In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Rebecca Corliss, VP of Marketing at GrowthLoop. After nearly a decade at HubSpot beginning as employee #45, Rebecca now leads marketing for a composable CDP that helps enterprise organizations like Costco leverage their data cloud for sophisticated audience segmentation. As B2B marketing faces seismic shifts—web traffic plummeting, LLMs reshaping discovery, and traditional playbooks failing—Rebecca shares how she's rethinking enterprise marketing around influencer relationships, authentic content partnerships, and strategic focus over scattered tactics. Topics Discussed Transitioning from inbound content strategies to relationship-driven enterprise marketing  Building influencer partnerships in B2B through authentic industry relationships  Optimizing for LLM visibility and the resurgence of PR Managing marketing teams through rapid AI-driven workflow changes  Balancing paid advertising versus influencer investment in resource-constrained environments  Navigating enterprise sales cycles with ABM and targeted positioning Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers Map Your Customer's Influence Network With Precision: Rather than broad targeting, identify specific individuals your best customers respect and listen to by name. Rebecca focuses on understanding who her target buyers follow, where those influencers participate, and how they contribute to the industry. This creates a foundation for strategic relationship building that reaches buyers through trusted voices rather than interruptive advertising. Reframe Influencer Partnerships as Mutual Growth Opportunities: B2B influencer marketing succeeds when positioned as authentic partnerships rather than sponsorships. Rebecca approaches industry experts by acknowledging their need for platform neutrality, being transparent about GrowthLoop's objectives, and focusing on how collaboration can grow both brands. She leverages her HubSpot credibility to earn respect while seeking ways to add value beyond financial support—thinking about content, audience access, and brand association as mutual assets. Ruthlessly Prioritize Focus Over Scattered Tactics: The shadow side of ambition is trying to do too much. Rebecca identifies her biggest 2025 learning as the need for greater focus, particularly questioning whether traditional paid advertising spend delivers value compared to investing that same budget in authentic influencer relationships. For resource-constrained teams, this means choosing fewer channels but executing with depth rather than spreading thin across multiple mediocre efforts. Optimize Content for LLM Recommendation Engines: With web traffic plummeting, marketers must think beyond traditional SEO. Rebecca observes that PR may experience a resurgence because LLMs perceive journalistic content as more reputable. Tactics include maintaining consistent company descriptions across all content, creating LLM-specific pages, and thinking about what you want AI to say when recommending your solution. The goal is training the algorithm through repetition and authoritative sources. Structure Small Teams Around Category Leadership, Not Just Functions: GrowthLoop's six-person team organizes around demand generation, events, and a "category team" that combines product marketing, sales enablement, and content. This structure emphasizes building market category understanding and point of view rather than siloed functional execution. Rebecca personally leads influencer marketing and customer announcements, showing how leadership can fill strategic gaps without hiring. Create Conditions for Self-Empowerment, Not Control: For first-time marketing managers, the hardest transition is measuring impact through team output rather than individual contribution. Rebecca's leadership philosophy centers on creating environments, resources, information, and direction that enable team members to make great decisions independently. This approach

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Raphaël Morgulis, Head of Marketing at Verity. Verity has deployed autonomous drone systems across 150+ warehouse sites for clients including UPS, DSV, and Maersk, solving the critical challenge of real-time inventory accuracy in logistics operations. Raphael shares how Verity navigates B2B hardware marketing in the warehousing sector, from event-driven outreach strategies to the discipline required at early-stage companies. The conversation explores the fundamental tensions facing B2B marketers today: balancing tactical execution with strategic foundations, resisting channel proliferation pressure from leadership, and filtering signal from noise in an era of content explosion. Topics Discussed Marketing autonomous drone systems for warehouse inventory management Event-driven cold outreach timing and mental availability Trade show strategy in warehousing and logistics markets Leveraging enterprise reference customers for credibility The declining effectiveness of cold email outreach Using customer site visits as conversion tools Stage-appropriate marketing strategy from Series A to Series B Lessons for B2B Tech Marketers Time Cold Outreach Around Mental Availability Windows: Verity structures cold outreach campaigns around industry events when prospects actively think about operational improvements. Rather than generic timing or superficial company signals, they target the week before major trade shows when warehouse managers and innovation leaders mentally prepare for discovering new solutions. This approach recognizes that inbox availability correlates directly with purchase cycle readiness—Monday morning leadership meetings leave zero mental bandwidth for vendor discovery, but pre-event research periods create natural openings. Anchor Early-Stage Marketing in Ruthless ICP Clarity: At Series A, Verity's approach prioritizes deep customer psychology over channel proliferation. Raphael emphasizes that marketers must function as "customer psychologists," understanding buyer fears and deeper motives through direct research conversations—not just documentation exercises. This foundation enables confident channel selection and provides the infrastructure needed when scaling demands shift the marketer role from psychologist to systems engineer at Series B. Testing six channels simultaneously without this foundation creates noise without learnable signals, undermining future attribution and scale efforts. Leverage Enterprise Logos as Live Conversion Environments: With deployments at UPS, DSV, and Maersk, Verity transforms reference customers into immersive proof environments. Rather than relying solely on case studies or testimonials, they physically bring prospects to operational warehouse sites where they observe autonomous drone systems in action and speak directly with operations teams experiencing the benefits. This approach moves beyond innovation theater to tangible ROI demonstration, particularly critical for hardware solutions where seeing becomes believing. Engineer Trade Show Strategy by Buyer Stage: Verity segments its trade show presence based on distinct buyer roles within the warehousing sector. Innovation-focused events connect with leaders exploring robotics and operational improvement solutions, while operationally-oriented shows reach warehouse managers responsible for day-to-day logistics execution. This segmentation ensures message-market fit and efficient resource allocation across the lengthy enterprise sales cycle typical in warehouse automation. Resist Channel Expansion Pressure Through Disciplined Focus: Raphael identifies a critical leadership challenge for early-stage marketers: pushing back against investors, executives, and market noise demanding presence across PR, LinkedIn, paid media, and additional channels simultaneously. Without marketing operations infrastructure, data models, or attribution systems, multi-channel testing

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Joyce Yeung, VP of Marketing at Pico MES. Joyce brings a contrarian perspective forged through experience at both enterprise (GE) and four different startups. At Pico MES, a 25-person manufacturing software company, she leads a lean two-person marketing team with a $500K annual budget. When faced with a sudden 30% budget cut mid-year while maintaining aggressive growth targets, Joyce demonstrated how behavioral adaptation and strategic constraint navigation unlock innovation that larger budgets cannot buy. Her journey from GE's 12-director marketing team to startup marketing leadership reveals the mindset shifts required to thrive in resource-constrained environments. Topics Discussed: Operating effectively within severe budget constraints  Building scalable partner marketing programs that split costs and expand reach  Transitioning from enterprise to startup marketing environments  Developing self-awareness to break ineffective habits and old playbooks  Leveraging AI tools for marketing efficiency without expanding headcount  Creating custom GPT copilots for marketing teams  Prioritizing communication skills as the foundation of marketing excellence  Evaluating whether startup marketing is the right career path Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers: Protect Headcount Over Agency Spend During Budget Cuts: When Joyce faced a $150K budget cut (30% of her $500K annual budget), she preserved her two-person team and eliminated agencies instead. While painful short-term, this forced her to internalize expertise and build sustainable internal capabilities. The constraint became the catalyst for developing partner marketing programs that ultimately recovered half the lost budget through cost-sharing arrangements. Structure Partner Marketing Around Cost-Sharing, Not Just Co-Marketing: Joyce built a three-tier partner marketing framework: zero-cost LinkedIn Lives for thought leadership, sponsored webinars through third-party media outlets with shared costs, and joint trade show booths where multiple partners exhibited together. This approach transformed manufacturing tool brands like Ingersoll Rand, Mazak, and Fanuc from potential competitors for booth space into collaborative marketing partners who split expenses while accessing each other's customer bases. Reframe Budget as Fuel, Not the Bottleneck: The real constraint isn't budget—it's reach. Joyce recognized that slashing marketing spend wasn't the fundamental problem; activating new audiences and resonating with the right message was. Budget accelerates reach, but doesn't create it. This perspective shift enabled her to identify partner marketing as the strategic solution: leveraging partners' existing audiences and open API integrations to expand reach without proportional budget increases. Build Marketing Teams for Efficiency Before Expansion: With a company of 25 people, Joyce deliberately keeps her marketing team at two people plus herself. Rather than lobbying for headcount growth, she's investing in a custom GPT copilot and exploring AI tools for ideation and heavy lifting. This efficiency-first approach creates organizational discipline that prevents the "meetings about needing more resources" syndrome she witnessed at GE, where 12 directors perpetually felt under-resourced. Master Communication Before Mastering Tactics: Joyce attributes her marketing philosophy to observing her parents struggle with communication throughout their lives—in business negotiations, team management, and family relationships. She recognized early that strong communication skills unlock recruiting, convincing, and enrollment. For marketers, this means storytelling and listening skills matter more than technical execution. Joyce recommends John Maxwell's "Leadershift" for anyone navigating leadership transitions, emphasizing that behavioral adaptation requires both self-awareness and the ability to enroll others in change. Evaluate

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Danielle Pederson, CMO of Amaze, a creator-powered commerce platform that transforms viral moments into revenue. Amaze uses AI-driven intelligence to anticipate and capitalize on content spikes, converting fan engagement into sales for creators across all platforms and verticals. As the creator economy matures beyond traditional monetization models, Amaze is positioning itself at the intersection of real-time commerce and AI-powered merchandising, helping creators monetize their moments faster than traditional e-commerce platforms allow. Topics Discussed Building marketing strategies around creator identity versus consumer behavior  Developing AI-driven lifecycle marketing for diverse creator segments Creating productized storytelling to explain complex platform value Executing impactful brand moments through strategic event activations Leveraging UGC-style content where creators speak to their peers Structuring small marketing teams around strategy versus execution Positioning category shifts rather than product updates Building community-focused experiences in the creator economy Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers Reject Traditional Consumer Assumptions for Non-Traditional Audiences: Amaze discovered that traditional marketing tactics failed because they assumed creators behave like consumers when fundamentally they don't. Creators aren't looking to buy something—they're looking to share. This insight led them to abandon high-volume paid campaigns with generic messaging, traditional linear onboarding flows, and one-size-fits-all email approaches. The takeaway: When your ICP fundamentally doesn't behave like typical buyers, don't just adjust your messaging—rebuild your entire approach around their actual motivations. Build Strategy Around Experiences, Not Channels: Rather than organizing marketing around channels (paid, email, social), Amaze structures everything around four pillars: storytelling, intelligent lifecycle marketing, impactful brand moments, and community. This experience-first framework ensures every tactic serves a larger narrative about what's possible for creators. For B2B marketers, this means asking "what experience do we want to create?" before asking "which channels should we use?" Use Productized Storytelling for Complex Value Props: When launching Amaze Moments at Adobe Max, the team created a fictional creator narrative that demonstrated exactly how the product works and its value. This "productized storytelling" approach transforms abstract platform capabilities into concrete, relatable scenarios. For B2B companies with complex technical products, embedding your value proposition in a story format makes it immediately understandable versus listing features. Leverage Peer-to-Peer Content Over Brand-Led Messaging: Amaze found that UGC-style content where creators speak to their peers significantly outperforms the company trying to tell creators something directly. In B2B contexts, this translates to customer-led content, user testimonials in their own voice, and peer case studies. Let your users explain your value to other users in their language, not yours. Market Category Shifts, Not Product Updates: For 2026, Amaze is explicitly positioning their AI Moments product as "a full category shift, not just a product update." This framing changes everything about go-to-market strategy, messaging, and timeline expectations. When you've genuinely built something that redefines how a market operates, don't diminish it by calling it a feature release or product enhancement. Build Teams Around Strategy Capacity in Disruptive Markets: Amaze intentionally built their marketing team around strategy-focused roles (growth marketing specialists, brand marketing strategists) rather than channel specialists. In fast-moving, disruptive markets, the ability to think strategically and pivot quickly matters more than deep channel expertise. This structur

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Maria Urs, Head of Marketing at VirTra, a company creating immersive training simulators for law enforcement, military, and security personnel. VirTra builds 180-degree and 300-degree simulation environments that train officers on split-second decision-making, de-escalation tactics, and use of force scenarios. With 70-80% of their customers coming from law enforcement agencies across 46 countries, Maria leads marketing efforts in a highly specialized govtech niche where trust and human connection outweigh traditional B2B playbooks. Through her Google-trained discipline and hands-on approach, she’s learned that marketing to law enforcement requires abandoning cookie-cutter strategies and starting every campaign with a clear, audience-specific goal. Topics Discussed: - Marketing immersive training technology to law enforcement and military audiences - Building trust as the foundation of govtech marketing strategy - Leveraging trade shows and in-person product demonstrations for high-touch sales - Tailoring messaging across different security verticals (law enforcement, military, education, healthcare) - Managing a lean, high-performing four-person marketing team - International expansion strategy for training simulators across 46 countries - Optimizing website and CRM workflows to accelerate sales velocity - The role of human expertise vs. AI in products serving first responders - Why govtech marketing requires constant adaptability and cannot follow standard playbooks Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers: - Reject the Copy-Paste Playbook in Specialized Markets: Maria observed that most govtech marketers make the critical mistake of applying generic B2B SaaS playbooks across different audiences, assuming that if it works in one government context, it will work in another. VirTra abandoned this approach entirely. Instead, Maria starts every campaign by defining the specific goal and customizing messaging for each distinct audience segment—whether law enforcement, military, or education security—recognizing that each has fundamentally different motivations, procurement processes, and success metrics. - Optimize for Trial, Not Clicks: Unlike typical B2C or SaaS companies that optimize conversion paths from website to purchase, VirTra’s marketing prioritizes getting prospects into physical product demonstrations. Maria invests heavily in national and local trade show participation, viewing these events as the primary conversion channel. The marketing strategy accepts that law enforcement agencies will not purchase based on specifications and testimonials alone—they must experience the immersive training scenarios themselves. This insight led VirTra to measure marketing success by demo completions rather than traditional digital metrics. //  Sponsors: Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Kaitlyn Chiu, Head of Marketing at Partful. Partful creates digital parts catalog and work instruction software for OEMs—a highly specialized B2B SaaS product in a niche manufacturing space. Coming from a fashion marketing background, Kaitlyn brings an unconventional perspective to technical B2B marketing, emphasizing the emotional dimension that’s often overlooked when targeting enterprise decision-makers. Eight months into her role, she’s transformed Partful’s marketing from brand-focused PR into a balanced demand generation engine, leveraging behavioral email marketing, trade publication targeting, and AI-powered personalization to build pipeline in a category disruption play. Topics Discussed: - Applying B2C emotional marketing principles to niche B2B SaaS products - Rebalancing marketing strategy from brand awareness to demand generation - Building behavioral email marketing programs using HubSpot’s native capabilities - Leveraging AI for hyper-personalized prospecting at scale - Targeting trade publications over tech media for direct ICP reach - Staying current in marketing’s rapidly evolving AI landscape Lessons for B2B SaaS Marketers: - Don’t Abandon Emotional Marketing in B2B: While ROI and commercial value matter, B2B buyers are humans with KPIs, stress levels, and sleep patterns affected by their purchase decisions. Fashion marketing’s emphasis on emotional connection and brand meaning translates directly to B2B—decision-makers consume the same high-quality content outside of work and expect that caliber during work hours. Messaging should address both the rational business case and the emotional relief of problem resolution. - Behavioral Email Marketing Delivers More Signal Than Brand Channels: Email marketing isn’t archaic—it’s data-rich. Unlike paid media, email provides granular behavioral signals: which pages someone visited, how long they engaged with interactive demos, how many steps they completed, and whether sales has made contact. Use this behavioral data to trigger hyper-targeted campaigns based on actual intent signals rather than demographic attributes. Being ”brave with words”—borrowing B2C’s FOMO tactics and harder-hitting copy—can break through B2B’s typically conservative messaging. - Reorient PR Toward Trade Publications Where Your ICP Actually Reads: Generic tech press and regional business magazines build brand awareness but rarely drive pipeline. Shift PR efforts toward the specific trade publications your ICP consumes daily. For Partful, this meant deprioritizing Northern UK tech magazines in favor of manufacturing and OEM industry publications. This surgical approach to media relations delivers both brand credibility and demand generation simultaneously. - Stay Curious About Adjacent Consumer Marketing Tactics: B2B marketers should actively study B2C newsletters and campaigns, particularly in email marketing where consumer brands push creative boundaries. Chase Dimond’s newsletter exemplifies B2C email innovation that can be adapted to B2B contexts. The discipline of translating consumer tactics into specialized B2B applications keeps marketing fresh and prevents the creative stagnation common in technical verticals. //  Sponsors: Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Jillian Childs, VP of Marketing at Turntide Technologies. Turntide designs, manufactures, and engineers electric motors, power electronics, and battery systems for OEMs across construction, motorsports, marine, and agriculture industries. With a lean marketing team of four targeting multiple industries with complex regulations, Jillian has built a revenue-focused marketing engine that drives results through strategic trade show investments, educational webinar programs, and high-quality content. After operating as a one-person marketing team for 18 months, she assembled her current team and turned on all marketing channels in January 2025, resulting in 400% growth in website traffic and significant pipeline generation. Topics Discussed - Building a revenue-first marketing strategy with a lean team across multiple industries - Allocating 50% of marketing budget to trade shows and measuring ROI - Creating educational webinar programs that convert engineers without being salesy - Launching 75+ articles of technical content to establish thought leadership - Navigating the challenges of paid advertising on LinkedIn and Google - Managing global trade show calendars with standardized booth sizes for budget efficiency - Coordinating integrated product launch campaigns across engineering, legal, and product teams - Growing from a one-person marketing department to a fully functional remote team Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers - Allocate Half Your Budget to High-ROI Channels, Even If They Seem Old School: Turntide dedicates 50% of their marketing budget to trade shows because they deliver the highest ROI for lead generation and revenue. They attend 13-15 shows globally per year, targeting tier-one industry events and increasingly niche, industry-specific shows in marine, off-road, and motorsports. Rather than chasing trendy digital channels, Jillian doubles down on what actually drives deals. - Standardize Trade Show Logistics to Maximize Budget Efficiency: Rather than customizing booth sizes for each show, Jillian maintains consistent space dimensions across all 13-15 annual trade shows. This allows them to reuse graphics, ship the same trade kits, and work with the same agencies depending on region. The standardization dramatically reduces costs while maintaining professional presence at every event. - Build a Trade Show Strategy Matrix Around Four Key Variables: Turntide evaluates trade shows based on: (1) which industries they’re trying to penetrate most, (2) what product launches are planned, (3) which channel partners they can leverage for exposure, and (4) what geographic gaps exist in their revenue strategy. This framework helps them choose between tier-one broad shows and tier-two industry-specific events. //  Sponsors: Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Lindsay Powers, SVP of Marketing at STACK Construction Technologies. STACK is one of the only cloud-based construction software platforms supporting the entire project lifecycle from bid through build and beyond. Lindsay shares how she’s built marketing-sales alignment, deployed a custom GPT to identify content gaps, and established clarity as the foundational principle driving her team’s strategy. From navigating the challenges of marketing to a specialized construction audience to leveraging AI as an accelerator rather than replacement, Lindsay provides tactical insights on building credible, outcome-focused marketing in a complex B2B environment. Topics Discussed - Building clarity-driven marketing strategies that scale across messaging, measurement, and team alignment - Developing customer-centric narratives by starting with ”why” before ”how” or ”what” - Shifting from vanity metrics to pipeline and revenue-focused alignment between marketing and sales - Creating trust through education and community building versus traditional advertising - Deploying custom GPT tools to identify content gaps and optimize content strategy - Balancing AI automation with human authenticity in both product and marketing execution - Operating lean marketing teams efficiently through strategic tooling and AI acceleration Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers - Establish Clarity as Your North Star Principle: Lindsay built her entire marketing strategy around a single word: clarity. Clarity in messaging, measurement, and team alignment drives performance across all marketing functions. This principle guides how STACK proves ROI rather than just promoting software features, leading with value and results instead of capabilities. When teams operate with clear principles, decision-making accelerates and execution improves. - Start Customer Discovery with ”Why” Before ”What”: Drawing from Simon Sinek’s framework, Lindsay emphasizes stepping back from product features to understand the fundamental purpose behind customer pain points. The process involves walking a mile in customer boots—understanding daily hurdles, listening for what they’re not saying, and exploring what they wish they could do rather than just what they’re currently doing. This depth of customer understanding informs everything from messaging to product roadmap decisions. - Build Sales-Marketing Alignment Through Shared Revenue Goals: STACK achieved complete marketing-sales alignment by shifting focus from lead volume vanity metrics to pipeline generation and profitability. When both teams speak the same revenue-focused language and share responsibility for go-to-market outcomes, finger-pointing disappears. Marketing treats sales feedback as critical market intelligence that informs not just campaigns but also product development, creating a continuous loop of improvement. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Tara Robertson, Director of Marketing at ContactMonkey. Tara is navigating one of the most critical transitions in B2B marketing: migrating from the traditional lead generation playbook to a modern, account-based approach. With eight months into her role, she’s rebuilding ContactMonkey’s marketing strategy while managing a seven-person team that allocates nearly half its budget to events. Her journey from building Alina Vandenberghe’s founder brand at Chili Piper to establishing new frameworks at ContactMonkey provides tactical insights into change management, team restructuring, and adapting to the post-lead form era of B2B marketing. Topics Discussed - Transitioning from volume-based lead generation to account-based marketing - Building thought leadership without optimizing for search engines or LLMs - Managing marketing team change when moving away from lead volume metrics - Structuring marketing teams for ABM motions and event-heavy strategies - Defining and hiring for ”GTM engineer” or growth hacker roles - Creating customer marketing campaigns for retention and expansion - Event strategy focused on side events and partner collaborations - Selling to under-resourced personas with limited buying experience Lessons For B2B Marketers - Shift Reporting Metrics Before Leadership Asks: When transitioning from the old playbook, Tara proactively tackled the reporting question: ”If we don’t care about lead volume, what do we report on?” She’s rebuilding board slides to focus on demo attendance quality and right-fit meeting bookings rather than traditional funnel metrics. The key is addressing this before quarterly reviews force the conversation, giving you time to establish new success measures that align with account-based motions. - Get Sales Feedback Early and In-Person: Tara spent significant time with the BDR leader in her first weeks, who transparently shared that marketing was sending ”garbage leads” that wasted their time. This feedback—easier to share with a new hire than existing team members—became the foundation for her quality-over-quantity mandate. Create safe spaces for candid feedback, preferably in-person, where sales can be honest about lead quality without worrying about stepping on toes. - Create Thought Leadership for Readers, Not Algorithms: Tara’s approach to content cuts through the noise of ”optimizing for LLMs”: simply ask ”who is the reader and is there value here for them?” If the content already exists and you don’t have unique data or perspective, don’t write it—even if ChatGPT makes it easy. This reader-first mentality produces differentiated content that builds trust rather than cluttering search results with recycled information. - Invest in What AI Can’t Automate: ContactMonkey allocates nearly 50% of its marketing budget to events—specifically because it’s ”hard to scale” and can’t be automated with AI. Tara’s 2026 strategy focuses exclusively on channels that resist automation: physical events, direct mail campaigns, and personal customer gifting. As AI commoditizes content creation, the competitive edge shifts to high-touch, difficult-to-replicate experiences. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Carl Standertskjold-Nordenstam, Head of Marketing at Inbolt. Inbolt is bringing vision and AI to industrial robotics, giving blind factory robots the ability to see and adapt in real-time. Operating across 100+ factories globally with major automotive manufacturers like Stellantis, Toyota, and Ford, Carl runs a lean one-person marketing operation focused on business impact over vanity metrics. From his start in B2B marketing at Sony to scaling growth at double unicorn Algolia, Carl shares how he’s building a marketing engine that prioritizes customer expansion over new logo acquisition, tactical positioning work that drives word-of-mouth in manufacturing, and a disciplined approach to selecting only the marketing activities that directly ladder up to business objectives. Topics Discussed - Building marketing strategy with business objectives as the foundation  - Operating as a one-person marketing team at a Series A startup  - Redesigning website architecture for customer acquisition and lead capture  - Manufacturing industry marketing where word-of-mouth drives most deals  - Creating positioning frameworks around memorable keywords that sales teams can deploy  - Account-based marketing strategies for customer expansion and NRR growth  - Audit-first approach to joining new companies and assessing marketing foundations  - Minimalist tech stack philosophy and avoiding tool bloat  - Using data from existing content performance to inform future content creation  - Balancing creative storytelling with analytical business thinking in B2B marketing Lessons For B2B Marketers - Ladder Every Marketing Tactic to Business Objectives: Carl structures his marketing plans by starting with business objectives first, then stacking marketing objectives that lead directly to them, followed by goals, measurements, and tactics. This framework allows him to trace every single marketing activity back to the company’s business goals, making it easier to secure C-level buy-in for initiatives and maintain strategic relevance. - Prioritize Customer Expansion Over New Logo Acquisition: Rather than focusing exclusively on new customer acquisition, Carl is shifting Inbolt’s 2026 strategy toward account-based marketing that expands within existing customers. For companies serving large accounts with multiple locations (like automotive manufacturers with dozens of plants), running customer-specific webinars that showcase problem-solving from other locations can drive expansion more efficiently than traditional demand generation. - Engineer Word-of-Mouth Through Positioning Keywords: In manufacturing, word-of-mouth drives most deals. Carl developed specific positioning keywords like ”intelligent” that sales teams and engineers use consistently in customer conversations. By creating memorable language that defines what the company should be famous for, marketers can influence peer-to-peer recommendations even without being in the room. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Julie Preiss, Chief Marketing Officer of Centripetal. With over a decade in cybersecurity marketing, Julie has navigated one of B2B tech’s most crowded and commoditized markets. In an industry where thousands of vendors sound identical—from Fortune 100 portfolio players to niche point solution startups—Julie shares her battle-tested framework for building brands that break through the noise. Her approach centers on looking outward as much as inward, bringing unbiased external perspectives into the brand process, and backing positioning decisions with customer research rather than founder assumptions. Topics Discussed - Building differentiated brand positioning in saturated cybersecurity markets - Structuring effective brand development processes with cross-functional stakeholders - The critical role of external creative partners in cutting through internal bias - Integrating customer research into brand development without massive budgets - Pricing frameworks for agency partnerships ($60K-$125K range for comprehensive branding) - Holistic brand development from mission/vision through visual identity - Adapting marketing strategies for changing buyer behavior and AI-driven research - Navigating the shift from intent signals to generative engine optimization Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers - Bring External Partners to Cut Internal Bias: The moment stakeholders say ”an agency can’t understand our business well enough,” that’s your signal you need one. Founders and internal teams are too close to the technology to see it from a buyer’s perspective. Julie recommends negotiating budget tradeoffs to invest $60K-$125K in mid-sized agencies (not solo practitioners juggling operations, not 500-person firms where you’re expendable) that treat you like their most important client. - Structure Brand Workshops Around Problem-Solving, Not Technology: Founder-led startups naturally gravitate toward discussing their technical innovation, but brand development must start with the unmet market need that sparked the technology’s creation. Julie marshals internal stakeholders—founders, sales leaders, customer service, and product—into a tightly controlled core group focused on articulating customer problems, not technical specifications. - Validate Positioning Hypotheses With Customer Research: Brand positioning cannot be solved through internal discussions alone. Julie emphasizes integrating actual customer and prospect feedback into the process. Research doesn’t require six-figure budgets or months of work—small sample sizes can be executed affordably in a week using online mechanisms, while comprehensive research takes about six weeks. Skipping this step leads to positioning that resonates internally but falls flat in market. - Build Holistically From Mission to Visual Identity: Resist the urge to cut corners or rush the branding process. Julie’s framework requires working through mission/vision statements, experience principles, positioning, messaging pillars, and visual identity in sequence. This comprehensive approach creates a lens for evaluating whether existing marketing strategies and tactics align with the brand narrative, often revealing programs that need adjustment or elimination. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Becky Brooks, Head of Marketing at MCP Manager. As AI capabilities rapidly evolve, a new protocol is fundamentally changing how marketers can leverage artificial intelligence in their daily work. MCP (Model Context Protocol) transforms AI from a text generation tool into a powerful digital colleague capable of accessing and manipulating your actual business tools. While technical teams have quickly adopted this technology, most marketers remain unaware of its potential—despite major platforms like Atlassian, Asana, Figma, and HubSpot already offering MCP servers. Becky shares how she’s marketing to a highly technical audience, why TikTok surprisingly became a viable B2B channel, and how marketers can position themselves at the cutting edge of AI adoption. Topics Discussed: - Understanding MCP (Model Context Protocol) and how it differs from basic AI usage - How MCP enables AI agents to access and manipulate business tools with read/write capabilities - Why technical audiences have adopted MCP while marketing tools lag in the top 50 most popular servers - Marketing technical products to skeptical, BS-detector-equipped engineering audiences - Building credibility with technical teams and IT departments - Optimizing content for LLM citation and the overlap with traditional SEO - Using TikTok to reach technical B2B audiences (and getting actual sales calls from it) - The authenticity advantage of TikTok versus LinkedIn’s increasingly AI-generated content Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers: - Position Yourself as an AI Early Adopter Through MCP: Most marketers feel pressure to ”be good at AI” without specific direction. Learning to use MCP with your existing tech stack (HubSpot, Figma, your CRM) positions you as genuinely skilled at AI implementation. The learning curve is only about half a day, but the credibility gain—especially with technical colleagues—is substantial. Start by auditing your tech stack and searching for ”[Tool Name] MCP server” to find which tools already support the protocol. - Proactively Engage IT on AI Security to Build Credibility: Before implementing MCP servers that have read/write access to your business tools, approach your IT team with questions about security best practices. This conversation accomplishes two goals: it protects your data and demonstrates technical sophistication to colleagues who are already thinking about these issues. Frame it as excitement about productivity gains rather than asking for permission. - Cultivate LinkedIn as Your AI Trend Radar: Build an algorithm that serves you AI thought leadership from marketers, technical folks, and product managers. You’ll start seeing patterns in what technologies are gaining adoption across teams. When you notice topics ”exploding on the scene” across your feed, that’s your signal to investigate whether your team should adopt them. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

Eden Green Technology is transforming agriculture through advanced vertical farming technology, bringing sustainable food production into the modern era. With an annual marketing budget of $500,000, the company has built a distinctive presence across multiple channels while competing in the traditionally uncreative AgTech space. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, we sat down with Bryson Funk, Marketing Director of Eden Green Technology, to learn about his unconventional path from music industry to B2B marketing and how his guerrilla marketing philosophy drives results in a sector that desperately needs creative differentiation. Topics Discussed: - Bryson’s transition from pursuing a music career to marketing leadership in AgTech - The guerrilla marketing mindset developed through entertainment industry budget constraints - Strategic channel consolidation from widespread presence to a focused ”core four” platforms - TikTok as a recruitment tool rather than customer acquisition channel - YouTube’s untapped potential for humanizing B2B brands through long-form content - Building trust through conversational content versus scripted corporate messaging - The experimental approach to marketing in an era of rapid change GTM Lessons For B2B Founders: - Maximize every dollar with guerrilla discipline: Bryson’s entertainment background taught him to extract maximum value from limited resources. Coming from TV, film, and music where budgets are constrained, he learned to ”maximize every single thing that I have, like every cent I have, every piece of collateral that I have.” Even with a $500K annual budget at Eden Green, he maintains this maximize-every-dollar mentality. B2B founders should adopt this scrappy approach regardless of budget size, treating each marketing dollar as precious and demanding clear value from every expenditure. - Consolidate channels before expanding: When Bryson started at Eden Green, they were ”spread out wide, but not doing really any of them very well.” He consolidated to four core platforms—LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok—completely cutting Facebook which was ”a black hole of nothingness.” This consolidation allowed deeper investment in fewer channels. B2B founders should resist the temptation to maintain presence everywhere and instead focus resources on platforms where they can actually win and measure results. - Define channel-specific success metrics: Bryson positioned TikTok explicitly as a recruitment tool, not customer acquisition, which allowed him to declare success when it brought in job applicants rather than sales leads. He noted that ”if you were looking on a financial side of like a return on investment, like bringing a new client, then you wouldn’t consider it a win.” B2B founders should set clear, differentiated goals for each channel before launch, ensuring stakeholders understand that not every platform needs to generate direct revenue to deliver value. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Ryan Mattison, VP of Corporate Marketing at Cribl. Cribl has built one of the strongest brands in the infrastructure space by prioritizing authentic storytelling over sanitized marketing. Ryan shares how Cribl’s founding team embedded their practitioner DNA into every aspect of the company—from product roadmap decisions to customer support interactions—creating a brand that stands for choice, control, and flexibility. Through provocative positioning and a ”geek chic” aesthetic inspired by retro sci-fi, Cribl has carved out differentiation in a crowded market while maintaining messaging consistency across diverse IT and security personas. Topics Discussed: - Building customer-centric narratives using the hero’s journey framework - Creating initiative-based storytelling for multiple technical personas - Embedding brand DNA from founding team through entire organization - Balancing provocative positioning with product delivery capabilities - Using pop culture references to make technical concepts accessible - Maintaining narrative consistency across all customer touchpoints - Pushing creative boundaries in B2B tech marketing Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers - Center Your Customer as the Hero, Not Your Product: The most common storytelling mistake in B2B tech is positioning your company as the hero. Your customers are buying technology to transform their careers and organizations—they’re the protagonists. Your product is a supporting character that enables their journey. Frame narratives around how customers achieve transformation, not how your technology works. This shift from inside-out to outside-in thinking creates authentic resonance with sophisticated buyers. - Structure Stories Around Customer Initiatives, Not Product Features: When serving multiple personas with different needs, lead with the specific initiatives each persona is pursuing rather than starting with your brand promise. A security professional migrating to a new SIM has different priorities than an SRE focused on reliability. Begin with their initiative, then connect to your unified value proposition. This approach allows you to maintain one brand story while making it relevant to diverse technical audiences. - Embed Brand from Founding DNA, Not Marketing Documentation: Messaging houses and positioning docs matter, but truly powerful brands live beyond marketing collateral. Cribl’s founders were practitioners who lived the pain they’re solving, allowing the brand ethos to infuse product development, partnerships, and customer support naturally. When brand represents authentic company DNA rather than marketing craftsmanship, every team member becomes a storyteller. Early-stage companies should leverage founders’ practitioner experience as a strategic advantage in building authentic narratives. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Natalie Taylor, Head of Marketing at Capsule. Capsule is an AI-powered video editing platform built exclusively for enterprise brands that need to scale video production while maintaining strict brand compliance. After raising their Series A earlier this year, Capsule has found product-market fit by solving a critical pain point: creative teams can’t keep up with organizational demand for video, yet enterprise brands require strict brand control that consumer tools can’t provide. Natalie shares how intimate VIP dinners became their highest-performing go-to-market motion, why curation matters more than event scale, and the tactical playbook for running enterprise events that actually convert. Topics Discussed: - Building an enterprise-first go-to-market strategy from day one - Scaling VIP dinner events as primary demand generation channel - Designing event formats that balance community building with sales discovery - Targeting creative leaders in large enterprise organizations - Navigating multi-stakeholder sales cycles (creative teams, end users, CMOs) - Pivoting from UGC collection platform to enterprise video editing tool - Planning virtual events while maintaining in-person event quality Lessons For B2B Marketers: - Use Event Invitations as High-Conversion Outbound Campaigns: Capsule’s VIP dinner invitations achieve exceptional open and response rates by leading with value, not product. Subject lines like ”VIP creative dinner in [city]” at recognizable restaurants get attention from busy executives who ignore typical sales outreach. Including peer attendees from recognized brands creates social proof and FOMO. Even prospects who can’t attend convert into sales conversations because the invitation itself positions Capsule as solving their exact problem. - Ruthlessly Curate Guest Lists Over Event Scale: The ideal event mix is 20% best customers, 10% internal team (including CEO and top sales reps), and 70% dream prospects. Attendees consistently cite guest curation—being surrounded by true peers and people they look up to—as the most valuable aspect of Capsule’s events. A dinner with 7-8 highly-qualified people outperforms events with 30+ mixed-quality attendees. Everyone’s time is limited; junior ICs who can’t add value to peer discussions kill the experience. - Keep Event Budgets Under $10K All-In: For intimate dinners of 12-16 people, staying under $10,000 total (including travel, team costs, food, and videographer) is totally manageable even in expensive markets like San Francisco and New York. Going significantly over that threshold requires justifying the spend. This budget discipline forces prioritization on what actually matters—the people in the room—rather than expensive production that doesn’t drive results. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with David Benowitz, VP of Strategy and Marketing Communications at BRINC. BRINC is a US-based drone manufacturer focused exclusively on public safety customers—police departments, fire departments, and SWAT teams. Starting with an incredibly narrow focus on SWAT team drones, BRINC built their brand by deeply understanding their customer and has since expanded across the broader public safety sector. David shares how marketing to non-competitive government customers creates unique advantages, why authenticity matters more than production value in this space, and how a small four-person marketing team executes high-impact campaigns by ruthlessly focusing on what works. Topics Discussed: - Building marketing authenticity for skeptical government buyers - Leveraging customer advocacy in non-competitive markets - Scaling event marketing as a primary demand generation channel - Operating a lean four-person marketing team with external support - Transitioning from hardware to software marketing motions - Creating brand messaging that doubles as sales and recruiting tool - Co-marketing strategies with larger partner organizations Lessons For B2B Marketers: - Build Voice of Customer Into Everything You Create: Public safety buyers immediately recognize inauthenticity—Hollywood misconceptions, wrong terminology, or features that don’t match real applications. David emphasizes conducting extensive customer interviews and ride-alongs to understand not just what customers need, but how they speak, what language they use, and what messaging feels real versus manufactured. This authenticity becomes your competitive moat. - Turn Non-Competitive Customers Into Your Sales Force: Unlike traditional B2B where customers compete and are reluctant to be case studies, BRINC’s public safety customers actively want other agencies to succeed since they’re providing a public good. This creates a flywheel where customers become salespeople, sharing success stories and advocating for the product without ego or politics getting in the way. Structure your marketing to facilitate this peer-to-peer selling. - Double Down on What Works, Kill Everything Else: BRINC identified events as their highest-performing channel and went deeper rather than broader—investing heavily in fewer, larger events rather than spreading thin across many tactics. David’s philosophy: 10% of marketing work provides 90% of results. Small teams need to ruthlessly prioritize the core activities that drive pipeline and eliminate legacy channels that no longer perform. - Design Brand Messaging That Serves Multiple Functions: When your brand story aligns tightly with your product differentiators and target audience, it becomes a tool for sales enablement and recruiting simultaneously. David validates his messaging when new employees say ”I already know this” and when customers who don’t know he’s in marketing repeat the company’s positioning verbatim. Purpose-fit brand messaging reduces training time and accelerates time-to-productivity. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Sarah Stadler, a startup marketing leader and fractional CMO who has built marketing programs from the ground up at multiple B2B startups, including Datalogix, which sold to Oracle for over $1 billion. Sarah challenges the prevailing obsession with marketing metrics and makes a compelling case for why B2B marketers need to escape analysis paralysis and return to the fundamentals of brand building and human connection. Through her extensive experience working with early-stage founders transitioning from founder-led marketing, Sarah shares tactical frameworks for balancing accountability with creative marketing work. Topics Discussed: - The tension between measurement-driven marketing and brand building - Why analysis overload leads to paralysis in marketing decisions - The fundamental difference between B2B and e-commerce marketing measurement - How zero-click content and AI searches are changing organic traffic metrics - The challenge of measuring awareness in an era of dark social and private communities - Building marketing accountability frameworks that work for early-stage startups - Navigating metric-obsessed organizations without sacrificing creative work Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers: - Anchor Accountability to Pipeline and Revenue Metrics Only: Start with just two core metrics that matter: marketing’s contribution to pipeline and contribution to closed-won business. Everything else is operational detail for your team to track. This creates genuine accountability while preventing the spiral into tracking dozens of vanity metrics that don’t connect to business outcomes. - Use Percentage-Based Goals for Early-Stage Predictability: When sales forecasting isn’t mature yet, commit to percentage targets rather than dollar amounts—such as 30% of open pipeline and 30% of closed-won business from marketing, plus a 50% conversion rate from marketing qualified leads to sales qualified leads. This approach creates measurable accountability without requiring the sales predictability that early-stage companies often lack. - Implement Source Tagging as Your Minimum Viable Attribution: Get a CRM operational immediately and tag every deal with its source—inbound from website, outbound motion, paid event, or other marketing activity. This simple tagging system provides clear visibility into what’s driving pipeline without requiring sophisticated marketing attribution software or complex multi-touch models. - Recognize That B2B Marketing Fundamentally Differs from Sales Measurement: B2B marketing cannot be measured with the same black-and-white approach as sales activities. Sales can work backwards from quota to required pipeline to number of activities, but marketing operates as a web of awareness-building touchpoints across channels that compound over time rather than driving linear, trackable conversions. Account for the Reality of Dark Social and Unmeasurable Awareness: Accept that significant value comes from channels you cannot track—private Slack communities, podcast mentions on shows you’re not on, word-of-mouth in spaces marketers can’t see. Trying to measure everything creates false precision and leads to cutting programs that actually work but don’t show up in dashboards. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Nate Smoyer, Head of Marketing at Lula. Lula provides maintenance coordination technology for scattered-site property managers across the U.S., combining software that plugs into existing property management platforms with a vetted vendor network. After running a 240+ episode proptech podcast called Tech Nest, Nate joined Lula to build their marketing function from scratch. Operating as a Midwestern startup that prioritizes profitability over blitzscaling, Lula recently achieved cash flow positive status while growing through strategic conference presence and organic content. Nate shares how he’s scaling marketing with limited resources, why he treats content as product rather than marketing, and his unconventional approach to SEO that drove a competitive keyword from position 40+ to #6 in just weeks. Topics Discussed: - Building marketing strategy from scratch at a Series A startup - Using podcasts as a lead generation and validation tool - Conference marketing as primary demand capture channel - Treating content as product vs. content as marketing - AI-powered SEO strategy focused on intent over volume - Growing organic LinkedIn presence without paid advertising - Operating with profitability constraints as a Midwestern startup - Balancing quick wins with long-term inbound investment Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers: - Prioritize Existing Demand Over Creating It: Rather than spreading resources thin across multiple channels, Nate identifies where prospects are actively looking. Property managers attend conferences specifically to talk with vendors—so Lula upgraded their booth design to a minimalist backlit setup asking one question: ”Make maintenance easy?” This simple approach lets prospects self-identify their problems, leading to 26 conferences scheduled for next year versus 10-12 this year. The principle applies across channels: find where your ICP is already searching, then show up strategically. - Structure Podcasting Strategy Around Your Business Goal: Tech Nest succeeded because Nate designed it as a disguised needs analysis call, not a media play. By targeting early-stage founders (his ideal agency clients), he gained undivided attention during interviews, delivered value through content distribution, and leveraged reciprocity—guests naturally asked about his work, creating organic sales conversations. His key insight: decide between thought leadership podcasts (audience growth) versus lead generation podcasts (hero-focused guest content). Both work, but require different approaches and success metrics. - Simplify Project Management to Maximize Execution Time: As a solo marketer, Nate rejected complex project management systems in favor of a single Apple Note with one-line bullet points. His reasoning: until you have a team requiring coordination and detailed scoping, administrative overhead steals execution time. This constraint-driven approach extends across his strategy—he focuses on one channel at a time until it works before expanding, rejecting the pressure to ”be everywhere, do everything, always.” // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Aimen Chouchane, Head of Marketing at IntelexVision. IntelexVision is an AI-powered video analytics platform transforming the global security and safety industry by adding highly contextualized intelligence to CCTV footage. As the company’s first marketing hire, Aimen is building a comprehensive go-to-market strategy that bridges traditional PR expertise with cutting-edge AI positioning, all while navigating the unique challenges of marketing to non-desk-based industries. From planning ambitious feature-length content to rebuilding market confidence in video analytics after past false promises, Aimen shares his pragmatic approach to creative marketing and budget planning. Topics Discussed - Marketing to non-traditional SaaS verticals (retail, hospitality, fire protection, physical security) - Building marketing strategy as the first full-time marketing hire - The resurgence of PR and press releases in the age of AI search and LLMs - Leveraging earned media coverage with paid LinkedIn advertising - Educating markets that have been burned by previous technology promises - Newsjacking and trend capitalization in sensitive industries - Competitive positioning without creating ”phony wars” - 2026 marketing planning and ambitious video content strategies - Pragmatic creativity: balancing creative ideas with organizational needs - Hiring outside traditional B2B SaaS backgrounds Lessons For B2B Marketers - Lead with Optimism Over Competition: Rather than positioning against competitors or pointing fingers at what others do wrong, focus marketing energy on solving the customer’s problem and championing the industry. Positive emotion trumps negative emotion, and buyers want to align with ambitious, optimistic brands rather than pragmatists and naysayers. The enemy should be the pain point your customer faces, not the competitor you’re trying to beat. - Leverage PR for AI Search Optimization: Press releases and earned media are experiencing a renaissance due to LLM-based search. Being cited in authoritative publications like major news outlets now provides dual benefits: traditional SEO impact plus visibility in ChatGPT and other AI search tools that pull from reputable sources. This makes PR especially valuable for global companies looking to scale brand awareness efficiently. - Maximize Content Longevity Through Distribution Planning: Don’t fall in love with creating the content itself at the expense of distribution strategy. What happens in month three after launch is as important as month one. Build comprehensive reuse and distribution plans upfront to maximize ROI, arm your sales team with assets they can leverage for months, and avoid constantly returning to create new executions every few weeks. - Apply ”Pragmatic Creativity” to Marketing Initiatives: Start by listening and understanding organizational needs first, then apply creative thinking to how you solve those problems. Use a ”fusion cuisine” approach where you deliver the fundamental requirements but add your own accents and character. This ensures creative campaigns remain tightly connected to business objectives rather than feeling disconnected or self-indulgent. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM

In this episode of The Marketing Front Lines, we speak with Jack McInnes, Director of Marketing at Corti AI, an AI platform company serving the healthcare technology industry. Corti AI started as a research group from a Copenhagen university and has evolved into a developer-focused platform that enables health tech organizations, EHR companies, and healthcare professionals to build AI-powered applications through APIs, SDKs, and embedded solutions. Jack shares how Corti pivoted from expensive enterprise conference marketing to a product-led growth motion targeting developers, the critical role of authentic content in an AI-saturated market, and why trust-building through scientific rigor matters more than ever in B2B tech marketing. Topics Discussed - Transitioning from enterprise conference marketing to product-led growth - Building dual go-to-market strategies for developers and healthcare enterprise buyers - Creating authentic thought leadership content in the age of AI-generated marketing - Structuring flat, cross-functional growth teams for agility - Establishing trust and credibility in highly regulated industries - Balancing automation efficiency with content quality and brand integrity Lessons For B2B Tech Marketers - Recognize When Traditional Channels Reach Diminishing Returns: Corti invested heavily in healthcare conferences and trade shows to stand out against major competitors, but found the ROI increasingly difficult to justify. The high costs and labor-intensive nature of this channel sparked their strategic pivot toward developer-focused product-led growth. For B2B marketers, this illustrates the importance of ruthlessly evaluating channel performance and being willing to redirect budget when enterprise sales motions become unsustainable for your company stage. - Design Go-To-Market for Two-Sided Influence Dynamics: Corti discovered that marketing directly to developers creates bottom-up demand that influences enterprise purchasing decisions—similar to how children’s marketing creates demand that parents must address. By enabling developers to build on their platform and experience its value firsthand, these technical users become internal advocates within healthcare organizations. This approach is particularly effective in industries where technical evaluators heavily influence procurement decisions, even when they don’t control budgets. - Preserve Content Quality as Competitive Differentiation in the AI Era: While AI tools make it tempting to populate every channel with high-frequency content, Jack emphasizes that automated content quickly becomes ”trash” that trains audiences to ignore your brand. Corti’s strategy involves investing in substantive Substack content from PhD researchers and subject matter experts, then using AI to reformat and distribute these valuable pieces across channels. The core principle: automate distribution, but never outsource strategic thinking or domain expertise. // Sponsors:  Front Lines — We help B2B tech companies launch, manage, and grow podcasts that drive demand, awareness, and thought leadership. www.FrontLines.io The Global Talent Co. — We help tech startups find, vet, hire, pay, and retain amazing marketing talent that costs 50-70% less than the US & Europe. www.GlobalTalent.co // Don’t Miss: New Podcast Series — How I Hire Senior GTM leaders share the tactical hiring frameworks they use to build winning revenue teams. Hosted by Andy Mowat, who scaled 4 unicorns from $10M to $100M+ ARR and launched Whispered to help executives find their next role.  Subscribe here: https://open.spotify.com/show/53yCHlPfLSMFimtv0riPyM