Account Manager @ Kurogo | Sharing lessons from a life in Marketing

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Joseph Rudd

Marketing looks simple ...

Until you try doing it.

It’s easy to look at marketing and think: 

→ Anyone can post something on social media
→ Anyone can write a few clever words
→ Anyone can make viral content
→ Anyone can ... 

But there’s so much more to good marketing than what people see on the surface.

Marketing (done well) is a careful balance of art and science, being aimed at (and held accountable by) business-oriented goals. 

It requires: 

✅ Deep knowledge and research 
✅ The ability to pivot quickly 
✅ Constant testing and learning 

Not to mention: 

✅ Storytelling 
✅ Trust building 
✅ Customer insights 
✅ Industry knowledge 
✅ Data-driven decision making 
✅ A near obsessive personality 

The list goes on and on.

Point is... 

Marketing is so much more than clever words, clicking post, or looking cool. It’s about driving tangible results. 

It's not 'easy'. 
But done well, it will be the Lifeblood of your business. 

Agreed? Repost to spread the word ♻️
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Strategy Director at LeverBrands | We help founders build leverage through personal branding

Helping B2B Teams win more clients in less time by growing an email list of buyers. Join my free workshop. Seats are limited, so apply now!

Most Business Leaders know how to deliver.

Very few know how to stay visible long enough for ideal clients to discover them.I help fix that.

I help B2B and recruitment leaders build an authority engine that increases visibility, drives warm conversations, and fills their pipeline with clients who already trust their expertise.

The system is simple: CLARITY → AUTHORITY → CONVERSATIONS (The CAC System)

1. Clarity - We nail your positioning, messaging, niche, and signature frameworks so buyers instantly understand your value.

2. Authority - I build your visibility tower — daily content, insights, stories, and a strategic narrative that positions you as the go-to expert in your market.

3. Conversations - Warm engagement, optimised profile touchpoints, and simple outreach loops that turn attention into booked client calls.

This creates for you.
⬆️ More visibility
⬆️ Better clients
⬆️ Consistent inbound
⬆️ Higher perceived value
⬆️ An easier sales cycle

Results my clients have got
✔️ 60k+ impressions in a single post 
✔️ Multiple warm client conversations booked within 30 days
✔️ £500k+ deal closed from visibility built using this system 
✔️ More replies, more reach, more opportunities, without constant grinding

Jonny Umoru

Here is a quick tip for every business owner who wants more monthly revenue.

Record your calls.
All of them.

Not for compliance.
Not for content.

For truth.
When you listen back, two things happen fast.

You see exactly where you’re strong.
You see exactly where you leak value.

Early 2024 forced me to dive deep into my meetings.
As I was booking them consistently.
But clients weren’t converting.

My first assumption was the obvious one.
“I must be bad on calls.”
Wrong.

The real issue was more subtle and more damaging.

I was allowing my prospects to treat the meeting like an open advice line.
Which is helpful, generous but also super unfocused.

There's no clear structure.
There's no solid boundaries.
There's no actual clear commercial direction.

Once I fixed that, conversions followed.

Same calls.
Same experience.
Different outcome.

Recording calls doesn’t just improve sales.
It improves your judgement.

And when you’re running a business, judgment is the real leverage.
More data always beats more opinions.

I help exec search and recruitment firms build authority that turns into client calls

One of the best things about the way we work now?

I can be on serious business calls all day.
While my kids are in the next room.

Sometimes my three-year-old pops in for a hug.
Sometimes my one-year-old wants to sit on my lap.

- Closed 2 more clients
- Had 5 meetings

And not once has anyone complained.

Not once has anyone questioned my professionalism.
That still blows my mind.

I came up in a world where “real work” meant sitting in an office all day.
Looking busy, wearing the right clothes, and pretending life didn’t exist outside the building.

Now, the bar is different.

Do good work.
Be clear.
Create results.

That’s it.

We’ve finally reached a point where output matters more than optics. 
Where trust matters more than appearances. 
Where being human doesn’t disqualify you from being professional.

That shift matters.

Not just for business, but for families, sanity, and how long people can actually sustain doing this work.

This era isn’t perfect.
But this part of it?

I genuinely love it.

If posting more content actually worked, you’d already have more clients.

You’re probably going through the same problem as everybody else, you're visible, and you’re consistent.

But nothing is converting.

That’s not a content problem, it’s a funnel problem.

Content without a funnel is just noise.

I learned this the hard way.

I used to post for likes and impressions.

Back then, landing clients felt hard.

Now I make what used to take me a month in a single week.

Because I post with intent.

I stopped creating content for attention and started mapping it to how buyers actually decide.

Most agency owners treat LinkedIn like a shop window.

It looks good, but does nothing.

If your content doesn’t guide action or build authority, you get seen but not chosen.

This is how to fix that problem.

Every agency needs content across all three stages:
1️⃣ Awareness. Make them care
2️⃣ Consideration. Make them trust
3️⃣ Decision. Make them act

Miss one and your pipeline leaks.

Stop posting to be noticed.
Start creating to be chosen.

DM FUNNEL for the full content to the client playbook.

Content Without a Funnel = Noise

January is about removing ambiguity.
Having just motivation or determination is not enough.

Most slow starts come from unclear rules.

No defined output.
No minimum standard.
No agreement on what a “good week” actually means.

This January, I did one simple thing.
I defined the floor.

Not goals.
Not vision.
The minimum level of execution that counts as “we are in motion”.

For me, that meant.
• one visible piece of content per day
• five outbound conversations started
• zero days with no pipeline activity

Same workload. Same constraints.
Just fewer decisions left open.

Within the first full week:
3 new clients closed
10 meetings booked

Not because January is special.
But because momentum shows up when rules are clear.

If January feels slow, do not push harder.
Set the floor and remove the choice to drift.

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Inbound is a hope strategy.
Outbound is a hustle strategy.
Neither scales on its own.

If you are an agency founder, here is the part most people avoid saying.

Inbound builds trust
But it compounds too slowly when you need revenue now

Outbound creates pipeline
But every call starts with “Who are you again?” if you have no brand

The agencies that scale do both
Content that builds demand
Outreach that creates momentum
A system that works without founder pressure

Inbound warms them up
Outbound brings them in

Do only one
And your funnel leaks the moment you stop pushing

Your email list does not grow by accident.

It grows when each step is intentional and done in the right order.

This carousel walks through the exact 5-step process I use to build email lists that attract the right people and turn attention into conversations.

It starts with clarity.
Moves into value.
Then creates a clean, simple path for someone to raise their hand.

Nothing here is clever.
Nothing is rushed.
And that’s the point.

If your list feels slow, quiet, or disconnected from revenue, the issue is usually sequence, not effort.

Follow the steps in order.
Do not skip ahead.

Save this and come back to it when you’re building your next asset.

5 guaranteed steps to grow your email list

Chasing new leads feels productive, but it’s usually just avoidance.

Most founders assume slow growth means they need more leads.

So they.
→ Start new outreach
→ Target new people
→ Switch content topics
→ Reset the cycle

What they don’t do is build depth.

Instead of chasing new conversations, follow up with someone you spoke to months ago who already knows how you think.

Instead of posting about a brand new idea, revisit a topic you’ve already covered, from a sharper angle, with clearer judgment.

Trust doesn’t come from novelty.
It comes from familiarity.

Pipeline building only feels hard when you rush it.
When everything is urgent, nothing lands.

Slow down.
Deepen.
Let trust compound.

That’s how conversations turn into clients.

If you think sales is just about how much effort you put in.
You are wrong.

You can work all day on sales and get none because you are doing the wrong things.

More calls with the wrong people.
More follow-ups that focus on the wrong part of the funnel.
More posts that talk about the wrong topics.
These things lead to more stress.

But if deals only move when you are actively forcing them forward.
That is not a motivation issue and it is not a market issue.

It is a system issue.
Fix the leak by slowing down and understanding the race youare actually in.

My clients and I get rejected every day.
On email. On LinkedIn.
And it grows our businesses → fast.

Most people avoid rejection.
We build systems that create it → at scale.

Why?

Because rejection means you’re in the game.
→ You’re visible.
→ You’re asking.
→ You’re testing.

Outreach that never gets rejected
...is outreach no one sees.

Rejection is just step one.
The next step is revenue.

👇 If you’re not getting rejected, you’re not growing.

I booked 5 client calls 1 hour ago because I followed up...

No secret framework, just 2 lines.

That is all you need.

So when people say they are not booking calls, I ask.
"Do you send a follow-up message?"

Most of them say.
"No."

So why are you shocked that you are not booking calls?

So make sure you follow up with each prospect.

Is being cringey worth it if you can build a successful business?

Most agency owners say the same thing.

“I do not want to post consistently.
I hate seeing those people who are always in my feed.
It feels cringey.”

And they are not wrong.
Some of the content is awful.

But here is what is actually happening.

You do not remember people because they post a lot.
You remember them because they show up at all.

The ones you complain about are the ones you can name without checking LinkedIn.

That is not an accident.

Consistency is not what makes content cringe.
Lack of thinking does.

Posting badly and posting often are not the same thing.
But they get lumped together because it is convenient.

Here is the trade-off most agency owners never say out loud.

You can protect your taste and stay invisible.
Or you can risk mild discomfort and be remembered.

There is no upside to being unknown with high standards.

Clients do not buy from the best hidden thinker.
They buy from the person they trust and can recall.

And recall only comes from repetition.

If someone needs to see your name five times before they take you seriously, that does not mean you are cringey.

It means you are human.

Avoiding consistency does not protect your brand.
It just protects your ego.

And egos do not build pipelines.

I have a big smile on my face this morning.

Not because of a launch or a viral post.

Because of two emails.

I sent two newsletters this week.
Each one took about 15 minutes to write.
Both were content-heavy and genuinely useful.

The result?
👉 5 replies to each email
👉 3 calls booked from each one
👉 6 calls total from 30 minutes of writing

That is not normal email marketing.
That is nurture working.

Usually, I get one or two replies per newsletter.
This time, more people responded and booked calls.

And this is exactly why I keep repeating the same thing to friends, clients, and anyone who will listen.

If you are not sending emails, you are making growth harder than it needs to be.

Newsletters nurture and sales emails convert.

When you stay consistently in your audience’s inbox.
→ You stay in their head.

When you stay in their head.
→ You get picked when the timing is right.

Most businesses do not do this because they underestimate the power of email.

Remember 30 minutes got me 6 calls.
The ROI on my time is crazy.

That is leverage.

If your pipeline depends entirely on chasing, this is your reminder that attraction exists too.

Attention is not a nice-to-have anymore.
It is the currency your pipeline runs on.
And every month, it gets more expensive.

Right now, your agency is in one of three positions.

1️⃣ Visible, but not credible.
2️⃣ Credible, but invisible.
3️⃣ Quietly bleeding pipeline while saying you are “doing the right things.”

Only one quadrant compounds demand.
And it is never the one that works harder.

High visibility without authority creates noise.
→ Likes, comments, conversations… and no revenue.

High authority without visibility creates comfort.
→ Referrals come in. Then slow. Then plateau.

Low visibility and low authority are the silent killers.
→ BD feels cold. Effort increases. Results disappear.

The uncomfortable truth is simple.
You do not need more effort.
You need to earn attention.

When visibility and authority move together.
BD stops feeling like rejection.
Meetings stop being random.
And your pipeline starts behaving like a system again.

💥 If you want to know exactly where your agency sits right now
🔥 DM me MATRIX and I will send you a breakdown

Being good at BD can actually slow your business down.

Not because BD doesn’t work.
But because it works too well.

When you’re the best person at opening doors, closing deals, and carrying relationships,

The business quietly learns to rely on you instead of replacing you.

At first, that feels like momentum.
You win more work. Revenue grows. People trust you.

But over time, your strength becomes the constraint.

The business can’t move faster than you.
It can’t grow beyond your availability.
And it can’t compound because everything resets through one person.

This is how capable founders accidentally cap their own growth.

Not through laziness.
Not through bad strategy.
But by being too central to how everything works.

If your biggest strength disappeared for a month, what would your business actually be left with?

Stop Chasing. Start Attracting.

Ever feel like content is a game of cat and mouse?
- You post.
- You chase.
- You get nothing.

But here’s the truth.
You can’t catch a mouse without putting some cheese out.

Most people continue to chase leads with empty content.
No hooks, no insight, nothing worth stopping for.

Then they blame the algorithm… or worse, the audience.

But it’s not a lead problem.
It’s a cheese problem.

Your market isn’t ignoring you.
They’re just not hungry for what you’re serving.

When your content actually hooks attention, shares something useful, and demonstrates genuine thought.

You stop chasing.
You start attracting.

That’s when the algorithm bends in your favour.
And the right people find you without you lifting a finger.

Because in the end.
It was never about catching the mouse.
It was about becoming the cheese.

Sometimes a simplified marketing process beats a complicated one.

Posting consistently, engaging properly, and connecting with the right people on one platform will outperform a scattered strategy almost every time.

Yet we keep seeing the same pattern.

3 landing pages.
25 long-form videos.
TikTok, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn.
Now YouTube is added to the list.

None of them mastered.
None of them consistent.

That is not ambition.
That is dilution.

You are not behind because you are missing tools.
You are behind because you are splitting attention.

I had a call recently with a prospect who is not active on social at all, but wants to build a following, run cold email outreach, and launch YouTube content in two months without any foundation.

I told him the truth.

That is not a strategy.
That is a full-time job pretending to be a side project.

The fastest way to grow is not being everywhere.
It is focusing on being somewhere for a long enough time.

So just keep it simple.
1. Master one platform.
2. Build proof.
3. Create momentum.

Everything else comes after.

Authority or virality?
Which is best, and which do you want more of?

Most founders say they want both.
That answer is usually the reason their content does nothing.

Virality optimises for attention.
Authority optimises for trust.

Attention feels productive.
Trust books meetings.

Viral content is designed to be shared by people who will never hire you.
Authoritative content is designed to be recognised by the few people who can.

So ask yourself this before you post anything.
• Who do I want to recognise this?
• What decision do I want them to make after reading it?
• Would the right buyer see this and think “this person understands my world”?

If the answer is no, the post is noise, even if it performs.

A recruiter with 3 inbound conversations a month from the right companies beats a recruiter with 30,000 views every time.

So decide what you are building.

A bigger audience
Or a smaller group of people who already trust your judgement

Because content that is not built around that decision is not neutral.

It is quietly training the wrong people to pay attention.

Starting the year slowly used to be my default.
And it used to kill my momentum from the year before.

I’d tell myself January didn’t really count.
People were still easing back in.
Decision makers weren’t fully switched on yet.

In reality, it was just an excuse to underperform.

So this year, I scrapped that thinking.

Instead of setting “January targets”, I set targets based on what the business actually needs to hit the outcome I want for the year. No easing in. No soft runway.

We’ve only really been back since January 5th.
That is only 3 days.

In that time.
• 3 new clients closed
• 10 meetings booked

Same market. Same people. Same calendar.
Different mentality. Different actions. Different result.

When you limit time and remove optionality, your actions rise to meet it.
When you stretch the goal and stop negotiating with yourself, you discover you were capable of more all along.

January isn’t quiet.
It’s revealing.

Just thought I’d share.

Most services fail because they make your client’s life harder.

No matter what you sell, your real job is simple.
Make your client’s world lighter.

If you run a recruitment business, your job is not to send CVs.
Your job is to reduce stress, indecision, and wasted interviews.

If you run a content service, your job is not to “support visibility.”
Your job is to remove thinking entirely. What to post. When to post. Why it matters. All handled.

If you are a consultant or strategist, your job is not to impress with ideas.
It is to make decisions obvious and execution frictionless.

Here is the standard most people avoid asking themselves.

Does working with me save my client time, money, or energy?

Because if the answer is no, you are not adding value.
You are outsourcing stress.

The bar should be this high.
When someone works with you, they should feel relief.

If your service adds complexity, it needs refining.

And if it adds stress, it does not matter how good it looks on paper.
Because you are bringing new propblems to your clients door.

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leverage-funnels

jonny-umoru-inc

I had one of my free trials convert into a long-term client yesterday.
But at the start of us working together, he was sceptical.

He wasn’t convinced the goal we set would actually happen.

Within 24 hours of us starting, he changed his mind.

When we spoke after, he said he was genuinely surprised.
Not just impressed by the offer.
Not just sold on the vision.

Surprised that what I said would happen… actually happened.

That’s why he became a client.

Not because I promised something big.
But because I set a clear target, explained what was and wasn’t possible, and delivered inside the timeframe we agreed.

There was no hype, no ego.
I never said to him, “Just trust the process”.

Just data, boundaries, and execution.

Here’s the lesson I keep relearning:

Overpromising doesn’t build trust.
Underselling doesn’t either.

Clarity does.

You should know what you can realistically achieve.
Say that.
Then do exactly that.

That’s it.

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The Battle

Joseph Rudd

Jonny Umoru

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taplio

The Battle

Joseph Rudd

Jonny Umoru

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Joseph Rudd's LinkedIn Performance

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