Leveraging Gifting to Break Through the Digital Noise with Kris Rudeegraap, CEO of Sendoso

On this episode of Industrial Strength Marketing, James Soto interviews Kris Rudeegraap, the founder of Sendoso. Sendoso is the worlds leading sending experience and management platform industrial and B2B marketers trust to build authentic relationships through intelligent corporate gifting. Kris shares his story of how he started the company and the challenges he faced along the way, including a cease and desist letter from Starbucks. The two discuss the importance of personalized marketing and its impact on the customer experience. This episode is a must-listen for marketers looking to make a difference in their businesses.

Articles and resources referenced in this episode:

• Connect with Kris on LinkedIn
• Follow Kris on Twitter
• Explore the Sendoso website

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About the Show:

The Industrial Strength Marketing Show is a top manufacturing podcast that explores the personalities, cutting-edge strategies, tools, and technologies transforming the industrial and manufacturing sectors. Each episode, hosted by James Soto, covers marketing, sales, business development, and integrating martech and AI into industrial B2B strategies. Tune in to gain actionable insights to help you stay ahead in the industry.

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Transcript

Kris Ruudegraap: 0:00

There's a few that stick out one when we were starting with coffee Senator, we got a cease and desist from Starbucks. And so that was like a no crap moment where we're like, well, we can't send Starbucks like, what's the point? So we flew up to Seattle to talk to them in person. They're like, Oh, this is way cooler. We didn't even know we just had some lawyer on payroll that like, sends out cease and desist. It's like, let's partner up. And so that was a really cool moment. We could have given up that and just been like it's over, but we fought through it.

James Soto: 0:34

Welcome to the Industrial Strength Marketing Show. Hi, I'm James Soto. I'm the founder and CEO of industrial strength marketing brands. We are here to help you make marketing the strength of your industrial business. I am so pleased to have Chris Rudi grap here with Sendoso. He's a founder, he's a leader, and we're gonna get into his story. And we want to just give you an opportunity to get to know him today. So you can learn about his career, his insights in marketing that makes an impact. Welcome to the show, Chris.

Kris Ruudegraap: 1:03

Thank you so much for having me, James. I'm really excited to be here inside to chat with you and share my thoughts, feedback and story with the audience.

James Soto: 1:12

Oh, my goodness, I'm really excited. So we've had a series of of martech leaders on the show. We've had, oh, gosh, John Miller from demand base. And and we've had the head of engineering.com, which has a really great marketplace for e learning. And folks from HubSpot, Nicholas Holland, the VP of product at Mark at HubSpot, and so many others. And Chris, when we met at B2B MX, I was very intrigued. And, and just to kind of set the set the the bar here for our audience, I really thought this would be a great episode to feature you here. Because we have an audience of folks that have come from the physical have come from the trade events who have come from the way of marketing and selling, that it's really you know, in person and people first, and those things have changed. So we're gonna talk a little bit about our market, our audience, and why I thinks in Dosso as a platform could be fantastic for them, but so that we can kind of set the set set the mood for the audience, just tell us a little bit about yourself and sendo. So, and just so you know, audience, we will have a point where Chris will unapologetically talk about their product and what they do. That's what we keep hearing from you that you like, yeah, tell us the product. We have him here. We want to know everything about it. So Chris, yeah, this let us get to know you a little bit. And, and yeah, give us give us the one on one on.

Kris Ruudegraap: 2:44

So I'll give you a little bit more about my founding story. And I think that sets this kind of the tone and the stage for why I started to do so. So I started to nursery about five years ago, prior to that I spent about 10 years in software sales myself in San Francisco. And while I was in sales, I saw a couple things happen in front of me one was just the overwhelming number of emails that I was sending, meaning my prospects were getting, you know, quote, unquote, spammed, and there's just a lot of digital noise out there. And it didn't felt feel as personal. And so I was kind of getting creative, as I think a lot of salespeople do is like, how do you break through that noise? And how do you really connect with prospects in a more human way. And I found myself writing handwritten notes and mailing them out, I found myself going into our swag closet at the time and grabbing stuff, sending it out, I found myself going on Amazon and finding like a quirky gift based on a conversation with a prospect and sending that out. And it all worked well. It was just manual, time consuming hard to track, you know, expense report. And I just wanted to do more of it. And so I looked online to see hey, was there a solution that allowed me to like, send physical stuff out in my sales process, and there really wasn't anything out there. So I asked a bunch of colleagues and sales friends and industry experts, and got a lot of people like, Hey, I'd use that. And so that was part of my inspiration of, you know, me forward seeing the future that this was going to be more part of people's kind of sales, marketing, customer tech stack, but also just the pain point I experienced in the solution that I needed. And so that got me to start Sendoso. So we are sending platform that helps other companies send out direct mail, corporate gifts, swag, handwritten notes, personalized gifts, you name it, we can send it. And we're a mix of a software platform that helps you orchestrate all of this have teams with budgets, integrations into your tech stack. We're a marketplace of all the different things you could send in one all in one platform. And then we have logistics and fulfillment to actually help get these things from A to B. And so that's what makes up Sendoso. So

James Soto: 4:51

And just to cover that, when he says it's true. This is a real thing, and especially today with supply chain payments, we talked about manufacturers and industrial distribution and services companies and that that that critical inter dependence, what is the scale of that supply chain? What you know, what are what is the area your, you know, the addressable market you're serving right now geographically?

Kris Ruudegraap: 5:15

Yeah. So geographically we service the world, we have warehouse fulfillment centers, our self in partner three PLS, a few in the US and Canada, the UK, the European Union and Australia. So we're servicing mostly all regions. from a company perspective, you know, we're about 700 employees, now, we've raised about 160 million or so in funding. And we have 10s of 1000s of users sending millions of items. So a pretty robust supply chain that we've we've really set up over the years, and founded what year 2016 is when the idea happened. 2017 is when we really launched. And I think 2018 is really when we raised funding and went to market and more kind of faster approach. Wow. A lot of a lot has happened in the last few years to say.

James Soto: 6:07

So we're gonna just pause here, Chris, how you doing, man?

Kris Ruudegraap: 6:12

I'm doing great. I am loving it. So I find, you know, so much enthusiasm for my team, I find so much just happiness in seeing our customers successful. And so yeah, I couldn't I couldn't ask for a better thing.

James Soto: 6:29

And you know, and what's better than doing something you love and getting this fit your vision turned into reality? Right. Exactly, exactly. And that's just intoxicating. And so I'll take us back a little bit. So I had the chance to meet Chris at the b2b marketing exchange in Scottsdale, Arizona, a few months back, and in, it was interesting, in that you saw, you know, a strong exhibition of, of marketing technology related providers data, everything from data analytics, experiential, and there was some Dosia, you'll notice and so if you see them out in the wild, because it's the coolest little deal, it's all the coolest swag, it's all about, you know, the physical experience here, like, you just feel like it's like your kid in the candy bar. So, and I was fortunate enough to be there with my team, you know, in terms of industrial and we were evaluating the technologies in terms of, you know, who we want to partner with? What are the right tech stacks, where, where can we deliver client value, ultimately, and helping these iconic industrial brands, leverage things like Account Based Marketing, and, and these great digital experiences? Increasingly, machine assistant and data assisted. And there we saw St. Joseph, and I'm just hanging out my team, they dive into the deep stuff, I may really work more on the partner program level, like, Okay, how do we partners and it's a good fit. And you're just like hanging out, man, you're just hanging out, just in the side back, you're just looking and he's just thought that like Papa, papa, bear proud, just like, chill, like, you know, you're at a phase now where it's not like survival, you know, or your payroll this week. And I just kind of said, Who's that guy, and I'm just like, hanging out watching my team do its thing, and they're checking you guys out. And then you're hanging out saying, Hey, what's up, and we just started talking? Yeah. And it just seemed to me, and I don't know if this was a moment for you. But I've seen that I've seen that moment before we see someone who's built it. Or you just don't know if that's part someone part of the team or someone who could have founded it. And I just had that feeling about you never met. And we just started talking. And it just sounds like you're really excited. I was talking about the manufacturing sector. We're working with some of the biggest industrial shows this year, like massive, you know, over 2000 exhibitors, and I'm like, Man, is there some way we can like, connect here, like, you think there's such an opportunity here and mark, and we just started talking is just guys, you know, and yeah. And you're sitting there watching your team, and I view when you look at where you are today, you know, whether it's a moment like that, and you see this stuff happening? 700 employees, like, you know, like, What, do you have any of these kinds of things, these moments where you let yourself absorb the success?

Kris Ruudegraap: 9:18

Yeah, I mean, I think I'm constantly grateful for the success of the company and of myself and seeing this grow. And I think I'm also just continuing to look for the future, and I love interacting with our employees, our customers, or potential customers, our partners. And so, you know, while on the show, I think, you know, I think that's one Testament where I, you know, I love getting out there and meeting new people as it relates to this journey. And that is part of the success for me is that, you know, being there meeting people and so, I do sit back and you know, and sometimes, you know, smile when I'm walking, just thinking about it, but, you know, it's a long journey. We're still on this long journey. And so there's no Oh, slowing down. And you know, if I can be at a show and meet another customer meet another partner, I can help out in other ways and really inspire our company to do better, then we're going to continue to have success. So

James Soto: 10:11

Yeah, that's fantastic. So when you started, it was around 2016. You know, what was it? Was it you? And just a vision? Was it you plus your you know, who's the lieutenant? Yeah. How did that start? What was the zero to first five people like.

Kris Ruudegraap: 10:30

So I had originally this idea of sending Starbucks cards, that was kind of what I would call like, maybe v one. And so it actually first came about by, I had to create a site called Coffee center.com. And so it was validating, and it was a Salesforce app that allowed you to set a Starbucks card. And it was kind of a very simple concept, something that you can easily grasp, and just started working on it my nights and weekends, found an engineer, actually through Upwork to help build it. And then one of my old sales friends from college I reconnected with and he was like, This is awesome. Like, I want to use this as a salesperson. And so he was like, hey, but I'd also be happy to help, how can I help. And it just so happened that his company was getting an Acura, hired at the time. And so he was like, Hey, I'm gonna have a free agent, can I start selling this and we became co founders at that point, became like, best friends kind of getting married almost as a co founder, you got to spend all your time together in the early days. And we just, you know, started to sell it. And I think in the early days, we then listening to customers, and then my own experience in sales as I when I was, you know, sending things out to prospects kind of had this epiphany where it was a mix of, okay, I can create a site that I can send out Starbucks cards, how can I do everything else? And we just said, Hey, let's just keep building this. And we figured out warehousing, and we just, you know, my co founder, and I just like, never looked back since. And then we just started hiring amazing people. And I think, in the early days, it's like, you got to figure out when you should be working on it yourself, when you should be hiring people, and how do you win if and when you want to raise money. And so it was really just, but ultimately, I think our biggest advantage was we both had sales background. So day zero, we were selling this to the world and talking to customers every single day.

James Soto: 12:28

So were there any belly of the whale moments there? You know, a lot of a lot of founder stories have like an extinction event. Or if this doesn't happen, you know, we're going down. And you know, were there any of those moments or you were just out there selling and just momentum? Oh, Momo. And, you know,

Kris Ruudegraap: 12:45

I'd say like, as a founder, you have to be like, kind of crazy, optimistic and insanely forward thinking all the time. But you also, I'd say every founder has a few of these moments, no matter what if they don't, they're lying to you. But you have to be crazy to get past them and not think that they're, they're, you know, showstoppers, they're just, you know, speed bumps. But there's a few that stick out one when we were starting with coffee, Senator, we got a cease and desist from Starbucks. And so that was like a no crap moment where we're like, well, we can't send Starbucks like, what's the point? So we flew up to Seattle to talk to them in person, they're like, oh, this was way cooler. We didn't even know we just had some lawyer on payroll that like, sends out cease and desist. It's like, let's partner up. And so that was a really cool moment, we could have given up that and just been like it's over. But we fought through it. There was also a moment when, when we were scaling our warehousing, and that we ran out of space. And we ran out of space, like, overnight. And so we had to, like have a truck full of stuff sit out in the yard overnight, we had to go find a new space over the weekend and Monday move warehouses because of the physical constraints. And so that could have caused some massive bottlenecks. But we quickly acted and found a new warehouse space and expanded over the weekend. And you could also say COVID was a scenario that could have been a crazy time for us as it's like, Hey, how are you going to send stuff to people's offices? And so we quickly pivoted with this dress confirmation feature and helping send things to people's houses. And we actually scaled faster through COVID. But some could have looked at that as a moment of, oh, no, like, how do you send stuff to people in a time where everything's shut off? And we use that as a thought leadership forum in a way to help other marketers sales folks, you know, get better and solve problems that they needed to solve during those try trying times. So definitely multiple things to point back to but you know, definitely ups and downs along the way.

James Soto: 14:46

And in a sense that each one of those scenarios actually made you stronger.

Kris Ruudegraap: 14:52

Exactly. It made the team come together stronger. It made us can think outside the box and it made us a better company on the other end.

James Soto: 14:59

Oh, Absolutely and coming out of COVID, you can think of every excuse or, you know, potential threat to your business and to see, you know, the innovators mindset, we can F, yes, this is this, you know, this is a problem, it's just a problem, you're always gonna problem exactly, and probably wouldn't solve the problem, solving problems, and then finding that these are problems that are repeatable problems. So when you have a problem in the market, and that's a lot of people have it, there was a challenge and you overcome it, you've delivered more customer value at the end of the day. And, you know, when when, you know, a founders journey is not alone. I know, you have your co founder, but yeah, you know, when you think about some of those challenging moments, you know, is there anyone that comes to mind that helped you get through those?

Kris Ruudegraap: 15:47

You know, aside from my co founder, we have an amazing, you know, advisory board of different mentors, I think it's important for founders and leaders in or anyone to have a sounding board of different mentors, people they can ask questions to. So that's important. I think that there's also our investors, and then just our executive team, you know, they we all come together. And you know, maybe as a CEO, I get credit for a lot of the work that happens behind the team, but behind the scenes, but each and every person at the company plays a part in their success.

James Soto: 16:20

Absolutely. It. When you look at how you've grown the organization, given, you're providing solutions that help people sell better and market better and create better experiences. What's Where did marketing play a role? Where's that playing the role past and present and the growth and survival and success of your business? You know, like, yeah, so are you guys do to market and totally, yeah.

Kris Ruudegraap: 16:48

So I love marketing, I actually was a business marketing major. And so marketing was something that's been close to my heart since Day Zero, even though I went into sales, early career marketing, and the creative aspects of marketing has always been something that's intrigued me. So I think a couple things stand out for me in the early days, and still to this day, and that, you know, we're creating a new category, like, you know, five years ago, or when I was in sales, or six years ago, you know, when I wanted to use a solution, like so, so there wasn't, so we had to kind of create a lot of awareness for that. And so in the early days, you know, marketing was instrumental, and, you know, brand awareness. And, you know, we did a lot of event marketing, which was really key to us in the early days, because we got our, you know, our booth next to another booth that was like, Oh, I know that, Oh, who's done? Oh, I want to hear about them. And so there was a lot of, you know, investments in the brand and to field events, demand gen. So our marketing team really, really played a big part in putting Sonos on the map. We also invested a lot in kind of our SDR team, which demand which is kind of an extension, I think, in some times in marketing in terms of kind of outbound and telling the world hey, so those two exists, you should use it. So I look at them sometimes as an extension of marketing as well. We do a lot of sending, you know, our, you know, eating our own dog food or drinking or champagne, whatever you want to call it. So that's something we do. And to this day, we still do. You know, marketing is one of my key areas that I spend a lot of time each week, working with our marketing team, making sure that we can continue to drive pipeline and drive awareness for what we're building.

James Soto: 18:26

Yeah, and maybe a gift and a gift here. They're there. They're right, strategically, exactly. In the right context at the right time. Exactly. Those are all good tips. And those are absolutely great things that that we see. You know, it's interesting to me, when you look at the manufacturing sector, it's so focused on, you know, there if you can argue that, you know, manufacturers, distributors, industrial services, companies are probably the best at social, marketing, experiential, but they are fantastic at leveraging their business networks. Yep. And when you look at a sector with so much tradition, and you know, when you're buying$100,000 million dollar capital, you know, technology, right capital, equipment, technology, it's big stakes, people go to the conferences, they go to the shows to see these things. And there's been that, that that physical experience as a way of, of marketing. What I find really strange, Chris, is when you go to these conferences, there's so many enabling technologies. You don't see the organizations like yours there. We're talking about how do they they're trying to figure out how to do these events, how to write these great experiences, but it really strikes me that there needs to be a really big reset on the thought thoughts around sales, marketing, how how the organization's work together, and we've been fortunate enough to have some great guests and some folks from McKinsey come on board and they talked about their their their, their marketing, Pulse study, and And, and what that uncovered was, okay, what has happened here over the COVID? Right during the period where you are pivoting and trying to really adjust and suggest features and find ways to like, how do you get to someone's house, you know, their place. And, you know, what they're finding is that there are studies and data showing that, that the way we're marketing and selling is leveling off into these rule of thirds. The first is that, you know, we have this, this personal, you know, in person type interaction working with a salesperson or an SDR, the second third of the way, you start to see the processes, the virtual, and you do a virtual communication, of contact, and, you know, that's obviously driven online. And the third is they want now a self service part where they just go get it, go do it themselves and go take care of it, that convenience. And so there's rule of thirds, we're finding industrials, have to serve and readjust all three, you know that in person, that that hybrid virtual, and that, hey, I want to go do it and self serve, I want to buy a $200,000 stamping press like, yeah, putting now. So when you think about that, how have you seen the ways that you have to, you know, approach physical experiences and, and sending, and, you know, and gifting whether it's, you know, based on intent and Account Based Marketing, or otherwise, how do you see the world shaping up for you, in terms of the way you're positioning this to all the different ways that b2b, let's say industrial buyers, and sellers are trying to connect?

Kris Ruudegraap: 21:42

Yeah, so it's a great point. So I'd say one trend that relates to those thirds is that, you know, as there was a lot more field reps meeting face to face in person prior to COVID, there's a little less of that. And there's even more of like, hey, I can do this through zoom. So let's keep doing this through zoom, which seems kind of, you know, advantageous at times based on maybe cost measures, timing, I get to stay home with the family more frequently. But you still need to figure out how do you build those relationships in inspire human connections, because people buy from people at the end of the day. And so that's where we come in. And we can help with, you know, sending things out during that, that buying experience to really impact that relationship in a positive way. So you can win that deal. And I think that's important, because, you know, you're spending less time face to face, which is an easier way, at times to create that relationship strength. So I think that's one way for companies to offset it, too, is when you're going to these events there, you need a platform that can also help with sending things to these events are sending follow up to these events are driving people to these events. And so I think we help with that as well, in terms of just another aspect of driving people to your booth or after your booth as a follow up. You also hinted on, like people wanting to have more self service experience. And so I think in that experience, it's how else are you going to, again, chime in and build relationships? Again, with that buying experience? While maybe it's changed from like a, hey, take it down, take a meeting, hey, let me give you the solutions consulting to where you're, you're giving them some sort of self service path. But along that journey, can you chime in with like, Hey, thanks for signing up, here's a welcome gift, how are you building rapport, because you're going to have to let your product build rapport and and you're going to have to kind of pay it forward with prospects at times. Because they're not going to be as eager to jump on a phone call with you. So how do you, hey, here's a piece of content on how to use this better. And here's, you know, lunch on me through some dough, so I'm going to send you a DoorDash gift card. And that's building that positive rapport to make sure that they're, you know, gonna buy are going to convert as well.

James Soto: 23:55

So that's interesting. So, so when you think about all the different ways you can send Yep, right. You can send gifts and novelties. But you can send value. Yeah. So that's a whole different stage. And obviously, then you can also look at behavioral, which is gamification, about you know, there. So there's a nonlinear arguably buying process, multiple stakeholders come involved in the b2b and certainly industrial buying process, especially in industrial, there's such interdependency, they can't put the wrong, you know, 100,000 parts in that vehicle, they gotta get that right, because they're there, they're in trouble if they don't. So, supplier and buyer. interdependence is so critical. So making some of these, especially bigger industrial, buying decisions takes one a lot of time there's a longer velocity to get it. And there's all of these stakeholders coming in and out. So when you look at what you're sending is there, you know, can you give some insights into some creative ways folks have been saying Sending and is it all those things we typically expect? What can you send?

Kris Ruudegraap: 25:04

Yeah, so that isn't our platform is there's a mix of kind of traditional things that you could send like gift cards, which we make it easier to do, we also offer up more of like the ability to send out like a gift card choice. So you can say, Hey, pick from this, and this and this. And this. So we offer that kind of flexibility. There's also more like on demand, things that are, let's say, not branded, but just gifts like wine, and flowers and cupcakes, and different things like that. There's also branded items that you want to get something cool and branded. There's virtual experiences, like, hey, I want to have a wine tasting experience, and I'm going to send some wine and there's gonna be like a small a. And then there's also just one off, you know, single personalized gifts. Like maybe I know you're a New York Yankees fan, and I want to send you some some Yankee swag, or I know you play golf. And so I want to send you some golf balls. And so there's some kind of a myriad of that. And we will help along that whole spectrum of saying, Hey, do you want something kind of out of box, do you want to come up with something super creative. And I think the super creative part is where marketers really lean in, because they can spend their hours with thinking about creativity. And then we spend our hours sourcing it, getting it into the warehouse, kitting it shipping it. And so they're not spending hours and hours, you know, we do all the tracking behind the scenes through software, we can out we can say hey, sales reps, you get to send this on behalf of marketing. And that's all automated through software. So when it comes to what you can send, there's, you know, themed based things like we had some really cool items sent for March Madness and football where people are in basketball where people are sending things out based on people's college on monitors, there's, you know, people that are focused around different trends that are happening around, you know, the world, there's, there's interest, like creative individuals, like there's a scene where, you know, you someone's got like a customized admin calendar over the holidays, which was cool, or they sent this like packet of seeds. And then a week later, they sent a watering can and a week later, they sent some cutting shears. And so it was like a three part gift. Or we see people sending these like mini Lego figures that they customized like Lego kit, or, you know, someone sending this, these really cool glasses where you can like see it with with when you put on the glasses, you can see this image on this paper, but you can't see without the glasses. So it creates interactivity. So really, there's just like an unlimited spectrum of what you can send and it really becomes around how do you use this as just a creative mechanism to grab the attention or to think somebody or as a means of communication outside of just the normal kind of email tenancies that most marketers have today.

James Soto: 27:36

So it's the physical, it's unleashing the creativity background, looking at whether it's an item or it's more experiential in terms of the intent and the utilization of it, right. And obviously, there's, there's so much more you can look at in terms of how you do that. And to the extent that you can also put in strategic messaging, there are ways that you provide that variable data input,

Kris Ruudegraap: 27:59

exactly the handwritten note or the printed note or collateral that goes along with it, so you can get your message. I mean, you could also use like the handwritten note as a way to kind of high level you know, have some, some messaging that grabs their attention, and then follow that up with a phone call or an email with more in depth information. And just using it as kind of a lightweight touch point to

James Soto: 28:22

So you can really just find those light, like those lightweight touch points, reinforcing a message, a little bit of personalization, exactly weaving it in there. To what extent that I don't know if you've had to do this, because it just seems to make a lot of sense. But, you know, I think from looking at, you know, some organization that has a lot of like outbound sales development reps to invest, you know, in terms of a customer experience investment, do you have to provide or do you guys provide a lot of data in terms of showing the lift? Right, yeah, this much more engagement, this much more, you know, outcomes are improved this much more? Is there any high level data that our audience would find interesting when it comes to leveraging a platform like Sentosa?

Kris Ruudegraap: 29:04

Yeah, so we have data across all different use cases, whether it's sales or demand gen, or field marketing, or customer marketing. So we have a resources section on our website on sindo.com that you can go look at, like how customers how companies are using it, and how what are the results they're seeing. So the nice thing is, is that with our platform and software, we integrate into your CRM and your marketing automation tools, so we can connect the dots for you. So you're doing less kind of manual tracking, and we can show campaign tracking and other ways to show the results of how much you're spending and then the ROI on it. And that was a big part of the software can play because people are sending things out. I bet most listeners, they've sent things out in the past themselves. They know their team is but oftentimes it's siloed. It's ad hoc, it's not an operationalized process, so they can't do it repeatable in a streamlined fashion, but they wish they could. And so you know, it's not Some. So being able to kind of use software to modernize this process is just helpful in showing the results so that you can spend more and use this channel even more effectively.

James Soto: 30:11

This is exciting. I want to go into some of the making the sausage here, and I'll tell you about something we're working on right now. So, and I think this is just for our audience, I think any, what I'm getting into here is the customers experience. So you have a customer, you've worked your tail off to get them, you know, arguably, according to data out there, it's five to seven times less expensive to organically grow your business from an existing customer than it is to create a net new one. And so customers journey in their experience counts. Yep, retention, reducing rescission rates, you name it, you can look at, you know, there's a big skilled labor gap in manufacturing, across the supply chain, what can you do to like, drive, you know, even your team engagement and retention, right? That's, I mean, this thing is amazing. So, and honestly, you lose people, you lose customers, not often based on logic, but how they're made to feel. And it really seems to me there's a huge opportunity. So when it comes to the experiential side, or these use cases, you're seeing a lot, you know, the, you know, the, the team engagement.

Kris Ruudegraap: 31:26

Yeah, oh, yeah. We, HR teams, people, teams love us for that reason. Because it's, you know, you've got, you've invested in this workforce, that a lot of it are still maybe hybrid or fully remote. And how do you keep them engaged? How do you make them feel part of the team. So that use case is even more important during COVID that we saw where people were using us for, you know, new hire welcome kits or gifts for, you know, anniversaries, birthdays, and just life moments are simply just like, hey, it's summertime, here's a nice little summer gift, take, you know, take this as appreciation. So I think it's more than ever important to appreciate your employees, and we can help with that tail.

James Soto: 32:08

Chris, I would imagine you have a massive opportunity in the segment, I guess, skilled, just the labor gap period, is so massive, and reducing churn is such a huge issue. And you think, Oh, how big of a deal with this be? Those moments count, you know, up to a quarter of our business as an agency has been at times related to recruitment, marketing, employer value proposition, employer branding, really messaging around how you're going to create a great place to work. And but how are you going to be the marketing sciences to engage, attract retain, folks, and it's massive opportunity. I mean, it's huge. And, and, and so when we see that and the opportunity to, you know, to be thoughtful, and and the other thing is, recognition programs. Yeah, folks are really good at recognizing people is, that's got to be a great use.

Kris Ruudegraap: 33:10

Yeah, recognizing people. And I think it's not just employees, but also recognizing your customer advocates, your referrals, your partners. And so I think it extends beyond what people think of like, Oh, I'll recognize some employees, but really creating a way that you can meet meaningfully think customer references, customer referrals. And we can really help with that, too. And, again, it's just streamlining and so it takes, you know, one minute versus 20 minutes do you get time back in your day to focus on on important initiatives, other than like running a little mini post office, at your house or in your office?

James Soto: 33:44

I love it, we just show you know, we've been talking about y'all to the whole team. And we form and I'll get into our personal case, I usually don't like to do this. But I think it's important, and I hope my my team is listening. You know, you know, for our industrial agency group, the industrial it's a services organization. And I think every business really is a services, organization, manufacturers, distributors, you name it, marketing tech software. And for us, we have a vision to be the best better than the rest as perceived meaning felt by our team, clients, peers and partners, be the best agency the best service for its services. And so, so I see technologies and platforms like some Dosso as as being very, very helpful in that in that goal. And so what we are working on is the first stage of the client experience and we do this from time to time we do it to ourselves. And I think if you and I think anyone listening, you're thinking about this same thing, what is the client's experience and you know, from that first touch point How do you say hello? Yeah? How do you recognize them? You know, how do you really give them the information they need in order to do business with you? How do you show gratitude? And and to what extent do you really kind of keep up on their pulses? So what we're looking at is like creating our process to work internally, again, we'd like to reimagine it. But we're also thinking about okay, now let's now once we're done with this, let's write it completely from the clients point of view. So one of the things we're looking at is, okay, let's start doing an intake survey. So we can get a formula. Who else is going to be part of this project? How are we going to do it? What do you like? What's your what your birthday and starting to bring in these these these types of discussions? And it's not just what are we sending them? It's how are we focusing on serving them? And then to the extent that you can match it up with an amazing experience, and those really strategic touch points. It's not about quantity. It's about quality. So as you look at that, that's our first phase, right, all the way and then how do you welcome them? Like the welcome kit? Right? Yeah. How do you do the welcome. And then from there, what happens is there's this period where there's handoffs, you know, or introductions, like we like to say, and then new people come in, but you know, really, I think the way folks look at services companies, it's like, okay, I trusted you, I kind of a feeling you can do what you said you did, are you doing it and do that first, like milestone, or sprint, we see that as like the end of the first stage, right, that first stage of like, went through this journey said yes to us. And now they've come on board, there's been a good hand off, they feel good about it, you know, there's a client satisfaction survey at the end. And it's really about their how they're feeling. How have you seen experiential type initiatives like that work in terms of really good integrations, when you're really attracting bringing someone on board? And do you look at it that way to the first stage where they like you've gotten through that first milestone? You know, is this just table stakes for you guys? Now, as you see that? Or is that just part of something like us, folks, like us have to look at all the time and, and really break down?

Kris Ruudegraap: 37:14

Yeah, so I think for us, you know, we practice, we preach this, and we practice this and that it's all about the customer journey? And how do you map that out to where there's certain milestones that you can create these, like, really impactful moments that matter, these memorable experiences. And so whether you think about it, you know, strategize on part of the onboarding experience, part of, you know, when a new deal is closed, during the handoff, during, you know, you know, moments during their either their their life moments, or product usage, milestone moments, all those things are just touch points that are going to just build better relationships, and the name of the game is like, you want to keep that relationship forever and retain that customer. And so how are you doing more of that? And so I think that there, as you mentioned, companies are seeing the picture much bigger now, instead of just as buyers journey that, hey, what are we putting all of our effort into this? You know, getting a customer from a prospect to a customer and then stopping it's, well, what else? What's the next 510 20 years look like? How do we keep a customer that long? And I think it's important that you can leverage a platform like us to like, sprinkle those things in so that, again, you have the ideas, you know, you want to do it, it's hard to do. So let us do the hard work for you so that you can, in some cases, even automate it through your CRM or through marketing automation, where you could put, put the hard work in upfront, which is planning that customer journey, deciding what it is you want to send, and then triggering that off based on data in your systems, so that it's repeatable, and you can continue to have success with it.

James Soto: 38:51

And that's, you know, I've once heard that there you can create moments of magic, right? And moments of misery, right and touch point, it's an opportunity to create a moment of magic or a moment of misery. I love that and anything in between, is forgettable. It's a moment of mediocrity. Yeah, hey, hey, Chris, how are you doing? I'm fine. I'm fine. Fine, isn't fine, you know? And when you really look at that, that that mindset Shep Hyken, said this, he's really lifted speaker and he basically said that, you know, when you really look at exceptional experience and service, it's, it's the uses the word always when it comes to service, they always, you know, mindful of us, they follow up, they're always remembering those moments that are special to me or those days. They always come up, you know, commemorate, you know, the number of years we've been a client, you know, they always call me back, you know, if it's, you know, yeah, before noon, if you know the next day, and I think these experiences and these touch points and these these emotional investments, yes. Okay, because that's truly what they are. It's how they're made to feel. And so for us and our journey is you know, as perceived by felt by people, you know, how do you really make them feel like you're doing that? You know, you're not always gonna be in moments of magic, but are you going to be in that sweet spot of like, you know, consistently always being mindful of the customer and how valuable they are how important the customer is that maybe or the prospect that may be your customer. And with that said, I have one more thing for you, Chris. So y'all do this in Dosso Cindy awards. And I know when someone says hey, after 19 years of industrial and all this stuff you guys have done you know, what are some of your favorite campaigns I don't even know where to start, you know? Like I'm just like, shuts me down. There's so many things and so what was your favorite send that you can remember whether it's one of the you know, sin docente awards winners or other rides? What are some of your all time faves?

Kris Ruudegraap: 40:58

Yeah, I mean, sending awards are true to my heart because it's like brings together one Austin sends with Austin customer experiences, and we're reward and we're celebrating our customer success. So one that I remember top of mine, he's me as Zendesk did a really fun campaign last year where it was like a movie, movie night in a box kit where you got popcorn, you got like a Netflix card, you got this little blanket, but and candy and it really thought about the whole family and play, which I think is a really important part of marketing is being knowing what your, you know, end buyer or end customer is. And at the moment a lot of people were at home with their families last year. And so that was a really fun campaign that didn't just target that persona, that one buyer but that buyer and their family and and had gifts for the whole family. So I thought that was really unique. Gone to this really fun like pinata unicorn program where they sent out these like, little unicorn pin Jada's and I think that was a really fun way to celebrate. Ultimately, just like things that you kind of, how can you not smile when you receive a pin? Yatta. So I think that was really good. And then yeah, there's just there's so many more, I mean, simple things like, like Uber Eats gift cards, sending that out the right time can make a big difference. And so they don't, you don't have to be crazy creative, like this movie theater kid, it's just more of a can you create a kind of this meaningful experience and send the right thing at the right time with the right message and have that hit home. But if you want to see other send the awards, we got it on our website, you can see all the different send the awards, and and also the results for them too. So I think one of the things we would like to pride ourselves off on is sharing the data behind the sending. And so we offer a bunch of that see, like, what was the results of these seven programs?

James Soto: 42:46

Yeah, I, I was gonna ask you the question, what's your favorite piece of swag? I had even that I'm not even asked because there's no answer to that, like, I know, what's the one you carry? Or you keep? Right. You know, I, I'd love you know, my son would love a one wheel like. So I don't know, you'd have to be a very valuable customer for that one. But that that's fantastic. And Chris, you know, when we think about, you know, our audience in the manufacturing sector, they are looking for ways to stand out from the crowd. And I think absolutely, dosa would be a fantastic platform for them to consider. And with that said, where can folks find out about Cisco? So you know, where can they reach out to you? And you know, you know, what's up, and what's important next for you guys?

Kris Ruudegraap: 43:36

Yeah, so you can find us on our website, if you want to look at more information, that's Sindo cio.com, you can email me directly. And this could be wanting more information on Sonos, or just connecting as an entrepreneur or founder. And you can connect with me at Chris, it's KR is at sendo cio.com. Or I'd be on LinkedIn. And I'm always looking to connect with more people. For us for what's next, you know, we're just continuing to have a lot of fun continuing to help our customers be successful. And so, for us, it's just more of what we're doing and just continuing to scale the company.

James Soto: 44:08

Wow. So you're, you're a person now with a successful company, 700 people strong, and you just get your email to everybody. Yeah, that's fantastic. That's a great customer experience. That is absolutely the way to do it. And it's great to see that you're out there. Thank you for doing that. And for the audience. Absolutely. We're going to have all of these links in Chris's LinkedIn profile and his email in the in the exactly that last name and in the show notes. And so with that being said, Chris, I just want to thank you for being on the industrial strength Marketing Show. And for you listening, I hope you just heard one thing, one thing about sending in gifting and how people are made to feel and the great experience I have, and how do you make that as part of your business to make marketing even more a strength of your business? So for more insights, from industrial marketers if you'd like to reach out to us visit us at industrial strength marketing.com Thank you Chris for being on the show today all right and everybody we'll catch you next time