Vendor Cooties
There is a deeply ingrained, culturally accepted reflex in cybersecurity: Keep vendor sales and marketing people at arm’s length during any serious evaluation or decision. Matt Calligan calls it “vendor cooties,” and in this episode he argues the assumptions underneath it have not been true for a long time—and that they are actively costing practitioners. Before the internet, vendors held a genuine information advantage, and that asymmetry created real incentives to mislead. So the community built a wall. But buyers have become more educated now, AI has made comparative analysis table stakes, and the people working inside these companies have had to become genuine category experts just to get a meeting. Gianna Whitver, co-founder and CEO of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society, and Charles Gold, a four-time cybersecurity CMO, join Matt to examine where the stigma came from, what practitioners leave on the table by keeping vendors out of the room, where AI as the “objective consultant” falls short, and what a healthier vendor-practitioner relationship actually looks like.
- “Vendor cooties” was a rational immune response to a problem that has largely gone away. Before the internet, vendors knew more than buyers, and the unscrupulous ones exploited that asymmetry. The community built a wall: keep sales out of the room, trust no one with a quota. But information is no longer asymmetric. The reflex persists past the conditions that justified it.
- The thesis is “replace generalized distrust with better discernment.” Nobody is arguing for opening the floodgates. There are still vendors playing fast and loose. The point is to judge the person, not the badge. Listen, and if there is something to learn, stay; if not, shut the door.
- Most people in cybersecurity marketing and sales are mission-driven. Security professionals are genuinely hard to market and sell to. As Gianna put it, you would not stay in this industry getting beat up all day unless you cared. Like the word “hacker,” “vendor” carries a pejorative charge, but there are good and bad versions, and most are trying to help defenders defend.
- The expertise asymmetry now runs the other way. Practitioners are generalists by necessity. No security team has the bandwidth to be a deep expert on every category they evaluate. A sales engineer who spends all day, every day on privileged access management likely knows more about that category than the generalist buyer. The person with the deepest category knowledge is often the one being deliberately kept out of the room.
- You buy from people, not from AI. AI is a powerful curation tool, but it is backward-looking, crowd-sourced, and weighted toward what is most represented online. It cannot anticipate innovation, market shifts, or new attacker techniques. As Charles put it: very rarely is “someone sold something”—almost always, “someone buys something.” They have to feel they want it, trust the vendor, and believe it solves their problem.
- AI-shaped requirements lists frequently do not match reality, especially in fast-moving categories. Buyers arrive with pre-built capabilities lists assembled from AI analysis of “commonly accepted wisdom.” In the secure out-of-band communications space, that conglomerate of best practices is often set against the wrong technologies.
- The single sign-on example: in a crisis, your normal requirements can invert. Buyers routinely insist an out-of-band comms tool integrate with Active Directory and SSO. But what happens when an attacker takes over your Active Directory? Do you want them to lock you out of the very tool you need during the incident? When the call is coming from inside the house, capabilities that look mandatory on a generic checklist can become liabilities. A good rep opens that light-bulb moment.
- AI itself is making the information gap worse, not better. Product launches used to take six months to plan; now product marketers run mini-launches weekly because development has accelerated so much. If AI has not “heard about” the newest capabilities yet, buyers researching a nascent category may be missing everything recent, precisely the information that matters most.
- Cybersecurity carries a trust burden with no parallel in other software. Ross Haleliuk’s point stuck with Matt: in cyber, trust is a far larger component of vendor selection than in most categories, because you often cannot tell whether a product works until you are in the middle of needing it. You jump out of the plane and pull the string before you find out if the parachute opens. That underlying trust requirement is a wall vendors must clear.
- Startups have the hardest time; they must earn trust through expertise. Established vendors come with years of case studies and proof. A startup has none of that. Maybe the founders have a pedigree, but working with a startup still requires a leap. Without ten years of “we were great partners when it hit the fan,” expertise is the only currency available.
- The biggest trust killer is saying something provably false. Claim your API supports something it does not, or that you are “end-to-end encrypted” when you are not, and everything else you say falls under suspicion. Far better to say “we don’t do that today,” “we do it, but not all the way,” or “I don’t know, let me come back to you.” Honesty about limitations is infinitely better than claiming you do all the things.
- Prolonging the truth just prolongs the torching of the deal. Reps are trained to always spin positive, which makes candor feel risky. But if you oversell, the buyer discovers the gap at the proof-of-value stage—or cancels the contract halfway through year one—and now it is worse. Being a straight shooter about fit, even sending a bad-fit buyer on their way, builds the trust that earns the next deal. It also feeds the product roadmap honestly.
- Ghosting a bad-fit buyer marks you as transactional, not a partner. If someone is not the right fit, tell them. Do not leave them staring at a dead email thread wondering whether to move on. A partner closes the loop. A transactional seller disappears.
- The onus sits more on the vendor than the buyer. What is asked of the buyer is modest: keep an open mind, and judge the person rather than the title. The heavier responsibility is on the vendor side—reps, marketers, and SEs must become genuine students of their category, and organizations must enable them with real training, not just Salesforce proficiency and a list of value-prop bullets. Expecting someone to be proficient in network security policy management in six weeks is ridiculous.
- Empathy is the multiplier. The buyer is the main character, not the vendor. The Cybersecurity Marketing Society pushes marketers to embed in the broader security community: listen to practitioners, learn from CISOs, volunteer at conferences. A SOC analyst has a whole pile of complications beyond the specific problem you solve. Hearing their reality echoed back in their own language is what builds the trust beneath the sale.
- Communities are starting to define what “good” looks like. The Society is setting norms for what a good vendor looks like—first in marketing, soon in other functions. Beyond Gartner’s Magic Quadrant top-right corner, there is room for tools that are not “perfect” but achieve a specific buyer’s use case. Communities can become the filter that separates genuine category expertise from noise.
- The framework to live by, on both sides: “Be nice, but take no shit.” Gianna’s closing line applies equally to vendors and buyers. Everyone is doing the best they can within their environment. Continuous growth of empathy is always a win—and so is refusing to tolerate bad behavior.
Navroop Mitter:
[00.00.03.21–00.00.33.15]
This is Navroop Mitter, founder of ArmorText. I’m delighted to welcome you to this episode of the Lock and Key Lounge, where we bring you the smartest minds from legal, government, tech and critical infrastructure to talk about groundbreaking ideas that you can apply now to strengthen your cybersecurity program and collectively keep us all safer. You can find all of our podcasts on our site and listen to them on your favorite streaming channels.
Matt Calligan:
[00.00.33.17–00.00.58.01]
Hey folks, welcome to the show! I’m Matt Calligan. Today we’re getting into a conversation. I don’t know, I suspect it will ruffle some feathers. I don’t know if I’m going to step on anybody’s toes so much, but I kind of hope. I challenge some folks’ perspective on this because this is intentional. We’re talking about what I’ve called for a while, vendor cooties.
Matt:
[00.00.58.03–00.01.38.05]
And what I mean is this is deeply ingrained. At one point, justifiable, rather culturally accepted reflex in technology generally, but cybersecurity in particular, to keep vendors, their sales and marketing folks on the outside of the room right at this arm’s length during any evaluation, right or decision making processes. And my guests today both live on the other side of that wall with me, and they’ve spent their careers really thinking about and dealing with this exact dynamic.
Matt:
[00.01.38.07–00.02.04.14]
Gianna Whitver is the co-founder and CEO of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society and was originally a CSO. And I’m going to work that one in. You made that up. But she is the Cybersecurity Marketing Society is the only dedicated global community for cybersecurity marketing professionals. She also has her own podcast, which is how we really Got Connected called Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing.
Matt:
[00.02.04.19–00.02.28.23]
Charles Gold is a four time CMO, over 25 years of marketing and product management, as well as business development and other high growth kind of responsibilities inside cybersecurity companies. He’s actually… We know a number of his folks that work in some of these companies as well. We have a lot of overlap there. And Charles is the co-host of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing.
Matt:
[00.02.29.01–00.02.32.05]
Gianna and Charles, welcome to my show this time.
Gianna Whitver:
[00.02.32.07–00.02.47.12]
Matt, we’re so very honored. And just a quick note for security folks who listened and, you know, can’t really get what the society is. It’s like an ISAC for marketers in the industry. I’ll say that.
Charles Gold:
[00.02.47.14–00.02.51.21]
Very nice. I love that, Matt. Thank you for having us.
Matt:
[00.02.51.23–00.02.57.18]
Absolutely. I have a much longer bios. If you all are okay with it, I’m going to skip those.
Gianna:
[00.02.57.20–00.02.59.08]
Wow. Yeah.
Matt:
[00.02.59.09–00.03.16.05]
Skipped. So what I’d like to do, actually, you know what? No. Because you’re. I’m going to reverse on this one, and I don’t care. We don’t even have to edit this. I am going to go through the bios because most bios are what you would expect, but because of your backgrounds, we kind of need to establish some, you know, street cred here, right?
Gianna:
[00.03.16.07–00.03.17.08]
So key facts in the case.
Matt:
[00.03.17.09–00.03.45.17]
Yes. Key facts exactly. So you were obviously your co-founder and CEO of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society. You co-founded alongside Maria Velasquez, which started as a small slack group, as I understand it, is now 4000 members and it is strictly cybersecurity. You run your own cybersecurity marketing conference, CyberMarketingCon. Obviously, you co-host the Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing podcast, so you talk to a lot of folks there.
Matt:
[00.03.45.19–00.04.03.20]
You regularly speak at RSA Conference, (ISC)², and InfoSec World. So you and as I understand you come from a practitioner side of the house before this. So you have been in this seat on the other side of that wall at the arm’s length, so to speak. You’ve had the cooties.
Gianna:
[00.04.03.21–00.04.14.02]
Yes, definitely. I haven’t been an actual security practitioner, but I have been in house doing marketing at security companies, threat intelligence companies and anti-malware companies.
Matt:
[00.04.14.02–00.04.15.14]
So the CSO was a lie.
Gianna:
[00.04.15.16–00.04.23.21]
Okay, it was a lie. I’m sorry. It was a joke. Listener. Before the before the episode aired, we had like 15 minutes of witty banter. I think.
Charles:
[00.04.23.23–00.04.33.04]
I will say this when you said that in the pre-show, like, I wasn’t sure if I was learning something new about you, right? So you sounded very serious.
Matt:
[00.04.33.10–00.04.40.14]
Well, Charles, you. So you’re four time CMO, right? You’ve got 25 years, nearly a quarter of a century of experience.
Charles:
[00.04.40.16–00.04.41.22]
And now I feel old.
Matt:
[00.04.41.23–00.04.43.21]
Yeah, I do that on purpose, but.
Charles:
[00.04.43.22–00.04.45.05]
It’s so.
Matt:
[00.04.45.05–00.05.07.15]
But it’s all been cybersecurity, cloud, SaaS. You’ve worked with ThreatConnect, Virtru, Sonatype, FireMon. You obviously you’re running the podcast now. You’ve worked across the space in a lot of these areas in exactly these kinds of problems. Interesting. You do hold an economics degree. Kudos. I’m finance. So, you know, next door neighbors.
Charles:
[00.05.07.15–00.05.09.07]
Well that’s my masters.
Matt:
[00.05.09.09–00.05.26.06]
Oh. Oh okay. Oh MBA. Oh yeah. Okay. See that’s what I get for not reading the whole thing, but yeah. so you’ve seen this as well. You’ve obviously you’ve, you’ve, you know, a ton of experience this particular issue there. So like I said, that’s why I did want to talk to your touch on both of your bios.
Matt:
[00.05.26.08–00.05.30.10]
Just because this is something we’ve dealt with and you know, it’s a real deal.
Charles:
[00.05.30.15–00.05.50.03]
Yeah. When you asked to talk about this, it was particularly interesting to me because I have been doing this for a long time, which does make me old, but I have always worked selling technical products to technical audiences. So after the last 16 years, we’re in cyber. Before that, it was all infrastructure and it was the same set of problems.
Charles:
[00.05.50.03–00.05.52.04]
So it should be a great topic to cover.
Matt:
[00.05.52.04–00.06.21.11]
Absolutely. All right. So for the guests, here is the argument that I’m going to put out here. And we’re going to start very high level and kind of work down through with both of you cyber practitioners. Cyber security practitioners are, as a culture, still operating from the set of assumptions that vendor sales and marketing folks, you know, these these are assumptions that are actively costing them in, in the decision making, in the decisions they’re making.
Matt:
[00.06.21.13–00.06.46.17]
Because, you know, the logic made sense years and years ago before the internet, even vendor vendors had a genuine information advantage. They knew everything and they knew you didn’t. And by doing that, they, the unscrupulous ones would. And sometimes it was hard not to would play to that, to, you know, position yourself as the best and not share the information about what’s actually the truth on that.
Matt:
[00.06.46.19–00.07.16.10]
And so that asymmetry created a lot of mistrust in technology. And the technology community as a whole built this wall, understandably, you know, totally justifiable to keep that kind of dynamic out of the room, you know, allow them to make objective decisions about products and things. And so the ultimate, you know, sort of knee jerk reaction is if they have a quota, if they have to if they’re marketing, if their growth, if there are any of these things, you don’t let them into the room until you’re ready to go.
Matt:
[00.07.16.10–00.07.46.17]
And from our perspective, as you all know, the world has changed. Information is not asymmetric. Buyers are more educated than ever. They have access to so much information. And and they’re making those decisions. Now with the aid of AI. And my we’ll get into this a little bit. But I think AI is actually hurting the cause, not helping because while it’s a great what’s the word you know, curation vehicle AI is it’s great.
Matt:
[00.07.46.17–00.08.10.01]
It’s kind of presenting this summary of what the, you know, the commonly accepted wisdom about a topic is it does not have the ability to anticipate innovation, shifts in the market, new ways. Even hackers are working. That might change the commonly accepted, you know, talking points about something. So I actually can oftentimes create more of a problem than than solve it.
Matt:
[00.08.10.05–00.08.28.15]
So what I want to talk to you all about today here we’re going to cover a couple of things. One is that cultural stigma. You know around vendor engagement what practitioners, you know are leaving on the table in this discussion, AI’s role and what it can do and what we should be aware of. Maybe we can fall short.
Matt:
[00.08.28.17–00.08.42.08]
What a healthier vendor practitioner relationship could look like in practice. I one want to really dive into that piece and then what needs to change on those things. So let’s let’s jump into this if that’s all right with you all go for it.
Gianna:
[00.08.42.09–00.09.18.20]
Absolutely. And so I love this topic to as a marketer, we’ve seen the for, you know, as a marketer in this industry for a while. And just in general, I’ve seen the information go more towards the buyer. Right. Like you said, the internet opened the floodgates. AI is making things accessible at the tip of anyone’s finger. I would add also on your point about, you know, some bad actor marketers or salespeople, most folks in this industry, I do think even on the business side, on the marketing and the sales side, do it for the love of the industry.
Gianna:
[00.09.18.21–00.09.24.23]
Yeah, I cannot imagine why anyone would stay in this industry if they didn’t actually care.
Matt:
[00.09.25.00–00.09.26.11]
You got to be down with the mission.
Gianna:
[00.09.26.12–00.09.47.22]
About the mission, right? Because you know what? A security professionals listening like you guys are hard to market and sell to. Like just truly. So if I wanted to get, you know, beat up all day and be told that my work sucks and that I’m doing a bad job and that I’m annoying, you know, I could find other jobs that potentially are.
Charles:
[00.09.48.00–00.09.50.00]
Do that. I do that for. I do that for free.
Gianna:
[00.09.50.01–00.10.13.14]
I know we have this podcast together where we do that. It’s a, it’s a, it’s a collaborative bullying process that we have. But yeah. So it’s like, you know, similar to how there’s a hacker, right? Hacker is a pejorative term, but there are good hackers and bad hackers. Right. And people are trying to say that, you know, hacker, it’s not a bad term because pen testers, people doing it for the purpose of making.
Gianna:
[00.10.13.15–00.10.33.12]
Exactly. Making companies and people safer like that is a good thing. So I think marketers in this industry, salespeople in this industry generally have at least some mission in their blood as well and believe truly believe that what they’re doing and selling and marketing is helping defenders defend.
Matt:
[00.10.33.13–00.10.40.08]
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. That’s why it’s particularly, I think, dangerous in cyber security in general. Go ahead Charles. Yeah.
Charles:
[00.10.40.13–00.11.01.20]
So I’ve add to that like if you were in the market to buy something anything a cybersecurity product, anything else, and I told you I could, I could get you the ability to talk to someone who talk to 20 other people just like you who are buying that product. And I could learn from that person. You’d say, hell yeah, sign me up.
Matt:
[00.11.01.21–00.11.02.12]
Sign me up.
Charles:
[00.11.02.14–00.11.22.11]
But as soon as I told you that person has a title account executive or sales engineer, you’d be like, hey, I don’t want to talk to that person. They have an agenda. So part of it is in the framing of the practitioners mind, like, hey, is this someone I can learn from because they’re paid? Those people are paid every day to talk to people just like you.
Matt:
[00.11.22.12–00.11.33.16]
Yeah. Do you think that comes from, do you think my assessment that it comes from the old school pre information asymmetry days, pre-internet. Do you think that’s where it comes from.
Charles:
[00.11.33.16–00.12.13.15]
I think it’s part of it. I think the other part of it is there’s a natural assumption that someone trying to sell you something or market you something is, is in an adversarial relationship with you. Like think about you walk into a car dealership, you’re immediately like a little bit, you know, on your on your back heel. so there is there’s a there’s a practitioner mindset that can be open, but there’s also an incumbent responsibility on the market or the seller or the solutions engineer to understand not just the speeds and feeds of their product and the value propositions and the silver bullets to sell something, but to understand the category and
Charles:
[00.12.13.15–00.12.24.14]
the buyer need and to be an advisor. So trusted advisor is like, you know, old school selling hackneyed phrase, all that thing. But it can also be true.
Matt:
[00.12.24.16–00.12.25.08]
Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.12.25.12–00.12.53.08]
I would agree with that. And I would also add, you know, as someone now who purchases some pretty heavy duty, high cost products, I do want to talk to someone on the other end if they’re a sale person or a sales engineer before I purchase, like I want to talk to someone during the event. I want to talk to a human, and I want to get as much information that I can’t deduce from just a web search or an AI search before making big decisions like that.
Charles:
[00.12.53.13–00.13.04.08]
And they better be knowledgeable. Yes. Right. That’s that’s the thing. If you’re if you’re coming with your game, then, you know, if expect bad things to happen.
Matt:
[00.13.04.11–00.13.27.16]
Yeah yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. That’s and I kind of attempt to draw that distinction. This isn’t just like, hey, open the floodgates. Everybody’s in. I mean, there are certainly companies that are trying to play fast and loose and get, you know, yeah, move fast and break things or whatever. And they’re they’ve got their motion incorrect or they’re hiring in focusing on the wrong skill set 100%.
Matt:
[00.13.27.16–00.13.28.18]
That happens.
Charles:
[00.13.28.20–00.13.38.01]
Well, it’s also the human right. It’s, it’s that salesperson or that SC or that marketer who hasn’t taken the time to learn, right?
Matt:
[00.13.38.03–00.13.39.12]
Intellectually lazy.
Charles:
[00.13.39.13–00.13.56.03]
That’s on them. And so I would encourage practitioners not to look at the label or the badge and say, this is a salesperson. Therefore they must be x, y, z and listen and see if there is something to be learned. If there isn’t, fine, shut the door. Cool.
Matt:
[00.13.56.05–00.14.03.09]
Yeah, it’s not hard to tell the difference. I mean, it really isn’t. You can. It’s easy to suss out in a short conversation. Go ahead, Jonah.
Gianna:
[00.14.03.10–00.14.35.14]
That said, as also a marketer and someone who buys things, I do, I want to be clear. Like I believe that providing as much information as possible before someone does even have to contact sales or contact the company is still a best practice. So I think anyone in this industry understands that security professionals often want to like, learn on their own first, and great marketing and sales teams are enabling that so that it’s an easier buying process for for buyers.
Gianna:
[00.14.35.14–00.14.58.08]
And then that way they can determine whether something is a fit or not based on what they can see ahead of time if they’re doing their research right. So it’s not necessarily that, you know, just because I want to say on this podcast, like it’s not like, oh, you have to talk to, you know, your life should be just vendor meetings for the rest of your for the rest of your days.
Gianna:
[00.14.58.08–00.15.15.20]
But, you know, good marketing combines both the hey, here’s some information of us. And then when there is the need for more information, a trusted partner, a trusted resource for you to ask questions to that will answer you honestly and help you make good decisions.
Matt:
[00.15.15.21–00.15.16.03]
Yeah.
Charles:
[00.15.16.03–00.15.18.17]
Yeah, it’s our job to help buyers, by.
Gianna:
[00.15.18.20–00.15.20.16]
Right or not by. We don’t want people to check.
Charles:
[00.15.20.17–00.15.20.23]
We’re not.
Matt:
[00.15.20.23–00.15.44.06]
By who wants yet nobody wants to churn. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. What’s so obviously we see on we’re describing the dynamic from that vendor side. We’ve seen how much the stakes have gone up just to have a seat at the table as a, as a vendor has it from your perspective, both of you. Has it gotten better proportionally, that knee jerk reaction.
Matt:
[00.15.44.06–00.15.59.22]
Do you see folks on the practitioner side adjusting, going, oh, wait, actually, they’re here to help me out? Or is it still does it got some? Is there a gap right between how far we’ve improved on the vendor side versus that cultural reaction from your perspectives?
Gianna:
[00.16.00.03–00.16.00.20]
Diana..
Gianna:
[00.16.00.21–00.16.07.07]
I would say there’s still room for improvement on both sides. And I would also say that.
Charles:
[00.16.07.13–00.16.09.00]
That’s so politically correct.
Matt:
[00.16.09.01–00.16.10.03]
Very nice, very nice.
Gianna:
[00.16.10.03–00.16.50.22]
So politically correct. Hi everyone. Vote for me for mayor. Mayor of Black Hat 2026. Yeah, I mean, I think that there’s I think it’s gotten better in a lot of ways. I think, you know, marketing in general has become more sophisticated and more buyer attuned, right? I think all of us, and I don’t want to say it’s the Cybersecurity Marketing Society who who pushed forward the agenda, but probably we took a stake in 2020 that like, hey, like, you know, we have to make the buyer experience pleasant for the buyer as well as hopefully ROI positive for us as companies.
Gianna:
[00.16.50.23–00.16.56.00]
Right? So I think and I would hope things are getting better in that regard.
Matt:
[00.16.56.01–00.16.59.03]
Yeah. Charles, did I cut you off there?
Charles:
[00.16.59.09–00.17.00.14]
No, no. You’re good.
Matt:
[00.17.00.18–00.17.23.17]
I’ll pose a question to you, Charles. The obviously the pitch that this whole concept makes is, you know, appropriately motivated, professional vendor, you know, vendor representatives of various stripes come to this with a very deep understanding of their industry. Charles, you said it yourself, right? You can’t be just a generalist or or nothing. You know, you can’t bring your seed game like you said.
Matt:
[00.17.23.18–00.17.47.09]
You have to know you. You got to know your the stack that you fit in. You got to know who your ideal client profile is and what their needs are, as well as all of your competitors in a in a an objective sense. You know why I why this product is better than that one. But from a practitioner side who are generalist in nature, I have seen as a, you know, someone who works for a startup.
Matt:
[00.17.47.11–00.18.07.05]
I think everybody here has worked for a startup. I have seen that generalist by nature lead them to incorrect even capabilities lists. As far as what this tool that I’m going to evaluate against, you should have, do you all see that, Charles? Have you seen that on your side from from the various companies you’ve worked with.
Charles:
[00.18.07.07–00.18.17.08]
So that let me make sure I understand the question so that the buyer is a generalist and therefore they don’t necessarily understand the depth of any individual solution. Is that the question?
Matt:
[00.18.17.09–00.18.17.21]
Yes.
Charles:
[00.18.17.22–00.18.55.15]
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yes, for sure. What the buyer knows is that their needs, their business processes, their organizations requirements. But if if they’re talking to a sales engineer in the, I don’t know, privileged identity space, who is spending all day, every day with other customers working on privileged identity issues, they’re going to know more about privileged identity probably than the internal than the internal buyer, who might have lots of responsibilities, who knows their organization’s eccentricities and requirements.
Charles:
[00.18.55.15–00.19.23.07]
So I do think it’s incumbent upon the seller. And when I say seller, I mean seller, marketer, SC customer success person, to have enough expertise to be an advisor and to bring to it information that their prospective buyer can use in making their evaluation. Because, you know, as much as AI is a force out there and I’m a big user, I love it for lots of things people buy from people.
Charles:
[00.19.23.07–00.19.29.18]
And so if you’re if you’re giving them the IC in the sales process, guess what? Yeah. They didn’t buy it from you.
Matt:
[00.19.29.18–00.19.44.09]
Yeah. Yeah. No it is it is the most it is the most human component of the technology space. Is that sort of the sales motion for lack of a better term. Right. It is. I think it’s there’s nothing more human than the sales motion in my experience.
Gianna:
[00.19.44.14–00.19.58.03]
Matt, has that happened to you? Have you found that buyers or prospects or companies, people you’re talking to come to you with a list that doesn’t match reality because of what they’ve found via AI?
Matt:
[00.19.58.05–00.20.18.19]
I was going to. Yeah. And that was I was going to say yes and then ask if sort of a question on top of that point, the a very common element from our side, you know, at ArmorText as a secure out of band comms tool, it is a very rapidly evolving space. There’s a lot of technologies entering and leaving.
Matt:
[00.20.18.21–00.20.52.18]
And so it’s common for, you know, someone who’s just been told, hey, go find a solution for this problem. Called out of band comms. They come with a capabilities list of requirements or even compliance requirements that don’t actively or accurately reflect the environment that you would use a tool like this in. Like and really weird example, if this is kind of a counterintuitive single sign on integration and I’m going in the weeds here just as an example, but people come to us and say, well, it needs to work with our Active Directory and single sign.
Matt:
[00.20.52.18–00.21.12.00]
And I’m like, yes, that’s interesting. What happens when they take over your Active Directory? Do you want them to shut you out of this tool? And so suddenly you’ve got to take when you’re in the middle of an environment. And again, this is a very explicit example. But when you’re in the midst of an active crisis, a, you know, the bad guy is the call is coming from inside the house.
Matt:
[00.21.12.02–00.21.37.12]
All of these things that make up your capabilities list from a security standpoint can and many do invert. Whereas like actually we don’t want that in this case. And so that was my kind of the example that I see with these sort of generalized AI tools is that it’s based on a sort of conglomerate of best practices thinking, all set by the wrong technologies.
Charles:
[00.21.37.12–00.22.01.23]
So great example, right? If you’re if your sales rep can go into that conversation and say, say what a lot of our customers tell us is, they actually don’t want single sign on integration. And this is why, you know, it’s opening up. Its opening up a light bulb moment for that buyer. And it’s positioning you as somebody who understands the space in a way that they might not.
Charles:
[00.22.02.01–00.22.08.10]
Right. So I mean, all of these things have a have have a positive other side to them or can.
Matt:
[00.22.08.11–00.22.10.20]
Have you have you dealt with it yourself, Charles, at all?
Charles:
[00.22.10.22–00.22.33.23]
I mean, yeah, certainly. I mean, it’s particularly in a new space, in a new category. There’s a lot of education that has to happen and that education has to happen in a very non salesy way. Yeah. And I and I say that because I’m a firm believer that very rarely is someone sold something. Almost always someone buys something.
Charles:
[00.22.34.01–00.23.04.09]
Yeah absolutely. In other words they have to have that feeling that this is something I want. I trust this vendor. I believe this will solve a problem. I believe this will make me look good. Yeah, they won’t say that, but that’s what they’re thinking, right? And so, you know, if you’re in an early category where you’re evangelizing something new, you absolutely need to go in with with the attitude that you’re a believer, that this is important and you’re going to help other people understand why it’s important and that they may be coming from a very different place of understanding than you are.
Charles:
[00.23.04.13–00.23.09.07]
If you’re selling firewalls, that’s a whole different thing, right? And everyone understands what that is.
Matt:
[00.23.09.08–00.23.10.00]
Yeah, yeah.
Gianna:
[00.23.10.01–00.23.12.05]
What’s a firewall?
Charles:
[00.23.12.07–00.23.13.04]
Geez, here we are.
Matt:
[00.23.13.04–00.23.14.01]
Luck.
Gianna:
[00.23.14.03–00.23.18.11]
Just kidding. I know what it is. It’s a way to access.
Matt:
[00.23.18.16–00.23.22.02]
When I was CSO, I use those all the time. Yes.
Charles:
[00.23.22.04–00.23.25.16]
She knows all the things I told you, Matt. She knows all the things.
Matt:
[00.23.25.20–00.23.40.02]
Jenna. Have you? When? When you were in that seat representing a product or even, frankly, you know, the cyber marketing. And I’m sure a lot of folks are like, why do we got to pay this fee, this membership here? Whatever. Wait. Is there a membership fee? I can’t remember.
Gianna:
[00.23.40.03–00.23.40.16]
It’s free.
Matt:
[00.23.40.17–00.23.43.15]
It is free. Sorry. Don’t. Yes. Don’t want to get that out there. But.
Charles:
[00.23.43.16–00.23.45.05]
But do come to the conference.
Gianna:
[00.23.45.08–00.23.48.20]
Yes. Do come to our conference. It’s incredible. Sorry. Matt. Go ahead.
Matt:
[00.23.48.21–00.24.06.21]
No, no, no. But even even the time, it’s like, well, they’re so busy. I mean, you see people with the wrong understanding of what, what solution or even a solution set you represent. What what’s been your experience with that in the past? How have how do you handle that from from your experience?
Gianna:
[00.24.06.22–00.24.31.16]
I think Charles nailed it on the head with the education comment. Right. So you have to in some ways evangelize your product if people have this broad misconception about it. Think about, you know, the next gen version of anything that has come out in this industry right now. When everyone moved to the cloud, there was tons of education on why and why does it matter and why is it better?
Gianna:
[00.24.31.17–00.24.59.12]
Or maybe not even better, but different than what you’re currently doing. So educating in and evangelizing what you’re doing and why? And who is it for and who it helps is a way to do it. I think we’re still in this. I think, you know, the what we were talking about with the AI point of view, Matt, with like the AI challenge that’s wrapped up in all of this is that AI is not often up to date, and things are changing daily within my community.
Gianna:
[00.24.59.14–00.25.29.19]
Product marketing. Right. Like there’s a product launch. It used to be, hey, we have six months to plan it. We launch it. Now, all of the product marketers that I know are doing mini launches, some of them are doing them every week. Just because the acceleration of development has really impacted, like how companies go to market and how often they have exciting news and how they even share that news, which all impacts how they publish it on the internet.
Gianna:
[00.25.29.19–00.25.46.01]
And then that impacts whether or not AI hears about it, too. So like you said, companies might be, you know, learning or trying to learn about a category or a nascent new technology and just be missing all of the new stuff that’s coming out because it’s so recent.
Matt:
[00.25.46.02–00.26.16.07]
Yeah, yeah. How do you so obviously the way this is shaping up here so far with the discussion is there’s an onus on both sides of this equation. One is, you know, practitioners and buyers have to be willing to point out when resistance is a counterproductive sort of reaction as opposed to justifiable. Then vendors and their their teams that represent them from a quota or marketing side.
Matt:
[00.26.16.09–00.26.36.05]
There, the onus is on them to become actual professionals, trustworthy people. Yes, if I have a practitioner hat on right now and I and I’m trying to find those people, what’s what’s a roadmap? What does a framework look like from from your perspective? How do I pick the right ones versus the, you know, the slick Rick’s?
Gianna:
[00.26.36.07–00.26.59.07]
I would ask Matt Calligan who he recommends talking to, but it’s going to be based on the product too. I mean, there are there are Vars, there’s resellers, there’s companies that evaluate products for you or evaluate your environment or make suggestions right. You can go that route. Buying direct is going to be a crapshoot in that it’s whoever works at that company, right, Charles.
Charles:
[00.26.59.07–00.27.02.08]
And has and has that particular territory.
Matt:
[00.27.02.10–00.27.03.10]
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gianna:
[00.27.03.14–00.27.13.00]
You get to choose your salesperson often. I mean, I guess if you really wanted a different salesperson, you could argue with a company about it, but it’d be a little weird on their end.
Charles:
[00.27.13.01–00.27.35.21]
I think. I think the way I would think about it, Matt, is from a, a buyer perspective, a practitioner or a decision maker or influencer or whatever, just have an open mind. Like think about it as perhaps there’s a chance I can learn from this person and then and then judge based on the person, not on what their title is, a lot more.
Charles:
[00.27.35.22–00.27.56.02]
The onus is on the vendor, it’s on the sales rep, it’s on the marketer, it’s on the s to be that trusted advisor, not be the like the guy or gal can take you out to play golf, but to be the person who can actually say, look, I’m actually a student of this category. And, you know, here’s why I chose to be at the company I’m at.
Charles:
[00.27.56.02–00.28.24.07]
There’s a lot of solutions in the in the space. Here’s what I hear from buyers in terms of what they’re looking for. And here’s what I think I could do to help you. It’s a it’s incumbent on the organization to empower those people with the training that they need. Yeah. So like having someone show up and say, all right, well, you know, you have six weeks to be completely proficient in network security, policy management or data security or whatever it is ridiculous.
Charles:
[00.28.24.09–00.28.51.23]
So it’s up to, you know, the Crow, the CMO, the CEO to provide that enablement and that access to the experts. Yeah, the product people, etc.. So, you know, I do put a lot more of the weight on the vendor side than I do on the buyer. What I’m asking for the buyer is be open minded and be be willing to say, this is, you know, this person may be able to teach me something about a category that admittedly, I don’t know all that much about.
Gianna:
[00.28.52.04–00.29.01.18]
Yeah. And I just add, like what Charles said, the onus is not really on the buyer, it’s on the seller to be professional and to create a great experience for the buyer.
Matt:
[00.29.01.19–00.29.13.22]
Yeah. Trust is something that has been mentioned a few times. And there’s an interesting perspective that I heard from, I think a butcher’s last name, I believe. Hallelujah, Hallelujah. There it is.
Charles:
[00.29.14.03–00.29.18.06]
So I talked to him this week and I still cannot pronounce his name. So I.
Matt:
[00.29.18.06–00.29.20.09]
Get Ross right? I get Ross right all the time.
Charles:
[00.29.20.13–00.29.22.15]
Sorry Ross, love you man.
Matt:
[00.29.22.17–00.29.55.14]
But just know something he said that really stuck with me was in cyber trust is a much larger component of vendor selection than, than in, you know, revenue side or, you know, forward facing stuff or enterprise management tools and things like that. Because a lot of times you don’t actually know how it’s going to work until you’re in the middle of needing it for something, or you need to trust that is, you know, I’m not getting any bad news because it’s working.
Matt:
[00.29.55.15–00.30.20.23]
You know, so there’s this underlying component of trust that cybersecurity practitioners put into their vendor stack, if you will, that in a lot of other just there’s really no there’s no parallels to it in other in other places, you get to use the product in most other parts of a company and look at it working and go, yep, it does what it says it does.
Matt:
[00.30.21.01–00.30.43.05]
But in a lot of cybersecurity scenarios, you have to wait until you know you’ve jumped out of the plane and pulled the string to figure out if the parachute is going to open. And so trusting the trusting that vendors building the right tool that they’re representing it correctly is a huge wall. It’s a big thing that and it is on the venue and it’s on the vendor side to get over that wall.
Charles:
[00.30.43.06–00.30.47.05]
And do you know who has the hardest time with that? Startups.
Gianna:
[00.30.47.07–00.30.48.02]
Yeah. Yes.
Matt:
[00.30.48.03–00.30.50.01]
Yeah. Because where’s the evidence. Where’s the evidence.
Charles:
[00.30.50.01–00.30.57.04]
Right. Like if you’re if you’re buying from Palo Alto. Yeah. Well okay. No. A lot.
Matt:
[00.30.57.04–00.30.58.01]
Of people. Yeah.
Charles:
[00.30.58.02–00.31.05.15]
Right. You know or whoever I mean whatever it is. Right. But if you’re a startup, you have to earn that trust through expertise.
Matt:
[00.31.05.16–00.31.06.02]
Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.31.06.06–00.31.27.23]
You have to maybe. Maybe you have a pedigree. Maybe your founders have been at successful previous cyber companies with great reputations. But yeah, it’s a little bit of taking a leap to work with a startup. They don’t have that. Here’s ten years of proven case studies of happy customers, of us being great partners when shit hits the fan.
Gianna:
[00.31.28.00–00.31.29.13]
Yeah, yeah.
Matt:
[00.31.29.15–00.31.53.17]
How does Jonah, how does the community play a role in this? Because I mean, again, this does this does come back to I kind of position this whole thing as a little antagonistic, like, you know, the, the behind the times practitioners. But there’s really does come down to the vendors, right? I mean, it does. The onus is on us to hit these marks and to get over that wall, so to speak.
Matt:
[00.31.53.17–00.31.57.03]
So what’s what is the community’s role in that?
Gianna:
[00.31.57.08–00.32.21.03]
The community’s role is to create the best buying experience possible, to not antagonize, to provide excellent and quality information, and be a helping hand and a true partner to security practitioners. It’s not on security practitioners to be the perfect buyer. It’s not on security practitioners to want to talk to us or take phone calls or whatever. Right. We’re here.
Gianna:
[00.32.21.04–00.32.31.23]
Our products are hopefully solving a problem. So let’s figure out a way to show practitioners who have that problem or might have that problem, how we can do it for them. In a.
Charles:
[00.32.32.01–00.32.38.14]
Can I say something nice about, can I say something nice about Gianna? Matt I guess I know it’s hard for me, but I will.
Matt:
[00.32.38.15–00.32.40.18]
I mean, I get it.
Charles:
[00.32.40.20–00.33.16.19]
What Gianna has done with the Cybersecurity Marketing Society is starting to set the norms of what a good vendor looks like, right? And so from a marketing perspective, anyway, and soon to be all sorts of other functions. But, you know, it helps. It helps marketers to understand what the norm is and what good looks like. So by being a part of the community, by attending the conference, by listening to the podcast, it’s helping develop that, that next generation of marketers who have the right mindset to market into this, into this, into this cybersecurity market.
Charles:
[00.33.16.23–00.33.17.14]
Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.33.17.16–00.33.19.16]
Thank you. That’s very sweet, Charles.
Charles:
[00.33.19.18–00.33.21.12]
And and nice thing.
Gianna:
[00.33.21.15–00.33.29.03]
It’s a nice thing we got we got so we got ten barbs that we flung across each other. One nice thing I owe you a nice as well Charles.
Charles:
[00.33.29.08–00.33.30.10]
And you know I’m waiting for.
Gianna:
[00.33.30.10–00.34.12.06]
It, I think. Matt, I know whose side you’re on in this podcast. I feel like it’s two against one. Anyway, the community to one thing we also are doing in the community is we are telling our marketers to go be part of the cybersecurity community as well, right? Go be involved in security or security adjacent things, listen to practitioners, learn from CISOs, research the category, learn about your competitors and about the market, and go out and volunteer at conferences and be part of the broader cybersecurity community as well, because that will engender empathy for what security practitioners deal with.
Gianna:
[00.34.12.08–00.34.19.22]
And that’ll make the entire buying process and the entire function of marketing and go to market better for the security industry.
Charles:
[00.34.20.00–00.34.41.07]
But by the way, that empathy thing is, is a huge part of it, because a lot of times we as vendors are sort of focused on the features and the customers security problems, right? Yeah, but there’s a human buying it, and that human has pain points that might be relate to their job, the environment that they’re operating in.
Charles:
[00.34.41.07–00.34.57.10]
And I think having that understanding and be able to being able to relate to those people in their jobs, like a sock analyst has a whole bunch of other shit going on that makes their lives complicated and hard, other than the specific problem that you’re solving for them.
Gianna:
[00.34.57.11–00.35.04.23]
Yeah, the vendor is not the main character, right? The buyer is the main character. The company is not the vendor, not.
Charles:
[00.35.04.23–00.35.07.19]
The person. Now she’s got it right again. Jesus.
Gianna:
[00.35.07.21–00.35.09.23]
Sorry. I’m on my soapbox now.
Charles:
[00.35.10.01–00.35.12.03]
No, she’s right though. She’s absolutely right.
Matt:
[00.35.12.04–00.35.41.05]
Yeah, well, in the empathy, nothing goes towards building that trust better than a practitioner know. Hearing their reality echoed back to them in a process, even if that reality isn’t necessarily specific to a selling motion or something like that. I mean, being able to talk to somebody and they repeat the language back to you, they use the same language, they use the same terms.
Matt:
[00.35.41.05–00.36.02.07]
They understand what you mean. When you said I had to do this thing the other day and the vendors like, oh my God, I yeah, you know, that is something that builds that empathy, which is a critical element of the trust because now it’s like they know where where I’m coming from on this problem, not just the problem, but where I’m just coming from and why it matters.
Charles:
[00.36.02.09–00.36.05.03]
Can I can I talk about trust killers for a second?
Matt:
[00.36.05.04–00.36.06.16]
Let’s do it.
Charles:
[00.36.06.18–00.36.12.00]
So if you say something that’s provably false, you’ve thrown away all the goodwill.
Matt:
[00.36.12.01–00.36.13.02]
Blew it. Yep.
Charles:
[00.36.13.03–00.36.27.13]
So I like John to have bought a lot of products, not cyber products, but martech products. And when a vendor has said something to me, which is provably not true, like our API supports X and their API does not support.
Matt:
[00.36.27.14–00.36.29.17]
X, definitely end to end encrypted. Yeah.
Charles:
[00.36.29.19–00.36.37.10]
Yeah, these things that are provably false now, like everything you say is under suspicion.
Matt:
[00.36.37.11–00.36.38.01]
Yep.
Charles:
[00.36.38.04–00.36.51.15]
So it’s way better to say no, we don’t do that today or we do it, but not all the way. I don’t know, but let me come back to you is infinitely better than we do all the things, right?
Gianna:
[00.36.51.16–00.37.12.02]
Right. I’ll add another thing to this one. Just grinds my gears or irks me. But getting ghosted by a sales like by a company or a salesperson because you’re not the right fit buyer too, is also something that gets me to think that they are kind of a low quality person, right? So like if somebody’s.
Charles:
[00.37.12.04–00.37.13.01]
Transactional.
Gianna:
[00.37.13.02–00.37.36.06]
They’re transactional, right? They’re not a partner. If just because I’m not a great fit for their tool or for their product or their service, they should let me know so that I don’t look at their email that’s been unreported to like, you know, being like, I wonder if this thread is ever going to open up again. Should I move on to find an alternative product that solves my needs?
Gianna:
[00.37.36.07–00.37.38.05]
Right. So I’ll add that to.
Matt:
[00.37.38.07–00.37.39.11]
Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.37.39.12–00.37.41.15]
I’m a little, little hurt about that.
Matt:
[00.37.41.16–00.37.45.02]
Recently pulling from a lived experience.
Gianna:
[00.37.45.07–00.37.49.22]
We’re small. You could tell me that I am an adult. Just say it.
Charles:
[00.37.49.23–00.37.54.13]
Also, I’m very well aware of it. I’m small, like I know.
Matt:
[00.37.54.15–00.38.21.15]
Well, what’s the Charles? What did you say? That it reminded me of something that going back to the. You know, that trust killer, provable false thing. I mean that is the impetus. Mean. I don’t know, because I’ve seen it myself. Like, I feel that resistance because, I mean, there are certain things there’s certain capabilities with the company I work with right now that like, it’s not the greatest.
Matt:
[00.38.21.16–00.38.38.11]
Right? I mean, there’s there’s tons of things it does really, really well, you know, what does it do this well, you know, not one. No, not so much. But it’s hard for me to just be that honest because there’s all these doubts of like, am I? Am I torching this deal because he’s going to well, that’s it. That’s, you know, that’s the killer.
Matt:
[00.38.38.11–00.38.39.05]
For me it’s like that.
Charles:
[00.38.39.08–00.38.45.08]
But like, are you just prolonging the torching of the deal? Right? Right. In other words.
Matt:
[00.38.45.10–00.38.52.05]
Like, it’s just going to be worse when they, you know, they end the contract halfway through for the first year. I mean, that, you know.
Charles:
[00.38.52.07–00.39.00.12]
You get down to the, the POV and the thing you told them, it absolutely did. Yeah. They see well, Matt told me it did this thing.
Matt:
[00.39.00.14–00.39.18.07]
Yeah. Right. Yeah. And it’s the first few times, you know, because again, you’re trained not to do that. You’re trained to always have the positive spin on this thing. You know, from a, from a as a representing a certain vendor. But you know, when you’re just straightforward and honest one, it, you know, it goes to building that trust.
Matt:
[00.39.18.07–00.39.33.12]
But it also establishes that you’re going to be a straight shooter about what it can, what it can’t do, and you’re willing to send them on their way. Right. If if they’re actually a bad fit for what your tool does. Right?
Charles:
[00.39.33.14–00.39.57.06]
I’ll tell you what, this reminds me of it. And we and we don’t always have the luxury of picking where we work. Sometimes we just need a job. But to the extent that you do have the ability to be choosy about where you work as a, as a sales salesperson, a marketer, etc., do your diligence on the company, because if the product is great, then you don’t wind up in as many awkward spots.
Charles:
[00.39.57.07–00.39.58.07]
Yeah.
Matt:
[00.39.58.09–00.39.59.13]
Pre-qualify. Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.39.59.14–00.40.27.13]
Yeah, I will say too. I attended the Gartner SRM conference a few weeks ago and it was really interesting. I sat in on a few sessions on buying and how to buy, and what Gartner recommends in terms of rubrics and things like that. And when I left out those sessions, it made me think, there is room for, you know, tools that are not just in the top right hand corner of a magic quadrant, right?
Gianna:
[00.40.27.14–00.40.54.15]
Right. There are things that are more important to some buyers than others. And it was really cool because Gartner walked through this sort of like, hey, if you can’t afford this, how do you want to think about a quote unquote lesser or less than perfect tool that still achieves your use case and achieves what you want? So now that I sell also sponsorships for our conference, again, not even SaaS product, it’s like it’s like sponsor a conference.
Gianna:
[00.40.54.15–00.41.09.06]
They’re not in the same realm really. But you know, I try to be as honest as possible. And sometimes I’ll even say, hey, I don’t think we’re a good fit. And then the person I’m talking to comes back and it’s like, no, no, no, we’re a good fit. And they just wanted to like, test your buttons, you know?
Gianna:
[00.41.09.06–00.41.22.22]
Yeah, they wanted to see what they could get. So I think, you know and Matt I know you’re like on this side of like I have to tell how it is. Like, I still, I think that’s the best way forward. And, you know.
Charles:
[00.41.22.22–00.41.26.00]
You just you just feel better. You just feel better when you do that.
Gianna:
[00.41.26.01–00.41.36.19]
Right. And it can inform the roadmap later, right? Hey, a lot of customers, a lot of prospects are asking us about this thing. But we you know, our thing is kind of like, you know, five out of ten. Can we make it eight?
Matt:
[00.41.36.21–00.41.58.08]
Yeah. Yeah. That and that’s, you know, as a startup you have to make those really hard resource decisions you don’t have to worry about. You know, when you’re when you’re $1 billion company, you have to decide is this product that is the capability that we need to invest in right now. And by being honest about where your capability set is, you get that immediate feedback from folks looking at it like, well, man, that’s a deal breaker.
Matt:
[00.41.58.08–00.42.02.05]
Well then, hey, we should probably fix that, you know? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
Gianna:
[00.42.02.06–00.42.03.09]
Or integrate.
Matt:
[00.42.03.14–00.42.20.12]
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, partner up. Yeah. Exactly, exactly. I wanted to pivot more to just kind of some of the final questions here, a little more geared towards each of you personally, professionally or I should say professional in a personal way before freshman.
Gianna:
[00.42.20.12–00.42.21.04]
No, no.
Matt:
[00.42.21.06–00.42.22.21]
No personal person.
Gianna:
[00.42.22.21–00.42.24.10]
Freshman. Okay. Sorry.
Charles:
[00.42.24.16–00.42.26.10]
Perfect perfect, perfect.
Matt:
[00.42.26.15–00.42.27.18]
That does sound you.
Charles:
[00.42.28.00–00.42.28.10]
Sorry.
Matt:
[00.42.28.15–00.42.45.12]
Okay, so I’ll give both of you the same question. Charles. I’ll go with you first. What kinds of. I mean, what are. I guess for lack of a lack of a maybe just a general question. What kind of final thoughts would you leave this topic with?
Charles:
[00.42.45.17–00.43.13.19]
It’s up to you, as a person working for a vendor to develop expertise on your category and your buyers needs, and it’s up to the vendor to enable the sales, the salespeople, the marketers, etc.. So like, take that responsibility seriously. It’s not just about enabling them to use Salesforce and enabling them to say yourself or bullets, but really to understand the environment in which they’re operating in that will have massive long term ROI.
Matt:
[00.43.13.23–00.43.15.05]
Yeah. How about yourself?
Gianna:
[00.43.15.10–00.43.41.11]
I am not a big like vendor suck. Vendors are doing a terrible job type of person. I think everybody in every company, whatever side you’re on, is doing the best they can, given their environment, their team, their boss, the things they have to do to not get fired. I will say for my marketing folks and for my go to market folks, a continuous growth of empathy for the job.
Gianna:
[00.43.41.11–00.43.53.16]
Learning about it is always going to be a win. And for the security pros, the buyers, I would say be nice but take no shit. And actually I’d say that to both sides.
Matt:
[00.43.53.18–00.43.56.06]
I think that would be a good framework to live by. Yeah, on both sides.
Gianna:
[00.43.56.06–00.43.57.10]
I think that’s a good one.
Matt:
[00.43.57.11–00.44.16.10]
Yeah, yeah. So the professional question is what’s I like asking this just because I like to, to hear how people’s minds work in this space. Gianna since you kind of wrap this up, I’ll post this to you first. What are you what are you learning about right now? What’s a new idea that has you excited?
Gianna:
[00.44.16.14–00.44.35.01]
AI, I hate saying it. I like started using cloud code two weeks ago, so and I don’t. I put it on a separate machine. It can’t touch any of my stuff, but I’m really excited about how that can help with like process flow basically is what I’m super excited about. And then I’m also very interested in this like post-quantum world.
Gianna:
[00.44.35.01–00.44.45.05]
We’re all like steadily like, what is that thing where you run across a lawn and then there’s a wet tube and you go fly across it, because did you play with that when you were little?
Matt:
[00.44.45.11–00.44.46.07]
Slip and slide.
Charles:
[00.44.46.11–00.44.47.10]
Slip and slide okay.
Gianna:
[00.44.47.11–00.44.54.18]
Thank you. So I am excited about this post quantum world that we’re all slipping sliding towards quickly.
Matt:
[00.44.54.20–00.45.02.12]
Yeah, yeah. Faster and faster. What’s what’s something that you recently changed your mind on or like something you’ve kind of been wrestling with?
Gianna:
[00.45.02.18–00.45.04.17]
Oh, right.
Matt:
[00.45.04.20–00.45.05.11]
See?
Gianna:
[00.45.05.15–00.45.10.12]
Oh, I shouldn’t buy any more plants. I can’t keep them alive. I think I’ve come to terms with that.
Matt:
[00.45.10.14–00.45.17.13]
I did not put a cybersecurity requirement on that question. Yeah, absolutely. Charles, from your side, like what do you what are you learning about what’s what’s what’s new on.
Charles:
[00.45.17.13–00.45.43.16]
Your radar. So I, I hate to say it again, but to me it’s AI and it’s the thing I’m thinking a lot about is not so much the AI piece of AI, but the human side of it, which is, you know, how can we do better at being authentic in the way we communicate, authentic in the way we market in the face of AI?
Charles:
[00.45.43.18–00.45.59.16]
So part of it is obviously I’m using Claude. I’m doing all the things. But, you know, I do think there’s a there’s a downstream aspect of this in terms of brand, in terms of how we show up that, you know, that’s extremely important. I’m thinking a lot about.
Matt:
[00.45.59.17–00.46.07.08]
Yeah, yeah. What’s, what’s something you, you’ve just discarded of throwing into the trash bin as far as ideas go.
Charles:
[00.46.07.09–00.46.23.20]
I don’t know that I’ve thrown anything away. I just keep collecting more stuff. I just spent the last two weeks in Alaskan wilderness. That was pretty awesome. So I’ve definitely I’ve definitely picked up, spend more time in wilderness. Try not to get eaten by a bear.
Matt:
[00.46.23.22–00.46.29.11]
Is the intent just to kind of reorient, you know, keep keep things from getting too ephemeral?
Charles:
[00.46.29.13–00.46.33.12]
Yeah, for sure. For sure that because that stuff is forever.
Matt:
[00.46.33.13–00.46.35.21]
Yeah. So our scars. Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.46.35.22–00.46.37.13]
The glaciers.
Charles:
[00.46.37.15–00.46.38.23]
Definitely gives you perspective.
Matt:
[00.46.39.00–00.47.03.20]
Yeah. Yeah. It’s I, I was listening to actually it’s a really it’s a really good. Was the guy’s name. Shoot I forget his name now. It’s like 15 minutes. There is a podcast is 15 minutes max. He does it in one take. And he’s a very technical guy. But he was talking about AI writing and why he’s convinced AI will never actually be the same thing as as human writing.
Matt:
[00.47.03.20–00.47.20.17]
And it was a really fascinating point he made was he’s like, AI is, you know, everyone’s talking about how AI is just about to be able to write technical papers that you can’t distinguish between a person and a and the technology. And he’s like, but the world doesn’t need mountains and mountains and mountains and more of research papers.
Matt:
[00.47.20.21–00.47.41.03]
He’s like, the world needs innovation and fresh thinking. And he said, you know, being able to regurgitate the words is not the same thing as being able to create the word. He’s like, you’re a good writer when you can put together words that help me invoke a meaning and add a meaning to them, because words don’t carry the meaning.
Matt:
[00.47.41.03–00.48.06.04]
They don’t, you know they don’t. They’re not a magic spell. They don’t make you feel something. It’s when you write in such a way that people can attach their own memories to it, or their own experiences, and then live that through. And if you’re a good writer, you can have that consistently across your readership. And he said, because I can’t do that, it’ll never actually compete at that level, was his his ultimate thesis, which was a fascinating idea to me.
Matt:
[00.48.06.05–00.48.17.03]
It was like, it is missing. Even though it can create a ton of content, it’s never going to emulate that experience because it doesn’t know what it’s trying to do from a human engagement standpoint.
Gianna:
[00.48.17.04–00.48.19.23]
Right? It can write a poem, but can it write a poem?
Matt:
[00.48.20.00–00.48.40.22]
Right? Right. Yeah, exactly. If you were at a bar, this is our final. This is our lock and key lounge question here. There’s the theme for it. And it’s one of those bars that is, you know, you know, it’s nice. You don’t have to, like, yell right at it. You’re at one end and there is somebody in the security space.
Matt:
[00.48.40.22–00.48.54.17]
And again, it’s a very broad space security that you’ve been dying to meet or have a conversation with. What’s what are you ordering? If you drink cocktails, what are you ordering and who’s at the other end of the bar?
Gianna:
[00.48.54.23–00.49.05.13]
That’s a great question. And I don’t drink very much at all. And I don’t know the names of alcohol. And so what I would I would bring a glass of cold milk.
Charles:
[00.49.05.15–00.49.08.03]
Nice milk.
Matt:
[00.49.08.05–00.49.10.20]
Hey, that’s a conversation starter cookies.
Gianna:
[00.49.10.22–00.49.29.16]
It would be the end of the night and everybody would be craving something to eat. So I would be the most popular person at the bar, and I would go over to the security person. It would be the CISO of Anthropic, and I would invite them to come to my conference and speak at it. There you go. Because I’m trying to get Anthropic to come speak nice.
Matt:
[00.49.29.18–00.49.36.09]
Yeah, well, and you can’t go wrong with cookies and milk. I’m sorry. Like, especially especially at the end of the night.
Gianna:
[00.49.36.14–00.49.38.07]
It’s called standing out in the industry.
Matt:
[00.49.38.08–00.49.43.07]
Yeah. Yeah. Or in general. Exactly. Charles, how about yourself?
Charles:
[00.49.43.09–00.50.10.08]
So I don’t drink alcohol. So I’m going to say it would be an espresso because it’s just pure no additives. Yeah. And the person the other end of the bar and this is going to be a total cop out would be a buyer okay. So I, you know, I would want to use the opportunity to learn about them, about their day to day struggles, doing their job, about the biggest problems they’re facing.
Charles:
[00.50.10.08–00.50.12.10]
Because I think that would make me a better marketer.
Matt:
[00.50.12.11–00.50.15.15]
Yeah, yeah I am. This is.
Charles:
[00.50.15.21–00.50.17.04]
Why are you laughing at me?
Gianna:
[00.50.17.09–00.50.27.04]
Oh, I think you copied kind of like what I said. I be like, oh, like not an alcohol. I sort of thing, you know, they wouldn’t want a coffee. They have.
Matt:
[00.50.27.04–00.50.31.20]
To put in a biscotti or scone. I’m like, he’s totally ripping off the I did.
Charles:
[00.50.31.21–00.50.32.14]
Yeah.
Gianna:
[00.50.32.20–00.50.39.14]
I’m changing mine to burgers, burgers and Yuengling. And that’s where you get Yuengling.
Charles:
[00.50.39.18–00.50.40.21]
All right. Fine.
Matt:
[00.50.41.00–00.50.43.03]
You’ve never had. That’s a good with burger.
Charles:
[00.50.43.05–00.50.43.21]
It’s not bad.
Matt:
[00.50.44.00–00.51.09.16]
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. All right. Well, Gianna and Charles, this has been genuinely great conversation. I knew it was going to be. And if even a few practitioners out there walk away thinking a little differently about folks like us on this side of the wall and maybe who their what processes in place are keeping these kinds of new ideas and things outside of the, you know, outside of the decision making room?
Matt:
[00.51.09.18–00.51.29.14]
I think it’s been it’s been a useful conversation. And I think the larger takeaway is for folks on the non practitioner side, you know, who are representing vendors, you know how to be better, how to how to develop those skill sets to build trust. Just be good at what you do be, you know, good in general as a person.
Matt:
[00.51.29.16–00.52.02.23]
Those are always good things as well. To everybody listening here that you know, that wall did, it was erected at one point for a reason. But I think it is past time that we examine what it’s there for. And is it is it in its current form, you know, being a benefit. So what other side of the wall you’re on, be sure to know how to address it and make sure that you’re always making the right decisions with a good information, and make sure you’re always representing good information on the vendor side.
Charles:
[00.52.03.01–00.52.08.14]
And be nice, but take no shit. And I learned that today. In fact, I think I said it, I wait, Gianna said it.
Gianna:
[00.52.08.17–00.52.24.01]
I will add to if any security practitioner has made it to this point in the show, we’d love to have you on our show as well. Feel free to come on the Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing podcast and share your thoughts with the marketers too. Since we got to share on Matt’s wonderful show.
Matt:
[00.52.24.02–00.52.30.05]
That is for those listening, that is Cybersecurity Marketing Society. Is that where they find it or yeah.
Gianna:
[00.52.30.07–00.52.33.16]
There’s a link to podcasts in the upper in the menu.
Matt:
[00.52.33.19–00.52.46.11]
Fantastic. Well, folks, again, your time listening. Everybody’s busy. Thank you for sharing this short window of time with us here. And until next time, you know, keep your vendors close and your discernment closer.
Gianna:
[00.52.46.15–00.52.47.10]
Thanks, Matt.
Matt:
[00.52.47.11–00.52.48.20]
Thanks, guys.
Charles:
[00.52.48.22–00.52.50.10]
Thanks.
Matt:
[00.52.50.12–00.53.23.10]
We really hope you enjoyed this episode of The Lock and Key Lounge. If you’re a cyber security expert or you have a unique insight or point of view on the topic, and we know you do, we’d love to hear from you. Please email us at Lounge@ArmorText.com or our website ArmorText.com/podcast. I’m Matt Calligan, Director of Revenue Operations here at ArmorText, inviting you back here next time, where you’ll get live unenciphered, unfiltered, stirred—never shaken—insights into the latest cybersecurity concepts.