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If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?

If you're a CMO struggling to hit pipeline numbers, it's probably not your strategy, team, or tactics. It's the broken system. For over a decade, B2B had a playbook that worked. Budgets were predictable, buyers were reachable, and marketing automation (mostly) tracked the journey. We built careers on nurtures, MQL handoffs, and attribution models. Then that foundation cracked.  Here's the data to prove it. THE BUDGET SQUEEZE Marketing budgets dropped from 11% of revenue pre-pandemic to 7.7% today (Gartner). Meanwhile, WordStream reports Google Ads CPL hit $70.11 in 2025, up 31% from $53.52 two years ago. B2B tech companies now routinely pay $200+ per lead. We're doing more with less, while the price of every click, impression, and conversion climbs relentlessly. THE INVISIBLE BUYER 6sense shows 70% of the buyer journey now happens anonymously, outside systems you can track. Gartner found 75% of B2B buyers actively avoid sales contact until they're ready, and when you do connect, Digital Commerce 360 reports 1/3 go silent after initial contact. Buying groups expanded to 6-10 people on average, sometimes up to 16, according to Gartner. Most of those people will never appear in your CRM. They're researching and forming opinions in the dark — and traditional marketing automation can't reach them there. THE BROKEN INFRASTRUCTURE Cookie deprecation and privacy regulations blocked the known, tracked visitors underpinning marketing automation, breaking traditional scoring methods and making the journey even harder to track. And meanwhile, the legacy MAP vendors were mostly stagnant, raising prices without adding new functionality. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS Backlinko reports content exploded to 6M blog posts daily.  Algorithm InSights 2025 found LinkedIn organic reach collapsed to 1-2% in 2025 — half of prior levels.. Email isn't faring better. Infraforge says cold email open rates dropped from 36% to 27.7% in one year. Reply rates fell from 7% to 5.1%, meaning 19 out of 20 cold emails are now ignored. It's a tragedy of the commons. We abused every tactic until buyers tuned out and opt out. THE MEASUREMENT BREAKDOWN Meanwhile, Televerde and Anteriad report many companies haven't updated MQL definitions in over five years. We're optimizing for metrics sales doesn't value, while what really drives revenue impact (strong brand awareness and preference) stays invisible. THE BOTTOM LINE Today's B2B marketers operate with smaller budgets against higher costs, trying to influence larger anonymous buying groups through noisier channels with weaker reach, measured by outdated metrics — all while buyers demand authenticity and avoid our outreach. I'd argue your pipeline misses are probably not an execution failure. The system fundamentally changed and the old playbook broke. What part of this broken system is hitting you hardest: the budget pressure, the invisible buyer, or the broken infrastructure? And do you have other stats on this?