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Hello and welcome to the Exit Five Weekly Newsletter - read by 25,000 B2B marketing professionals around the world. Exit Five is a membership site designed to help you build a successful career in B2B marketing. Join 5,000 other members at exitfive.com.

By the way - this email was designed in Knak which helps you create email and landing pages in minutes without having to write code. Learn more about Knak here.

💰 Need help planning your marketing investments?

I’ll cut right to the chase because this offer is too good.

If you want to start 2025 knowing:

• Exactly where to invest your marketing dollars
• What campaigns are worth doubling down on and which to scrap
• How to avoid attribution fights with your CRO

Sign up for your free 1-1 brand assessment with Pranav Piyush, Founder & CEO of Paramark. He’s a former marketer who’s spent his career leading growth at companies like PayPayl, Dropbox, Adobe, and Bill.

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It’s first come, first serve and he can’t meet with everyone, so it will fill up.

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🔨 3 First Principles for B2B Marketing You Need to Nail

It’s the new year: fresh budgets, new campaigns, and a lot of pressure to dive right into marketing tactics.

But all of those tactics will fall flat if you haven’t nailed the basics – and in B2B, that means the story.

Andrew Davies (CMO at Paddle) says that in demand infrastructure, story and narrative are often the least optimized pieces of the whole puzzle.

Follow Andrew’s “Back to B2B Basics” principles before getting swept up in the tactics this year:

Tightly Define Your Market

The cliche is true: if you’re marketing to everyone, you’re marketing to no one.

Andrew stressed the importance of a tightly defined Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). That’s not just surface-level details like industry or company size—it’s about knowing your audience’s pain points, priorities, and buying triggers.

How to Nail This:

• Study your best customers: What problems did you solve for them? Why did they choose you over competitors?
  
  
• Talk to them: Yes, actual conversations. Listen for recurring themes about their challenges and goals.
  
  
• Create a One-Pager: Summarize your ICP in one clear document that your entire team can use. Think of it as your North Star for every campaign.

Why it matters: When you know your market better than they know themselves, your messaging hits harder, and your campaigns convert faster.

Build a Culture of Customer Relationships

One of Andrew’s non-negotiables is spending time with customers – not just through data or surveys but real, face-to-face (or Zoom) conversations.

These insights are gold when it comes to refining your ICP, shaping your messaging, and delivering value that truly resonates.

How to Build Genuine Customer Relationships:

• Make conversations a habit: Regularly schedule time to talk to your customers. Skip the sales pitch and just listen.
  
  
• Capture high-fidelity feedback: What challenges are keeping them up at night? What do they wish existed? Use this to guide your marketing.
  
  
• Use customers as your compass: Let their insights steer everything from product development to campaign strategy.
  
  
• Focus on Non-Transactional Value: Provide tools, insights, or connections that solve problems, even if they’re outside your product’s scope.

Why it matters: The closer you are to your customers, the easier it is to deliver exactly what they need – and that helps make your marketing more effective.

Clarify Your Message (and Then Do It Again)

One of the biggest traps in B2B is overcomplicating your message.

Andrew shared how Paddle initially positioned itself as a “Revenue Delivery Platform.” The result? Prospects were confused.

But when they simplified it to “Complete Payments Infrastructure for Software,” suddenly the value was clear, and sales conversations improved overnight.

How to Fix Your Messaging:

• Keep it simple: If your prospects are asking, “Wait, what do you do again?” it’s a sign you need to overhaul your messaging.
  
  
• Test with real customers: Use tools like Gong or simply ask prospects if your message resonates.
  
  
• Answer one core question: “How does this make my life better?”

Why It Matters: If your messaging is vague or overly complex, your audience is left playing a game of “figure it out.” And guess what? They won’t. Confusion slows down conversions – or worse, stops them altogether.

P.S. Let me know if you want the full interview with Andrew and I'll send it right over ☺️

And if you've read this far, then you're the first to know about the next big thing we're doing at Exit Five this year: a report on B2B Marketing Salaries.

It’s not just data – it’s a tool to help you negotiate better pay, ensure fair compensation for your team, and get a clear picture of the market.

Learn more and take the survey here.

📺 UPCOMING EVENTS

✉️ The B2B Event Playbook: Building Revenue-Driving Events in 2025

Events are back, baby.

From small gatherings like dinners to large scale customer conferences and webinars, events are back in B2B marketing in a big way.

But throwing events without a strategy is like burning money.

Whether it’s hosting your first user conference, investing in a sponsorship booth at a tradeshow, or looking into hosting micro-events like dinners – you need a solid strategy to back up your investment.

Our first Exit Five Live session of 2025 is all about B2B events. We’ll be joined by event experts Stephanie Christensen (Director of Marketing at Zuddl) and Kristina DeBrito (Director of Strategic Events at Iterable); hosted by Exit Five founder Dave Gerhardt who will share how we’re running events at Exit Five.

You’ll learn:

• The key metrics to track to show ROI on your event plan in 2025
• How to get buy in from key stakeholders
• What’s working for B2B marketing leaders right now (and what’s not working)
• How to do follow up post event
• We’ll also cover some lessons from virtual events too

Plus, there will be plenty of time for live Q&A so you can get your burning questions answered by our panel of event pros.

Join us live

📰 LATEST ARTICLES

We’re investing in free content in a big way in 2025, starting with Articles. Each one is a deeper dive into a topic based on expert interviews with marketing leaders.

Our latest is on What B2B Marketers Need to Know About Account Based Marketing with insights from Hillary Carpio (Head of ABM at Snowflake), Chris Rack (former CEO of PharosIQ), and John Short (CEO at Compound Growth Marketing).

Read the full article here.

🏢 OPEN ROLES

Who's Hiring Right Now?

HOT JOB OF THE WEEK: Exit Five (yes, us!) is hiring a Marketing Assistant.

Salary $75,000/year. Remote, but US and Canada only (no exceptions, sorry). This is an entry-level position – but it’s not your typical entry-level job. If you’re the smart, ambitious, team-centric person we’re looking for, check out the listing for more details.

Interested? Apply here.

Other open roles on the Exit Five job board this week:

• Neuron7 is hiring a Content Marketing Director. Fully remote, US Only.
• Global Payments is hiring a Principal Content Strategist, SMB Professional Services
• Global Payments is hiring a Principal Content Strategist, Higher Education
• Opus Training is hiring a B2B Growth Marketing Manager
• Paramark is hiring a Head of Marketing, Founding Marketer

See All Open Roles >>

Have an open role and want to make sure the best B2B marketing talent sees it?

Just reply to this email and we'll send over more info on how you can post it on our job board + get it in front of 25k+ marketers.

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