2024's Biggest Business Mistakes (And 2025's Revenue Secrets)

The hosts of Revenue Reimagined close out the year reflecting on a critical concept they coined: the Go-To Market Gap. They realized that too many founders attempt to build a product and immediately jump to repeatability and scalability, skipping vital steps. This often leads to burning through their total addressable market (TAM) with the wrong messaging and destroying their domain reputations. The hosts emphasize the urgent need for a "stabilization" phase—essentially applying a tourniquet to stop the bleeding before establishing a solid growth foundation. The Go-To Market Gap framework hasn't just resonated with struggling founders; it has become a central asset in boardroom discussions and investor decks. By explicitly mapping out the stages—Stabilization, Foundation, Repeatability, and Scalability—leaders are successfully aligning with investors on realistic, multi-year growth timelines. This structured approach builds trust and sets clear expectations for what successful scaling actually requires, proving that stepping back is often necessary to move forward. Looking ahead to 2025, the hosts predict significant shifts in the sales landscape. They foresee AI agents completely eliminating the need for manual list building and data scraping, freeing up revenue professionals for actual selling activities. Additionally, they anticipate a broader return-to-office movement and stress the importance of ignoring inexperienced "gurus" selling cheap playbooks without the historical receipts to back up their claims.

Discussed in this episode

Why founders must stop trying to achieve scalability immediately after building an MVP.
The definition of the Go-To Market Gap and its four distinct phases of business growth.
How sending thousands of poorly targeted messages a week burns your domain and ruins your TAM.
Why 'stabilization' is required to act as a tourniquet for broken front-end sales processes.
Using the Go-To Market framework in board decks to align investors on realistic growth timelines.
The importance of conducting a comprehensive GTM audit to prevent project scope creep.
How AI agents will completely eliminate manual list building and data scraping in 2025.
The urgent need for founders to demand receipts from influencers selling unproven playbooks.

Episode highlights

0:00 — Podcast intro and vacation shirts
2:15 — Coining the Go-To Market Gap
4:30 — The danger of premature scaling
6:45 — Stabilization: Stopping the bleeding
9:10 — Using the framework in board decks
11:30 — Investors reacting to the GTM Gap
14:00 — 2024 regrets and scope creep
16:20 — 2025 trend: AI agents in sales
18:45 — Fake gurus and showing receipts

Key takeaways

Stabilize your company before building a growth foundation.
Stop scaling broken messaging that burns your domain reputation.
Map your growth framework directly into your board decks.
Block out dedicated sprint time to do deep work.
Leverage AI agents to automate list building and scraping.

Transcript

if I never see someone who has minimal to no experience hawking their 1999 course or 2999 playbook promising to fix a founder or a company's or a person's problem to only fail to deliver, um, it'll be too soon. It's a trend that's got to stop. Welcome back to another episode of The Revenue Reimagined podcast. We are joined by a very special.

No, we are not joined by a special guest today. You are stuck with Dale and I. Dale is wearing his vacation shirt. What I was saying before we started recording, I actually bought a shirt very similar, um, which is interesting because I don't wear button downs.

I don't wear flowers, um, and is that short sleeves or long sleeves? Short sleeves. Yep, so I have a very similar shirt, um, from Tommy Bahama. So cool shirt, but we are not here to talk shirts.

What we are here for is a really quick, it won't be 30 minutes, but we want to close out the year, uh, super strong with all our listeners. And we really want to talk briefly through a quick 2024 recap. What we're seeing in relation to the go-to market gap, a term that we coined this year that I don't think we expected to take off like it did, and I'm excited for you to talk about where we saw it this past week that, like, I I I'm I'm smiling and even blushing just thinking about it. Um, and then just a quick look ahead to, uh, 2025.

So, uh, thanks for being here, Dell. Yeah. Thanks Adam. I appreciate the, uh, introduction.

And actually, I wanted to take a quick second thanking everybody that kind of listen, like it's kind of interesting this journey of this podcast over really more like 18 months now, but like this evolution of people that have listened to it, people that actually when we're interviewing or having, uh, prospect calls that actually have gone to the, the podcast and listen to it. So, appreciate anyone that's listened to it, even like if it's two or three people. But, um, and and going into 25, so many really cool things that we've been thinking about. So the first thing that we built out over, actually really the last three or four months has been not even over the last year is is what we've termed the go-to market gap.

And what we saw in the market was people were trying to get to repeatability and scalability from a go-to market perspective. Like right away, and the problem with that was they had to build the product, they will come. They have a bunch of broken stuff in the in the front end. And so, we we sat together and were like, okay, what can we call this first phase?

And it's like, the thing that came to our mind was we have to stabilize the organization. We have to stabilize the go-to market strategy. And so, I was I talked to somebody this week and I was like, we have to put a turnicate on like this bleeding. Like you may be going into a new market, or you may not get more top of funnel, or you may be, uh, struggling with your close rates or not getting the revenue that you need to generate.

And there's like, the question is why, like, why is it happening? We know that it is happening, and you got to be really transparent and honest on on why it's happening. Like, what is it? And so, we spent a lot of time this year sitting with companies in stabilization, and it's it's hard even on us.

Like, you want to get into this foundation building and like, building processings, but I I think we've spent a lot of time in 2024 in this place of putting the turnicate on the bandage, or on the on the wound. And so, I look forward into 25 on actually getting into building the foundation with a lot of our current clients and new existing clients and new clients we bring on. Yeah, it's it's funny to me, right? You know, every founder, and this isn't even just with Revenue Reimagined.

I think this is even when we were working full-time, has this mindset of build a product, hire a person or 10, whatever. Um, and just flip a switch and it's going to replicate itself and the world is great. And like I I half joke when I say, you know, build it and they will come, but that is kind of the mindset of like we we've built this, we have this V1 ICP, we have this V1 messaging, we have this MVP product, and let's just go make it repeatable and like the business is going to grow and we're going to, you know, have this massive exit for $100 million. And it doesn't work that way.

And when the go-to market gap was built starting with that that bridge, if you will, of stabilization, foundation, repeatability, and scalability, I get asked a lot, well, what do you mean stabilization? Like don't you just come help build the foundation? And the problem transparently is, and I'm going to be a little bit unkind here, is typically when we come in, things are so fucked up that it's not build the foundation. It's like, we have to stabilize what's wrong and stop the bleeding for lack of better terms, because every message you send out is the wrong value prop and you're totally messaging the wrong ICP and burning your TAM.

And you're sending out 6,000 messages a week and burning your domain. Like if we don't stabilize that, there's going to be no foundation because there's going to be no business. So you you have to take the step back to stabilizing the company and then using the house analogy, building this foundation and making sure that you're getting things the right way. Um, I'm shocked at how well it's been received by prospects, by customers, and I'll let you talk a little bit about like where we've seen the go-to market gap go from this initial idea to the ethos of our business and how we structure our sprints, how we structure our engagements, how we interact with our clients, but I think it's been taken one step further over the past month that I certainly never in my wildest dreams thought would happen in in the time course of a quarter.

Yeah, and and that that that evolution actually came to kind of a crescendo, I guess, is the best way to put it, during some meetings we had with clients this week as they're putting together board decks and putting together uh investment, uh, requests and talking with, uh, the chairman of the board on some of these, uh, companies and talking and putting that go-to market gap and framework right into their deck and how not only they've gone from where they were before, like, in the stabilization phase, and like, what is happening currently in the stabilization phase, and moving them into the foundational elements of the organization, the foundational elements of how we're going to build it over the next three to six months and then getting out to repeatability and scalability. And they the the clients realized that they need to take a step back before moving forward. And this was just it's an easy framework for people to grasp and and get a hold of. Like, too many times these frameworks are too difficult or they're like, really, like, you know, how do you how do you figure out where you fall in this?

And so, Yeah. I it was nice to see them just take the fundamental wording of it, build it into the deck and see kind of how it was going to evolve over the next six or 12 months. And then even getting into 26, right? Like, 25, like they realized like they were bleeding a lot.

They realized that now in 20 uh, 24 that they're kind of getting in the stabilization, like they could realize that. Then they're like, okay, we're going to build our foundation in 25, and then we're really going to drive to repeatability and scalability in 26. I I think that that's the part that blew my mind the most, right? Like certainly seeing the four stages in a board deck, um, was pretty darn cool, but seeing the three to four-year plan mapped to each of those stages, Right.

very specifically with like little circles and then talking about what happens in each of those stages. Um, I didn't expect it. And then the icing on the cake to me was the other day sitting in a executive leadership team meeting with the lead investor of this company, and the entire meeting is focused on the go-to market gap. And what what that tells me is like, we didn't just come up with a great idea that sounds good for us, but investors are deeply understanding this concept, um, and actually keen to have a framework that they could tie these engagements to to create some predictability on how you're going to move the business forward.

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He said that was the most impactful slide of the deck, right? So he could he could see how that like and trust me, we had financials and numbers and all sorts of other things, but he felt like he could pitch this back to the other owners and the other investors, um, in a way that would make a lot of sense. So, um, that was really cool. Um, I think it also grounds, uh, founders or leaders into a path and a and a and a process, because everyone, like, we want repeatability for you guys as much as in scalability.

Like, I I used to say this when I was selling all the time, um, and everyone would be like, well, well, what happened? Like, can you get to your quota? Like, what get your quota? I'm like, or can you get the deal size higher?

And I'm like, you don't think I want to sell this as at the highest price that I can? Or that I'm not trying like, you know, extra hard to like hit your quota? Like, I always felt like sales people are trying to do this, but there's there's things that end up happening. So this just gives them, you don't know where you're going unless it's designed and and mapped out, and then you have a path to get to it.

And so, that's what I think the framework has done. Um, I'm super excited as we roll out some new assets, um, as we revamp the the website that'll be coming out, as we're building, um, some some ability for people to almost do it on their not do it on their own, but enable them to have an understanding of how to get there. And that's what's exciting for me in 25. I, you know, when we started the business, it was all like, how can we help as many founders as possible get to a revenue generation faster, right?

We've we've all gone through these these these hard times of, we have a good product, we have a good position, we know what we're hitting in the market, but we just can't seem to generate the revenue. And so, I like as many founders and companies that we help this year, I look forward to helping even more next year. Yeah, I I I couldn't agree more. When you look at 24, Dale, what's the one thing we did that looking back, you're like, yeah, probably shouldn't have done that.

Um, I think not having an audit done properly, because we had a lot of scope creep. Um, so I think in the middle of the year, we learned like, let's get a a go-to market audit, uh, put together, it's super comprehensive. Um, and I think that was that helped like at least level set us. Um, and so, I'll flip that back on you.

What was one thing that you would have changed over the last year? Um, I would have blocked out what we what I call sprint time much earlier. I I I hate scope creep, but at the same time, I truly believe that we're an extension of our clients' executive team. So I I as much shit as I give you, I have a hard time saying no to clients as well, because like our job is to make you successful.

And what I found is, you know, my my calendar is arguably worse than anyone's. I have a lot of meetings and I wasn't allowing the right time to like have heads down building time, and it took me probably until July where I blocked time every morning, every afternoon, and an extended midday block on Wednesdays to like do deep sprint client work. Um, and it's made me so much more productive. Yeah, yeah, that's a great point.

Going into 25, what do you see as some trends that are going to actually turn into like real things going into 25? Yeah. It's a great question. Um, AI for sure, but not like everyone's thinking.

Um, I I'm doing a talk at an event we're going to end of January, the Growth Elevated Summit, specifically about AI and Go-to Market. And I think when you look at AI agents, that is where I think you're going to see the biggest uptick in go-to market. The days of people doing long, drawn-out list building, research, and data scraping are over. And I for one, think it's a great thing because every revenue person will now focus on revenue producing activity, not building lists, um, and and grabbing data.

Um, so I think that's one. And then number two, as much as it pains me to say, um, I think we're just going to see a big return to office shift. Mm. Yeah.

And I, you know, what I'm seeing going in there, it there's going to be a lot of AI pieces in, um, the process, but I'm get I I still think we're going to get this continuing shift of customer success, value creation, value creation at a very quick, uh, time frame. One of the things that we get stuck with sometimes is just scalability. Like we get to a place where we have challenges scaling. So, um, one of the things that I'm super focused on in 25 is is how to even democratize go-to market further.

Um, how we can help founders, companies, investors, um, start a process even without us and get to a place of stabilization so that when they're ready and they want to go build the foundational pieces, they've already stabilized their business. Like, we're so when we start, because when we've been starting with companies, we're in a stabilization mode, can we get to the place where we're at the end of stabilization and getting into foundation building within the first two months? Like that would be a goal that I have in the 25, so we're not spending the first two to three months stabilizing all the things that we need to do before we can start building. So, that's that's something I want to want to get into in 25.

I love that. What do you, uh, last last question, um, as you look to 25, what trend do you want to see go away? What what's the trend of 24 that you're like, shit, dude, like this is got to stop. It's funny.

Um, I saw Mac post something today on LinkedIn about all these LinkedIn influencers that just talk about AI dying, like people just trying to get clicks and comments and starting to get real, uh, real engagement. So I would love to get to a place where networks are getting stronger, communities are getting stronger, like I think the tech is starting to get there, and we get away from people trying to make a quick buck with founders, investors, something like that, at a G P T level strategy. I'll put I'll put it that way. I I was going to say something relatively similar.

Um, if I never see someone who has minimal to no experience hawking their 1999 course or 2999 playbook promising to fix a founder or a company's or a person's problem to only fail to deliver, um, it'll be too soon. It's a trend that's got to stop. Show me the receipts, we say it over and over again. Um, if you haven't been there and done that, you probably don't have the right to teach others how to do it.

Yeah. I for one am extremely excited, um, about 2025 for a plethora of reasons. Um, I think there is a lot of changes in the market. I think there are new products that we are taking part in right now that are going to really disrupt the market.

I think sales as we know it is going to continue to change, continue to evolve. You're going to see tech strategies going over to services, service strategies coming over to tech, um, and really start to see these things blending together. I don't know how I feel about another year working alongside you. Um, we will see how that I'm kidding.

Um, it's been an amazing year. I'm excited for 2025 and all that's to come. For everyone that has given us an hour of your week, whether it be once a week, whether it be, you know, multiple times a week where you're going back on episodes, if you've listened one time or if you listen to all, I think 70 episodes, uh, that we've put out this year because there were a couple special episodes. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for spending your time with us.

Thank you for working out with us, um, and keep the feedback coming. Let us know how the show could get better. Yes. I appreciate it.

I appreciate all the effort that, uh, you put in as well, Adam. I'm super grateful for everything we put together and looking forward to a great 25. So, uh, happy New Year, everybody, and, uh, look forward to connecting in 25.