Speaker 0: Hello, everyone. And thank you for join for attending our second annual Pardot Dreaming conference. Uh, my name is Andrea Terrel, CEO of Sercante, um, and I’m thrilled to be kicking things off for our closing keynote here today. Um, it’s hard to believe that we’re already at the end of an amazing three days that were jam packed full of Pardot, Salesforce, and digital marketing content, um, but it’s time to wrap up the week. Um, we had an awesome week with over 4,000 marketers joining us, um, from 64 countries across the globe. Um, we started things off, um, with a series of pre-conference workshops on Tuesday with topics like advanced nurturing, scoring and grading, and analytics. Um, we also have the first ever, um, global Pardot trivia competition, um, where teams of both new and old, uh, friends in the ecosystem tested their knowledge, um, of the one marketing platform that we all know and love. Um, new this year, we also hosted Birds of a Feather round tables, um, bringing together discussion groups of, um, folks with similar interests in the ecosystem. So tables included things like moms in tech, veterans, Pardot newbies, um, and many, many more. Uh, we also held the first ever Pardot awards, the Pardreamies, um, which recognized the best and brightest examples of people that are just killing it on the platform. So each of these winners that you see on the screen has a unique compelling story of how they’ve managed to use Pardot, uh, to achieve their marketing goals. Um, these stories really deserve to be told. Our team had a really great time reviewing them. So by popular request, we’re going to be posting a “How It’s Made” blog series, um, spotlighting each of these winners. Um, and then this morning, we had our Demo Jam, um, where FeedOtter was was crowned the champion of apps, um, that can be used to extend the power of Pardot. Um, and, of course, we had lots and lots of swag. Um, so all the VVIP ticket holders, um, and some folks that we’ve been have been engaging on social media, um, received some awesome PardotDreamin swag. And the swag isn’t stopping anytime soon. Um, if you stay with us till the end of today’s session, um, we’re going to be doing yet another swag giveaway. Um, before we dive into the meat of today’s keynote, um, I wanted to say thank you and and just kind of pause and express the gratitude I feel kind of coming to the end of this conference. Um, I am so grateful on a personal level to be a part of such a supportive community where everyone has each other’s backs, is committed to continuous learning, and is genuinely excited about all things Pardot. Um, it remind this week reminded me of everything that I love about being a part of this Pardot and Salesforce, Ohana. Um, I specifically wanted to say thank you to all of our Pardot trailblazers. And by that phrase, I mean every single one of you in the audience. Um, it’s hard work to do what you do, showing up every day and bringing your experience and knowledge to the table for your organization, for the people that you encounter in this community. So thank you for being here, and thank you for all the things that you do. Um, also, I have to say thank you to our sponsors. By this point, you’ve probably seen this slide several dozen times, um, but I can’t say thank you to these folks enough because these are the companies that make this event possible, um, and that show up to support, uh, the Pardot community with the products and tools that they’re building to help us take things to the next level. Um, I also wanted to just say the extra special thank you to the Sercante team. Over I I just looked at our time tracking tool Harvest, and over 5,000 hours, um, between everyone on our team has gone into planning and executing this event. Um, so this effort was led by, um, Sarah Kloth, Amber, Christina, and Brendan on our team. Um, but every member of our 57 person person company, um, has touched this event and contributed in some way. So thank you for shuffling client calls, backing each other up, contributing brains, heart, and hustle, um, to make this special event come together in a really awesome way. So without further ado, um, let’s get in today’s into today’s keynote content. We’re going to be talking about one of my favorite topics, which is Pardot plus Slack. Next, we’ll be digging into a Q&A fire Q&A style fireside chat, uh, with two of Pardot’s most senior leaders, um, Mike Kostow,

Speaker 1: uh, and Meredith Brown. We’ll as promised, we’ll get into some swag giveaways with the very swag mother of Pardot herself, Gilda. Um, and then finally, we’re going to talk about some ideas about how to keep the energy

Speaker 0: and vibes from this conference going in ways that you can can engage with other, um, fellow Pardot trailblazers once we wrap up this conference. So to set the stage for Pardot and Slack, let’s see if a quick video.

Speaker 2: Move to telemedicine. We’re doing business over Zoom. Consumer goods companies are going direct to consumers via custom apps. Call centers are not going back into buildings. Workforces are now distributed everywhere. When we look at what it means to grow in this new normal, it’s the Slack-first Customer 360. With Slack, we have a completely reimagined way to work from anywhere. You can chat, share files, run video calls, align with colleagues, connect with partners and customers, all within the context of the work that needs to be done. Over 750,000 customers use Slack to get work done today. Imagine the explosion of productivity now we’ve joined forces. With Slack, sellers don’t just chat to close deals. Here, you’re seeing a mortgage lending team run their entire deal cycle, and it’s not just for employees. Slack Connect totally transforms how you work with people outside your company. So here, all the parties from the underwriter to the broker and the customer are brought into this deal room. It’s a channel to close this loan fast. In fact, companies that use Slack Connect close their deals four times faster, four times faster. Documents are shared. Multiple systems are connected. Einstein is recommending the next step to take. Workflows are automated, and the right party is getting the right alert at the right time. Slack is where deals close. Celebrate it. And in retail, marketers, their agencies, and commerce teams jam on a new campaign and shopping experience to support a product launch. What used to take hundreds of meetings and calls and wait. Was that nah. And calls and so much time to align on messages, creative content, the side experience, all happens in the feed. Emoji serve as approvals. Workflows are sped up. And if you’ve ever wanted to talk to your data, now you can. Ask Tableau about your forecast. Break it down by region. Find out why sales in certain areas are spiking and take action. Even site reliability engineers have their command center, ensuring the commerce experience scales to meet this heightened demand. Cyber Week runs on Slack.

Speaker 1: Woah.

Speaker 2: And after the launch frenzy, you got to eat, so order some pizza already for everyone. Yep. You can do that too. Slack is the front end for every experience. It’s a platform with over 500,000 custom apps used weekly. We’re blown away by all the use cases, like the community taking photos of receipts and submitting Workday expense reports or signing important documents with DocuSign, even publishing late breaking news. You name it, it’s happening in Slack, and we couldn’t be more excited for the future. This is your digital HQ for growth and how you succeed from anywhere. It’s a Slack-first world, and our future has never looked so bright.

Speaker 0: I don’t know about you guys, but that video has me super excited about the future of Slack and the platform. Slack and Pardot joining forces, there’s there’s just going to be a lot of great things coming out of that. Um, I’m thrilled to welcome Neha Shah and Prasanna Vijay Kumar to talk more about what it means to really be digital first, um, in these interesting times that we find ourselves in. It’s not just about translating what we do offline to digital channels. It’s truly a question of how we how do we transform and rethink the way that we’re doing work, um, and rethinking how we’re building relationships. And I think Slack and Pardot can be at the forefront of that. So Neha, I’ll pass the mic to you to to walk us through this.

Speaker 3: Thank you. Thank you, Andrea and Sercante team for this amazing week at Pardot. I’m Neha Shah, director of product marketing at Pardot. And I’m super excited to be here today to talk about how Pardot and Slack can help you grow relationships with your customers in this digital-first world. Since we will be talking about Pardot and Slack, we’ll be referencing to some of our future innovations today. So let’s take a look at the fun forward

Speaker 4: Greetings, everybody. My name is Pres Maxon. And here at Salesforce, we always strive to help, inform, educate, and, yes, entertain, which is why I’m going to deliver today’s safe harbor statement a little differently. So wherever you are, push your chair away from your desk or your table, give yourself some room to dance, and let’s rock out.

Speaker 5: Here comes the safe harbor statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. This presentation contains some forward looking statements about the company’s financial and operating results. Now that includes expected gap and non gap, financial and operating and non operating results and much, much more. So what does this mean for you? And third party trademarks are property of their owners. For more information, you can check out the slide.

Speaker 3: I loved it. Uh, thank you, Chris. And also huge thank you to all of you. Thank you for being our customers and partners. And most importantly, thank you for being part of this incredible Pardot community and inspiring us every day. When we think about the past year and a half in this new digital-first world, it has had core values that has helped us navigate, guide, and thrive. Values that both Sercante and Salesforce align very closely on, which are trust, innovation, and equality. Leaning on our values, we constantly try to transform all that we do so you have access to the latest and greatest technologies. For example, with Slack, you can continuously innovate, build, stay ahead in your industries, all while being digital first. But the question is, why is this innovation so crucial to B2B marketing? Based on what we have seen in last eighteen months in this digital-first tool, the speed of everything has accelerated, And there are no signs of things slowing down, from changes in customer expectations to shift in marketing tactics to the pace of work itself. And for B2B marketing, every buyer that is considering to buy your product or service expects this heightened level of digital personalization wherever they engage with your company. But the challenge is keeping up with the speed of digital and driving internal alignment to deliver on those customer expectations, that’s incredibly challenging. And this is because in B2B marketing, it all comes down to delivering connected moments across digital as well as connected human engagements across marketing, sales, and service teams. If you see each buyer, every buyer in an account is a unique person, and they want engagements they have with your team members and digital channels to feel connected and seamless. And if we thought this was challenging before, it’s even harder now, especially now that your teams and employees are all remote. In fact, even your customers and partners are all remote. So for example, the trust that you used to foster with your sales teams during in-person meetings or events, well, those meetings and events are now held virtually. The account selection and planning process that was done in a room, that’s now done over Slack and email. In fact, your headquarters are all digital first now. And during all of these changes, your customer expectations have just continued to rise. So you really can’t just translate what you’re doing pre-pandemic into a virtual setting. This actually requires a complete transformation of how you did things before. Transforming from a physical headquarter office to working from anywhere. Transforming from an in-person centric to being in-app centric. And while you’re transforming, you need to prioritize trust to meet the changing customer expectations. And Salesforce Customer 360 enables you to build that trust. Salesforce Customer 360 enables you to get that single shared view of your customers. And with the single shared view, your teams, not just marketing teams, but the extended sales and service teams are empowered to work as one from anywhere. And this is what helps deliver that seamless connected customer experiences. And Slack is key to connecting your employees, customers, partners, as well as systems. Slack is your digital headquarters. Slack connects the entire Customer 360 with every application and every workflow at your organization, creating the digital HQ with trust. So when you bring this rich information from Customer 360 into Slack, that’s where magic happens. It’s where your employees are discussing and debating. Teams are having insights to align, and that’s enabling them to make decisions better and faster. And this is what helps improve the experience for your customers, and that results into deepening relationship with your company. So the big question is, how does this translate to marketing, and how does this translate to your role? Well, for the digital headquarters for marketing, you will be able to accelerate your end-to-end marketing because Slack empowers marketers to drive revenue team orchestration. It does this with a single command center and with the power of Slack channels. Slack channels helps break down the silos and fosters closer collaboration not only within your marketing department, but across the organization with other teams like sales, service, commerce, and IT. Secondly, you’ll be able to get your work done faster by making partners part of your team with Slack Connect. Slack Connect enables you to bring external partners like agencies, even customers, and internal teams together all in one place. And finally, you will be able to optimize your marketing efficiency and truly free up the time to focus on strategic work by automating processes, sharing real-time business insights, and streamlining workflows like approvals or gathering feedback or even gathering data from other teams. Well, all of this sounds so exciting. So to learn more, let’s welcome Prasanna Vijayakumar who’s going to share insights on how Pardot and Slack will come together from a product perspective.

Speaker 6: Thank you, Neha. It’s great to be here with all of you today. I’m Prasanna Vijayakumar, senior director of product management on the Pardot team. Uh, I volunteered to sync through my section as well too, but they specifically asked me not to. And so I’ll be talking to you about how Pardot and Slack can be your new digital HQ for B2B marketing. Aligning a revenue teams is hard under normal circumstances when you’re all in the same office. But how difficult is that to do in a world where most employees don’t want to return to the office? The digital transformation Neha spoke to earlier isn’t just about how you work within marketing. You’re striving to provide a personalized empathetic engagement in this new normal. And that really starts by creating seamless account-centric experiences. That means connecting all of your revenue teams, sales, marketing, and service. Pardot and Slack bring that revenue orchestration to life, and it starts with visibility into buyer engage looks like inaction. Here we can see a notification based on a prospect’s engagement from a key account. The marketer reaches out to their sales lead as this was an important current customer they were trying to expand with. The salesperson recalls a recent issue that account has and pulls in their customer success counterpart, who mentions the customer is really happy with the resolution of their case. Well, this seems like a perfect opportunity to expand into this account. And this is what revenue team orchestration looks like with Slack and Pardot. And by the way, you can do this right now with the Winter ’22 release. Now this new normal extends beyond your team. In a hybrid world, we need to work and connect with partners in new ways. The hours you used to spend meeting need to be adapted to asynchronous ways of working, but that presents an opportunity to get to market even faster by bringing together your teams and tools you need into one place to accelerate your marketing. Slack Connect enables that acceleration by opening up the power of Slack across organizations. In fact, we use Slack Connect to work with our agency on this very presentation. We were able to share conversations, files, even apps in one secure place. Slack Connect makes it easy to build strong alignment even if your creative partners and teams are working across multiple time zones. Now connecting your revenue teams and partners is only half the battle. The explosion in marketing applications out in the ecosystem hasn’t slowed down, and you have so many systems in your tech stack. Salesforce research says the average marketer uses 21 different systems, and I suspect many of you watching this, you probably see that number is even higher. Pardot has made a lot of recent advancements to better connect with your marketing tech stack, from custom components in our email builders to external activity and Engagement Studio. And now with Slack and Pardot, you can take it a step further with workflows that connect to your systems and your people. In the future, you’ll be able to use the Pardot app in Slack to create workflows that not only span your revenue teams, but other applications in your MarTech stack. Let’s see what this could look like. In this example, we get a notification of activity in a high-value asset into a Slack channel. Then we can reach out to another app in your marketing tech stack, like Demandbase, to pull in additional account insights to share with the team, where you can then choose to wait and take another action before adding the prospect to an existing Pardot nurture program. And that’s the power of Pardot in Slack, connecting your people, connecting your partners, and connecting your systems because when work flows, relationships grow. And with that, I’ll hand it back to Andrea for our fireside chat.

Speaker 0: Awesome. Thank you, Neha and Pras. Um, it’s incredible to think about the potential of Slack together, and I can’t wait to put this to work, um, both at Cercante because we’re obsessed with Slack, uh, and also for the customers that we work with. Um, PardotDreamin has been incredible. These last three days have been so great, and I can’t think of a better way to wrap up the week than with a fireset fireside chat with two of my favorite, um, folks from Salesforce HQ, um, Mike Kostow,

Speaker 1: uh, and Meredith Brown. Welcome, both of you. Oh, I think Mike’s muted. I see lips moving, though.

Speaker 7: Hey, Andrea. Nice to be here with you.

Speaker 0: Great to have you guys here. Um, so the first question that I wanted to ask you

Speaker 1: is Andrea. Am I here? Am I am I

Speaker 0: right here? We’re here. We’re with us.

Speaker 1: Great to see you.

Speaker 0: Great to

Speaker 1: see you. Someone had to be muted. It was either me or Meredith, so I I took the one for the two.

Speaker 7: I’m glad it was you, not me this time.

Speaker 0: Um, cool. A lot has changed for me both in the last year. Um, Mike, you owned the Pardot business for seven years, and you’re now leading the entire Marketing Cloud business over at Salesforce. And there have been some pretty significant products and business changes, not to mention just general changes in the world over the last eighteen months.

Speaker 1: What? Nothing has happened over the last eighteen months. It’s been very boring.

Speaker 0: Yeah. You know? If you blink, you miss it kind of thing. But can you tell me a little bit more just from your perspective on how the business has evolved over the last year? I guess, let let’s go that type first.

Speaker 1: Sure. Um, well, first of all, thank you for having me and Meredith. I know Meredith was able to do the keynote, which is great, and I’m excited to be here with you and all the Pardot-ians here today helping to close out. I also just want to say, you know, huge thank you to this entire community. I think, you know, one of the things that makes Pardot so special is this incredible community that surrounds it. Um, and I remember, Andrew, when you put together this event last year, we were just amazed at the number of people that wanted to participate in it, um, and how impactful it was. And so it’s really great that we’ve got this event to bring Pardot-ians from all over the world together. So thank you for doing that.

Speaker 0: Yeah. We were amazed by the response last year too. Um, and it’s it’s great to see the community come together and do what it does best, which is share knowledge and back each other up, um, and really appreciate you guys making time to be a part of it.

Speaker 1: Yeah. And let let’s not lose sight of how special the community is that surrounds Pardot. It’s it’s really great to see. So I just want to start with that and a big thanks for having me. Yeah. I think look. A lot has changed over the course of the last, say, year and year and a half. Um, you know, for me, as I talk to customers in my new role running the Marketing Cloud, you know, there’s a lot of interesting themes that come up, you know, but the first one is really around, you know, digital transformation and digital acceleration. And a lot of customers who had intended going into the pandemic, you know, to make this shift to digital, to really think about digital marketing as a core part of their business, They were really forced to accelerate that, um, very quickly in order for their businesses not just to Um, and so that’s been a a huge theme for us. And as Meredith and I think about our product investments across the Marketing Cloud portfolio, you know, we’re doing everything we can to make sure we’re helping these customers to be able to find unique ways to connect with their customers and grow their business. You know, the other thing that’s really changed over the course of the last year and a half is the fact that we’re all sitting here on a call dialed in and having these conversations. And, you know, I think marketers, um, which is supported from the state of marketing report that we that we pulled, uh, last year where we pulled 8,000 marketers all over the world, like, marketers are really embracing this concept of remote work. Um, and, you know, even though we now at Salesforce have the option to go back to the office, a lot of people are still really choosing to, you know, to work in this remote way. And what we’ve proven is that we, both as an organization and also as individuals, can be incredibly productive, uh, working like this. But it has also forced us to rethink what are the platforms that we need in order to stay connected in this world where, you know, we’re operating digitally and and not physically or operating in a in a hybrid way? Um, and, you know, Slack to me, and I think Neha did a good job of articulating the value to our customers, has been an incredible way, not just for our customers to see value from the Salesforce platform, but also us as leaders to be able to stay connected through all the changes going on over the course of the last year and a half. You know, as an example, when I came into this role running Marketing Cloud, my teams are in Atlanta, San Francisco, Seattle, Tel Aviv, Canada. You know, Slack has really been the glue that has helped to keep us together. You know, I’ve been running this business now for nine months. I only first met most of the people on my team last week, but I felt like I know everyone because we’re incredibly connected. I can keep those relationships alive with Slack. So I think that really that shift to, you know, remote, that shift to hybrid is something that marketers are really embracing, and they’re really thinking about the platforms that allow them to do that successfully.

Speaker 0: We’re we’re seeing a lot of those same changes both internally at Sercante and with our customers customers as well. Um, Meredith, a lot has changed for you too. So you were the head of, um, all of Pardot’s product strategy for the last five years, um, and now you’re kind of in the driver’s seat of the entire Pardot business. So how how are you seeing customers’ businesses in the competitive landscape changing?

Speaker 7: Yeah. I mean, I think it’s a lot of what Mike said. It’s, you know, finding new ways to connect with customers. You know, it’s really interesting because first and foremost, I’m a product person. Right? And so when we’re all going through this experience together around how do we work remotely, how do we collaborate asynchronously, what are those tools that my team needed in order to continue to ship products and make sure that we were working really well with our design team and our engineering team. I mean, those are similar challenges that marketers have. Right? I mean, how do you work with your agencies? How do you collaborate with your sales teams? And I think that this experience has given us a lot of empathy in terms of thinking about how can we evolve our product to adapt to this new way of working. You know, like I said on Wednesday, well, what is it that marketers really needed this time? And I think it’s been as hard as it has been during the pandemic, and I think we have to acknowledge that it was a really hard time for lots of folks. I think it also created a really interesting opportunity for innovation and thinking about doing things differently. And, you know, thinking about leading this business, that’s what I’m most excited about is, like, okay. Well, we’re coming out of a really terrible time, but we’re also have so much opportunity in front of us to think differently, to think about technology in a way, to think about collaboration in a new way. And, personally, I’m super excited about that.

Speaker 1: I agree with everything Meredith said, Andrea. And I think it’s really exciting that marketers have really led through this as well. Um, and, you know, you look at this data marketing report and it tells us that 75% of marketers are going to shift permanently to either remote or hybrid work. Like, instead of instead of pushing back against this change, marketers really embraced it, um, and are are are able to lead. And I think that’s really going to pay dividends for them in their respective careers and also for their businesses.

Speaker 7: And I think this event’s a perfect example of that. Right? Like, look at how we’re looking to connect with the Pardot community in a different way and using all of these new platforms to just get creative and make sure that we’re continuing to get those messages out and continuing to build community. Um, this is a perfect example of how teams are adapting.

Speaker 0: Yeah. I think the silver I think the silver lining of this pandemic is that it accelerated the move to digital by, I don’t I don’t know how much, at least a decade. Um, kind of forced our hands as marketers and forced our hands as leaders to, um, speed up kind of what what could have been inevitable next steps.

Speaker 1: And you can wear slippers all day. So it’s a combination of those two things.

Speaker 0: It’s magic. And my my leggings have gotten more use than any article pulled up in my closet. Um, so, Mike, I’m not going to beat around the bush with this next question. Um, when I heard that you’re moving to become the GM of Marketing Cloud, I got I got a little sad for a second, and I thought, okay. Kostow was leaving Pardot. So did you leave Pardot? Is Pardot part of the Marketing Cloud? Um, can you tell me kind of what’s the story here?

Speaker 1: I’ve never left Pardot. Um, so just by way of introduction, because I’m not sure how many folks who are watching know all the background. You know, before I took this role running the Marketing Cloud, uh, I ran Pardot for for six years, first as the COO to the co-founder out of Blitzer and then as GM. Um, when I took this role as GM of Marketing Cloud, this includes all of our marketing cloud portfolio. Right? All of our MarTech. Everything from our messaging and journeys product, personalization with Interaction Studio, our customer data platform, uh, our marketing intelligence platform with Datorama, and, Andrea, Pardot. So Pardot is very much within my purview now just as it was before. Um, and I think Meredith would even tell you that, uh, our relationship has only grown and strengthened. She gets to talk to me daily where before it may have only been once or twice a week. And as I talk to customers, you know, this this part of the portfolio and Pardot is incredibly important. Um, and I reflect back on Dreamforce. So we had Dreamforce. I’ll do a quick plug here for the Dreamforce content. You can still pick it up on Salesforce Plus. Um, but we did a a a keynote or a main show for Dreamforce, and we told the stories of three great customers, uh, HBO Max, Amazon Business, and oh my god. I can’t remember the third customer who we talked about. Meredith, you’re going to have to refresh my memory on that. But the point of what I was going to say is is, you know, we we showcased Pardot prominently as part of a part of that story to tell how Amazon Business is transforming their business and growing Amazon Business, you know, using the Pardot and Marketing Cloud platform. So not only do I have responsibility, Andrea, for Pardot as part of my new job running Marketing Cloud, You know, I and Meredith continue to find ways to elevate Pardot within our Marketing Cloud narrative and be able to tell the story and the impact that it’s having in our customers. And I think a really good example of that is the story that we told at Dreamforce around Amazon Business.

Speaker 0: Yeah. I definitely tuned into Dreamforce for those customer stories. They were they were really powerful. And I was also impressed to see that you guys awarded the first ever

Speaker 1: Pardot Momentum, SurveyMonkey. Sorry. That’s the third customer.

Speaker 7: SurveyMonkey. I knew you’d get there eventually, Mike.

Speaker 1: I’d get there eventually. It’s been a long couple months.

Speaker 0: Um, but I was also excited to see that you, uh, gave out the per the first golden hoodie to a Pardot trailblazer. So, uh, recognizing Ben Lamoth for all awesome things these days in the community.

Speaker 1: That was super exciting. I hope Ben is watching here, and that was something that was not even uh, he did not even know going into it. So that was a total surprise, which I think you could see on his face if you go back and watch the video. Um, but, you know, Pardot was prominently featured in that Marketing Cloud main show. Uh, and it was great to see one telling the story of Amazon business, but two recognizing an incredible part of this community, uh, in giving Ben Lamoth that golden hoodie. So it was a great it was probably one of the highlights for me professionally over the course of this year, you know, was to see the look on Ben’s face when we gave him that hoodie and help to put it on. Yeah.

Speaker 7: I also want to just jump in there for one second. And, you know, Mike taking over Marketing Cloud, for for me and for the Pardot team, that’s huge. I mean, we continue to invest in Pardot. I mean, you look at all the investments that we did this year, all of the innovation. It is the cornerstone of our B2B solution for B2B marketers. But within Marketing Cloud, we have so much opportunity to bring in other solutions and complement. And I think that opportunity is just so incredible to really think about Pardot as that center of gravity for the teams, but be able to pull in the rest of our platform and to do that in a really strategic way. Um, that’s why I’m really excited for Mike to take that role because I know we’re probably his favorite children still even though he he likes to, uh, say he doesn’t have any favorites, but, you know, absolutely. I love all

Speaker 1: of my children equally.

Speaker 7: All of your children equally.

Speaker 0: When you read between the lines, it sounds like Pardot’s your favorite, but we won’t quote you on that.

Speaker 8: We just keep you out

Speaker 0: with us here.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 0: So we we already talked quite a bit about the product this week. I mean, that was pretty much all we talked about all week. Um, so I’m going to ask you for about something that’s a little bit tangential to that. Um, I want to ask you about, um, what it takes to build a career in the ecosystem. So the job market for Pardot talent is hotter than it’s ever been. Um, businesses are talking a lot about the great resignation, ways to attract and retain awesome talent. This kind of intersects with what you were talking about with the changing world of work. Um, and I think a lot of talented people are just realizing that they have options and they have an opportunity to pursue new and interesting work that they’re really passionate about. If you could kind of go back to your earlier career self, um, is there any wisdom that you would share, um, with your past self about building a successful career in business, specifically in the Salesforce ecosystem?

Speaker 1: Yeah. I think you define the great resignation really well. I think, you know, a lot of people I talk to who come to me for career advice, you know, are looking for purpose in what they do. And, you know, it’s causing people to question where they are in their life and with their careers and what it is they want to do in light of the fact that we’ve gone through this pandemic over the course of the last year and a half. So, you know, I think everyone should be asking themselves that question more than once a year. Am I doing what I’m passionate about? Do I feel challenged? Do I feel like I’m learning? Do I feel like I’m working with and around people that I like and I respect? Um, I think, you know, to me, it has to be all of the above. Um, and I think we’ve given people with Pardot, uh, a great opportunity to build a skill set which is incredibly marketable right now. I also think there’s tons within the Salesforce ecosystem that can allow people to build their careers and go in a number of different directions, which is great. I go back to, you know, my career, and I think one of the things that I’ve kept as a theme is really having what I call a personal board of directors who I use when I’m at a decision point in my career. And I would encourage everyone to go and think about who are those four or five people that you know, who respect you, who are going to give you objective and unfiltered advice and guidance, and use them as your own board of directors. Go to them when you’re deciding whether or not you want to make a shift in your career. Go to them when you’re trying to get that promotion. Go to them when you’re thinking about, you know, making making a move into something that is uncomfortable. I have tried to do that throughout my career, and every time I’ve been been in one of those different pivot points, I’ve gone back to, say, three or five of these people and said, hey. What do you think? Um, and that advice has been invaluable. And so I think it’s a really good exercise to go through, especially as people go through great resignation, you know, to think about first, you know, what is it? What is your purpose? What is it you want to do? What are you passionate about? And find those people that you know and respect, uh, to be your personal board of directors to help give you that advice and help you think about how you can execute against the plan. Meredith, anything you’d add to that?

Speaker 7: Yeah. One one thing that I know we talked about a lot this week is one of our favorite terms, growth mindset. Um, and, you know, I think it’s true. It’s like all of these opportunities do open up an opportunity to to think differently, to try something new. Um, you know, my I myself, I took on a a new role in the middle of the pandemic, and it’s always hard. It’s uncomfortable. I think that, you know, change can be uncomfortable, but it’s also super rewarding too. Um, and so I would just encourage folks to, like, if you have been interested in something, like, what do you have to lose? Like, it will be a little uncomfortable maybe in the beginning, but there’s always a community behind you. Mike has his trusted advisers. There’s a whole Pardot community. Um, so I would just use opportunities like this to find your network and find that sounding board because, you know, there really are limitless amount of things that you can do. You don’t have to be stuck doing something you’re not super passionate about. Um, and it could just be a different role in the Pardot ecosystem. You know? Uh, we’ve had plenty of folks on my team who’ve gone from more of a customer success role into product management, but they’ve stayed in the Pardot ecosystem. And that was a great way for them to foray what they knew about this product and knew about the MarTech ecosystem and try out a new role in their career.

Speaker 0: That theme of, like, the growth mindset and kind of looking at everything through that lens. One of my favorite books personally is a book called The Art of Possibility, and it talks about, like, when you’re faced with a challenge, instead of kind of treating it as a yes or no decision, like, can I do this? Thinking about, like, what would it take like, what would need to be true for this to work? Um, and if if a and b don’t seem like great options, coming up with option c, d, and e, and figuring out how to how you can use everything to drive growth. Um, and I think that’s just a really great frame of mind to go into just about anything.

Speaker 1: And I think you’re a great example of it, Andrea. You started Sercante. Not not to flip this around and not be the the question asking the questions and you answering them, but I think you’re a great example. You went out on a limb and started Sercante. Back in Pardot was a lot smaller. And and, you know, look look at the look at the growth you’ve realized both, you know, personally and professionally and and through this incredible conference that we’re running here. Like, it’s pretty amazing to see.

Speaker 0: It’s definitely not what I had envisioned on day one setting out that we’d be fifty seven two fifty seventeen over strong in four different countries.

Speaker 7: But You’re

Speaker 1: supposed to say this is exactly what I envisioned, Andrew. You’re saying this is exactly how I planned it. One other thing I would add to, you know, at Salesforce, we go through this exercise every year, which Meredith and I just spent the last week with our leadership team going through, we call it, V2MOM. And that’s the the business plan that we build for our respective parts of, you know, our portfolio. For me, I’m doing it for the Marketing Cloud, and Meredith’s going to build the V2MOM for Pardot. That is our Vision, you know, our vision for what we’re responsible for, the Values that guide us, the Methods or what we’re going to do, Obstacles, what’s in our way, and the Metrics and our measures and how we measure ourself. Um, and that’s a good exercise to go through if you’re running a business. I think, you know, everyone should should have something similar to think about the strategy and how they execute against it. But I also think it’s a really good thing if you think about your career to build that personal V2MOM. You know, what is my vision? What is it I want to do over time? Not in the next year, but, you know, my career aspirations more broadly. What are the values that guide me? And then what are the things or the methods that I’m going to do? What am I going to execute on over the course of the next twelve months to help me to realize that vision? Um, and it’s a really healthy exercise. And then as you go talk to these board of directors, one of the references that I gave, you know, you’ve got something that you can put in front of them and get them to react to and give you advice. But, also, I think help crystallize your own thinking as to, you know, what it is you want to do, you know, with your career and with your life.

Speaker 0: Framework and just kind of a a very logical thinking through it and, um, getting to the heart of what it is that you’re you’re setting out to do. Um, I’d love to to ask you guys a little bit more about Slack, which is the main topic of our keynote here today. Um, I’m super excited about how Pardot and Slack will work together in the future. Um, at Cercante, Slack really is the backbone of how we do just about everything. Um, the video that we watched used the phrase, like, the front end of how work gets done, and that truly is how we use Slack internally. Um, can you talk a little bit more about how you see Slack empowering teams to work in new ways and maybe comment on how Salesforce is using Slack internally?

Speaker 7: Yeah. I can I can take that one? Um, you know, I had the opportunity when we were going through this, um, at Salesforce thinking about, well, what is our strategy with Slack across all of our different products? Um, and what was really interesting about marketing is something that Pras shared right in the, uh, keynote around all of the different MarTech systems that are out there, all of the different, uh, solutions that help marketers get their team get their work done. And, you know, we’ve always leaned into this notion of the platform. Right? So how do we connect, uh, all of the workflows, all of the systems? But with Slack, you know, those values are very much aligned. And so if we can think about Slack as that engagement layer where work’s getting done, where you can, you know, fire off your approval workflows, and it doesn’t matter where the data lives or what system it is. It’s just an incredibly powerful way to get your teams engaged, um, in in the workflow, right, and to have one engagement layer that’s allowing you to get that work going. And that’s what I’m super excited about. I mean, Pardot is in a really important part of the overall tech stack, but it’s not the only one too. Right? There’s are there are other solutions that we know you’re using to get your work done. And I think we have a very bold, uh, ambition and vision to bring that all to Slack. Um, and I think that we’re seeing it. Right? Like you said, Andrea, that’s where the work’s getting done. And I think more and more, we’ll be pushing a lot of those experiences into that workflow.

Speaker 1: Yeah. I completely agree with Meredith. Um, the other thing I would add is we look at the Marketing Cloud. There’s a lot of different products that make up the Marketing Cloud. And this gives us a unique opportunity to use Slack as the system of engagement or, for lack of a better term, the front door of the Marketing Cloud. As marketers are using a number of our different products, um, across the portfolio, Slack becomes the place in which they engage. They work not only across the different marketing teams, but also with our agencies as well. And so we’re really leaning in hard from a Marketing Cloud perspective, To hear you, Andrea, is a great example that tons of our customers are using Slack already, and it’s become their digital HQ. We see a great opportunity to really start to infuse a lot of a lot of what makes Slack great into our Marketing Cloud portfolio and reduce the complexity that exists in our products today. The other thing that I would say is it’s really transformed the culture of Salesforce. You know, we pivoted very quickly as a company after we bought Slack to using the product. And quite frankly, like, there wasn’t significant usage across Salesforce of Slack. It was done really in pockets mostly on on, um, tech and product teams. But it it has become really the place where we work now. And everything from if I have a customer meeting next week, an account team is creating a channel for us to collaborate on that, to my leadership team sharing information around what’s going on, to how we are evolving. Our V2MOM is is done in Slack. The Dreamforce keynote that we did for Marketing Cloud was done in Slack. Our state of marketing report work that we did as a marketing team with our agency was done in Slack. You know, it’s just become really, like, the operating system of Salesforce and for a lot of our customers, and that has happened very, very quickly. Um, and so, you know, as I think about it as as a leader, like, I’m not really sure what I would have been able to do without it, uh, in in light of the fact that we were not able to see each other in person.

Speaker 0: It’s one of those things once you start it and you get really comfortable with it, imagining life without it is almost impossible. Like, imagining life without email or life without texting. Like, there there were was a life before those things, but it’s really hard to remember what that felt like. Um, I I feel that way about Slack.

Speaker 7: Well, it was interesting. There was, like, a I think there was a tipping point, and I even noticed it this morning when I was kind of getting going for the day. I didn’t go into my email. I went into Slack. That was the first thing that I opened up when I started my day. And I think that, you know, that was a big shift

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 7: From where we were a year and a half ago. I would have immediately gone to my email. That was kind of driving my work. And that’s I mean, I’m probably in Slack 75% of the time and emails 25% of the time now. Um, so it’s really just completely transformed how we do our work.

Speaker 1: When I get emails now, I ask the the sender, why is this not in Slack? There’s no there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be bringing all of those communications into Slack.

Speaker 0: I’m 100% on board. That’s how we operate internally here too. Um, and with kind of all we talked a little bit about, like, pandemic changes, pushes towards digital, that sort of being an accelerant to companies going more digital. And it’s been interesting to see that while there’s a massive push in that direction, there’s also kind of a parallel trend pushing in the other way. So, uh, marketing teams looking at offline communications and more physical experiences and how they incorporate that into their overall marketing. Um, we’re also seeing heightened concerns over privacy, um, becoming a pretty big theme, um, and that was one of the the keynote topics from earlier in the week. Consumers basically just saying, like, no. I don’t want you to know about me and my buying preferences, and, no. I don’t want an algorithm to decide what I get to see and what I get to buy. Um, so as a consumer, I I love the idea of locking down some of that data and greater privacy and control over what data is shared. Um, as a marketer, though, I I have to admit that I feel some some dread over that. It’s a pretty big change, um, especially in a a world where data has really been the backbone of how we how we build our content and personalization strategies to date. Um, how are the two of you thinking about data privacy, and what should marketers be doing to prepare for that shift?

Speaker 1: I’m I mean, I think the first thing is marketers and brands are going to have to earn the trust of their customers. And I believe very strongly that once they are able to earn that trust, then consumers or businesses, depending on who you’re marketing to, are going to be be much more willing to share more information about themselves that they can have and engage in those personalized experiences. You know, the the customers, Andrea, that I talk to are asking a lot of the questions that you ask right now, like, what does Salesforce think we should do in light of all of these changes? And for a lot of them, it’s really, how do I build a first-party data asset? And the combination of having a first-party data asset with being able to earn the trust of your customers will then allow you to start to develop really, really strong and what I think are going to be lifelong relationships with those customers. Um, but to me, it it’s grounded in trust. And, you know, as a marketer, you’re going to have to really think about how am I earning the trust of my customers because that’s going to give me the license to be able to deliver those great experiences.

Speaker 0: I love that.

Speaker 7: I think that’s a really good point, like, from a strategy perspective. And then it’s, you know, how do you back it up with tactics too, you know, like, actual marketing that you’re doing and different types of content, um, different types of data that you’re you’re really leaning into? What are all those first-party signals that you can get? So I think it’s, you know, the less reliance on the the email and the opens and finding other ways to engage, you know, other types of landing pages, ancillary content. Um, I think those are going to be really important. And then, you know, how do you use your analytics to just get smarter about segments of your audiences, not individuals, and really start thinking about, like, cohorts of audiences you need to go after. So I think that there will definitely be some workflow changes as well as marketers adapt to this this new world.

Speaker 1: And I think about the brands that deliver incredible experiences to me. I’m more than willing to share with them. I have trust to share with them my information so they can tell me what that next best experience would be. Um, and I try to put myself in their shoes and think about that also from a perspective of a marketer. It really comes it starts with building that trust.

Speaker 0: I love the phrase earn their trust because I think a lot of how digital marketing has empowered to date, the general population wasn’t super aware of how that was all happening. So but the average consumer may not have known what it means to cookie your device and cookie a browser or anything like that. Um, but now you have to kind of tell them in plain English and get them to say, yes. I consent. Um, and that that’s a a a big trust barrier to to get through. And Meredith, I love what you were saying too about analytics and moving beyond, like, things like email opens. Like, it it’s time to evolve beyond that, um, and this is kind of forcing our forcing our hand a little bit in a in a good but daunting way.

Speaker 7: Yeah. And I think, you know, data science too. Right? So, like, do you have the right tools and solutions in place to adapt? You know, the right analytics platform, the right data science capabilities because those insights are going to be more and more important.

Speaker 0: So on the topic of changes that are coming down the pike and things that are happening in the future, um, what are each of your marketing predictions on kind of what’s coming in the future and how those will impact marketers?

Speaker 7: Well, I think we have to go back to this idea of personalization. Right? And in humanizing the experiences. So as much as we have the push and pull around privacy, I think consumers still want those

Speaker 1: personalized experiences. They still want to feel like the brands

Speaker 7: are speaking to them. And incredible challenge and opportunity for marketers to adapt to that. I mean, I know for for me and my team, account based strategies are just so top of mind. So for many of our customers and probably for many of the people on the call, and so I know we’ll continue to invest in that and and look at how we can help marketers get to the right businesses to build those, uh, human contacts. Um, and then, you know, the last thing that I’ll mention, I know Mike probably has some he wants to add to, but, you know, this notion of data and signals is something that we spend a lot of time talking about. And so, know, we’ve all heard about CDPs, but what is a B2B CDP look like? I think, um, that’s going to be really essential as we’re looking at new signals to come into the ecosystem to really help marketers reach those customers.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Plus one, everything Meredith said. A couple other things that I see, uh, which are impacting, you know, our product strategy. Also, I think marketers more broadly. You know, one is data unification. So, you know, there’s all this data being generated, especially with acceleration to digital marketing. You know, really, how do all how does all this come together in a single place? Um, and customer data platforms, I think, will continue to be incredibly important both on the b to c and on the b to b side is a single source of truth for marketers. The other thing that I see is continued investment and proliferation of MarTech applications. You know, the Lumascape that, you know, once had a couple thousand MarTech vendors now I think has 8,000. Um, and the amount of funding that continues to flow into this market, it is really incredible. And I I see that continuing to expand over the coming years. You know? And we at Salesforce, as we think about, how can we be a platform which allows all of these great products, you know, to to be a part of that platform and to extend the power of Salesforce. You know, I think of it as a good thing that there’s more of these MarTech applications out there. The other thing that’s very top of mind, particularly for our our customers outside The US, is data residency. A lot of a lot of countries and thus a lot of companies are now thinking about how they have data resident in their respective markets, and that’s certainly influencing, um, how Meredith and I and our other product leaders are thinking about our product strategy.

Speaker 0: A lot of change on the horizon. That must be the one the one constant for better or for worse.

Speaker 1: It’s not going to be it’s not going to be boring, Andrea. I’ll tell you that.

Speaker 0: No. It will not be. Um, and you’re you’re both in charge of keeping Pardot and Marketing Cloud on the edge edge and thinking about the future and all the all the changes that are coming down the pipe for your customers. Um, how do you how do you keep a pulse on what the community needs and stay grounded in, like, what your customers are looking for in the here and now? Kind of balance, like, what people are asking for now with what’s what’s coming up with the future.

Speaker 7: Well, it’s got to be events like this. Right? I’m I’m looking at the chat window. I’m seeing what people are saying. Um, you know, the trailblazer community. Uh, of course, we’re we’re looking at the, uh, comments that are coming in. But, you know, I think, uh, as a product leader, I’ve really encouraged my team to really listen with empathy and spend time with customers. And, you know, we even have some metrics around, like, you know, have so many customer meetings per month or per quarter because it’s really important to get out there and go across industries too, um, and really understand what’s happening in manufacturing, what’s happening with high-tech, what’s happening in health and life sciences. And so, really, just the more conversations we have as a product team, that helps us become better informed around what’s really important to our customers. Um, and then it comes back to the network too. So, you know, I think building a strong network of partners. Andrea, I consider you one of our strong partners as well, and just keeping those relationships strong and really just listening with empathy and understanding what’s happening in the industry.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Look. I think Meredith said it really well. You know, the more time that we can spend not in internal meetings and in front of our customers and talking to our community with folks like you, Andrea, and the people who are participating here, We’ve also got a very sophisticated, um, go to market team as well, and that’s, I think, the third channel. If you think about talking to our customers, we’re talking to our partners, we’re talking to our community. We’re also speaking, um, and listening to what our field teams are telling us, um, what they’re seeing and hearing from our customers, but also in the competitive environment. And so it’s really about, I think Meredith said it really well, um, listening with empathy and spending as much time, um, with all of these different constituencies as we can to understand, you know, where the opportunity is, what and what’s happening in the market.

Speaker 0: Well, I think the two of you being here and making time to be a part of our dreaming is proof that you guys are living exactly what you just said, which is spending time with the community, listening, being a part of, um, um, kind of all that the community is talking about. Um, so I really appreciate it.

Speaker 1: We’re just here for the swag, Andrea. That’s the only reason. Would you be a blessing?

Speaker 0: We’ll get you swag. Um, but thank you guys both for your your candor in this session, um, and for all that you’re doing to take Pardot on to the future. Um, we’re really excited about it, um, and really appreciate having you guys here today.

Speaker 7: No. Thank you, Andrea. Thank you for all your leadership.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you, and congratulations on another hugely successful PardotDreamin.

Speaker 0: And so the next thing on our agenda, um, which I know you guys have all been waiting for, is more swag. Can we go to the can we advance to the swag slide and bring, um, our fairy swag mother up? Hey, Gilda.

Speaker 8: Hello. Hello. How are you?

Speaker 0: Good. Um, so it’s time to announce the winners of our PardotDreamin challenge. Um, as you guys for those of you who have been playing along probably know, um, you’ve gotten points for engaging with different parts of the platform, um, so far this week. Um, so Gilda is here to bestow some swag on some lucky winners. Do you do we still have you on the line, Gilda?

Speaker 8: You you do. You can you hear me?

Speaker 0: Yep. I can hear you. Okay. I’m a little I’m tiny to lag you, but I can see you now. You look great in purple, by the way.

Speaker 8: Thank you. You’ll have to I’ll have to apologize for my connection. We had a storm this week, so the connection’s still a little wonky.

Speaker 0: Yeah. We had a couple couple folks in the Boston area get taken out by that storm, so can we can release that on this team.

Speaker 8: So as Andrea mentioned, the moment you guys have all been waiting for so over the course of this exciting week, attendees from all over the globe, because I’ve been watching, I’ve been popping in sessions here and there, and I’ve been looking at some of the challenge scores. You guys have been blazing trails throughout the event, visiting sponsor booths, attending sessions, participating in chats, networking, all to rank up as many points as you can. So now it’s time to see who will be crowned our grand champion of PardotDreamin’ and let me tell you these winners are truly getting the swag box of the year. I am definitely jealous of what’s in the box and what you guys are getting. Um so without further ado, I was going to see if my Pardragon would help me but I can’t figure out a place to put him so he’s going to be on the side. Um so everyone hold on to your chairs, hold on to the table. So our swag winners for the activity challenge, first winner is Dave Frey. So Dave, I don’t know if you’re on, you are one of the grand champions of PardotDreamin’, so let’s give a round of applause for Dave. The second winner is Vikrant, I hope I’m pronouncing your name correctly. Third winner is Shalini, fourth winner is Priyanka, fifth winner is Sunil. So you guys are the new grand champions of PardotDreamin, so if you guys are on congratulations, congratulations for taking the PardotDreamin challenge. Um and last but not least last but not least we also have honorable mentions for general swag boxes Not to say that you’re not getting a swanky swag box, but, um, you guys will also be getting, you know, a little surprise box here and there as well. These three winners are Andrew Epperson, Molly Eng, and Sarah Empson. So congratulations to all of our winners. Congratulations to all of our attendees. I truly enjoyed being part of ParDreamin, and I hope you guys too, and we will definitely see you next year. So now I am going to pass it over back to you, Andrea.

Speaker 0: Thank you for bestowing some swag on some of our lucky attendees. I feel like you would bring joy and awesomeness everywhere you go. So thank you very much.

Speaker 8: Fairy godmother. I’m the fairy, um, godmother.

Speaker 0: Yeah. Um, yeah. We’re really excited to get that those all shipped out. Um, so if you’re sitting here wondering where are we going from here with this conference, um, I wanted to suggest a couple of other ways to kind of take this momentum forward, um, and connect. Um, if you haven’t heard about it already, um, The Spot for Pardot Jobs, it’s jobs.thespotforpardot.com. Um, highly recommend checking that out. You can post jobs. You can browse jobs. Um, whether you’re looking for your next gig or your next team member from this ecosystem, that’s going to be kind of our central talent hub. Um, so please check that out. Um, we also have a Slack community, um, very on topic with this, um, presentation, but it’s called Kardashians. Uh, it was started by the one and only Sarah McNamara, um, and is now managed by Erin Duncan. But if you’d like to join the conversation and, uh, be a part of our community driven Slack group, um, we have a link here on the screen for, um, a form you can fill out to to join as a member. We also have courses, um, at https://www.google.com/search?q=cercante.com. So if you’d like to keep the learning going, we have, um, long training courses, six-week sessions, um, and also some mini workshops, um, that you can check out. Um, so be sure to to take a peek at that. Um, and then a few just general housekeeping reminders. We’re going to be sending surveys out about, um, some of the specific events that you attended, but then also the conference as a whole. We really appreciate any time you can take to give us feedback on what worked, what didn’t, what you’d like to see as part of next year’s event. Um, one thing we’ve heard a few times is that some folks would like to see this be in person next year. Um, so if you feel that way, definitely definitely let us know on the survey. Uh, but we want to keep growing this and keep making it better. Um, so please help us do that, um, so that we can expand our impact next year. We also have a digital swag bag, um, going out to attendees from our sponsors. Um, so keep an eye out for your for in your inboxes, um, for instructions on how to access your digital swag, um, box. And to answer our most asked question across all of our sessions, um, yes, we recorded almost everything in this amazing week. Um, the sessions are available live in the platform now, so you can go navigate to past sessions, watch the recordings. We’ll also be uploading these to YouTube, um, making a playlist of all of them. Um, so we’re going to make sure this great content gets as many eyeballs as possible, um, so that we can all learn from the sessions that you were able to attend and the ones that you that you couldn’t attend. Um, so one last thank you to kind of wrap things up. Thank you to all of the Pardot Trailblazers, all of you who have been here all week, um, participating, networking, growing, and learning from each other. Um, thank you to the Sercante team, uh, for putting together an amazing event, And thank you to all of these sponsors who made this possible. Um, really hope all of you have a great weekend, um, and thanks for being here, guys.