Frank Growth

Episodes

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  Stop Writing Only for Humans with Jesus Requena 18.08.2026 27m

  Episode #233: Jesus Requena — Dropping SEO entirely to optimize for LLMsSanity stopped producing SEO content and started building pages only machines will read. Roughly 60% of last month's signups came from LLMs.For B2B growth leaders watching organic traffic fall and trying to work out what replaces it.Jesus Requena is CMO at Sanity, and previously led growth marketing at Figma, demand gen at Unity and Algolia, and growth at Hex. After watching client SEO traffic fall to a tenth of what it had been, he stopped SEO content production entirely and rebuilt Sanity's content for LLMs to parse rather than humans to read. He walks through the three-layer playbook: fixing contradictions across 100 to 200 pages on their own site, converting roughly 1,000 FAQ pages from user-centric to LLM-centric, building five single-topic microsites excluded from Google, then correcting third-party citations that conflicted with their own story. Sanity moved from ranking 15th or 20th in LLM visibility to top five.What you'll hear Why visibility comes from reasoning: if an LLM can reason your concepts clearly, it recommends you, which makes first-party consistency the starting point How they executed it — crawling their own site to find unclear terms, writing content no human is expected to read, and partnering with AirOps to fix obsolete third-party citations Why attribution breaks when signups arrive through a CLI or MCP without ever touching the website, and the self-reported "where did you find us" question they fell back on Where to start from zero, in order: audit your own site, then third-party mentions, then microsites — plus the caveat that Reddit's influence is fading and LLMs are pulling more from videoChapters 00:00 — Cold open: "We literally just stopped any SEO content" 00:38 — The AEO shift: what's going wrong and what works 02:12 — Meet Jesus Requena: Figma, Unity, Algolia, Hex, Sanity 02:45 — The common thread in marketing to technical audiences 04:30 — SEO traffic drops to a tenth, and the bet that followed 06:15 — The three layers of AEO content 08:22 — Citations, visibility, and going from 15th to top five 10:37 — Authority, and becoming the thought leader for the LLM 12:07 — 1,000 FAQ pages and five microsites excluded from Google 14:23 — Why brand investment went physical: events, swag, billboards 17:30 — Measuring attribution when nobody clicks 19:17 — Is the growth repeatable or is it timing? 20:41 — Where to start from zero 22:38 — Scaling agents, and humans handling the exception 23:59 — Lightning round 25:14 — Jason's top three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestJesus Requena — CMO, SanityWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  His AI Employee Works While He Sleeps with Andrew Mok 11.08.2026 27m

  Episode #232: Andrew Mok — What the CMO job becomes when AI runs the mechanicsHeyGen doubled to $200M ARR in eight months, is cash-flow breakeven, and runs on about 130 people. Its CMO explains how marketing actually operates there.For marketing leaders deciding what to keep, what to cut, and what to hand to an agent.Andrew Mok spent 12 years at Turo building a category nobody believed in, then joined HeyGen as CMO four months ago in the middle of its fastest growth stretch. He walks through the operating details: a verticalized stack that runs inference 10x cheaper than general video models, 100 to 200 customer interviews a week piped into an internal MCP that any employee can query, and a personal agent named Mara (marketing automation and research agent) that hands him a metrics digest on his drive into the office. He's also blunt about the parts most people won't say out loud — that job replacement is real, and that it will come mostly from lean AI-native companies growing into big ones, not from big companies running layoffs. He does three to five customer interviews a week himself, and that's the metric he checks every week.What you'll hearThe three Cs he runs on — customers, company fundamentals, culture — and how customer voice became infrastructure instead of a slide: 100–200 interviews a week, curated by agents, queryable for pain points, churn reasons, and competitor chatter.How Mara actually gets used: metrics digests over voice in the car, deep dives before he reaches the office, and why documents and decks went from a multi-week exercise to 30 seconds.What was slowing the company down: leading with technical capability instead of the human problem, which works on AI enthusiasts and stalls with the mainstream. Plus how Turo handled its worst crisis — the New Year's terror attacks — by putting everything in the open instead of covering it.Jevons paradox applied to video: lower the price and friction, and quantity goes up. HeyGen's five-person internal video team produces roughly 100x more video than a company not using AI tools, and it's the biggest video team Andrew has ever run.Chapters00:00 — Cold open: AI-native companies will hire far fewer people00:49 — Intro: if AI handles the mechanics, what's left of the CMO job03:29 — 12 years at Turo and what long tenure teaches you about brand04:34 — The New Year's terror attacks and handling crisis with transparency05:44 — Turo vs. HeyGen: trusting a stranger with your car vs. a company with your likeness06:52 — Who the real customer is: small business owners, skewing older, not AI enthusiasts08:26 — Why he left Turo, and the introvert founder story behind HeyGen09:51 — $200M ARR, doubled in eight months: what marketing changed at that velocity11:09 — Breakeven economics: owning the model and running inference 10x cheaper12:16 — Customers, company, culture: 100–200 interviews a week and an internal MCP13:56 — Mara, the marketing agent: morning digests, campaigns, weekly team updates15:27 — Which bottleneck disappeared first, and what's still hard16:23 — AI and jobs: replacement comes from lean new companies, not big layoffs18:21 — Jevons paradox: lower the barrier to video and demand outstrips it19:50 — Hyperframes: why HTML, and why they open sourced it21:56 — What surprised him inside an AI company: refusing deepfakes when allowing them would pay23:17 — Lightning round23:51 — The creator who kept her livelihood after long COVID24:45 — Where to find Andrew25:20 — Jason's top three and one action for this weekLinks & resourcesGuestAndrew Mok — CMO, HeyGenWebsiteLinkedInXMentionedHyperframes — HeyGen's open source HTML-based video rendering framework, on GitHubJulia McCoy's YouTube channelAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional linksWork with Winston FrancoisSubscribe / Follow Jason
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  What is Growth Design? with Philip Lowe 04.08.2026 31m

  Episode #231: Philip Lowe - Growth creative isn't art, and the customer is the judgeHow to build creative that moves a number (a click, a conversion, a download) instead of creative that only wins the room.For growth marketers, creative directors, and in-house studio leads deciding what to test, what to produce, and what to kill.Philip Lowe runs creative, brand, and marketing operations at Quicken, and previously built Instacart's growth creative team from scratch after starting there as a creative director for CRM. He and Jason worked together at Soothe and Headspace, and this conversation covers what actually separates creative that's good from creative that performs: hiring people who understand both brand and performance, testing hooks, concepts, and narratives as a stage gate before anything gets produced, and knowing where AI helps and where it doesn't. Philip walks through the four-pillar roadmap he uses (exploration, production, learning, infrastructure) and explains why the old path of $30,000 per storyboard and a week and a half of waiting is no longer the only option. He's blunt about the limits too. An AI-generated couple reviewing their finances cycled through eight facial expressions in seconds, which is a non-starter for a brand that has built 40 years of trust.What you'll hear Why growth creative sits at the intersection of brand and performance, and why separating the two is the biggest mistake leaders make How Philip built and staffed a growth studio at Instacart, and why the asset was the vehicle and the insight was the point Where AI delivers, including stylized worlds, claymation, stop motion, and surrealism, anywhere imperfection is the aesthetic, and where it falls flat on human emotion, eyes, hands, and quiet moments What the job of creative becomes in CRM and lifecycle when AI is reading the inbox and open rates stop being the focusChapters 00:00 - Three seconds to hook, like a comedian on stage 00:29 - What growth creative is, and why it's not decoration 01:24 - Sooth, Headspace, and having conviction in the work 04:11 - Growth creative vs. brand creative vs. design 05:56 - The kangaroo video: when it clicked 07:24 - Building Instacart's growth creative team from scratch 09:27 - Good creative vs. creative that performs 11:05 - Testing before you spend a dollar producing 12:41 - Taking on ops: from tastemakers to operators with good taste 14:24 - What changes when production gets cheap 16:38 - The four pillars: exploration, production, learning, infrastructure 18:20 - Where AI delivers a performance and where it doesn't 20:31 - Real humans, real stories, and trust in finance 21:56 - CRM and lifecycle when AI reads the inbox 24:12 - Breaking through when agents do the browsing 25:53 - Hiring for taste 27:01 - The one thing leaders get wrong 27:39 - Lightning round 29:48 - Top three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestPhilip Lowe, creative, brand, and marketing operations at QuickenLinkedInTikTokAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow: real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Growth's Most Dangerous Trap With Sara Wallace 28.07.2026 21m

  Episode #230: Sara Wallace — Repositioning a consumer cashback app into a B2B platformIbotta is known as a cashback app. It's also a white-label promotions platform for the largest retailer in the world.For marketers at consumer companies standing up an enterprise or platform business alongside the one that made them.Sara Wallace is Head of Brand Marketing at Ibotta, which runs both the consumer cashback app and the Ibotta Performance Network. Five months into the role, after building executive marketing and global AI go-to-market strategy at Google Cloud, she's working the problem of building B2B awareness for a company whose recognition lives almost entirely on the consumer side. We get into why she treats the two audiences as genuinely separate rather than migrating one into the other, the one channel where that split breaks down, how she handles AI thought leadership under legal and compliance constraints, and why she argues brand is the engine that makes performance marketing work rather than a luxury line item. She also walks through Ibotta's annual State of Spend findings, including a decline in grocery list-making as shoppers plan loosely and let promotions fill the gaps.What you'll hear Why Ibotta doesn't try to convert cashback users into a B2B audience, and where the two narratives still collide (social media) What Google Cloud taught her about selling to CIOs and CTOs: show how you support the work their org is already doing instead of proving you're the smartest in the room Why public AI messaging stays stunted at most companies — legal exposure, and stories that aren't fully baked yet How to make the case for brand investment when leadership is pushing for immediate ROIChapters 00:00 — Cold open: brand building feels like a luxury, and why it isn't 00:45 — Intro: most companies die from brand confusion, not obscurity 02:33 — Two distinct audiences, not one rebrand 03:32 — Building awareness for the Ibotta Performance Network 05:01 — Google Cloud lessons: talking to technical buyers like people 05:46 — Rebuilding momentum under a new CRO after the CMO left 06:33 — Talking about AI inside legal and compliance limits 07:55 — Founder-led content and the CEO-hosted podcast 08:46 — Enterprise marketing lessons: Walmart, Uber, DoorDash 10:51 — Differentiating against Amazon DSP, Google Ads, and Meta 11:37 — Denver as a hiring market outside Silicon Valley 12:36 — What she hires for: ownership, fail-fast, decision-making 13:23 — State of Spend: fewer lists, more promotion-driven baskets, private label 15:28 — Brand as the engine for performance marketing 16:44 — Brands she admires: Nike and Shopify 17:52 — The overlooked story: Ibotta as a technology company 18:47 — Lightning round 19:29 — Jason's top three takeaways and the 10-minute actionLinks & resourcesGuestSara Wallace — Head of Brand Marketing, IbottaWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Longevity Medicine's Dirty Secret with Jim Donnelly 21.07.2026 23m

  Episode #229: Jim Donnelly — Franchising longevity medicine without losing medical qualityHow to scale a medical franchise when you can't train a local owner to interpret biomarkers.For operators and founders standardizing a complex, high-trust service across many locations.Jim Donnelly scaled Restore Hyper Wellness to 260 locations before starting Humanaut Health, a concierge longevity practice he's now bringing to market through a franchise model he describes as ten times more complex. With his third location opening in Dallas, he walks through how he splits growth across corporate sites, franchisees, and a real estate joint venture, why the company hires and trains every doctor centrally, and how it backs a results guarantee tied to a client pledge and an accountability protocol. He shares concrete numbers, including 87% of clients arriving with metabolic dysfunction showing no sign of it six months later, and a Dallas clinic set to open cash flow positive and profitable in month one. It's a tactical look at standardizing a category most people can't yet define.What you'll hear The two rules of franchising anything: provide value constantly and remove the complexity a franchisee can't handle, plus the test that if you need exceptional operators, you don't have a franchise How Humanaut centralizes doctors, tech, and supply chain while leaving franchisees local hiring, sales culture, and marketing, each backed by a playbook Why most medical businesses fail by leaning too far to the medical or the business side, and the "you can't start at your PhD" progression that got Jim here Reframing longevity as health optimization you feel today to drive retention, and the unit-economics bar: high AUV, 20%+ net margins, and a sub-two-year paybackChapters 00:00 — Longevity is a bad word: reframing it as health optimization 02:48 — The 25-year path to Humanaut: health clubs, Restore, cancer, a car crash 05:03 — The value prop: proactive care, a focus three, and a results guarantee 08:58 — Franchising health optimization: provide value, remove complexity 13:37 — Unit economics: AUV, margins, and opening profitable in month one 18:39 — What it actually takes, plus the lightning roundLinks & resourcesGuestJim Donnelly — Co-Founder and CEO, Humanaut HealthWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois: Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason: Subscribe / Follow Jason on LinkedIn
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  Your Bookkeeper Is Failing You with John Zdanowski 14.07.2026 24m

  Episode #228: John Zdanowski — Why you're losing money on 80% of your customersMost owners can tell you last month's revenue but not which customers actually make them money. This episode gives you the math to find out.For founders and operators—especially DTC brands—who suspect they're spending too much to acquire customers who never come back.John Zdanowski is co-founder and CEO of Weekly Accounting and a Harvard MBA who describes himself as a sonar engineer applying signal-processing math to business data. He previously co-founded Assembled Brands, a $100M fund that has seen the financials of 3,000+ emerging consumer brands—the vantage point where his core thesis formed: most brands optimize for revenue growth and quietly lose money on customers who only buy once. In this episode he walks through his "fourth statement" (audience to first-time customer to repeat), the sets of books every business already has or still needs, and why he runs accounting on a weekly cadence instead of monthly. He gets specific: the lifetime-gross-profit-to-CAC ratio, why a 1.7 ratio means you're grinding the engine, and how he turns a quarterly goal of $189,000 for 6,100 customers into a weekly target of $14,500 and ~470 customers.What you'll hear The "fourth statement" framework: turning audience → first purchase → repeat into unit economics you can forecast growth and saturation from How to run the numbers weekly—divide a quarterly goal by 13, compare this week to the same week last year—for 52 feedback loops a year instead of 12 The common mistake: optimizing for revenue growth and losing money on one-time buyers instead of optimizing for contribution The first number to calculate: lifetime gross profit (purchases per customer × average order value × gross margin) ÷ CAC, and why anything near 1.7 means you're overspending to acquireChapters 00:00 — The fourth statement: audience, first purchase, repeat 01:16 — Why most owners are flying blind on customer profitability 02:44 — Assembled Brands, and optimizing for contribution over revenue 03:59 — The break-even math on a first-time DTC customer 05:22 — What bookkeepers actually deliver vs. what you need 07:07 — Two sets of books, then a third, then a fourth 08:05 — Weekly cadence: 52 feedback loops instead of 12 09:53 — Daily vs. weekly vs. monthly, and troubled to world-class 11:58 — The integrated financial model: weekly tied to the quarter 14:45 — Warning signs your accounting is broken 15:25 — Why accounting is a venture-scale opportunity 17:11 — Inside the Weekly Accounting platform 19:48 — The one number: lifetime gross profit to CAC 20:32 — Lightning round 21:59 — Takeaways and a 10-minute actionLinks & resourcesGuestJohn Zdanowski — Co-founder & CEO, Weekly AccountingWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  The Three-Sided Growth Problem with Robin Izsak-Tseng 07.07.2026 27m

  Episode #227: Robin Izsak-Tseng — Marketing one brand to three audiences at onceMost B2B companies fight to win one customer segment. WellHub has to win three at the same time.For marketers and operators running multi-audience, marketplace, or multi-country growth.Robin Izsak-Tseng is VP of global B2B marketing at WellHub, a corporate wellness platform serving over 40,000 companies across 18 countries. She runs a three-sided marketplace — HR buyers, fitness partners, and the employees who use it — through three distinct teams that report to one CMO. In this episode she breaks down how those teams stay aligned without becoming siloed, how acquisitions like Urban Sports Club buy instant brand recognition, and why pulling back GymPass paid search and web properties too early after the rebrand opened a door for a competitor in Brazil. She also names the simple mistake complex teams make: assuming the same level of market maturity everywhere, when a household name in one country still gets "what's WellHub?" at marketer dinners in another.What you’ll hear How WellHub structures three marketing teams (B2B, partners, B2C) under one CMO and keeps them aligned around a single company story Using zip-code-level data to map partner supply down to individual neighborhoods, not just cities Why cutting GymPass search bids and web properties too soon let a competitor gain authority in Brazil When to put the product in employees' hands first (a SoulCycle class, 30 days on the diamond plan) so engagement opens the door to HRChapters 00:00 — The market-maturity trap (cold open) 00:42 — The three-sided growth engine 02:46 — Inside WellHub's triple-sided marketplace 04:48 — Proving ROI on employee wellness 05:49 — Acquisitions and instant brand recognition 08:24 — The GymPass to WellHub rebrand 10:08 — Martech, HubSpot, and AI disruption 15:35 — Events and the product-led sell-through 20:11 — The biggest mistake: assuming market maturity 22:58 — Lightning roundLinks & resourcesGuestRobin Izsak-Tseng — VP of Global B2B Marketing, WellHubWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois: Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason: Follow Jason on LinkedIn
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  The $10 Million Rule with Seth Lowery 30.06.2026 19m

  Episode #226: Seth Lowery — The $10M rule that kills good ideas, not just bad onesHow to decide which growth bets to fund when every idea on the table already looks good.For marketing and growth leaders drowning in too many opportunities and a team that's too small to chase them all.Seth Lowery is VP of Marketing at Octane, a fintech that has originated over $8 billion in consumer loans and runs both a lending arm (Roadrunner Financial) and an in-house SaaS layer—with close to 50% of the company in product and tech. On Seth's first day, his CEO handed him a single rule: a new initiative needs to clear $10 million in incremental originations to get approved. In this episode he breaks down why that number is a guideline rather than a hard rule, how it forces his team into P1/P2/P3 backlogs, his four-prong method for working with sales, and how he runs three different go-to-market motions—OEMs, dealers, and B2B2C—at the same time.What you'll hear The $10M incremental-originations bar, and why Seth treats it as a compass rather than a cage The four-prong method for sales and marketing: to sales, for sales, through sales, and in lieu of sales Why the hardest no's are the easy internal asks—a better-looking slide deck, an event t-shirt—and why he tells his team "let me be the bad guy" How he runs three GTM motions at once while deliberately keeping Octane's own brand in the backgroundChapters 00:00 — Cold open: the problem isn't too few ideas, it's too many 00:33 — Intro and the initiative-overload problem 02:35 — Lending company or tech company? 03:40 — Where the $10 million rule came from 05:13 — How the rule changes what to run and what to kill 06:30 — The hardest no's and "let me be the bad guy" 07:57 — Running a remote team to results, not hours 08:40 — The four-prong method for sales and marketing 11:21 — Hiring for B2B and channel marketing over fintech 12:15 — Octane's moat: the octane score and the soft pull 12:54 — Running three GTM motions at once 15:04 — The overlooked lever: loyalty 15:34 — The two biggest prioritization mistakes 16:33 — Lightning round 17:53 — Jason's top three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestSeth Lowery — VP of Marketing, OctaneWebsiteRoadrunner FinancialLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois: Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason: Follow Jason on LinkedIn
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  The Taylor Swift Effect with Blakely Neilson 23.06.2026 17m

  Episode #225: Blakely Neilson — Building a high-growth EdTech brand when buyers aren't on LinkedInThis episode is a tactical playbook for marketing to a buyer that ignores LinkedIn, retargeting, and white papers: the school district.For operators and founders selling into education, or any relationship-first market where you can't performance-market your way to pipeline.Blakely Neilson came from finance and joined the founding team at Parallel Learning, an EdTech company building virtual special education services for school districts in over 25 states. She built the B2B marketing function from scratch as the company pivoted from DTC to B2B, which meant trading paid social and paid search for conferences, webinars, email, and thought leadership, and shifting the message from emotion and urgency to compliance, scale, and risk mitigation. She gets concrete about what works: a lemonade-stand booth during a California heat wave, a Taylor Swift email sent the minute the engagement news broke, and using AI to track Google alerts so the message can adapt when a district like Wake County cuts $18 million from special education.What you'll hear Why the DTC-to-B2B pivot meant moving from paid acquisition to an organic mix of conferences, webinars, email, and thought leadership, with messaging built around compliance, scale, and risk mitigation How the team pairs marketing with revenue at conferences, sets up pre-conference meetings, and uses creative on-the-ground tactics like a lemonade stand during a heat wave to drive top-of-funnel leads Why leading with "we're radically changing the field through AI" backfires with late-adopter special-ed buyers, and why the message instead focuses on absorbing administrative burden How to keep one core message constant while tailoring execution state by state, using Google alerts to flex when budgets get cutChapters 00:00 — Cold open: why most B2B EdTech marketing is boring 00:27 — Why EdTech marketing breaks the standard playbook 01:33 — Meet Blakely Neilson and Parallel Learning 02:32 — From finance to building marketing through a DTC-to-B2B pivot 03:39 — Building trust with relationship-first district buyers 04:44 — Making conferences a real pipeline driver 05:59 — The webinar formula that stands out post-COVID 07:17 — Marketing an AI product to AI-skeptical buyers 08:27 — Pop culture, the Taylor Swift email, and humanizing B2B 11:05 — Awareness vs. conversion in a two-sided marketplace 11:45 — Scaling across 25 states with Google alerts and AI 13:01 — Sales and marketing operating rhythm 13:50 — Lightning round 15:22 — Jason's top three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestBlakely Neilson — Founding team, Parallel LearningWebsiteLinkedIn (Blakely)LinkedIn (Parallel Learning)InstagramAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  The Bootstrapper's Revenge with Alex Roy 16.06.2026 23m

  Episode #224: Alex Roy — Bootstrapping an AI company for 12 years, no fundingHe founded an AI company in 2014—when AI was a punchline—bootstrapped it with zero outside capital, and landed Fortune 50 clients.For founders and growth operators figuring out how to build (and sell) AI products in a market that shifts every few weeks.Alex Roy is the founder of SalesBox AI, a single-founder, bootstrapped company he started in 2014 after 20+ years in martech (MarketFirst, TrueInfluence). With no outside funding, he reached Fortune 50 clients through a partner-led, agency managed-service model—building the part of the product that generated both capital and data first. In this episode he walks through why he moved from lead-centric to a buying-group, opportunity-centric model, how SalesBox's agents work toward one unified revenue goal, how he proves ROI to enterprises burned by AI promises, and why he says product-market fit now lasts "maybe a month."What you’ll hear Why he scrapped lead-centric and account-based marketing for a revenue/opportunity model that scores and prioritizes buying groups How he bootstrapped: building the managed-service module first to capture both capital and data, then reaching Fortune 50 through a partner-led agency model Where founders go wrong—chasing the hype to "hop off" in a couple of years instead of building, and not yet knowing when to override the agent How to apply it: start with a pilot before a full rollout, and learn how the system makes decisions so you know when to step inChapters 00:00 — Cold open: don't build it for free 00:31 — Intro: the three AI traps 01:50 — What breaks when you scale revenue 02:29 — Betting on AI in 2014 03:39 — Building in 2014 vs. 2026: PMF as a moving target 05:10 — Why bootstrap, and what it cost 05:52 — Landing Fortune 50 clients with no VC logos 06:38 — What makes SalesBox AI different 08:00 — How the platform works 08:51 — Lead to account to buying group 09:45 — Hype vs. real: start with a pilot 10:27 — What AI can't do: knowing when to override 11:37 — Proving ROI to burned enterprises 12:56 — What founders get wrong about timing 14:39 — Advice: get someone to pay the first dollar 15:38 — Lightning round 16:22 — Live demo: RevOps, voice agents, LinkedIn 20:47 — Where to find Alex + the offer 21:28 — Closing takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestAlex Roy — Founder, SalesBox AIWebsiteLinkedInMentionedGet $1,000 in SalesBox AI creditsAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Most Tests Will Fail, That's Fine with Divya Ramaswamy 09.06.2026 21m

  Episode #223: Divya Ramaswamy — Running one growth function across travel and fintechHow a lean team runs acquisition, retention, and cross-sell across a travel marketplace and a fintech suite on a single brand.For growth leaders who own multiple products serving one customer across very different trust thresholds.Divya Ramaswamy runs growth across travel and fintech at Super.com—acquisition, activation, retention, and cross-sell—on a lean team of around 16 people. The products span hotels, flights, cash advance, credit, cash back, direct deposits, and a new pharmacy product, built for everyday Americans that premium brands typically walk past. She explains how the Super+ membership ties these disparate products together, why turning a $79 hotel booking into a fintech relationship is the hardest conversion they face, and what building financial trust actually requires beyond performance marketing. She also walks through the company's first major brand push—New York subway and out-of-home ads, plus becoming NASCAR's official savings partner—and why ruthless prioritization is the underrated lever that keeps the team focused.What you’ll hear Why Super+ membership is the flywheel that ties travel and fintech together, not just a perk layer on top (the “house and rooms” frame) How the team predicts cross-product adoption using behavioral signals—booking frequency, product bundles, in-app activity like games and surveys—alongside direct user research Why a direct travel-to-fintech handoff doesn’t happen, and how they build the journey through “value moments” instead (cashback on headphones, gas savings on the drive to a hotel) How they split channels by intent—Google for demand capture, Meta for storytelling—and use quarterly OKR resets to ruthlessly prioritize on a lean teamChapters 00:00 — Why trust in fintech can never be taken for granted (cold open) 00:29 — Intro: one growth function across travel and fintech 02:16 — What Super.com is, in one sentence 02:42 — The day-to-day operating model: acquisition to cross-sell 03:40 — Running one growth function across products that don’t behave alike 04:32 — The Super+ membership flywheel (house and rooms) 05:59 — The customer Super.com is built for 07:01 — Turning a $79 hotel booking into a fintech relationship 08:19 — Signals for predicting cross-product adoption 09:22 — Channel strategy built on customer context, not product category 10:20 — Google vs. Meta: capturing demand vs. storytelling 11:36 — What building financial trust actually requires 12:36 — The brand push: NYC subway and out-of-home 13:43 — Betting on quality creative and the NASCAR partnership 14:45 — One creative team, one brand voice across products 15:44 — The most underrated growth lever: prioritization 16:51 — Hard lessons on meaningful testing and embracing failure 17:57 — Advice for leading a complex product portfolio 18:33 — Lightning round 19:15 — Where to find Divya + closing takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestDivya Ramaswamy — leads growth (travel and fintech) at Super.comWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Getting a CFO on Board with Your Growth Plan with Simon Heyrick 02.06.2026 36m

  Episode #222: Simon Heyrick — How CFOs become real growth partnersWhat it actually takes to turn your CFO into a growth ally instead of a gatekeeper.For founders, CEOs, and CMOs trying to align finance with marketing and growth investments.Simon Heyrick is the CFO of Sun World International and was Jason's CFO and then CEO at Soothe. In this conversation, Simon walks through what changes the moment you step into the CEO seat ("overnight, there was a shift in the relationships"), what every CFO role across green Dot, Soothe, and Sun World has had in common, and how he evaluates growth pitches from CMOs. He shares the story of Soothe's brand refresh that didn't survive a single board member's objection, the TV spend he'd take back in hindsight, and why at Sun World — a 50-year-old PE-backed agriculture IP business — the finance model runs out 25 years and the data sets matter more than the AI strategy.What you'll hear The two CFO archetypes — growth partner vs. growth gatekeeper — and how risk tolerance separates them How to pitch growth investments to a CFO without getting dismissed (skip the impression counts, bring an intellectually honest ROI story) Why institutional investors rarely understand operations, and how to manage the "feet below the surface" dynamic What Simon learned moving from tech and marketplaces to a 50-year-old agriculture IP company where customers are farmers, not consumersChapters 00:00 — Stepping into the CEO seat: the loneliness shift 00:54 — Introducing Simon Heyrick 02:19 — The through line across a CFO career 05:37 — From CFO to interim CEO at Soothe 08:33 — What translates across every CFO role: managing institutional investors and the under-promise / over-deliver rule 11:32 — The growth bet Simon greenlit and the brand refresh that didn't land 14:16 — Growth partner CFO vs. growth gatekeeper CFO 17:21 — How CMOs should (and shouldn't) pitch growth investments 21:53 — Inside Sun World: a 50-year-old PE-backed agriculture IP business 24:31 — Climate risk, varietal IP, and a 25-year forecast model 25:56 — Data as the linchpin of the AI strategy 28:07 — Lessons across five C-level roles, and advice to a younger Simon 30:57 — Lightning round 32:33 — What a founder should do this week to turn their CFO into a partner 34:17 — Jason's three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestSimon Heyrick — CFO, Sun World InternationalWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Stop Selling. Start Method Acting. with John O'Donnell 26.05.2026 23m

  Episode #221: John O'Donnell — Selling AI Trust When Your Best Outcome Is InvisibleHow do you sell infrastructure that works best when nothing bad happens?For GTM leaders, founders, and sellers building pipeline in category-creating, mission-critical sales motions.John O'Donnell leads go-to-market at Alice, where he sells AI trust and safety to the top foundation model companies and the enterprises deploying AI in production. Before Alice, he built pipeline at Rapid7 in cybersecurity and led GTM in music distribution. In this episode, John breaks down his "method acting" approach to selling, why storytelling beats feature pitches in invisible-infrastructure categories, the milestone approach Alice uses to convert AI FOMO into committed deals, and why he sees the AI trust category today as the cybersecurity space in 2008-2010. He also shares the one discovery question most enterprise sellers never ask: "Can you live with your current situation for another year?"What you'll hear The "method acting" framework for entering a buyer's world before the first call Why Alice leans on storytelling and 200+ PhD dark web experts instead of feature pitches The milestone approach for converting AI FOMO buyers into committed deals What breaks when you scale founder-led sales too fast, and how to train a team to replicate itChapters 00:00 — Cold open and the three GTM traps in invisible-infrastructure sales 02:56 — Method acting: living inside the buyer's character 06:13 — Marketing something mission-critical but invisible 09:33 — The AI FOMO problem and the milestone approach to closing 12:19 — Scaling beyond founder-led sales without breaking culture 16:58 — Where the AI trust category is now, lightning round, and takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestJohn O'Donnell — AliceWebsiteLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  The Neobank of Insurance Playbook with Jacob Batist 19.05.2026 26m

  Episode #220: Jacob Batist — Launching the first new health insurance company in Canada in 70 yearsHow a European challenger broke into a market controlled by three incumbents — without a CEO on the ground, without brand awareness, and without growth-at-all-costs spend.For founders and growth leaders entering markets dominated by entrenched incumbents, where trust is the real constraint and speed alone won't win.Jacob Batist is Head of Growth at Alan in Canada — the first new health insurance company to launch in the country since 1957. Backed by a European parent valued at over 5 billion euros, Alan competes against three companies that hold roughly 80% of policies. Jacob breaks down why their initial blitz strategy failed, the warm-first pivot they made instead, why they target 20–100 employee companies, and how they say no to revenue they're not ready for. Concrete detail: Alan can process claims in as little as 15 minutes and onboard employees same-day.What you'll hear Why Alan positions itself as "the neo bank of insurance" and what that means operationally (sign-ups in minutes, claims in 15 minutes, one platform vs. multiple vendors) The warm-first pivot: what they tried first, why it failed, and the four credibility levers (events, organic media, partnerships, in-person moments) they replaced it with Why 20–100 employee companies are the sweet spot — and how Jacob says no to larger deals that would damage trust How to balance European credibility with the local Canadian story without leaning too hard on eitherChapters 00:00 — Cold open and host intro: Canada's silent oligopoly 04:28 — The "neo bank of insurance" positioning, in practice 09:42 — Why 20–100 employee companies are the sweet spot 11:56 — The warm-first pivot: why blitzing failed and what replaced it 18:59 — Saying no to revenue you're not ready for 21:27 — Lightning round and closing principleLinks & resourcesGuestJacob Batist — Head of Growth, Alan CanadaAlanJacob on LinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Meet Your On-Demand Co-Founder with Wade Lowe 12.05.2026 23m

  Episode #219: Wade Lowe — Why GTM in the AI era is a Rubik's CubeThe business takes on the personality of the founder. If there are problems, look at thyself.For founders running $5M–$50M companies trying to crack go-to-market when the playbook keeps changing.Wade Lowe is a 3x co-founder with two exits, focused on bootstrapping, AI, and mindset. He's led revenue at two Inc 500 companies (ranked 72nd and 23rd) and now embeds with founders as a co-founder on demand. Jason and Wade get into how to diagnose a stalled growth motion, why the operating model is the first thing to fix, and how to play where the smartest people aren't — equipment rental, construction, fuel. Wade is direct about the trade-offs he made to be present for his kids and the hard truth most founders resist hearing.What you'll hear Why acquisition has to come before retention and expansion when budgets are tight How Wade diagnoses the operating model first in every $5M–$50M company he embeds with The Google AdWords inbound engine behind two Inc 500 companies — and why being first to a keyword segment was the unlock How to evaluate talent quickly using soft-skill signals: response time, commitments kept, and whether someone proposes solutions or just critiquesChapters 00:00 — Cold open: the business goes as the founder goes 03:01 — GTM in the AI era: test, test, test 06:22 — Playing where the smartest people aren't 12:13 — What Wade diagnoses first in a $5M–$50M company 17:17 — The hard truth founders resist hearing 20:29 — One operating principle for cracking GTMLinks & resourcesGuestWade Lowe — 3x Co-Founder | 2x Exit | Bootstrapping | AI | MindsetLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  The Sephora of Chocolate Strategy with Pashmina De Shon 05.05.2026 20m

  Episode #218: Pashmina De Shon — Why Friction Is The Moat In Craft ChocolateHow a bootstrapped founder built a $3M+ craft chocolate marketplace by owning the operational pain everyone else outsources.For e-commerce operators, bootstrapped founders, and brands weighing the jump from DTC to physical retail.Pashmina De Shon is the founder of Bar and Cocoa, a curated marketplace for craft chocolate featuring 1,200 SKUs from 60 makers across 30 countries. After a decade running the business purely online, she recently opened a physical store in Greensboro, North Carolina. In this conversation, she breaks down why she runs her own warehouse instead of using a 3PL, how owning fulfillment keeps her waste rate at 2% versus industry norms of 10-12%, why the subscription model forced early clarity on curation, and what actually changes in the P&L when you move from DTC to brick and mortar.What you'll hear Why "even Amazon doesn't ship chocolate" became both the warning and the opportunity How owning fulfillment, FDA compliance, and temperature-sensitive shipping creates a moat competitors can't copy The plateau that hit at scale — and the boring, decisive fixes that got Bar and Cocoa past it How to think about retail economics as a marketing and retention channel, not just a sales channelChapters 00:00 — Cold open and Frank Growth intro 02:45 — The thesis: why the easy e-commerce business is the shortest-lived 07:12 — Owning fulfillment and a 2% waste rate vs. the 10-12% norm 11:53 — Moving from DTC to physical retail: what changes, what stays 14:10 — Educating the craft chocolate market while selling 17:04 — Lightning round and three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestPashmina De Shon — Founder, Bar and CocoaWebsiteInstagramLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  The Swiss Army Knife Operator with Jeff Bishop-Hill 28.04.2026 21m

  Episode #217: Jeff Bishop Hill — How Swiss Army knife operators scale marketplacesWhat breaks first when a marketplace expands into new markets.This episode is for founders and operators balancing growth, ops, compliance, and enterprise sales at the same time.Jeff Bishop Hill breaks down what it takes to scale marketplaces when one operator is covering multiple functions at once. Drawing on his work across Soothe, Mercato, and Roo, he explains how to sequence market launches, what metrics actually matter, how to win enterprise accounts from the bottom up, and when to build compliance versus prioritize growth. He also shares where operators get expansion wrong, why supply is usually the first thing to break, and how Roo limited launches to about five markets per quarter to avoid doubling investment on failed rollouts.What you’ll hear Why supply-demand balance and customer satisfaction matter more than a stack of dashboards How Jeff sequenced new market launches using household income heat maps, logistics, and provider density Why picking markets for “sex appeal” and expanding too fast leads to expensive mistakes How to win larger enterprise accounts by starting with local users, proving value, and building up to procurementChapters00:00 — Why glamorous market selection fails01:49 — Scaling marketplaces across multiple markets and countries04:01 — The only metrics that really matter (supply, demand, CSAT)05:14 — Fixing expansion strategy and sequencing markets09:02 — Winning enterprise accounts from the bottom up15:05 — Growth vs compliance and scaling tradeoffsLinks & resourcesGuestJeff Bishop Hill — Marketplace operator at RooLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois: https://wf.team/podcast Subscribe / Follow Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton/
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  Why Your Lead Gen Keeps Failing with Matt Putra 21.04.2026 22m

  Episode #216: Matt Putra — Cracking paid lead gen for a services businessHow to lower lead costs by teaching instead of pitching.For service founders stuck with expensive, inconsistent lead flow.Matt Putra of EightX explains how he finally cracked lead generation for his fractional CFO business after spending $150,000 over 18 months on cold email, outbound, hiring, and agency support that did not work. The breakthrough came when he stopped trying to force a funnel and started running simple paid ads built around genuinely useful tools for e-commerce operators. He shares how a CAC spreadsheet offer dropped his cost per lead from $11,000 to $20, what his five-minute ads actually look like, and how he thinks about payback periods, inventory risk, and marketing spend across the brands he advises. The conversation also covers the operating cadence he uses to align demand, supply, and finance and why inventory strategy is often the biggest growth leak in e-commerce.What you’ll hear Why lead gen for services often fails when the offer is not clear enough How Matt structures five-minute paid ads around spreadsheets, tools, and AI workflows Why cold email, outbound, and agency-led efforts underperformed for his business How to use CAC, LTV, payback periods, and inventory analysis to make better growth decisionsChapters 00:00 — The ad that dropped CPL from $11,000 to $20 02:41 — The failed experiments: cold email, outbound, hiring, and agencies 05:56 — What the ads look like and why they convert 08:50 — The biggest financial mistake e-commerce founders make 12:23 — Diagnosing growth problems and missed ROI 14:15 — When to spend more on marketing and when to pull backLinks & resourcesGuestMatt Putra — EightXWebsiteLinkedIn
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  Make Merch People Actually Wear with Jay Sapovits 14.04.2026 21m

  Episode #215: Jay Sapovits — Turning branded merch into a strategic growth toolHow to stop wasting money on swag that gets ignored.For founders and operators buying merch without a plan for impact.Jay Sapovits of Ink’d Stores explains how branded merchandise becomes useful when it starts with audience, objective, and distribution instead of a last-minute product order. He shares lessons from a failed fitness brand, a pivot into on-demand apparel, and the operating choices that helped build a $5M+ branded merchandise business. The conversation covers trade show strategy, on-demand merch economics, and why a $3 difference in shirt quality can determine whether something gets worn or turned into a rag. Jay also breaks down why distribution is the step most teams forget, even when the product itself is right.What you’ll hear How to define strategic merch based on purpose, audience, and event How on-demand merch stores reduce inventory risk and preserve cash flow Why most swag fails: low-quality product choices, no planning, and weak distribution How to use merch to drive trade show engagement and other measurable outcomesChaptersTimestamps 00:00 — Why cheap swag gets wasted 02:27 — What strategic merch actually means 06:15 — The pivot from failed fitness brand to Inked Stores 09:02 — Why quality, fit, and content determine whether merch gets used 10:41 — How on-demand merch changes the unit economics 18:11 — Why budget and distribution matter as much as the productLinks & resourcesGuestJay Sapovits — Ink’d StoresEmail JayLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason
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  Why Billionaires Pay Him a Retainer with Leigh Rowan 07.04.2026 25m

  Episode #214: Leigh Rowan — Building a premium service business without adsHow to grow a premium service business through trust, referrals, and client retention.For founders and operators building high-touch services and trying to scale without paid acquisition.Leigh Rowan, founder and CEO of Savanti Travel, joins Jason Shafton to break down how he built a luxury travel management company serving ultra high net worth individuals, family offices, VC firms, and Hollywood entertainers without ever advertising. He explains how Savanti evolved from helping entrepreneurs unlock value from points and miles into a full-service travel business built around 24-7 support, personalization, and relationships. The conversation covers how his team uses CRM workflows, SOPs, and regular standups to deliver consistent service across five continents, how they ask for referrals after delivering concrete wins, and why they have fired clients worth as much as 25% of revenue to protect the team and the business. Leigh also shares that Savanti has saved clients more than $10 million by using points and miles more strategically.What you’ll hear Why Savanti chose word of mouth over paid advertising and how that shaped client selection How the team uses monday.com, SOPs, standups, and shared context to deliver high-touch service at scale Why most people leave points and miles value unused and how Savanti turns those assets into real savings and better experiences How Leigh thinks about referrals, client feedback, hiring for judgment, and protecting culture even when revenue is at stakeChaptersTimestamps from transcript 00:00 — What luxury travel management actually means 03:22 — From points and miles to full-service travel support 07:26 — The system behind saving clients money with loyalty assets 11:42 — Why Savanti never advertised and how word of mouth compounds 17:37 — Handling travel crises, hiring for judgment, and firing bad-fit clients 21:05 — Client feedback, luxury as personalization, and how to grow by word of mouthLinks & resourcesGuestLeigh Rowan — Founder & CEO, Savanti TravelWebsiteAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason