Diversification consumer tech products — Andrew Samson // Level Home Inc.

Does having more products make you a more credible tech company? Many brands believe the more products they have, the more credible they are, but no real consumer insight supports that. How can a marketer stay on brand message and not have to split spending down the line across multiple products? Listen to Andrew Samson, Chief Marketing Officer of Level Home Inc., as he discusses insights from doing high-level marketing across sports, lifestyle, wellness, culture, and tech brands, retail as a channel for tech products, understanding product diversification, and more.
About the speaker

Andrew Samson

Level Home Inc.

 - Level Home Inc.

Andrew Samson is Chief Marketing Officer at Level Home Inc.

Show Notes

  • 02:25
    How Andrew Samson cut his teeth in marketing
    A thriving marketing career through sports, lifestyle, wellness, culture, and tech.
  • 08:38
    What has contributed the most to a marketers success?
    The mentors you have, the people you sit next to, those on your team that push you to think differently, and the leaders you report to.
  • 11:08
    What makes a good client agency relationship?
    A lot of trust, a clear understanding of expectations, and the ability to push each other to get outside each other's comfort zone
  • 13:04
    Performance marketer vs. brand marketer?
    You need both. You cant be a one-trick pony when it comes to that because performance can't just be performance, and if you forget about the brand, you have no lifeline. And you have no real differentiator.
  • 16:34
    Whats the growth cycle for the level smart lock brand?
    Continuing to innovate around how the brand will fit into a broader smart home, how the brand will continue to add features, and the new and exciting things like the future of Apple home keys and what that means for an Apple user.
  • 19:52
    The all in one smart home integration
    Amazon, Apple, and Google are working on an all-in-one smart home app to control and have everything in one place.
  • 23:57
    Is retail a good marketing channel for smart locks?
    Theres still a lot of education and research in the category, so retail presence complements direct-to-consumer marketing efforts because it allows the brand to tell a better and more complete story.
  • 26:12
    Understanding product diversification
    If you have a stand-out product, make it the stand-out product and celebrate the hell out of that because it allows you to get more narrow on tightening that message, which ultimately can make the entire thing much sharper.
  • 29:17
    Does having more products make you a more credible company?
    Not quite; a consumer could prefer a company that does one thing exceptionally well and six to ten things just ok.

Quotes

  • "If it weren't for the mentors that I've had, the people I sat next to, the people that were on my team that pushed me to think differently, and the leaders that I reported to, I wouldn't be here because every single place that I've gone, I've taken an element, not just of the company, but of the people from those places that have shaped me into, into who I am." - Andrew Samson

  • "What makes a good client-agency relationship? It's a lot of trust. And a real clear understanding of expectations is another. And the ability to push each other to get outside each other's comfort zone." - Andrew Samson

  • "Performance can't just be performance; if you forget about the brand, you have no lifeline. And you have no real differentiator. And you see that with companies like Airbnb now divesting from performance and only focusing on brand or other companies that went so heavy on performance or trying to go back." - Andrew Samson

  • "A future-proofed marketer is someone who's going to have deep knowledge of brand and performance and how performance drives brand and brand drives performance. And that is a shift from where we probably have been the last few years, where it has been so performance heavy. And that was a shift from three to four years before that, where it was so brand heavy, and no one was thinking about performance yet." - Andrew Samson

  • "The opportunity for us is a lot of exciting things happening within the smart home space more broadly. The matter is happening, familiar or at all with the matter, Scott. But the matter will allow the likes of the Apple user, the Amazon Alexa user, and the Hey, Google user to come together on a single platform, allowing them to manage your smart home through a single source. What's awesome about Level products today is that all of our products are ready for any matter when it does come." - Andrew Samson

  • "We know that there's about 80% awareness of smart locks, but only about 10 to 12% adoption; huge opportunity, and millions and millions of people, again, to use our favorite term from before with dumb deadbolts on their doors, we now need to get people enlightened and understand why this can be such a value add for them, and why when you think of a SmartLock level should be synonymous with that." - Andrew Samson

  • "My thing as a marketer, historically, has always been making the thing, the thing. And right now, we're seeing what level lock plus is, which can be the thing for us. But at the same time, we don't want to dilute the other products; we're not diluting them." - Andrew Samson

About the speaker

Andrew Samson

Level Home Inc.

 - Level Home Inc.

Andrew Samson is Chief Marketing Officer at Level Home Inc.

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