Is your capital raise struggling because of the marketing, the offer, or the positioning?

In this episode of Behind the Raise, Martin is joined by VirtualAd’s Brendan Manley to break down one of the biggest questions issuers face when conversions slow down: is the marketing not working, or is the offer itself not converting?

They discuss how to diagnose performance across the funnel, from ad engagement and landing page conversion to booked meetings, investor follow-up, and bottom-of-funnel sales conversations. Brendan shares how issuers can use data to understand where investor interest is dropping off, why the first few weeks of a raise are so important, and how marketing benchmarks can help separate creative issues from deeper offer or positioning problems.

From minimum investment strategy and pricing psychology to urgency, incentives, trust, testing, and the importance of validating positioning before scaling, this episode gives founders a practical framework for understanding what is really holding a raise back — and what can actually be fixed through marketing.