You didn't lose that deal in the proposal. You lost it six months earlier, before the prospect ever found your name. In this episode, I break down why the buyer's journey for tech business owners has shifted, why AI is accelerating it, and why most owners are still showing up only at the last two touch points and wondering why win rates feel random. I walk through the channel analyst data from Jay McBain on the 28 touch points in a modern B2B buying journey, and I share the three fixes that decide whether your business compounds or flat lines over the next five years. If you are tired of being invisible in the early part of your client's buying journey, this one is for you.

Resources and Links

• Jay McBain on The Paul Higgins Podcast: Episode 435
• Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
• Book a Decision Session here
• Previous episode: 679 - The LinkedIn Secret Filling Tech Business Owners' Calendars with Donald Kelly
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Why you should listen

1. Donald runs one of the top B2B sales podcasts in the world, heard in over 155 countries, and breaks down the exact LinkedIn-first sequence he uses to turn cold prospects into booked calls without paid ads or cold spam.
2. Learn the three-step system Donald uses to move a prospect from stranger to conversation: engage on their content, send a personalised connection request tied to something specific about them, then bridge to a short email that speaks to real pain, not surface pain.
3. Get Donald's follow-up sequence that replaces the lazy "bumping this up" email with relevance-based touches your prospect actually wants to reply to, plus the exact tools (Hunter.io, Sales Navigator, Apollo) he uses to find verified business emails.

Tired of sending LinkedIn messages into a black hole and wondering why your outbound never converts? In this episode, I talk with Donald C. Kelly, founder of The Sales Evangelists and one of the most recognised B2B sales voices in the world. Most tech business owners default to pitching before earning attention, and it is the reason their pipeline stays empty. Donald walks through the exact sequence he uses to break through the noise, earn engagement, and turn it into a real conversation, without faking friendship or copying the spray-and-pray playbook every SDR is running. If you sell on LinkedIn and the results are not matching the effort, this one shows you where the gap is.

About Donald Kelly

Donald C. Kelly is the founder of The Sales Evangelist and host of one of the longest-running B2B sales podcasts in the world, with nearly 2,000 episodes heard across 155+ countries. A LinkedIn Top Voice in Sales and three-time Salesforce Top Influencer, he helps SMB and mid-market sales teams build LinkedIn-led outbound systems that turn cold prospects into booked calls. He is the author of Sell It Like a Mango and based in West Palm Beach, Florida.

Resources and Links

• thesalesevangelist.com
• Donald's LinkedIn profile
• Donald's free prospecting tool
• Hunter.io
• Apollo.io
• SNOV.io
• ZoomInfo
• Gemini Nano Banana
• Base44
• Previous episode: 678 - 81% of Partners Will Grow Below the Industry Rate
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Watched your vendor's share price lately, or noticed the quiet changes to partner fees, commissions, and cloud service minimums? In this episode, I break down why Wall Street is pricing in the collapse of the per-seat model, and why platforms restructure partner economics long before they touch executive pay. I share the pattern I've seen across 670 tech business owners, including what happened to my own consulting business when the platform pivoted overnight while I was on dialysis three times a week. The business owners coming through this stronger already made three structural decisions, the ones still waiting for the platform to stabilize are still waiting. If 80% of your pipeline still runs through someone else's hands, this one is for you.

Resources and Links

• Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
• Book a Decision Session here
• Previous episode: 677 - Hard work isn't your problem
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Most tech business owners hitting mid-six figures aren't stuck because they're not working hard enough. They're stuck because they're running a business built on assumptions nobody has ever tested. In this episode, I walk through the exact audit I did on my own business when activity was high and revenue wasn't moving. I share what the data revealed: a newsletter that warmed but never converted, a target market too early-stage to invest, and growth projections built on events and partnerships that historically produced near-zero direct clients. Once I faced those numbers, I made one decision: cut the noise and go back to the one engine that actually built my business. If you're adding more LinkedIn posts, more outreach sequences, and more channels but the gap between where you are and where you need to be isn't closing, this episode is for you.

Resources and Links

• Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
• Book a Decision Session here
• Previous episode: 676 - Why Your Voice Is the Only AI Tool That Matters With Molly Mahoney
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Why you should listen

1. Molly launched the world's first AI-focused content membership in 2021, two years before ChatGPT, and has generated content that reached over 39 million views. She brings hard-won perspective on what separates human-first AI strategy from AI zombie content that erodes trust.
2. Learn the SAAVE framework: a five-part method for identifying what makes you a uniquely weird human, so your AI agents produce content that actually sounds like you and not like every other consultant using the same tools.
3. Get the APR Method: a repeatable three-step system for announcing, producing, and repurposing every video you create, so one piece of content generates an entire week of output without starting from scratch.

Your content machine is broken, and the tools aren't the problem. If everything you publish sounds like it could have come from anyone in your industry, you haven't got a content problem. You've got a voice problem. In this episode, I talk with Molly Mahoney from The Prepared Performer, a digital marketing strategist and keynote speaker who has been building AI-powered content systems since 2021. Molly shares how she helps established business owners identify the 20 things that make them a uniquely weird human before touching a single AI tool, because without that foundation, you're just feeding the robot army. If you've been hiding behind the technical work while the algorithm rewards personality, this conversation will change how you think about content.

About Molly Mahoney

Molly Mahoney is a digital marketing strategist, keynote speaker, and former NYC performer who helps coaches, consultants, and agency owners build AI-powered content that actually sounds human. Known as The Prepared Performer, she launched the world's first AI-focused content membership in 2021, two years before ChatGPT, has generated over 39 million views, and been featured in Forbes and Inc.

Resources and Links

• Thepreparedperformer.com
• Molly's LinkedIn profile
• Free Custom GPT Source Prompt Generator
• Spotlight Engine
• Sora
• Perplexity Computer
• GoHighLevel
• RSS App
• Previous episode: 675 - SaaS isn't dying. Your positioning might be.
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Platform agnosticism made sense when software budgets were small. That era is ending. In this episode, I break down why the "death of SaaS" narrative is the wrong read, and why the tech business owners who believe it are about to miss the biggest software wave in a decade. I walk through what Monday.com's CEO said on the 20VC podcast about the budget equation flipping from headcount to platforms, and what that means for consultants who haven't yet committed to a single platform. If you're still keeping your options open because it feels safer, this episode will challenge that directly.

Resources and Links

• Monday.com CEO Eran Zinman on 20VC with Harry Stebbings
• Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
• Book a Decision Session here
• Previous episode: 674 - AI Can't Give You a Blood Test
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Using AI to diagnose your own business is like Googling your blood test results and treating yourself. In this episode, I share what seven years of post-transplant care taught me about pattern recognition, and why the same principle applies to the WHO and WHAT decisions most tech business owners are avoiding. I walk through the difference between a tool that helps you execute and someone who has seen your situation hundreds of times and knows exactly where the problem is. If AI is giving you polished output but no real direction, this one is worth your time.

Resources and Links

• Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
• Book a Decision Session here
• Previous episode: 673 - The 40-Minute Meeting That Makes or Breaks Your First Hire
• Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
• Join our newsletter
• Suggested resources

Most tech consultants building their first team make the same mistake. It's not the hire. It's what happens on day one. In this episode, I walk through the exact 10-item induction call checklist I use with every new hire, whether they're based in the Philippines, Australia, or North America. I cover the questions that flip the dynamic from day one, the ones most consultants skip entirely, and why the first 40 minutes determines whether your team can eventually operate without you. If you're building your first team and want to stop being the bottleneck, this is where it starts.

Resources and Links

1. Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
2. Previous episode: 672 - Why Discipline Won't Fix Your Consulting Business
3. Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
4. Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
5. Join our newsletter
6. Suggested resources

Working 60-hour weeks and still watching your revenue flatline? In this episode, I break down the two strategic decisions most tech consultants have never made: WHO to target and WHAT business model to run. I share how one consultant went from competing on commodity rates with payroll anxiety every month to building a specialist practice, hiring a team, and clearing over $30K a month without changing his technical skills. If you're great at delivery but still trapped in the project grind, this episode is for you.

Resources and Links

1. Need help with your WHO and WHAT decisions? Apply for a FREE Multiplier Call
2. Previous episode: 671 - Why Your Clients Are Not Using the AI Tools You Recommended with Angie Carel
3. Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
4. Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
5. Join our newsletter
6. Suggested resources

Why you should listen

1. Angie scaled from an 18-year marketing agency to leading AI adoption for 600-person corporations, giving her a rare ground-level view of exactly where companies get stuck and what actually moves people from fear to fluency.
2. Learn the "people-first" sequencing Angie now uses before any AI tool deployment, including how she frames corporate AI training as "recess" to sidestep resistance and drive real adoption.
3. Get Angie's workflow automation logic: how she mapped every bottleneck in her business using Miro, then eliminated them with Make, enabling her to run 15 trainings in a single week instead of her previous max of three.

If your clients keep investing in AI tools and their teams still aren't using them three months later, the problem isn't the technology. In this episode, I talk with Angie Carel, an AI enablement consultant who spent 18 years running a marketing agency before pivoting full-time into corporate AI adoption in 2022. Angie works with large corporations across finance, healthcare, and higher education, and her view is consistent: jumping straight to use cases before building AI literacy almost always backfires. We dig into the people-first sequencing she now uses to close the gap between deployment and actual adoption, and why framing AI training as "corporate recess" gets results that formal rollouts never do. If you're a consultant whose clients are sitting on AI investment with nothing to show for it, this conversation will reframe how you solve that problem.

About Angie Carel

Angie Carel is a Generative AI Consultant named one of the Top 50 Women to Watch in AI and featured in the IEDC 2025 Yearbook as a leading entrepreneur. After running a 10-person marketing agency for 20 years, she went all-in on AI consulting — and in her first year solo, she's on track to outpace her old agency's revenue. Angie founded AI in FW, Indiana's largest AI community with 700+ members, and Co-Crafted, an AI consultancy collective. She helps organizations adopt AI with a human-first approach and coaches emerging AI consultants on building sustainable practices.

Resources and Links

1. Angiecarel.com
2. Angie's LinkedIn profile
3. Lovable
4. Midjourney
5. Runway
6. Make
7. N8N
8. Relay
9. Google Gemini Deep Research
10. Claude
11. Claude Code
12. The AI Show with Paul Roetzer and Mike Kaput
13. Google DeepMind podcast
14. Previous episode: 670 - Stop Chasing Small Clients
15. Check out more episodes of the Paul Higgins Podcast
16. Subscribe to our YouTube channel: @PaulHigginsMentoring
17. Join our newsletter
18. Suggested resources