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 :)

Dhruv Patel

Co-founder @ Saleshandy

Hey there,  

I'm a guy who wears many hats, and I like it that way! 

My marketing journey kicked off at a company where I managed a team of over 25 folks as the Marketing Lead and Operations Manager. 

But my itch for something more took me down the road of content and niche marketing. That's how I ended up co-creating Saleshandy, a place where I'm still enjoying the ride and helping the company grow.

I'm a marketing junkie and a business starter, and I get my kicks from companies that encourage teamwork and don't put up roadblocks to success. I live to meet and exceed what customers want. I keep a close eye on the results and always tinkering with my game plan based on what's needed. When things go south, I don't get bent out of shape; I see it as a chance to learn. I take a good, hard look at what went wrong, figure out why, and then cook up solutions based on the facts.

As a growth hacker and digital marketing buff, I thrive on the hustle and meet life with a never-say-die attitude. My constant grin shows my love for creating strong teams and my readiness to lend a hand at the drop of a hat.

So here I am, a Co-founder at Saleshandy, extending an invitation for you to join me on this wild ride as we take over the marketing world, one success story at a time. 

Let's get together and see how we can help each other grow. What do you say?

Co-Founder

Saleshandy is a cold outreach platform that helps B2B businesses automate and scale their outbound sales efforts. 

» I am the person responsible for
- majority of marketing stuff
- people management
- developing and implementing systems & procedures throughout the organization
- operations

I’m 32. Married. A daily 90-minute commute. A toddler at home. 

All while running a leading cold email outreach platform.

People usually ask me one thing:

“How do you manage everything?”

The honest answer?

I don’t.

> I don’t chase balance.
> I don’t try to win every day.
> I don’t pretend all weeks look the same.

What actually works for me:

• Hard boundaries, not perfect schedules

Some days work wins. Some days family wins. I simply decide which one it is.

• Energy over hours

I protect the few hours where I think clearly. Everything else is secondary.

• Fewer decisions

Same routines. Same defaults. Less mental noise.

• Letting go of guilt

You can’t be fully present everywhere. Accepting that changed everything.

Running a business isn’t about doing more.

It’s about choosing what not to do—consistently.

Take it from me.

If you pour everything into running the business,

Ten years from now you’ll have hundreds of proofs of success—

And countless gaps in your life you can’t explain to anyone else.

Co-founder @ Saleshandy | Automating cold emails to drive lead generation & sales

First big release of 2026: Saleshandy MCP is live!

Most of us start our day inside AI, so we brought Saleshandy right there.

You can now run your entire cold email workflow from the places you already work, 

ChatGPT, Claude, Cursor, n8n, and more...using the MCP server.

It takes just a few clicks to connect Saleshandy with your AI assistant.

Once connected, you can do everything from creating multi-step sequences to building full apps using real Saleshandy data through tools like Cursor.

The possibilities are exciting!

Huge thanks to the team for making this happen.

Really excited to see what you all build with it.

What’s the first thing you’d try with Saleshandy MCP? 👇

If I had a dollar for every sales rep chasing the wrong metric in outbound, I’d already be on the Forbes Billionaires list.

I’m not kidding. 

Many still run after metrics like they’re the finish line. 

But unfortunately, that’s just part of the game. 

>Open Rate doesn’t mean your prospect knows you—it shows the effectiveness of your subject line. 
>Reply Rate doesn’t mean you’ll close sales—only a small fraction show real interest. 
>Click Rate doesn’t mean your prospect is sold—it only shows they were curious enough to click. 
>Spam Rate doesn’t mean your message is bad—it just shows who’s annoyed, or which ISPs are watching you. 
>Deliverability doesn’t mean success—it only tells you your emails landed, not that they mattered. 
>Unsubscribe Rate doesn’t mean failure—it often signals your list is cleaning itself, and that’s not always bad.

Don’t give your team a number to hit.

Give them a goal that actually matters: Real engagement.

The sole goal of outbound is to start a conversation.

Let’s keep the main thing the main thing.

I keep seeing outbound teams stuck in delulu.

They swing between two extremes:

• Blindly sending as many emails as possible
• Or over-personalizing emails for 20 people

Both think they’ve figured outbound.

Most haven’t.

Because outbound isn’t about volume vs personalization.

It’s about your TAM.

Volume-based makes sense when:

> I’m testing a new market or PMF
> My product has a short consideration cycle
> My deal size supports high-velocity sales
> I have proven templates that convert
> I need to fill an empty pipeline fast
> My market is broad and less sophisticated

Value-based makes sense when:

> I’m targeting enterprise or strategic accounts
> My product needs education and trust
> My deal size justifies deep research
> I’m in a competitive, saturated market
> I’m building long-term positioning
> My buyers are sophisticated and over-pitched

Nothing here is good or bad.

It’s not about what sounds right.

It’s about what works best for your market.

I don’t believe cold emails can always be taught through tutorials.

Sometimes…

memes teach better.

This carousel shows 6 golden cold email moments every cold email lived through:

If you’ve done outbound for a while,

you’ll probably nod at more than one slide.

It’s Friday.

So let’s keep it light.

But if one slide changes how you write on Monday,

it’s already worth the save.

Happy weekend.

6 Golden Cold Emails 

I would call this a principle rather than advice. Because it will help you survive in almost everything:

- Outbound
- Business
- Relationships
- Even life

 It is: Give before you take.

Most people say they want growth, but what they really want is output without input.

- Recognition without contribution
- Trust without proof
- Results without patience

But the sad truth is—
That equation never works.

Growth demands payment upfront.
 
 You give effort before you see momentum.
 You give clarity before you get alignment.
 You give value before people give you attention.
 You give trust before it comes back stronger.

This applies everywhere:

 In careers — you invest in skills long before titles show up.
 In leadership — you support people before they follow you.
 In business — you solve problems before revenue appears.
 In relationships — you listen before you’re understood.

So if you want growth, 

Ask yourself a harder question:

What value are you putting into the system every day that says what you’re trying to take out?

Because nothing meaningful is free.

Everything has a price,

And everyone has to pay it.

P.S. But this image tells a different story — my daughter ignoring the principle and going straight for my sunglasses.

In outbound, I’ve seen many teams panic after a few days of no replies.

But they’re reading it all wrong.

They try everything.
- New subject line.
- New copy.
- New sequence.

Nothing changes.

Because the issue wasn’t the email.

It was the assumption.

Not all silence means “not interested.”

Sometimes:
 • the timing is off
 • the message missed their world
 • the trust isn’t there yet

Understanding the type of silence makes all the difference.

If you count every quiet inbox as rejection,

You’ll never stop counting.

Outbound works when you respect where the prospect is—

not where you want them to be.

See silence as a signal, and outbound gets a lot easier.

The top 1% don’t expect replies. They engineer them.

Yes, replies are never luck or coincidence.

There’s a clear science behind them,

And it works in your favor when you understand it.

When outreach is designed without:

 • a clear reason to exist
 • a defined outcome
 • feedback loops

You don’t get signal — you get noise.

That’s why scaling outbound early feels random.
 
- One week it works.
- The next week it dies.
 
No one knows why.

Sometimes, frameworks like RAID help a lot.

They simply remove the guesswork from the equation.

Without guesswork, you can point to where something broke —

attention, intent, or measurement.

Now you can finally stop reacting and start correcting.

So the next time you refresh your screen for the 10th time, expecting replies from your outbound campaign,
 
Remember the first line of this post.

People ask me what my biggest cold email motivation is. It is this.

A simple experiment that brought home $13M.

You think the output is great?

Think again.

It is actually the input.
 
There was no clever copy.
 No personalization tokens.
 No growth hacks.

> a clearly defined audience
> a reason to reach out now
> a single, obvious next step

That’s it.

I know

 •  inboxes are noisier than ever
 • competition is brutal
 • deliverability isn’t optional anymore

But… believe me,

The fundamentals haven’t moved an inch.

Get the basics right & the rest will fall in place.

Proven by history already.

And you know, “History repeats.”

First cold email that made $13M

You can give all the logic in the world to your buyer… 
but they won’t care a cent about it. 

Because humans decide emotionally first, then justify with logic. 

Yet most cold emails are written for rationality: 

>Features. 
>Processes. 
>Explanations.

Your prospect doesn’t wake up thinking about your product.

They wake up with pressure, doubt, and 100 unfinished problems. 

That's why: Emotion opens the door; logic closes the deal.

Keep cold emails 70% emotional:

• Time it—after industry changes, losses, or gains.
• Reduce effort at every line.
• Lead with “no” before explaining.
• Focus on one emotion.
• Leave the emotional portion unresolved.

Emotion shows in: Subject line, first line, pre-pitch bridge, problem framing.

Keep it 30% logical:

• Remove doubt, don’t add reasons.
• Prefer direction over detail.
• Explain mechanisms only when asked.

Logic shows in: Value proposition, proof, differentiation, CTA.

Small tweaks make a huge difference: 

>Mirror your prospect, 
>Name the pain, 
>Lower emotional cost, 
>And stick to one emotion per email. 

If your email makes sense but gets no replies

You didn’t lose on logic. 

You lost on emotion.

The first thing I tell users NOT to do when targeting a global audience: Using the same email for the US and the EU.

Every time I say this, the conversation goes the same way.

“No, Dhruv, I edited the email before sending it.”

Me: What edits did you make?

Them: Changed the spellings for the EU.

And that’s it.

Here’s the real problem:
 
When a high-performing US email fails in the EU,
 
It’s not an infrastructure issue.

What changes isn’t just the language or demographics.

The entire ICP mindset changes.

And if you don’t understand that,

Every click on “send” quietly burns your cash.

Comment “strategies” i will send you customized cold email strategies for both the demographics.

Most of the people I have ever met are eager to fix others' flaws. But not theirs. 

But growth waits on the other side. 

Where you find the cost of your strengths.

Yes. the cost of your strengths AKA your flaws 

We all have & know what our strengths are. 

But we hardly know 

What are the costs of it? 

It took me years to find out mine. 

Here are four exercises I keep coming back to:

1. The “If I were replaced” exercise
 Ask: If I left tomorrow, what would break immediately?
 That shows your strengths.

 Then ask: What would suddenly feel lighter?
 That shows your flaws.

2. Energy audit
 Track what drains you for a week.
 Energy loss is often feedback your brain already has.

3. Feedback triangulation
 Don’t trust one opinion.

Take it from me, 

The higher you climb in your career ladder. 

The lesser feedbacks you get 

And that’s not good news. 

Feedbacks are the great way to grow. 

Start asking for it. 

4. Negative Externality lens

 Every strength creates a cost somewhere else.

Here is a simple example 

Strength: You stay updated on news and trends. 

Cost: You get distracted, tasks take longer, or miss face-to-face interactions.

Don’t pay your strengths with your flaws. 

If it is not you who fix you 

It is nobody 


P.S: not all flaws needs to be fixed. Few makes you unique & few makes you pay for your strength.

There are two categories where a cold email fails.

Let’s talk about the second one—the least talked about.

It fails outside the inbox.

It fails outside the brain.

There are thousands of blogs, lectures, and tips on how to make it to the inbox.

But what about the emails that do land there—and still fail?

They fail because the brain never lets them in.

So the real question isn’t:
 “How good is my copy?”

It’s:
 “Did their brain decide this was meant for them?”

To pass that test, you need three things:

1. Anchor to something concrete

If you can’t point to one real thing that recently changed for them, wait.

2. Create a mental speed bump

When something feels slightly unexpected, the brain slows down.

Overlap, shared context, or a specific angle buys you a second.

3. Show you noticed, not that you researched

There’s a difference.
- One feels respectful.
- The other feels invasive.

If it wouldn’t sound normal face-to-face, remove it.

Simply put:

If you want to increase the chance of a sale,

Impress the brain you’re aiming for.

That’s what changes the game.

Rowan Atkinson once talked about a quote  that stayed in my head all day.

The quote is:

“Life is a tragedy in close-up and a comedy in long shot.”
 — Charlie Chaplin

That’s it.

And it says everything.

Most tragedies feel like tragedies because of the shot.

When I was in school,

Math felt like a huge tragedy.

When I look at it now,

It feels like nothing.

Every “tragedy” in close-up becomes a turning point in long shot.

- The feature that failed.
- The product rebuild that felt like wasted time.
- The customer who left angry.

What changes when you zoom out is not the problem—
 
It’s the perspective.

- You stop catastrophizing.
- You realize this moment—
 
No matter how painful— is just one frame in a much longer story.

And often, the frames that hurt the most

are the ones that redirect you toward something better.

When you’re in the close-up, feel it.

Don’t pretend it’s not hard.

But also remember:

You’re not watching the whole movie yet.

The tragedy you’re living through

Might be the setup for the comedy you’ll laugh about later.

What “tragedy” are you living in close-up right now?

It's Day 3 of 2026, and my LinkedIn feed is flooded.

"10 Skills to Learn in 2026" 
"12 Books to Read This Year" 
"5 Goals to Achieve"

But I won’t suggest 10 or 5. 

Just ONE skill.. 

Cold email 

It is not new, not trendy

But here's what I know after 10 years:

Most people still don't understand the power cold email holds.

- They think it's dead. 
- They think it's spam. 
- They think it's for salespeople only.

Wrong.

Cold email is for:

- Founders who need their first 10 customers
- Consultants who need clients beyond referrals
- Recruiters who need candidates who aren't on job boards
- Partnerships people who need intros without warm connections
- Startup owners who need funding 

It's not a "sales skill." 

It's a business survival skill.

Trends that you follow will change. 

But the ability to generate your own opportunities?

That's timeless.

The real problem in outbound isn't low replies. 

It’s misreading what replies mean.

I’ve noticed something simple:

Replies are no longer a decision signal.

They’re a filtering signal.

People reply to sort their inbox:
yes / no
now / later
me / not me

That’s useful.

But it’s not interest.

Interest shows up differently.

You see it when someone:
- corrects you
- adds nuance
- pushes back thoughtfully
- takes time to explain their situation

Those replies take effort.

And effort is the signal.

This changes how outbound should be written.

Not to get a reply,

but to invite thinking.

Emails that work now:
- make a specific observation
- leave room to disagree
- ask something that can’t be answered with one tap

When someone has to think before replying,

you’re no longer doing outbound.

You’re starting a conversation.

The goal isn’t more replies.

It’s better effort from the right people.

That’s the shift most teams haven’t made yet.

You won't believe me for saying this, but you do need luck in outbound.

Luck in cold emails is not anything random.

It’s the side effect of showing up often enough, in the right places, with enough relevance.

Don’t treat outbound like lottery tickets.

> One big send.
> One version.
> One moment in time.

But buying decisions don’t happen on your schedule.

- Budgets open unexpectedly.
- Priorities shift quietly.
- Internal pressure shows up without warning.

The teams that “get lucky” didn’t predict any of it.

They just stayed visible long enough for timing to work in their favor.

Here’s the real split:

You can’t control when someone is ready.
 
But you can control how often you’re present when that moment arrives.

Consistency does three things most people underestimate:

 • It multiplies timing overlap.
 • It builds passive familiarity before intent exists.
 • It removes pressure from any single email to be perfect.

So the next time you see someone “getting lucky” in outbound,

Remember—they didn’t get lucky fast.

They stayed long enough to get lucky.

There’s one skill you can’t avoid—no matter your role.

Selling.

- Not sales targets.
-  Not cold calls.
- Not pipelines.

Selling means this:

Can you get someone to say yes to your idea?


Because that’s what decides outcomes every day.

A founder doesn’t win by being right.

They win by getting others to believe.

An engineer doesn’t ship the best solution.

They ship the one the team aligns behind.

A designer doesn’t lose to bad design.

They lose when they can’t defend good decisions.

If you can’t sell, you don’t lead.
 - You don’t influence.
 - You don’t move things forward.

I’ve seen average ideas win—purely because they were explained well.
 And I’ve seen great ideas die—because no one fought for them.

Ideas don’t fail on quality.

They fail on conviction.

Real selling isn’t manipulation.

It’s understanding what someone cares about—and connecting your idea to that reality.

You’re already selling.
  - Every email.
  - Every meeting.
  - Every conversation.

The only question is:

 Are you doing it deliberately or leaving outcomes to chance?

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The Battle

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