Breaking Remote Work Barriers Through Virtual Connection | Drew Moffitt from Kumo Space

Ernesto Quezada: Pathmonk is the intelligent tool for website lead generation. With increasing online competition, over 98% of website visitors don’t convert. The ability to successfully show your value proposition and support visitors in their buying journey separates you from the competition online. Pathmonk qualifies and converts leads on your website by figuring out where they are in the buying journey and influencing them in key decision moments. With relevant micro experiences like case studies, intro videos, and much more, stay relevant to your visitors and increase conversions by 50%. Add Pathmonk to your website in seconds. Let the AI do all the work and get access to 50% more qualified leads while you keep doing marketing and sales as usual. Check this on pathmonk.com. Welcome to today’s episode. Let’s talk about today’s guest. We have Drew from Kumo Space, head of marketing with them. How are you doing today, Drew?

Drew Moffitt: I’m good. I’m here in snowy New York.

Ernesto: Oh, man. I don’t want to throw a little bit of envy on you, but I’m on a beautiful beach down in the south. We’re hitting mid-70s today, so a little bit of a different climate.

Drew: Unfortunately, I’m a big skier, so it’s kind of exciting. It’s just at that moment in time when it’s snowing in New York, and it’s fresh for those few hours before it becomes a sloppy mess. So right now, it looks beautiful.

Ernesto: All right, awesome. Well, it’s great to have you on today’s show. Let’s give our listeners what they’re tuning in for. Let’s talk about Kumo Space. In your own words, can you tell us a little bit more, Drew?

Drew: Yeah. Kumo Space is a unified communication platform for remote and distributed teams. If you think about the challenges most companies face today, their employees are siloed, and communications are often fragmented. You might have conversations happening in Zoom, email, and Slack, but that information doesn’t live anywhere. We have a product that helps solve those kinds of challenges. Most companies face some combination of lack of collaboration, lack of culture, employee engagement, and lack of accessibility to what’s happening in the company.

Ernesto: So that way our listeners can get a good understanding of your company, if you could sum it up in one or two key problems you solve for clients, what would they be?

Drew: If you’re running a remote, distributed, or even hybrid team today, you probably have team members who are very productive doing individual work. But as soon as it becomes cross-departmental, projects get really slowed down. The average Kumo Space user sees about a 30% boost in productivity. Average meeting times go down to about nine minutes. Some tertiary benefits include cost savings and higher employee engagement.

Ernesto: Definitely. All right, awesome. So, who would you say are your clients? Is there a vertical segment that you guys like to focus on?

Drew: It’s uniquely difficult for Kumo Space to define a singular ICP. Our customers range from healthcare startups to small businesses that have been around for 20–30 years to Fortune 500s and government agencies. Any company that uses Zoom or Slack today is a fair ICP for us. It’s hard to individualize that to a specific type of buyer, which makes marketing a challenge but also an exciting opportunity since we’re addressing a very large market.

Ernesto: Definitely. Would you say this could be from small businesses with 5–15 employees to 100–500 employees?

Drew: Yeah. Our pricing tier starts at $5. Everything below that is free. To get strong value from the product, a team typically needs to be a little larger than five—around ten users simultaneously using it. Think of Slack: if you used it by yourself or with one other person, it wouldn’t be particularly valuable. It’s similar here. We also have customers among some of the largest companies in the world.

Ernesto: That’s awesome to hear. How does someone typically find out about you guys? What would you say is the top client acquisition channel for Kumo Space?

Drew: We’re in a bit of category creation. We don’t make traditional video conferencing or traditional team chat. We combine the two, but users aren’t specifically looking for this product—they’re looking to solve problems. Our customer acquisition breaks down into thirds: about a third is organic search (e.g., increasing employee engagement or collaboration between remote team members), another third is influencer marketing, and the last third is word of mouth. This includes our team speaking at conferences, appearing on podcasts, and other public appearances.

Ernesto: Great to hear that. I’m here on the website. For our listeners, you can check it out at kumospace.com. What role does the website play in client acquisition?

Drew: It’s 100% of our client acquisition. Our business is entirely driven by inbound, so the website is a very important asset for us.

Ernesto: Perfect. Would there be any tools or methods you’d recommend for lead generation?

Drew: We’ve been successful scaling content and SEO. Influencer marketing and public appearances have also worked well. My advice is that some tactics will work for one business and not for another. Be open to testing tactics, evaluate ROI, and double down on what works.

Ernesto: Thanks for that. Let’s switch it up and talk about you as a leader. What are some key tasks you focus on in your day-to-day work as head of marketing?

Drew: Right now, we’re in the new year, so a lot of time is spent finalizing Q1 execution based on 2024 planning. My core focus is scaling successful channels, making processes more efficient, and unlocking new channels.

Ernesto: Great stuff, Drew. Let’s jump into our rapid-fire question round. Are you ready?

Drew: Of course!

Ernesto: First off, what’s the last book you read?

Drew: I don’t read many books because of ADHD, but my favorite is The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz. It’s a great story about overcoming challenges while running a business.

Ernesto: What is one thing your company is focused on the most right now?

Drew: From a marketing perspective, it’s scaling content and influencer marketing. Holistically, we’re focused on expanding product features.

Ernesto: If there were no boundaries in technology, what’s one thing you’d fix for your role as a marketer?

Drew: I’d automate having a team of data scientists to better utilize data.

Ernesto: If there’s one repetitive task you could automate, what would it be?

Drew: Prospecting people on TikTok and Instagram. It’s very human-driven, and AI isn’t quite there yet.

Ernesto: What’s one piece of advice you’d give yourself if you were restarting your journey as a marketer?

Drew: Marketing is a contact sport. It’s competitive, and you need to approach it with that mindset. Use everything at your disposal to succeed.

Ernesto: Great advice. Drew, thanks for being on the show. If someone forgets everything about this interview, what’s one thing they should remember about Kumo Space?

Drew: If you want to demo Kumo Space and meet me, go to our website and schedule a demo. You’ll see our team in action.

Ernesto: Awesome. Listeners, check them out at kumospace.com. Drew, thanks for being on Pathmonk Presents.

Drew: Thank you!