How to Lead B2B Marketing for the First Time: Strategy, Budget, Team, and Content with Jess Cook

#266 Marketing Leadership | In this episode, Matt is joined by Jess Cook, Head of Marketing at Vector, a platform pioneering the contact-based marketing category. Jess has spent her career building standout content strategies at B2B brands like LASSO and Fastly, and she recently made the jump from Head of Content to first-time Head of Marketing. Jess and Matt cover:How content marketers can transition into marketing leadership and what gaps to prepare forThe strategy behind building a brand that stands out in B2B (and why Vector leans into being “a little unhinged”)How Jess built her first marketing budget from scratch and sold it in using storytelling, not spreadsheets You’ll walk away with tactical insights on running a modern B2B marketing org, from content and brand to budgeting and team structure. Timestamps (01:00) - – Jess’s B2C roots at McDonald’s and Kellogg (04:39) - – Jumping into B2B and growing through content (06:24) - – Why she moved from Head of Content to Head of Marketing (08:59) - – Hiring product marketing first (and why it matters) (13:09) - – How Vector built a bold B2B brand with personality (17:09) - – What Jess looked for in her first marketing hire (20:29) - – Building and pitching her first full marketing budget (25:54) - – Creating a 30/60/90 plan that actually drives buy-in (27:24) - – Category content, SEO, and early wins with AI (31:43) - – The podcast pivot: ditching “Funnel Cake” for something better (35:23) - – How she knew Vector was the right fit (39:03) - – Going all-in on YouTube and video-first strategy (43:13) - – Short-form content, brand building, and trust (45:43) - – Biggest lesson: balance long-term planning with quick wins (50:13) - – Leading with action and setting the tone as a new marketing leader (52:13) - – How Jess communicates vision and builds internal alignment (55:43) - – Wrap-up and final takeaways Send guest pitches and ideas to hi@exitfive.com Join the Exit Five Newsletter here: https://www.exitfive.com/newsletter Check out the Exit Five job board: https://jobs.exitfive.com/ Become an Exit Five member: https://community.exitfive.com/checkout/exit-five-membership *** Today’s episode is brought to you by Walnut. Why are we spending all this time on marketing… just to push buyers to a “Request a Demo” button? Even if they’re interested, no one wants to click that. No one wants to “talk to sales.” They just want to try the product for themselves! Good news: now they can - with Walnut. Walnut is the interactive demo platform for marketers who are done hiding their product and want to put it front and center. You can build guided, self-serve demos in minutes. No engineers. No developers. No waiting. Embed them on your site. Drop them in emails. Let buyers explore your product on their terms - at any stage of the funnel. And the best part? You get the data. See what features prospects are engaging with, where they drop off, and what’s actually driving pipeline. 500+ companies use Walnut - including Adobe and NetApp. Their teams save 400+ hours a year building demos… and have prevented over 1.5 million minutes of bad ones. So if you want to drive more leads, shorten sales cycles, and actually show your product, go check out Walnut.io (and tell their team you heard about it on the Exit Five podcast!).