IRL - Kathy Maachi
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Innovative Revenue Leader Podcast. I'm your host, Seth Mars. Join me as we deliver practical insights to help B2B CROs Find new and innovative ways to grow in this fast changing environment. The Innovative Revenue Leader is sponsored by Sandler, a triad company, empowering sales professionals and leaders to master the craft of selling at all levels.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: welcome back everybody. Today's guest is someone I've been working with for probably the last year, and just a great collaborator around sales and marketing and trying to figure out ways to align. She's, uh, she's an innovation leader, systems thinker, solution architect. Her accomplishments, I mean with, she has years of experience across B2B marketing, consulting technology to help organizations navigate change.
Scale demand, modernize how they Go-to-market, and has held senior roles spanning consulting, market development and operations, working across global markets from the US to Europe. She's a a long-term [00:01:00] operator, advisor, well-known for blending deep technical understanding with real world execution and practical insight.
She's the executive VP and co-founder at inta. Kathy Mackey, great to have you on.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Thank you. I should have you write my LinkedIn profile. That sounded great.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, I mean, read it back to.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah. This is, that sounds, sounds good. I just think I'm a, I'm a survivor of the tech industry. That's how I just
say it, You know.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. Yeah. I was reading it going, wow, how do I do this, this justice? You've done so much. So the, the first question I have for you is just, it's, it's a standard one that I, that I always ask, and it's always interesting to hear. It's like, what's the most innovative thing that you're, that you've seen in B2B right now?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: So I'm gonna, uh, 'cause this is BDRs. There's a colleague we're working with who I think has done the best job of rethinking from scratch the whole BDR, and I'll say sales motion.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And how I look at is he's what was [00:02:00] previously, I'll say unscalable parts of the Go-to-market. He has done it without sacrificing relevance.
So, um, You know, you always had to choose, and I'd love your opinion. You, to me, you always had to choose, you wanna scale or I wanna do relevance or personalization.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: That's abm one to one, one to few. One-to-one. Like you
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: At
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Marketing, sales, it's always the same way. And doing almost the one-to-one or that personalization. To me, that was a luxury. Like you had to have accounts that were worth doing it, and now it's with ai, it's. I think economically feasible to that for a large amount of accounts, like you can suddenly do deep research. There's a lot, I'm seeing a lot accounts going down, what I'm calling micro verticals now
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Oh.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: To get that messaging really on point. I've seen people do tailored demos. Now you can do really more relevant outreach. You can have personalized landing pages and then think of all that institutional knowledge, like we just work with a client and basically we're just going through. All their Gong [00:03:00] Scripts, You
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: The stuff in Salesforce, like, so the BDR has that history, like, oh, they did engage with us three years ago.
We lost the deal. Like how? And before it would take them, this one BDR was working on, he said it would take 'em two or three hours if it was really a large account to look at all that history. You can just serve that all up now it's there for 'em. You know, like,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yes.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: To me, just being able to do that at scale, that was just not possible.
You know, only could do it for your 10 best accounts like that Was it.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, you would, you would have to because it took so long to do it. And now it's like, so, so this person's found a way to act, uh, is it that they've found a way because like that personal, it's really interesting, and you and I have talked about this, that ability to personalize at the top of the funnel.
Is amazing because you can basically do all that research and then everyone gets their own personalized message, but it's all aligned to the goal you're trying to do for whatever you're trying to engage with. Is it that like, because those tools exist. Why do you think it is that [00:04:00] that's so hard for people to, to do right now?
Is it that they're just having a hard time like believing it and just implementing it? Or is it the tools are too complicated and put together that it takes someone really smart to kind of figure out how to, like what, what's your theory on why that works?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: well, I think there's a couple. One is a lot of systems are still disconnected.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I mean, we talked about that the other day. Um,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Where I have gong, I have qualified, I have Chili Piper. I've like, and they all, I have unify and
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: like, so what do you pull from? Because it's almost like, what is it?
Uh, a colleague of mine just came out with a new solutions. Instead of doing the fire hose of his everything, what they do is they collect it all and then they pull out the one thing that you might care about. It's almost a how do I give you less information, but I'm gonna put it now in context. And I thought it was a really, like, that's a problem with Salesforce, not sales like Demandbase and Six Sense.
As much as I like the tools, rep gets the, that little window in Salesforce and they're like, okay, [00:05:00] well what do I do with all that?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. What does it mean?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: What does it mean? So I think having, how do you pull information about the industry they're in? So with, with one-to-one a BM, we used to do this like first what's going in the industry, like
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Fit? then what's going on at that company? we always had to look at it around like what was, what are the things they need to do to be in, in, in business five years from now?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And those are like the big imperatives. And the initiatives were always like, what are they doing internally to address it?
Because you can't do everything and trying to figure that out. And then you always have this bucket of information. Here's all our product marketing value prop. And then you expect a 25-year-old to somehow do that.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah. You pull that all together like it's like.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: that's true. It's kind of unfair to do that, yeah, but, but now with these tools, you're able to get 'em to a certain point. So it's almost like. Everyone talks about context and it sounds like what you're talking about here is it, it's you've built a system that allows [00:06:00] context for the BDR. So instead of them having to shuffle through all this stuff, I get a contextual response.
I can act on, I could be smart about, I'm not gonna do, it's not a rote next best action. It's, here's the way to engage and it's unique to each one. And then I push that through.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: and I think there's two things. I think it's account research and the people research also.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Do you get their dis pro? Like how do you wanna talk to this person? Like what did, where do they fit? Like if you look at the Kerry Cunningham research, like what is their role in the buying group? it's interesting, I'm curious what you see.
I've seen accounts approach it two different ways. I've seen some where they have AI do all that stuff or the BDR sort of does, here's all the stuff you need to pull the research and they have to do it. And I've had another, like almost half the account say, no, no, no. We are having our expert teams do all that and then they just hand it to the BDRs.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: so I think it depends. This came up on the call we were on,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: it did. Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: For now? [00:07:00] Do you wanna hire reps that are really engaged and curious? Like they could probably do that. If you have reps that say, just gimme, I'm just doing the road stuff, then you need your experts doing it.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: it, it's interesting because. I don't think that story's been written yet, so it's, we're kind of in this cool point where you have people having success by empowering and, and sending to each individual BDR and I'm, I'm like funneling all of that astute to them with context so they can act and then you have the other that are just aggregating it all together and using.
The BDRs as the, Hey, this is how you engage. I'm wondering, like, it'll be interesting to see how that plays out. The, the finance person in me says the, the second one's better. The experienced person in me would say that the, the first one would be better because you'd have, when you, when you allow them to do that.
They learn more about the account, they can have better and more educated conversations because they've, they're smarter. So it's about letting them do all that tons of research in a [00:08:00] really isolated area. But it'll be interesting to see how it plays out.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Well, I think one of the big things like when BDR. Teams don't work out. They're always like, well, it's this motion. And a lot of it is, I think people underinvest I'll say BDR, leadership and capability and onboarding. Like no one's teaching people, like who do you contact? How do you work accounts?
How do you qualify them? How do you partner with AEs?
How do you regress pipeline? Like that's the part I think that's missing a lot. Like you could give it to folks and it depends how, if you're building a career path for
folks. Like if you're investing in really good management of those BDRs, then you could probably give it to them
because you wanna grow them to be AEs at some point.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. So it's not that, yeah, that sweatshop mentality is kind of the second one where I just stuff it and you just do, you just make calls and versus I'm gonna get a group of in of people that are a level up that are gonna be able to [00:09:00] do a lot more. I think that, I mean, that seems to make more sense in today's world because your ability to put your own spin on it.
So my vote is for that one,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: But I, I think that's what I think it just is, what a company's value. What are their, You know, what are their core values? How do they manage, how do they think about that? And I think companies will go down one of two paths.
Well, We've seen the ones that just think I can replace 'em all, and they're all hiring BDRs back,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Which is, which is hilarious. I mean, you and I have been on several calls with CMOs a a around that and, and that's like, so that we know that's the number one question. 'cause you and I have talked about it a lot, like
with, with a bdr. How do I talk to my CEO around why this is a crazy I idea. Um. When you get past that one, what other questions do you see CMOs asking around how to work with the BDR?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: the number one is everyone knows what is the modern version of this look like? Like that's, everyone's asking, what does it look like and what do I set up? Like, no, [00:10:00] everyone has ideas now. Nothing's proven yet, like, You
know, And so I think it's like, what is automated? What do I have the BDR do? marketing signals are gonna be important to them? You know, like it's all that type of stuff. And I think they're all asking like. And is it a role or is it a management issue? Like what You know, I, I think everyone's saying what does this need to look like? Like I had one client come and say, people go to BDRs because they need information they couldn't get elsewhere.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: He goes, do I solve that by having a better job on the front end to serve up that information. But if you think of your BDR as they are really driving and trying to progress pipeline and get all more of the buying group, then no, like. Do you give them the skills to do that? Like
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. Makes total sense. Like.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: The part that I like, or we talked about this previously, but the, the idea of ab testing this and validating your [00:11:00] hypothesis just seems to be really hard for companies to do. Like that example you provided there, it's like, okay, well do I, which way? Why don't I just test this approach and see if it is better or test another approach alongside it and see if it's better and then make the change.
It kind of seems like we've gotten ahead of ourselves and people are, put this, this goes back to the CEO's story of just get rid of 'em. Like just get rid of the, because I, I read this article by this vendor who said that this company did it, so like what happened to the days of, actually, why don't you try and see if you could make that work and then make a decision if you could actually make it work.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah, and as You know, part of it comes down to your BDR.
Quality varies across all. Like I was just working with a team. There was this one guy, he's, he's gonna be amazing. Like he already knew I wanna take all this stuff in because I know my job's gonna be managing agents five years from now. And I had others like, eh, You know, I just talked to Jet GBT with my [00:12:00] phone and I, I just sent him out an email like. And it's just, I think it gets down to who, who has those qualities that you wanna hire for,
who's like, this one guy was really curious, like he want to learn, I wanna do this. And the other was like, You know, I come in nine to five and I'm just gonna send, send, send. And I think those sense and send days are over.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: those are over.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: it almost seems like this is the case with everything. Like there's this weird world where people talk about, oh, AI is gonna make you. Like a robot, like you're done. Like you're not gonna, you're no longer gonna have to think anymore. And I think to your point, there are people who are just like, great, this is a way for me to just click that button for eight hours and go home rather than making it a little bit harder.
But it seems to me like there's, there's a whole other side to this and I think you and I are on that side too, where it's like, man, it's actually making me think more, like I have to think more than I've ever had to think before. like.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: load is a lot more, I think they had that study recently where they had. [00:13:00] Like, yes, I can have three. You know, I have CLO all three going, and Ital gets done in an hour, but it was like on my brain, three hours worth of work.
Like, and now you're doing more of that back and forth. I'm going through that whole thing.
Well, I need to tweak this a bit. I mean, I'm
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: I.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I'm getting a better output, but I think I'm spending a lot more time on some things now, You know?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: That's how I feel too. It's, it's like I feel better about what's being done and I think I could do cool things with it, but I don't find myself working any less. And I do find it, it's a lot more brain intensive than it, than, than in the
past. And I don't think I did non brainin intensive work before, but You know,
you didn't either, but it feels even more so.
It's almost like it's, that extension's great, but it also is taxing.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: it's taxing. I also realize, uh, I was on a flight. A couple weeks ago, and the internet was not working when I had big plans on the plane to,[00:14:00]
And I remember thinking, I'm, well, I can't get to Claude. And I thought, well, You know, I used to be able to do this without Claude,
You know, but it's, it's, it was, I, I had to use a different part of my brain.
Like it really was like, okay, I mean, I've only had Claude in the last, what, two years, and it's only really since December. It's at a whole different level. It's
like. How quickly I've adjusted and how quickly my brain is more in tune in different areas now, but this part that would create from scratch is like, oh, I actually have to do.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. It's, it's, yeah. You, why in. It makes you more innovative, right? Because the create from scratch leaves you a lot of waiting for the moment to come. Whereas like when you add those things and use a clot or, or to, to do that, it allows the ideas to formulate quicker. 'cause you're partnering back and forth.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And I can tweak it. I'm not quite that this like, and I, and I know what I want. It's just sort of, and I have more context, You know? and and I think that's the way that A BDR will [00:15:00] work in the future. Like, they'll get that information back around what they should do, and they'll go, You know what? I know this type of customer, how about this or that in my last, like, I, I think we should do it this way, or I don't agree with it. I'm gonna try something different.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: That
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And you want that, like they need to be responsible for that output. Even if AI creates it,
we have it stopped there like, 'cause at the end of the day, one, you need someone who's accountable at the end of the day for the outcome
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: BDFU approved it, whether you wrote it or not, you're responsible if it goes out.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I think the level of accountability is like that's where you need someone to loop, because who you gonna fire Claude if it doesn't perform?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, Yeah, absolutely. And yeah, someone to think beyond just the, what's the next word that I want to put in front of my, my, my writing? What? When you think of like, like switching a little bit to outbound, like how, how outbound works like it used to be like you, like I come from a sales background and, and you've seen this on the sales types on the [00:16:00] sales side too, where it's like, Hey, pick up the phone, you're dialing for dollars and it's all about like cold calling and not really about targeted cold calling.
And there was a time where you could call the phone book and it may work. So I don't think it works anymore. I don't think the math would work on it. Like is there a world where you can do this without marketing? Because to me, marketing that team is the sage group that understands how to identify who to call and then to help the BDR with the context to be able to do it.
Like how do you, how do you, whether they sit in sales or marketing.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: can it exist without marketing the, I just thought of this enough. You can actually take this out on your podcast if it's totally inappropriate. Uh, Lily Thomas used to have a quote, is there sex after death? Yes, but you don't feel anything. And I think it's sort of similar. Yes, it can exist without marketing, but it's not gonna be any good.
I mean, without marketing. [00:17:00] You know, you basically, you lose all that context and if you don't have context, it's just interruption, like marketing. I think what you said, it provides the segmentation, it provides the positioning, it provides, You know, how do you interpret those intense signals? The campaign, air cover, the
content, The account intel, I mean like the BDR has to take that and turn it into like, like buying group engagement, human engagement.
That's what their role is
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: I mean, if you think of the level, right? I'm A-B-D-R-A and I just call people, I call lists, I call whatever, versus I am Enri getting enriched data from a marketing team that's going through and helping with all this stuff. And then my job is to turn that enriched data into quality calls that lead to.
gonna look different. the timing, the message. It's not an isolated appointment setting like yours is to take all that. And then I also think yours is to get. Who else in the buying group?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: How do I Drive internal consensus? Like it's like you are the signal interpreter and [00:18:00] your job job is to engage accounts and figure out who's in the buying group.
Like that's what your job is. Like. Can you spot that buying motion? Can you engage the right people? Can you add context? So they actually wanna talk to you
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, and I think people still see A, B, DR and all they see is, is, is an SQL or an opportunity and, and it's just so much different than that in, in the way that this stuff works. Like, 'cause you,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I, it works how buyers, the buy whole buyer thing has changed. That's not how people buy anymore. Take AI
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: It's just how do buyers buy now? Yeah, they're not gonna, they're not going to buy that way. And yeah, the, the math doesn't, doesn't work anymore. How, so in your opinion, is there, does it matter if A BDR reports to sales or marketing
Um, I've seen both work. I've seen
both fail. Uh, I think if it's integrated and it's well led. I think it can work. Like to me, if you're working off the same [00:19:00] accounts, you have the same you have the same handoffs, you, You know, same definition of success, but I think it has to do with the leader. The leader doesn't know your ICP, your territory dynamics, your conversion rates, your pipeline impact.
I mean, someone has to own that business outcome and, but. week when we were talking, someone brought up a really good point that I hadn't thought of, because I think a lot of times marketing, it's almost like it's a good way to weed out some of that stuff,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: But what you brought up was BDRs don't dream about becoming marketing people. wanna become salespeople,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I hadn't thought about that and I was like. I've seen it work both ways
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Some, I think marketing can bring things like we're just really trying to qualify and there's long, they're teaching them who to contact, how to work accounts, how to qualify.
They're managing it. They're following up like stale, like stale leads. Like do they know how to manage [00:20:00] that function Yes. But a lot of them really, if, if they can't do that marketing or sales, it's just gonna fail.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: so I mean, a lot of it is just, I mean, it's about the leadership of it. It seems like if you're unified as a leadership group. There's no reason it can't work. And where it sits becomes almost wherever you think it works best. But if you're siloed, you're almost, it doesn't matter where it sits, it's gonna fail both ways because it takes both those groups to properly engage a customer.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Right, and you need someone who's inspecting that, who can look at pipeline progression, who can give feedback, who can get roadblocks outta the way. Like if you're doing that as a marketing leader in speeds and you have a good organization, you're sharing all that up, we're sharing the same countless we're
sharing, Then I think sales leaders will see who's good.
And if they wanna go in a BDR up into AEs, they could.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. It's not like if you're in marketing that you're like, they salespeople don't see you. You're still the conduit of handing off all the oppor. They're gonna know who's good, who's not good.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: They [00:21:00] know who's good or who's not.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I thought she brought up a good point, like BDRs don't dream of becoming CMOs, You
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. It, it, yeah, it is interesting. It it, but true because, I mean, that job is very much sales. It's, it's. Probably one of the hardest jobs of sales in engaging a whole bunch of people. That, that, yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: yeah.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: When you think about, um, like measurement, there's tons of measurement that goes on here. Like what do you think's the, if I'm measuring success for A BDR team, what do you think's the best measure of success?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I mean, it's gotta be pipeline contribution. if you just make meetings they don't turn into anything, who
cares? And so how do you get better at making meaningful appointments, like getting more people, like how do you do all that prep work? That's what's gonna make you interesting to an ae. Like you've gotta have that, um. I think meetings are the output in pipelines, like the outcome,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: You have to have meetings,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: But you could have two BDRs. I just set up meetings, [00:22:00] but he just found one person, he made a meeting and others who are really making sure that they're interested, that that, that there's some signal there.
They're engaged, You know, it's, it's just other things. They've spotted a buying motion,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: What distinguishes a good BDR from just, I just get paid on meetings,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep. Qualified or not? I, I get paid on them.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I get paid on them. Yeah.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, it's a major difference, right? Because it w if you also, there's this weird part if you, not weird, but if you waste the time of a sales person by giving them a whole bunch of meetings that cancel or no-show or nonqualified, the salespeople just start fading away from you.
Whereas if you give them quality, quality accounts that generate pipeline, you are, you're gonna, you're gonna start getting them to ask you to do more. It makes total sense. So a thing that I've heard as well when talking about like this end of the BDR thing was, oh, You know, this is, you just hand that part back to the sale, the [00:23:00] seller, and they'll do the top of funnel stuff.
I mean, okay. Um.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Sure. Give that a try.
See how that's gonna go.
that's gonna go.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: I haven't, we read that. I've read that book before and like I, you look at a, you look, you look at a funnel, the bottom part's more important than the top to the person getting paid for it. So it's never gonna,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: It's never a priority one. One, they have, they're dealing with just their deals.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Deal progression. They're dealing with internal coordination, they're dealing with forecasting. They're dealing with closing. gonna fall off? Is that other stuff? Like, that's not their role because you're not gonna say, oh, I spent time making all these calls.
Say I didn't those opportunities, I haven't followed up with them in a week or two. Like, no.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: that's the worst part. Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: That's what's gonna fall off. And usually the person likes doing, the AE doesn't wanna do the work. I mean, they've moved on from that.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I'd say if you can get it to work, like knock yourself out. But I [00:24:00] think you'll see that like all of 'em, like I've seen people cut off marking like three quarters later.
Oh, we have no pipeline.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: like it's a whole motion. Like
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: just surgically take out a section. Think oh, it.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: yeah. It's, it's funny because I can, when I think about that stuff, it's be, people don't turn it around and say, how does the buyer engage with us? And you go, oh wait, the buyer actually contacts this. In this way. Nobody does this, but marketing in this way, nobody does it from sales. Like you have these channels, then when you cut one off, you go, I wonder why our buyers, we, we have le well you, you cut a channel off that they were using to engage with you.
Of course things aren't going to go well.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I know.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. Um, one other thing around like, so like five years from now, do you think the BDR role exists?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Five years from now, do we any of us exist in a job?
Uh, let, let's go like two years. Let's go two years. If I could [00:25:00] predict five years, I'd be in Vegas making a lot of money right now, You know? Um, but I think, I think you do have to redesign the role for how. Not just ai, but how buyers buy today. I think it will be a lot around, how do you do more of that relevance or personalization at scale, whether this group does or do your BDRs?
I think it's gonna be, there'll be a blurring between marketing sales, like some's gonna be just machine to machine. Like
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: are they, how are they finding you through ai? Like even we're getting leads, like the few calls, it's been like, how, oh, You know.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Really.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah, it's, it's, yeah, it's been interesting. So one, I think, how do you tune your marketing machine for that? Because that's where people wanna go. And then when they engage, like, what's that motion you want? And someone's gonna pick it up. It has to be someone's role. That's why I don't think it's gonna go away. You might call it something else, it's the account quarterback or it's the, You know, but [00:26:00] when someone wants to buy from you, they're gonna say, well just go online and. You know, you'll figure it out on your own. Like someone needs to handle that. And I think there's always the qualification,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Mm-hmm.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Part, like someone how to qualify, gather right information, and one, either not waste the buyer's time or not waste your company's time.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Like how do you qualify and then how do you manage it through, what is it, nine to 11 people in a buying group.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Know, like how do you, I think their role can change. Like, I think the big thing is for me, garner had a paper around this, actually, not even a paper, a little thing that I, I really sort of clung onto You know, a lot of deals just stall
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep. Both.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Well, what we've talked about, oh, the value prop wasn't strong enough, there wasn't urgency.
But I think a lot of it is, you've been, you've been in a big company, right?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Mm-hmm.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: You know, you have nine people. How long does it take to get nine people on a meeting?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: It's impossible.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: It's impossible. So [00:27:00] you're at least three weeks out. according to Kerry Cunningham's research, You know, they do all this work ahead of time and they come up with, here are my two or three, like, I've got my short list. They engaged, dah, dah, dah. And let's say the one you chose first, it's good enough, but let's say the third one actually is better. Do you have to be the one to try to get those nine people together again and go through that three month process?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: No. So I think a lot of it's gonna be like, content do we have for doing internal consensus? Because they're the ones, at the end of the day, they're gonna decide
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Mm-hmm.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Do you enable that team? And is that what the BDR does? Here's what you need for your financial role. Here's what you need for your procurement role. Here's what, here's the deck you need to present. Why? I think it does come down to, You know, we all want this solution, but I have why I want it.
You have
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Want it. think people just like [00:28:00] in politics, everything else, no one can get along.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Like no one coming to consensus is not a skill that's valued anymore.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, that's a really interesting way to put it, because what you're saying there is basically in a buying group scenario. The BDR role may shift into something where you're enriching what each one of those people, and empowering the seller to have the, you may not you, you're gonna pass over, not just here's your meeting, but here's your overview of how they interact together, what's going on.
So,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And here's how you bring on this person. Here's your oh, for this person. Like, really enable them to come to consensus on it.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: That's really interesting.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: So I, I, so I think those roles will change. I, I, I don't think it'll look the same as it does today. I think a lot more will be automated, like the research, some of that outbound stuff,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: You wanna get something over the finish line, you want someone whose job it's
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. To go get it done.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: go get it done.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Cool. So
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: [00:29:00] let's shift a little bit to talk to you. You and I have had some conversations. You've had a fa You know, like a fascinating career and I mean, you and I have shared kind of our affinity to travel. Um. If I were to go back when you were, when you were a kid, would you have said I wanted to be an entrepreneur?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Okay. Here's something you don't know about me. I was raised with Marxists like, like they were Marxists.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Oh, really?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: No, they were not into anything capitalist at all. Like that was their, now not communist. Very different Marxists,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: But everyone's the same. So Marxist, everybody has the same. We we, everyone's on par. There's no differences in terms of your living to raise. Yeah. went.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: no.
And I have to say, I was really worried about that and I spent a lot time with grandparents. He came back and was like, he liked it. He's like, he, he was on board, but yes.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: One of the few people where you, you're like, I'm gonna go be an entrepreneur and start my own business. [00:30:00] And like most of the time it's like, oh wow, amazing. But you're, you're like, Nope, parents, I've, I've gotta find a way to get this one accepted.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, and I don't think it was anything really planned. It just sort of came about,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Trying to think. Yeah. You know, like, yeah.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: And life happens, right? And then you just end up.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah. Life Yeah. So if you could go back, like when you graduated college, what advice would you give yourself having gone through this journey and, and where you are today?
I also put on my Marxist hat. Uh, had, Trotsky had five year plans. I never had five year plan, even though the Marxist did. Uh, if you remember. You may not, I think sort of unfolded and I, I have to say, I really benefited from them. I benefited a lot and I don't recommend I got further on luck than perhaps I should have. But I also think being open to opportunities when they were presented themselves, like knowing that's worth pursuing as opposed to like one of the [00:31:00] examples I've talked about, You know, I, in Austin when Michael Dell was first camping, he was in college and there's other stories I could tell there, but. You know, his grandparents gave him a lot of money to start the business. Like a quarter million dollars back in the eighties was a lot of
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah, it was,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: was like, well, they gave him a lot of money, but then I thought a lot of people they got a quarter, quarter million do as a Boston accent, quarter million dollars, You know, they would've blown it up their nose,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: He actually started a business.
So like it's knowing you get opportunities and you take advantage of them.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. There.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I think I was very lucky to take being open-minded, taking advantage of them. But, um,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I would probably tell myself, you should be a bit more deliberate about things if I were,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Interesting.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: You know, don't outsource the whole direction by chance.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah. But you need to, it sounds like you're talking a bit more deliberate, but you still need to be open to that chance, into the guidance.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Yeah. Yeah. How about for you?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: I'm one of the weird ones, like for like advice out of [00:32:00] college. I, I, I don't know if I'd listen it to it today. I, I mean, for me it would be just. Relax and, and kind of, if I could figure out a way to not, like, overthink things, just like let things come and do the best you can, but I, I, I can't help myself and I,
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: We would've been a good
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: yeah. Seriously.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: pair.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Exactly. So say a little bit more about inta. Like what if people wanna understand what you guys are doing there, a, a, a little bit more for anyone who, who hasn't, hasn't heard of, hasn't heard of it.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Um, we really touch anything around the revenue engine, but we do it in three different ways. And I'll tell you the ones I think that are U one. I would say it's unique how we do it, but not unique. If you talk to any consulting firm, like one, if you wanna get better results, you get better at your campaigns. Like, do I have the right audience? Do I have the right message? Do I have the right, You know, all. right creative, the right and the right buying groups like we do that now. I think we have some unique ways of doing who is your right audience? The messaging and all that. But that's one [00:33:00] way, like, yeah, I'm just gonna do better campaigns. But I think where we're different is we also look at. This is really big, and I think regardless of ai, how do teams work together?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Like if you look
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: So important.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Stuck, if you have a team of five marketers, Seth, everyone around the table, everyone go, oh, Seth, you do this, I'll do that, I'll do that. And then some you grow and there's a product marketing team, there's a digital team, there's, then everyone, it's where it falls apart. don't have race's, people don't have process, people don't agree, and they're all at an equal level, so no one can tell the other person what to do. And so you end up having basically random acts of marketing and part of it is, I'll say our own fault and not our own fault. Let me put it this way. Marketing has the biggest discretionary budget, probably anyone in the company like discretionary.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And you have to be very specialized. Think of people that do field marketing, don't do messaging. People that do messaging don't do digital. You know, people do [00:34:00] digital, don't do events. I mean, it's just like, so we end up dividing ourselves up by teams.
'cause you need that specialty. I do search, huh? I couldn't do Google search. I know not, but,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And so you divide budgets that way. And so how do you prove your value, but to show how your little patch is doing there's no incentive. To try to say, well, I didn't contribute to pipeline, but I did this.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I'm at the top, so be able work with teams about how do you get your teams to work a long way to say how do you get your teams to work better together towards a common goal?
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: And I'll tell you, when you just do an annual plan and give it to people, everyone interprets it differently.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Totally true.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: You wonder why three months later I told everyone what we're focused on. But, but everyone in a good way wants to show how their.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yeah.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: I'm doing a good job and if I'm not doing a good job, I'm gonna take my budget away.
So I have to prove my budget, I have to.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: You see that?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Just falls apart. It just falls apart,
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: It's so true.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: So even if you have all that good stuff and you don't get any results, a [00:35:00] lot of times it's that layer and we really work with teams on that. That to me is one of our secret sauce. And the other thing is I have an IT background.
We all have data. Like we actually understand how that stuff works because that is how. Tech and process how people experience your brands these
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Yep.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Like we don't do branding, but you could have staff companies with two different tech stacks and how they experience is, oh, I go into their website, I say Contact me.
I didn't hear for anyone for three days. And the other one like, oh, I got an immediate phone. Like all that operational AI stuff is how people experience your brand this day. Yes, I know there's all the creative and all that, but. It's also the underlying process in tech, and that's, that's to me the process, how teams work together and how you set up your infrastructure and all that stuff goes with how, that's how we do campaigns different than anyone else.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: I don't think any of that's different in today's world. If anything, it's more complex and faster. Like you could have the greatest AI in the world and if you don't [00:36:00] follow up, which still like I, it's always crazy to me when you go fill in a contact us form. Companies how often They never, those are supposed to be the, like, they'd never respond, like
goes into an abyss.
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: RA's workflows, SLAs, like if that's not in place. It just doesn't happen.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: it's crazy. So where could people find you and Inta if they, if they wanna learn more?
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Www inverter.com, we have a contact us and we actually do follow up with people. Lisa, I hope we do or on LinkedIn or get in touch with you and you can get in touch with me.
seth-marrs_20_04-03-2026_150941: Will do. Yeah, absolutely. All right. Thank you very much, Kathy. It's always great
kathy-macchi_1_04-03-2026_140940: Ah, thanks S oh, it's always a pleasure chatting with you.
And that wraps up another episode. Thank you for joining. For show notes and other episodes, visit us@innovativerevenueleader.ai. The Innovative Revenue Leader is sponsored by Sandler, a Trilia company. Sandler provides top corporate sales and business [00:37:00] development training while empowering sales professionals and leaders to master the graph of selling at all levels.