Andrew Michael
Hello, welcome to the show.

Olga Andrienko
Hi, thank you so much for having me here.

Andrew Michael
It's a pleasure. It's a pleasure. Great to have you today. For the listeners, Olga is the head of global marketing in sem rush. And if you don't know sem rush is an all in one marketing toolkit used by over 4 million users and trusted by companies like eBay, Cora and booking.com. Olga spent the last six and a half years at sem rush and is an accomplished speaker at leading industry conferences. And together with the team, she has built one of the strongest international communities in the online marketing industry. So my first question for you, Olga, is what is one thing that has stayed the same throughout your time with sem rush? And what is one thing that is radically different today from when you started them?

Olga Andrienko
I think the startup culture is what we managed to preserve or to retain because I started one, it was only 50 of us and right now it's 100. So I've seen really some radical changes but this freedom to test freedom Fun creativity. And then also people on like lower levels being responsible that so that's the startup culture that we have. And then it's still there with 800 people. And one things that changed is probably the budgets. So with them growing, and then having more users, then obviously we have run more marketing campaigns. And then yeah, we're able to do more. And that's definitely what changed.

Andrew Michael
What changed and Sorry, just to make sure you said you started window 50. And there's now over 800 people in December. Wow, that's quite a lot of growth over the last few years. And for yourself, like what is that meant in terms of marketing and terms of like the role and the progression that you've seen at sem rush?

Olga Andrienko
I was one of the first marketing people that started now we have over 100 and for me, that meant that I just joined and had Lot of I had the potential of like, even co seeing what I did, and I was the girl at the social media. And right now, it's so well for people who join us increasingly hard to also get that attention from sea level, for example, and then to the results of their work. So I think we're bigger companies. That's something that just fades away this personal connection, the same personal touch. And then so with just yeah, we were a corporate company now, I'm happy to say that we still feel like a startup But anyways, with we were absolutely flat. So there was no managerial levels. Yeah. And right now with 800 there's still three which is an impressive yet but I would say that still it's just so I joined a completely different company in terms of structure. And also in terms of like I I definitely I would just went to the kitchen and chatted with them. founders and I was able to understand a lot more about the business because I heard that from people who built that initially. And at this point, this is almost not possible.

Andrew Michael
Yeah, I can imagine. You know, so it one thing is what I think you must've seen happen quite a bit and through the transition as Himesh grew and scaled was the impact on churn and retention. And maybe you want to just give us a little bit of a backstory of like, where you actually started, if you want to run through anything that changed during the last six years.

Olga Andrienko
Yeah, absolutely. So when I joined, we almost so when I said the budgets change, that's actually what was the case like we have, we're not spending that much in marketing, which means that also, our Well, when the users subscribe to us, then their return on the investment that we had with this user. It was just We would get our money within a few months back with the subscription price. Yeah. And that's Yeah, that's because we were not spending much. So right now. And the lifetime value is, well, it's just, it's over six months, I think. And maybe even more, maybe just because we are we investing a lot and then we were acquiring a lot of leads and eventually converting the clients. But the problem with the Yeah, so it's just, it's a completely different when you see the return on the investment, when you're spending not a lot and then when you suddenly start spending much, then it's just it's not a really good picture, and it's not not a nice one, and it makes management also bit nervous. Also, the journey becomes increasingly longer. And there are more touch points in the customer journey and that also increases the acquisition costs. So I think because the people who knew you in the beginning and then when you invested a smaller amount of money, then they needed less persuasion they just weren't ready to buy. And then when you're acquiring new audience, yeah, they need more than you need to invest more. So, that is I think, what probably all companies with what who are willing to invest in top of the funnel especially, they need to be ready for that the return investment would take longer and also there is a there was an interesting impact on the churn because when you have new marketing campaigns, then there are people who subscribe and then they cancel within a few months. And so the churn rate starts getting lower. What what I see in the how I sell those people is that they were just not our guys because for the if you have new and bigger marketing campaigns, then you acquire bigger audience, but then you don't have to worry about the churn rate of few first months. Because that would mean that this audience just tested something because it's new. And then they didn't like, what the churn that I always look at is the churn of five, six months and more. Because that would mean that this is the audience that stayed long term with us and they're committed. And if they leave, that's a problem. But if some someone just just tested us for one month, please that's not a problem because that was not the like the audience that would stay. So I always looked at yet. Five like what three months is the first point where I really was more pay more attention, and then the goal and then I'll ask my teams in different markets, to always look and talk to customers that been with us for having Yeah, yeah, and ensure that they stay with us. Because I believe if they've been using us for half a year, then there is a potential that they will be using us for a year or more. And these are the customers we definitely need to retain.

Andrew Michael
Yeah. So you mentioned quite a lot of things. And I'll try to sort of recap and then unpack parts of it. I think the first thing that you sort of talking into is that in the early days, there wasn't a lot of money. So you didn't have much money to invest into customers. And really, it was sort of the early adopters before Crossing the Chasm. And before reaching sort of the early majority were, you were in a fortunate position that people knew about the brand and the way we a little bit more sophisticated and knew exactly what they wanted and got on with it. And then when you started spending more money now as the company started to grow, you started to reach new audiences who perhaps were maybe a little bit less sophisticated, who perhaps didn't know as much about sem rush as your early adopters. That's when you started to So to see the cost per acquisition go up and then also sort of as a result, impacting churn potentially on some campaigns, bigger marketing campaigns and attracting potentially some of the wrong customers. It's interesting that you say as well, in terms of the way that you sort of segmenting churn and looking at retaining customers, of customers say three and six months. How did you go about sort of determining this month that you wanted to measure and track? And what are some of the metrics that you're looking at around those? So obviously, just looking at lack retention at six months six, but are you looking at growth and retention at month 616? Are you expanding as a whole as a percentage of all signups? Like what are some of the things that you're trying to understand when it comes to retention and customer acquisition?

Olga Andrienko
So regarding the month that I look at is that I see that churn is higher and too fast months, and then the graph is already started being lot less aggressive or Well, no, it's just it's stable. That means that these first months is someone trying out and then deciding that it's just not for them. And then whoever stays for three months, then they already think what would consider the platform as some that they would be using for the future? Yeah. So that's like, well, I just read the graph, and then see the patterns and then try to identify them. And then so the two first months, obviously, were something that was standing was standing out. And then with the US, just increasingly releasing more campaigns that it was a really good connection or correlation that I saw. And then for three months, that's already the user that was likely to stay and then six months. I think that's just a point where it's, I would, I would say that's wild. Yeah. So if that's a loyal customer, then I want them to stay and yeah, And that's that's why six months is so important. But that's we haven't based this metric on something that is just, I guess my own assumption on how I would and then in the company as well. So six months was something that many leaders and marketing and sales were seeing as the like a term for well, customer.

Andrew Michael
So then the thing is, well, is that what you're saying previously, is that as you started to spend more, and I think this is something as well, like, a lot of companies maybe don't look into enough at the beginning is in when you see growth is going well and steady, like churn is almost masked in a way. But then when you really start to put your foot on the gas, and you start to invest more into paid media and start to try to acquire more customers. This is typically where churn starts to increase them because like you mentioned before, potentially not getting the right customers. So with this in mind, like what are some of the things that you're trying to do and knowing like what the demographics look like of customers at six months, in and those are the company Customers you're trying to acquire and get more of what are some of the things that you're doing at sem rush to do that.

Olga Andrienko
We we really work a lot with social media and our customers. So I integrated my social media team and customer success team when they work together and answering all of the clients questions and social media, and we tried it so the logic was is that if the customer calls then it's them. We need to tackle this as quick as possible. But as I've learned, I also spent two weeks and customer support department just answering calls answering emails, this is what I recommend for any marketing person in any sass company. So what I've learned is that people now call only if they have billing issues or release something with a card because this was triggers the call mostly and that's the like some financial problems because welcome times card, look, just cannot be built or there's some bank issue. And then what if they can wait, then they sent an email, but if that's something in the middle, people always address and then talk to brands and social media. So that's so the phone is absolute urgency, then social media and then email. But we tried to answer everything in email within 24 hours anyways. But social media I asked for for this priority because that one person can wait up until one hour on social media but not longer. And and so that's, that's what we do. And that that ensures that even if we, if the client has some issue with their account, they feel that we are responsive, and that's sometimes what actually makes them stay while we because they know that even if like any technology has some issues, or like or downtime or whatever, like there is the can be some issues. So what differentiates a good company from the bad for the client is usually the response that the company has. And, and that's where I wanted to ensure that we really stand out in a good way. And that's why we work on social media. So we use Sprout Social, and they're listening tab, and our customer support and our social media, they have the accounts on both sides of the ocean. And we have a person that's monitoring that tab during the whole day and is assigning different tasks to customer support or social media team, and then the priority goes to their clients questions.

Andrew Michael
I like that a lot as well. As well, the way you've sort of classified the problems and the channels in which people sort of go to and I think, at least in my case, it holds true that if there's something super urgent and I needed it solved immediately, I'll try get on the phone. The next best case in would be social media and then the last resort would be email that sort of really covering all bases and making sure that your presence because I think sometimes you get onto social media and you might send a message to a brand and then you get a message spawn saying, Please, can you email us and I think that for me is already like a very big turnoff, because I've tried to chosen to interact with the bandits and opportunity to have a conversation with me. And you've pushed me to another channel not to sort of put another roadblock. I really like that you've sort of given that focus and emphasis to, to the support and social. So let's talk about as well like some of the things now you mentioned you started investing or you started to see an issue with chip and what was sort of like the response in the company, what are some of the reactions to this, this change?

Olga Andrienko
We will I believe everyone is super concerned about retaining the users and then that's one of our major goals. So right after first payments, we also have a goal of the retention and we We worked with the development a lot on this. And then one other thing that we've done is that we created a private Facebook group for only paid users. And then product department is there when the client has to wish. Then we tagged the product owner, which also makes all this is a great feeling of the client for the client that they impact the future. And also, we have customer support there. And then all of the group moderators, they know that product on the level of customer support. So we ensure that there is a space where clients will get priority will treatment, so to say, and they also get the access to the sea level on the product department and then they could talk about the tool on a completely different level. So that's one thing that we've done last year,

Andrew Michael
like when you say all paid customers, how big is this group, like how you're going about moderating I think it's often often quite a concern as well for people that I mean, I love the idea of really interesting customer speaking like we introduced touch our customer advisory board. And I've seen the most change ever happened as soon as you started getting messages coming to slack and interacting with product managers and with the team, but when you say Facebook group, sort of how big is it? How are you managing? It's like, what are some of the processes that you put in place?

Olga Andrienko
we gradually invite customers there. So we started with 500 people. And then when we were sure that we could moderate 500 people, and then there's a conversation going, then we send another email blast to them to just a small portion of the newsletter database. And then also we got the incoming requests because people started referring and mentioning the group. So it's gradually growing. We're not sending the invite straight to the whole database because that would be a nightmare. Just to moderate that, and people will be upset. So right now it's two and a half thousand people. Yeah, and then so we're sure that we're moderating this in a, in a proper way, once we, we add more forces from our side, then I will send another email blast. So it just gradually growing. And the most important thing that and the metric that I look at, well in this group is not how many users we have, because that's how I know the final number we can get there. So it's not a point and I just, we measure the engagement and one and then once we see the engagement went lower, then we see that it's just we need to engage them more and that's, that's the most important thing. Also, we look so we we asked the email when when they apply to enter the group. So we know all of They're emails. And then what? Exactly which clients are members of the group. And then so we check their activity in, in the tool and the specific dashboard. And we're able to see what tools they're using and whether it was the spike. And then once we share the updates and the product updates there, if we see that the usage of the tool is growing, that we're able to understand that our marketing was deficient, and also the art the post was efficient.

Andrew Michael
Yeah, I like making sure you're keeping them engaged. How are you been sort of dealing? And maybe it might not be the case, but I'm sure there's quite a lot of different feature requests coming in through the channel, and how are you sort of moderating those requests, making sure you're keeping track of them ensuring that sort of direct knowledge but also at the same time that you're not just going out and building and changing everything for anyone. It's more about making sure that you're doing the right thing. So what does the product team doing? What is your team doing to try and help back sort of Bring all that feedback together and quantify it.

Olga Andrienko
We tagged the product owner. And from that point, we have an ultimate trust to the product owners decision. And then product owner replies to the client instantly in the group. Either they take it the discussion further somewhere in the email, or in our private messages or Well, if their product owner likes the idea, or they already have an answer, White can be made at this point or when it sometimes it just doesn't make any sense. For example, we have different pricing plans. And then there was a question why there is only one user per week per subscription. And that is When will our Chief Strategy Officer actually join the discussion and explained our pricing policy to the existing plans. And so this is this was nothing that we would be changing but we always Open on the discussion and then we wanted to be transparent. So I think it's not always. So its ultimate decision, we fix the tool wish. And then it all depends on the product owner. But if that's something that we won't be building will be also open and transparent about that.

Andrew Michael
Make sense? Cool. So the next thing I wanted to ask you, because I was actually before the show, going through just LinkedIn, looking at your profile, and I came across a presentation that I think you did a great job it is titled marketing, gamification, customer retention strategies. You want to talk us through a little bit about that. What did you do at sem rush around gamification to help the customer attention?

Olga Andrienko
Sure, and that was one of the really exciting campaigns that we've done, and it was for Easter. So we, we worked with the product department on this so we had a lot of new tools, and we decided to hide easter eggs and 15 tools and so clients will visited one tool, then there was a papa. Non intrusive, but so that was saying that there's an Easter egg and then they needed to unlock it. And then they started searching by clicking different functionalities. And then another pop up said Congratulations, and then offered to tweet that they found the easter egg. And then also gave a hint to link to another tool where we had the EC and, and then so a lot of people took part and we had a winner list. So people also were able to check how how they're doing compared to others. And we had a lot of tweets, I think it was, yeah, so it was around 8000 tweets, but a lot of people were obviously well, that could be up to 15 tweets or even more depending on how much They were playing from one person. So ultimately, we also use one of the Twitter extensions for Chrome. And we were identifying who were tweeting. And then we, by the end of this game, we ended up with that, too, with the list of actual users. That was 1200 people in that list. So it was really great way to also identify the existing clients and active ones, obviously, on for social media team.

Andrew Michael
is very cool. And then did you sort of take a look at what the impact was on retention with those customers, I think obviously, makes a lot of sense that you sort of took this game around Easter time, very seasonal as well, and then sort of encouraged people to try different parts of the product to educate them was anything that went into sort of the follow up and looking at sort of how this impacted engagement and retention for this cohort

Olga Andrienko
Yes, so we analyze further usage of the tools. And for some tools they use, it increased for a time. So there were a lot of people also who played but never tweeted. And but they kept using the tools. So for for the tools that were not that popular. And then they were super new. That's why we basically decided to do it, then, yes, the number of users went from like four times that was the biggest but then yet two times or one and a half times more users. That was what we've seen in more than five tools. And that was really yeah, that campaign was super successful because by that time, we released the keyword magic tool, which is one of our, one of our most popular, fewer tools now, but that was the first campaign that this tool was really part of. And Yep, so from that points, really the the two really had them the growth Off users and their attention that it while it has now. So, yeah, it was it was super successful for this specific tool.

Andrew Michael
Very cool because that was gonna be my next question sort of, did you see just spike in usage? Or was it something that continued even after the campaign it finished for the users like for the specific tools? So did you still see the same some figures? Or was it just a spark during the duration of the campaign?

Olga Andrienko
Or some tools it was a spark because they were nice tools and then I you might not necessarily visit them very often all the time.

Olga Andrienko
Yeah. But for some like keyword magic tool, yeah. People stayed there.

Andrew Michael
And us because I think obviously this is one of the great ways to increase engagement and and obviously like, engagement, being the depth and retention being the breath is that the more you get people engaged, the more likely you are to attain sir. feature. adoption is a very, very big play. It's a very, very interesting sort of thing. So what went into deciding to do this? Like, what were some of the order? I mean, did you look into any specific actions that you wanted users to take? And how did you decide like which ones were which

Olga Andrienko
that was up to the product department with and they looked at functionality. And also it really said there was a really human factor there. Because some of the some of the product owners decided to focus on the really easy features to make it easy for the users to find the egg. And then some focused on less common. And then so in to encourage users to more to dig deeper, which I will, which didn't really work well. So for the tools where the game was easy, then we've seen a lot of results and then also a lot of completion. And yeah, so the emotional connection was like really positive. And then whenever the Check the tool and try to search for the eggs in the tool that were it was difficult and obviously they didn't find the egg and then do I didn't really have a stronger impact. So I think the takeaway that we had and then what I would suggest to others is make it easy. So make it fun, easy, and do not really overcomplicate it, because eventually won't really bring the results so didn't for it for the first few tools were clients just could not really find anything.

Andrew Michael
And it was my last question, and this was anybody that found all these things.

Olga Andrienko
Yes, yeah. Yes, there were. A lot of people found all the eggs and yeah, in we even had a prize for well, that that we randomly gave to, to one person out of everyone who found all the eggs, but the prize was really insignificant to everyone like they just played Because they found it fun, but I think there were Yeah, I cannot remember the amount of people that found all the eggs but they were plenty.

Andrew Michael
Okay, cool. So next question I had for you then is something that I asked for to everybody on the show as well. And you've been through quite a lot, not sem rush. You've seen how the company has changed and evolved and how an aggressive acquisition strategy has an impact sort of entrepreneur retention. But obviously, it's a necessity to keep growing as you start to scale. Let's say you move to a new company now and you've come to you arrived here and you see Turner, attention is not doing great at all. And you've actually been tasked not to try and turn things around. You've been asked by the CEO to try and make an impact. And you've been given 90 days to make an impact. To show some results. What would be some of the first things you'd want to be doing in that time? After joining

Olga Andrienko
I will call I will message those people who just dropped us So I want to understand the reasons and that's what we did well now with the Italian team they call 60 people and then I would then maybe send an email if I can base them GDPR. But if I cannot, then I just I will, I would want to find a way I would go to also customer support and try to understand the biggest concerns people have. And also, I would want to understand the model, the frequently asked questions. And also, I would want in a customer support knows those people. I would want to talk to 10 people who are really who asked a lot of questions, but who who are loyal customers. And then I would will build the profile of someone who is not really staying with us and then who leaves and then I would also understand the profile of a person who is loyal customer From that, I would understand who who is staying and then what questions should I answer? So people would stay longer. And then I would know promo, who's not likely to stick and who I shouldn't bother about.

Andrew Michael
So would you sort of describing is you'd go through an exercise of trying to identify what the ideal customer profile looks like, but then also what your empty personas look like. So who is not your customer? I think this is a super valuable exercise to do for companies as well. And a lot of times as well, like we just focus on what the ideal customer profile is. And it does help us in terms of marketing and building products and supporting them. But a lot of times our understanding who they aren't as well, who we shouldn't be going after and we shouldn't be trying to acquire build for is almost equally as powerful. It's interesting that you enter into that. And then from your perspective, you didn't really be trying to go out and focus and acquiring these his customers are correct.

Olga Andrienko
Yeah. And also, I will would want to create content that would be really easily accessible. So, I would actually save some time from customer support and then make sure that our existing clients would not need to write and ask that they would have this information in hand and then I would start probably building my funnel and I would do that. So, if I know the ideal customer, then I would want to interview these three of them in the sense that if they so I would want to understand the main questions that someone is asking when they are not even considering and they don't know we exist, but they have some questions regarding so if well, if to have the SEM rush an example. So there is some marketing professional, not perfect, yeah, there is some marketing person that just starting and then they would not understand what channels and then how they even have to deal with Marketing. So then I'll cover those questions. And then if we go to level further, then so they know they have to do my thing. And they know for example, search already brings 50% of the traffic to the website. So they would then look at SEO. And then so what is Seo would be my content, and then what and then after identify the top questions, then they already know what SEO is. And that's where they would be interested probably to, to choose the software. And that's where we already have to build them content regarding us or ensure that if on some comparison websites, then the information about us is accurate. And also work on this content. So I would build the funnel based on the questions of the audience, when starting really way before when I talk about Michael Any

Andrew Michael
even like, you know, from like, even from a problem and nowhere stage like when they just sort of really trying to figure things out and then realizing that there's a problem. Yeah, absolutely. I think, at least for me, probably this is one of the most powerful areas when it comes to solving fortunate retention is really having a solid understanding of the problem that your customer has, and being able to sort of nurture them through the funnel being able to educate them to begin with. So by the time they arrive to purchase your solution, they really have a good idea of what the problem is how your product solves this problem and why they're gonna be wanting penguin sticking around with you because I think far often than not as well, like we spend way too much time on resurrection strategies are done in campaigns when you're trying to solve tonight attention, but really, if you're not solving it at the core, which is the initial problem, which is when somebody actually come to you and said, I have a problem, you have a solution help me then nothing you've really lost the battle if you sudden to focus further down the funnel. Yeah, very cool. Well, Olga, it's been a pleasure having a chat with you today. I really appreciate your time. Is there anything you'd like to leave the listeners with? Now, before we close off for today? How can they keep up to date with your work or follow what you're doing in sem rush?

Olga Andrienko
I think we've covered a lot so I won't wouldn't add anything else. Yes. So and I'm happy to answer any follow up questions, and then just go to my LinkedIn or Twitter profiles. I'm happy to chat further.

Andrew Michael
Very cool. Well, thanks so much for joining today and wish you best of luck now going forward. Thank you so much. I hope it was useful. Thanks.

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