Revenue Problem Solvers

Operationalize
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Revenue Problem Solvers is the sales and revenue leadership podcast for founders, executives, and operators who are done with generic advice. One question drives every conversation: what's the most significant revenue initiative you've ever led, or the most challenging problem you've solved or are currently solving? The conversations span the entire GTM function from sales, marketing, ops, CS, product, leadership, and AI. Real stories. Specific lessons. No filler. New episodes weekly.

  1. 3d ago

    From NFL Locker Room to Tech Founder | Mark Clayton

    One in three headphones in his first Kickstarter batch came back with a virus on them. That was the moment Mark Clayton, a former first-round NFL draft pick, almost walked away from the company he built out of a broken pair of headphones. Mark spent 7 seasons in the NFL with the Baltimore Ravens and St. Louis Rams before starting LIVV Audio with zero background in consumer electronics. In this conversation with Karl Ortmanns, he breaks down how a personal training problem turned into a headband redesign, why a factory defect forced a full product recall, and what it costs to learn an entirely new industry from scratch. If you are building something outside your area of expertise, or navigating a major identity shift after a high-performance career, this episode is for you. Mark gets specific about manufacturer selection, waterproofing tradeoffs, and the mentorship that helped him avoid an even more expensive education. This episode is brought to you by Docket, the inbound demand agent that talks to every visitor to your website in real time, answers real product questions, and qualifies them inside the conversation. What lands in your CRM is not another MQL, it is a booked meeting with full context attached. Visit docket.io and mention the show for a special rate. Revenue Problem Solvers is built for revenue leaders who are not afraid to say they are stuck and need a real answer. Subscribe for more conversations on solving the revenue problems that actually matter.

    From NFL Locker Room to Tech Founder | Mark Clayton

  2. Aug 28

    The Brand Metric Your CEO Doesn't Know Exists | Sandra Rand

    Your CEO just told you brand can't be measured. Sandra Rand has heard that line more times than she can count, and she's done letting it slide. Sandra is the VP of Marketing at Spreetail, one of the largest e-commerce operators in the country. Before that, she led a rebrand at Thrasio that drove a 168% increase in lead flow, and grew user acquisition by 24% at GETIDA with marketing responsible for over 70% of pipeline. She's not guessing about brand and revenue being connected. She's got the receipts. In this conversation, Sandra breaks down why brand isn't the warm and fuzzy afterthought most executives treat it as, and why it's actually what your revenue is downstream of. She and Karl get into the Stanley Cup viral moment that everyone remembers but nobody's actually unpacked, the Heineken Olympics story that almost became a PR disaster, and the specific metrics you can use when a CMO demands proof that brand spend is working. If you've ever sat in a room and struggled to defend a brand budget against a wall of performance marketing dashboards, this episode gives you the language and the framework to make that case, and to actually prove it's working six months later. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway. If Sandra's point about winning your buyer before they're even in-market resonated, that's exactly what Virtual Causeway helps B2B companies do. They get you found earlier in the buying process by the right people through the right channels. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate. This is the Revenue Problem Solvers Podcast, built for revenue leaders who aren't afraid to say they're stuck.

    The Brand Metric Your CEO Doesn't Know Exists | Sandra Rand

  3. Aug 21

    How to Build a Demand Generation Engine From Scratch | Brydon McMillen

    Most companies build a demand gen engine, hit their number, and walk away. Brydon McMillen says that's exactly the moment it starts to break. Brydon's path here wasn't typical. He came up drafting electrical diagrams for billion-dollar energy projects with a chemical engineering degree, until a co-op placement handed him a broken chatbot nobody else wanted. He rebuilt it, drove a 352% increase in qualified leads, and pivoted into paid search for good. From building an agency's PPC department from scratch to founding his own shop, Plateau PPC, and hitting $26,000 a month in recurring revenue in just three months, Brydon has built demand generation from zero more times than most people do in a career. In this conversation, Brydon and Karl dig into what it actually means to build a demand gen engine, why "strangers buying from you" is the real finish line, and how AI Overviews and disappearing cookie data have quietly changed the rules of paid search. Brydon breaks down Broad Match, AI Max, and Performance Max in plain language, and shares the two things any advertiser should check this week to stop wasting ad spend. Want to connect with Brydon or see what he's building? Find him on LinkedIn or check out Plateau PPC. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate. Revenue Problem Solvers Podcast is for revenue leaders who aren't afraid to say they're stuck, and want a real answer.

    How to Build a Demand Generation Engine From Scratch | Brydon McMillen

  4. Aug 14

    How Bad Hiring Creates Customer Churn | Mark Grimwood

    There's a job title at Salesforce that doesn't exist anywhere else, and once you hear what it does, you'll wonder why every company doesn't have one. Mark Grimwood spent almost two decades at Salesforce, rising from corporate recruiter to SVP of Recruiting for the company's entire global sales organization. Along the way he held a role most people have never seen: VP of Recruiting for Global Customer Success. Recruiting and customer success, one job. Mark and Karl dig into a question most revenue leaders never ask: is hiring actually the first stage of customer success, not just a department that feeds it? They cover where AI genuinely helps in recruiting and where it still falls short, what quality of hire really means beyond a vanity metric, and a live diagnostic for one of the most common blind spots in sales leadership: figuring out whether a struggling rep is a bad hire or just sitting on a bad book of business. Mark also breaks down a redeployment number most companies never track, and why high turnover might actually signal a healthy organization, not a broken one. If you lead a sales team, sit in RevOps, or run talent acquisition, this one will change how you think about your next hire. Connect with Mark on LinkedIn, he's active there and always up for a conversation on this stuff. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate.

    How Bad Hiring Creates Customer Churn | Mark Grimwood

  5. Aug 7

    He Signed the Offer. Two Weeks Later Came the Layoffs. | Steve Shauck

    Two weeks into a new CRO role, Steve Shauck got the call: they were doing a layoff. Not exactly what the recruiting process had promised. In this episode, fractional CRO Steve Shauck sits down with Karl Ortmann to unpack what happens when the company you were sold doesn't match the company you land in. Steve has run global sales teams at GE Digital and Oracle, led two successful PE-backed exits, and now works as a fractional CRO for founder-led B2B companies scaling toward their next stage of growth. He breaks down what a real due diligence package should actually include, why forecasts can hide the truth that actuals reveal, and how he rebuilt a broken revenue team without losing the people worth keeping. Karl and Steve also dig into the executive recruitment landscape right now, including a growing wave of recruiter identity fraud, why some recruiters have become accidental gatekeepers to great candidates, and Steve's case for hiring curious generalists over disengaged specialists. If you're evaluating a new leadership role, sitting inside a team that needs rebuilding, or just want a clearer read on how to protect yourself during the hiring process, this conversation is packed with things you can actually use. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway, helping B2B companies get found earlier in the buying process by the right people through the right channels. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate.

    He Signed the Offer. Two Weeks Later Came the Layoffs. | Steve Shauck

  6. Jul 31

    Why Growth Stalls Even When You're Doing Everything Right | Michael Kleinmann

    You're hitting your numbers. Then you hit a wall, and nothing you try seems to move it. Michael Kleinman has seen this exact wall before, and he knows why most founders never get past it. Michael built Fresh Pair from a New York City apartment into an 8-figure retailer with over 30,000 SKUs before selling it in 2011, then built one of the most-read editorial platforms in men's apparel with Underwear Expert. Before content marketing was even a category, he invented a national holiday just to win at SEO. Now he runs Powered by MK (mkinc.com), where he fixes the operational chaos quietly capping revenue for D2C and subscription brands. In this episode, Michael breaks down a real client story: a decade-old company running one brand across three separate websites, doing every task by hand, three times over, for years. He explains how he found it, fixed it, and grew the client's US revenue 100 percent and Amazon revenue 333 percent in 15 months, all while gross profit went up instead of down. If you've ever felt like you're doing everything right and still not growing, this conversation will change where you look first. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway. If your sales team is spending more time chasing than closing, that's a discovery problem. Virtual Causeway helps B2B companies get found earlier in the buying process by the right people through the right channels. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate.

    Why Growth Stalls Even When You're Doing Everything Right | Michael Kleinmann

  7. Jul 24

    Enterprise AI Without Guardrails? Here's What Happens | Michael Lamb

    Your team is already using AI right now, without your permission, without IT knowing about it, and without any guardrails on what data is walking out the door. Michael Lamb, Senior Director of Marketing Technologies at Mitel, has spent the past year leading digital integration through four major acquisitions while building the framework that governs how Mitel's marketing teams use AI. On this episode, Mike breaks down why most enterprise AI rollouts produce inconsistent, forgettable output, and why the fix isn't a better prompt, it's a shared skills foundation the whole team draws from. He walks through a live test where his team fed an AI a photo of a sausage as design inspiration and uncovered roughly 30 unstated assumptions the AI made on its own, the same blind spot that quietly produces generic content across every company using the same tools. If you're a revenue leader, CMO, or marketing operations lead who suspects your team is already deep into AI without a real framework behind it, this conversation gives you a practical model for governance that speeds teams up instead of slowing them down. For more from Mike, find him on LinkedIn. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway. If your sales team is spending more time chasing than closing, Virtual Causeway helps B2B companies get found earlier in the buying process by the right people through the right channels, resulting in fewer cold calls and pipeline that moves faster. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate. This is the Revenue Problem Solvers Podcast, built for revenue leaders who aren't afraid to say they're stuck and need a real answer.

    Enterprise AI Without Guardrails? Here's What Happens | Michael Lamb

  8. Jul 17

    Your Messaging Is Losing You Deals and You Don't Know It | Nima Chadha

    Ask five people at your company what you actually do. If the answers don't match, your messaging is broken, and it's costing you pipeline. Nima Chadha, CMO at Venti Group and founder of Offload Marketing, has spent her career fixing exactly this problem for companies working with names like SAP, Adobe, and Okta. She started in sales, not marketing, which means she's heard broken messaging from the worst possible seat, in front of a prospect who can't tell what a product actually does. In this conversation, Nima breaks down why most B2B companies describe features instead of owning a real position, why trying to appeal to everyone means you get remembered by no one, and why pouring more budget into demand generation only makes an unclear message louder, not clearer. You'll hear the simple test Nima uses to diagnose a messaging problem in any company, the "corner of the room" framework for standing out without trying to be everything, and a real story about what happens when a company hands AI too much control over its own messaging with no way to undo the damage. If you've ever struggled to explain what your own company does in one clear sentence, or watched your sales team all pitch it differently, this episode will change how you think about positioning. If you want to hear more from Nima, find her on LinkedIn. This episode is brought to you by Virtual Causeway, helping B2B companies get found earlier in the buying process by the right people, through the right channels. Visit virtualcauseway.com and mention the show for a special rate.

    Your Messaging Is Losing You Deals and You Don't Know It | Nima Chadha
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About

Revenue Problem Solvers is the sales and revenue leadership podcast for founders, executives, and operators who are done with generic advice. One question drives every conversation: what's the most significant revenue initiative you've ever led, or the most challenging problem you've solved or are currently solving? The conversations span the entire GTM function from sales, marketing, ops, CS, product, leadership, and AI. Real stories. Specific lessons. No filler. New episodes weekly.

Information

  • Creator
    Operationalize
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    63
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Operationalize
  • Show Website
    Revenue Problem Solvers