Field Notes
Sharper Stories.
Better Pipelines.
Practical writing on B2B messaging, positioning, AI search visibility, and why most homepages don't convert. Written from inside the work, not the conference circuit.
Greg Rosner
Founder of PitchKitchen · Author of StoryCraft for Disruptors
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Anchor · Magnetic Messaging Framework
How do I know if my B2B messaging is broken, not just underperforming?
Underperforming B2B messaging needs tuning. Broken B2B messaging needs rebuilding. The difference between them decides whether the next $50,000 you spend lifts pipeline or just amplifies the silence. Three tests, 30 minutes, no agency, tell you which one you're actually looking at.
9 min read
Anchor · Magnetic Messaging Framework
What changes about B2B positioning when AI is doing the buyer research?
The buyer changed and so did the first-pass evaluator. ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity now summarize, rank, and filter B2B vendors before the buyer ever clicks a homepage. Three diagnostic prompts tell you in 20 minutes whether AI buyer research has already filtered you out.
10 min read
Anchor · Magnetic Messaging Framework
What does it mean when my marketing spend is going up and my pipeline is going down?
When spend climbs and pipeline falls, the problem is almost never the tactics. It's bottlenecked marketing ... stuck behind a positioning problem upstream. Five diagnostic questions you can run this week, and the four moves that fix it, in order.
10 min read
Anchor · AEO Strategy
Why doesn't AI cite my B2B company when buyers ask for recommendations?
AI engines don't cite B2B companies that sound like every other B2B company. If you're missing from ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity answers, the model didn't fail to find you. It found you and decided your content didn't earn the citation slot. Five tests, the Princeton GEO numbers behind the pattern, and the order in which to fix it.
11 min read
Anchor · Sales-Marketing Alignment
Is my B2B sales cycle slow because of sales execution or because of my message?
Most B2B founders blame sales execution when cycles stretch from 80 days to 120. The cause usually sits one layer up. If your message isn't doing the work, your reps have to do it inside every call, and the deal slows under the weight of the explaining. Five tests to separate message-caused friction from execution-caused friction, plus the order to fix it in.
11 min read
All Insights
How Much Does a Marketing Engineering Agency Cost?
Most marketing engineering agencies charge $3,000-$15,000 a month or $10,000-$45,000 for a fixed build. Here's what each dollar buys, published 2026 price examples, a year-one budget formula, and the hidden costs to ask about.
How to Choose a Marketing Engineering Company
Name the job first, then make every finalist build one small piece of the system live, in your accounts. Here are the ten areas to evaluate, a weighted scorecard, the contract terms that protect you, and where PitchKitchen fits.
What is answer engine optimization (AEO) for a B2B company?
AEO means publishing substantive answers to the questions your customers actually ask, so AI engines have something useful to cite. PitchKitchen's Greg Rosner explains what it is, what it isn't, and how to measure it.
You built something new. Your website still describes the old business. Here's how to close the gap.
PitchKitchen's Greg Rosner on the most expensive gap in B2B: real progress inside the company that buyers and AI assistants can't see, and the two jobs that close it.
Does switching your CMS fix stale website content? Not usually.
WordPress carries the same share of stale B2B sites as fresh ones. PitchKitchen's Greg Rosner on why a new platform rarely fixes a frozen story, and what does.
AI Marketing Agency vs. Marketing Engineering Agency: What's the Difference?
An AI marketing agency sells output AI helps produce. A marketing engineering agency builds the system that does the work, and you keep it. Here are the five kinds of firm behind the AI label, an eight-question depth test, and which one fits your situation.
Marketing Engineering vs. Growth Marketing vs. RevOps: What's the Difference?
Growth tests, RevOps runs, marketing engineering builds. Here's how the three differ on responsibilities, deliverables, skills, technology, KPIs, the typical hire and the typical agency, plus a decision table for which one a $5M-$75M B2B company needs first.
What is a verbal identity? (And why your visual identity can't do its job)
A verbal identity is the agreed, written story of who a company is for, what it stands for and why it matters. PitchKitchen's Greg Rosner explains how it differs from visual identity and how to build one.
What did the stale website scan actually measure? (And what it didn't)
PitchKitchen scanned 32,574 B2B homepages. Here is exactly what the copyright-year finding measures, what it doesn't, and what a CEO should do with it.
April Dunford vs. other positioning consultants, and how to pick by the job
April Dunford is the benchmark for B2B positioning, and she earned it. Here's a fair comparison of her workshop against Fletch PMM, Play Bigger, Punchy, StoryBrand and PitchKitchen, by the job each one is best hired for, using their own published prices.
How do I get product and marketing aligned on positioning?
Product and marketing align when both build against one written problem statement: who the buyer is, their problem, and what changes when you win. Here's the five-step sequence, and why only 21 of 302 scored homepages finished the buyer's half of the story.
How do I position a new product?
Position a new product by naming the old way it replaces, the buyer who feels that pain most, and how it strengthens the story your company already tells. Here's the six-step method, and why 75 of 176 clear-product homepages never say what standing still costs.
Who should own positioning in a B2B company?
The CEO should own positioning. Product, sales and marketing each own an input, and one written record owns the result. Here's who owns what, and why 61 of 302 scored homepages describe the product perfectly but never lead with a problem.
How do I use win/loss data to improve our positioning?
Read win/loss data one positioning decision at a time: lost deals show your real alternative, fast wins show your best-fit customer, buyer words show your value. Here's the method, plus why 278 of 302 scored homepages never name the alternative.
What should our company be known for?
Your company should be known for one problem, one buyer and one belief, said in seven words anyone can repeat. Here's how to find it, test it, and why only 12 of 302 scored homepages get there.
How do I turn positioning into messaging?
Positioning is the decision. Messaging is that decision said in your buyer's words, format by format. Here's the translation, piece by piece, and the six-step process to close the gap.
Why does our sales team struggle to explain our value?
Your reps can describe the product. What they can't describe is the buyer's before: what the problem costs today and what changes after you. Here's how to write it down so they can say it.
How do we answer "why should we choose you over competitors?"
Stop starting with features. A five-part answer that moves the comparison onto the buyer's problem, names the old way, proves one difference and says who you're wrong for.
How do we figure out what makes our company different?
Your difference is already hiding in deal stories and your best customers' words. A five-step way to dig it out, the questions that work, and why AI engines need it in your own language.
How do we know if we have a positioning problem?
You have a positioning problem when buyers can't say who you're for, what you replace, or why they'd pick you. Seven symptoms, a 30-minute leadership test, and how to tell positioning from messaging.
Who should we hire for B2B product positioning?
Positioning help covers three different jobs: making the decision, documenting it, and carrying it. A straight hire-X-if-Y answer, an honest credit to April Dunford, and why the product marketer comes second.
How do we position an AI product?
Lead with the problem you end and the buyer you built it for, then describe the AI as a mechanism a buyer can check. Five steps, the AI-in-the-category question, and data from 105 AI-category homepages.
How do we create a differentiated sales pitch?
A differentiated sales pitch names the buyer's old way, what it costs, and a point of view a competitor wouldn't co-sign, before the product shows up. Five steps, the competitor-rep test, and data from 302 scored homepages.
What category should our B2B product be in?
Your B2B product belongs in the category your buyer already types into ChatGPT and Google, with the problem you solve named inside it. Four tests to pick it, with data from 302 scored homepages.
How do we turn product features into customer value?
You turn features into customer value by running the chain backward: start with the problem the buyer already feels, in their words, then show the feature that ends it. Here's the five-question method, with data from 302 scored homepages.
How do we position a product in a crowded market?
You position a product in a crowded market by changing what buyers compare you on: pick the slice you win, name the old way, and stand against it. Here's the method, with Dunford's three styles credited and data from 302 scored homepages.
Why does our messaging sound like everyone else's?
Your messaging sounds like everyone else's because it was built from the same inputs: the product's features, the category's vocabulary and a committee's edits. Here's what that looks like in 302 scored homepages, and how to fix the inputs before the copy.
How do we identify our best-fit customers?
Your best-fit customers are already on your customer list. Here's how to sort them by behavior, what to ask the champions, and how to write a profile your team and your AI tools can both use.
How do we know if our company is ready for AI marketing agents?
You're ready for AI marketing agents when your company has a brain: documented context every agent reads first. Here's the five-check test a CEO can run in an hour.
How do we create a compelling B2B value proposition?
A B2B value proposition compels when the buyer recognizes their own problem in it, before they ever see your product. Here's the four-line method, where the raw material comes from, and three tests to run this week.
How do we create differentiated B2B messaging?
Differentiated B2B messaging starts with what you're different from, not with better adjectives. Here's how to find the difference, write it down once, and keep AI from averaging it away.
Why do our AI marketing agents sound like everyone else?
AI marketing agents write generic work because they start every job with nothing of yours to read. Marketing engineering, the role Greg Isenberg is putting a name on, starts with the brain. In B2B, where you sell to a few hundred accounts, the brain matters even more. Here's what goes in it and which agents to run first.
The 20 Best Marketing Engineering Companies in 2026
There's no single best marketing engineering company. We researched 20 GTM engineering, RevOps, AI search and messaging-first firms in October 2026 and mapped each one to the buyer situation it fits, with pricing signals and honest watch-outs.
The Best Marketing Engineering Agencies for AI Search and GEO
There's no single best AI search firm, and none can guarantee ChatGPT will recommend you. We researched 11 firms that genuinely do GEO and AEO work, what each costs where it's published, who each is best for, and where PitchKitchen honestly fits.
What Does a Marketing Engineering Agency Actually Do?
A marketing engineering agency builds the machinery behind your marketing: data, CRM, routing, AI agents, content systems and AI search tracking. Here's every function it might touch, what actually gets built, which parts are strategy versus implementation, and who usually owns each one.
Shared space or MCP: how do we keep every AI on our story?
Your reps draft in ChatGPT, marketing writes in Claude, and every tool tells its own version of your story. There are two ways to give them one source of truth. Here's when a shared space is enough, and when it's time for Brand Twin over MCP.
Are buyers using AI to fact-check our sales claims?
Sixty-two percent of B2B buyers now use AI to check vendor claims against public sources, and 56% have dropped a vendor after it found a gap. The problem usually isn't lying. It's five assets telling five slightly different stories. Three tests show you what your buyer's AI sees.
How do we know if ChatGPT actually sent us a customer?
AI engines strip the referrer, so your AI-sourced buyer shows up as direct traffic weeks later. Here's the three-signal join that proves whether AI search sent you a customer, and what one of our own 24-day bookings showed.
There is no best B2B messaging company until you name the job you're hiring for
A CEO sent me the list ChatGPT gave him for 'best B2B messaging company.' Every list like it, ours included, is written by a firm that sells messaging. Here's how to read them, and the three jobs hiding under that one search.
Does our company need a new name, or just a clearer story?
Pure Storage renamed itself Everpure in 2026. Almost no B2B company should copy that. Here's the one condition that makes a rename the right call, what it costs now that AI engines file your reputation under your old name, and the cheaper decision most founders actually need.
Is calling our product AI-powered still helping us, or is the word costing us trust?
Every competitor can generate the same AI sentence for free, and as of August LinkedIn is demoting polish that lacks substance. Here’s the deletion test that tells you whether your AI claim is load-bearing, and what to do with the word when it isn’t.
How do we run April Dunford's first positioning step ourselves?
Competitive alternatives are what your buyer would do if you vanished tomorrow, and the list is usually a spreadsheet, an analyst, or nothing at all. Here's how to build it yourself in a week, with your own deal data.
What can't a go-to-market consultant fix for us?
A GTM consultant can extract, document, and pressure test your position. They can't make the decision, supply the conviction, force adoption, or fix a product gap. Here's the line, with data from 302 scored homepages.
We scored 10 real B2B positioning statements. One passed.
We graded 302 real healthtech homepages on the four parts of a positioning statement. Exactly one scored full marks. Here are ten of those cases with their real language, their real scores, and the one part nearly everybody drops.
One customer is half our revenue. Do we chase another like them, or sell to everyone else?
One customer at 40 or 50 percent of revenue is tracked as a financial risk and never as a messaging risk. Meanwhile the homepage, the case studies and the roadmap all describe that account's problem, so every other buyer reads material written for somebody else. Three tests to find out, and what to do about it.
Nobody copies the true part of your message
Last Tuesday a construction SaaS CEO sent me two homepages and asked which one was his. A competitor had lifted his headline, his three value props in order, even his customer outcome sentence. Then I asked him to point at one thing in it only his company could say, and he couldn't find it. That's the copyable claim, and almost every B2B homepage is built out of them. Here's the villain, three tests you can run in twenty minutes, and what to fix first.
Does StoryBrand work for B2B? Where it fits, where it breaks, and what a complex sale needs instead
StoryBrand works exactly as far as it promises: a clear page for one buyer who already believes in the problem. Roofers and HVAC companies prove it. A company selling AI-enabled RCM to a hospital committee fails all four fit conditions. Where it breaks, what the critics say, and what a complex sale needs instead.
What should actually be in our go-to-market plan?
Six decisions, each with one owner and one date. That's the whole plan. Here's what belongs in each row, what to cut, and the ten-minute test that tells you whether yours exists on paper or only in somebody's head.
Want this thinking built into your story?
The 90-Day Magnetic Messaging Sprint rebuilds it for you. Fixed price.
Strategy plus execution. Your story, homepage, sales deck, and an AI Brand Twin trained on your narrative ... rebuilt in 90 days. You own everything at the end.