Welcome to The Spoonful newsletter!

Can you believe January is almost over?

Shout to our newsletter sponsor today, TechnologyAdvice!

TechnologyAdvice is sponsoring the Spoonful this week! TechnologyAdvice is a leading B2B media and demand generation partner for cybersecurity software vendors. With a network of 30+ tech media brands, expert content, and lead gen solutions, they help IT decision-makers discover new solutions and empower marketers to engage cybersecurity buyers at every stage of the buying journey. Thank you TechnologyAdvice for supporting the community!

📌Boston Cyber Marketing Meetup New Date: March 12

The Boston meetup this week was cancelled due to weather and storm aftereffects and has been rescheduled for March 12! Register here for the new invite.

Not in Boston? Join us at one of our other upcoming in-person events: at RSAC 2026, Atlanta (Sandy Springs area), and NYC, Raleigh, SF Bay, and DC are in the works too!

Are you a cybersecurity marketer or Society member who wants to help put on a regional event? Reply to this email!

OFFER: Free List of High-Intent Accounts

Interested in seeing who's actively researching new cybersecurity products within your solution category? Our friends at TechnologyAdvice can pull that data for you! Click here to request a complimentary list of companies who are currently show high intent to purchase!

Where We’re Meeting Next:

Upcoming events, webinars, and meetups across the community.

Feb 13: Prep for RSAC 2026: Expert Panel & Open Q&A 12-1 p.m. ET (NEW)

Feb 25: CyberMarketingCon Replay Day: Watch Together, Learn Together (Virtual) 11 a.m-4 p.m. (NEW)

Feb 25: Wine & Chocolate Tasting for Cybersecurity Field, Demand, and Heads of Marketing (Virtual) 2:30 p.m. PT / 5:30 p.m. ET (NEW)

Feb 26: Behind the Cyber Creator: AMA with Phillip Wylie (Virtual) 2-3 p.m.

Mar 5: Cybersecurity Marketing & GTM Atlanta Meetup (In-Person, Sandy Springs, GA) 6-8 p.m. ET (NEW)

Mar 12: Behind the Cyber Creator: AMA with Patrick Gorman (Virtual) 2-3 p.m. (NEW)

Mar 22: RSAC 2026 Party for Marketers (In-Person · San Francisco, CA) 5:30-8 p.m. PT (NEW)
Apr 10: Partner Up: Co-Marketing @ Black Hat USA Matchmaking (Virtual) 12-1 p.m.
Apr 30: SEO & GEO: What’s Working for Cybersecurity Brands in 2026 (Virtual) 1-2 p.m. ET (NEW)

Check out the monthly member & non-member events calendar! It’s packed with exciting networking opportunities and recurring meetups designed just for you.

Cybersecurity Tech Marketing Trends for 2026:

Check out TechnologyAdvice’s take on where cybersecurity marketing goes right (and wrong).

Winning attention with IT and security leaders takes more than clever content. Join cybersecurity expert Ken Underhill and TA CMO Tyler Lessard as they unpack 2026 buyer trends, what’s keeping leaders up at night, and the marketing plays actually driving demand.

Trending News 📰

Do you have cool news from your company? Please send it to us! Email media@cybersecuritymarketingsociety.com

Jen Easterly Joins RSAC as CEO

Jen Easterly has joined RSAC as CEO. A big leadership move for one of the most visible organizations in cybersecurity. We're a fan of Jen's recent LinkedIn post about it. Following the announcement, federal agencies like CISA, the FBI, and the NSA announced they are withdrawing from this year's RSAC 2026 Conference.
👉 See the announcement

G2 Acquires Capterra, Software Advice, and GetApp from Gartner

In the last Spoonful, the talk around town was all about CVENT's multiple acquisitions (Goldcast and ON24). This move by G2 is another major play in marketing- and review-tech consolidation, and follows reporting mid-January on Gartner's 47+% share value decrease in 2025. Independent review sites like Peerspot and Trustpilot remain and, as far as we can tell, PeerInsights is staying with Gartner. 👉 Read the press release

SEO Isn’t Dying. The Panic Is.

Every few months (for months!), someone declares SEO dead. A new Graphite study says otherwise: 40,000+ sites show organic search is holding steady while AI-powered discovery is quietly growing alongside it.

👉 Read the study

👉 PS! Register for our upcoming webinar: SEO & GEO: What’s Working for Cybersecurity Brands in 2026

LinkedIn Articles Are Showing Up More in AI Responses

If AI visibility is on your roadmap, LinkedIn just got more interesting. According to Social Media Today, long-form LinkedIn articles are being cited more frequently in AI responses, suggesting that the platform is becoming a stronger discovery surface rather than just a distribution channel. 👉 Read the article

“TamperedChef” Uses Fake PDF Manuals to Deliver Malware
Researchers uncovered a malvertising campaign that uses fake PDF manuals to drop malware and steal credentials, especially targeting organizations that rely on technical equipment and documentation. 👉 Read the Infosecurity Magazine report

AIStrike Raises $7M for AI-Native Cyber Defense
AIStrike announced a $7M raise to accelerate its AI-native, preemptive cybersecurity platform, another signal that investors are still backing early-stage cyber bets with a strong AI angle. 👉 See the announcement

👇👇New Podcast episode alert: The ROI of Recognition

Why DataGrail’s awards program works and how Ian Phippen, Head of Content & Community Marketing, built and runs it  - yes, we get into the DETAILS on this one!
👉 Listen to the episode

🔥RSAC: What we are doing this year!

RSAC is coming up fast, and we’re showing up in a few ways this year, not just with booths and badges, but with real opportunities to connect and prepare.

Prep for RSAC 2026: Expert Panel & Open Q&A (Virtual):

First up is an expert panel with marketers who’ve done this before, covering booth strategy, meetings, follow-up, and what’s worth your time. Plus live Q&A so you can ask about your specific RSAC challenges. Feb 13 at 12-1 p.m. ET

RSAC Party for Marketers (In-Person):

We’re also hosting a pre-RSAC gathering for cybersecurity marketers. It’s a chance to see familiar faces, meet a few new ones, and start the week without the usual conference noise. March 22 at 5:30-8:00 p.m. PT in San Francisco

Tickets are selling fast (and are limited)! Get your ticket today!

How To Lose a Prospect in 10 Days

Written by Tyler Lessard, CMO at TechnologyAdvice

It’s the MarCom movie (see what we did there?!?) that none of us want to be a part of. Especially in cybersecurity, where it only takes one poorly written love letter eBook to send those hot prospects off into the hands of another. But if you really DO want to sabotage your pipeline, here’s some simple instructions for how to lose a cyber prospect in 10 days in 2026:

Day 1: Preach “prevention over resilience”. Who needs resilient architectures when they can just prevent every breach?!

Day 2: Talk about AI like it’s magic. Hype up your AI capabilities without transparency around how (or if) it really works.

Day 3: Focus on how many alerts your product creates. More is better! Who cares about alert fatigue and analyst burnout.

Day 4: Downplay Zero Trust identity management. Hype up “stronger passwords” as the real solution to mitigating attacks.

Day 5: Only message to the CISO. Don’t waste time targeting IT Ops, Compliance, or those silly business stakeholders.

Day 6: Run another webinar without your customers speaking. Keep them relegated to vague quotes in your sales decks.

Day 7: Give up on thought leadership. Don’t even bother trying to drive the narrative around trending industry topics.

Day 8: Focus on one single channel to reach your ICP. And don’t even think about newsletters, creators, or native articles.

Day 9: Work with a lead gen vendor who doesn’t have its own cyber audience. Push them for lead quantity over quality.

Day 10: Avoid producing co-branded research with a trusted brand. Especially ones like eSecurity Planet or TechnologyAdvice.

Honestly, you likely lost them after Day 2, congrats! Now on the flip side, if you’d prefer to win more customers this year, we suggest the following two great resources:

(1) In Cybersecurity Tech Marketing Trends in 2026, our cyber bestie Ken Underhill (head researcher and writer at eSecurity Planet) peels back the big trends related to days 1-4 above and offers concrete ideas for how to align your messaging and content right now.

(2) In the Cybersecurity Marketing Handbook, our friends at TechnologyAdvice have curated 150+ cybersecurity-specific newsletters, media sites, influencers, events, podcasts, and other channels you can use to reach new prospects with that killer messaging.

Now go find those perfect prospects, and don’t blow it!

From the Community 💌

What the Community is up to this week!

In Memory of Andrew Smeaton
We’re saddened to share that Andrew Smeaton has passed away. Andrew was a well-known and respected CISO in the community, and many of you likely knew or worked with him. Our thoughts are with his family, friends, and everyone who learned from or was impacted by his work.

CyberMarketingCon Planning Is Starting Earlier This Year
One of the Cybersecurity Marketing Society goals for 2026 is to avoid the end-of-year scramble [CyberMarketingCon is Nov 15-18 this year!] by starting conference planning earlier. That work is already underway, including opening the call for speakers!

In other words, the bones are being built now, so get your tickets today, apply to speak early, and we even have a glimpse of our (DRAFT, to be clear) designs this year 👀:

Just for laughs: Meme of the Week... 😂

Not all systems named Gianna are under our control.

That’s it for this edition! Thanks for reading!

Don't forget: you're the best! 💪

Have a great weekend!

❤️ Gianna & Maria

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