Funnels That Never Worked, Buyers That Actually Buy (with Patrick Cumming) | Ep. 35

Funnels that never really worked, buyers that do their own homework, and a performance marketing agency that wants to be its own best case study sit at the center of this conversation. Host Charlie Riley, head of marketing at one screen, and co-host Greg Wise talk with Patrick Cumming, Director of Marketing at KlientBoost, about moving away from made up funnels and running demand generation based on how buyers actually buy.

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Patrick shares how he went from retail and moonlighting as a copywriter to leading marketing at a performance marketing agency with the most published wins for any agency, why 95% of the market is out of market and 5% is in market, and how to reach actual buyers without trying to warm prospects through imaginary stages. The group digs into CPMs, frequency, B2B SaaS SQLs, LinkedIn, out-of-home, and why marketers should not be afraid to talk about revenue while still keeping the creative work fun.

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Patrick Cumming is Director of Marketing at KlientBoost, a performance marketing agency with the most published wins (case studies, reviews, video testimonials) of any agency on the planet. He started out in the agency space as a copywriter, working two jobs in retail and moonlighting, then became the digital marketing guy at a brand marketing agency before joining KlientBoost to work with B2B clients.

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Patrick built a LinkedIn presence in the B2B space, generated $50M+ pipeline for B2B Tech and SaaS companies through content marketing, paid search, and paid social demand generation and GTM strategies, and then pitched founder JD to let him take over marketing. Today he leads marketing at KlientBoost to add $250K MRR using the same strategies, principles, and processes rolled out for clients.

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• How Patrick moved from retail and moonlighting as a copywriter to the fast pace of agency life, bigger and bigger agencies, and then a decision to hyper focus and specialize on B2B marketing.
• Why funnels never really worked in his experience, how companies guessed where people were in tofu, mofu, and bofu, and what changed when he discovered demand generation based on how buyers actually buy.
• The 95% out of market and 5% in market view of a quarter, why most “in market” tools misread funnel data, and what happens when you focus less on optimizing for conversions and more on driving down CPM costs and getting the highest quality inventory for the cheapest.
• The approach of hitting around 80%+ audience penetration with 10+ frequency roughly every 90 days, targeting actual buyers, and why you don’t need to warm prospects as much when you get the right message in front of someone who is in market right now.
• How KlientBoost runs its own ad spend as experiments first, becomes its own best case study, and then rolls out proven campaigns to B2B SaaS companies with the highest close rate, highest ACV, and longest lifetime value.
• Why Patrick believes companies should stop treating performance marketing and brand marketing as two separate things, and instead see channels like Facebook, LinkedIn ads, and out-of-home as ways to build brand and still expect incremental lift in inbound.
• A look at an ABM project with huge ticket value where out-of-home ads around company HQ locations increased engagement scores, plus how sales teams, LinkedIn ads, out-of-home, linear TV, and CTV can surround the market with a coherent message.
• The Salesforce static image ad example with a mascot that got attention but not recall of the message, and what that says about creative work that doesn’t clearly explain what the product is and why anyone should care.
• How familiarity builds trust, why people often choose a brand they’ve already heard of, and why seeing a neighbor every day is enough to make you go to them first, even if you’ve never spoken.
• Why marketers should focus less on what story they want to tell and more on what story the audience needs to hear, sell people what they want, then educate them on what they need later, and how that makes revenue conversations with CROs, CFOs, and CEOs easier.

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• KlientBoost – The Performance Marketing Agency – performance marketing, paid media, performance creative, CRO, SEO, business intelligence, and “the most published wins for any agency.”
• LinkedIn – personal brand building, DMs, thought leadership ads, and a key channel for B2B marketing and performance campaigns.
• Dream Data – B2B attribution tool used to see journeys that started with an ad impression two years ago and would otherwise look like direct traffic.
• Salesforce – example of a creative ad with a mascot, strong recall of the visual, but unclear product message and unclear reason to care.
• Gong – example of a brand that many people remember for call recording, and a reminder to lean into what people trust you for before telling a bigger product story.
• HubSpot – source of many playbooks and a contrast point for KlientBoost’s own experiments rather than just reading playbooks.
• Google ads – part of a thought leader ad example where a CMO doubles budget, pipeline stays the same, and CAC goes through the roof, plus a key channel for paid search.
• Facebook and LinkedIn ads – performance channels that can still build brand while driving revenue-focused campaigns.
• Out-of-home, linear TV, and CTV – channels that add context, surround key markets, and support ABM plays like targeting HQ locations for million-plus ticket value deals.

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