Every conversation starts with a bold opinion, and then we put it to the test with people who spend their days building brands, growing businesses, and solving real marketing challenges. No scripts, no PowerPoint — just candid conversations, different perspectives, and the occasional uncomfortable truth.
In this conversation:
Jessica Phillips, Senior Marketing Director at Ironpaper, spends her days in the middle of client pipelines — watching what actually happens between "lead generated" and "deal closed." Marisa Jarae, known to most as MJ, has spent more than 15 years helping B2B companies figure out what's really slowing their growth, then connecting them with the strategy and people to fix it.
The two of them recently sat down to pressure-test a hot take that tends to make marketing leaders a little uncomfortable.
Jessica: Before you answer, let's get a temperature check to kick things off. Are you "on fire" — could not agree more; "warm" — there's some truth, but not fully bought in; or "ice cold" — not having it at all?
Marisa Jarae: On fire — as on fire as I could be for this. There are a few different ways to look at it. The first is from an internal perspective, because I do believe there's a world where that's true, and certainly an external perspective too.
On the internal side — and this is probably the most uncomfortable truth we'll talk about today — I sometimes talk with clients who are successfully generating marketing leads, maybe 50, maybe hundreds, depending on the organization and the industry, and they're consistently asked for more and more, because those leads, even if they're qualified on paper, aren't translating to closed-won deals in the sales process.
When we actually dive in and look under the hood, there's usually a broken system in play, or several. Sales and marketing aren't aligned, or aren't even talking to each other. There's data misalignment around what's actually qualified, or what's needed to move the revenue needle. And at the end of the day, leadership owns that. Leadership owns the system, and the responsibility for that system to talk to itself, and for the people and departments to work together. That's a harder pill to swallow, typically, but we see it with more frequency than people might expect.
Jessica: It's interesting — I interact with clients daily, and one of the things that still surprises me is how often we find out they haven't actually audited their current customer base. They have one idea of what their ideal lead looks like, and what their actual customers look like is extremely different. It's an "aha" moment for them sometimes. It feels simple to us, but I think people forget that part. You say, "This is who I'm going after, this is who I want," but it might not be who you're actually getting.
Marisa Jarae: I'll sometimes see businesses that are built in a silo — you did your market research, you did your business building, and you forget that the marketplace is this constantly moving, changing, growing, alive thing. The market forces are changing genuinely month over month right now. I don't know that that will slow down anytime soon. Sometimes there's just misalignment: "Well, we built it for this buyer and this need and this pain point." Great, but that was a year ago, two years ago, five years ago. You're in a different world now. Making sure there's a conduit for that communication, that data transfer, and that trust internally can really influence solving one facet of the lead problem.
Jessica: When you were talking about how fast things are changing, I was thinking it's like chasing a toddler. You may never actually catch them, but you try really hard. They're also changing daily sometimes. What worked yesterday might not work today, and you've got to evolve.
Jessica: Do you think there are people out there who disagree with this hot take and think, "Absolutely not"?
Marisa Jarae: Good point. Yes — I think there are people who would disagree, partially because they might feel like they've done it all already: "Our systems are connected," whether they are or not. Maybe the intention was there at one point, but something has broken that just hasn't been diagnosed yet. There's also a bit of defensiveness that can come with it, and rightfully so — these are individuals and organizations that have put blood, sweat, and tears into something they believe in. It's so tempting to think, "If we just got more in the pipeline that were somewhat qualified, our problem would be solved" — at least initially — and then either continue down that path, or take a step back and, quote, "do it the right way," whatever that means. The reality is that it will always be a stopgap if getting that volume in the door is purely a volume game. At some point, there's diminishing return.
Marisa Jarae: There are also plenty of situations where everything's genuinely in place — the infrastructure is right, leadership is pushing change management, everyone's talking, the technical infrastructure is passing data appropriately, all the toolsets are there. At that point, is it a leadership problem? That's where I pivot: you're right, it's not an internal issue. It's the trust factor. You know you're leaders in your space from your personal expertise — is that actually landing in the public sphere? Is it getting in front of the right people who need that trust, who need to know you exist? That's typically where those conversations go from there.
Jessica: Say you're a marketing leader and you've made this realization: "We have a leadership problem here — it's not about the quantity of leads. I need to go to XYZ and have this conversation." How do you start?
Marisa Jarae: The first thing I'd do is generate an objective report. Not just data — I don't think that speaks to a lot of people. More like a genuinely objective report: here's what marketing sees, here's how we're qualifying, here's what we think is a win; however, here's what we're understanding from sales. Highlight the gaps. Step one. Then say, "We need to talk about this," and bring the voices in the room that need to be heard — not just key decision-makers, a truly all-team effort. Here's current real estate on the marketing side, here's current real estate in sales, here's what's missing — let's come together to fill in the blanks and identify the crux of the challenges. It takes time, but then you start to bring in additional senior leadership and senior voices that can affect that change management. It can take months, and that's just the reality.
Jessica: One thing I see often is the silo in teams and, related to that, a silo in systems — especially at larger companies. Marketing is working really well in its little bubble, sales is working really well in its bubble, and in between, giant question marks — no one is really communicating. I think that's the hardest part for folks to overcome: it's not one owner managing this. Everyone has a piece of the puzzle, and they all have to come together to solve this and move forward efficiently. Do you see that a lot in sales conversations? Are you able to identify it in those discussions?
Marisa Jarae: Almost everyone, even if they can't articulate it as well as you, typically knows. I'll ask, "Talk to me about your relationship with sales," or "Do you have visibility into any trends that might be contributing to deals that are more likely to close-won?" The answers vary from "absolutely" to "absolutely not" to "yeah, a little bit, but it needs to be better." Typically the people we talk to do have some level of understanding. I'll also sense a need to cover themselves a bit — "marketing is getting blamed" comes up a lot. "We've got our goals and we're just going to hit our goals, and if we do that, we're not the ones at fault if the larger organization doesn't win this quarter." Some bridge-building is going to be necessary to actually grow. It just can be hard to work around.
Jessica: I've used this phrase both personally and professionally: if everyone owns it, no one owns it. Sometimes what we recommend is just defining the roles — what is the role of marketing in this dynamic, what is the sales role, what are other departments contributing — so everyone knows their lane, what they're working toward as a whole, what they're working toward as a team, and what they're being held responsible for.
Jessica: Anything we haven't talked about that you think needs to be aired out?
Marisa Jarae: Why do any of us care, beyond ego, about being a leader in a space? From a sales perspective, the assumption is leadership equals sales — and I'd actually say that's probably misconstrued, but that's the perception. In reality, leadership is gaining trust. Is it gaining trust broadly? Yes. But that's a seed that's planted — it's not this massive forest that shows up by magic wand. You're planting seed by seed. As individuals and organizations say, "I want to be a leader — how can I be a leader in my space?" — yes, it's all of those tactics, or none of them, totally different ones — but at the end of the day, it's this meta-question of what's going to build trust over time, because leadership equals trust in the B2B space. When you gain that trust, you start to become a leader.
Jessica: What's one hill you'll die on as a salesperson?
Marisa Jarae: The goal should never, ever be to sell something. The goal is to build a relationship, and build that relationship by being a consultative resource — and I don't mean that performatively. People talk to a salesperson because they have a problem they need to solve, whether that's through technology, a service, or a combination of the two. If you're selling just to sell, you may or may not be successful, but at the end of the day, you're not always contributing something. The whole point of being a salesperson is to build relationships — really, it comes down to what it means to actually meaningfully sell and connect.
Jessica: What's one thing you wish people would stop doing tomorrow?
Marisa Jarae: Focusing only on ad spend.
Jessica: Book or podcast?
Marisa Jarae: Book.
Jessica: Coffee with anyone, living or dead?
Marisa Jarae: Monet.
Jessica: Slack or email?
Marisa Jarae: Slack.
Jessica: How many unopened emails do you think you have right now?
Marisa Jarae: Tens of thousands.
Jessica: One buzzword you wish would disappear forever?
Marisa Jarae: Ranking.
Jessica: What's your B2B prediction for the next five years?
Marisa Jarae: It's going to be more human with an increase in AI — which is why the humanity and authenticity of it all is going to matter just so much more.
Jessica: I love it — totally on board. You've survived the lightning round.
Before I let you out of the hot seat: what's one hot take you genuinely believe that maybe not everyone would agree with you on?
Jessica: Marisa Jarae, thank you so much for joining me today and for stepping into the hot seat. One of the things I really hope people take away from these conversations is that there are very few easy answers in business, and the best ideas hold up when we're willing to challenge them, not just because everyone agrees with them.
Marisa Jarae: Thank you.