Hi, my name is Irene Triendl and I do marketing strategy for B2B tech companies.
Before setting up Say What? in 2018, I spent my career agency-side (mostly B2B with some B2C thrown in) with a short in-house stint at a startup. I’ve always done strategy and writing (and a bit of account management early on – where I soon realised that I want to do the work, not manage it).
B2B positioning and content marketing are my sweet spots, with B2B tech being the juiciest of the sweet bits. I learned a lot from the folks at B2B agency Velocity, where I spent a good chunk of my first five years in London. I have since worked with many of the big B2B agencies, in addition to working for direct clients.
Many small consultancies try to look bigger than they actually are. I don’t blame them. I am though, for the most part, a one-woman show, supported sometimes by talented people from my network of specialists – writers, designers, performance marketers – to help me scale up and out. So when you see the copy switching between ‘I’ and ‘We’ on this website, that’s why.
I work with startups, agencies, and big + little tech
I’ve done work for some of the big guys – Microsoft, Salesforce, Xerox, AWS, Oracle, etc – and have created content for tons of much smaller tech businesses and startups that you probably haven’t heard of.
To be honest, I enjoy working for the smaller companies more. There’s more urgency, less hierarchy, and more freedom. You can make a bigger impact, and on the whole it tends to be much more enjoyable than creating yet another ebook for Microsoft. (But obviously, I wouldn’t say no to a well-funded big-ass company handing me a beautiful project.)
I love B2B strategy because it’s hard. You can’t take shortcuts when you’re trying to convince a seasoned B2B buyer with a keen bullshit detector. You’ve got to put the work in. There’s a crucial phase during strategy creation, where you’ve done all your research, gathered all the knowledge, and you still haven’t cracked it. And you mull things over and think about them even before you go to sleep. But when you finally do crack it, stories and messages start to fall into place. And when you get that bit right, and it lands with your audience, that’s the most rewarding thing there is.
Outside of work, I love contemporary art, cooking, cycling, cheese and cinemas. (literary fiction, too, but it doesn’t start with a C).
I speak and work in English and German. Ja, echt. (I have some Italian, too, but not enough for work.)
To learn more…
…You can listen to me speak about content strategy on Radix Communication’s Good Copy, Bad Copy podcast…
…read this interview I did with Illuminate Financial…
…connect with me on Linkedin:
…or you could, of course, always drop me a note.
Say What? 