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Jason: 00:06
Hello and welcome to a special edition of the Anzen Approach this month. We’re in Boston for Klaviyo’s K Boss event, the first time they’ve done it since 2019. We’re excited to have Jeremy from Klaviyo with us. And also Roddy, our Anzen General Manager for North America. And as always, Brennan, our CEO too. So we’ve just finished two days of the conference. Brendan, you were you did an extra day before the conference as part of Klaviyo’s advisory. Maybe that’s like a great place to start, would be kind of what the week generally has been like for everyone. Getting started, getting into it, and then we can talk a little bit about the conference itself.

Jeremy: 00:54
Yeah, the um K Boston’s special, like, and and the and the K Boston, K Sydney, K London, they’re all they’re all really special events, and they are for a couple of reasons. There’s obvious the obvious, you know. Um products get announced, people we get to see people’s real real-time views on that those products as well. But for me, as someone that works for Klaviyo, what’s great to hear from both with from partners, customers, and and just the broader ecosystem is um just getting the feedback as well. Just getting the feedback as to how how how we’re approaching the market, how we’re doing things, how we’re shaping the product. That’s always the best part for me.

Roddy: 01:35
Yeah, I totally agree. I think one of the biggest perks of coming out here is just getting to sit down with everybody, getting some FaceTime with Klaviyo, getting FaceTime with other agency friends and and the tech partners. So for me, this was my first official Anzen event, and uh it was uh it was a big one. It was a it was a good one to uh to start off with, and just the product updates and the speed that Klaviyo is moving at right now is kind of wild in the grand scheme of things because like uh I was at the Klaviyo Partner Day for Toronto, New York, Miami, Austin, and they were talking about a lot of this stuff, and then now to actually see it like deployed in GA is is really exciting. So yeah, it’s been a great week. I’ve been really enjoying it.

Brenden: 02:20
Yeah, so as Jason said, um I came in a little bit early uh for the Klaviyo uh Partner Advisory Council, um, which Anzin are a part of. Uh so it was really great to spend some time with uh agency partners and tech partners from around the globe, uh in with Klaviyo leadership and product teams, uh, talking about the new features, talking about the roadmap, um, and giving some pretty candid feedback on you know what we think of the roadmap, what we think of the new products and what we think is missing and what we think could be done better. And I think one of the best things about Klaviyo, um, which has always been the case, has just been how receptive the team have been to product feedback from people like us uh at the callface, uh dealing with multiple clients. Uh they’re really receptive, they listen, um, and things get built. Uh I would be lying if I didn’t say the most exciting part and the best part was Anz End winning agency partner of the year for APAC. Um that was great. Uh great, a huge effort from our team. Um, but it was really nice um to be here in Boston um and get the award from A B himself uh and Eddie. Um yeah, outstanding.

Jason: 03:34
Yeah, I’m definitely biased. I would say that that was easily the best part of the of the show was us winning that award. Um, and they’re heavy too. They’re like it really, it really feels solid. Yeah, um, yeah, it was absolutely amazing yesterday afternoon. And I think like to be in that room with other partners as well, and have you know, whether it was other APAC agencies and platforms, but Amir and North America all coming over and congratulating us, and um just the whole experience was really awesome. But I do want to talk for people um that maybe haven’t had the chance to watch the recordings yet about some of the features that were announced, some of the new things that came out. Um I think for me the big one obviously is Kai, uh Klaviyo’s new AI, so KAI, obviously Kai. Um really, really impressive and incredibly exciting, I think, for us to be able to be able to deliver more quickly and merchants to be able to do more with their data. Um, but yeah, Jeremy, anything, what’s your major, I guess, takeaway?

Jeremy: 04:41
Yeah, um K B Austin was very much like a uh a lot of there was a lot of Kai going around. Yeah, there’s a lot of Kai. Um, so yeah, that that was the big one for me as well. Both the marketing and the service agent as well. Um, that’s um yeah, really, really good innovation. That’s that’s what I’m excited about. And I’m more I like the like the actual product itself, the tool itself is great and and it adds a lot to the platform, but I’m excited to see what it means um for the ecosystem, the customers, the partners, because as you know, that just gives you back time, and I’m just keen to see what people do with that time um going forward.

Brenden: 05:20
Yeah, Klaviyo AI, um super interesting, uh very uh frankly terrifying as an agency, right? Like, you know, we’re talking about Klaviyo building tools um that is gonna speed up and replace a lot of what clients engage us for. Um, and I think if we weren’t Anzen, we would be pretty scared. But um we are innovators. Uh I think we we’ve intentionally selected Klaviyo as our tool because our team can work faster, because the product is better. So uh this innovation I think just pushes AnZen to be more consultative, do more strategic approach, um, and maybe less hands-on some of the laborous parts of what we do for clients, um, and a lot more strategic. It does mean I think we’re gonna have to transform what we do as an agency. Um, but I love that we’re working with a partner like Klaviyo that pushes us to do that. Um there’s a there’ll be a lot discussed around the front end of what an actual user, and be that a brand or you know, one of our agency team members, on how they work. What I’m really excited about is the fact that Klaviyo has opened this up in the sort of back end from uh um an AI MCP perspective where we can start and continue actually building our and zen agents alongside with what Klaviyo is doing. Um, that’s what I’m really excited about.

Roddy: 06:49
Yeah, I think everything with AI was just like riddled throughout the entire day and a half that we had here. A hundred percent, and it’s like you you gotta adapt and adopt or die. Uh and I think it was A B that said it’s like, you know, AI is a great tool, but it’s all the strategy that you put around it. And I think that’s really where like AnZen can shine, and like we have the strategy, you know, we won best agency of the year for a reason because we do good work. Sorry, but a little a little bit of a brag there, but that’s a big part of why I joined Anzen as well. And I think like the way that we’re embracing it and the way that we’re rolling with it is just it’s exciting. Uh it’s really cool to see this this innovation and the the pace at the innovation is just accelerating. So I don’t think that’s gonna slow down. It’s terrifying and exciting.

Brenden: 07:47
Yeah, I was also uh very fortunate enough to be sitting um at the table with A B on, I guess, our welcome dinner ahead of PAC, um, the Partner Advisory Council, uh, and was able to get some, I guess, uh insights into his thinking around AI. And I think the thing that really stood out for me was about um, you know, those companies and those individuals who are willing to um, you know, blow everything up and start again. Uh, and that that in itself is terrifying, right? You know, burn the boats, there’s no way back, right? We’ve only the way forward. Um, and it was a huge validation for a lot of the thinking that I’ve been doing and that we’ve all been doing on this front.

Jason: 08:30
Yeah, I agree completely. I think a few other things, I think, for people that are maybe looking at what they should be honing in on um in terms of watching sessions, um, some great updates to marketing analytics, um, being able to bring multi-channel uh reporting in and uh looking at linear models and things like that. So if you’re interested in marketing analytics, definitely go and have a look at some of the new releases that Clevi have done there. Um, and then I think the MCP stuff as well is really, really exciting. So if you are someone who has been really engaging with AI and you know using um trying to look at building your own agents or how you can get uh get more out of agents, Clevire have basically opened the platform up to create secure connections between these agents and um your whatever your uh program of truth is um to be able to get some really, really cool, really deep insights, um, which were great.

Jeremy: 09:28
Um yeah, I was just gonna say, yeah, thank you for bringing up that um multi-channel reporting as well, because they kind of didn’t get buried, but the the the AI stuff was so exciting that you kind of like lose sight. Hey, there’s actually some other really, really cool stuff going on. I was sitting next to a few partners that do a lot of work with performance, and so this sort of tool was gonna save them time, gonna save their clients time, and also gonna save um, you know, possibly money for some of their clients as well. And it was, yeah, really, really that that that’s one that’s also really exciting. So, yeah, definitely a good call out there.

Jason: 09:59
Yeah, cool. I think let’s talk maybe a little bit more outside of the the actual um talk tracks and things, um, maybe some highlights from the the broader event itself for everybody. I know for me, one thing that I really enjoyed, um, obviously we can see all of our APAC friends at home whenever we want, but it actually was really great to see how strong the APAC presence was. And you I really got the impression that um we’re thought leaders even in this market, and that um a lot of agencies had come here and shown that. Um so yeah, that was really exciting for me to see. I think the the kind of global respect for uh some of our agencies in APAC and the quality of work we do.

Jeremy: 10:44
No, I yeah, absolutely. I I come I completely agree with that. You know, you could you come to Boston, you get your fill of um clam chowder and and consume many lobster rolls and maybe a couple of Sam Adams as well while you’re here. Um but yeah, it was you know the APAC folks, they they they travel the longest to get here. Um uh but um I think the way that the APAC folks um uh approach businesses, they don’t shy away from, as you say, giving honest feedback. And and and as a you know, as a vendor or a platform like Klaviyo, which is innovating at such a rapid rate, getting that sort of uh immediate feedback um and and is just very, very valuable to us. So yeah, it’s it’s it’s definitely a big big highlight for me too.

Brenden: 11:30
Of course, um you know it’s great to be from APAC um and have some good APAC representation here. Um but what I’m focused on is North America. Um and it’s so good to have Roddy here um as our new general manager for North America um and continue our expansion um in this region. We’ve been operating um here in North America for what five or six years, seven years, um, but now we’re really stepping things up. Um love to hear more about your thoughts on the role, Roddy, and a little bit about yourself.

Roddy: 12:03
Thank you. Yeah, um thoughts on the role. I mean, we’re a month in, so I’m still figuring out names and logins and things like that. If I’m getting no, I’m I’m past that point. Um it’s it’s funny being on the other side of the table now. Uh, you know, in partnerships I’ve often talked about like my background is in sales and partnerships. I’ve worked in SaaS for the last 10 years in like e-commerce uh across a bunch of different uh products, and the last like five, six years has been heavily focused on partnerships, and so I think like in partnerships you’re often like focused on like sales, support, success, product, marketing, and you’re like context shifting across those different things within the role, and then coming over to the agency side, that context shifting is like multiplied by 10 because you’re doing that for each merchant across your entire like client base, and then each of those merchants has a different tech stack that they’re they’re leveraging, so the like spider web effect is like it’s a bit overwhelming, I’m not gonna lie, but I think you know plays nicely into my ADD where I can like flit around from subject to subject, um, and I honestly it’s it’s I I’ve got a really good uh position here where like NZEN has the the process, and then we’re just moving it over here where we’ve already had success, and then just like leaning on people that I’ve worked with for the last decade to sort of build out our our our presence here. It’s it’s exciting, it’s it’s a lot of fun. I’m uh I’m pumped to be here.

Brenden: 13:42
It’s good to have you, and it’s good to have you to like here in Boston for K-Boss. Like, what a way to kick off and to be together.

Jason: 13:53
Final thoughts. Um, so I think for me, the everything at the conference was great. Um I think um some of the final bits uh that I found really interesting were some of the new products like uh Gatsby, the recent acquisition. Um so social, that tab is going to be appearing in people’s Klaviyo accounts. I believe that’s in GA now, um, is it?

Jeremy: 14:21
Or yeah, yeah, yeah, it is, yeah.

Jason: 14:24
Yeah, so you should start seeing a social tab, you know, neck near campaigns and forms in your Klaviyo account, um, and the addition of WhatsApp too, which we you know we haven’t also not really had a chance to cover, but um essentially Klaviyo adding two new channels at once, which is really huge. So, final thoughts for me is that I it really did feel like I think across this event, you know, features and marketing analytics, the launch of Kai, which is an incredible suite that is across the whole platform, um, and adding social as well. It feels like Klaviyo really have just gone crazy with launching new things, which is great.

Jeremy: 15:00
Um final thought for me, um we announced at the beginning of this year um Klaviyo as the first um B2C CRM. Uh and what’s been great is that you know that was announced, and we at the same time we announced K-service as well. Um and uh and since that point we’ve been adding features and adding functionality across the board of our product. And you mentioned some great ones, it’s not just AI-related things, it’s Gatsby, it’s the it’s the Gatsby um uh the social side of it. Um, you know, it’s it’s it’s it’s WhatsApp, it’s the the so the orchestration across like two new channels as well. So that that all plays into it. So it’s just it’s just really good to see this um uh this really come to life. Um and and see how people and now people are uh are uh starting to see the vision and understand it a bit more. And in the in the famous words of our founder AB, we are only one percent done, so it’s just gonna keep getting better every year and every time you see it. Final thoughts, Ronnie?

Roddy: 16:02
I think one thing we didn’t uh touch on chatting quickly is just uh some of the talks that we had that we that went on today. So like Omar’s talk this morning, like his so good. Like talking about like forget demographics, like sure they can help you direct like where your paid is going, but like think about like the behavior, the emotion, and like the connection and things. And I I just thought some of the talks were like really well curated and and organized for for the audience.

Jeremy: 16:31
And Paige’s talk yesterday had me in stitches. Oh yeah, she was funny. I was saying Paige’s talk yesterday also had me in stitches as well.

Roddy: 16:38
Yeah, yeah, yeah. She was hilarious. Yeah, uh, that was really all I had, so I can pass it back to you.

Brenden: 16:44
Uh so my final thought is um Anzen is a customer journey and CRM agency. Uh Klaviyo is the only B2C CRM. Uh, you know, we have traditionally been known as an email and SMS marketing agency. Uh we’re not. We’re a customer journey agency, we’re a CRM um agency. Uh Anzen is going to be doing a lot more in service and help desk, um, marketing analytics reporting, strategy, AI, agents, um, and of course, email and SMS. Um, so I think I think that wraps it up. Uh, check out anzen.co forward slash podcasts. Um, you’ll be able to get it uh this episode, you’ll be able to find a whole bunch of our previous episodes. Uh, you can also find us on YouTube and Instagram, TikTok. Um, see you next time.

Klaviyo: 17:37
Founded in 2012, KLAVIYO is the only CRM built for B2C brands. Powered by our built-in Klaviyo data platform and AI insights, Klaviyo combines marketing automation, analytics, and customer service into one unified solution, making it easy for businesses to know their customers and grow faster. Klaviyo helps relationship-driven brands of all sizes deliver one to one experiences at scale, improve efficiency, and drive revenue. Chat to the team at ANZEN or visit https://andzen.co/klaviyo to find out more and get started.

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