Marketers are Ethical Hackers Prove Me Wrong with Clark Barron

Joining Maria and Gianna this week is Clark Barron, the Demand Generation Manager at Nisos. He has a background in cybersecurity marketing, photography, and independent film, and is an avid gamer. Clark shares his unconventional ways of lead generation through websites. Every marketing campaign might feel like it says the same thing, but Clark defies the user’s expectations to bring in user interest and stand out in the field.

 

Timecoded Guide: 

[05:48] Marketers are hackers of different colors

[09:14] Campaigns that changed the game

[15:08] How Clark tracks his unprecedented marketing campaigns

[22:31] Communicating with leadership to try your ideas

How can marketers apply this approach to messaging branding?

Marketers have more influence and power than they often realize. The similarity between hackers and marketers is that marketers are gathering data in an ethical manner. Both are building personas, exploiting pain points, researching, and reaching vulnerabilities. Clark believes that is the power of choice to be good ethical marketers. 

“Marketers, a lot of times, don't realize the kind of powers that they have, they have to make a choice to use them for good. That's the way I look at it.”

 

How have specific campaigns you’ve implemented changed the game?

Clark started his process by evaluating voice and brand identity. He sat back and watched what others were doing. Noticing that all the cybersecurity websites were saying the same thing over and over, Clark decided to take action in a wacky way. He developed a marketing strategy that changed the game.

“Subvert their expectations from the very beginning. They're expecting one thing, and they're getting something completely different. We know what they're expecting, but instead, what we're gonna do is, we're gonna say, ‘Enjoy a completely different cybersecurity landing page.’”

 

 How do you have conversations with leadership to go along with these ideas?

The first step is to have those conversations. If the CEO or higher-up doesn’t understand marketing processes, then you need to have those conversations with them. Long-term growth is what you should be working toward. Before you cast out the big campaigns, you have to have small wins so you’re better prepared for a marketing plan with bigger risks.

“A lot of bigger organizations are not going to be able to do this. I have that level of self-awareness that I know that, however, what you can do is change the way you look at conversations with leadership.”

______

Links: 

Find Clark Barron on his website or LinkedIn and check out his blog here!

Follow Gianna on LinkedIn.

Catch up with Maria on LinkedIn.

Grab your ticket to the Cyber Marketing Con 2022.

Join the Cybersecurity Marketing Society on our website, and keep up with us on Twitter.

Keep up with Hacker Valley on our website, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter. 

Additional resources: Nisos, PhishFirewall, DEF CON, Cybersecurity Marketing Society, Celeste