Contrary to what martech tools like HubSpot say, marketing has never been predictable or linear. And it doesn’t drive revenue directly. It multiplies sales effectiveness, shortens the path to “yes,” and protects future growth. Here’s what every B2B tech leader should know.
Last week, HubSpot sent out this email:
The gist of it was to promote their new AI-powered features, as if AI will make marketing predictable like it once was.
“Marketing used to be predictable and linear. Not anymore.”
Really?
Um, Marketing was never predictable. Never linear. Not in B2B, not in B2C, not anywhere.
And framing it this way is exactly why companies waste time and money chasing shortcuts.
For the past 15–20 years, B2B marketing has been hooked on “performance marketing” because of promises made by software companies (HubSpot is not mutually exclusive here).
Marketers were sold a bill of goods: predictable funnels, lead-to-revenue models, and real-time multi-touch attribution displayed on pretty dashboards.
Hey, I’m just as guilty. I drank the Kool-Aid too.
But the results? Nothing to be excited about.
Research and data analysis have proven the opposite:
The idea that marketing once marched buyers in a straight line from awareness to deal? That's a fairy tale.
And the idea that AI will restore predictability? Wishful thinking.
Here’s the real distinction every executive should know:
Marketing creates the conditions for sales to succeed:
But it does not “drive” revenue on its own. Presenting it that way sets CMOs up against an impossible benchmark, one the CFO and board will never buy.
Dale W. Harrison explains this clearly in How Marketing Creates Revenue.
His model shows the incremental effects of sales, performance marketing, and brand marketing combined:
This proves that marketing is a non-linear multiplier of a linear function like sales. It produces zero direct revenue, but it radically amplifies sales.
PS: Dale’s The Mythology of Brand Growth is an insightful follow-up to Byron Sharp’s book, How Brands Grow (mentioned above). Definitely worth reading.
Mark Stouse and I have discussed this many times.
He reinforces this reality with two important points:
This is CFO-friendly language: delayed, compounding effects that expand efficiency and probability.
The “predictable funnel” story keeps getting pushed for a number of reasons.
This last point matters. When we stop questioning, we stop leading. And when we outsource our thinking to vendors, we reduce marketing to a support function instead of a growth function.
The messy reality? It’s inherent in the system.
But that’s okay! Because the real job of marketing is to:
This is how CEOs and CFOs should frame marketing internally: as a capital investment in future efficiency, not as a vending machine for leads.
If you lead a B2B tech company, here are three shifts worth making:
1. Stop asking for linear attribution.
2. Treat marketing outcomes as probabilistic not deterministic.
3. Listen to Peter Drucker: Reframe marketing as capital allocation, not cost.
And here’s another important point:
Marketing must raise the bar. We’ve grown complacent. Too often we accept whatever martech vendors tell us instead of doing the harder work of insight, strategy, positioning, and brand-building. Marketing can only reclaim its full power when we start asking tougher questions again.
Marketing is not predictable or linear. It never was.
It’s complex and messy.
Why? Because people are complex, irrational, and messy.
The power of marketing lies in its ability to compound over time, multiply sales, and shape the likelihood of revenue.
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Cheers!
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