10 Lessons from 10 Years of B2B Marketing (Dave's Newsletter)

Hello and welcome to Dave's Newsletter — read by 42,000 B2B marketing professionals around the world. I’m Dave Gerhardt, founder of Exit Five and former CMO. I really write this newsletter (not AI) and my goal here is to share lessons and learnings about B2B marketing, insights from the Exit Five community, and to be a resource to help you grow your career and advance your skills in marketing. If you enjoy getting this newsletter, I’d love it if you told a friend about it. I also enjoy getting replies here because it is really me, so reply back after you read and say hello.

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TOGETHER WITH DEMANDBASE

📰 2025 State of B2B Marketing Report: What’s Broken and What’s Working

Revenue targets are going up. Budgets don’t seem to be following. And most teams are stuck managing more tools, more data, and more noise, without seeing better results.

That’s why Demandbase teamed up with The Harris Poll to publish the 2025 State of B2B Marketing report. A deep dive into what top-performing teams are doing differently, and how you can apply it right now.

Here’s what’s inside:

• How to actually connect your data (so your team isn’t working off 12 dashboards)
• What automation and AI look like in real-world campaigns
• Why campaign ops is the new secret weapon
• How the best teams are tracking impact across leads and accounts

If you’re rethinking how your team works across tools, channels, and data, this is the roadmap.

🙌 10 Lessons from 10 Years of B2B Marketing

Editor’s Note: Dave here. Now, instead of writing about Thanksgiving we decided to keep it focused on marketing today. BUT I will say Turkey is the most overrated meal of all time, and I’m ready for all your replies about that (usually people tell me it’s because I don’t smoke it or do it this or that with it, so I’ll see you in the replies). Anyway: I’ve been hosting a podcast about marketing for the last decade or so and that has give me hundreds of hours of lessons beyond my own first hand experience. So for this week’s newsletter we thought it would be fun to feed all of that information to our AI Assistant (aka DaveBot) and pull out the gems, the 10 best lessons from over the years. Here we go. Sidenote: DaveBot is a feature inside of our community if you’re an Exit Five member.

Note: this photo is a look at my office setup over the last 2 weeks on the mend from them rebuilding my hip; photo credit goes to my beautiful, smart, funny, and awesome 8 year old daughter, Annie. She’s sitting over my shoulder right now as I type this. Happy Thanksgiving.

1️⃣ Nobody cares about your product
Because people care about themselves and what’s in it for them. So stop leading with features. Your prospects are lying awake at 3am worried about missing quota, getting fired, or looking stupid in front of their boss. Start every campaign, every piece of copy, every conversation with their problem. Not your solution. Make everything about them.

2️⃣ Brand is your moat
This is more important than ever. In the age of AI there are more copy cats, more content, and it’s getting harder and harder for people to tell how you’re different. You don't just want attention, you want a reputation that resonates with your audience. So how do you make prospects feel when they hear your name? Brand is how you stand out and win.

3️⃣ Differentiate or die
Using phrases like, "We're the leading provider of..." means sounding exactly like everyone else. Take a stand. Have a perspective. Be known for something specific, even if it alienates some people. You can’t possibly be everything to everyone and get ahead.

4️⃣ Speed beats perfection every time
Marketing isn't about launching perfect campaigns, it's about learning what works through real feedback. The only way to do that is to get stuff out there (ideally weekly, not quarterly). So ship something, measure the response, and improve from there.

5️⃣ Talk to your customers
You’ve heard this 1000 times, but the absolute best insights you have come straight from your customers. Join sales calls, run interviews, listen to recordings. Ask why they bought, why they almost didn't, and what made the difference. Their exact words can be used everywhere in your copy. Real conversations are what help you win.

6️⃣ Marketing is a team sport
You can optimize your funnel all day, but if sales doesn't know how to handle your leads, you're wasting money. If product doesn't understand your positioning, your messaging falls apart. Get everyone rowing in the same direction first. This is so much easier when there’s trust. So do whatever you can to build it.

7️⃣ Measure what matters
There are SO many things you can measure in marketing. Website visitors, traffic, MQLs, conversion rates. So it’s really easy to get overwhelmed and lost in the weeds (we’ve all been there). But at the end of the day, marketing is about sales and oftentimes the things you need to focus on are pipeline and revenue. Because the more you can connect your metrics to revenue, the better.

8️⃣ Take creative risks
Yes, legal will have opinions. Yes, leadership wants to see three rounds of revisions. But vanilla gets ignored, and ignored doesn't move deals. The risky move is being forgettable. Start with small tests, find what resonates, then double down. Your audience is drowning in sameness. Give them something to talk about.

9️⃣ Master the fundamentals
Positioning, messaging, and storytelling are forever. Every new marketing channel, every AI tool, every trend builds on these basics. If you can't clearly explain who you serve, what problem you solve uniquely, and why anyone should care, nothing else matters. Get the foundation right first.

1️⃣0️⃣ Stay curious, stay scrappy
The playbook for success is changing constantly. The best marketers aren't the ones who know everything. They're the ones who learn fastest. Question everything, test constantly, and never stop experimenting.

The fundamentals haven't changed in decades. Everything else is just noise.

– Dave

PS. What did I miss? What would you add to this list? Reply back and let me know. Happy Thanksgiving if you’re celebrating, but also a big part of our audience is not in the U.S. so I know someone is working today, like our guy Matt, Head of Community working out of our Toronto HQ. I see you Matt, hold it down for us!

📺 UPCOMING EVENTS

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• December 2nd: The Future of Pipeline: How Marketing Leaders Are Using AI to Drive Revenue (exitfive.com/live/pipeline-ai)

Exit Five Pro Members Only

• December 2nd: Local Meetup: Seattle, WA
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• December 9th: Local Meetup: Raleigh, NC

Not a member yet? Learn more about an Exit Five Membership here.

If you are an Exit Five member, click here to RSVP to these events.

📚 LATEST CONTENT

Here's the latest from the Exit Five content library:

• 🎧 What’s Working Right Now in B2B Marketing
• 🎧 The Case for Influencer Marketing in B2B with Brianna Doe (Founder of Verbatim)
• 🎧 The B2B Buying Experience With AI: What Changes?
• 🎧 The Day You Become a Better Storyteller with Harry Dry (Founder of Marketing Examples)
• 📰 How I Post on LinkedIn (Now That I Have 200K Followers)
• 📰 The Real ROI of Events (It’s Not What You Think)
• 📰 How marketers (actually) use AI

✍️ NEW FROM EXIT FIVE

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Click here to subscribe to The Prompt and we can help you get an A in AI. 🍎

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