Joshua Perk 👻's Linkedin Analytics

The huge difference between sales and marketing comp plans has always left me scratching my head. Traditionally, salespeople earn more due to the perceived risk and difficulty of closing deals. Meanwhile, marketers are left grappling with outdated comp models that don’t reflect their evolving roles and the fact that our accountability goes far beyond qualified leads. More and more, marketers: - are measured on pipeline generation or direct revenue - oversee BDR teams as a means to build that pipeline - must increase pipeline AND prospect quality with smaller budgets and fewer resources At the same time, sales compensation structures could benefit from lower commission-based risk. Why? Because enabling sellers to prioritize long-term decisions for the business over chasing short-term gains can massively improve outcomes. Marketing and sales compensation models should evolve TOGETHER to drive better, more aligned business outcomes. What if we flipped the script? - Sales: Higher base, lower variable = more freedom to build long-term relationships - Marketing: Higher variable tied to pipeline/revenue = better alignment with business outcomes What do you think? Are we valuing marketers and salespeople the right way?

Lots of CEOs think brand marketing is a fluffy waste of money. "Just fill out forms and create pipeline." I am not one of those CEOs. Something critical I’ve learned building Vector: your brand creates trust INSTANTLY. Within 2 seconds of landing on your site or consuming your content, prospects make subconscious decisions: - Can I trust these people? - Do they understand my problems? - Will they and their product make me look good? Think about how you eat - your nose and eyes make decisions before your taste buds ever get involved. Buying works the same way. And this applies to EVERY company: If you're selling enterprise security, your site needs to FEEL secure and trustworthy before a prospect reads a single feature description. If you're selling creative tools, your brand needs to radiate creativity and out-of-the-box thinking before buyers ever see product UI. Your brand is either building trust or creating doubt - there's no in between. It works 24/7, scales infinitely, and creates a foundation that makes every other marketing and sales effort more effective. So while your competitors focus only on conversion rates, invest in brand. Because a conversion rate for someone who already trusts you? That's the difference between fighting for every deal and having prospects ready to buy before sales ever reaches out.

You want to know who CRUSHES IT with Contact-Based Marketing? 👇 After watching hundreds of marketing teams implement CBM, I've noticed a pattern in the ones that see insane results: 1️⃣ They've been BURNED by ABM before. These marketers spent YEARS betting their careers on ABM. They stood in boardrooms promising personalized experiences for target accounts. They invested in all the tech... only to be over-promised and under-delivered. Now they're FIRED UP discovering they can actually see the specific humans showing intent. They're not just guessing anymore! 2️⃣ They build cross-functional alignment. The most successful teams don't silo CBM to just the "ABM person." They get buy-in across: - Demand gen - Content creators - Growth marketing - Digital/performance teams - Revenue teams When everyone understands how contact-level data makes THEIR job better, magic happens. 3️⃣ They obsess over the HUMAN journey. Instead of "here's our campaign for Account X," they're thinking: "Sarah from Account X is researching competitor solutions - what's the exact experience she needs right now?" 4️⃣ They're goaled on revenue. These teams have already made the mental shift from "we measure success by blog posts and backlinks" to "we measure success by pipeline and revenue." 5️⃣ They connect ALL marketing activities. The best teams understand that content, ads, events, and sales outreach ALL work better when coordinated around the same contact signals. Here's the truth: Accounts don't buy software. People do. The marketers who get this - who can look inside an account and orchestrate experiences based on where ACTUAL HUMANS are in their journey - these are the teams leaving their competition in the dust.

Did you catch Forrester's latest "buyer group intent" trend? 🤔 Let's cut through the MarTech buzzword jungle for a second... "Buyer group intent" sounds cool - like we finally solved the mystery of WHO at your target accounts is actually researching. But here's the frustrating reality: It's just account-level intent with extra assumptions. Here's how it works: 1. They see activity from an IP address (a company) 2. They analyze WHAT that anonymous person researched 3. They make MASSIVE assumptions about who they might be: "Oh, they researched board docs = must be an executive!" "They looked up HubSpot help articles = must be junior!" But they STILL don't know WHO it actually was! 🤦‍♂️ When you're selling into large enterprises with 5+ marketing execs or 10+ security leaders, you're STILL GUESSING which one showed intent. This is why contact-level intent is revolutionary. We don't guess - we use device fingerprinting to identify the EXACT person showing intent. The difference? - Account-level/buyer group: "Someone at Acme Corp is researching, probably an executive!" - Contact-level: "Sarah Johnson, VP of Marketing at Acme Corp, is researching." It’s 2025. When you're deciding where to invest ad spend, which accounts to focus on, or who sales should prioritize… shouldn’t you be working with real data instead of educated guesses?

"OMG! Sarah from Acme just visited our pricing page! Quick - send a sales email saying WE SAW YOU ON OUR SITE!" Stop. Breathe. Don't be that person. Just because you CAN see exactly who's on your site doesn't mean you should immediately act on it. The power of contact-level data isn't for instant gratification - it's for creating SERENDIPITY over time. Think about your own experience: You mention dog food to your partner, and suddenly Instagram serves you perfectly timed dog food ads. THAT'S the experience you should create for your buyers. When someone first shows intent: ✅ Meet them where they’re at to build awareness ✅ Nurture with content that matches their interests ✅ Serve relevant ads that feel like perfect timing Only when they've shown consistent, strong intent should sales reach out - and even then, the conversation should feel natural: "We've noticed companies like yours are exploring solutions in this space... would you be open to a conversation?" The goal isn't a quick meeting. It's making your buyers feel like you're reading their minds somehow. Contact-level data gives you superpowers. Use them responsibly.

Your brand should be more mirror than megaphone 🪞 I've been watching a curious trend on LinkedIn lately - companies slinging dirt at competitors, posting "us vs. them" comparisons, and playing the "we're better than XYZ" game. Does it work? Sure... for SOME personas. At Vector, we market to what we call "adult marketers." These are senior professionals who don't come to LinkedIn for entertainment or founder beefs. They're looking for solutions they can confidently recommend to their organizations. They need to see THEMSELVES in your brand. This realization has completely shaped our approach: 1️⃣ We balance creativity with professionalism. Our prospects need to envision themselves making recommendations that will be taken seriously in enterprise settings. But they're still marketers who value creativity and innovation. 2️⃣ We make deliberate design choices. We didn't pick a boring blue. We don't use square borders. Our mascot is a gosh dang ghost. When you land on our site, it feels different - because our buyers are different. A creative marketer sees us and thinks: "These people get me." 3️⃣ We focus on product excellence over competitor bashing. Our buyers don't care about founder drama. They care about bringing solutions that make THEM look good internally. You're subliminally winning the buyer before they even discover what your product does. They see themselves reflected in your brand and think: "These are my people." Look at your marketing honestly - does it mirror your ideal customer? Or is it just broadcasting what YOU think is important?

Targeting B2B buyers in B2C ad channels is HARD! #BurnDatBudget I'm so excited to announce Vector 👻 can now create contact-level ad audiences natively in Google! You heard that right — no more broad audiences, no more wasted spend. Tell us who you want to see yours ads. Done. Better yet: - Pair it with Vector's contact-level intent to only show interested buyers your ads - Pair it with Vector's ad reveal to see who's clicking your ad but not filling out the form We out here savin' marketing budgets!!!

I'm a believer in marketing but was skeptical of event sponsorships. "Can't I just show up and have as many conversations for 10% of the price?" Yes, probably. But here's the 3 things I learned standing at Vector 👻's first sponsored booth yesterday for 12 hours (my feet hurt) @ #PavilionCMOSummit. 1️⃣ 𝗧𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗟𝗲𝘅𝗮𝗽𝗿𝗼 I'm a bit anxious and not always the life of the party. In the first few hours of any event, attendees aren't fired up to get pounced on by vendors. Mix in my social awkwardness and it made for a morning of slowness. Between sessions I decided I HAD to make the most of our investment, even if it was outside of my love language. I hunkered down, started having great conversations, and ended up really enjoying it! (Until I saw Jon Miller. That was scary. Dude's a legend.) 2️⃣ 𝗕𝗲 𝗩𝗘𝗥𝗬 𝗱𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝘁 Our booth felt a little abnormal. Colorful. Creative swag. No screens for demos. Turns out, marketers kinda love that (who woulda' thought?!) In fact, Kyle Lacy came up to our booth to chat about our Marketers Against Humanity parody card game, showed us that his team had done the EXACT thing for engineers years ago, and then casuallyyyy talked about us on stage 🤯 3️⃣ 𝗖𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗵𝘂𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗱𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗶𝘀 𝗱𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗺𝘆 Perhaps I could have had the same conversations as an attendee, but our booth served as a beacon for current customers to come up and rave about how much they love Vector! Not only was this SO humbling but having potential prospects hear Katie Berg 🔎 and Elaine Zelby talk about how they're building incredible CBM programs using Vector was ELECTRIC. Hopefully Trinity Nguyen💎 and Alina Vandenberghe 🌶️ overheard 👀🤣 I loved spending so much time with Talya, Corrina, 🎁 Katie, and so many other incredible marketers! Can't wait to run it back with Aaron and Sam again!

Intent is BS. It's a guess. "Someone at this company is showing intent for X topic." But we've never been able to hold those intent providers accountable for account-level intent because: 1. They don't tell you exactly WHO is showing intent 2. They make you guess about what intent even means "Intent" is a 4-letter word because legacy ABM providers have hidden behind black box algorithms that can't be attributed. UNTIL NOW! 🔥 I'm super excited to announce Vector 👻's latest punch to old school ABM: our 𝐈𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐅𝐫𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐲 settings. We're honest about how we define "Intent"... some read an article or searched something related to the topic you care about. Does that mean they're ready to buy? Hell no. We give marketers raw access to CONTACT-level signals and allow THEM to define what determines someone is truly searching for a solution to their problem. Goodbye, guessing!

Bane of my existence. Why does it pop up 27 times in a row?! That's all.

This is my favorite part of being a CEO. Other than spending every day working with some of the smartest people I've ever met, I end my night (when the kids are in bed & the wife is scrolling TikTok) by writing up some letters of appreciation to our customers and folks who've helped guide Vector 👻 to what it is today). I hate my handwriting (I wrote a lot of sentences as punishment as a kids so I've been trained for speed, not accuracy 😂). But I love making sure there's a personal touch to these people who've helped us building something incredible. Just a little wholesomeness to start your day! Let's get it! 🫶🏼

Today we're officially unveiling our integration with @ Common Room - and it's going to completely change how you think about website signals and buyer intent. Here's what's happening: For Vector users → You've been getting amazing contact-level website signals from us for free, but now you can instantly:  • Orchestrate those signals alongside 50+ other buying signals  • Surface the right prospects to the right reps (no more wires crossed!)  • Create automated plays that actually drive pipeline For Common Room users → You're about to get a massive upgrade to your signal coverage:  • Up to 50% hit rates for US-based traffic  • Up to 2X deanonymization rates  • Uncover the 70% of buying intent you're currently missing 😱 We built this because marketers and sellers have been flying blind for too long. You're either: 1️⃣ Getting website alerts but struggling to turn them into pipeline 2️⃣ Building complex plays but missing critical intent signals This solves both problems instantly. The best part? Vector's free tier works seamlessly with Common Room right out of the box. No crazy, complex implementation required. This partnership takes contact-level intent and signal-based prospecting to a whole new level. So you can stop guessing, stop chasing ghosts, and start closing real buyers.

The hard truth about category creation: a lesson from my time at Drift Elias Torres (Drift, co-founder) recently said something on the 20VC podcast that struck me: he called Drift his "biggest failure." Weird statement for a company with a billion-dollar outcome, right? But I understood EXACTLY what he meant. From the outside, Drift looked like a rocket ship - amazing brand, disruptive marketing, category creation. But internally, we made a critical mistake: We fell in love with our own story instead of our customers' problems. We spent MONTHS building decks about being "category creators" while our customers were thinking: "We don't care that you had a cool logo and threw great events 7 years ago. How does that solve MY problem?" Meanwhile, Qualified came along with laser focus on what customers actually wanted. Their team got Salesforce certified, built deep integrations, and crafted a narrative that spoke directly to customer pain: "If you use Salesforce, you NEED Qualified." Was their product actually better? Nope. But their story and customer focus won. The painful lesson? As a category creator, the category is YOURS TO LOSE. At Vector, this shapes everything we do: - Yes, we're building the Contact-Based Marketing category - But we obsess over substance, not story - We ship features at lightning speed - We never rest on our laurels Your category creation story might look great in investor decks, but it doesn't solve a single customer problem. Enterprise buyers don't care if you were first. They care if you're BEST at solving their specific challenges right now.