How Successful Sales Teams Are Embracing Agentic AI by Jaya Prakash (Jay) Kaza, Doug J. Chung, Candace Lun Plotkin, Siamak Sarvari, Jennifer Stanley, Maria Valdivieso

Successful sales teams are embracing agentic AI—autonomous tools that identify, nurture, and close deals. These systems adapt in real time and integrate seamlessly to scale sales impact.

The AI Marketing Revolution: Key Insights from G2’s CMO on How B2B Buying Has Forever Changed by Jason Lemkin

Buyers now expect AI to be built-in rather than optional, and are choosing platforms that allow them to build “agentic” workflows. Traditional funnels are being disrupted: people begin with large language models, value trust over polished messaging, and favor content optimized for LLMs.

Why B2B Tech Deals Really Stall — And What Marketers Can Do About It by Jonathan Franchell

Deals often stall not because of competitors, but because of internal buyer confusion, misalignment, and lack of clarity among decision-makers. To move forward, marketers need to shift from pushing for urgency to helping buyers build confidence, align stakeholders, and clarify their path forward.

Business Automation for Scalable B2B Marketing & Sales by Mike Hakob

​There’s a crucial shift in B2B marketing where leaders can no longer rely solely on stacking up MQLs and webinar signups—they must clearly connect marketing efforts to actual revenue. This article outlines a strategic framework that uses unified data, AI-driven touchpoints, and optimized customer journeys to turn marketing into a revenue-driving machine.​

5 P’s of Marketing Meets Outbound Sales: Aligning Marketing Mix with B2B Lead Generation by Rachana Pallikaraki

When marketing and sales align around the 5 Ps—Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People—outbound lead generation is significantly more effective, with higher conversion and revenue uplift. Disjointed outreach undercut by mismatched messaging and mis-aligned strategy is replaced by coherent, value-led communication that better resonates with prospects.

Have a wonderful weekend and thank you for reading!  If you have B2B news sources you rely on we’d love to hear about them.  Please share them with us.  

The post B2B Reads: Agentic AI, Stalling Tech Deals, Business Automation, 5 P’s appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

Ever scroll through your LinkedIn feed, open a newsletter, or skim a marketing email and catch yourself playing I Spy AI? You spot it immediately: a phrase that’s a little too stiff, a claim that sounds generic, a sentence trying just a bit too hard. Suddenly, reading feels like a game and not a fun one.

Of course, we all expect AI to be part of the process. It makes content development faster, more efficient, and often easier, especially when you’re tight on time and resources. But while AI can help churn out first drafts in seconds, it can also leave your readers with that unmistakable “AI ick.” 

So how do you get the efficiency benefits of AI without drowning in the noise of machine-generated content?

As Robert Rose explains, “That instinct — the human urge to pause, to refine, to leave space — is something no model can truly mimic.” 

Even when you don’t have time to step away from your desk, taking a few intentional moments to tweak your draft can make a world of difference. Below is a practical checklist to help your content feel real, relatable, and human without sacrificing AI efficiency. 

4 Practical Tips that are Anti-AI Ick

1. Replace generic adjectives with concrete details

AI loves phrases like “innovative solution” or “cutting-edge platform,” which sound polished but hollow. Instead, identify exactly what your product does and how it impacts the user. Ask yourself: “Can my audience picture this?”

• AI output: “Our innovative solution helps marketing teams optimize campaigns.”
• Humanized edit: “Our dashboard automatically identifies underperforming ads in under 60 seconds, letting marketing teams adjust campaigns before budgets are wasted.”

2. Quantify outcomes to make claims believable

Whenever you see a broad claim, attach a specific metric or timeframe. Numbers make content tangible and credible. Ask: “How much, how often, or how fast does this happen?”

• AI output: “Our tool improves team productivity.”
• Humanized edit: “Teams using our workflow saw a 25% increase in completed campaigns in just three months, while cutting reporting time by two hours per week.”

3. Add subtle human touches to break the monotony

AI drafts are “perfect” but lifeless. Insert small imperfections like pauses, asides, questions that make your content feel conversational. Look for places where your content feels too perfect or stiff and rewrite it like you’re talking to a colleague.

• AI output: “Our version control feature prevents data loss.”
• Humanized edit: “Ever lost a file minutes before a client call? We have too. Our version control keeps your work safe and stress-free.”

4. Use relatable anecdotes or scenarios

AI often explains benefits abstractly. Tie them to experiences your audience recognizes. Ask: “Who has faced this problem, and how did my solution help them?”

• AI output: “Our workflow saves time and increases efficiency.”
• Humanized edit: “One CMO told us she reclaimed three hours every week by automating dashboard reports, hours she now spends coaching her team instead of wrangling data.”

Final Thoughts

AI can help you draft content quickly, but it cannot make your writing memorable on its own. The difference is in the human edits adding real details, measurable results, tiny imperfections, and stories your audience recognizes. These small touches transform polished-but-flat text into content that connects, engages, and sticks in readers’ minds.

Remember, people don’t just read words. They read intent, personality, and understanding. Make your edits count, and your audience will notice the difference.

Curious about how we support our clients in achieving their marketing goals? Connect with one of our experts today!

The post How to Create Content that Doesn’t Give People the AI Ick appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

The advancements in AI and the tools that have come out of these developments have been rapidly integrated into B2B business workflows and GTM market programs. Some are more successful than others, as seen in that MIT report. Now, I’m not coming on my soapbox here to label AI, LLMs, Agentic, etc., as a mistake that we should go back from (even though there are ethical concerns regarding creativity and intellectual property that have yet to be rectified). What I want to bring up is a growing concern about where the market is.

The Problem

With the execution of AI investment and rollouts, as well as the hidden uses of AI, we have entered a period of diminishing returns from these AI tools that we are using. I’m not referring to a potential market bubble here; I’m specifically referring to the impact that overreliance and uncritical use of AI have on what we are seeing in the market, on the brand voice and content of B2B companies, on GTM initiatives, and on the models themselves. The more we use AI to create content, strategies, emails, etc., uncritically and without creating novel and human-created assets to then put back into the models and systems we’re using, the more generic and milquetoast the outputs we will get from these models, and we’ll likely see more hallucinations as well.

I’m sure everyone has noticed the flush of obvious and generic AI writing bombarding inboxes and LinkedIn posts daily. There are obvious patterns to look out for: EM dashes, random emojis, excessive bolding for emphasis, and the list goes on. For brands, this writing often erases their unique brand voice, and for marketers and salespeople, it renders any outbound initiatives incredibly generic and unlikely to drive engagement.

The Solution

We need to reintroduce some modicum of human input into any workflow that uses AI. It is dangerous in the long term to be entirely reliant on them. This post, for example, was wholly written without AI. That brings me to my second point: we must continue to practice the skills we used before we started to rely on AI models. This blog took me twice as long to write compared to what it used to take when I wasn’t using AI to support. The pattern of people offloading much of what was a daily part of their job that required skill to AI is something we are seeing across industries. The pattern leaves all of us vulnerable not just to something like a major AI outage or market impact, but also to new model rollouts that change the way the AI works, responds, and its output quality.

Potential Opportunity

On the other hand, the pattern and direction in which companies and teams are utilizing AI also leave an opportunity for those who can strike a balance between human creation and AI optimization. People crave authentic human tone and conversation, and the content that doesn’t sound AI-generated stands out. So, while the overreliance on AI models is a concern, I also think there is an opportunity that comes with it.

If you want to chat about CLG or anything in this post, please reach out: acceleration@heinzmarketing.com

The post AI in B2B: The Human Imperative appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

Sometimes it is more important to track what doesn’t work than what does.  Customer marketing is one of these areas, at least in my opinion.  The reason is simple: the relationship is yours to lose.  Every relationship needs boundaries, and customer marketing walks a fine line between offering value and being annoying.  This is especially true when you want them to spend more money.

Don’t get me wrong, it is very important to know what works.  However, if you don’t know where the boundaries are with the various segments of your customers, then you run the risk of overstepping.  Excitement about what works can quickly translate to anguish, and relationships are hard to rebuild.

I like the term “boundary metrics” for the type of thing that shows you were the line is.  So here are some common flags we have encountered and suggestions on what to do about it.

Just getting started?  Here is is a guide on what CLG is, an FAQ on CLG Metrics, and essential tools you need for CLG efforts.

Email Metrics

Email is very trackable and benchmarks are easy to gather.  When you start to see sudden degradation of your performance against those benchmarks, there are a few things you will want to ask your team about.  First off, here are some flags to look for in your email reporting:

• Deliverability below 95%
• Unsubscribe rates at greater than 0.1%
• Open rates at less than 15% (particularly for welcome/education emails)
• Click-to-open ratios of less than 8% (this can really vary by email topic)

These benchmarks I listed are general and for reference only, it is better to compare against your own historical performance.

In these cases, there are a few culprits that would indicate you are bumping up against boundaries in your customer relationships.  Here are some questions to ask:

• What is the frequency of emails going out to customers?
• Do unsubscribe rate increases correlate to frequency of emails in a given period?
• What new accounts were added in the period where your metrics declined?
• Is the open-rate decline over time or does it better connect to topics?
• Has anything else changed in your email program?

As with everything, you need to figure out where the point of diminishing returns is and avoid going too far past it.  This is more than economics, relationships can be damaged and take time to repair.

In-App

This is commonly less visible to marketing.  But hey, it is a good reason to get chummier with your product team.  There isn’t a right-size for this one, but there are some commonalities and themes.  As a rule of thumb these are generally also churn-risk indicators.

• Drops in in-app communication engagement
  • Things like notification muting or unopened messages
• Announcement dwells <1s
• Declining engagement with announcements

Marketing in-app can be a tricky thing.  Users are there to get the value they paid for, and while we want to add value (through selling more services), they might not be open to it.  Cross this boundary and you will associate negative affect with the product.  Yikes.

Ask about:

• What campaigns have happened in-app?
• How frequently are we running in-app campaigns?
  • Has that increased lately?
• What % of announcements have been marketing vs. other?
• Has the messaging in-product changed recently?

As with email, this boils down to relevance and frequency.  Too much frequency or too little relevance will hurt the relationship.  Both at the same time is a big turn-off for users.

Community

Not every tool has, or needs, a user community.  If you don’t, there is still somewhere that professionals using your tool go to complain/rant with others (specific to you or not).  Some examples would be subreddits, professional forums, and private Slack or LinkedIn groups.  These are common.

Flags to look out for:

• Increasing negative posting about you.
• Complaints about marketing.

That’s it, pretty simple to envision, but harder to gather.  Harder still to analyze, but here are some questions to ask (pro tip – use ChatGPT to do this sort of qual analysis at scale):

• What does the ChatGPT wordcloud of these comments look like?
  • Copy the text of the comments, put it into a doc or directly into ChatGPT and ask it for this.
• What is the overall sentiment of these comments?
  • The official term is “sentiment analysis”
• Does the frequency of these posts correlate to any particular campaigns or trends in customer marketing?
• Are any of the people posting known to us?
• What is specifically mentioned in the posts, and what trends are there among them?

There is a lot to mine in this sort of customer ranting.  Highly recommended work, here.

Sales/CS data

Whoever is responsible for your expansion/renewals is the group to talk to.  There are some quantitative metrics that you can track here, but a lot of it is qualitative and relational.

• Dips in expansion deal win-rates
• Dips in expansion deal qualification rates
• Dips in NPS
• Increasingly negative sentiment in expansion deal notes
• Jumps in cycle time for expansion deals

Not all of these will be directly related to marketing, but there may be correlations there that you wouldn’t know about if you didn’t ask your team.

• Are customers mentioning anything about our marketing?
• Are customers complaining at all about notifications in the system?
• Are leads from our campaigns disqualifying at a higher rate than normal?
• Are deals from our campaigns taking longer to close?
• Is there any timing correlation between NPS dips and customer marketing campaigns?

Get this information early and often, and then plan with your CS/Sales folks to react.

Conclusion

Boundaries matter.  Just like in the buying process, customers are defining more about how the relationship goes than ever before.  AI is only accelerating this as there is increasing parity between product offerings.  Tech is commoditizing, and what will matter more is the relationships you have with your customers.  These take time to build and based on trust.

In customer marketing, it is easy to get focused on the things that drive leads.  To tie it all the way back to the beginning, if you aren’t careful the desire to bring value to your customers can quickly sour them on you.

Remember, what buyers want the most is confidence in the decision they made to go/stick with you.  Don’t endanger it by pushing too hard, too fast.

As always, if you want to chat with me about how you can build these warning systems and the plays to deal with issues, email acceleration@heinzmarketing.com.

The post CLG Metrics: Red Flags and Questions to Ask appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

CMOs Plan Big Investments In AI For The Next Three Years by Megan Poinski,

A recent Forbes report reveals that 71% of CMOs plan to invest over $10 million annually in generative AI in the next three years, with 83% optimistic about its impact. This shows that AI is moving from experimental to foundational in marketing strategy. The article highlights real-world examples of how AI is already improving content creation, targeting, and customer insights, making it clear that this is a trend marketers can’t ignore.

Laying the Groundwork for Smarter, AI-driven Marketing by Mike Pastore

AI-powered decisioning is only as good as the governance and data infrastructure behind it. This piece emphasizes the importance of clean data systems and internal guardrails before chasing flashy tools, reminding marketers that the basics are critical. Companies that invest in this groundwork see smoother scaling and avoid costly missteps, which makes it a must-read for anyone planning to implement AI strategically.

Standing Out In A Zero-Click World Starts With Stronger Collaboration by Lisa Gately

As AI-powered search and summaries reduce clicks to brand websites, marketers need to rethink how they reach buyers. This article explains why collaboration across teams and structured content is key to standing out in a zero-click environment. It’s practical advice for brands that want to maintain visibility and influence in an increasingly AI-driven search landscape.

AI-powered Personalization: The Future is Here, but are Brands Ready? by Claire-Louise Green

Marketing Week reports that only 39% of B2B marketers personalize their website experiences, despite AI strategies boosting productivity by 64% and customer engagement by 61%. The article makes it clear that the tools are available, but many brands haven’t turned them on yet. It’s a solid reminder that personalization isn’t just a nice-to-have, it’s becoming table stakes for effective B2B marketing.

Why Pilots, not RFPs, Define the Future of Martech Selection by Gareth Chilton

Have a wonderful weekend and thank you for reading!  If you have B2B news sources you rely on we’d love to hear about them.  Please share them with us.  

The post B2B Reads: Smarter AI, Strategic Personalization, and Modern Martech Wins appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

You’ve closed the sale with a new customer, now what? Closing the deal is often celebrated as the finish line. But, in reality, it’s just the beginning. The post-sales process isn’t only customer support, it’s the engine for customer-led growth.

Strong post-sales processes lead to retention, expansion, advocacy, and sustainable growth. When your customers are happy, they want to share their positive experiences. In turn you receive more customers and they stick around longer.

So what should your post-sales process look like? Here’s a step-by-step framework to help your organization deliver value after the sale and build lasting customer partnerships the fuel retention, expansion, and advocacy.

Step 1: Seamless Handoff From Sales to Customer Success

The customer shouldn’t feel like they’re starting from scratch after signing the contract. A poor handoff creates friction, misaligned expectations, and lost trust.

• Best practice: Create a structured transition process where sales documents goals, success criteria, decision-making content, and any promises made or other helpful information
• Action: Introduce the Customer Success Manager (CSM) during the final sales conversation so the relationship feels continuous
• Customer impact: Builds confidence that your team is aligned and invested in their success from day one

Step 2: Onboard with Purpose

Onboarding sets the tone for the entire relationship. A rushed or confusing start can delay adoption and cause customers to be unhappy.

• Best practice: Deliver a clear implementation roadmap with timelines, responsibilities, and milestones
• Action: Personalize onboarding to the customer’s objectives instead of using a one-size-fits-all checklist. For example, if their top goal is cost savings, show them the workflows that will achieve this first
• Customer impact: Quick wins build momentum, and customers see progress toward their goals immediately

Spend time in the onboarding stage, even if it takes longer than anticipated. The more confident your customer is in the product or service, the stronger the relationship will be.

Step 3: Define and Measure Success Early

If success isn’t defined upfront, it can’t be recognized or celebrated.

• Best practice: In a kickoff meeting, co-create a “success plan” with measurable outcomes tied to business impact (e.g., reducing manual reporting time by 40%)
• Action: Align on a cadence for reviewing progress (e.g., quarterly business reviews)
• Customer impact: They know what success looks like, and you’re accountable for helping them achieve it

Step 4: Deliver Ongoing Value & Education

Once onboarding is done, the real work begins: ensuring customers get sustained value.

• Best practice: Share resources like training sessions, playbooks, office hours, or webinars that deepen product expertise
• Action: Highlight new features with tailored messaging about how they help your specific customer segment
• Customer impact: They continually discover new ways to use your solution, keeping adoption high and reducing churn risk

Step 5: Foster Proactive Communication

Silence is dangerous in customer relationships. Don’t wait until renewal time or a support ticket to engage.

• Best practice: Establish a regular check-in rhythm that feels consultative, not transactional
• Action: Use check-ins to share insights, benchmarks, or recommendations – not just to “see how things are going”
• Customer impact: Customers feel guided and supported, not sold to. Trust grows, and they view you as a partner

When you meet for the check-ins, make sure to look at the customer account and really customize your insights and recommendations based on what you’re seeing. This will go a long way with customers instead of blanket recommendations.

Step 6: Identify Expansion Opportunities

Expansion should never feel like a sales tactic. It should feel like the natural outcome of delivering value.

• Best practice: Monitor usage patterns and listen during business reviews for unmet needs or emerging challenges
• Action: When introducing an upsell or cross-sell opportunity, frame it around how it helps the customer achieve more of their goals
• Customer impact: They see expansion as an investment in their success, not just another line item

Step 7: Turn Customers into Advocates

Happy customers can be your most powerful growth channel. Advocacy strengthens trust with prospects more than any marketing asset.

• Best practice: Invite satisfied customers to join advisory boards, participate in case studies, or speak at events
• Action: Celebrate their wins publicly (e.g., LinkedIn posts, award nominations) to show appreciation
• Customer impact: They gain recognition and influence, while you gain credible advocacy

Step 8: Continuous Improvement & Feedback Loop

Customer relationships are dynamic, and so is your post-sales process.

• Best practice: Regularly collect feedback through surveys, interviews, and product usage analytics
• Action: Close the loop. Show customers how their feedback directly informs product or service improvements
• Customer impact: They feel heard, valued, and part of your growth story

In Summary

The post-sales process is no longer just about customer services. It’s about customer partnership. From seamless handoffs and purposeful onboarding to advocacy and continuous feedback, every step after the sale should focus on delivering outcomes, building trust, and unlocking growth together.

Companies that get this right turn customers into their most reliable source of growth through renewals, expansions, and referrals. Closing the deal is just the starting line!

Have more questions or want to dig in more? Reach out and let’s chat.

Image by Freepik

The post The Post-Sales Playbook: A Guide to Driving Customer-Led Growth appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

You searched for how i work

Search Results For: how i work

Turn customer relationships into revenue with a smarter, more sustainable go-to-market strategy.

Talk to an Expert

The Problem

Why Traditional Lead-Only Growth Doesn’t Work Anymore

Companies that focus solely on lead generation often miss out on their most powerful growth lever—existing customers. Without a strategy aligned to customer needs, businesses risk churn, stagnation, and costly pressure on new demand.

Everyone knows it’s more efficient to grow revenue from existing clients—so why is it still so difficult to do?

The Solution

Align Teams. Activate Insights. Drive Customer-Led Growth.

At Heinz Marketing, we help B2B organizations operationalize customer-led growth. Our Predictable Pipeline framework integrates customer insights into every stage of the buyer and user journey—helping you deepen engagement, unlock expansion, and accelerate revenue.

With a tailored CLG strategy, you’ll turn satisfied customers into your strongest growth engine.

Our Process

What a dedicated team can deliver: Customer-centered growth that consistently delivers meaningful results.

Embracing our Predictable Pipeline Process, we leverage customer insights and data-driven strategies to unlock new revenue from your customer base and guide your business toward sustainable growth.

Identify Revenue Opportunities Within Your Customer Base

• Customer Growth Audit Pinpoint and prioritize expansion opportunities from your current clients. 

• Voice of Customer (VoC) Review – Evaluate how well your current strategy captures and responds to customer needs. 

Align Cross-Functional Teams

• Customer Journey Mapping – Define and improve each stage of your post-sale experience. 

• Expansion ICPs & Buying Committees – Target the right stakeholders with tailored messaging and engagement strategies. 

Operationalize Your CLG Strategy

• Define key customer segments using behavioral and intent data.
• Create role alignment across marketing, sales, and CS teams.
• Build dashboards and reporting to track CLG KPIs.
• Orchestrate the tools, tech, and teams needed to scale customer-led growth

“Thanks to Heinz Marketing, Ivanti is on the path to achieving better orchestrated, customer-led growth through an integrated Voice of Customer (VoC) program. Their comprehensive VoC audit and meticulous integration mapping, complete with clearly defined walk/run phases, have been essential for our internal alignment and the development of customer-focused initiatives. It was a pleasure partnering with the Heinz Marketing team, and we look forward to continuing our VoC program as a key project this year!”

Leslie Alore

SVP, Lifecycle Marketing

Ivanti 

Build a Roadmap to Customer-Led Growth

In this guide, you’ll learn how to fuel efficient growth by defining your ideal customer profile, crafting messaging that connects, building customer-focused content, and aligning post-sales stages with lifecycle metrics.

Download The Guide

Ready to transform your GTM with a customer-centric marketing strategy?

Learn how our expertise can guide you through integrating user insights into your growth roadmap, ensuring your offering not only meets but exceeds customer expectations.

Talk to an Expert

Resources

Expand Your Knowledge. Impact Your Bottom line.

Dive into our B2B sales and marketing resources for a fresh perspective on the industry’s biggest challenges.

Explore All Resources

Brenna Lofquist

What is CLG and Why Does it Matter?

Customer-Led Growth

Karla Sanders

Frequently Asked Questions About Managing the B2B Customer Life Cycle—From Acquisition to Expansion

Customer-Led Growth, Frequently Asked Questions, Strategy

Payal Parikh

Customer-Led Growth in a Downturn Economy

Customer-Led Growth, Strategy

“I loved working with Heinz Marketing. We were very lucky to have so many people from the team on each call. Having the strength in numbers and the overall organization of the engagement was great.”

Dylan Yip-Chuck

Demand Generation Manager

Influitive

About Us

Impacting your revenue, company, career, and life with poise, drive, and confidence.

At Heinz Marketing, the focus we bring to B2B demand generation, is the same focus we bring to the impact our work has on the careers, communities, and lives we serve. While a bustling sales pipeline is the goal, we understand that happy humans are just as important.

Learn More About Us

Award-Winning Sales Pipeline Experts

The post Customer-Led Growth appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

A Practical Guide to B2B Marketing and Sales Alignment By Twelverays Agency
When marketing and sales paddle in sync, growth accelerates—when they don’t, chaos follows. This guide breaks down practical strategies to bridge the gap and turn alignment into revenue growth.

Mind the Lead Nurture Gap: New Strategies for B2B Marketing Success by Matt Hummel
Even in the age of AI and ABM, lead nurturing remains critical. Research shows top-performing teams excel at it, while most struggle to keep up with today’s chaotic buyer journey.

Marketing Must Own The B2B Commercial Operating System: Here’s Why The Future Depends On It by Cameron Partridge
AI won’t fix broken go-to-market systems—it’ll just make the cracks bigger. Forbes argues that marketing must take ownership of the entire commercial system to drive lasting growth.

Strategic Growth: Aligning B2B Marketing & Sales by Proven ROI Marketing Team

Aligned marketing and sales teams can generate 32% more annual revenue. This guide explores why old approaches fail and introduces a new framework for true collaboration.

How to Build a Winning B2B Digital Marketing Strategy for Success by Breakthrough3X
A strong B2B digital marketing strategy combines audience insight, measurable goals, and channels like SEO, content, and email to build trust and generate qualified leads. Success comes from data-driven decisions and consistent, personalized engagement that drives long-term growth.

Have a wonderful weekend and thank you for reading!  If you have B2B news sources you rely on we’d love to hear about them.  Please share them with us.  

The post B2B Reads: Sales & Marketing Alignment, Lead Nurturing, and B2B Digital Marketing Success appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

75% of B2B Buyers Will Prefer Sales Experiences that Prioritize Human Interaction Over AI— Colleen Giblin and Elizabeth Jones

According to new Gartner research, the human element will remain central in sales . Buyers will increasingly seek personalized, human-led interactions over AI-driven engagement. A timely reminder that while AI enables, it can’t replace trust-building human connection.

The B2B Marketing AI “Magic Bullet’ Myth — Curtis Bendt, Chief Revenue Officer, MarketJoy

AI isn’t a plug-and-play solution. Success still relies on orchestrated strategy, thoughtful workflows, and teams capable of using AI, not just owning it.

Jump-starting B2B sales performance — Darius Bates and Yasir Mirza

McKinsey highlights how one company accelerated cross-sell revenue tenfold in just eight weeks by using advanced analytics and structured execution — even suggesting generative AI for scaling prospecting effectiveness.

Dear Clients, AI Is Smart, But It’s Not an Agency — MarketingProfs (Andrew Smith)

AI should augment creativity, not replace strategic thinking and accountability. A great perspective for maintaining human-led quality in AI workflows.

Five Trends Changing Marketing Today — MarketingProfs (Dipesh Jain)

This article highlights five major shifts including AI integration, first-party data, and authentic storytelling; that are redefining how marketers connect with buyers in 2025. It offers strong directional insights for teams building next-year strategies.

Have a wonderful weekend and thank you for reading!  If you have B2B news sources you rely on we’d love to hear about them.  Please share them with us.  

The post B2B Reads: B2B Marketing and AI, Trends Changing Marketing Today appeared first on Heinz Marketing.

At Heinz Marketing we value transparency and we want to make it easy for people to understand what we do, how we do it, and what it’s like to work with us. So we have compiled the most frequently asked questions to tell you just that. Whether you’re curious about our services, process, or what it’s really like to collaborate with us, you’ll find the answers here.

What is it like to work with us?

We are pipeline experts dedicated to making a meaningful impact on clients, careers, and community. We like to think of ourselves as an extension of your marketing team and we’re here to empower your success. This means we are very collaborative, adaptable, and authentic.

Everything we do is based on achieving real results through customized strategies – no cookie cutter business here. Our main goal is to teach your team what we know, to drive towards client independence.

We adapt to your needs and can operate in a way that fits best with your organization. We treat every engagement as an opportunity to positvely impact careers and lives by enabling work that matters.

What is our expertise?

Our expertise can be broken out into three categories:

• Predictable Pipeline
  • Covers all the foundational sales and marketing elements including Target Market, Content & Messaging, Sales Cycle, Technology & Resources, and Metrics
  • We take those foundational elements and then develop a GTM strategy for your organization depending on your goals
• GTM Orchestration
  • We take a peek behind the curtains at the processes, people, and technology that support your GTM strategy and develop a process to enable teams, improve agility, and speed to market
• Advisory Services
  • Our advisory services give you direct access to senior marketing expertise without the overhead of a full-time hire
  • We act as strategic partners to help you assess challenges, uncover opportunities, and make confident, data-driven decisions

How much does a project typically cost?

The simple answer: it depends. Each engagement is catered to your needs, so it varies. However, we operate on a project basis versus an hourly rate. We chose this model for a few reasons:

• Clear scope and cost upfront – You know exactly what’s included and what it will cost before work begins, making budgeting easier
• Focus on outcomes, not hours – Our main goal is to deliver results efficiently rather than stretching time to fill tasks or nickle and dime you for more time
• Aligned expectations – Project milestones and deliverables are clearly defined, making progress easier to track
• Better value perception – You’re paying for the finished product, not just the time it takes to create it

Typically, our engagements range from 3-6 months with an option to extend on a month-to-month basis or we can switch gears to another type of engagement. The pricing of our engagements is all inclusive as described in the scope. There are a few things we don’t do like design and creative, which we can outsource at an additional cost – all of which is clearly outlined in the proposal.

What if there are other things out of scope? Let’s talk about it. We can swap things out or provide a proposal/addendum to add on to the initial engagement.

How do we measure success? What KPIs do we track?

We have a standard measurement and KPI framework that we adjust based on your needs and that’s what drives how we measure success. There’s no one-size-fits-all set of KPIs. We want to make sure how we’re tracking success aligns with your organization and what you’re trying to achieve.

Metrics is one pillar of our Predictable Pipeline model where we go through an exercise to determine and recommend which KPIs should be used for your organization. We’ll then use those KPIs to measure success of our efforts. We create reports and dashboards to showcase performance and make sure we’re all aligned.

How long does it usually take to see results?

This is another question where the simple answer is it depends. It depends on the type of engagement, sales cycle length, and other factors. However, depending on the engagement type of KPIs tracked, we can see initial results within weeks. Even though our engagements aren’t long term, we set up check-ins with our clients post engagement to review performance, make recommendations, and answer any questions. We want to make sure the work we’ve done together is successful.

Will we provide regular reports and insights?

Yes! Once we have a launched a GTM strategy, you’ll see weekly reports that include a summary of performance, insights, and recommendations for optimization. This can be done within your systems (i.e., Hubspot, Salesforce, Marketo) or manually in Excel. We adapt based on your tech stack and can accomodate any limitations within these tools.

Need a report for your board or exec team? We can do that too. We are often asked to provide a summary of the work we’ve done and the results, which we can pull together for you.

How do we adjust strategies if something isn’t working?

First, we’ll start by having a conversation about what we’re seeing, why it’s happening, and provide recommendations for improvement. If need be, we’ll go back to the drawing board and figure out a new solution. As previously mentioned, we’re focused on delivering results and if that’s not happening we will figure out how to get there.

We’re no strangers to pivoting – it happens. Our framework and processes allow us to adapt to our clients needs.

Who will be my main point of contact?

Each engagement is assigned an Engagement Manager which is your main point of contact throughout the project. They are your go-to. However, you will have access to a team of consultants, which make up your client team. We include all client team members on communications for visibility.

Will I have access to project management tools?

Yes. We use SmartSheet for project management and can provide access to our clients. If that format doesn’t work, we can adjust. Don’t want to see all the nitty gritty details? We can provide a high-level timeline, so you know where the project stands at any time.

If you have a project management tool that you prefer, we can be added as users and incorporate into your process.

How involved does my internal team need to be?

At the beginning of our engagements we conduct discovery interviews with people in your organization. This could be a variety of people as we like to speak with at least one person in each department or function related to sales and marketing. Throughout the engagement we might have follow up questions or want to share deliverables with the appropriate teams. In this case, we do expect your internal team to participate in those conversations and provide feedback in a timely manner.

Although we typically work with a few people on the client side, we want to ensure everyone is aligned on the work we’re doing. We may recommend having conversations with other internal stakeholders and can facilitate those conversations.

Weekly Communications

We meet with clients once per week for an hour. This time is used to present and discuss deliverables, gather feedback, and outline next steps. We communicate asynchronously when necessary via email, Slack, Microsoft Teams, etc. We don’t limit communications to the weekly meeting.

In addition, we send an agenda prior to each weekly meeting. After the meeting, you’ll receive a recap with notes and next steps for your team and ours. Every Friday you’ll receive a weekly summary outlining next steps and what we’ve accomplished that week.

We expect our clients to review the weekly communications and encourage them to ask questions or provide updates in between our weekly meetings, when necessary.

How are the client teams structured?

Each engagement has a dedicated client team comprised of an Engagement Manager and Senior Marketing Consultants and/or Marketing Consultants. The client team depends on the type of project, expertise, and the amount of resources needed. As previously mentioned, you have access to the entire client team and you will often hear from consultants, not just the Engagement Manager.

What certifications does your team hold?

Our team holds the following Google certifications: Ads (Search and Display), Measurement, Analytics, and Tag Manager. Other certifications and training include (but aren’t limited to):

• Account-Based Certified Expert from DemandBase x ForgeX
• Hubspot Academy Inbound Certification
• Netline Certified
• 6sense
• Salesforce Reports and Dashboards
• Salesforce Campaign Basics
• Hubspot AI for Marketers
• Salesloft
• Outreach

In summary

We hope these questions provide more visibility into what we do, how we work, and what its like to work with us. Have more questions or want to learn more? Reach out and let’s chat.

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