The Unexpected Strategy That Turned $15K into a $1.5M B2B Marketing Win

Speaker A: Imagine turning a, uh, $15,000 investment into a 1.5 million return. Sounds impossible, right? But not for Steve Robinson. Today, Steve shares how he achieved this remarkable 15x return through smart B2B marketing strategies. We will explore the tactics that made this success possible, from targeting the right audience to crafting irresistible offer. Whether you are a startup founder or a, uh, seasoned entrepreneur, these insights transform your approach to marketing. Get ready to learn how to attract customers, build trust, and drive growth. This episode is packed with actionable advice you won't want to miss. Let's dive in. Hello, Steve. How are you doing today?

Speaker B: I'm doing great, Ash. Yourself?

Speaker A: Good, thank you. Good, thank you. We have a little bit of grim and gray weather as usual in England, but otherwise, all right,

Speaker B: we're the same here in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. So there you go.

Speaker A: There you go. But let's lighten up our listeners day by talking about how we can help them demonstrating the different strategies and different techniques, uh, when it comes to marketing and specifically for B2B marketing. But before we start, Steve, do you have a favorite quote, something that motivates you, inspires you, you would like to share with our audience?

Speaker B: Absolutely. Uh, one of my favorite quotes is from, uh, Louis Pasteur. It is, chance favors the prepared. And it's one of my favorites because, uh, it seems like, especially in marketing, but across a wide array of our experiences as entrepreneurs, um, chance plays a larger role than any of us would like. Right. Uh, and it feels like we don't have control in many times. And the truth is we don't have control over the outcome of the dice roll. But we do have control over the, um, you know, the environment, the setup, the context for that dice roll. And the more we, uh, stay curious and the more that we, um, uh, explore and keep our eyes open to opportunities, uh, the more opportunities land in our laps. And, uh, that's something that I take with me every time I get a winning dice roll and every time I get a, uh, losing dice roll.

Speaker A: Indeed, indeed. I forgot the name of this person. I think I've heard it. Um, I think Shark, uh, Tank, but it's. Well, it's not Shark. It's called Dragon's Den in England is equal to the Shark Tank. And I think it was Mark Cuban or someone else. He said that a successful founder is somebody who just keeps striving. Because until you get successful, if you keep failing, one day when you will be successful, people will say, oh, you got the overnight success. But it actually is all the learning you have done with all the Failures, uh, on the way. Right, Great stuff. Well we are on a very good start here today because I think one of the biggest challenge every founder have in their life is um, making sure that their product, their service, their startup, their whatever they're working upon has um, ample amount of eyeballs traction and obviously you know, revenue to potentially grow and then make it a successful uh, uh, entrepreneur journey. Right. One of the challenge um, I have came across personally but also through all these events we host in London as well as all these um, emails we received through our founders podcast, Small Community is when a founder launches the product or service. One of the biggest challenges, the marketing. And you have mentioned on our intro call that you have helped your clients specifically in a B2B uh space going from a very small um, investment which is somewhere around $15,000 to 1.5 million within a very small significant amount of time. Which tells me that you have got them 15x return with this small investment. Right. Would you be able to share that story with our uh, our listeners and why you actually chosen to go into that direction of business?

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Uh, so uh, this particular client, we had been working with them for a period of time and uh, they, they had some question about how well the marketing and advertising was working and uh, uh, they weren't able to separate what was sales results and what was marketing results. And so what we did is we ran a demandless study where we set aside a group of their audience that was a control group, uh, that did not get the advertising treatment and then the other group that did. And when uh, we ran that study we were able to validate that they're small uh figure investment resulted in over a million dollars in incremental new revenue. It was a 15.7x return on their investment because uh, it was the right people. It was a small investment because in B2B your audiences aren't huge. In this case we were reaching their uh, dealers, distributors, their network of resellers. And it was through reaching that small audience on a consistent basis we were able to get these massive returns. And think it goes to show that it's not in marketing, it's not reach and volume and hitting millions of people, it's hitting the right people, uh, and that really makes the difference.

Speaker A: Would you be able to share which industry that particular client was in?

Speaker B: That client was um, in a restaurant equipment. So they were manufacturer of uh, uh, higher priced restaurant uh, equipment. But we've seen similar results in other manufacturing sectors and in uh, SaaS, um, anywhere where you have that Bigger considered purchase. Um, uh, the audiences generally aren't huge and staying in front of the right people is really the key and everybody

Speaker A: can vouch for it that restaurants are the most difficult people to sell to. Right. Because they have very low margin. They're running their payrolls 247 and uh, you know, towards the end of the month they're all the founders of the restaurants are always panicking unless they're like a big group, right? I don't know. They're restaurants um, like Dishum in London is like multi million dollar business. I think they're opening in New York also. So having a uh, business coming to your uh, services, website or lead form, getting their interest is a very difficult task when it comes to. Because they're already busy. They're already busy. They're already busy running their business. They're already busy doing all these things. Right. So getting in front of them is very tedious job. But obviously you have done it. What I would like to learn from you today and what I would like my listeners to learn today from you is specifically in B2B arena, what are the top strategies to get in front of your customers? I have interviewed several people. Most of them have demonstrated uh, that you can go to the platforms like LinkedIn because it's one of the primary platform for B2B leads. What's your opinion on that and how do you tackle uh, when a new customer comes to you? When it comes to B2B approach and

Speaker B: marketing, I think the key is understanding the journey of the buyer. Um, so every company is a little different in this regard. And so if we come back to the case study that I mentioned earlier, in that case you had mentioned that restaurant owners are incredibly busy and that's very true. So they will often push that buying decision back onto a trusted partner, uh, a dealer or a manufacturer's representative or somebody that they have a relationship with that they trust. And so in that case marketing to the restaurant owner is important, but it is equally or more so important to market to that, that channel partner, that person who, who is that trusted advisor of the restaurant owner. And so I always find uh, that the companies that are most successful are the ones that understand their buyer, the buyer's journey and who the players are in that play. Because it's not just the person signing the contract, it's not just the person who's writing the check. Uh, it's often a cast of characters and some of them are outside the organization. Um, so that's probably the first key that I would look at m, the

Speaker A: journey of the whole um, their purchase journey actually. And who's the key Personas involved in that journey? Great stuff. Ah, let's filter out a little bit more because 28% of our listeners are the people who are into some sort of technology business like SaaS businesses, or they have a product which they sell online or they have courses and things like that, right? Um, they produced, they have put their blood and soul and sweat uh, in the product and now they are trying to get in front of the B2B um, customers. Right? Let's say a very typical example. Let's say um, you have created a new product, let's say a chatbot. You know, everybody is doing it right now for agencies, right? You, you upload your PDF files, you put your website link there and then it crawls it, get all the information, tokenize it, put it in the vector, whatever it is. And then now you have to search for, I don't know, agencies who provide website services or E commerce brand who are selling stuff right online. Considering this small example of a SaaS business, let's say if I come to you, I run that business, what would be your uh, framework would you advise to me? And then next part of the question is after following that framework, how would you approach the B2B space when it comes to advertising, specifically paid advertising?

Speaker B: So the framework I like to use is what I call the orbit framework. So imagine uh, you know, uh, think like outer space. You know your brand, your company, your organization is a, is a, is a body out there and your goal is to attract potential uh, customers into orbit around your brand and then bring them in, into, into, into pipeline, into sales, into deals, depending on how you, how you can convert that business. So if you're a SaaS company and you're selling to other businesses, there are a, ah, finite number of businesses that are just an ideal fit for your company. And um, one of the things that uh, uh, uh, well we'll get back to that. So you need to go find those businesses and then pull them into orbit. That's step one. Once they're in orbit around your brand, you need to nurture those individuals. So when they're in orbit they know you, you know them, but they're not a customer yet. Maybe they don't have a need yet, or maybe that level of trust isn't quite there yet. But either way you need to nurture those individuals, make sure that you stay top of mind for that whole time. And then you need to provide a great offer, a Great. On ramp to becoming a customer. So get them, get them into that, into that pipeline, into the, the, the, the um, uh, if it's E commerce, close that sale. And so you, you, you find you only have four jobs now, right? Pull someone into orbit. Once they're in orbit, make sure they're aware of the brand, educate them on so that they, they feel that level of trust and they have that level of understanding of your brand and your product and your position. And then get them into pipeline. And if you separate out those four, four jobs and then, and then work to continuously improve at each one of those four jobs, you, you really can't lose.

Speaker A: Hmm, interesting. Interesting. Would you be able to um, deep dive in, in these four um, jobs you mentioned? Let's take the same example again. Chatbot, right? We are selling this to website developers and agencies and everyone. Right? How do you, what are the, how do you separate these four jobs and what we will be doing exactly in these jobs?

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. So the first step is to pull those individuals into orbit. That means they know who you are and you know who they are. Usually uh, you're going to do that through some sort of ah, a lead magnet. Now if you rewind five, 10 years, a lead magnet could be a white paper and people fill out a form to download a white paper. Uh, those days are long over. And so today what we see as um, uh, compelling lead magnets are uh, free utilities, free tools. So if you're that AI Chatbot, if you have the ability to release a, a version of your tool that is um, uh, free, whether that's a freemium model or some other product led growth model, maybe it's a different tool that's a great lead magnet. Uh, communities can be a great lead magnet. We have one, um, I'm working with one uh, company right now and they have, their niche is gis, um, uh, uh, practitioners. And there is a lack of community within that group. And so they launched an online community and it's been a great lead magnet. Um, uh, a challenge or a quiz or something else that allows people to uh, engage over time is another good lead magnet. But you get them to complete uh, a uh, form or take an activity or attend an event and then off of that now they know your brand and you know them and you have permission to market to them. At that point it's a matter of staying in front of that audience. So you now have a name and a database. You have an email address. You can target paid media, um, using that contact information you can Send emails, um, obviously staying compliant with whatever the rules are of where you, where you are. And uh, um, you can invite those individuals for further experiences. Whether that's uh, again webinars and events are probably the leading way. FaceTime is so important in the age of AI. If you can get people to engage face to face, I think that's a huge win. Um, as you continue to market to those individuals in orbit now your next task is to educate them. And so ideally you targeted uh, uh, people who are really an ideal fit for your unique position in the marketplace. If I'm a chatbot, I've gotta be different than the other chatbots that are out there. There's hundreds of these that are popping up every day. And so if I have uh, um, solved the problem of uh, uh, you know, uh, AI being um, a yes person to everything that you say, right. We have built the chatbot that will challenge you into think, you know, in, in, in your thinking consistently. And this is the, the adversarial thought partner you've always wanted. Right. So now we've, now we've staked a claim as a unique position in the marketplace. Um, it's, it's a matter of making sure that our audience understands that unique position so that they know that this is the ideal product for the ideal person for this product and making sure that that education occurs. And then the last step is you need the offer, you need something to pull them in. And so this is where uh, you creating some sense of urgency becomes really important. So how can we put um, how can we put an offer out there that has a time box on it where you know if you sign up by X date you're going to get ah, a 60 day free trial instead of a 15 day free trial or you're going to get an additional you know, a thousand credits you can use whenever you want for whatever, whatever tokens or whatever, whatever the unit is, um, identifying what, that, what that incentive is to get someone to act. And in some cases that's an Amazon card for attending a meeting. Those still work, believe it or not. In some cases it is ah, um, some sort of a premium or bonus. But the key is that there's a time box to it where if you don't act by this date you don't get it. So that individuals uh, are incentivized to um, act because we're all busy and we're all a little bit lazy and the easiest path is the path of inaction. Right?

Speaker A: Indeed, indeed. Okay, so let me reiterate for our listener's uh, sake. Then first thing you have to do is you have to get them inside your orbit. So you created a um, uh, lead magnet, let's say because you mentioned that this company, this chatbot, um, SaaS platform has to be different. Let's say all the chatbots right now are charging monthly fee for a one website or two. Let's say we scrap that. We will just give it to them for free. We will only charge them uh, I don't know, 100 credit for 100 message. Something like tokens in AI world. Right. Nowadays it's very, very popular. So that makes a little bit of difference. And we also make sure that we provide them not just PDF, not just text messages, but uh, images or other modality for AI to read through. Right, there you go. The second bit is to give uh, them this opportunity to learn about it. So let's say um, when they sign up with us, they get 500 credits for free, which is plenty for them for two months to test the chatbot on their website. They put their URL, it scraps all the um, pages and then it creates the chatbot for you, put it on your website and it has this backlink to the chatbot powered by, I don't know, Stephen Robinson's chatbot AI.com. right. Um, which gives you an uh, SEO, uh backlink also, but also gives them a free chatbot. That's done. The next bit is we started hosting some um, let's say webinars as you mentioned and everyone who would attend it, we will give them 10 or 20 pounds of Amazon voucher. Um and during that webinar we potentially could give them um, a new deal. Okay. If you buy, I don't know, 100,000 credits today, we will give it to you for thousand dollars or something like that. I'm just trying to come up with, with some example. Right. This is, do you think it's, it's viable for long term? Like is this the one time thing to get like your first 100 customer or you just have to keep doing this and this looks to me a lot of work.

Speaker B: Well it is, it is a long term strategy. So one of the things that is uh, uh, driving me a little bit crazy right now is that when you look at marketing and advertising there is a lot of thought leadership out there. There's a lot of LinkedIn posts and uh, um, vendors out there trying to sell you uh, an easy button in the form of we'll get you in front of whoever's in market for your product right this second and get, get you that lead, get you that sale. And the problem with that, uh, as we've seen it, uh, in my work consulting with clients, and as I've seen it with, uh, just in the grand scheme of what makes a successful marketing program, is that, uh, your best customers aren't going to be the ones that are so uninformed that they jump to a Google search to find a product. Um, your best customers aren't necessarily the ones that are going to pop up through intent data that you can buy from Bombora or any other provider. Um, your best customers are going to be the ones that understand the marketplace that you're in and they understand how you're different and they're attracted to that. And if you want that type of customer who will pay a premium for your product or service, who is bought in and knows what they're buying, um, you have to build a bigger marketing program that is, uh, you know, full funnel is the term that a lot of people will throw out there where you're trying to reach them earlier in their buyer's journey and you're trying to, uh, establish that relationship and build that trust over time and that awareness in the marketplace. And so, um, is it more work than going out and bidding on a few keywords? Uh, absolutely. Um, but it pays off in spades. When you look at your churn rate six months down the road or when you look at your average deal, uh, size, um, you're going to get that return on that investment of that time. You don't need to build it all at once either. I think that's the key. Um, you know, you probably need some sort of a database, whether it's your CRM or a marketing automation platform to get these people into. And then, uh, um, just start attacking the four, four jobs, one at a time and build each piece, you know, a month and then get to the next piece. Um, I would start at getting people in and then, uh, working to nurture those. Although if you already have a bit of a following, maybe you start with some of that nurturing piece and, and build out some of that content there.

Speaker A: Um, yeah, and I couldn't agree more with you on this one because education or helping people out could do a lot. It makes your life easy when it comes to reaching out to the exact person. Right. And, um, I remember you mentioned offer, I'm reading right now, $100 million leads from Alex Harmozi. I'm sure you must have read all of his books. Um, I'VE reached to halfway through and he has used some scrappy and some strange, uh, language in the book. But I love this guy, man. He is so spot on. He just like literally put you into the place where you want to like, okay, this is what I exactly want in my life when I'm, you know, want to, when I'm starting my business. So I'm, I'm really enjoying it. But let's, let's, let's focus on um, more value, right? Let's say this person who is running this AI chatbot, uh, company comes to you and say, okay, I have, I don't know, thousand dollars a month budget. And then if the same person tells you I have a $10,000 same budget, how would you tackle these two requests? Because now suddenly you're responsible. To bring him more eyeballs is not necessarily leads or it's not something which brings in more business. It's more literally about marketing and getting people on board. What would be the two different strategies for these two budgets?

Speaker B: So when uh, I work with uh, uh, a company, um, I like to break the audience into two groups. You have a, ah, closed audience, which is generally those people who are in orbit around your brand. You know, they're the right people because they've already uh, interacted with you in some, in some way shape or form. And uh, those are the people that you want to focus the bulk of your efforts at. So if you only have $1,000 and you really want to, really want to focus that effort, start there. Start with the people that have already visited your website that are in your database, um, and uh, market to them. So set up some, some retargeting on your, on your webs, on your, that you're getting back in front of those individuals. Set up um, um, some advertising that is targeting them on CRM and invest in building an email marketing program. Email's getting harder in 2026 as more and more junk is getting in there thanks to AI. But um, uh, if you are adding real value, you can still build a following via email. I mean certainly the rise in substack shows that that's possible. Um, and so if you have that minimal budget, start in nurturing those people that are in orbit. If you're doing a really good job of that, it'll naturally start to pull additional people in. Once you have fully funded that and fully built that out, then that next incremental investment, the next, you know, in your case you said $1,000 versus uh, I think you said 10 or $15,000. Now you want to go after your open audience. These are the individuals that don't know about you yet. And you have to do a little bit more F out there to go find them. And so this is where um, tools like uh, LinkedIn and uh, LinkedIn ads and um, your uh, meta and Facebook and Instagram and those properties, um, and Google, um, whether it's performance max, that's their advertising platform that does a really good job of using AI to go and find individuals in a sea of, of others. Um, that's where they, they shine is going after that open audience. Because then you have an algorithm at your back. You have uh, uh, the AI is going and pattern matching the individuals that are in orbit and comparing them to the ones that are out there and fishing and finding them, uh, if you're in a jurisdiction that allows it, purchasing lists and targeting those lists is definitely a very um, fruitful way to go about this as well. Um, but you want to be, you want to be very selective about those that really match that ideal customer profile of who you know. Now if you're really early in your journey, you don't know that ideal customer profile yet. So some cases the algorithm can really be your friend in figuring that out.

Speaker A: Interesting. So you're saying that Google is a very good platform to reach out for an open audience because they figure out with their algorithm who could be your potentially good uh, uh, customer. And then you also touched basis a little bit about some meta products as well as some other products. Is that also for open audience or is it more for closed meta products?

Speaker B: It's interesting you ask that. Um, uh, that's the key question that actually got me down the path of building my startup, of building path three because um, out of the box meta is really built for going after an open audience. They have invested billions of dollars in uh, building the algorithms and the artificial intelligence to go and fish in a sea of millions of people to find an ideal customer for someone, usually in a B2C sort of way. Um, can you use that for B2B? Yes, but generally if you're running ads on meta, it will not show the same ad to the same person more than twice before moving on. Um, and uh, it knows algorithmically that if somebody sees an ad twice and they don't buy, they're not the right person and we need to move to another person. But if somebody's already in orbit and you're nurturing them, you want to stay in front of them, maybe not with exactly the same ad all the time, right? You need to change that up, up. But uh, you want to be in front of that individual and that goes counter to all of the best practices that meta will put out there. It means running a campaign that is based on awareness and they guide you away from that. And then it means setting it up so that uh, uh, you're forcing uh, the budget to be in a certain way and turning off this checkbox and doing all of these things that meta will tell you not to do right there in the user interface. But that's how you nurture those closed audiences. And so after figuring out how to jump through all of these hoops with uh, with meta, with LinkedIn and which has its own set of challenges and dark patterns, and then um, out on the web, Google, uh, is not your best partner. So we ended up uh, pulling in programmatic advertising through, through a different path in order to be able to do both, to do open audiences and go find new people and then also nurture those ones that are in orbit around your brand and make sure they, they understand you and make sure you can get an offer in front of them because you want to um, you want to be in it for the long haul. And B2B, there's not that many people out there that can really buy your product. Um, so if you've got some of them that are, that are on the hook, do everything you can to reel a man.

Speaker A: What are the different techniques which still works in B2B space when it comes to advertising? The reason I'm asking this question is because I think if you do not have money, you have to spend your time for sure. You have to go to the places where your ideal customer Persona is hanging out and you help the community and it takes a very long time, but it creates really tangible credibility in the space. When it comes to startups who already go, who already got a little bit of funding, let's say from an incubator or some, uh, angel investors have believed in them. If they want to spend some money and they want to get some eyeballs, what are the best strategies when it comes to B2B in the advertisement and marketing space?

Speaker B: LinkedIn ads and meta ads both have the ability to embed a form right inside of an ad. And so if I'm going to spend a dollar on advertising and I want to get the most out of that dollar, uh, I want to come away with an asset. I don't want to just spend money on the transaction of getting, getting an ad in front of an eyeball. And in B2B, I'm very, it's very unlikely that I'm going to be able to put an ad in front of somebody and convert them into a customer in one click. Now if I'm selling something that is uh, an absolute no brainer, uh, maybe, and if I'm selling a 99 cent widget, maybe. But for the majority of us in B2B we're selling a more expensive thing that has to go through a couple of uh, stakeholders and it's not a one click sale. And so if I want to get the most return on that dollar of investment in advertising, I want to convert that into a name in my database with permission to market to them. And so the best bang for buck is to put a lead form out there on Meta, on LinkedIn and uh, um, then cap the system on how much it can spend to get that lead form in front of somebody. Which again kind of goes against the best practices. But your goal is to let the algorithm find the right people but give it some guardrails on how much it's going to cost to get that lead and then put an offer out there for something that is um, of free value. So this is that lead magnet of. It could be an event or a webinar, it could be a free um, uh, report. Um, if you've got some proprietary data that you're uh, this isn't sas, this happens all the time. You've got some data that you have access to because you built the platform right. Just make sure your terms of service says you can, you can, you can use that data and publish a, ah, publish a state of whatever your, your industry is and, and get that proprietary data out there and then put a lead magnet out there to go get it. So getting something that's irresistible out there, that someone has to fill out a form is going to be your best bang for buck in your advertising. And then that gets that people into that orbit. You can market to them from there with your email or other mechanisms and then pull them in as a customer.

Speaker A: Perfect. Would you be able to help our uh, listeners around how to create an offer? Because that's also a very tedious task, isn't it? I mean you know, pricing could take months and months to even understand how to price your, your product but then to come up with an offer because it always feel to a founder like okay, I'm giving a too much right, uh, when it comes to giving a big bang offer. But um, what are the different strategies you have suggested to your customers to come up with an offer.

Speaker B: Um, I'll start off with what not to do. Um, if it's at all possible, do not discount your product or service. And there's two reasons for that. One, it immediately sends a message to your audience that your product isn't actually worth what you're charging for it. Right? If we're discounting it then that means this is actually what it's worth. The sale price isn't really what it's worth. And so uh, do not discount in an offer. The second reason is if you're selling B2B and this I think is the key thing, the person on the other side isn't spending money to buy your product or service. By and large there are exceptions, but by and large they are not spending money if they aren't the owner of that company buying your product or service. What they're spending is their reputation. They are sticking their neck out to say this is the vendor we need to buy and if it goes south, it's their head on the platter, right? That's the capital, that's what they're spending, they're not spending money. And you can be priced higher than a competitor and they can make that sale internally if you give them the tools. And so uh, uh, incentivizing with a discount isn't going to do a thing for somebody that isn't really paying for your product with money. They're paying for it with their reputation. So at that point any offer you put out there to, to, to make that sale or as a lead magnet has to be offering value to the individual in their particular role. And so this is where from a lead magnet standpoint we're looking at um, helping them feel like they're part of a community, um, or helping them level up. A, uh, 30 day challenge, right? You're helping that individual, not the company. The company is abstract. And then when it comes to generating that lead or that sale, incentivizing by throwing in an additional feature that makes their life easier or throwing in um, ah, free training and certification, right? That's helping the individual making the purchase. It's helping them with their team that's going to have to use the software. If it's a SaaS type of thing, um, get at what is the, um, uh, what, what is the value you can offer the person making the buying decision, not the company.

Speaker A: Very interesting because I think Alex Hormozy also mentioned something similar. What you have to do is you have to figure out the perceived value. Ah, and there's like uh, so it's something like speed is equal to distance upon time, but the value is equals to something multiplied by perceived value. And then in the dividend it was related to the effort or time.

Speaker B: Um, I think it's risk is one of them. Um, uh, the probability of success is one of them. So uh, the value and then time I think are the three. Is that right?

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: I love her mosey by the way. Like I feel like uh, uh, I cannot do justice to him when it comes to talking about offers. But um, yes, reducing risk I think is one in B2B in particular because her mose talks more and more in terms of B2C. But reducing risk is really of the three levers, um, I think probably the strongest one you can pull. Um, one area that we've had a lot of success in when executing, but not a success in getting clients and customers to actually pull the trigger on is can you offer a guarantee? Can you say we will refund your money if this goes south. And if you can say that it will increase your conversion rate uh, a ton, double it easily. But you have to be willing to, to, to do that. And very few companies ah, are willing to say we'll give you your money back. Um, even though those that I've worked with that have, it doesn't really happen very often. Like it's, it's, it's, it's pretty rare. Even if you have, you know, something goes wrong and you don't have a satisfying customer, the probability they're going to actually stick their neck out to ask for their money back is still relatively low. So it doesn't cost that much to do and you immediately get past that, that risk. And it also helps for that person, that stakeholder who's sticking their neck out to say this is the vendor that we ought to choose.

Speaker A: Yeah. And even though not just in B2B, I think B2C also when you put that, I don't know, 14 days, 30 days, 90 days guaranteed money back, no question asked, that just removes the whole anxiety of should I put my hundred dollars here? What if I don't get the value right? But if it says 30 days, no questions asked, money back, I mean let's say even 5% people ask the money back, fine, it's their money. Right. You have spent some of your AI credits or something like that. Just continuing with my AI chatbot example. And uh, what about this 95% customers whom you enabled to put their credit card on the table, Right?

Speaker B: Yeah, it seems it really is a no brainer. But Everybody jumps to the worst case scenario where if I, if I do this, what if, what if half the people ask for their money back? No, you, you know, you, you know your product and service is good, you know that it works. Um, you know, you know, you know who is asking or complaining. So um, it really is a, it's a no brainer as a marketer and it's a no brainer as the customer.

Speaker A: Indeed. Perfect. So I was thinking Stephen, that we can keep continuing this conversation but obviously we have limited amount of time and I have to take you through the six quick fire round. Also before we jump into that, would you be able to um, give our customer a golden nugget, which is one of the secrets in your book, which you use with almost every customers of your a, um, very good, uh, trendy working way to get early stage eyeballs on your, on your either website or app or whatever solution you're building with uh, paid marketing campaign. What that golden nugget would be, I

Speaker B: would say trying m to think of something I haven't already shared. So that's, that's the trick here. Uh, the number one thing you can do is figure out how you're different. And I know that sounds like it's bland or table stakes, but if you aren't positioned differently in the marketplace and you aren't screaming from the rooftops how and why you are different. You're a commodity and you will not succeed because everyone around you has more money than you.

Speaker A: They can put it on the ads and everything.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And commodities, scale is what wins and to break that, be radically different. Know how you're different and know uh, who that matters to and you'll win.

Speaker A: Great. And that triggers, and I really, really want to get into my quick fire round, but that triggers another question in my mind and that is what is the one thing you would advise to our listeners not to do? One mistake or setback, you know, you might have came across, you know, along the way with one of your customers or maybe yourself, what would that be? And additionally, what advice would you give our listeners based on this experience?

Speaker B: Uh, don't over invest in uh, a uh, hypothesis or small numbers. Um, the number of times I've worked with, especially early stage companies that have had a string of small wins and thought this is it. And then they start throwing everything at that little string of small wins and then not listening when the market doesn't respond in kind. Uh, that is the trap, that's the pattern to avoid. We have, ah, an unfortunate bias as human beings that we seek patterns everywhere. And so we will see three wins in a row as the pattern. Right. And that means this is the industry I need to go at, this is the angle I need to go at into the market. This is the positioning that I need. And then when that doesn't materialize into a windfall, we're left going, I don't understand what happened. When in reality, three is a small number. If you have a data set of a hundred sales, three is a really small number. You just happen to get those three in a row.

Speaker A: Exactly, Exactly. All right, great. So let's move on to our quickfire round then. I've got six quick fire questions for you. At any stage, if you feel you don't want to answer one of them, just give me a skip and then we, you move on to the next one. Is that right?

Speaker B: Sounds good.

Speaker A: Great. What are the top three strategies to generate B2B leads in 2026?

Speaker B: Uh, free course or 30 day challenge? Uh, uh, uh, uh, an event, uh, the sexier, better, fun the better, and, um, uh, a free, uh, tool or utility.

Speaker A: Got it. 1. What book would you recommend to our audience and why?

Speaker B: I can't go any better than the one you already recommended. And that's the $100 million leads. Actually, all three of, uh, her Moses books are phenomenal.

Speaker A: Yeah, that's true, that's true. I have to add them up into my, uh, list. I have just bought the one. Uh, it's super expensive. Also, it's like 20 quid. Uh, 20 quids in UK. So it's very big registry kind of book. It's not a small book which you can take in a train and then book. Right. It's a big one, so you have to sit down on a sofa, read it. Um, yeah, totally recommend it. What's one attribute? What is the one attribute or characteristic in your mind of a successful founder?

Speaker B: Curiosity. Uh, the best founders are the ones that if they don't understand something, it keeps them up at night. They have to understand what they see around them, and it's out of that understanding that opportunities arise.

Speaker A: Indeed, indeed. What's your favorite personal productivity tool or habit?

Speaker B: Uh, I have a, uh, weekly ritual where I go through the different roles that I serve in my life. So father, husband, mentor to my kids, robotics team, uh, et cetera. And, uh, I go through each one of those roles and I, uh, say aloud my vision for where I believe I am or want to be in that role. And then I go through my annual goals, and then I set my weekly tasks. Tasks to make sure that they align with the annual goals. And then, uh, um, and I do that every week, and it keeps me grounded and focused. And, uh, the game changer was splitting up that activity into these different. Different roles or hats that I wear that made all the difference. I do it in todoist, but you could do it in any app.

Speaker A: Interesting. Very interesting. That's, uh, a. That's a good, good, um, way to, um, sort of like look at your yearly goals by splitting it into small tasks. Right. Um, very nice. What's your, uh. What's a new or a crazy business idea you would love to pursue if you had time?

Speaker B: Oh, okay, let me see. Um, uh, these come to me, like, once a week. Um, my, uh. My. My daughter invented a thing that goes on the door, the front door. And, uh, uh, if you try to leave the house, um, and, uh, it'll recognize that you're walking past the door, and it will say, don't forget the. And then you can specify whatever goes in there. And she invented it to solve her unique problem of forgetting to put something in her backpack when she left for school. And I thought, everyone has that problem. And why hasn't somebody come up with something that buzzes your phone or dings you or something as you're leaving the house? And so I would love to take my daughter's invention to market in some way, shape, or form.

Speaker A: There you go. The new ring company is coming. But it's inside the door, right?

Speaker B: It's inside the door. Right?

Speaker A: Great stuff. And last but not least, what's an interesting or fun fact about you that most people don't know?

Speaker B: Uh, I, um. Uh. So, uh, I have a tendency to want to do things myself. And so I'm a big DIYer. I will fix appliances I have no business fixing. I will, um, uh, build things. And, uh, um, I get a ton of satisfaction out of it. As much as everybody looks at me like I'm a fool for not hiring a professional to do these things. But, um, I. I'm a sucker for a, uh, sucker for a YouTube video, making it look easy.

Speaker A: Awesome. Did you do the shelf behind your camera? Where are you sitting right now?

Speaker B: That's an IKEA purchase. So, yes, I built it, but I built it off the IKEA flat pack.

Speaker A: Great stuff. Well, Steve, thank you so much for joining me and sharing your story, unpacking last year's, building the business and helping your customers. If people want to speak, uh, with you or check out, um, your new product. What's the best way to do it.

Speaker B: So you can check out Path3, which is our B2B self service advertising platform at Path3 Media. And please invite, uh, you to follow or connect with me on LinkedIn. Uh, just, uh, search LinkedIn for Steve Robinson, uh, and then path three. All one word and I ought to pop up. There's a lot of Steve Robinsons out there, but you'll find me.

Speaker A: Indeed. Indeed. And do you want to share any goodies with our uh, listeners today? I can put that into the ebook, man.

Speaker B: Um, uh, if you mentioned the fact that you heard me on this, on this podcast, we'll get you, we'll get you a special, uh, a special incentive on Path three. We'll, we'll double your, double your number of active streams.

Speaker A: Awesome. Great stuff. So as you can hear Steve, uh, listeners that if you share uh, uh, with Steve that you have heard about him on uh, Founders Podcast with Ash, you know, then he will double your stream. So make sure you sign up for our newsletter and I'm going to put that information in the episode when we release, um, this one. So Steven, thank you so much, uh, for joining us today and sharing your inspiring journey and the impactful work you're doing. It's been an absolute pleasure having you on Founders Podcast.

Speaker B: Likewise, Ash. I really enjoyed the conversation.