Tycho Luijten's Linkedin Analytics

Marketing deserves more credit for the pipeline they influence. Today, most buyers reach out to sales (81% on average across industries*), yet sales gets all the credit for closing the deal. But why did these buyers contact sales in the first place? They knew the brand and trusted it enough to get in touch. They knew and trusted your brand because they: • Read your LinkedIn Posts • Visited your website • Saw you at an event • Attended a webinar • Read cases and reviews • Clicked on your ad • Listened to your podcast • Read your newsletter • Etc.. All these little touchpoints built a level of recognition and trust that made a prospect reach out and become a lead. Also, that foundational level of trust makes it much easier for sales to close that lead. It's just very hard to prove the influence of marketing because it's influence is spread out over 100s of little touchpoints over time (a lot of them not even measurable). On the other hand, it's very easy to prove the value of sales because it's the last touch before a lead becomes revenue So yeah, I believe that marketing has way more influence on pipeline and the success of sales than it gets credit for. I also believe marketers have no choice but to improve their ability to prove and explain their influence. *6𝘚𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘤𝘩 𝘥𝘢𝘵𝘢

GenAI will trigger a revolution in content marketing, and if you don’t adopt quickly I don’t think you’ll survive With GenAI's more widespread adoption, there will be 100X times more content online a year from now. Your content will literally get lost in the vortex if you don't have a strategy to stand out. I believe the 'big flood' of AI content is yet to come. I will become even easier to create great content with AI, and the technology will become more widely adopted. If it's difficult to get impressions or search volume now, it will become much much harder in the near future as AI content floods the internet. So I urge you to develop a strategy that will help you stand out in an online world with 100X the amount of content. What can you do? 1. Develop a unique POV I'm not the first to say this, but now more than ever, voicing an opinion is important to grab attention. Your audience can literally find any type of information anywhere at any time. just spreading information won't do. People follow Chris Walker or watch Fox News because they're opiniated. 2. Show the faces behind the brand / create authentic content In a sea of AI content, people crave realness and authentic content. Involve the faces behind the brand (aka your colleagues) in your content creation. Create content with your colleagues, with your colleagues in it, and distribute content from personal accounts. 3. Create content that is hard for AI to create With some written posts, it's hard to say whether it's AI or not. Same goes for designs in the near future. If you prompt well you can get amazing outputs. But there are also content types that AI cannot create yet. Such as this video, or live content. If you create and push content AI cannot create, you'll more easily stand out. Adopt or 💀  (pretty dramatic I know, but I'm trying to convey urgency haha)

Never optimize your LinkedIn Ads for clicks to website. People don't click on ads on LinkedIn. Think about it: when is the last time you clicked a LinkedIn ad and browsed around someone's site? Exactly. LinkedIn is a scroll-and-scan platform. People consume content in-feed, not by clicking out. So if your goal is to drive pipeline, stop optimizing for behavior that doesn’t happen. Instead, optimize for signals that show your message actually landed: - Dwell time - Video views - Avg. watch time - Completion rate - Read more click That’s how you know you’ve earned attention, and attention is the real first step to intent. Optimize for what people actually do, not what you wish they did.

As a B2B Marketer, you need to learn how to prove that what you’re doing is working (if you want to be appreciated for your work). Because your CEO, Founder, CFO, and sales team will scrutinise you for it. They will judge you for the pipeline you create. Whether we like it or not. And proving that something works in b2b is not easy. You're dealing with long and complex sales cycles and lots of dark touchpoints. But just because it’s hard to prove, doesn’t mean it’s not working. In fact, your marketing is likely working right now. It’s influencing pipeline, building trust, shaping perception. You just might not be tracking it the right way. According to 6Sense, 81% of buyers reach out to Sales on their own. Why? Because they: • Read your LinkedIn posts • Listened to your podcast • Opened your newsletter • Attended your webinar • Watched your videos • Met you at an event • Clicked on an ad • Visited your site • Read your blog That’s marketing. And yet... Sales gets all the credit for closing the lead. So, as a marketer, you have no choice but to: 👉 Get in the CRM and understand what's going on. 👉 Partner tightly with Sales. Get them to ask leads how they found you. 👉 Build processes to measure influence, not just last-click attribution Modern marketers can’t afford to just do the work - we have to learn how to prove it too.

Marketers and thoughtleaders are struggling on LinkedIn. Impressions and engagement are down. That's why - now more than ever - you need to develop and voice a unique point of view (POV) I'm not the first to say this, but I don't think most people understand how urgent this is.  Why is a unique POV so necessary? Because people no longer consume media for information (they can look up any type of information at any point) 🚨 People consume media because of the opinions they share! 🚨 • Why do people watch FOX or CNN? Because of their opinions • Why do people watch Jimmy Fallon? Because of his opinions • Why do people follow Chris Walker? Because of his opinions Let me make this very clear: You will NOT attract an audience on LinkedIn just by sharing facts or regurgitating the opinions of others.  You actually NEED to develop your own POV. How do you do this? Sit down with a pen and piece of paper and think: • What do you believe about your market? • What frustrates you about how things are done? • Where do you see things going? Write that down. That’s the start. Everyone has opinions. If you genuinely don’t, ask yourself: Should you even be posting in the first place?

Your CEO, founder, and sales don’t care about your beautiful campaign. They’ll judge you on one thing: Did it create pipeline? I learned that the hard way at my first B2B marketing job back in 2018. We were a scrappy team with a small budget and big ideas. We made a set of videos we were really proud of: Completely tailored to the ICPs, beautifully shot and edited. All on a tiny budget. We booked time with one of the founders to show what we’d been working on. He watched all three, looked uninterested, and asked, “How many leads did this generate?” No compliment, just that question. Painful 😂. I felt underappreciated. We put so much into it, and all he cared about was leads? Now, after working with 100+ B2B companies… I get it. Founders and execs aren’t judging the creativity. They’re judging the impact on business metrics. And proving the impact of marketing in B2B customer journeys is really hard. But just because it’s hard, doesn’t mean we won’t be judged for it. So if you want to be appreciated as a B2B marketer, it’s not enough to do great marketing. You need to prove and communicate what your marketing actually does. So you have no choice, but to: • Be in the CRM and actually understand what’s going on • Work closely with Sales and get them to ask leads, “How did you hear about us?” • Track leading indicators and explain what they mean to leadership • Learn how to show influenced pipeline (not just sourced)    It’s not always fair or easy. But this is the game. Learn how to prove your impact, and you’ll get the credit you deserve.

A little controversial maybe, but I like comparing myself to others on social media. The current narrative is: "don’t compare yourself to others. Social media is fake. Everyone shows their highlights." But I've noticed that seeing people who are more successful than I am inspires more than anything else (in marketing, business, sports, personal development..). If somebody else can do it, I can do it! It IS important to take into account what you cannot influence: I’ll never be an NBA player (I’m 1.78 and Dutch 😂). But I can: 1. Build a better business 2. Become a better marketer 3. Get healthier with better habits 4. Show up better for the people I care about And oftentimes, I notice that I get these triggers from people I follow on LinkedIn or Instagram. The biggest argument against this stance would be that social media is fake, or that you don’t see the complete picture. That is 100% true. That's why I intentionally follow very specific people who: • Are successful specifically at what I want to be great at • Are a few levels ahead of me so it doesn't demotivate • Keep it real (no rented Lambos)    You are the product of the 5 people around you, but you might also be the product of those you see on your feed every day?

I honestly have so much fun creating content. Especially with my buddy Steven van Marle. (and we don't just do it for fun - it's also generating half of our revenue) If b2b businesses had more fun creating content, I think they would do a lot more of it and the outcome would be less boring and more effective. Steven and I did a full episode on measuring success in B2B. Go check out 'B2B in 15' on Spotify or Apple Music!

Clients don't buy from you because your solution is so different. They buy from you because you're mentally available. Your product or service is probably not very unique. In today's market, most categories are saturated. I'm not very original myself: I run a B2B marketing agency. There are probably a thousand B2B marketing agencies worldwide. Service businesses were always easy to copy, so there are lots of similar service-businesses in every category. Software businesses became easy to copy with AI. So there are now 101 tools that do exactly the same thing. When a client has so many similar alternatives, why would they come to you? Not because of your unique approach or because of that extra feature. But because you are mentally available! Because you are the first they can think of in a market with too many similar choices. If you want to become mentally available, you need your ideal clients to see you constantly. With content that makes them understand you solve certain problems and that you can be trusted. You want to become the most mentally available in your category.  When a client needs you, they can choose from 101 solutions. But because you are known and trusted, they come to you. That's the power of mental availability. That's why I invest so much time in creating videos, podcasts, and newsletters for my ideal customers. All content builds an understanding of the problems I solve, trust and top-of-mindness, simply so I'm mentally available for when they need me. So remember: clients don't buy from you because of your solution's distinctiveness. They buy from you because your solution is mentally available.

There are two types of content marketers: 1. The Calendar Filler • Creates content to fill the content calendar  • Optimizes for reach, likes, and impressions. • Creates Valentine's Day and Easter posts 2. The Revenue Influencer • Creates content to influence revenue • Cares more about pipeline than likes  • Creates content that builds demand The job title is the same, but the mindset is completely different. One creates content for the sake of activity, the other for the sake of impact. If your content isn’t influencing the buying journey - what’s it really for?

We filmed this with a 50-year-old camera. Your feed is flooded with AI-generated images and polished content. We wanted to do the opposite: No AI. No filters. No scripts. Just vibes. The video gives you a glimpse of the real vibes here at Dapper - B2B Growth Agency. It makes me so damn proud of our team. We gathered such a smart, hardworking, and kind group of people. With this team, I truly believe we can build the #1 B2B agency in the world. Let's build 🛠️! PS: Big shout out to Paascalino Schaller for the video. If you need a video that gives you instant feelings of nostalgia, he's your guy.

Companies are afraid to build the personal brands of team members because they might leave them. It’s the same flawed thinking as: “Let’s not invest in our people too much, because they might become really good and then leave us.” Yeah.. they might. But in the meantime, they could also be creating demand in your market through their personal brands. It’s one of the most effective marketing plays in B2B right now. And yeah, maybe they’ll leave someday. But I'm convinced the opportunity cost of not doing it is much higher. Plus, I actually believe the more you involve your team in the journey, the longer they’ll want to build with you. So instead of worrying about what happens if they leave, start thinking about what’s possible if they stay.

If you run Google Ads in B2B, please NEVER target top-of-funnel keywords. TOF keywords attract students, researchers, or people just exploring - not buyers. You're paying for curiosity, not conversion. Every click is expensive, so you only want clicks from people who are actively looking to buy. B2B Google Ads isn’t about traffic volume. It’s about catching a tiny slice of the market that is ready to evaluate or act now. Your CAC will thank you :)