CEO @ Refine Labs | The B2B Demand Generation Agency

I create the conditions for people, customers and companies to be successful. 

Over my 20+ year career, I have built and scaled go-to-market teams at eChalk, ZocDoc, Grubhub/Seamless (IPO: 2014), ManagedbyQ (WeWork Acquisition: 2019) and Platterz. 

In 2020, I teamed up with the Founder of Refine Labs to change the way B2B companies go-to-market.

Today, I am the CEO of Refine Labs, A B2B Demand Generation Agency.

Refine Labs helps mid-market and enterprise B2B SaaS companies change the way they measure and execute marketing. Our demand strategies drive qualified leads, maximize ROI, and reduce acquisition costs for profitable, sustainable growth.

Learn more by visiting:

- Website: www.refinelabs.com

- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@refine_labs

- Refine Labs Podcast Stacking Growth: https://open.spotify.com/show/68IrwrTAMubmi6lorDpT4c

- Sign up for Our Newsletter: https://www.refinelabs.com/newsletter

10 Things I Hate (and secretly Love) About Me

I’ve been thinking about all the contradictions that make us who we are

So here’s my list

1. I have really, really, really high expectations, of myself and everyone around me

2.  I’m a recovering people pleaser who still relapses sometimes

3. I’m too competitive for my own peace of mind

4. I’m impeccable with my word…which means I lose sleep when I can’t follow through

5. I chase clarity like it’s oxygen, when going with the flow may serve me better 

6. I never give up - even when I probably should

7. I hold grudges while trying hard to forgive (still working on it)

8. I hold on tightly and let go lightly - I’m all in until I’m not, then I’m fully out

9. I’m a practical problem solver and a student of spirituality - equal parts logic and intuition

10. I love doing the hard things…and I love venting about doing them just as much

Sometimes your flaws are just your strengths turned up too high - the trick is learning how to use them intentionally

Megan Bowen

CEO @ Refine Labs | B2B Demand Gen Agency

If you want a crash course in how I think about modern B2B GTM, our latest Stacking Growth podcast episode covers a lot:

How B2B buying has changed

From cold calls and trade shows in the 90s, to the website era, to dark social, to the early AI era. The tactics changed, but the constants are awareness, trust, and word of mouth.

Why your strategy has to start with your buyer

Not “best practices” - where your buyer spends time on this maturity curve should drive your GTM. Not the other way around.

ICP and Strategic Narrative 

Most companies have an aspirational ICP and a completely different customer list. We talked about using data to define your ICP, building a target account list, and aligning product, sales, and marketing around one story.

Brand, Demand, Expand as a system

Brand to get known and remembered. Demand to turn intent into pipeline. Expand to grow and retain the customers you already fought to win. Most companies overfund demand and ignore expand.

Measurement that finance will actually respect

Share of search, split/blended funnel, pipeline sources, self-reported attribution – and why attribution alone will always be an incomplete truth.

If you’re tired of overcomplicated marketing takes and want to get back to the basics that actually drive profitable growth, listen to our latest episode

There’s a quiet pressure a lot of marketing and revenue leaders won’t admit out loud

You’re being asked to hit increasingly aggressive targets using a measurement model that hasn’t kept up with how buyers actually buy

Last-touch attribution looks clean on a dashboard

It gives executives a sense of control

It feels safe to finance

But it leaves marketers trying to reverse-engineer success inside a system that only rewards the last click, not the real journey

And here’s the truth I’ve seen up close:

Most leaders aren’t clinging to last touch because they’re stubborn

They’re clinging to it because they’re accountable for hitting a number and no one wants to walk into a board meeting empty handed

So let me offer the bridge:

You don’t have to blow up last touch tomorrow

You can operate within the current constraints while quietly building the system that will replace it

Here’s what that looks like in practice:

1. Hit the target with what you have

Use last touch as an operational reporting layer and experiment with direct response campaigns that may actually work (content offers that solve a real job, free tools and incentivized demos that are tightly targeted)  

2. Layer in reality, privately at first

Run parallel measurement: margin-based ROI, self-reported attribution, share-of-search, funnel velocity, win rate by source

Begin building the business case to leverage new and alternative measurement models 

3. Translate insights into CFO-friendly language

This isn’t about asking them to trust you or the strategy, it’s about contribution margin and acquisition efficiency

Finance will trust new models when they map to how the business actually works

4. Socialize the shift slowly

Show how a more modern model leads to better forecasting and less wasted spend

Make small changes to your strategy and continue to provide multiple views of reporting to paint a more holistic picture 

5. Create safety for change
 
Leaders adopt new measurement when they believe it reduces their risk

Your job is to build that confidence step by step

Because this isn’t really about attribution

It’s about enabling the business to make better decisions, with a fuller picture of what actually drives pipeline and revenue

And yes, moving away from last touch is hard, it takes time and it requires uncomfortable conversations

But you don’t have to choose between hitting your number today and modernizing your measurement for tomorrow

Smart leaders do both

Most performance marketing is just slightly fancier lead gen

In one of our latest Stacking Growth episodes, we focused on what actually drives pipeline now

🤘 Matthew Sciannella and Ky Shaw 🏹 went deep on 4 areas:

1. Three performance plays that are working right now

- Content offers that solve a real job

Examples: a “new hire compliance checklist by state” or a product request template - something tied to a line in your buyer’s job description, not another “State of X in 2025” PDF

- Free tools 

Reframe the ROI calculator around a question your buyer already has in their head: “What’s a fair 3PL price at my volume?” or “How big should my LinkedIn audience be and what results should I expect?” Then layer your unique data set on top so AI can’t replicate it in two seconds.

- Incentivized demos that are tightly targeted

Yes, we talked gift cards. The nuance: this only works when your ICP targeting is very tight and the problem framing is specific. Done right, it’s not bribery - it’s compensation for time that leads to real pipeline.

2. How to actually align with sales 

We framed it as a pipeline activation project, not a big company-wide transformation: 
- Work with 1–2 AEs or SDRs
- Agree on a named account list up front
- Share an SLA: fast follow-up, how they’ll reference the offer, what happens on the first call
- Meet weekly to review: which leads were qualified, how the conversations went, what to tweak in the offer or targeting

The goal is simple: sit on the same side of the table, looking at the same funnel, owning the same outcome

3. How to think about performance based on your market

We broke down the difference between:

- Novel solutions – you can lean more on product marketing and creative “show, don’t tell” content

- Crowded, competitive categories – you win with better offers and tighter ICP definition, not just more impressions

Your performance plays should match the reality of your market, not your desire to avoid direct response

4. What “good” performance actually looks like

We pushed on a few principles:

- The offer should map to a real problem in the job description, not just interest in the topic

- The conversion itself should be a buying signal (someone downloading a high-intent template vs. a generic industry report)

- Sales should be able to look at the conversion and say: “If someone did this, I definitely want to talk to them”

- Your follow-up should have continuity: “You downloaded X to solve Y. I can show you how we solve that in <timeframe> with <clear value>”

If you want practical ideas you can test this quarter, this one is worth a listen

The real job of a GTM leader isn’t just to hit the number - it’s to change the trajectory of the company

And that means being willing to be the change agent, even if it means stepping on toes

Here’s how I’ve tackled this: 

1. Find the biggest, ugliest problem no one wants to touch - the one with no clear owner - that’s the problem that needs to be solved 

2. Volunteer to solve it and tell the truth about why it exists. Use first-principles thinking to cut through the noise most problems are actually symptoms of deeper root cause issue 

3. Build a credible business case: Develop a hypothesis, quantify the impact, be ready to defend it - you’ll get pushback, that’s the cost of conviction

4. Sell your plan, get buy in, and execute relentlessly by communicating clearly, building momentum, and earning the trust that buys you time to deliver

5. Follow through until the business result is real - push through the resistance, politics, and setbacks - that’s what separates operators from leaders

You’ll know you’re working on something that matters when there’s a high chance you’ll fail

The obligation of every GTM leader is to take on those challenges anyway

This is how companies evolve and how leaders are forged

We don't just take a playbook and implement it with our customers 

At Refine Labs, our onboarding process is an investigation

Before we touch campaigns, we go deep into the business:

- 4–8 quarters of revenue and funnel data
- Conversion rates, win/loss patterns, and buying journeys
- Who actually becomes a customer and who doesn’t
- How and where awareness is being created today

We look for patterns, where you lose efficiency, where quality drops, and which levers will actually move the business

Then we build a roadmap that’s specific, prioritized, and rooted in your reality

That’s why most of our clients see 30%-50% increase to qualified pipeline growth within 8 months

Check out our latest episode on Stacking Growth to hear my conversation with Evan Kirstel that covers modern go-to-market models, buyer-centric strategies, and how Refine Labs helps companies drive measurable pipeline growth through data, experimentation, and cultural excellence

AI is a tool for execution - the real differentiation still comes from human insight, creativity, and judgment

AI is our partner, Humans are still the leaders 

​​There’s a big difference between knowing and understanding

You can know that communication is key - and still avoid a hard conversation

You can know that delegation drives growth - and still hold on too tightly because it feels safer to do it yourself

You can know that boundaries matter - and still take on more work than you should

You can know that self-care isn’t selfish… and still skip rest because you think “the thing” is more important 

Understanding shows up in your behavior - in the decisions you make, how you lead, how you treat yourself and others

Understanding happens when you live what you know

When you tell yourself the truth

When you recognize a pattern you’ve repeated for too long

When you finally act differently - even when it’s hard

In business, that might look like changing how you measure success or finally addressing the real root cause behind a problem

In life, it might look like saying no to something that doesn’t align, even when it disappoints someone

Knowledge is just information

Understanding allows you to change

And, just because you know something, doesn't mean you really understand it

Proving paid media impact in 2026 is going to keep getting harder 

Channels are more expensive and CFOs want answers that last-touch attribution can’t provide

Tomorrow, 🤘 Matthew Sciannella and Keith Putnam-Delaney are hosting a session that gives B2B marketers something most teams don’t have right now:

A practical, attribution-agnostic blueprint for proving ad effectiveness in 2026

Here’s what they’re covering:

1. The State of Paid Media 

LinkedIn and Google costs are climbing and direct response is hitting ceilings because it only reaches the 5% of buyers already in-market

Teams are stuck between proving brand impact with no clean attribution or overfunding direct response campaigns that don't reflect blended CAC reality

We’ll walk through why influenced attribution and MTA can’t hold up in CFO conversations and what to use instead

2. Using B2C Channels to Win in B2B

If LinkedIn is your only paid social channel, you’re overspending by 5–10x for the same audience

Real examples we’ll unpack:

- Medical device TAM (~9,000 surgeons) - Adding Meta + Reddit increased inbounds 44% YoY and drove $3.50 in inbound revenue per $1 spent

- Enterprise SaaS TAM (~2K → 11K accounts) - After broadening reach using Primer, inbound demos jumped 23–35%, with Meta-driven booked calls up 82%

We’ll show how to validate, expand, and track your ICP across Meta, YouTube, and Reddit

3. “Unbundling ABM” - What to Keep, What to Replace

Traditional ABM platforms are expensive, rigid, and built on attribution models that no longer reflect reality

We’ll break down a modern approach using:

- Primer for account journeys + custom audiences

- Vector, Warmly, RB2B for contact-level enrichment

- 50/50 list splits to measure incremental lift

- Account-level tests to isolate channel impact

- Clear paths for large TAM vs niche TAM measurement

You can deploy ABM without 6 figure platforms 

4. How to Prove Impact Without Fragile Attribution

This is the core of the session - we’ll walk through the exact testing frameworks marketers should use in 2026:

- Account-based incrementality testing

- GeoLift

- Difference-in-Differences for channel comparison

- Holdout design, power checks, confound controls

- Signal integrity and CAPI alignment

If you’ve been struggling to defend budget, diversify channels, or justify brand investment  - you’ll walk away with real test designs, measurement templates, and channel plays you can run immediately

Join us on Wednesday, November 19 at 1 pm EST for our next B2B Roundtable hosted by Matthew Sciannella (Refine Labs) and Keith Delaney (Primer)
 
Bring your toughest attribution questions - we’re taking them live

Register here: https://lnkd.in/exT-YBMA?

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