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Hello and welcome to the 160th edition of Fresh Salmon.

If you're new here, welcome aboard! And if you’d like to catch up on past issues, click here.

Let me rant for a second.

The era of the faceless brand is over. Nobody cares about your logo.

People care about you. What you stand for. Your story. Why you do what you do.

Yet, I see early-stage companies obsessing over their branding - tweaking logos, adjusting colors - when they haven’t even acquired 10 customers.

Your logo is not your brand.

Your brand is built over time. It’s your strategic narrative. Your POV. The product you’re creating. The messaging that actually lands with your audience.

Want to go to market successfully? Stop fixating on aesthetics.
Focus on:
✔️ Your story.
✔️ Your positioning.
✔️ Your distribution.

Because without distribution, even the best products go nowhere.

That’s the rant. Now go build something real.

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The Rented vs. Owned Audience: How B2B Companies Can Play the Long Game

One of the biggest challenges in marketing today - especially in B2B - is getting attention.

But not just any attention. The kind that actually leads to long-term growth.

This is where businesses run into a fundamental dilemma: rented vs. owned audiences.

Social media platforms (LinkedIn, Twitter, TikTok, etc.) are rented audiences. You don’t own the audience. You don’t control the algorithm.

You’re competing with a million other voices, and people aren’t there exclusively for you - they’re there for the platform. Your content is just one of many things they might see.

For a sustainable marketing strategy, you have to do more than just capture attention on these rented platforms.

You need a mechanism to convert that attention into something you own.

The Goal: Move People From Rented to Owned Platforms

The most valuable owned platform?

Your email list.

Social algorithms change. Email doesn’t.

Other strong owned channels include podcasts - where people subscribe to you, not the platform. If someone follows your podcast, they aren’t going to Apple Podcasts for Apple; they’re going for you. The connection is direct. That’s powerful. More intimate.

So, how do you turn rented attention into owned audiences?

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Two Common Strategies - And Why One Falls Short

Most businesses fall into one of these two approaches:

1. Founder-Led Growth (Creator Strategy)
   

   Some founders act like creators, posting regularly on LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube to build personal audiences and funnel them into email lists and podcasts.

   Does this work? Sure. But it’s not a sustainable strategy for most B2B companies.

   • The founder becomes the brand, which can create long-term dependency issues.

   • If they leave or shift focus, the audience-building effort loses momentum.

   • It’s hard to scale beyond one person.

   This approach works better for solo entrepreneurs or thought leaders. But for a company? You need something bigger.

2. Building a Media-Like Presence (The Sustainable Strategy)
   

   A stronger, more scalable way to build an owned audience is by creating a media network - one that positions your company as the go-to resource for a category, movement, or key industry topic.

   This works because:

   • It attracts an audience beyond just your brand.

   • It rallies people around an ecosystem, rather than one person.

   • It establishes credibility and authority in a way that individual social content can’t.

3. Instead of relying on a founder-led audience, you become the industry publication - a trusted source where the entire ecosystem gathers.

The Takeaway

If your marketing strategy relies only on rented platforms, you’re playing a dangerous game.

The smarter, long-term move is to use social platforms to grab attention - but then have a clear mechanism for moving that audience to an email list, a podcast, or a content platform that you control.

In B2B, the future belongs to those who think like media companies - not just brands.

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Eat Your Own Dog Food

Eat Your Own Dog Food - The biggest marketing lesson!

Yup, you heard me right.

The marketing world is full of fluff. Everyone’s got a pitch:
“We can build your audience.” “We’ll get you leads.” “We’ll 10x your following.”

But here’s my question: Have they done it for themselves?

Before you hire anyone:

SEO services? – Check their own search rankings. Do they rank for anything relevant?

Running ads? – Are they running ads to acquire their own clients?

Podcast services? – Do they have their own podcast? Have they grown it?

This applies to marketers, too. I hear the excuse all the time: "I can’t grow my audience because I’m busy doing the real work.”

You know what? That’s BS.

Marketing changes too fast. If you’re not in the game, testing, experimenting, and building in public - you’re falling behind. Fast.

So here’s my takeaway:

👉 As a buyer: Don’t trust anyone selling you something they don’t use themselves.

👉 As a marketer: Don’t preach what you can’t practice.

Because if they can’t do it for their own business, why should you believe they’ll do it for yours?

Interesting Thing That I Saw This Week

Agreed.

Tweet That I Posted This Week

That’s it for this week! If you found this valuable, share it with a friend.

See you next time!

Do what is good for your soul ❤️

All the best,

Vivek

PS. Whenever you are ready, here are 3 ways in which I can help you and your business:

#1: B2B Marketing Consulting and Go-To-Market Advisory for your business.

#2: 1-on-1 Personal Coaching and Mentoring on anything related to Marketing and Go-To-Market Strategies for you.

#3: Promoting you or your brand via this newsletter.

For any of these things just shoot me a reply, and we will arrange a time to chat.