an organic fashion, if they're in between engagements when they're not getting paid, you still want them to be advocates for your brand so that those relationships are really important.

Mary Killelea: Do you think that it's become so normalized, I guess, as you know, I mean, obviously everything in digital is just warp speed, but influencers have more relevance and more predominance today in marketing mix. Do you think big businesses at the top get it? Because even if you're in marketing, you're always trying to justify your job, you're always trying to show ROI, but with even social media, I think it took upper management a while to say, okay, yes, this is a valid place where I endorse you spending money or I see the value in it. Do you think that is true to where influencers are? Or you still think there's an education needed for upper management?

Lucinda Henry: That is a great question. The social space is an interesting one right now, especially in the B2B and trying to figure out what social channels work and help build brand awareness or share a voice or whatever your KPI is that you're measuring. And so, I think that a lot of companies may be making shifts around social and their social strategies and trying to figure that out. I think generative AI coming into play is going to be an interesting mix of automation and what you do to the customers coming into your website, the customers and prospects coming into your website and what happens with that intent data, even second and third party intent data and what you're going to do with that. I think more companies will probably start investing in some of those AI tools to understand their customers better. And therefore, the shift might be that they start focusing more on customer advocacy and employee advocacy as communities. And I still think this is an important mix to add into those advocate programs.

You have an influencer advocacy. Most companies in the enterprise space will have an analyst relations team. And oftentimes you'll find influencer relation lives in that sense, usually in the comms group and the sort of relations lives within that group. And it's all important. I think it's a matter of where budgets are and if there is an influencer engagement strategist like myself sitting in a company, it's important to have an executive sponsor and continue to educate them. But I think more importantly for a person in my role, it's important to reach across the aisle and build collaborations with the analyst team, with the comms team, with the executive comms team, and continue the education in the space.

And just as a practitioner, continue to watch the trends around social and what's going on there. Understand how AI will automate a lot of the intent data coming into the company and how you can build and align to some of those KPIs and prove out the value of having these voices talking about your brand.

Mary Killelea: To be successful in your role, what would you say are some of the skills that you need to have?

Lucinda Henry: Well, I definitely have to love building relationships and you have to enjoy that aspect of often reaching out as like a cold call initially. I'm doing air quotes as a cold call, but reaching out and building those relationships, it's a lot of touch points. So if you have a bench of 20 influencers, just factor in how much that takes to build those relationships and keep those relationships ongoing. And you kind of want to be continuing to build your bench all the time. So, it's a lot of relationship building.

There is a lot of cross collaboration within the company that you work for. So, you want to collaborate with product marketing. You want to collaborate with the comms team, especially the executive comms team. You want to be collaborating with all the marketing and then the campaign marketing and all the way down to the account based marketing people because you're going to align to all of those. You'll also need to be a content creator yourself and understand content strategy and project management and budget.

Mary Killelea: You're a little busy. Yeah, I think that's great. And I'm so glad that you listed those all out because I just don't think people realize, well, they don't know what they don't know, but they also don't realize all that this what it takes to be successful in your role. So, I really appreciate that. Can you share an influencer project that you're proud of?

Lucinda Henry: I'm proud of all the projects I've worked on. I'm especially proud of one project where we took a traditional influencer engagement and built on the influencer role to becoming a matchmaker with an executive team. So, we picked out several executives that were important for the brand and stood on the pillar of technology and had a narrative. And we matched made them with some influencers in the space. And we built goals for the executives to create some content with those influencers within a year. So, we had set goals for them to create X amount of long form, short form content, guest appearances on podcast, guest appearances on stage and guest appearances together. And then throughout the year, we asked the influencer and the executive to build a one on one relationship so that the influencer could understand the brand better and understand this executive better and understand the technology pillar that they were supporting and vice versa.

The executive was able to have one on ones with this with the influencers and understand the market a little better and get a different perspective of the market. And it was a very successful program.

Mary Killelea: That sounds awesome. And where do you think B2B influencer marketing is going in the next two to three years?

Lucinda Henry: That's a very good question. And I believe that campaign and account based marketing is going to be really important. And that's why I mentioned earlier to the cross collaboration with a campaign team and understanding the account based marketing team. There's even going to be cross collaboration of sales if you get far enough into those relationships, into the account based marketing program. And you start to understand the goals of sales and the goals of marketing and how they're aligned. Then you can bring those voices into those accounts and really help, especially building out content at the lower bottom of the funnel. And that's where you've got consideration and intent to buy. And the influencers may have some really valuable content to create there that is more like a peer to peer type of content, which is account based marketing kind of relies on a lot of the time. And I think there's a lot of opportunity there that we haven't seen in the space yet.

Mary Killelea: God, you touched on so many good things. So, what people may or may not know is besides building successful influencer marketing strategies for the top tech companies, you have had other exciting roles in your career. Can you share the work that you did around database marketing and the knowledge that you gained and how it applies? I mean, I think it you kind of just did in the sense that, you know, you're taking what you're working on today, but bringing it down to really how do we make it effective with sales? And I don't want to put words in your mouth, but tell us how, tell us about that automation work that you did and really understanding database and then how it's shaped your thinking.

Lucinda Henry: Yeah, I mean, my love for data started early in my career and way before we had a MarTech stack, way before we had CRM system. So, I'm kind of aging myself here, but I was at a museum and when I joined that museum as a membership manager, they still were managing their membership by three by five cards. And I came in and convinced them to implement a software system that could allow them to track membership and even had some benefactor information on there so they could see the benefactor investments. And it was where I really fell in love with data because we did a lot of overlays of demographics and psychographic information. And I realized then how important it was going to be to personalize that data and give a person an experience that made them feel seen and held and like given the white glove treatment.

So I went on to many other companies to work on database marketing programs where we were actually modeling out data, segmenting data, building sales enablement programs based on lifetime value of the customer and understanding what the next steps were for the customer and being able to take those models within each segment and build on a sales enablement program and build content into that sales enablement kit and essentially hand them off to channel partners for some of the brands and those channel partners were then just kind of a plug and play to their campaign and could go after the low-hanging fruit because we knew when a customer might be ready to buy something or when they needed to be nurtured. And so it could be put into the nurture program or could go right to a salesperson and that salesperson could get a sale right away.

That part of my career I've just always loved. It's been surrounded by data and understanding, like I said, just understanding with the modeling and segmentation down to a small degree of when you can turn a customer and that to me is exciting especially if you think about when you've consumed a product or you've purchased a product and you've been treated well by the company, it makes you feel good and you want to become a loyal customer to that brand and then you start to become an advocate. So there in lies where influencer comes into play.

Mary Killelea: It's fun to hear you talk about data because I mean not that you don't with influencers but you light up when you talk about data, data management, and just like make it's kind of like one of those nerdy times where it's like it's like a game almost and you can make it work. Anyways, that's how I feel about SEO.

Lucinda Henry: Yeah, data driven and we hear the terms data driven in the B2B world all the time now. So it's actually fun to see and great to hear companies talking about how especially generative AI coming into play and how we will be able to personalize so many experiences. I think in some degree some people get nervous about that and that's why we have a lot of, we have a ways to go with security and privacy and that's going to still be very important and all the policies and procedures around that but if you think about at the end of the day people really do like having a white glove treatment.

Mary Killelea: Does it surprise you that there's not more enterprises or big tech companies doing it right today? And maybe it's just the B2B space because I think consumer has figured out that full funnel journey more so just because they've seen their customer as a buyer, but I think it's taken a while for B2B to think of the end user as a customer in the same way and to treat them like that.

Lucinda Henry: Yeah, I think there's going to be a lot of companies that get there pretty quick especially in the B2B space with the account-based marketing programs and if I mean there's so many tools out there now. I mean if you look at the Martech landscape, the annual printout that comes every year that shows you all the brands and that Martech space, that is an pie chart and there's a lot of companies looking at those tools to use but maybe they don't have the right practitioners in place to use them and so they have fits and starts and they may think that the tool is not working for them and so they jump to another tool and then they have to start all over again. But I think we'll start to see enterprises really shifting and I think generative AI is going to help more companies get better at data-driven marketing.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, I'm totally excited for it. What advice do you have for women building careers that struggle in the area of self-confidence and believing that they're enough and kind of worry about taking risks? Any advice?

Lucinda Henry: Oh, that's such an important one. Anyone that's starting out their career or mid-career, even late stage career, I think it's important to have mentors. I think it's important to have peers that you talk to on a regular basis because often like you and I, Mary, we talk on a regular basis and find out that we're not alone in some of the struggles we might have around confidence or feeling like, oh, this happened to me and then realize, oh, I'm not alone. This is happening. And I think just finding good mentors to keep in your network is really important.

I spend a lot of time reading self-help books – more than I'd like to admit, but I think those are all also very helpful. I listen to a lot of good podcasts that help me feel like I can get ahead in my career with different ideas or hearing different use cases or people share their experiences. But I think the most important is just having strong mentors or even close peers that you can reach out to on a regular basis and maybe build accountability partner. And when you're struggling, you can reach out and see what ideas they might have to kind of push you along.

Mary Killelea: That's fantastic. And I know you've been my accountability and I've taken a lot from that. I'm not going to put you on the spot, but I will ask you to send me, email me after this, some of those podcasts for resources. And so, I can share those in the show notes because I know people would be curious about that. What would you tell your 20 year old self starting out?

Lucinda Henry: Oh, don't stop taking risks. Don't stop being afraid to fail. You got to start to fail. Just make sure you're surrounded by really good people that value you and support you. It goes back to the mentorship and peer relationships. Yeah, just never stop taking risks.

Mary Killelea: What does to be bolder mean to you?

Lucinda Henry: Taking risks, not being afraid to fail. You know, don't be afraid to reach out and network. If you see somebody that is doing something incredible, try to reach out to them and see if you can get time on their calendar to hear their story. And I think it's important for women in business to support one another and help each other succeed and excel in their careers. And who knows what the next person's advice might be for you. It could be the best advice you've ever gotten. And if you didn't reach out to that person, you'd never know. So just be bold and take risk.

Mary Killelea: I love it. I love it. I love it. Okay. So, you survived the questions. Now we're going to move on to a little fun rapid fire before I let you go. Just so you know, you know, you a little better. Winter or summer?

Lucinda Henry: Winter.

Mary Killelea: Comedy or drama?

Lucinda Henry: Romady?

Mary Killelea: Okay. I do that too. The beach or the mountains?

Lucinda Henry: Oh, that's a hard one. I would say the beach.

Mary Killelea: Okay. Cats or dogs?

Lucinda Henry: That's a hard one too. Cats.

Mary Killelea: Coffee or tea?

Lucinda Henry: I used to be a coffee drinker. Now I'm a tea drinker.

Mary Killelea: Okay. Before I really let you go, how can someone get in contact with you?

Lucinda Henry: Feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn.

Mary Killelea: Well, listen to thank you so much for being here. I seriously, I really owe you one. Thanks.

LH: All right. No, thank you. The pleasure was mine. And again, I am just so proud of you and this podcast and so many great interviews that you've achieved over the last couple of years. Kudos to you.

Mary Killelea: Thanks. Thanks for listening to the episode today. It was really fun chatting with my guests. If you liked our show, please like it and share it with your friends. If you want to learn what we're up to, please go check out our website at 2bbolder.com. That's the number 2, little b bolder.com.