I’ve been doing this for more than 15 years now. No, not podcasting. That’s about the last 4-5 years or so and just two years so far on this particular show. But I’ve been doing this social media, digital marketing, influencer marketing talking head thing for a long time.
The first time anyone really took notice of what I was saying was when I started reviewing and talking about social media monitoring platforms. The industry vernacular knocked that term around a bit and they became known as social listening software platforms eventually.
In my book Winfluence, I tell the story of how one such social listening platform made a seven-figure sale because I wrote about them on my blog.
In the last 18 years, I’ve probably reviewed, demoed or tried hundreds, if not thousands, of software platforms. The one underlying theme that emerged in me from all that testing and trying was that I sure would love to get my hands on one.
I would like to be a part of building a software solution. I’m guessing you’ve ascertained that from my occasional rant here about how the influencer marketing software companies aren’t providing good indexing for owned content. Or that none really take into account offline influence and other paths of identifying influential people for your brand beyond that which the social platform APIs provide.
Well, I’m making a big move this week that finally puts me on the software side of the aisle. That’s right … as of today, I am officially the executive vice-president of marketing for CIPIO.ai.
Those of you who follow my content might recall in July of this year I published a written and video review of CIPIO.ai. You can find that review and the video on my website at jasonfalls.com/cipioreview. I’ll link to it in the show notes as well.
In that video, I said this …
“Because CIPIO.ai also enables you to tap into the influence of your community … your customers, your followers and such … it’s the first platform I’m happy to call an influence marketing platform. Without the R.”
That alone should tell you why I jumped at the chance to merge my philosophy on influence marketing with a software platform and services company that thinks the same way.
Today on the show, I want to tell you a little more about the move. What is in store for me and CIPIO.ai in the near future. And explain what me being an employee of an software company that includes an influence marketing software application means … and doesn’t mean for this podcast. Spoiler alert … not much is going to change.
So today marks my first day of work as the EVP of Marketing for CIPIO.ai. If you’ve been following me closely the last few weeks, that might be confusing. Many of you know I launched Falls+Partners, an influence marketing strategy consulting firm, a few weeks ago while I migrated work away from Cornett and to F+P. Cornett became a client rather than my employer. And I could open up my strategic consulting to anyone else.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the forum. Sundeep Sanghavi, the chairman and CEO at CIPIO.ai, Growson Edwards, the president and COO at the company, and Kelly McDonald, the Chief Product Officer, and I had some time together at an event. When I shared the news of my migration to consulting, the conversation shifted and their need for someone to lead the platform’s marketing surfaced.
I’ll dig into some details in a moment, but I jumped at the opportunity to join the team at CIPIO.ai. The clients of Falls+Partners can now become clients of CIPIO.ai’s Strategic & Managed Services and I can spend time with everyone I planned to, plus a platform of software and applications that I think are going to revolutionize the way we not only think about, but execute influence marketing … without the R.
What does that mean for this podcast. In a word: Nothing. I will still bring you insights and interviews with the leading thinkers and doers in the space. From brands to agencies, to creators and yes, even my now fellow software and service providers … they may be competition, but they still know a lot about influencers and influencer marketing. The conversations we’ll have together will be far more useful than anything either of us could offer separately.
In fact, you’ll be interested to know that I’ve got IZEA’s Ted Murphy lined up to tell you about his new Flex platform in a couple of weeks.
Basically, this podcast will be presented by CIPIO.ai, but it will not be an advertisement for it. You now know my role there and the respective biases that might come with it. But I think you know me well enough to know I will always offer up the best advice I can muster to help someone with their marketing, whether that directly benefits me and Cipio.ai, or not. I will continue to invite and welcome competitors to the microphone to talk about their perspectives on the marketplace. And yes, they can talk about their platforms, too.
I promise you that I will continue to attempt to be a fair arbiter of the conversation, and only inject the occasional recommendation or information about CIPIO.ai where it’s relevant. And the brief sponsor segment after our introductory information at the top of the show.
The space Tagger has occupied for some time.
Speaking of which, it’s appropriate to thank Tagger and Pete Kennedy for their support of Winfluence for the last two years. I still love Tagger as a software solution. I just now work for a competitor. CIPIO does some different things which I’ll explain in a moment, but Tagger is certainly well worth a look-see if you’re looking for a robust, enterprise solution for your influence marketing management.
And no, I was never lying to you. I did use Tagger every day. But I won’t be moving forward. Doesn’t mean they aren’t good or not worth looking at. If they fit your needs, you should sign up.
Thank you Tagger … and the Tagger team … for the support.
And that brings me to CIPIO.ai. What is it and what makes it so different, and good, that I would change direction and agree to work for a software company?
CIPIO.ai is a Community Commerce Marketing Platform. What does that mean? Well, that’s actually one of my challenges in this new role … to translate that for you. So here’s a first attempt:
A community commerce marketing platform is a software solution built with a variety of apps that give you the power to uncover, engage and activate members of your community. Find the most relevant voices among influencers, employees, customers, followers and beyond and turn them to raving advocates for your brand.
The brands we’ve worked with to date have shown incredible results in increasing sales, strengthening customer retention and growing customer engagement.
Many of the apps have a core of generative AI behind them. And we’re building more apps to make CIPIO.ai the influence platform of the future.
Think of it like this … you’re making an influence cocktail. The base spirit you’re putting in it is let’s say one ounce of influencer marketing. But then you add a ½ ounce of employee engagement, a ½ ounce of customer loyalty, another ½ ounce of fan and follower user generated content with a garnish of incentivization … and voila! The CIPIO.ai Old Fashioned.
I call it old fashioned because the platform’s approach is very much rooted in the philosophy we talk about here a lot … influence marketing. Focusing on influence, not just influencers. And that happens online and offline. Inside and outside the company. With consumers, but also with employees, and vendors and all those concentric circles out from the brand we talk about.
What the platform doesn’t currently offer in terms of features and functionality, it’s on the roadmap and I will now have a direct input channel to change or add. And you can bet I’m going to try and ensure the platform follows through on the promise to answer the call for commerce marketing through the influential people in your community.
This is going to be quite the adventure. I’m going to learn a lot about software development, demand generation marketing, seed-stage startups, raising investment dollars … and I’m going to bring learnings to you as well.
But we will always focus on how those learnings can help you find better pathways to influence for your brand.
If you’d like to join me on that journey now, go visit CIPIO at jasonfalls.com/cipio. You can sign up for a demo of the larger platform. You can also register for the Community Influence Marketing application for free. Influence discovery and list building don’t cost a thing. Accessing profiles of individual creators will cost you one Cindex token. You get 10 of those per month without a fee, too. You can buy more for a buck or so.
And of course, I’ll share more and keep you in the loop here from time to time, but again promise, the only change to the show is the presenting sponsor. And that’s CIPIO.ai.
We’ll get back to our insights and interviews later this week, so why not make sure your friends and colleagues know about the show? Tell someone who might want to know more about influence marketing about this podcast. Send them to WinfluencePod.com or share a link to this episode on your social network of choice. If you have a moment, drop Winfluence a rating or review on your favorite podcast app. We are on them all.
You can also help make a future episode of Winfluence awesome! Ask your question about influence or influence marketing that you want my answer to or take on. Send an email to [email protected]. If you’re feeling adventurous, record a voice memo on your phone and email me that file. I’ll let you ask the question right here on the show using the recording.
Winfluence is a production of Falls + Partners. The technical production is by MPN Studios. Winfluence airs along MPN … the Marketing Podcast Network.
Thanks for listening, folks. Let’s talk again soon, on Winfluence.