Bob London - CEO of Chief Listening Officers

Bob London takes the long view when he is out in the market and is never selling when he is out at events.

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Guest - Bob London
Host - Carl Grant
Producer - Seth Grant

Transcript

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Carl Grant: 0:06

Welcome to Rainmakers. I'm here with Bob London, CEO of Chief listening officers. Welcome, Bob.

Bob London: 0:13

Hey, Carl, how are you?

Carl Grant: 0:15

Very good. So Bob, this is a really unique play here. You're CEO of Chief listening officers, what in the world is chief listening officer?

Bob London: 0:26

Well, the first, the first goal of calling a chief listening officers wiki was to get people curious about what it is so that I've achieved that with you already. So I basically what I do is help b2b tech companies with go to market strategy, particularly messaging, value proposition differentiators. So they can, you know, put effective relevant messages out to through all their channels, whether it's their website, their investor pitch, their sales pitch. And the reason I call the chief listing officers was because in my many years as a chief marketing officer with both public and private companies, I saw that companies, too many tech companies kind of assume they know a lot about their target audience. And they're not, they need help listening, basically. And so what I do is the how behind the work I do is I go interview my clients, customers and prospects before every as part of every engagement. And I you, I get amazing insights, because I get people to open up about their real problems, priorities and perceptions. And then I interpret that and synthesize that into a strategy for my clients. And at this point, I've done about 20 401, on one interviews with decision makers across the b2b spectrum. So you know, it's going really well,

Carl Grant: 1:48

yeah, that's a really unique play. I don't think most people listen. These days, they, they do a lot of talking. And they're thinking about what they're going to say next. And they're not really listening to others. So I think you've really differentiated yourself in the market. So I also notice, Bob, and I've known you a while and in the marketplace, your rows, well respected guy, you're, you're on boards of a lot of influential organizations, talk about your go to market strategy.

Bob London: 2:16

So my go to market strategy is based on the fact that I don't like selling. And what I mean by that is, I'd rather spend my time talking to companies listening to companies meeting founders meeting CEOs, listening to what their challenges are, and either helping them indirectly by finding a solution for them and someone in my network or to help, you know, sometimes I can help them directly or sometimes a year later, I can help them directly. So my go to market strategy really is about, you know, strategically giving away my time. I'd much rather, and I do this all the time, for anybody who's listening. I'd much rather do a one hour workshop with a CEO and maybe his leadership team on either how well they understand the customers and tease that out. And or kind of whether their messaging is really market friendly, customer friendly, I'd much rather do that for an hour to do a proposal. So I find myself only you know, the only proposals I really do are to confirm a deal that's already been agreed to and kind of scoped out. It's more of a formality. And so it's I it's all about engineering things, so that I spend my time doing what I want to do. I also do go to events, but that's just more because I it's good energy. For me. I'm an introvert. I've been working at home for many years. And it's just great to get out when when there's no COVID, of course, looks like things are starting to open up. But yeah, I do go out, but I don't go out to pitch. I don't I don't even have business cards anymore. And that's not to sound obnoxious. That's just to say that, you know, when you get to a certain point, and you're well known enough, you just don't have to be shoving your your your sales pitch at everybody, you really let it happen organically. And that's just more suits my personality. I hope that's a clear answer.

Carl Grant: 4:06

Yeah, no business cards that become a thing of the past. It's, it's crazy. So So I actually am getting this QR code that's coming new company called New Age. So a little plug for them, that that you can scan, scan your phone over this thing and it'll it'll take you to a page that has all the links to all your social media and contact information. So not that you need that. But

Bob London: 4:31

no, I love that idea. I love that.

Carl Grant: 4:34

It's cool. I'm talking to these guys next week, and I should have it in the mail today. So I'm, I've never been so excited about getting a piece of technology. So anyway, so that's I think, I think we're gonna see these things happen. I don't know if you remember back in the day, this will date ourselves when when people carried BlackBerry's and they can beam their information to each other.

Bob London: 4:55

Absolutely.

Carl Grant: 4:56

Yeah,

Bob London: 4:57

absolutely.

Carl Grant: 4:58

I remember those days. So So Bob, it's it's funny that you say that you go out to events, but you're an introvert. So I don't think I'm an introvert. I think I'm an extrovert. I go out to the events because I like, the energy and just being in the mix, honestly, like you, I don't think I think I could not leave my house ever again, and, and still be able to do my job. I mean, because once you've amassed 15,000, business contacts, I don't think you really, you know, other than just keeping those contacts alive, which you can do by phone and zoom, I don't think you need to meet another person so that it's interesting yet I still go out, right? I'm hosting an event today. As a matter of fact, just because I don't know, maybe I enjoy doing it. And it sounds like you get a level of enjoyment out of that as well. But as an introvert, that seems odd.

Bob London: 5:55

Yeah, it is interesting. And I have a very, very smart advisor. Her name is Monica, London, she's my wife, who knows me really well. And she's not afraid to tell me what's what. And once in a while, I'll say, Well, you know, I don't know if I need to go to all these events, this event of that event will say, you know what, every time you come back, you got stories you got, you know, you've got you learn things. She said, just keep going. She's like, sort of like Shut up and get in the car and go. And so I think that's good medicine for someone like me, I'm an ambivert. I mean, I can definitely, you come in, can you hear me talk? I don't much shy about talking. But but the whole listening thing fits with me because I am more of an introvert. And I'd rather hear what people have to say. And so so the events do fill a role. And also I, you know, I think if you look around the DC area, it's a great ecosystem, partly because of your doing, and others, of creating real energy and a real center of gravity. And so the people are just great, you know, the people that you meet are great. And as long as you're, you know, smart and selective about the events you go to, and as long as you don't expect to sell something, as soon as you cross the threshold, right? I mean, who goes to events to buy stuff nobody's aware now.

Carl Grant: 7:12

And that's another part of your story that resonated with me, because I'm never selling ever. Right, right? I'm, if I'm selling anything, it's what I can do to help the other person.

Bob London: 7:22

I don't think I'v ever seen you, or heard you say hey, let me tell you about coo ing. You know, it's just not tha's not how it works for you. And I think that people more peo le should be that way.

Carl Grant: 7:35

Yeah, no, but but you know, that, but the things that I offered to do, strategically, lead to the need for legal services, right? Like, I know, sources of money, if you're going to close $5 million of financing, which I'm helping somebody do right now. They need our services, right. But I didn't have to sell that. It just it was a easy outgrowth of what I'm helping this person do. And, and, or if you're introducing a CFO into a new job, or, you know, any of those types of activities, all of them have components of, of what we do, and people naturally want to reciprocate to people who help them. It's just a natural thing. I think it's unnatural for somebody to not want to do that. And so you're just, you know, I think what you're doing plays into that, right. I mean, you're, you're doing it because you like doing it, right. I like helping other people, I think it's very rewarding to help people raise money, find jobs, help their companies be successful, eventually, they have liquidity events, they make lots of money, they invite you over to their nice houses. I mean, I, I enjoy all of that. Right? It's, it's part of the fun of doing what I do.

Bob London: 8:41

You know, I'm glad you said, you really said it really well. And I think what what I heard when you were just talking was, you know, it's really taking the long view, it's taking the long view and saying, I'm going to spread goodwill and expertise and help people do whatever, whatever is on their list I'll help them with, I'm not going to shove my list onto them. And then over time, without expecting quid pro quo, good things will happen. And so the long term kind of karma driven approach is and by the way, if it's appropriate, Rick Fleischer, who, you know, course, serial entrepreneur, that easier, he's kind of the guy who indoctrinated me into that, you know, maybe 20 1516 years ago in that sort of that whole approach. And it really fit me so well, because I don't like to. I don't like to sit around talking about everything, every little detail about what I do and why you should buy, you know, that's just not made. So shout out to Rick and folks like you for paving the way for this, that sort of approach.

Carl Grant: 9:40

Well, there's a new entrepreneur who was moving to Austin, Texas, where I am right now who I interviewed her for the last podcast. So gottschee we've got you Oh, she she, she talked about, about being relational rather than transactional. And and she does young person, she's in her 20s. And I thought that was very insightful for a young person like that to to be thinking about that, right? Because so many people you meet are transactional, they want to know, you know, what can this person do for me today? And, and, you know, is there anything I could do for them. And I found a lot of people, particularly in Austin, this is a, you know, it's a new town. For me, I spent most of my years around the DC metro area, I found that most of the people around here are very relational. And I like the culture. Because I'm meeting with people, I'm having lunch and dinner with people that there's really nothing that we can do for each other today. But we like each other. And we know of each other. And we're looking to see what we can do to help each other, whether it's in a personal situation, or a business situation, or, you know, just in just as human beings, right, and you spread that kind of I hate the word karma, but get good karma.

Bob London: 10:57

And I already already broke the seal. Yeah,

Carl Grant: 10:59

but it comes back to you, it comes back to you, Bob. And it sounds like you've got a lot of that going. And you've turned your your kind of knack for listening into a business and packaged it up, which I think is really interesting.

Bob London: 11:11

Thank you, I really appreciate it. It means a lot coming from you. And I, I do enjoy being having something different. That that does, you know, doesn't raise everyone's eyebrows, but when it does, it really works. And I think what what I would summarize and this is not necessarily for everybody. You just talked about it when you connect with someone and you like each other. You know, you I sort of follow the chemistry, not the money, right? So if someone is it, like Jeff crafts from Hungary, you know, he what he All he did was get an introduction to me. And he immediately grabbed on to the idea of listening to customers. And he had he had that other startups before hungry. And you know, I think what I found is like many entrepreneurs who do it a second and third time, they see opportunities to build more customer intimacy before they start, you know, spending money building product, you know, more customer discovery. And so it really clicked with him. And he ended up referring me to some great people. And ultimately, I did work with Jeff at hungry because I follow the chemistry, not the money. You know, hungry? I'm not even sure they were well funded when I first met Jeff. So follow the chemistry. You know, I like what you said, well,

Carl Grant: 12:24

that's good advice. And so let's let's backtrack a little bit. So you you weren't always the chief listening officer, you had some industry experience to lead up to this. Tell me a little bit about that.

Bob London: 12:35

Yeah, so back in the day, when there was something called long distance telephone industry, there was a company called MCI, which I'm saying in an elementary way, because I'm sure people have lost their recollection of or it predates people. But it was a pioneering it was sort of the AOL around DC before AOL. So MCI came into being by attacking at&t, who was the monopoly with a regulatory strategy, basically, to say, you know, monopoly, this monopoly has to come down and MCI grew. And I was fortunate to be there during an amazing time where we were growing, you know, multiple market points share points per year, market share points per year in a market that was worth hundreds of billions of dollars. And that's it was a great place to learn marketing, basically, and cut my teeth. And I actually managed at one point, a $200 million national advertising budget, which at the time, I was not qualified to do, but that's how it was at MCI you kind of learn and you go into it. And then from there, I went into the b2b world. And there was a local DC area startup success story called digitex. Which, as you may know, about, which was the internet infrastructure play that went public twice. And just, you know, really pioneered the area of web hosting and managed hosting, and I was the VP fortunate enough to be they were a client of mine when I was consulting, and then they asked me to come on full time, and I did. But ultimately, and I had some other interesting stops, not all successful. And, but ultimately, what I learned about myself, or I was forced to learn about myself. I enjoyed. I did not enjoy managing people, and I think it showed, you know, candidly, and I didn't enjoy dealing with stuff that wasn't the work itself. And that's okay. Right. In other words, some people are really good. I was just talking to a really senior sales guy, strategic sales guy yesterday, a close friend, and he said, I don't know what I'm supposed to do all these reports, you know, like, I got a job here to sell. And what am I supposed to do all these reports and updates and deal with these meetings that are political or related to commission haggling and be between divisions and stuff like that. So I just I just want to do work, I just want to do the work. And so consulting turned out to be a great fit for me. I had enough of a network to get started. And then I had to learn on the fly how to do my own business development, which is 20% of my time, or should be 20% of your time. And so, yeah, but I learned marketing, I learned b2b. And I learned strategy. And, you know, that's all come together in this and then the listening thing was really the big breakthrough, like five, six years ago, was, companies just spend way too much money on marketing before they start listening to customers.

Carl Grant: 15:35

Well, Bob, this has been great advice for our listeners. I thank you so much for joining us today. And I want to encourage our listeners if you like what you're hearing, please subscribe and please rate us and share us with your friends. Thanks so much, Bob.

Bob London: 15:50

My pleasure. Anytime, Carl. Thank you.