Playbooks
Short, direct answers to the questions founders ask about marketing, sales, RevOps and AI. Each one takes a few minutes.
Fractional CMO
- What Is a Fractional CMO? Role, Cost, and When to Hire One What is a fractional CMO, and does my startup need one?
- The First 30 Days With a Fractional CMO What happens in the first month, and what should I have at day 30?
- Founder Problem or Funnel Problem? How to Tell Before You Hire More Help Is our growth problem in the funnel, the system, or me?
- How Much Does a Fractional CMO Cost? Pricing vs. a Full-Time CMO What does a fractional CMO cost, and how does that compare with hiring full-time?
- Is Your GTM Problem a System Problem? How to Diagnose Your GTM Operating System Why hasn't fixing one part of go-to-market moved the result?
- How to Hire a Fractional CMO: A Founder's Evaluation Checklist How do I evaluate and hire the right fractional CMO?
- What Does a Fractional CMO Do? Scope, Responsibilities, and Boundaries What will a fractional CMO actually own, week to week?
- When to Hire a Fractional CMO: Signs a Startup Is Ready Is now the right time to bring in a fractional CMO?
AI-ready company
- What Is an AI Operating System for a Company? What is an AI operating system for a company, and do we need one before buying more AI tools?
- AI Agent Operating System: The Context Layer Your Team Needs What do we need in place before AI agents can do real work for us?
- AI Data Classification: What Company Data Can an AI Tool Access? What company data can we safely give an AI tool?
- AI Governance Framework for a Small Company What AI rules does a small company need, without enterprise bureaucracy?
- How to Build an AI-Native Operating System for a Startup In what order should we build an AI-native operating system for our startup?
- AI Prompt Library for a Team: How to Build One and Keep It Current How do we make good prompts repeatable and keep them current?
- AI Readiness Assessment: Score Your Company in Eight Questions How ready is my company to get real work out of AI?
- AI Use Case Prioritization: An AI Adoption Framework for Picking the First Workflow Which AI workflow should we fix first?
- Human-in-the-Loop AI: Which Outputs a Person Should Review Which AI outputs need a person to check or decide?
- AI Knowledge Base vs. AI Operating System: What Startup Teams Need We have a wiki. Why isn't our AI output any better?
Marketing foundations
- Positioning Statement: How to Write One, With Examples How do I write a positioning statement my team will actually use?
- Beachhead Market: How to Pick Your First Segment Which customers should my startup go after first?
- Digital Marketing Channels: Which One to Test First Which channel deserves the first serious test?
- Go-to-Market Plan Template for Startups How do I write a go-to-market plan for an early-stage company?
- How to Write a Value Proposition: Formula and Examples How do we explain our value without listing features?
- Ideal Customer Profile Template for Startups What has to be true of an account before we pursue it?
- Landing Page Structure: The Sections of a Page That Converts What does a page need once a buyer arrives?
- LinkedIn Ghostwriting for Founders: When to Hand Off Your Posts Should someone else write my LinkedIn posts?
- Marketing Plan Template: A Quarterly Plan for Startups What does a useful marketing plan include before we spend?
- Measurement Plan: What to Track Before Judging a Channel What should we track before deciding a channel works?
- Messaging Framework: A Template for Startups How do I get everyone at my company saying the same thing about what we do?
- Positioning Map: How to Build One and Read It How do we see the market the way a buyer does?
- SEO for Startups: What to Do About Search in Your First Year What should a startup do about search in its first year?
Sales and outbound
- Founder-Led Sales: When to Sell It Yourself and When to Hand It Off Should I still be doing the selling, and when do I hand it off?
- Cold Call Script: How to Open a Call Without Sounding Scripted How do I open a cold call without sounding scripted?
- Cold Email Follow-Up: How Many, How Often, and What to Say How many follow-ups should a cold email get, how far apart, and what goes in each?
- Cold Email Infrastructure: Domains, Inboxes and Daily Limits How do I set up cold email so it lands in the inbox?
- Outbound Lead Generation: Why It Dries Up After the First List Why does outbound dry up after the first list?
- Pipeline Velocity: The Formula and the Constraint It Finds Why isn't our pipeline turning into revenue?
- Sales Discovery Questions for Founders What should I ask on a discovery call?
- Sales Objection Handling: How to Handle Price Objections Without Discounting How do I answer an objection without arguing or discounting?
- Sales Pipeline Stages: Exit Rules That Show a Deal at Risk What stages show a deal at risk before it slips?
- The Sandler Selling System, Explained for Founders What is the Sandler Selling System, and does it suit a founder who hates pushy selling?
RevOps and CRM
- What Is RevOps? Revenue Operations for a Startup What is revenue operations, and when does a startup need it?
- CRM for Startups: How to Choose One You Can Keep Clean Which CRM should we choose before the data gets messy?
- Executive Dashboard: The Metrics Leadership Should See Which numbers should leadership see every week?
- HubSpot Lifecycle Stages: How to Set Them Up How should I set up lifecycle stages in HubSpot so the data means something?
- Lead Routing: Who Owns a Lead, and When Who owns a lead, and when?
- MQL vs SQL: How to Define Each for a Startup What's the difference between an MQL and an SQL, and where should the line sit?
- North Star Metric: How a Startup Picks the One Number to Steer By What one number should the company steer by?
- Weekly Scorecard: How to Turn Your Numbers Into Decisions How do we turn the numbers into decisions every week?
- CRM Data Hygiene: The Rules That Keep a CRM Trustworthy Why can't we trust the data in our CRM?
- Vanity Metrics: The Numbers to Stop Steering By Which numbers should stop driving our decisions?
Strategy
- Competitive Analysis Template: Map Competitors Without the Trivia How do we map competitors without collecting trivia?
- Competitive Moat: How to Tell Which Advantages Will Last Which of our advantages will last?
- The Sean Ellis Test: How to Measure Product-Market Fit How do I know if we have product-market fit?
- TAM, SAM, SOM: How to Size the Market You Can Actually Reach How big is the market we can actually reach?
- Unfair Advantage: What Counts at a Startup, and How to Test Yours What advantage can we actually build on?
Bring your own question
If no playbook covers it, book a call and ask me directly.