How many times have you read a company’s marketing and thought – they’re not talking to a customer; they’re talking to themselves. This is especially prevalent in B2B. I’ve seen this on homepages, landing pages, print ads, in press releases, and on and on. I started my career as a copywriter and then worked in sales enablement. So I – it is tempting to write for the person signing your check. But where the revenue for that check really comes from is the customer. Always write for the customer. As our latest guest put it in his podcast guest application – ‘Outside-in messaging is the important factor for success.’ To hear the story behind that lesson, along with many more lesson-filled stories, I talked to Ralf Paschen, Chief Marketing Officer, xtype (https://www.xtype.io/). The venture-backed startup just announced $10.8 million in growth funding. Paschen uses five to 10 artificial intelligence and automation tools to run his department. Stories (with lessons) about what he made in marketing Some lessons from Paschen that emerged in our discussion: Outside-in messaging is the important factor for successTrust and learn from othersFail fast, fix fast, learn fastNothing counts more than the language of the customerUse data to make informative decisionsSell a vision by defining a strategy for the companyRelated content discussed in this episode Get the power of 10,000 marketing experiments. Play with MECLABS AI at MECLABS.com/AI (MECLABS is the parent organization of MarketingSherpa). Customer-First Marketing: Do you put your customers’ interests first? (https://sherpablog.marketingsherpa.com/customer-centric-marketing-2/customer-interests-first/) Customer Experience: Take risks, fail early, and learn fast (podcast episode #32)  Data-Driven Marketing: 7 examples of using data as a force for the good How I Made It In Marketing podcast, from MarketingSherpa Subscribe to our podcast This article is distributed through the MarketingSherpa email newsletter. Sign up for free if you’d like to get more episodes like this one. For more insights, check out... This podcast is not about marketing – it is about the marketer. It draws its inspiration from the Flint McGlaughlin quote, “The key to transformative marketing is a transformed marketer” from the Become a Marketer-Philosopher: Create and optimize high-converting webpages free digital marketing course. Apply to be a guest If you would like to apply to be a guest on How I Made It In Marketing, here is the podcast guest application – https://www.marketingsherpa.com/page/podcast-guest-application