Ashley Faus

Kogan Page Publishing

My book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI" features three frameworks to help marketers build trust and attract, convert, and retain customers.

Key messages:

-	Trust is the key: People buy from people they trust, and people trust people like themselves. As marketers, we need to build trust with our audience to win and re-win their hearts, minds, and wallets.

-	The human connection becomes more important in the age of AI, because more technology makes it harder to find people you can trust and make authentic connections.

-	The Playground mindset shift: Marketing needs to evolve to match the modern journey. It’s no longer about rushing people to a purchase, it’s about building trust and rapport for long-term value exchange.

-	The Social Media Spectrum (communication, conversation, community): Social media continues to evolve, but too many brands are still focused on driving and participating in conversation about the brand, instead of meeting the audience where they are and fostering community.

-	4 Pillars of Thought Leadership (credibility, profile, prolific, depth of ideas): Thought leadership helps build trust, but it’s not the only type of content or creator that you need in the marketing mix.

Author, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI"

Atlassian

Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Portfolio

Director of Integrated Product Marketing

Product Marketing Lead, Software Teams Content 

Sr. Manager, Integrated Media

Sr. Corporate Communications Manager

Skyport Systems

Skyport Systems, acquired by Cisco, provides secure, hyperconverged infrastructure to modernize the DMZ, protect Active Directory, and secure legacy applications and remote branch operations.

Sr. Product Marketing Manager and Content Strategist

Palerra

Palerra, acquired by Oracle, pioneered the API-based Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB).

Sr. Manager, Content Strategy and Marketing Communications

Duarte, Inc.

Strategy and execution for all things marketing.

In addition to previous duties, manage budget, forecast, and annual planning for marketing strategy.

Sr. Marketing Manager

Manage a team of creative experts
Marketo integration, strategy, and execution
Analytics/KPI reporting and analysis
IP launches - Resonate multimedia, Slidedocs, Persuasive Presentations eCourse
Email campaigns, social media, and ad campaigns
Website branding and content updates
Editorial content strategy and execution
Executive presentations

Marketing Manager

Killick Aerospace

Killick Aerospace encompasses several companies that provide engine maintenance, accessory maintenance, airframe support, and parts and engine sales to the aviation industry. I oversaw the marketing activities for all companies in the Killick Aerospace portfolio. My duties include, but are not limited to:

Work with management and IT department for requirements gathering, implementation and documentation of CRM strategy 

Manage 3rd party programmer to update company websites, content manager for company websites

Manage relationships with outside vendors including designers and promotional representatives 

Coordinate all aspects of trade show exhibits, including marketing collateral, shipments, promotional items, and travel logistics

Co-creator and co-manager for print advertising budget

Track and measure success of marketing activities, including website traffic/SEO, referral lead source, and email campaigns

Marketing Coordinator

UserTesting.com

I helped research and implement a social media strategy, including Twitter and reaching out to bloggers. I also helped with customer service.

Independent Contractor

Solar Designs, Inc

Account manager for the company’s largest project, a commercial solar installation, worth $150,000

Improved profit margin by 5% through bulk-price negotiations with supplier

Grew affiliate partnerships from 2 to over 50 within 8 months, used direct Marketing to offer qualified leads and guaranteed revenue to new partners

Increased revenue opportunity by creating a training package for installers

Strategic analysis of customer and installer needs, led to over-hauling information-gathering form and presentation of final customer proposal

Wrote proposals with details about solar system design, environmental impact, and financial implications including up-front costs, rebates, ROI, and payback

OpenTech Media, Inc.

Research, layout, and copy for corporate brochure and website to present a more cohesive message to customers

Virion Interactive Agency

Competitive analysis, post-project analysis, client invoicing and work order processing

Account Management Intern

Director of Integrated Product Marketing, Atlassian

Marketer, writer, speaker by day... singer, actor, fitness fiend by night!

I've handled all aspects of marketing strategy and execution, from product marketing, to demand-gen, to content and events. I love telling the high-level stories that resonate with an audience and connecting the dots between types of assets and distribution channels.

My writing has been published on TIME, Forbes, The Journal of Brand Strategy, and The Muse, and I've spoken on various marketing topics for INBOUND, Harvard Business Review, and MarketingProfs.

Visit https://ashleyfaus.com/ for more information about my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI".

(Views are my own)

When you're friends with smart marketers, you feature each other as an example when you write a book 😀

Devin Bramhall released her book recently, and she featured my Playground framework.

I released my book in May, and I featured her community work from her time at Help Scout.

Per usual, there's a blooper pic if you swipe through 😂

Buy "Human-Centered Marketing": https://amzn.to/480QQLI

Buy "B2B Content Marketing Strategy": https://amzn.to/4i3SLne

(Thanks to MarketingProfs B2B Forum for the cozy background and in-person photo opp 😊)

Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Portfolio at Atlassian

You do NOT need more assets.


You need better distribution.

That's it.
That's the post.

(Ok, one more thing: grab a copy of my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI" if you want tactical advice on how to build an audience journey that scales and converts)

I don't have many rituals before I step onstage to speak.

But I DO love my glitter face mask tradition 😀

Excited to speak about building trust in the buyer's journey MarketingProfs B2B Forum this morning, 10:20am EST!

My highest-converting channel ever will shock you 👇👇


It's DocuSign.

This channel has a 99.9% conversion rate when the counter-signer has agreed to move forward with a contract.

(If you're looking to build a journey that ACTUALLY works, I show you how to ditch the linear funnel in my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI")

Marketer, writer, speaker by day... singer, actor, fitness fiend by night!

I've handled all aspects of marketing strategy and execution, from social media, to content and editorial, to demand-gen and events. I love telling the high-level stories that resonate with an audience and  connecting the dots between types of assets and distribution channels.

My writing has been published on TIME, Forbes, MarketingProfs, and The Muse, and I've spoken on various marketing topics for INBOUND, Harvard Business Review, and MarketingProfs.

Visit http://consciouslycorporate.com/ for more about my marketing experience, observations, and philosophy on practicing marketing, as well as posts about corporate life, etiquette, and decisions.

(Views are my own)

Guess who's back (back, back)
Back again (gain, gain)

Stanford's back (back, back)
Tell a friend (friend, friend)

In case the old-school lyrics didn't trigger enough back-to-school vibes, lemme spell it out real clear: I'm reprising my Stanford Continuing Studies course at the end of January 👩‍🏫

If you want to...

🧠 Define your unique voice by uncovering the experiences, expertise, and insights that set you apart

📢 Identify the right platforms, including LinkedIn, blogs, newsletters, podcasts, and YouTube, to connect with peers and grow your professional audience

👩‍💻 Develop content that resonates, from thought-provoking posts to scroll-stopping stories

Join me for a 5-week series where you'll walk away with assets, posts, and a long-term strategy to build your personal, professional brand!

Got conflicts on Monday evenings?

Fear not: sessions will be recorded.

Not sure where to start at all?

Fear not: We start at the very beginning, discussing goals and outcomes that are unique to YOU.

If you've got learning goals in 2026, class will be in session 🙌

(Register for BUS 125 - Build Your Expert Brand: Content Fundamentals for Professionals: https://lnkd.in/eqcWSDTR)

Grateful for another award for my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI" 🎉

Need a gift for yourself or a marketer you love? Get 40% through December 1st!

Grab a copy: https://lnkd.in/eJWZHRF8

Need some light reading en route to allllll the Thanksgiving dinners?

Free sneak peeks:

Thought leadership: https://lnkd.in/eXCZ2qPf

Buyer's journey playground: https://lnkd.in/esQDz9EK

Congrats to all the winners: https://lnkd.in/emxkNFZ2

When I was VERY early in my career, I had to make an expensive decision on behalf of the business.

I was SO worried about it!

Tons of money.
Literally minutes to make the choice.
No time to call my boss for approval.

I decided to spend the money, and trusted that my boss would be ok with it once I finally talked with her.

Y'all... It was paying $50 for valet parking.

But at that time in my life, $50 for parking seemed absurd.

At that time in my career, I wasn't well-versed in how businesses expenses and vendor agreements worked.

And I was genuinely worried about confirming with a vendor that they could pay $50 for valet parking because they were running late to film a customer testimonial during a big conference.

My boss was thrilled that I made the decision to spend the $50 on faster parking vs. potentially losing the filming slot with the customer.

Now as a seasoned marketer, I cringe at my younger self, thinking how silly it was for me to even worry about $50 valet parking. 

OF COURSE that is a no-brainer call!

But... does your team know when it's a no-brainer decision? 

Do they trust that their leaders will back them up when they need to make real-time "expensive" choices?

Do they have a framework for when to escalate?

If you're rolling your eyes at folks making bad calls, it's worth taking a step back to understand whether they have context and trust to make good calls.

Because it's ACTUALLY expensive to do things cheap.

"Which bakery did this come from?"

"Wait, YOU made these!?!"

"You should open a bakery..."

People say this to me frequently when I bring treats to the office, the theater, birthdays, etc.

There's some AMAZING commercial-scale bakeries out there, AMAZING home bakers out there, and everything in between (including my amateur baker status).

After baking treats and buying treats over the years, I've started applying my marketing nerdery to the questions of perception, compliments, trust, etc. in this space.

And so, I'm curious...

In the comparison below, which option would you pay more for?

How much would you pay for a dozen of the cupcakes shown in the picture?

Assume that each option has comparable cost of goods sold, etc. to not bias the results too much, and you can make whatever assumptions you want about where the cupcakes came from, who took the pictures, if they're AI-generated vs. human, etc.

Please nerd out with me about the intersection of my baking hobby and my marketing brain 😋

"96% of organizations say they DON'T see an org-wide transformation with AI" - Atlassian State of AI Collaboration Report

What are the 4% of companies who go beyond individual productivity doing differently, and how can you get past the hype to actually see results from AI adoption?

Join me next week for a FREE event with Hard Skill Exchange to hear how real people are bringing AI into their organizations.

I'll cover:

👀 More surprising findings from the AI Collaboration Index

📋 Practical exercises, like FixIt Fridays, to help your teams bring AI into their workflows

🧠 The mindset shifts to go from a lofty mandate to real-world use cases

You're not tricking anyone into buying anything.

A "Learn More" CTA that goes to a form to contact sales, book a demo, or otherwise become a "lead" that will then be "nurtured" is not, in fact, increasing your conversion rate or contributing to your pipeline and revenue goals.

It's just breaking trust with your audience, over and over again.

To build trust AND drive business impact, we need to match CTAs and metrics with intent.

And that's EXPLICIT intent, based on the next action for the AUDIENCE.

It's NOT whatever inferred intent you want it to be as a marketer (and let's be honest... we always want it to be buy-intent 😅).

Your thought leadership content should drive trust- and learn-intent outcomes.

Your product content should drive buy- and use-intent outcomes.

Your support forums and documentation should drive help-intent outcomes.

Draft accordingly.
CTA transparently.
Measure accurately.

Build trust and drive revenue 🙌

(PS - Want more details on how to build and measure a journey that converts? Grab a copy of my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI", on sale with code SALE40 through Dec. 3!)

"When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure." - Goodhart's Law

I've been on a bit of a metrics and attribution kick lately, and I talked a bit about Goodhart's Law in my conversation with 🍁 Glenn Schmelzle on the Funnel Reboot podcast.

The heart of it is something that marketers continually struggle with...

We know we gotta measure.
But we know we can't measure everything.
And without everything, it kinda feels like we have nothing.

The problem is that we're so focused on capturing every. little. detail. in a way that we can easily show in a dashboard, but we miss the big opportunities that actually help people move through a buying process.

We talked about the core frameworks in my book that help you do just that: create a journey that helps the HUMANS make decisions, take action, and solve their problems (and yep, drive revenue for your business)!

Hear the full episode: https://lnkd.in/emxHSDgk

Grab a copy of the book: https://amzn.to/480QQLI

"We need to talk about [Product Name] in this asset, but we don't know what to say 🤔"

Hear me out... maybe you DON'T need to talk about [Product Name] in this asset 🤷‍♀️

Stick with me:

I love Sally's Baking Addiction.

She's got recipes for all sorts of delicious baked goods (like the chocolate cake pictured below 😋).

She's got educational guides about ingredients, tools, and methods.

She's got a whole guide on baking with yeast!

She talks about different kinds of yeast, storage options, using yeast in recipes, and more. It's VERY thorough. 

You know what it doesn't talk about?

Frosting types. 
Dutch-process vs. natural cocoa powder. 
Baking soda vs. baking powder.

Because this asset is not about those topics.

And suddenly shoe-horning in a mention of those things FEELS like shoe-horning to the consumer. 

Sally has lots of great baking guides.

She calls out the most related ones in a little CTA box at the end of the article, along with an easy yeasted recipe to get started baking with yeast (not frosting or chocolate).

So no, your asset doesn't always need to mention [Product Name].

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