I help B2B founders build go-to-market systems that hold up in investor due diligence.

Most startups don’t fail because of product or market, they fail because revenue is fragile, founder-led, or impossible to underwrite.

What investors usually find:

- Sales driven by one person or one channel
- No documented or repeatable GTM motion
- Poor visibility into forecasting and revenue quality
- Growth rented from agencies, not owned internally

That might generate pipeline.
It does not increase valuation.

At AdvancedClient.io, we work with B2B startups and scale-ups preparing to raise or exit.

Instead of running lead generation, we install investor-grade GTM infrastructure inside the business.

Our work focuses on:

- Removing founder dependency from sales
- Designing repeatable, internal GTM motions
- De-risking single-channel acquisition
- Building real revenue visibility and forecasting
- Creating systems the team owns long after we leave

Everything we do is designed by reverse-engineering how VCs and PE firms evaluate revenue, risk, and scalability during diligence.

When we’re done, founders are no longer the bottleneck and investors see a business that can scale without heroics.

If you’re raising or exiting in the next 6–18 months and want your GTM to increase valuation, not just pipeline, that’s the conversation we should be having.

Tom Grainger

It’s 2026.

And most sales orgs still look like 2018 with better tooling and worse morale.

- SDRs hammering phones with low-intent lists.
- Cold emails fired from the main domain.
- “Marketing-approved” messaging that sounds like it was prompt-engineered by someone who has never sold a thing.

Here’s what that produces in the real world.

Reps barely get connects, so confidence drops fast.

When they finally get someone live, they freeze due to lack of conversations.

Email domains get burned due to spam cannons without the proper infra.

Coaching becomes reactive as leaders are pulled in 100 directions.

Quota attainment goes with it.

But the orgs that figured it out look very different now.

Sales is phone-first again.
Not spray-and-pray dialing.
High-confidence dials.

Reps are fed signal-led lists built by a backend team that actually understands data.

Numbers are enriched, filtered tightly, ranked by intent, and sequenced properly.

This only works if the data layer is treated as infrastructure, not a one-off purchase.

Most high-performing teams now run off live databases with verified emails and mobile numbers, refreshed constantly, and pushed straight into Clay workflows so reps are never dialing or emailing stale contacts.

You’re starting to see tools like Prospeo.io show up here more often, especially as teams move away from stitched-together sourcing plus verification setups and want one clean, reliable data layer underneath everything.

Better data leads to better conversations.

Better conversations rebuild confidence.

Confidence creates pipeline.

--

Cold email no longer sits with SDRs.

It lives inside marketing.

Centralized. Infrastructure-led. Quality-controlled.

Secondary domains only. Proper warm-up. Clean copy.

Run like a performance channel.

Positive replies route straight to the phone team.

The result is simple.

Instead of 15 burnt-out SDRs chasing activity metrics, you have a small group of elite operators.

They talk to real buyers.

They convert at 3 to 5x the rate.

They are backed by a marketing-driven outbound and paid engine that actually compounds.

Less headcount.

Higher output.

Cleaner data.

The smartest orgs didn’t build this from scratch.

They started fractional.

They brought in partners with the infrastructure, training, and ramp already solved.

They proved the motion fast.

They validated the pipeline.

Then they internalized it with reps who already knew how to run it.

Speed first. Ownership second.

The future was never sales-led or marketing-led.

It’s ops-led.

That’s the modern sales org.

Phone-led.
Data-fed.
Marketing-integrated.
Ops-powered.

And if you are still running your 2018 playbook, 2026 already left you behind.

Happy New Year ;)

Founder at AdvancedClient.io | I help B2B founders build investor-grade GTM systems before they raise or exit

I'm Tom, I'm 28, I was an SDR for 10 months, 6 years ago. I quit.

And I still see the exact same problems today. Just with shinier tools.

Back then, what pushed me out wasn’t the phone.

It was the absence of a workflow.

- No support, just lots of pressure.
- Months of product training with zero guidance on how to actually sell.
- Ancient data that forced me to beg receptionists for scraps.
- Six green SDRs tripping over each other in the same territory.
- Complete lack of support or training

There was no system to plug into.

You were expected to figure it out while hitting quota.

Fast forward to 2025 and the symptoms look different, but the disease is the same.

- No defined ICP.
- No clear TAM.
- No segmentation.
- Five data tools stitched together.
- Reps paralysed because they have no training.
- Enablement that stops the moment onboarding ends and minimal onboarding at that.

SDRs are still being hired into chaos.

What irritates me most is the new leadership take I keep hearing:

“Cut headcount. Replace with automated outbound.”

If you sell into companies with more than 25 employees, deal complexity, multiple stakeholders, or a sales cycle longer than a week, automation alone will not save you.

Here's our take for 2026: 

Reps should not be thinking about data, tooling, sequencing, or what to do next.

They should be thinking about conversations.

The job of leadership is to ramp reps into a pre-existing workflow that removes non-revenue work entirely.

A real workflow looks like this:

- The ICP is locked.
- The TAM is mapped.
- Accounts are segmented by who buys, why, and when.
- Data is pre-qualified and ranked by intent.
- Messaging is locked in, documented and stress tested.

So all the rep does is show up, pick up the phone, and execute.

I'm sitting here writing this post during my daily call block. 

I've made it a habit to cold call (almost) every day

Whether it's for my clients or for Advanced Client I like to switch it up to keep my skills sharp. 

It's also a nice little driver of pipeline :) 

When I speak to sales orgs I normally find out through one way or another that their reps are hiding from the phone. 

I get it - it's hard to call up people who probably don't want to be called an have a difficult conversation but it doesn't need to be as hard as everyone makes out. 

Here's how I make it easy for myself. 

1. Reps: I don't go more than 2 days without calling

The biggest barrier to calling is the mental barrier you put up in your head. The moment you stop calling the worse case scenario builds up and you start thinking of every excuse of why not to call. 

It's never as bad as you think it's gonna be. 

2. Sales leaders: Elite rev-ops

Elite lists, hyper segmented, AI-qualification, carefully curated and enriched with the best data on the market. 

This means my connect rate stays high and I keep on having conversations. 

A big reason reps get disheartened is that data is a second thought and they might have two conversations a week which means they aren't able to practice. 

The list is the strategy. 

3. Sales leaders / reps: create proper talk tracks. 

Pick an opener, say it 150 times until it sounds smooth as butter coming out your mouth. 

Then work with AI to build hyper targeted talk tracks for your lists. This is all possible because Louis Young put's in so much effort with the lists so I can focus one persona type each day. 

Typically I find it best to create an elevator pitch that ties in key problems you know that persona deals with that your solution solves. 

Have it in front of you so you don't need to stress about memorising it. 

4. Sales leaders: Use a good dialer

Using outdated, ugly tech sucks, especially if it's clunky and not easy to use. 

Get a clean, modern dialer like Trellus (YC W22) that makes your reps want to call and let's them hit their daily numbers as easily as possible.

5. Reps: Doodle or find something to do. 

The worst bit about cold calling (imo) is sitting still anxiously waiting for someone to pick up. 

Do something that requires a little bit of concentration like writing a linkedin post or painting the mona lisa. 

---

The point is; from a managerial perspective, make your reps lives as easy as possible so all they need to think about is calling. 

From a rep perspective; make your life as easy as possible by compartmentalising the work and using AI.

If I was a Founder or CRO rebuilding a GTM team from scratch today, I wouldn't hire more reps.
 
(I would fix this first)
 
Most GTM teams are fragile by design.

- Undocumented
- Lack of systems 
- Burn out machines 

Meaning when a rep churns and burns everything they've built disappears. 

Here's the system that we would build

And the system really has only one goal:

Survive rep churn

Here is what that actually means in practice.

The workflow owns lead generation, qualification, activation, and follow-up.

Reps do not.

Reps execute inside a system that already knows:

 • Who should be contacted
 • In what order
 • On which channel
 • And why now

No rep is inventing their own process.

No one is rebuilding lists from scratch.

No one is guessing what to do on Monday morning.

Under the hood, everything feeds into a single operating layer.

Inbound, outbound, paid, website traffic, and LinkedIn engagement all resolve into one qualified lead stream inside Clay.

That layer handles:

 • Enrichment and filtering
 • Data quality and validation
 • Routing rules by priority

By the time a lead reaches a human, the work is already done.

Leads are automatically:

 • Dropped into email sequences
 • Routed to SDR call lists
 • Triggered into LinkedIn workflows

Calendars, reminders, and CRM updates run without (OR minimal) human intervention.

If a rep leaves tomorrow...

A new rep steps in and executes the same playbook on day one.

When deals close, the workflow compounds.

Closed-won accounts feed back into lookalike models.

Paid and outbound re-target the same profile.

The system gets smarter without adding headcount.

I’m Tom. I talk to hundreds of CROs and VPs of Revenue every year.

When I hear this one thing on a call, I know the org is in deep trouble.

Most revenue leaders at early-stage startups and scale-ups are deep in the trenches.

- Working deals.
- Building workflows.
- Hiring reps.
- Training reps.
- Stressed. Scrappy. Constantly reactive.

They’re so far below the waterline that they rarely get a chance to come up for air and actually look at the business like a leader.

That’s survivable when the org is running a modern, optimised motion.

It’s lethal when they’re operating a 2018 model with better tools slapped on top.

That’s when things start to break fast.

Quick fixes.
New tools that never get adopted.
Reps hiding behind “busy” work instead of outcomes.

So when outbound starts to stall, the only lever they feel they can pull quickly is volume.

- Stick on a parallel dialer.
- Ramp activity.

More calls should equal more pipeline.

Right?

Wrong.

All that does is amplify a broken system.

- Results flatline. Then drop.
- Reps burn out making 400 calls a day and having two conversations, if they’re lucky.
- Data gets torched.
- Pipeline doesn’t grow.

Now the revenue leader panics.

“Wtf do we do?”

This is where most teams spiral.

This is also where we reset.

Here’s the order of operations that actually works.

1. Map the TAM.

 Based on ICP, build a full picture of all your target accounts. 

2. Fix the data.

High-quality phone numbers and emails, properly enriched. We use Prospeo.io heavily here.

3. Rank the numbers.

Not all numbers are equal. Tools like TitanX let reps power dial lists that actually pick up, pushing connect rates into the 20 to 30 percent range.

4. Coach properly.

Once conversations are predictable, coaching finally matters.

- Tonality.
- Messaging.
- Value props.
- Openers.

Only once that MVP is producing consistent results do we start layering in signals and more complex GTM workflows.

Not before.

Please always remember: Simplicity scales.

Here are some GTM trends I've noticed over the past couple of months. 

1. The gap between those that are and those that are not is getting bigger

Some orgs just get it. They move at speed, adopt the latest and greatest, rework systems consistently, build teams of winners and create environments they want to succeed in. Revenue leaders realise that their job is to destroy obstacles in the way of their team. Whether that means reducing time spent on non revenue generating activity, better data, better tools, better training, better offers, better marketing, better people. It doesn't matter. They can see every step of their funnel and know exactly where to zero in and fix. 

Other orgs don't. I speak to lots of them. They are bogged down in minutiae, only coming round to ideas that were popular 2 years ago and don't have the agency or authority to make rapid changes. They have antiquated systems, their reps are burned out and 1 week away from quitting and they have no idea what to do. It's like they've got themselves bogged down in quicksand and every time they move they become more stuck.  

2. AI = great equaliser. 

Everybody on planet earth has access to AI. That means anyone can do account research, write scripts, create emails, write posts etc etc. So then what becomes the great differentiator? You. What's in your head right now, the way you talk, the way you right, the things you notice, the trends you pick up. You are AI. The best GTM operators are using AI for the bullsh*t stuff that bogs you down. They also hyper focus on what they consume so they can finetune themselves. Soft skills are going to be the thing that means you'll succeed or not succeed in the next 5 years. 

3. Automation isn't that important. 

I hyper-focussed on automation a lot over the past few years. I was always thinking about what I could focus on for a few hours that would save me massive time in the future. Did that have an affect on my bottom line? I don't think so. What did? The manual stuff. Hand writing a Linkedin post, creating a graphic, quality testing a list, segmenting data, doing proper market research, power dialing a list (one-by-one), having conversations with my market. These all made big improvements to my bottom line. The key for me is stripping down the workflow to key tasks that are worth spending time on; List building, qualification, data, conversations. 

Curious to hear what everyone else is seeing atm?

I speak to so many companies with bloated tech stacks that eat into their budget every year.

$20k on this... $30k on that 

All for tools that sit underutilised and ignored by reps. 

Here's what I know. 

Reps don't want more tools. 

They want simplicity. 

They want to log on each day, and execute on workflows that make sense and ultimately - make them money. 

So how do we do that? 

1. Elite revops: 

- Map your TAM and enrich every persona in your market with the best data on the market (it's worths splashing a bit of cash on this) 
- If you're prospecting in the US, use a tool like TitanX to rank your data so your reps can be more efficient and have more conversations. 

2. Decide a simple cadence 

- You sell HR software, you don't need a 43 step special ops delta force extraction plan. 
- Call up each segment, connect with them on Linkedin and if needs be send an email 

3. Use a good dialer

- The tool a rep is most engaged with is their dialer (or should be anyway). 
- Get a good dialer like Trellus (YC W22) and make calling enjoyable. 

4. Create battle cards for each persona / segment 

- Have an elevator pitch and discovery matrix for each persona we've segmented from your ICP. 
- This removes any mental burden from the rep, they just need to speak and then listen. 

---

CRO's, VP of sales; You can do this with 4-5 tools, keep a bunch of budget, keep headcount low and then have a much bigger ROI on your quota ;) 

Everyone loves the guy who cuts cost and generates more revenue. 

Looks good on the CV and you'll want to refer us to all your friends.

I run a GTM business. I've learnt a few things.

Here they are: 

1. Volume doesn't solve anything

Volume is a fix for people who don't know what they are doing. Zero point in scaling volume if it didn't work in the first place. 

This goes for email, the phone & scaling headcount.

2. If the workflow is unclear, the team will create their own

SDR's will create their own workflow to maximise their income. Sometimes they are good, often they suck. Find the good ones and standardise it across the org to reduce variance and key person dependencies. 

3. Most outbound fails before the first email is sent

When teams put minimal effort into ICP definition, list building, value props, scripts etc campaigns flop then sales leaders blame the channel. 

4. Tool ownership is underrated.

If no one owns the list quality, deliverability, replies, and feedback loops then expensive tools become underutilised. 

Set clear expectations of who owns what in the funnel. 

5. Signals beats personalisation (Sometimes)

Signals and personalisation are buzz words. 

What matters most is having an offer that people actually want to buy.

Once established you can then layer on signals to reach out at opportune times. 

6. Your best rep is showing you the future

If one person is consistently winning, reverse engineer what they are doing before they leave and create a workflow you can place any rep into. 

Happy Friday :)

Andrew Osborne

2026 is the year of Allbound. Allow me to reintroduce Understory.

We were the first ever allbound agency with an emphasis on both GTM engineering and paid media.

We're a team of nearly 35 experts building bespoke marketing strategies for over 100 B2B businesses.

Here's what we do:

GTM Engineering & Audience Building

We write custom scripts for data scraping. We identify triggers and signals. Job changes. Funding rounds. Tech stack additions. Hiring patterns. Website visits. As a Clay studio partner for three years, we parse, organize, and segment all of that data to create hyper-targeted audiences that power both paid and outbound. We also do full-blown Clay implementations.

Paid Media
LinkedIn Ads, Google Ads, Meta Ads, Reddit Ads, YouTube Ads. Thought leader ads, conversational ads, document ads, branded search, competitor keywords, retargeting. Higher quality lists with higher match rates, and near zero waste.

Outbound Email & LinkedIn
Hyper targeted campaigns with punchy copywriting, optimized for deliverability and landing in the primary inbox. Messages personalized based on exact triggers and specific business pain pulled from news, 10Ks, LinkedIn posts, and how you solve it.

Thought Leadership Content
Graphics, text posts, light video editing. Content that builds trust and earns follows.

RevOps in HubSpot
Workflows that sync data from every channel. Dashboards that show the entire lifecycle of marketing events. Attribution that actually works.

Your audience sees your content, your ads, your outbound messages. When they search, you're there. Every touchpoint flows into workflows that convert leads into customers.

This is the same system that scaled us to nearly 35 team members and multiple millions in revenue.

If you're not running allbound in 2026, you're leaving revenue on the table.

This is tailored for businesses that have found product-market fit and have a budget to scale with a premium partner.

If this resonates, head to our website and book a call. You'll speak with the founders directly.

Your Clay workflows are probably inefficient and it's costing you time and credits.

Here's what I see all the time.

Teams default to Claygent for everything.

Need to scrape a website? Claygent.
Need to pull structured data? Claygent.

But here's the thing.

Claygent is powerful, but it's not always the right tool for the job.

Especially when you're scraping structured data at scale or dealing with sites that have heavy anti-bot protections.

That's where Firecrawl comes in.

I just recorded a walkthrough showing exactly where Firecrawl outperforms Claygent and how to know when to use each one.

Now in most cases, Claygent has you covered

Though when it comes to workflows where you want top accuracy and fine control, Firecrawl will likely be the better option

It's about using the right tool for the right job.

Not just defaulting to what's already in your stack.

Check the detailed video below 👇

BetterContact recently released their Lead Finder API.
It's pretty insane.

At Understory, we do a lot more than just outbound campaigns.

We also handle RevOps implementations that enable our clients' sales teams to be more efficient.

And this new API unlocks a really simple but incredibly effective use case.

I'm monitoring new connections that get accepted through HeyReach.io and immediately mapping out their entire sales org.

Which means the moment someone accepts my connection request, I can reach out with actual relevance.

Not guesswork.

You know who reports to them, who they report to, and who else on their team might be worth talking to.

I recorded a quick walkthrough showing exactly how this works.

Same principle as Monday's post. Simple system. Modular steps.

If you're doing any sort of account-based outreach, this one's worth watching.

Hope this helps 👍

And big thanks to Roman Hipp for letting me give it a swing!

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