Aaron Francis Is Laravel's New VP of Marketing & Community

Okay, so I think we can now finally actually talk about the job.

You said VP of marketing and community.

Mm-hmm.

And one of the things you named here, which I'm really grateful for your pointing out, is that we want to, A, reach out to a whole new audience and a whole new mindshare, and also B, consider the existing folks as a part of, as a, as important of a part of a, you know, the community as possible.

I mean, and that's, I feel like that's a hard line to walk, and hearing that your title has both marketing and community in it-

Mm-hmm

... tells me that there's some real intentionality about that.

Can you talk to me about kinda what's the purview of the role, what have you been sent out to do, and how does it being marketing and community together in one, what, what does that reflect?

Yeah, totally.

So just to kinda give you like a, a map of the territory, I've got events.

Mm-hmm.

So I've got, you know, Laracons, Laravel Lives, that kind of stuff.

Devrel-

Mm-hmm

...

so that's all, you know, public videos, Discords, live streams, all of that.

Demand gen, which is more like more on the paid side of the house, product marketing, content, all, all of that kind of stuff falls under my domain.

Okay.

And so yeah, the way that I'm thinking about the future of Laravel is Taylor has done an incredible job basically building a movement, frankly.

Yeah.

I mean, when you have tattoos and children named Laravel-

[laughs]

... it's a movement.

Building a movement based on a few core beliefs.

Mm-hmm.