 From our studios, in the heart of Silicon Valley, Palo Alto, California, this is a CUBE Conversation. Hi, I'm Peter Burris, and welcome to another CUBE Conversation. From our beautiful studios here in Palo Alto, California, this is going to be a CUBE Conversation that focuses on marketing. It's one of the series that we have where we're talking to CMOs here in the Valley and beyond about the challenges of marketing and the role that marketing is playing in driving increasing levels of value to customers. And to have that conversation, we've got Micheline Nijme, who's the CMO of Zscaler here in the CUBE with us today. Micheline, welcome to the CUBE. Thank you, glad to be here. So, Zscaler. Yes. Tell us a little bit about Zscaler. Let's get started there. Zscaler is really transforming traditional network security. They are a security cloud platform that securely connects users to applications no matter what location, on any device, over any network. And just to kind of put it in a little more context, if you think about how cloud and mobility are changing, how organizations are transforming digitally into the cloud, network security is changing, right? Apps are moving to the cloud out of the data center, and there's no longer a perimeter to secure filled with appliances to secure their data, their applications, and the mobile workforce, while they're accessing these apps, not in your traditional method, they want secure, fast, reliable access. And Zscaler is the platform that was born in the cloud, built for the cloud, to help securely access those applications. Well, you get no argument from me about how important network security is. It's one of the fastest growing and become one of the largest areas of spending within an IT organization. But let's put that aside. Yes. And instead, talk about marketing. You mentioned digital transformation. Let's start there. What does digital transformation mean to marketing? To me as a marketer, I think of how can you run your organization with the minimal amount of manual steps you can take? Why? It's because how do I connect better with my customer? It's going to make me more efficient, effective, save money, right? It's going to cost savings there, but it's going to help me understand my customer better because I'm going to have the data. It's going to give me the data that I need, that single pane of glass, because all of these tools will allow me to have a better access to my customer, faster, more efficient, and understand them better. Well, I've been working in the marketing technology space for quite some time at various other, in various places. But one of the observations I make is that a lot of the marketing automation tools are not growing as fast as you think their tool would suggest. By that I mean, if their tool is that great, by using their own tool, they'd be growing a lot faster than they are. That always suggested to me that the real value of these tools is in how they're utilized by people. So it still is highly dependent upon how the marketing organization uses these tools, and that's even more important in the selection of the tools. What do you think about that? Absolutely. If you think about a tool, it's not moving away from the human connection, it's enabling you to have a better human connection. And if you don't have the right amount of tools, sorry, the right type of tools that allows you to engage with your customer better, then why have them? There's data that shows almost 30% of marketers have 11 to 20 tools. That's crazy. And if you don't have them integrated, if you don't have them working and talking to each other, then they're going to be a hindrance more than help to a marketer. So that also suggests, and you mentioned, we start off by talking about digital and how digital can improve efficiencies and effectiveness, but also how it can transform the role that marketing could play within a business. At Zscaler, what is the role of marketing and how do you envision that that role could change over time? Zscaler, we are so customer centric, right? Our customer is truly at the center and the heart of everything we do, from our customer success team to our CEO, to our CTO, all of our C-level execs, and everyone within those organizations. Think customer first, and marketing is another organization that has put them at the heart. And when we think about a buying journey, that's how we start our any sort of planning, any sort of strategy. We look at how do we engage and drive interest before they buy, of course. How do we engage with them through this purchasing experience? And then how does marketing impact them post-sale? And it takes sales, customer success team, marketing, all working together as a true machine, and that's how we've evolved marketing at Zscaler. So is marketing a cog in the function, or, which of course it is in certain respects, but are you seeing that marketing is expanding its role within Zscaler, becoming more of a steward of customer-related data, becoming more of a advocate for customer experience? Is that happening at Zscaler as well? Zscaler, from the start, to be honest with you, has always valued marketing. So our CEO is a number one advocate and fan of marketing. You cannot have any more happiness as a marketer to have that. So he's been a huge advocate. So I can't say it's been more. I think what we're seeing more is optimizing it. How are we understanding the buyer a little bit better? How do we understand their challenges, their needs, and then what are we doing to help solve that problem? So that's kind of how we're evolving. It's less about having more fans because we've been so lucky to have such huge advocates from sales, customer success, all the way to the exact team. It's been really wonderful. Well, I'll tell you a quick story. This is a CEO at one of the Valley's juggernauts once told me a number of years ago when I asked him what was the value of marketing to this particular company. He said, oh, marketing's what I put between my sales and engineers people to make sure they don't kill each other. Sounds like that's not the role that marketing plays at Zscaler. You mentioned being customer centric and having marketing sustaining a focus, helping Zscaler sustain and reify that focus in the customer. We see a new challenge emerging in the industry. How do we use data to personalize what we offer to customers and sustain that engagement versus violating the privacy? What's some of the challenges that you've encountered as a CMO at Zscaler as you try to find that balance, especially given new regulations like GDPR? Right, GDPR, when you first hear about it, when it first came out, it was a beast. And as a marketer, you start thinking, am I doing the right thing? Am I following? Am I being compliant? But at the end of the day, marketers have had bad behaviors. We have not been looking at our database and understanding how to engage, how to deliver that value to our customer all the time, consistently. You say it, but sometimes you realize in your best practices, it doesn't always come true. So with GDPR and other standards that are coming in, it is enabling us to make sure and look back, are we following what we need to do to be compliant? But are we delivering the value to the customer? And for us, it's been, to be honest with you, great. As a consumer, I love it. As a marketer, as challenging it has been, it has really helped us reset, make sure that we are engaging properly. We are delivering that story that really the persona cares about and not just hitting them with communications over and over without really thinking through of what your needs are, what your challenges are, and then how our solution helps. I've always liked to say, and I want to see if you agree with us, that if marketing focuses on delivering value with every touch, they rarely get into problems about abusing privacy. Does that resonate? Completely agree. And that's why when you put a strategy together of how you're engaging, who you're engaging with, but really understanding who you're communicating, then that value comes through because you're not going to be sending them any sort of message that doesn't resonate because you've done your homework, you've looked at your database, it's compliant, you're understanding how you're engaging with them properly. So it is huge in terms of delivering value. So data is essential to marketing. Customer data sounds like it's essential to Zscaler. Correct. I'm going to throw you off a little bit. Yeah. Let me see if you can help me out here. Yes. Connect Zscaler secure networking to making the CMO's job better. So when you think of Zscaler, we have so much data, understanding kind of the usage, the patterns. And so by delivering, by having the CXOs, the CIOs understanding what data is in front of them. We're giving them this visibility that they've never had before. So they know what apps are out there, how they're being used, where there's security risks. Marketing has similar data, different tools, but we have that access to data, understanding how the consumer, our customer, is engaging. Where do they go on the web? I mean, it's a little scary, but we do understand how they're engaging with us, and then we make better marketers. Just as we have better security networks in the cloud built because of the accessibility and the visibility, marketing is getting those similar tools as well. I got to believe that as a CMO who's worried about the customer experience, especially in a world where there seems to be an ongoing onslaught against trust, that marketers also need to feel that they can trust their data, that marketing is becoming increasingly distributed and part of a community to get the work done, and that it's an essential feature of all of this so that a marketer can say, I trust my data and I want my customers to be able to trust their digital interactions with us. Have I got that right? Absolutely, you have to trust your data, but you also have to have trust in how you use your data. If you're not being accountable on how the data is used, you're not being a good marketer. You don't want to take advantage of the data that you do have. You should be able to understand the data, and then how do you turn that around to engage with your audience? It sounds like Zscaler, a trusted, secure, networking, cloud-based service is potentially a real tool that a marketer can use, both internally as well as externally with customers. Absolutely. All right, so one last set of questions. There's been a lot of conversation about how diversity improves a business to shareholders, to employees, and also to customers. So you're often, tell us a little bit about what it means to be a woman in the CMO job in a technology company. Peter, I've been a woman in the technology company. My entire life, and what is important to me is that I'm looked at just as equal as everyone else, but really I feel responsible and accountable and almost a role model to every woman out there. So for me, I hold myself at a higher standard, but because I need to make sure I'm delivering and being my authentic self, I'm able to voice what my feelings are at any time. I don't see myself as a woman amongst a C-level exec. I see myself as a CMO amongst a C-level exec. So for me, it's being accountable, being responsible as a role model for these women who are growing, it's mentoring them. But also, again, I don't differentiate as a woman versus a man. I think for me, I'm responsible as a marketer, as a leader in how do I lead the entire marketing organization, men or women? How do I lead them no matter what? I am their leader, I am responsible for them and I consider them as kind of my family that I'm trying to nurture and grow as well. All right, let's go out three years. Where is Zscaler in the industry and what role is marketing playing to get Zscaler there? We are changing and disrupting how network security is being managed. We are the largest cloud security platform built for the cloud, born in the cloud. And I don't see us, anyone else, kind of coming to us in three years from now. Fantastic. Michelin, Nijme, CMO, Zscaler, thanks very much for being on the team. Thank you for having me. And once again, I'm Peter Burris. Thank you very much for watching this important CUBE conversation. Until next time.