WashingtonExec has reached out to leading govcon communications and media executives about the latest trends in a post-pandemic world. These interviews highlight success stories that resonate, discuss how organizations are navigating current challenges, and provide insight into lessons learned.
Frank Salatto, head of field marketing of Americas at Chainalysis Inc., shares his thoughts below.
How did you/your team approach a post-pandemic world? What does that look like in your organization?
The core principle that we’re focused on ⏤ post-pandemic or otherwise ⏤ is meeting our customers and prospects where they are. Live activations are definitely part of that again, which is great. We saw strong demand and a return to in-person meetings and conferences in both the public sector space and the commercial space. But digital programming is not going away, and we all learned so much about that in the last year.
Going forward, we know we need to be hyper-targeted with our campaigns, matching relevant content and channels to specific audience segments. We also will focus on integrated campaigns, where we augment our live activation investments with digital program elements before, during and after the onsite activities.
Ideally, this stitches everything together in a seamless and powerful way for the audiences we’re trying to engage.
What are some of the biggest media and communications trends you are anticipating for the remainder of this year, and into 2023?
The trend for marketers toward efficiency, given the macroeconomic environment, is something we’re embracing as a team. Chainalysis is a hyper-growth organization with a massive market opportunity. So our expectation is continued growth and, from a marketing perspective, fueling that not through a higher volume of activities, per se, but by squeezing every bit of impact we can from each investment we make. Campaign integration, as I alluded to earlier, is going to be a big part of that.
But another big focus will be on tight alignment with our sales partners, ensuring we are running programs that target the right opportunities and the right decision-makers at all times.
Are you/your team spearheading any major media and communications initiatives at the moment? If so, can you explain?
A major initiative for us is to become more data-driven in everything we do. There are multiple layers to this. First and foremost, data can drive the alignment between sales and marketing that I alluded to earlier, both in terms of the opportunities we want to pursue in the markets we serve and in terms of the ways we approach these opportunities.
The marketing approach against targeted opportunities is really the second layer. What channels and tactics have worked in the past to engage these segments? We want data to drive the answers to that question.
And the third layer is on a campaign execution level. What can we test in this execution that will enable us to learn and iterate throughout the program or campaign? This approach, ultimately, will drive performance in everything we do. And this holistic data-driven approach is going to play a big role in our push toward efficiency.
How do you hope current or ongoing media and communications initiatives positively impact the organization and its workforce?
This data-driven initiative is our path to getting more impact inside the budget we plan to deploy in the short and long term. The positives for Chainalysis, if we do this well, are obvious ⏤ more efficient pipeline creation, customer acquisition, etc.
Additionally, on a programming level, this approach will be a driver for us to do more of the tactics that work the best, enabling our entire team to build more expertise in these proven areas.
What are you most passionate about enhancing communications-wide in your organization going forward?
At Chainalysis, we have a massive opportunity to bring education and our solutions to governments looking to get a better handle on the crypto ecosystem. What we’ve learned over the last few years is that our tools can enable success in missions that span, on the public sector side, multiple verticals.
As an example, law enforcement and investigations around illicit behavior in crypto can touch state and local, federal and defense agencies all at once. At Chainalysis, we can be a connector for these agencies, certainly with our products, but also in the relationships we can facilitate through our marketing programs.
That’s a point of passion for me personally and, of course, for our various teams. And growing that influence as we grow as a company is an exciting proposition for us in the years ahead.