Jacob Rushfinn

I’ve never really told you all what I actually do for a living, so here you go Pisgah Peaks Ventures builds & manages fractional marketing team for SMBs that are doing under 10-15 M ARR. The teams could be anywhere from 2 to 20+ individuals. Hiring for PT marketing roles can be a big drain on small businesses. They're unsure of who to hire, how to train, and they def don't want to manage them. This keeps costs in check (no office space here!) + avoids costly benefits / W2 wages. Perfect clients for us? B2B companies with 1-2 internal marketing team members Dispensaries with 2-5 locations. Soloprenuers who are scaling from 6 > 7 figures. A few years ago we started investing into other small businesses & at this point have equity in a handful of other SMBs. The goal? By 45; be able to live off the proceeds of our portfolio and golf 4X a week. To my network.... Tell us What do you do? Why do you do it? Post in the comments!

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When someone demands "more MQLs", it's a dead give away that they have no clue how real MQLs are actually generated. A true MQL is the result of extensive top of funnel and brand development work, often conducted over a period of months or even years, targeting ICPs with valuable content and genuine education. That bowl for business cards on your trade show booth? Not the way to MQLs. Sending that 4th cold email to people who've never heard of you other than in their spam box? Not the way to MQLs. A LinkedIn pitchslap that says "Hi Abdul, I noticed we both have lots of connections in common so let's also connect." Not the way to MQLs. Cranking up the dollars on Google Ads to obscene amounts so you can be the first sponsored link to appear? Not the way to MQLs. Every once in an rare while, that kind of activity may lead to something but the ROI of it is shockingly low and probably not worth the effort. And it makes your marketing program reek of desperation. What works better? You guessed it... demand creation, and that hated word of "brand development." Demand creation through genuine content, market education, (ethical) influencer collaboration, relationship-development. Perhaps even community building, though that one is a whole other level of complex. And it can't be about your products or services. It has to be about the customer's needs, and how their goals can be achieved. That's the type of marketing activity that leads to genuine MQLs that eventually convert to new opportunities. And as Marketing leader, it's your role to educate the rest of the management team and the Board about this reality.

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Saw the Adam Robinson post on RB2B churn numbers and had two major takeaways: 1. I wonder what portion of the field is actually using larger tech stacks. When I look at RB2Bs premium offering (compared to free) I see a ton of value, but value that is dependent on you also using (and paying for) other tools in the stack. If you only need one or two of those integrations, it seems like you might be losing out. Which is maybe a marketing/offering phrasing? like the next tier should be presented as a X number of resolutions and Y number of integrations? I don't know... I suppose this would be dependent on the operating costs per integrations per user. 2. It's crazy to me how many people need to be prescribed what to do with the information that RB2B. It makes me believe the number of tools available have actually handicapped peoples ability to think and figure shit out for themselves. It also tells me that they might just not have good strategy outside of their tools. In many instances (if you have traffic) clearly resolving a small portion of your traffic is infinitely valuable in validating your strategy. RB2B (or any other tool)won't help if you: a. don't have traffic. b. don't have the right traffic. c. wouldn't convert anyway. Meaning...the shiniest new tool in the world can't help you if your foundation is trash and you don't know what you're doing. #b2b #demand #contentstrategy

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Should you change your messaging strategy for different follow-up sequences? Yes. You should have different follow-up sequences for: > OOO > Interested > Wants to book a call > Bump At the very minimum

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You can now store sensitive HIPAA-protected medical data in HubSpot. HIPAA protection goes beyond pure medical data to include financial data linked with health information. If you're a marketer you can: - improve lead generation by collecting sensitive data that customers have consented to use for marketing purposes - build complex segmentation and automation without workarounds to handle HIPAA-protected data If you're a sales rep you can: - personalize prospecting with additional patient profile data - automate deal workflows based on the supplied sensitive data collected in forms Having a complete view of the patients is very important in B2B but absolutely critical for healthcare companies. Additionally regulatory compliance will be much easier to manage. To enable HIPAA compliance you'll need an Enterprise HubSpot subscription. Then go to Privacy and Consent > "Configure Sensitive Data Settings". #hubspot #healthcare #hipaa

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I’ve used UGC to build multiple 7-figure brands. But… 1. There’s no one formula that works for every brand. It depends on the product, the niche, and more. 2. The only way to figure out what works for your brand is to try a ton of stuff, cut out the 95% that doesn’t work, and iterate on the 5% that does. Keep your quality high, but get your volume up. Then keep going until the results start pouring in. That’s the only way to win. P.S. My UGC marketplace helps you find proven creators and get persuasive content made for affordable prices. Hit the “visit my website” button to check it out.

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I interviewed and hired many marketers. IMO, marketers who blend these skills are priceless. Skill combinations I love to see: ✅ User Acquisition + Engineer - Works on sprints that bring new users - Solid at setting up tracking and automated workflows ✅ Partnerships + Evangelist - Owns integrations/collaborations - Good with planning, deep audience understanding, and coordinated distribution - A practitioner who spreads the word online through tried-and-trued content ✅ Product Marketing + Educator - Educates users with evidence-backed and relatable content - Comfortable on video - Can execute activation and retention marketing experiments ✅ Content Strategist + Creator - Knows how to write actionable content and captivating stories - Can distribute content effectively, increase traffic, grab people’s attention, scale volume, adapt to different formats, coach juniors in the team... ✅ Community + Events manager - Manages and grows an active community - Comfortable in front of the camera and on stage bringing memorable events to the community ✅ Ads + Conversion Copywriter - Building funnels, targeting audiences strategically, and converting from retargeting - Solid conversion copywriting skills (comes in handy in the early stages) I know these people are hard to find. But since working with them feels like riding a rocket, the pursuit is worth it. Sometimes, you may encounter someone who hasn't reached this level yet, but they can achieve it with the right guidance. Identifying such potential is an art that comes super handy if you have a lower salary cap and can’t hire seniors. 😇 Plus, many more combinations to talk about. These are the ones I love and frequently need. 😀

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We meet with 20 DTC and enterprise brands a month that are working with other agencies to build an influencer-affiliate channel. Here's how 90% of the convo's go: "Our agency is reaching out to 150 influencers a week..." OUCH "They're sending one email through an influencer platform using their primary domain... AND NO FOLLOW UPS!" 😅 "They aren't recruiting influencers on instagram DM's." 😑 "They are only focused on nano and micro creators because the brand doesn't have budget for paid relationships." "They only send one product to influencers and expect them to continue creating content that converts." 😲 "Their is no community management strategy." 😒 "No automations or trigger based email flows to nurture influencers." 😤 "No monthly challenges or campaigns running." 🤐 "They're not putting whitelisting/ spark ad spend behind top performing content." 😶 These are what we call the cardinal sins of building a successful influencer-affiliate channel and will 100% guarantee that your program will never generate results Influencer-affiliate can be a profitable growth channel driving direct revenue, millions of free impressions, and create a library of high converting ad creative But you have to get the fundamentals right Start with a richer offer Use your CPA on Meta and start their... paying $50? Cool why not be willing to pay that for a creator to drive sales for you. 20x your outreach volume! YES 20x Get a new influencer software that supports email at scale, we use SARAL - The Influencer OS Set up a secondary domain and 10-20 new inboxes Now you can send 35 emails a day per inbox or 10,500-21,000 emails a month to recruit influencers Stand up 4 brand owned instagram accounts Start sending 100 dm's a day to recruit influencers Have a dedicated person that builds relationships with influencers in the community and finds ways to get them creating more content These programs are often the biggest marketing opportunity for brands But their agency doesn't have the right strategy or isn't willing to do the work required to make it work If you're working with an agency, at a minimum push them to scale TOF outreach and you'll start to see better results. What other constraints have you experienced building your influencer-affiliate channel?

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How do you *really* know if podcast ads are bringing in net new customers? Sure, pixel attribution can capture 70% more podcast-attributed conversions.... But how many of those are truly incremental? Well, Podscale® partnered with Podscribe to find out... "For the large brands we work with, understanding the net-new impact of podcast ads has always been a challenge—especially when they’re spending big on other channels, too." - Natalie Kovac, CEO Podscale® Using Podscribe’s “always-on” incrementality testing, Podscale® was able to finally measure which podcast ad conversions were incremental. Meaning... They wouldn’t have converted without hearing the podcast ad. The Findings? INSANE!  ➡ 58% of conversions driven by podcast ads were incremental, meaning these customers were genuinely net new.  ➡ Up to 2.56x Incremental ROAS, securing over two and a half times return for every dollar spent on ads from net-new customers. ➡ Podcast ads drove a massive +$3.9 million in incremental revenue for some of the fastest-growing DTC brands. Want to see the full story? Check out the case study to learn how Podscale® and Podscribe made it happen → https://lnkd.in/g8_cp4v4 #podcastadvertising #incrementality #dtc #podscribe

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🚨 PSA: Please, please, please collect data. You've been avoiding it for years. Worried that it might hurt your brand or lower sign-ups. But here’s the truth: responsible data collection won’t kill your subscription biz. It fuels better targeting by sending positive signals—helping you better understand and find more of your best-fit customers. Do it ethically? Goes without saying. Integrate fully? Everywhere you can. Necessary for growth? Absolutely. The future of scaling depends on how well you know your customers. Don’t leave your growth to chance.

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Today's CRO tip - make checkout speed 4 times faster with one-click checkout from Shop Pay. If you’re having abandoned cart issues, implementing this on your checkout simplifies the buying process and will result in higher conversions. (It's led to checkouts with Shop Pay having a 1.72 times higher conversion rate than those without it.) So how does it work? - Streamlines the checkout process - Makes it easier to buy on mobile - Reduces abandoned carts - Helps make you more sales and revenue Customers only need to fill in their details once and it’s all stored for future use. This means when they come back to your site next time, once they click the cart button, their details are automatically filled in and they can complete the order with one click. Shop Pay is available to Shopify merchants using Shopify Payments. The great thing about the functionality is that it saves, encryts and autofills checkout details across all Shop carts, so customers can use one-click payment on your store even if it’s their first visit. #shoppay #shopify #cro #marketingtips #ecommerce

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Stop hitting up brands who are your "dream partner" 💭 And start hitting up brands using... ✨ Intent ✨ Intent determines two extremely important buying signals: 🛍 Need ⏰ Timing Everyone wants more brand deals, but blasting your roster to extremely popular brands rarely converts. So what's the best process for figuring out the "right" brand partners? Target brands who've recently... 💰 raised capital 🚀 launched a new product 🤝 partnered with similar creators 📢 expanded into new markets or regions ↗ increased spend on a specific platform 👩‍💻 hired additional influencer marketing roles Cold outreach shouldn't be wishful thinking — it's about observing buying signals to target the "right" brands 🚨

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Does UGC content matter to customers? It does, here’s a stat to prove it: ~60% of consumers think UGC is the most authentic way brands can market themselves. Still, many brands struggle to harness the full potential of UGC in their marketing strategies. Too often, UGC gets lost in the vast sea of social media content. But fear not – your brand's UGC can stand out and deliver maximum ROI. How? 🤔 Here’s my 'secret sauce': 1) 𝐍𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐟𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐚 𝐔𝐆𝐂 🤐 As a brand, your goal must be to stay authentic always. So, hiring an actor to shoot UGC is a big NO. Be real, Be authentic 2) 𝐋𝐞𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐤 🗣 When shooting a UGC, you shouldn’t bind your customer to a particular script (just little direction is OKI). Instead, give them the freedom to speak from their heart. When they do: — They bring real emotions  — They bring authentic views — Content feels raw and real Also, META Algo loves real UGC content and rewards them with improved KPIs (Higher CTR, Higher ER)    3) 𝐊𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐢𝐭 𝐬𝐞𝐦𝐢-𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 📽 Stop making the UGC content like a movie. Let there be a simple setup. Because when you make it too professional, people somehow feel disconnected from it 4) 𝐑𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫 🍭 If you’re asking for a customer to make a UGC, then they should be awarded and recognized on social media I believe UGC is a powerful tool for brands. They can leverage it and get maximum ROI. Any doubts ? Just leave a comment, I’d be happy to help. #marketing #UGC #branding

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Check out our recent case study for a Shopify website We teamed up with Pinkergreen (who assisted w/ UX & design) Outcomes from work? Conversion rate up ⬆️ 60% Avg order value ⬆️ 7% Upsell value (within 45 days) $8100 SEO up ⬆️ Bounce rate ⬇️ Check out the full case study below with more info on process & outcomes

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I love sprint testing. It's so powerful to test problem messages in $30 increments to understand exactly what your customers want right now. Seriously feeling pumped! #paidmedia #whitelabel #mediabuying #productmarketfit

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Asking is the best policy.

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Most SaaS brands are terrible at describing what they do. Want a headline that actually says something? Try this: [Verb] your way to [ideal state]. Here’s an example: “[Test] your way to [winning ad concepts].” And here’s why it works: - It’s free from filler words or fluff - It boils your value prop down to one thing - It tells buyers what they can achieve by doing that one thing Imagine a SaaS headline people can actually understand? That's both rare and powerful...! 💎

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Today Monday! 9am PT (or if you can't make it, sign up to get the replay). Can't wait to join: - Kipp Bodnar, CMO of HubSpot, - Zach Kitschke, CMO of Canva, - and Jeff Titterton, CMO of Stripe for "A CMO's Guide to AI, efficiency and engagement" ->> How are marketing teams actually using AI in production? ->> What are the biggest obstacles? ->> How do you navigate the changing search and search ad landscape? ->> How should you approach governance, privacy, and safety? ->> How do you get more of your team to adopt and get productive with AI? These are just a few of the questions we'll be answering. Join us! Registration link in the first comment. #AI #CMOs #Bestpractices

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You go through so much manual work to get the perfect email out the door to maximize performance - precision segmentation and targeting, brilliant copywriting and editing, QA loops for days on end, all those expensive change requests. 🫠 But do you have any idea if your creative, the element that arguably has the most impact on the performance of the campaign, is working as hard as you are? 🤔 Find out what happened when I was read into the biggest secret in marketing and why you and your team don't have to operate in the dark anymore with Movable Ink Da Vinci. 💡 Interested in turning the lights on for your talented team? Drop us a line to get started and you can be using data, not guesswork, to make decisions and improve performance by this peak season - https://lnkd.in/ebPue-Nc

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