INSIGHTS FROM EXPERTS ON LINKEDIN
Scott Gelber explains that great Google Ads and high-intent leads don’t mean much if sales never actually talks to them. He points out that slow or weak follow-up lets leads go cold before the pipeline can form. The real handoff between marketing and revenue starts the moment sales engages, not when a form gets filled.
Steffen Hedebrandt argues that positioning isn’t a one-time project, but something B2B teams should revisit every year. He explains that once the hard first round is done, clear positioning makes ads, content, and sales work much easier. Regular reviews help teams stay aligned with how customers buy, what actually wins deals, and where the market has moved.
Elena Jasper shares research showing that brand awareness alone isn’t enough if buyers can’t easily find and buy from you. She breaks down physical availability in B2B as showing up where buying happens, being easy to spot, and pushing the right products. Growth stalls when mental availability isn’t matched by real-world access at the moment of purchase.
Austin Hay explains that as attribution breaks down, teams are losing visibility into where traffic actually comes from. He argues that simple HDYHAU form questions, once dismissed as friction, are now one of the most reliable signals left thanks to AI-powered analysis of free-text responses. Not all friction is bad, and asking users directly can help marketing and sales make better decisions as tracking continues to erode.
Brenden Delarua shares a story where clear incrementality results sat unused for months because no one wanted to cut a favored channel. He argues that many brands run tests but avoid acting on them when the results are uncomfortable. If incrementality data doesn’t change spend decisions, he says, it’s not data-driven marketing — it’s expensive theater.
Nick Turner describes a CMO quietly burying brand budget inside performance spend just to survive CFO scrutiny. He explains that CRMs only show the last 30% of a 211-day B2B buying journey, while most demand is created long before sales gets involved. When leadership funds only what they can see, CMOs are forced into workarounds instead of building sustainable growth.
Andrei Zinkevich breaks down how sales and marketing still operate in silos despite modern B2B buying behavior being far more complex. He argues that ABM fails when it’s sold as a marketing initiative instead of a shared operating model. The future, he says, is tighter weekly collaboration, dynamic account prioritization, and continuous buying committee engagement.
Stan Rymkiewicz walks through his updated ad creation process after driving millions in pipeline with LinkedIn Ads. He focuses on leading with relatable facts instead of value props to reach buyers who aren’t ready to purchase yet. His approach prioritizes standout ideas, fast iteration, and creative volume to improve attention and performance.
Carilu Dietrich shares a hard lesson from turning off paid search at Oracle and watching organic leads drop 15%, revealing how brand spend was quietly driving incremental demand. She explains that most leaders believe brand fuels pipeline, but struggle to prove it with data. The brand needs proper incrementality testing, using geo, control, or time-based experiments to show how brand presence actually lifts pipeline and lowers CAC.
Jamie Skeels explains how his team used tools like Clay and AI to build a high-confidence ESG audience when traditional targeting broke down. Starting with a broad account list, they layered keyword analysis and AI scoring to identify companies with real sustainability focus. The result was a test-ready list of 6,000+ accounts built in a single day, something that wasn’t realistic a few years ago.
Andreas Obel 
argues that the in-house versus agency debate misses the point. In-house teams bring speed and product knowledge, while agencies bring pattern recognition and deep expertise. He’s seeing hybrid models work best, with each side owning the channels they’re strongest at.
Patrick Cumming predicts a tougher, noisier B2B landscape where rising costs, weaker data, and AI saturation challenge lazy strategies. He expects smart teams to stick with strong fundamentals like broad targeting, clear differentiation, incrementality testing, and human-led creativity. The teams that listen to the market and act on real signals will outperform those chasing shortcuts.
WHAT'S NEW IN THE INDUSTRY
New research shows most B2B ads fail to grab attention or stick in memory, even though brand plays a huge role in buying decisions. The study highlights that logos and colors alone aren’t enough – distinctive assets, consistency, and smarter use of sound and branding cues matter far more. With billions spent on B2B ads each year, stronger brand investment could drive better recall, pricing power, and long-term growth.
Google Ads now has a quiet setting that lets Google add its own images to location-based ads. That means visuals could appear in your ads without your direct approval, which may be risky for brand-sensitive or regulated businesses. Advertisers should check their Location Manager to make sure creative control hasn’t been handed over by default.
Google is testing a new setup flow that lets advertisers launch a campaign at the same time they create an account. The goal is to reduce friction and get new advertisers spending faster. The tradeoff is less control upfront, as more decisions may be handled automatically.
Microsoft is rolling out new Performance Max features, including goals focused on acquiring net-new customers and better reporting like impression share and asset-level tracking. Advertisers can now guide automation more clearly while keeping visibility into performance. Overall, the updates aim to make PMax easier to manage without giving up control.
YouTube is upgrading its Promotions tool so creators can target viewers based on interests, not just age, gender, or location. That means promoted videos can now reach people who are already into related topics, like food, travel, or fitness. It makes paid promotion feel more precise and closer to how full Google Ads campaigns work.
Google now lets advertisers set a single budget for an entire Search or Shopping campaign over a fixed time period. The system automatically manages daily spend to stay on track and fully use the budget by the end date. It’s designed to make short-term campaigns easier to run without constant budget adjustments.
Salesforce has rebuilt Slackbot into an AI-powered assistant that can summarize conversations, surface context, draft content, and trigger workflows directly inside Slack. It pulls from real Slack messages, files, and connected tools to help teams stay aligned without switching apps. For marketers, it promises less chasing updates and more time actually executing campaigns.
As AI takes over more marketing tasks, trust, empathy, and real human presence are becoming key differentiators. Research shows many customers still prefer humans over bots, especially for support and emotional moments, and are growing skeptical of AI-generated content. Brands that balance automation with genuine human input are more likely to earn trust in 2026 and beyond.
That’s the scoop for this week! If you found this valuable and any useful insights caught your eye, feel free to share them with your network.
Until next week!
