A $2M pipeline that's actually $800K. It happens when every stage means something different to every rep. That's not a sales problem. That's a definitions problem.
'I know some vendors are screwing me. I just don't know which ones.' I hear this at least once a week. The answer is always in the data. But nobody has connected the data yet.
Five payment processors running simultaneously. Three overlapping CRMs. Two email platforms. One founder asking 'why does everything feel so expensive?' That was a real audit.
Your ad manager says ROAS is 4x. Your accountant says you lost money last quarter. Both are telling the truth. They're just measuring different things.
95% CPL reduction. $140 to $7. Not by changing the ads. By fixing the landing page and the form. The ads were fine. Everything after the click was broken.
Five vendors. Five dashboards. Five different stories about where your money went. And somehow all five of them are "performing well." That math doesn't work.
Your CRM says $2M in pipeline. Your close rate says $800K. That gap isn't optimism. It's a definitions problem. Every rep has a different standard for "qualified."
A good diagnostic isn't "here are 47 things to fix." It's "here are 3 things to fix, in this order, worth this much money each." Prioritization is the whole game.
The fix for a marketing problem is better marketing. The fix for a data problem is reconciliation. Pull every source into one view. Find the gaps. Fix them. Then and only then does marketing actually work.
Marketing problem: you can SEE what's working but need more of it. Data problem: you can't tell what's working at all. Different revenue numbers from different tools. No clear attribution. Growth decisions made on vibes.