Influencer Marketing & Growth @ lempire (Taplio + lemlist) | Exploring how B2B influencers help SaaS companies drive growth

Alex Llull

I've worked with 200+ creators. Only about 10% get rebooked.

Here's what separates them from the rest:

→ They send a recap without being asked

Post links, key metrics, screenshots. All in one message.

Most creators post and disappear. The ones who make it easy for me to report back to my team go to the top of my list.

→ They offer a discount for round two

"Hey, if you want to lock in another collab, I'll do 15% off."

This might seem counterintuitive. But for creators building a business, consistent work beats one-off payments. And brands appreciate your commitment.

→ They reply within 24-48 hours

Many creators ghost after a collab ends. That's one of the fastest ways to get blacklisted.

Be communicative. And if you can't, just say so. That alone builds trust.

→ They pitch before I do

"Want to turn this into a series?" or "I have an idea for a follow-up."

Brands value proactivity. It shows you're invested beyond just the current project.

→ They're honest when things underperform

One creator told me: "Hey, this one flopped. Here's why I think it happened, and here's what I'd do differently."

That message made me want to work with them more, not less.

Most creators don't do any of this. Which is exactly why you should.

Partnerships @ Perspective | Building B2B creator, influencer and partner programs that drive revenue

→ Found a creator on our niche
→ Paid for one sponsored video (flat fee)
→ Offered affiliate commission on top (he didn't ask for it)
→ Video did really well, signups came in
→ A few converted to paid customers
→ He started seeing passive income hit his account

Then, without us reaching out for a new one, he made 3 more videos about Perspective.

On his own, with no ask, brief or second payment from our side.

Why? Two things:

- He loved the tool and thought it was valuable for his audience
- He saw the potential to own this niche before others did (smart creator)

Once I noticed he was doing that, I reached out. Now we're plotting how to 10x his impact together.

Here's the thing most brands get wrong:

They pay a flat fee. Creator posts. Done. Transaction over.

But flat fee only pays for their time. It doesn't keep them around.

That's why we always offer affiliate compensation on top, even when creators don't ask for it.

Yes, the affiliate cuts into margins on video one. But it almost guarantees videos 2, 3, 4 without extra spend.

It's a retention strategy (if you have a good product).

How do you structure your creator deals? 🤝

Fractional CMO for agencies & consultants | Creator with 1.1 million followers | Make The Internet Nice Again™️

My job is simple: help you grow your business by any means necessary.

I've spent the last 20 years at agencies & in-house, so I know both sides of the table. I created education products that drove $20 million+ in revenue at CreativeLive and URM Academy, did design & marketing for Abercrombie & Fitch, product strategy for Swiffer & Febreze, digital media for Red Bull, Element, and Nike ACG and projects for bands including A Day To Remember, Periphery and Of Mice & Men.

As a content creator, I've also generated over 130 million views and 750k subscribers on YouTube, 80k followers on Instagram & 20k LinkedIn followers (big numbers = I'm good at my job, right??)

Let’s do something cool together! Send me an email or DM any time.

Finn McKenty

Honestly impressive how hateful the whole experience is!

Fractional CMO for agencies | Recovering YouTuber (750k subs) | Make The Internet Nice Again™️

Never thought I'd feel so strongly about file formats but it's true: HEIC is a war crime.

Elon Musk replied to one of my tweets yesterday.

I've also been reposted by Ice T and Olivia Wilde, Deadmau5 showed up in my Twitch chat once, etc.

To be clear, none of them know who I am. These were just random interactions, and other than using it for engagement farming in this LinkedIn post, Elon replying to me on Twitter doesn't really do anything for me.

Put aside your personal opinion of Elon or any of those people - that's not the point (but for the record, I was a big fan of Olivia Wilde on The OC).

The point is that you'd be surprised who's paying attention to what you're doing.

I've had tons of other DMs from people who DO matter - who I ended up working with, being friends, etc.

And all it takes is ONE comment/DM/etc from the right person at the right time, to change your life forever.

So keep putting yourself out there... but focus on quality over quantity. 

Random interactions with celebrities are worth precisely zero dollars.

And PS- If you're the type of person who's interested in OpenClaw/Clawdbot, check out tomorrow's newsletter. It's 900 words on exactly what I've been cooking with AI over the last few months and imo it's a banger 🔥

📩 Get the newsletter here: https://lnkd.in/g3uHsd-H

Literally 1 genuine DM to the right person at the right time, will do more for you than 10,000 crappy automated ones.

It's not complicated...

Find people you want to work with, pay attention to what they're doing. And if you genuinely think you can help them, send them a (short) message:

"Hey [name] - love what you guys are doing. I saw that you've been doing more video lately so I thought I'd reach out. I've done tons of them for brands like X, Y and Z, would be great to chat if you're looking for any help."

That's literally all it takes!

And it doesn't need to be "scalable," because you only need a handful of good clients to have a great business.

Quality > quantity.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

I saw Jesse Randall ask Claude how likely he was to get replaced, so I did the same.... and it surprised me!

It says I'm an immortal vampire, destined to live forever and rule with an iron fist over a vast empire that stretches across oceans so vast that humans can scarcely fathom their magnitude. 

I will witness firsthand the moment that the sun sputters and goes dark, plunging the solar system into cosmic blackness, and spawns eldritch beings that waited eons for this moment.

Unless the Opus 4.7 update ships before then, in which case I'm cooked.

My toxic trait is talking 💩 to people like this who send me crappy, automated outreach.

Of course, he didn't book the call with me or even reply, which tells you that he's full of 💩 and never really believed in his offer.

But my point is bigger than clowning this guy:

Cold outreach DEFINITELY still works. For example, I just got a client 6 meetings in ~10 days (with very picky VCs).

And you don't need some fancy automated system with a bunch of fake "personalization."

Just send people a quick message that you ACTUALLY WROTE YOURSELF that shows them you're a real person, with a legit reason to talk.

For example:

"Hey (name) - Thought I'd reach out since I'm new to the area and looking to meet people in the local ecosystem. I'm an exited ecom founder, and I see you've done a bunch of cool ecom investments like [company], so we probably have a lot in common. If you're open to it, I'd love to chat and hear more about what you're up to."

That's it! Note a couple important details:

- We only reach out if we think there's a legit connection. Eg, if the investor focuses on healthcare or life sciences, we'll probably skip it since that's just not his background.

- The angle could be something more personal, eg if the person if also a combat veteran like him... there's no formula.

Yes, it takes more work than automated slop... but that's why it works. 

Not everything can or should be "efficient." Sometimes you should do it the hard way.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

Announcing my new book, "Negotiate Like A Toddler" 📚

Want a raise? Trying to close a deal? Can't get a vendor to come down on price?

Just throw yourself down on the floor, start crying at the top of your lungs, and don't stop until they give you what you want.

"OK, OK- we'll send over the f-ing Docusign, just stop screaming and eat something other than Goldfish crackers!"

Preorder now and get the bonus chapter, “How To Win Any Argument By Just Saying ‘No’ Over And Over Again.” 
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies & consultants
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

The honest truth is that the majority of agencies do mediocre work at inflated prices.

Waaaaay too many of them do the bare minimum- just enough so the client doesn’t leave, but it feels like a bit of a ripoff (because it is).

Solo consultants are usually a better bang for your buck, but they hit a limit of scale pretty quickly.

That said, an agency that actually gives a shit is worth their weight in gold, especially when you can essentially use them as an extension of yourself.

Once they know you, the company, product, processes, etc, and they've proven that you can trust them, let them off the leash.

Don't treat them like a "vendor." 

Make them as close to a true part of your team as possible - bring them in early, give them access to as many things as possible, then just let them run with it.

It'll take some time to get here, but that's the ideal. 

They're like your SWAT team that just gets shit down autonomously, so you can focus on the bigger picture - and since they're not employees, you don't have to worry about annual reviews, development plans, promotions, etc etc.

If you don't think your agencies can get there, I'd think about finding new ones.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

How to get AI images that don't look like yellow-tinted ChatGPT slop:

🟣 1. Draw what you want. 

It can literally be stick figures, I spent maybe 90 seconds on this one.

Add text to label the important parts, eg "Rocky cliff" and "Satellite dish"

🟣 2. Upload to Nano Banana Pro

It's smart and it has a semantic understanding of the objects in your sketch. Meaning, it maps your scribble of a dog to all the Google images data of "dog photos."

I'm using Weavy here, but the same idea will work in any app that supports Nano Banana Pro.

🟣 3. Prompt something like "Make this a photorealistic image, in the style of a still frame from a 1980s adventure movie."

Re-roll if you need to, sometimes it takes a few tries. That's it!

Waaaaay better than writing long, elaborate prompts that never quite turn out the way you want.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

There are essentially two viable strategies: cranking out AI slop for the low end, or doing top 1% work for the high end.

Hopefully it goes without saying that I'm not a fan of the slop factory route!

But the fact is that plenty of people will make lots of money shitting out generic slop for clients who don't know any better.

Getting caught in the middle is where you have problems: too expensive to compete on price, but not good enough to compete on quality.

So if you don't want to be a slop factory, the path is clear: Push yourself to be in the top 1%.

That shows up in the quality of the work itself, but also in how you work with people - as Matt Raminick calls it "unreasonable hospitality."

Get back to people quickly. Give them clear, complete answers. Be proactive about solving problems for them. Basically, just make it obvious that you care about them and their business.

That shouldn't be rare, but it is!

So if you do good work and you're great to work with, you're probably in the top 1% (or close enough).

The right clients will be THRILLED to pay a premium for that, because the alternative is way more expensive (wasting time and money with underwhelming, crappy agencies).
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

It's pretty easy to be in the top 10% of any field: listen to smart people, then do what they say.

For example, I have a list of tech/design people on Twitter, a few engineer friends who are always trying new things, etc.

If they share something that looks interesting, I try it. That's how I learned about WebGL shaders, Claude Code, ComfyUI and tons of other cool shit over the last year that's completely changed how I work.

There's so many smart people on here, Twitter etc who will share everything they know! 

All you need to do is try it.

Note the important part: actually TRY IT. Reading articles, watching tutorials, etc is cool but it only matters if you actually DO THINGS with it.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

I made an app that's kind of like Canva, but optimized for making weird, glitchy graphics.

It's still very WIP, but it already supports a lot of features you won't find in Figma, Illustrator, etc like 20+ types of noise and distortion with detailed controls, and aliasing on text and shape edges.

I'll drop a link in the comments if you want to try it!

But the bigger question is, why did I make this?

1. I wanted to see what I could do with Claude Code (and apparently, you can do just about anything)

2. It's VERY clear to me that the future of agencies & consultants will include creating apps for themselves and their clients to use.

For example, apps that will:

→ Create on-brand assets with a few clicks
→ Pull data from the clients' internal systems and use it in content, ads, etc
→ Onboard clients & pipe that data into other systems
→ Create visual effects that off-the-shelf apps can't easily do
etc etc

This is also great because it means agencies move to a software-enabled services model which scales WAY better:

The value is in WHAT YOU ALREADY BUILT as much as the time you spend, so now you can charge purely based on value vs billing by the hour.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

I made an app that's kind of like Canva, but optimized for making weird, glitchy graphics like this one.

It's still very WIP, but it already supports a lot of features you won't find in Figma, Illustrator, Photoshop etc like this stair-step warp effect (it's a quantized exponential curve, for anyone who's interested).

But the bigger question is, why did I make this?

1. I wanted to see what I could do with Claude Code (and apparently, you can do just about anything)

2. It's VERY clear to me that the future of agencies & consultants is to become software-enabled services businesses.

Let’s say you’re an ecom consultant. You make an app that integrates all their data sources and finds “profit leaks” (SKUs that aren’t selling, campaigns with bad ROAS, etc). 

But it’s not just another dashboard (nobody looks at those) - it has an agent that will fix the problems it finds, eg automatically ordering less of a hoodie that’s not selling.

This is a WAAAAY better model for everyone:

→ Clients have instant, 24/7 access without blowing you up
→ You get recurring revenue with better margins
→ And you can scale much more effciently

It's going to be VERY interesting!

And if you want to know more, I wrote lots more about this in my next newsletter....

→ Sign up here: https://lnkd.in/g3uHsd-H

I'll drop a link to my app in the comments too!

Build your own tools

I've been using Twitter a LOT more lately since the algo update- it's REALLY good now.

I never thought I'd say that, because I was a massive Twitter hater, but it's a different app now (99% less mentally ill people who will try to cancel you for anything and everything).

Personally I've learned a TON about AI this year from Twitter. Just search for whatever model/app you're interested in and you'll find legitimately great content.

TIP: The algo heavily weights replies. So reply to a couple things you'd like to see more of in your feed, and you'll see it change almost instantly.

It's not for everyone. But if you're in SaaS, ecom, design, software engineering or investing, I wouldn't sleep on Twitter. 

There's a lot of extremely smart people on there sharing what they know and business definitely happens there. And it's VERY early - what trends on Twitter today will be on other apps 1-5 days later.

Also, some S-tier memes!
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

I get a fair amount of DMs asking for feedback on a product, and I almost always say the same thing:

"I'll assume the product is good. What's your plan for GTM?"

I'd say 90% of the time, they don't really have a solid answer.

It's usually something vague like "We're going to do outreach to people who could use it" or a very incomplete tactical thing like "build an email list and focus on that."

First of all, how exactly are they going to build the email list?? It's hard!

Those contacts aren't going magically appear in your CRM, so that tells me they haven't really thought about GTM in a meaningful way, and this is ALMOST ALWAYS what makes companies fail.

Of course your product matters but the biggest variable is usually MARKETING (or as they call it now "distribution").

Specifically, ALMOST EVERYONE overindexes on the details of the product (or service offer). They end up building a good product that nobody buys, because nobody knows that it exists!

Put 80% of your time and energy into marketing. 

The product is almost certainly good enough to sell as-is.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

AI images are basically a solved problem (still not perfect, but close enough) so I'm focusing on video.

I'm challenging myself to make more videos that have some kind of a loose theme between scenes.

Not quite an actual "story" yet, but at least a sense of place and some implied concept behind it- I want to do an actual narrative soon.

Learning how to think in terms of narrative video is definitely the next frontier, so I'd encourage everyone to experiment with it.

I've made 1500+ longform videos so this isn't a new way of thinking for me, but it's been a fun creative challenge to adapt it to the new toolset.

This one is a combo of Midjourney for the images (with a little help from Nano Banana) and Kling for most of the video, with the final edit in Premiere. Song is the Caves Of Qud menu music.

If you want to get started, I suggest the Grok app. It has very good images and video all in one place, and it's REALLY fast.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

Unwillingness to focus is THE crippling weakness for the vast majority of companies.

Like when you see those stats that 80% of businesses fail, this is usually why. The most common version I see:

🟣 Pursuing multiple markets at once

Trying to reach teachers, lawyers and fine dining chefs at the same time is not gonna work. Pick ONE.

🟣 Ignoring "boring" parts of the business

They've got all the energy in the world for the fun stuff like brainstorming new ideas etc, but when it comes to the "boring" parts like budgeting, sales, etc they tap out fast.

🟣 Adding new offers/capabilities too soon

They get "shiny object syndrome," come up with a cool new idea and immediately shift the whole company's focus to that-- "let's start offering 'video strategy' too!" 

Their core business gets neglected, and the new thing usually ends up flopping.

Stay focused, my kings and queens 🫡 
--
👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

How to set up a virtual editorial product shoot with Weavy and Nano Banana:

The key is to break it up into parts, so you have full control over each step.

1. Models

A simple headshot works, or you can get as detailed as you want and specify tattoos, hair style, makeup, etc etc.

2. Outfits

I like combining them into reference images that are each a complete outfit, just to stay organized.

3. Locations

Plug the model and outfit into the background as image inputs, and that's it!

Now you can mix and match models, outfits, and locations but everything stays consistent like it's part of the same photoshoot.

You can also get more detailed and specify the pose, weather, time of day, etc if you want.
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👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

Everyone's saying "Taste is the only moat." Sorry, but NOPE.... you need to:

🟣 Execute at a consistently GREAT level

Yes you need great taste... but if you can't execute on it, then all you have is an opinion (and we all know what that's worth).

Mastery of the craft matters MORE THAN EVER in the slop era:

When everyone can get 7/10 results with AI, you need to consistently hit a 9/10 or 10/10 to stand out.

🟣 Drive adoption of AI tools

This is probably the biggest blindspot I'm seeing: Hardly any non-engineers I know are using AI at what I'd call an advanced level. 

Most are just prompting, and maybe making a custom GPT here and there.

I hate typing these word because it sounds so cringe and cliche, but it's also true: You need to be an AI-native company, and you need to do it yesterday.

🟣 Convince clients to sign off on your ideas

Last but not least, remember that (for now, at least) people run the world. If you want your great ideas to ship, you need to get that skeptical CFO and grouchy engineer on board.

Based on what I see/hear talking to people every week, I'd say the most common weak point is lack of fluency in the new generation of tools.

So if that's you, time to make some coffee and get yourself up to speed! 🫡 
--
👋 Hi, I’m Finn
📈 Fractional CMO for agencies
👨‍💻 20+ years designing & marketing products
📬 DM me to say hi

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